San Francisco Meets London

Having Meera and Gautam here last week was so great! I wish they could have stayed longer. We always have such a great time together and this time was no different. Even though the day after they arrived it snowed the rest of the week they got great weather, which really enabled them to see all of London. Except the hail storm they encountered for a couple of minutes of Friday but we're not going to really count that! Neither of them had ever been to London so they had their list of places to see and they accomplished almost every thing on there list. Not to mention going to another European city, per my previous post.

These two were the ultimate tourists... While I was at work everyday they were exploring all of London. They toured Westminster Abbey, saw Big Ben and Parliament. They toured the Tower of London, went to St. Paul's Cathedral, although they had a bit of a hiccup the day went to the tour the cathedral due to the arrival of the Duke of Kent. They went to Harrod's found it to be a little too much, I can relate. They shopped in Oxford Circus, walked through Hyde Park, and took in Buckingham Palace. Of course, I took them around my neighborhood as well. The list goes on and on. They are such city people having lived in San Francisco for the last couple of years so they were really appreciate what a city like London has to offer. By the end of the week Gautam had the bus system down to a science and was giving me lessons on how to navigate around London, priceless! On somewhat of a side note, Meera is an amazing photography and she took a ton of pictures while she was here. I can't wait to see them and I will definitely post some of them on the blog once she sends them to me.

My only regret was not being able to spend more time with them during the week they were here. My work schedule was not as flexible as I would have liked so my interactions with them were limited to only evenings. But I made the most of it. One of the great things about Meera and Gautam is the three of us share a passion for fine dining. So, I took them to some great places to eat every evening for dinner. We had amazing Indian food one night at my favorite Indian restaurant, pan Asian fusion another night at Cocoon, a traditional pub dinner, where Gautam had the best fish and chips of his life and on their last night, we had a to die for dinner at an Argentinan Steakhouse. My future roomie Sima joined us that night as well, she happens to work for the restaurant company and wanted to try a different location than the one she works at. The location I chose was an area of London I actually never been to;Richmond. I had heard great things about this town. It's right alongside the riverside and is very much like a new England town. Charming, quaint, colonial homes alongside the river. It was like being in Maine. It was the perfect end to their visit.


I was really bummed to see them go on Saturday, the house felt so empty without them but something tells me they'll be back. If you guys are reading this, I love you guys and hope I can make it to San Francisco in August!