Each day in London has its own
charm. One may never know what they will stumble upon. However, often times the only
way one finds the extraordinary is by getting hopelessly lost in an unfamiliar
borough of the city. I was lucky enough to do just that this past
Tuesday.
After
finishing off another two hour session of statistics with Dr. Mee, I decided
that today, instead of immediately starting my homework, I was going to go
explore London and see some marvelous ancient place I had not yet seen. After
consulting my nifty list of attractions to see, I settled in on seeing the Inns
of Court, specifically Lincoln’s Inn. From my quick, pre-trip research, I
noticed several words that stuck with me and gave me what I believed to be an
accurate representation of the purpose of Lincoln’s Inn. The words that stuck
with me: bar, barristers (which looked a lot like baristas), and bar again. Naturally,
I assumed I was about to walk into the fanciest bartending school in the world.
Solid.
10
minutes later, I arrived. Ok. An extremely nice bartending school in the most
picturesque park-like environment.
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| Random Park-like setting. Very nice. Peaceful. |
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| Lincoln's Inn. |
Personally, I didn’t understand how a
bartending school could be good enough to deserve such a setting, but I am just
a “silly” American. While exploring the grounds, I came across the Lincoln’s
Inn Chapel.
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| The Chapel at Lincoln's Inn. |
Yeah, beautiful.
Finally,
I made my way to the reception desk, to learn more about tours and the history
of the inn. There I discovered the truth. Much to my own personal chagrin,
what I had been exploring was not the world’s classiest bartending school, but
one of the four original legal schools in the London area, dating back almost 400
years. Bar. Bar exam. Suits. Yeah. It all made sense. Such scholastic. Nice.
A bashful Eric decided it was time to head back to the study centre and begin the statistics
assignment for the night. But what fun would a trek home be if we didn’t take
an alternative route? Answer: no fun at all. So, on the way home, I became lost
again. Typical. While trying to figure out where I was, I happened to walk by
one of these nifty signs…
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| Oh herro. |
And suddenly found myself on the campus of the world’s foremost thinking school in economics: the London School of Economics.
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| LSE: World Renowned in the Study of Economics. |
Not a shabby discovery. A truly neat place, and perhaps something to keep in mind for future days.
Eventually, after consulting the conveniently placed bus marker maps a number of times, I walked down
Drury Lane (the same Drury Lane where the muffin man is supposed to live) and
made it back home. Another adventure. Another day in London. Not too shabby.
- Eric Peters
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