An English 'Aidiladha

I had to spend one 'Aidilfitri overseas, so why not make it even and spend one 'Aidiladha overseas as well?

Frosted leaves scattered all over the ground you walk on- Toto, I don't think we're in Malaysia anymore... :P

Yes, it's another meeting, in Aylesbury this time, smack in the middle of the Raya Haji celebration week!

I wasn't alone this time. I'm tagging along to Pauline, my senior colleague, who's luckily very travel-wise and made the experience so much fun for me :)

A word to the wise, when traveling abroad, no matter how unsafe it feels, bring CASH! Or stick to your credit card though keep in mind that you won't be able to use it on all occasions. I had one HELL of a time finding a place to cash in my traveler's cheques in Aylesbury!!!

Of course we wasted no time. Pauline had her friend book us a table at a halal restaurant and so we journeyed into London the very next evening... It took an hour by train from Aylesbury, then another half hour by underground tube to get near the vicinity of the restaurant.

The place is called Original Tagines and it served delicious Moroccan food. I went crazy in there because it could be some time before I tasted any more halal meat on this trip :p

Took a trip around the hotel grounds before the meeting started early the next morning...

...and I almost caused a minor incident by taking a shot of this snow topped car. It seems that one of the guests reported the incident to hotel security because they thought I took the picture in order to steal the car! :P

Apparently such a thing had happened before... scary!

A view of the meeting room. Quite a surprising turnout! I didn't see this many people at the meeting in Adelaide.

There was a get together for dinner that evening. The halal meal they ordered for me didn't make it so I turned vegetarian for the night :( Not that bad though...

Now with business out of the way, we headed for London again...

Once we checked in our bags at the hotel, we practically had to rush to the London Eye site. We had tickets booked for 12 noon and it was already half past 10! It was a race through the underground tubes with one of the lines having serious delays.

From the picture, we obviously made it :) hehehe...

Turun jer dari London Eye, tengah jalan-jalan nak tuju tempat lain lak, tiba-tiba semerbak harum daging bakar menusuk hidung aku yang lapar ni... Tengok-tengok- halLaMAK! Nangesss!!! Bagaimana kan ku samak hidungku ini! Huhu... :P

Gediks sat kat pondok tepon, hehehe... Hey! Tak main lar pondok tepon tiruan kat Malaysia tuh! Ni ori nyer London phonebooth you know?

Rusa masuk London... Sempat lak si Pauline tangkap gambar aku tengah melopong tengok double decker bus (also ori okey?)!

 Then we caught the tube and took photos of each other around Trafalgar Square and Picadilly Circus (not shown) so that we could say, 'been there!'.

Back to the hotel room for some rest before we hit the West End that evening :) Pauline had her cousin book tickets for a play...

My camera and I again caused another minor incident at the theatre. No pictures allowed but I still wanted some mementoes to bring home. We were told off in no uncertain terms that taking photographs is absolutely prohibited inside the theatre!

The play was 'Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Coat'. Essentially the story of the Prophet Joseph made into a musical...

Took a walk around the area after the play. With Christmas approaching, London was beautifully lit everywhere...

Really early the next morning, we checked out and caught the plane home. Oh, just wanted to share with you this deli at Heathrow called 'Eat'.

They have so many choices of sandwiches and salads with each box clearly labelled plus the complete list of ingredients for each meal. It certainly made it easier for me to avoid those I cannot eat and I had absolutely zero problems finding my breakfast here, unless being stymied by all the choices constitutes a problem :P