Yoojin Cho

A Tribute to… None Other than Hing Loon :)

Located at 25 Lisle Street, Hing Loon has quickly become our favorite Chinese restaurant in London. It all started with us lazying around in our flat one random day, thinking “Where can we get some sweet-and-sour chicken?” Trust me, after going a month or so without my regualr dose of some orange chicken, the craving for Chinese food only gets worse.

So, Christina, Gabby, Jack and I adventured out to China Town (in Leicester Square) one night, with high hopes of finding some affordable AWESOME Chinese food. Well, honestly, we would have settled for any sort of sweet-and-sour, but alas, lucky us, we stumbled upon Hing Loon.

We passed by a few restaurants on our way to Hing Loon (we had no idea what we were about to discover, obviously). Too expensive. Too fancy. Too crowded. Oh, and we also passed a very interesting club called the Ku Bar. No, not interested in half naked men, thanks. Chinese food > Ku Bar.

We then approached the window of Hing Loon. Not too crowded. We see an empty table. Price? £3.75 for fried rice? £4.00 sweet-and-sour chicken? Oh man, we found the perfect place! For all four of us, after ordering two bottles of wine, four appetizers and four dishes, the total came out to £65. Amazing.

Ever since then, we went back twice (I would say once a week…) and further discovered Hing Loon’s aromatic crispy duck with hoisin sauce (thanks to Garrett) and wonderful shredded beef. Absolute favorite!!!

Alright, done talking about food, seeing that I still have about 5 hours left at internship and dinner time won’t be till around 7:30 p.m. today. Yikes.

http://www.timeout.com/london/restaurants/reviews/9310.html Check out the TimeOut review. It’s wonderful.

-Yoojin

My diet for the 3 days in Brussels = Waffles and Chocolate

On Sunday, I experienced the “Chunnel” for the first time. Chunnel = Tunnel + English Channel = Eurostar to continental Europe =My journey to Brussels, Belgium. As part of my European Business class (IP 405), we hopped on the train to go check out the capital of Europe. Really, not a big deal. 😉

This was my first weekend trip since I arrived in London, so needless to say, I was extremely excited. Not that I’ve run out of things to do in London, but the thought of escaping the cloudy, dreary, misty weather for three days seemed appealing.

Eurostar, the train with particularly comfortable seats, travels at 208 miles per hour, thereby reducing the travel time to only 1 hour and 25 minutes to Brussels and 2 hours and 30 minutes to Paris. The only time I’ve been to Brussels in the past was when I stopped by for about 3 hours while driving from Paris to Amsterdam. So spending 3 days this time was definitely a different, more fun and exciting experience.

When we arrived Sunday evening, I was at first disappointed to find everything closed at 7 p.m. Apparently, stores in Brussels like to close early on Sundays. We ended up rushing to the first restaurant we saw (The Cheesecake Cafe) for a quick dinner. After all, we were all starving. After a wonderful burger and a milkshake (YUM) we went on an adventure.

Brussels is a fairly small city. In fact, you can see everything you need to in less than a day. We got a Belgian waffle, obviously, and experienced a super-smokey Irish pub. Yes, an Irish pub in the middle of Brussels. With live bands. Walking out of the pub with my sweater reeking of cigarette smoke isn’t exactly my favorite activity, but I enjoyed hanging out for a few hours and listening to live bands.

Monday was filled with “educational” sessions at NATO and the European Parliament, and we ended the day at Delirium. Oh, Delirium. This place carries over 1,000 kinds of beer – their beer menu is a binder. Between about 6 of us, we had just about everything from cactus beer to honey beer. Definitely a must-see if you’re planning on visiting Brussels. http://www.deliriumcafe.be/. That is the website! Check it out!

And here are the pictures:

-Waffle #1!

-European Parliament

-Waffle #2! Obviously…

-Oh, and did I mention we acquire a DAS BOOT??? Really, NBD 😉

-And the last waffle of the weekend. Miss the waffles. Oh man.

Overall, what a great trip! My mouth still waters when I think about those waffles and loads of Belgian chocolates. 🙂

-Yoojin

That's Art? – Pop Life @ Tate Modern

As you can imagine, London is a BIG city. That means there is just so much to do and so little time. While I’m here, I would like to do all sorts of “tourist-y” thing there is, so last weekend, Jack and I decided to start with something basic – Buckingham Palace, St. Paul’s Cathedral, HARRY POTTER BRIDGE and Tate Modern Museum.

On Saturday (16 Jan) we woke up even before the sun came up – fine, exaggerated, but early enough – to get out to Buckingham Palace for the changing of the guards. So Robert, Jack and I simply hopped on the tube, which, by the way, is so fancy compared to the glorious T back in Boston, at around 10:45 a.m. We honestly thought the ceremony started at 11:30, but when we actually got there at around 11:10, we realized we were wrong. The new set of guards were already marching into the palace and starting the whole process.

So yes, we saw these people in funny furry hats and gray winter coats playing music, including a bit of Somewhere Over the Rainbow, marching around for about an hour and successfully switching their guard shifts. It took just about an hour, and I couldn’t believe how many people there were to see this. Despite the rain, many were gathered around. More importantly, the number of different languages I heard around me was even more impressive. London is indeed a very diverse city.

