When you're away on travel in college, you can do some very stupid things, although when I look back on some of them, they were weirdly funny. My friend and I were goofing off on Tottenham Court Road in London when we noticed that there was a Scientology office there. I had written about Scientology for my school newspaper around 1981. Wow, a chance to see what some considered a cult in action from within their own office.
We planned for about ten minutes to go in and give fake names and go undercover to see what in the heck it was all about. We thought about all the spy movies we ever saw and what we'd do if we got separated. How we would run out and meet up at the Tottenham movie theatre and go see a movie.
I walked in the doors first and my friend walked in a minute or so after me. A young, tall man approached me and began asking all sorts of personal questions, directing to literature. Finally, he asked my name. He must have thought that I was a total wack job, because I totally couldn't remember the name I planned on giving to... read more >>
London Travel Stories
My freshman year of college took me overseas to England. I had never been away from home before alone, to another city or state, much less to another country. Here I was, 18 years old, leaving home for the first time, going on a plane for the first time, excited to be legal to drink alcohol en route "across the pond." I talked to my first New Zealander whom I couldn't understand although he spoke English. I expected the clouds and the grass to somehow be different, but they weren't. But it didn't stop me from taking pictures with my first camera.
I rode the London underground tube for the first time. Nearly lost my luggage en route to King's Cross in London for the first time. Rode my first train. Of course, I sat by some cute businessmen, and a beautiful lady; and for the first time since my trip began, I fell asleep. When I woke up, the men were gone. The beautiful lady and those sitting next to her were smiling.
I knew it instantly. Here I was on my first passenger train, snoring away like a freight train with my mouth hanging open (which I knew because... read more >>
While walking along with a friend in the heart of Soho in London's famed Piccadilly Circus, I lost track of her for a few moments. I was standing there on the street corner around ten at night, looking around for her, when this dark-complexioned man dressed in a white hat with a feather off to the side, long white heavy fur coat, and laced up boots, came up to talk to me.
Me, being just 18 years old and from a small town of around nine thousand people in the Midwest, didn't think a thing of starting up a conversation with a total stranger. Even one who looked like a pimp. He began to ask me all sorts of questions in another language and motioned for me to follow him over to another area of Piccadilly. Thankfully, my friend noticed that I was missing and came over to where we were standing. She took one look at the man in the pimp clothes and her eyes grew wide. Being older and much more worldly, she grabbed my arm, none too gently, and pulled me out of there, practically dragging me down the street, breathlessly chastising me over and over with... read more >>