Sorry for the day-late post again, guys. Our agenda today required us to be at Olympic Park by 10 AM. My recent track record of next to no sleep, then falling asleep at events indicated that I was better off going to bed last night instead of staying up until the wee hours blogging.
Yesterday morning, as usual, we set out to leave the hostel by a certain time, but ended up leaving later. We suck at waking up, if you couldn't tell. With tickets for the 1 PM session of beach volleyball, we arrived at Horse Guard's Parade around noon. The last time we had beach volleyball, we ended up walking for FOREVER from the tube to get to the venue. We tried a different tube stop this time (I want to say Westminster. I could be wrong, though.), and it cut our walking time in half. It also unexpectedly took us right in front of Buckingham Palace. We had perfect timing as the Changing of the Guard ceremony had just begun.
Getting into Horse Guard's Parade was a breeze this time compared to last. Standing in line and security took ten minutes tops this time as opposed to last, where the line snaked about five times and was seemingly endless. We each grabbed a Cumberland sausage sandwich with carmelized onions from one of the food stands (the food at the games has been AWESOME, btw) and took our seats- which were even better than they were the first time.
I witnessed quite possibly the most British thing I have ever seen/experienced in my life right before the session began: a Hey Jude singalong. See the guys in the red/gold in the middle-left of the pic? They had instruments and quietly began playing the melody to the song. They gradually got louder when finally, the guy announcing the session got on the mic and told everyone to join in and sing. How do you not join in on a Beatles singalong when you're told? Nevermind that, how do you not join in on a Beatles singalong when you're in England? I completely disagree with the British guy we overheard on the phone one day as we left gymnastics. Hey Jude is an awesome song.
The weather at this session was a MILLION times better than it was the first night we went. The sun was shining and while it did feel warm, a cool breeze would come through every few minutes and make things bearable again. The thing that frustrates me about British weather is that it is a different degree of unpredictable. You can always bank on it being hot as hell in Texas. What you can't bank on is whether it will sun or tornado. In England, it will either be sunny or cloudy, but you don't know if it is going to be hot or cold. Yesterday would've been a great day for shorts, but based on my experience the first day I wore shorts here (Amy and I came back and changed), I didn't want to chance freezing my legs off.
No USA in our beach volleyball session, sadly, but we did get to see a men's match between Norway and Latvia. You wouldn't think they would have beach volleyball in these countries, would you? I mean that as a legitimate question. I believe the beach volleyball is now in the knockout rounds, because I do recall the commentator saying that it was a "must win" match for both teams, and that loser would be going home. Norway fought as hard as they could, but in the end, Latvia outmuscled them and beat them in the first two sets.
Norway serves.
Latvia celebrates the win.
The second match was a women's match between Brazil and the Netherlands. I missed the first set and most of the second, to be honest, but I hear it was fairly neck and neck until Brazil ran away with it at the end.
I know I touched on the atmosphere at beach volleyball the last time we went, but it really is a ton of fun. They play fun music during breaks in the action, they make you dance and sing and they even have a dance crew that performs throughout the stadium. When I came back during the second set of the women's match, I had to wait to get to my seat and let the conga line pass by. It's a little odd to have this patch of sand in the middle of London with the Prime Minister's residence and the London Eye serving as a backdrop, but it's awesome.
I made the mistake of leaving my UK phone in the bathroom during the women's match, but some nice person turned it in to the lost & found. Before we headed that way, we posed for a few pictures and chatted with a group of locals.
The locals have been amazing. The minute they hear an "American accent," they immediately want to know more. When this particular group of locals found out we were American, one of them whipped out his video camera and started interviewing us like we were athletes. What particularly cracked me up was when he looked into his camera and said, "we've found two REAL, ACTUAL Americans!" They asked us the standard questions of where we're from, how long we're staying and what events we're going to. Once we finished talking to them, we retrieved my phone from the lost & found, chatted with two more locals and then headed over to Trafalgar Square.
Trafalgar Square is freaking HUGE. It was PACKED with people, so we limited our time there to climbing on the lions and taking pictures under the 2012 sign. Yes, I did just say "climbing on the lions."
