It Pays To Be Friends With Important People

Through my internship program, there is an option to intern for an MP at the House of Parliament. Although I was not interested in interning at Parliament, my friend Chad is interning for an MP in the Conservative party. Being Chad's friend has now paid off, because he was able to bring me and five other people as guests to tour the Parliament building!

Usually you have to book a tour of Parliament, and often you cannot see the House of Commons or the House of Lords due to security reasons. However, Chad knew that there was a recess today, and decided to bring us in to tour the entire building! We got to see the House of Commons room, which has a lot of green cushions and wood. Then, we toured the House of Lords corridor, which was much fancier - and gorgeous! There were statues and gold panelling, and the seats were cushioned with really deep read leather. Also, we were able to see the queen's throne in the House of Lords, which is covered in gold and absolutely breathtaking (and her section takes up an entire wall and is two stories high!). It was definitely an experience to remember.

There were also two funny experiences I had in Parliament while going through security. First, I had a coffee from McDonalds that I had just begun to drink. At security, when they asked me to throw it out I said, "it's fine" and then tried to drink as much as I could in two seconds. Clearly the woman thought I meant that it would be fine if I took it through security, and she said very sternly to me, "no it's not, we don't want you to ruin the new 12 million pound renovation." I was very confused and insulted until I finally figured out that she misunderstood what I meant by "it's fine." The second weird experience was that we were able to just walk around by ourselves throughout the entire building. Although Chad had a pass and is an intern, and they took our photos at the door, I still feel it would be somewhat unsafe to let random foreigners wonder arround unaccompanied. I think we would have been a little closer watched had we been foreigners in Capital Hill.

The final cool experience about the trip is that we were able to go to one of the pubs in Parliament, where the food is very subsidized. I paid 2.20 pounds for a glass bottle of cranberry juice and a giant piece of chocolate pudding (British pudding). I didn't order any alcohol, but I hear you can get a pint of beer for a pound. There are definitely monetary benefits to working at Parliament!