Portobello Market in Notting Hill

Do you remember how Hugh Grant walks down Portobello Road Market in "Notting Hill" on his way to his bookshop where he meets Julia Roberts? Aww, I thought of that famous movie scene yesterday when I went to Portobello Market. 

The world's largest Antiques Market takes place since the early 1870s and is best described as very colourful and lively Antiques, Fruit and Vegetable, Secondhand, and Jewellery Market:

But you can not only buy things there, you can also discover new musicians. Yesterday, there was a quite impressive opera singer, and a couple of months ago, I discovered "The Robbie Boyd Band":

You can also indulge in various delicious sweets there. For example, I had a massive Raspberry and Champagne Marshmallow yesterday, and you shouldn't miss out on a cupcake from the http://hummingbirdbakery.com/

Notting Hill in general is an interesting area - not only the market.
In Victorian times, Notting Hill was a  rough working class area. In the 50s it was the scene of race riots. A second riot during the famous Notting Hill Carnival of 1976, actually inspired the Clash's punk anthem "White Riot". Within the past 30 years though, it has become a very popular and expensive area. I guess Hugh Grant and Julia Roberts also contributed to making it a fancied area.

Olympic and Paralympic Games

At first I was not excited at all about London 2012. I'm not really interested in watching sports, Transport for London spread panic about how the public transport system would collapse, tickets were too expensive anyway etc.

But then the Olympic Games arrived and surprisingly became personal and interesting. One of my friends participated in the opening ceremony, a guy from my hometown competed in the wheelchair table tennis competition, and all of a sudden, the olympic fire had even caught me:

I decided to get a ticket for the Paralympics and chose my favourite sport: dressage.
It was an early morning session, but the volunteers who guided us to the venue were all in such a great mood and danced and sang while leading the way. I really have to say all these volunteers impressed me so much. I heard that they had a course on American friendliness. I don't know if that's true, but they definitely transformed London for a couple of weeks to a friendlier place.
But what impressed me the most were the athletes participating in the Paralympic Games. Most of the equestrians had their disability from a horse-riding accident. How brave and strong must you be to get back on a horse? One guy from Ireland had only one leg and still had his horse perfectly under control:

But I think you really start caring when you actually know somebody participating in the games. I have no interest in table tennis whatsoever, but I watched all games of the German paralympic team, because a guy from my hometown was playing for the German team. In the end they won silver and I was so proud.

I have to say London 2012 was a once in a lifetime event. I'm glad I could take part in it and I'm looking forward to Rio in 2016: http://rio2016.com/en