London - Day 4

Harrod's. Massive

Day 4 in London was my first official classroom day. We started with a morning lecture on globalization and how it has turned in to glocalization. We sat and listened to how the world has become more integrated and how technology and information continue to push us to continue to evolve in an ever changing world. Seeing all this at work, it really puts in to light how the rich get richer and how the gap between us and the poor continues to widen.

Speaking of poor, I don't know how anyone affords anything in this city. It is REALLY EXPENSIVE. I went and bought some soup today just so I wouldn't have to eat out everyday because the prices are really high.

Glass fusbol table

Niketown shoe display

After our morning lecture, we broke in to groups of six or so and headed out into London for a Scramble/Scavenger hunt. We we asked to go to different places and see how each place represents different things. Our first trip was to Harrod's in London, which would be considered by some similar to Macy's. It is crazy because you have this massive, historic looking building and everything inside is divided by room. One room might be a purse and bag room, next will be Egyptian Cotton room, next will be a room for booking travel on a yacht, next will be a Lee jeans room, while the next is a fine china room, and so on. It is just interesting to see how they have integrated something as simple as Lee jeans in one room and the next is a recreation room where a pool table is 20,000 gbp. The building is massive and looks very historic, yet around it looks modern.

Niketown

We then went to Niketown London. Apparently, this place is so big, it has it's on town name. It was basically the online Nike, made in to a Nike store. It was really large as well, with 5 stories of product. One whole floor had football (soccer) and an endless supply of Arsenal gear (my favorite club). The top floor was all girls workout clothes and I must say, some of the stuff was more about sex than working out. Even the pictures were objectifying women. Some of it you would never see in the states because it showed a little too much.

We then headed to a place called Lillywhite's, which prides itself on being the largest sports store in the world. I have to admit, it was like the Foot Locker on steroids. It was quite large, but after a few rooms, unimpressive to me.

One of the cooler displays I saw

Street and buildings we went saw along the way

Then we headed to a place called the Sports Cafe. The whole idea of this place was built around integrating US sport culture with European. There you would see signs that would tell you that you could watch "US ESPN" while having a Bud Light. They had waitresses that were dressed in cheerleader outfits and looked really out of place. Our waitress was from Australia and she had never seen a cheerleader before she moved to London only three months earlier.

We then made our way to two more places that were just complete tourist destinations. Large markets/squares where the typical people could go and buy everything you could buy in a mall in America. GAP and so on...boring.

The Times Square of London

Historic next to Modern

Just looked cool from a walk

Our boy and his liquid confidence

One of the guys that was in my group turned 21 today, so we headed to a pub after we got back and took him out for some drinks. Needless to say, he was feeling pretty good after a night out with some of his close buddies and decided to sing karaoke. His song of choice? "Sweet Home Alabama.