Visiting London

Easter Holidays... Great time to forget school, assignments as well as teachers. Time for fun and relax.

However, last Easter holidays have been a little different.

We, me and some colleagues, have organized a school trip to London. Our adventure has been share by sixty, young, bright and nice students.

The journey started early in the morning at Escola Secundária de Felgueiras with many parents sobbing and showing some tears. For us only excitiment.

At the airport, after a long check-in we were all finally ready to get on the plane.

The journey took an hour and fifty-five minutes. Long minutes as for most students it was their first visit to one of the most cosmopolitan capitals in Europe.

Still in the plane we got the first glimpses of the city, some clouds covering the majestic and always impressive city. Some, such as Francisco, my nine year old son, could identify many famous monuments and places such as Tower Bridge, The Thames, The London Eye.

Once at Heathrow, bags packed on the coach and the mini-bus we headed to Central London and our first stop was at the London Eye, a giant wheel built by British Airways to celebrate the coming of the new milleniun. Each capsule takes twenty-eight people and the tour takes thirty slow-motion minutes. It is time to watch the city, to take photographs and to tell each other's first impressions.

Then, time to visit Westminster, Houses of Parliament, the famous Big Ben and time to enjoy British multiculturalism.

Later in the afternoon, we were left at Iceland car park, in Croydon to meet host families. Here some students started feeling "shocked" by the looks of their hosts. Many were negroes, others from Asia and some apparently British.

Our host families represented, quite well, multicultural England and the mixture of races.

The story goes on...