Amy actually climbed and sat on one with the help of one of the locals. This picture was right on the heels of a security guard reprimanding a tourist for "disrespecting the monument" by standing on it, so I went with the safer option of standing next to it.
With the countdown clock.
Once we were done at Trafalgar Square, we went back to North Greenwich Arena, but NOT for gymnastics (for once, right?). We had tickets for the evening session of fencing at the ExCel. Instead of taking the Tube one stop past North Greenwich to Canning Town, however, multiple locals suggested for us to take the cable car, instead.
It takes eight minutes to get from North Greenwich to Canning Town on the cable car. While quick, it did not disappoint and provided us with some breathtaking views.
North Greenwich Arena.
Gorgeous view of the river.
Olympic Park off in the distance.
The ExCel is like a HUGE convention center. Fencing was not the only event going on that night; with multiple arenas, the ExCel is home to other events including table tennis, weightlifting and boxing.
Amy and I went into this fencing session knowing absolutely NOTHING about the sport. Literally nothing. All we knew was that we had tickets to the Men's Team Sabre finals, and that was it. When we got in, the arena looked straight out of an 80's video. They were playing an explanatory video about the three different types of fencing, but it didn't help much until the event got going. The British man sitting next to us helped explain a lot, too.
Outside ExCel.
I was half ready for a disco ball to come down.
So here's what I know about sabre: you can hit your opponent anywhere from the waist up except for the backs of the hands. You can only score a point if you have the "right of way," which you apparently indicate that you have by holding your arm out straight. You can touch your opponent with either the tip or edge of your blade. In one type of fencing, there is a way that both players can get points at the same time, but that is not the case in sabre. So the first one to touch his opponent with the sabre gets the point.
The session started off with the bronze medal match: Italy v. Russia. We originally agreed to root for Russia, but Italy got off to such a bad start (which we interpreted as them being screwed by the ref, because at the end of the day, we are still soccer fans) that I slowly but surely ended up rooting for them. Russia took a really early lead, but Italy gained momentum the more the match went on. Italy won about three or four consecutive sets in a row so that by the time it got down to the last set, it was Italy's to lose.
When the match first started, Amy and I were completely lost. So lost that Amy turned to me shortly after it began and whispered this gem:
"Is this how people feel when they watch gymnastics for the first time?"
As I said before, the British man next to us spoke fencing, and he explained a lot to us and answered our questions. By the end of it all, I'm pretty sure I became one of those people who acts like they know the sport inside and out, but is really just talking out of their ass (gymnastics fans know ALL about these people!). I didn't care, though, as I found the whole thing incredibly entertaining and ended up having a blast.
Italy came away with the win against Russia and was ecstatic to come away with a medal, even if it was bronze (maybe they should give Victoria Komova lessons in humility?). The gold medal match was down to South Korea v. Romania. The match started out pretty evenly, but South Korea got the lead early and never gave it back. It seemed like a well-deserved win to me. For only having watched fencing for about an hour in my life prior to that moment, it looked to me like they played- err, fenced? What's the word? It looked to me like South Korea played/fenced well.
En guard! I don't even know if I spelled that right.
South Korea celebrates.
What I've realized about medal ceremonies is that it doesn't matter whether it's your country or not. They're special no matter what. I definitely got a little teary seeing South Korea accept their medals. It's the Olympics, y'all, these people have sacrificed so much that you can't help but be happy for them when they achieve their goals.
We left fencing and took the DLR back to the Jubilee Line to return to the hostel. We got back at about 9:30, at which point I blogged about Thursday and then went to bed. Midnight has got to be the earliest bedtime I've had over here; y'all know I'm usually up until about 2 AM, but as I said, we had Olympic Park at 10 this morning, so I wanted to make sure I was rested instead of nodding off during the event!
I'm about to follow up this entry with today's- promise this time! So you know the drill- leave me comments. I miss the states like crazy (normal plugs, American money, access to a washer and dryer being the things I miss the most!), and I'll catch you guys here in a few!
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