For more information – i.e. history, time, place etc. – check out their website: http://www.changing-the-guard.com/

After, we walked through St. James’ Park toward Westminster tube station. I have been saying over and over again London is a BIG city, but the truth is, once you get to one area of the city, within certain areas, it is definitely walkable. For example, from Westminster station, if you’re up for it, you can walk all the way to Tate Modern, located across the river from St. Paul’s Cathedral, and on your way over, you’ll see the Aquarium, Movieum, Shakespeare’s Globe Theatre and National Theatre Gallery.

BUT we actually decided to be lazy and utilize the great public transportation system. For a good reason though; it started pouring, and thankfully, the #11 Bus took us directly to St. Paul’s Cathedral. Upon our arrival, we did find out it would cost us 9 pounds (student rate) to see the inside of this magnificent church.

Our thought process was this: St. Paul’s Cathedral isn’t exactly going anywhere. In the meantime, we’ve already burnt through a good portion of our budget. Unfortunately, the dollar/pound exchange rate isn’t exactly in our favor. Therefore, if we have money left over at the end of the semester, we’ll come back for the interior tour. For now, skip!

We grabbed a quick lunch at a small place called Fresh Italy. (http://www.fresh-italy.com/aboutus.aspx). To our surprise, for only £5.50, we had a huge portion of pasta and a cup of tea. What a great deal!

Now, probably the most important question ever, do you recognize this bridge?

If you don’t, SHAME ON YOU! We are no longer friends.

Alright, just kidding. But seriously, this bridge’s formal name is Milenium Bridge. If you’re a Harry Potter lover like I am, you’ll know this as The Bridge That was in the Sixth Movie. Mmhmm, that’s more like it. After all, the deatheaters didn’t destroy it. Thank goodness. As you can see, on the north side of Thames is St. Paul’s Cathedral, so if you cross the bridge, you stand right in front of Tate Modern on the south side.

Tate is a modern art museum. The building used to be a warehouse. All museums in London are FREE. There you go, cool enough reasons for me to visit and learn about modern art. As a modern art museum, Tate houses contemporary paintings, sculptures, videos and any other form of art created by imaginative minds, such as Claude Monet, Anish Kapoor, Picasso and Mario Merz. Honestly, I am not an expert, so I can’t really tell you what their artworks are like. One thing I can say though is if you ever do go to the Tate and decide to see Paul McCarthy’s video, well, don’t. Semi-disturbing. Not sure what he was trying to say through a naked man dancing around with a mask on, but I didn’t really get it.

Besides those collections, the Tate does have special exhibits – and you do have to pay admission for those. When I went, Pop Life was the main attraction. Pop Life was a display of various works by Andy Warhol and Jeff Koons.

And I will let these articles do the review of the exhibit: http://www.guardian.co.uk/artanddesign/2009/sep/29/pop-life-tate-pop-art AND http://entertainment.timesonline.co.uk/tol/arts_and_entertainment/visual_arts/article6852784.ece

This is a fairly lengthy recap of my last Saturday. I know I still have so much to catch up on – pubs in South Kensington, Notting Hill Arts Club, Soho and Brick Lane.

More to come very very soon!

-Yoojin

Windsor Castle & Eton College

It’s already been two weeks! WOW. More accurately about 11 days, but who cares… Same difference, right? This week was filled with lectures and orientation events, including Imperial College pub night and start of the semester party at Langley. I have so much to say about both places – and of course about Tate Modern Museum, St. Paul’s Cathedral and generally being Harry Potter, but I am going to try to keep this entry focused on the daytrip I went on today.

That, my friends, is WINDSOR CASTLE – the place where past kings and queens of England have used. Most importantly, it is the oldest occupied castle and Queen’s official residence. The castle is absolutely gorgeous, especially the front entrance used by the Queen. It is just like what you see in fairytale where there is a long walkway leading up to the gate where you’re greeted by those guard with funny hats. And only after that, you enter a majestic courtyard, and up on the second floor is the Queen’s hall.

The tour of Windsor was very simple. All there was to do was circling around the circle, seeing the chapel where the Order of the Garters met and admiring the gorgeous garden. But, the most impressive and possibly the most popular feature was Queen Mary’s Dollhouse. Honestly, those dolls have it so much better that us normal folks would ever be able to afford. So. Jealous. It was fascinating to see an elaborate dollhouse that was taller than I. PS, the dollhouse is equipped with perfectly working electricity and plumbing. Why is that necessary? Not sure, but it’s SO COOL! Unfortunately photographing inside the exhibit was not allowed, but here is the taste:

That is the living room… Really, NBD.

Another site we visited was Eton College. Don’t let the name “college” deceive you. It is simply an all boys boarding school where Price William & Harry spent their high school years. Once again, really NBD. Eton is right next to Windsor Castle (only about 15 minutes of a walk), situated very nicely along Thames River. While the campus is really pretty, and according to our awesome tour guide Penny, the education the boys receive is superb, you do have to be able to pay close to 10,000 pounds per term – and there are 3 terms a year – to attend this school. Wow.

Windsor & Eton was a nice short getaway from the little bubble called South Kensington, but I’m not sure if I can ever afford to actually live in the area. It is indeed a nice little village that I enjoyed visiting.

Next up – hopefully very very soon – is my thoughts on some London explorations I’ve done so far, such as pubs around the area, Buckingham Palace, Tate Modern, etc.

PS. Today was the first sunny day in London. What a miracle!

-Yoojin