An Overcast Day In London Town

As I mentioned on my previous entry, the one remaining real task I had before leaving for Korea (other than actually getting to the airport in one piece) was to get into London to get my passport with attached E-2 visa, which would allow me to work (and teach) in that green and pleasant land.

However, as where I'm staying at in Swanbourne is somewhat out in the Boondocks, actually getting to the ROK Embassy required a pretty imaginative travel plan involving three different types of transportation. As an additional perk, the visa office was only open between 10am and 12 midday so that meant a rather early start.

So...up at 6.30am, out the door by 7.25, and caught a bus heading for Bletchley. Then there was an 90 minute wait at Bletchley train station for a train that wouldn't cost me a stupid amount of money (yes, attached picture does actually show what it costs to go on a train from anywhere to London at peak time these days).
Thanks largely to the wonders of the iBooks application for my iPhone (other book-reading software is available) the aforementioned 90 minutes passed relatively quickly, and I made my way into London Euston station for about 10.30.

There was then a fairly stress-free time on two lines of the Underground (I'm no native of our capital but the Underground, I find is pretty easy to get around). Took the Northern line from Euston to Embankment, as you can see:

Once at Embankment, a quick switch onto the Circle line and a couple of stops brought me to my destination.

From there - just a 5 minute walk to the ROK Embassy.

I got my visa easy enough once there, but they didn't give me any of my supporting paperwork, which means I didn't get either one copy of my contract nor my NOA back. I'm pretty sure I'm not going to need it, but it is a little worrying not having it. Well...guess that's a bridge I'll cross when I come to it. It's going to be fun and games, however, if I meet up with my head of POE on Monday and the first thing they say is, "you have notice of appointment?" My reply: "um....."

Anyway, I got the REALLY important thing (passport with visa in), then headed back they way I had come, stopping off for a BK at Euston before taking train and bus and arriving back in Swanbourne in good time. Mission accomplished.

Now, after my last proper sit down meal in England for some time (which just happened to be Thai green curry, who'd have thought - very English) I'm just going to chew through what paperwork I have left to do, and get ready for the trip down to Heathrow tomorrow.

Oh, and as a bonus pic, I went by a certain football stadium on the train. It's pretty indistinct, but I still think it's a damn good piece of footballing architecture:

PS. I'm still looking for peoples opinion on what else I could add to the blog page to make it better looking or more functional. Let me know your ideas, people!