The People Are Everywhere!

Day 2 – 19th July 2023

Today’s original plan was to go to the beach for the day. We hadn’t decided on Southend, Westcliff or Canvey Island. But it doesn’t matter.

Today we are going to Oxford Street.

We headed to Grays Station for our train. But before that, we headed to the high street to get some drinks for our journey.

I wanted to get some travel cards, but when we arrived at the station. The train station worker wasn’t there. And I didn’t see the machine until I went through the bollards.

We were meeting up with my brother again. But this time. We would pick him up when we arrived at his station. After he came onto the train, our first stop was West Ham. After arriving at West Ham, we had to go on the District line. But we had a little problem with there being no lift. Because of this, we had to walk up the static stairs. This is because the wife has a phobia of escalators.

After that wonderous, tiring physical activity: we headed to the District line. From here: we got off at Mile End. Then on to the Central Line, where our final stop was Marble Arch Station.

Beware the Shops

As soon as we left March Arch Station, we found this shop. And that little green fellow. So we had a look around.

During our walk along oxford street, I began to notice a pattern. I have been watching the news about a set of people money laundering by opening shops along oxford street. The big well-known ones were the American sweet shops. The council had been shutting these shops down very slowly. But, by the time they get shut down, they are replaced by others. I believe these shops selling tv, book, comic, game and movie merchandise could be in that same category. Of course. Although this may be true, I have no evidence either way. But as long as they sell at a reasonable price. I am all for it. We need more shops like this.

Not the criminal activities, of course. But tv, movie, book, game and comic merchandise shops. Just so we are clear.

We took in the sights of the old and the new merged together. It didn’t always work. But all in all, it was still good to look at.

I used to come down here a lot when I was younger. The shops have changed, but the atmosphere hasn’t. Everyone is doing their own thing, getting from A to B. Darting about. Some just window shopping while others can not help but buy more things.

But anyway, we arrived at the first place the wife wanted to go: The Disney Store.

Looking Inside

After our visit, the wife was a bit disappointed with the range in the shop. She was after a particular item, but they didn’t have it yet. Wrong season. They didn’t really have anything I wanted either. The best things they had were the wall displays and the artwork. Not the actual products themselves. The artwork for the Marvel and Star Wars area was really cool. It was set up like comic book pages.

The wife bought a T-shirt of She-Hulk, from the TV series. She hasn’t watched it yet.

Food?

My brother was getting hungry. So we went to McDonalds. We ordered our meal in a three-floored family restaurant. After ordering our food and sitting down, we decided to wait an hour for our food to arrive.

The staff. Although friendly and pleasant. They did not want to deal with us and had little to no contact as possible when we asked them where our food was. One of the staff walked over to us, said what he wanted to say, turned back and walked away without stopping. How bloody rude!

To say sorry, they gave us a Mcflurry. How nice. But you still forgot my bacon! We just wanted to leave, so we ate and left.

More Window Shopping

We found a few more shops we popped into:

We continued our journey until we finally arrived at Tottenham Court Road and turned right.

We turned down this road but then realised we were headed down the wrong road. But it didn’t matter. The wife was happy when she saw this:

My brother had walked off for a while, and we turned left whilst giving directions to him on the phone. That was when we finally arrived at our final destination.

Beggars

One thing you should keep an eye out for. When travelling in London or anywhere really is the beggars. I’m not talking about the people who are actually homeless. I am talking about the professional beggars. The professional beggars I saw down London were all the same. Elderly or youngish women and one was even pregnant. They were all dressed in the same colour and type of clothing.

The thing that made me laugh was the signs they each had. It was all written by the same person. Each notice was probably made with the same cardboard box. Another funny one was most of the signs said, “I am Hungry”. As we approached, she was eating and throwing her leftovers away. She saw me looking at her and didn’t care.

Shopping

After looking around the shop, I decided to buy a few things and went a little overboard. I decided to buy some books. But I never know what I want. So I went to the best-selling books section. They had twelve books in their list. So I went through them, reading the synopsis and then choosing these:

The Star Trek toy I found is a replica of one of my favourite gadgets from the next generation period, the Tricorder. Although I know; I will never have one. Even though they are trying to build one, and from what I hear, they are very close. But until then, I will have to be content and have this toy instead.

But for those who wanted to see it in action. Here you go:

The missus bought a few things as well:

After our expensive visit to Forbidden Planet, we bought one more drink and had one more stop at the toilet at the nearest Burger King. Then we got on the tube to make our way home.