Had to escape from Cambridge for a while this week, so I went to London for a couple of days.

19 Apr 06
After having bought tickets for the wrong date online (cos i was looking at the June calendar... very smart of me.. ;p), I had to get a new set of tickets, having sold the "wrong" tickets to Sean, I hopped on the National Express bus to London. Come to think of it, having gone to London quite a few times since I've gotten here, this is the first time I'm heading there by bus. For good reasons too - It was only GBP4 for a pair of return tickets. :)

Having arrived in London, my first "task" was to go running - Allan's idea of a welcome greeting... ;p So Allan, Shihao and I put on our running gear and ran to Regent's Park. I must say I was quite mesmerised by Regent's park. Unlike the open picnic areas that i've been too, Regent's park was a park park, with flower beds, fountains, lakes, animals and more. Of course I was a little exhausted trying to keep up with the gang (Allan was obviously trying to prove that he's been going to the gym.. haha) to really appreciate and take in the sights.

Then having done as much exercise as I've done in a couple of weeks, we went to stuff ourselves at Misato, at Chinatown which serves really huge portions if you've not been there. And because we waited quite a long while for a table (there were 5 of us, including the apparition of Zhao Qing whom i've not seen for a couple of years. Although it was still amusing that he spoke with the same Jabroni accent he did before.... haha. Allan does a fantastic imitation), Louis and I had to rush through our colossal portions of food and headed off for The Producers.

Well, I must say I went with pretty mixed feelings about the show, having heard some mixed reviews about it. I thought the first half was rather boring and a little draggy. But I was glad that the pace in the second half picked up, and there were some pretty impressive stage directions, like this gigantic mirror with Nazi dummies dancing, forming a Swastika at the end. That was really jaw-dropping. *kenny catches his own jaw* Of course, I have to say some of the humour was rather bawdy (at this point, i'm reminded of Corrie's post on the Magic Fundoshi! I wanna watch that!) but that was what I was told to expect anyway, just "suspend the mind" as Louis said... haha.. (line i remembered: "Rest assured even though we're sitting here, we're giving you a standing ovation...")

But on the whole, I thought the Producers was an enjoyable production. Not the best of musicals I've watched but highly recommended. :)

20 Apr 06
One of my purposes for heading to London, other than catching a musical and meeting up with friends, was to go check out camera lenses at this shop called Aperture UK. Well, I hadn't quite gone with the intention of buying a lens, cos I'd just bought a lens from eBay a few days before... ;p But i just thought I'd check out some of the lenses available. But who knows, the shopkeeper brought out one of the lenses that a customer had brought in a couple of days back, a Nikon 28-200mm lens, and WOW. it felt so much better than the Tamron lens i'd bought from eBay. And it was just GBP130... urm, yah, so i bought it. haha. Now i'm putting the Tamron lens for sale on eBay.. haha.

My beautiful lens posing with my F65.

So now, my collection of lenses for my Nikon camera has reached 4, excluding a manual macro lens in Singapore.
Oooh.. how nice... :)

Anyway, I thought i'd also drop by Regent's Park again today to take some photos of Spring. And again, who'd have known that I'd spend my whole time by one of the public toilets at Regent's Park watching this toilet keeper feed squirrels. And who'd have known that I'd spend a whole roll of film taking photos of ONLY squirrels.

Squirrel approaches the peanut..

I kinda liked this photo for the squirrel behind bars... the larger version should be easier to look at.. (just click on it)

Those were just a couple of shots taken on my digital camera, not on film. I think the film photos will have to wait for a couple more months! ;p And to any conservationists out there, I don't actually have a preference for grey squirrels... they just happened to be around which was why i shot them.... haha. I haven't seen a red squirrel yet though... hmmmz..

So anyway, that kind of ends my trip to London. Went to catch my bus back to Cambridge from Victoria Coach Station and coincidentally bumped in Grace at the station and she was taking the same bus back. It was nice to have (good) company and someone to talk to on the long journey back. :)