Queen City Livin': Parliament, European Union, Hampton Court Palace

The trip to Parliament was quite interesting because they have recently been criticized for unnecessary spending and have had picketers standing outside their building since we've been in London. Apparently they have always had allowances but now the way the spend that allowance is open to the public through the Internet.

The lecturer was extremely conservative which made me giggle a little because I know Andy would've loved him. He gave an interesting lecture on how they do things and how it's different than the U.S.. Apparently they are only allowed to spend 10,000 pounds per person for elections and campaigns are run much differently. They are not allowed to run attack ads, must only talk about their own policies, and utilize posters and meeting people door to door and a few church rallies than other means to advertise. For the entire party there is only a 20 million pound budget so there is a huge difference between us and them.

After that we went to AIFS to hear a lecture on the European Union which was also surprisingly interesting. A young professor in his thirties usually teaches a 2 semester class on the subject but he broke it down for us in an hour. He talked about why, who, how, when, and which countries currently belong to it now and which ones are still trying to become members. Basically in 1992 they opened the borders in 27 countries so people can work and live freely between each country in the union. The also united to have a little more world power instead of being tiny countries trying to stand up against world superpowers.

Hampton Court Palace was honestly a little disappointing compared to what I was anticipating. It was significantly different than the other palaces we visited. The best part was reading the stories about Henry VIII's poor wives.

Here are some pictures: