Anyone who visits London normally pays a visit to Harrods. Ever since I was a young child in Manila, I already heard about this famous department store. Although I have only been to London twice (I don't include layovers!) in all my traveling years, I have visited Harrods a number of times. That's because every time I come to the English capital, I visit the store several times per visit. I do the same with Harvey Nichols, Selfridges, Marks and Spencers, and Debenhams.

As far as I am concerned, there are really only two sections worth visiting in Harrods. They are the Food Hall in the basement and the souvenir store in the second floor. The food hall is indeed a sight to behold for its architecture. I personally think the souvenir store, also called the Harrods Store should be renamed the Harrods Zoo. That's because there are so many tourists and there is so much jostling. It is here where all types of Harrods memorabilia from key chains to Christmas ornaments to the quintessential plastic green and black shopping bags either printed or stitched with the store's logo are sold. It was so chaotic one Monday morning we went to shop. I bought the Harrods tote in black as a memento of my latest visit. I had been meaning to for the longest time. I had to suck it up and paid the high price.

I must have mentioned it here in a previous post, but years ago when Marc and I first visited, we were told to go to a nearby building where we had to leave our bags, totes, other shopping bags, and even our camera otherwise we weren't going to be allowed inside the main Harrods building.

Honestly, I found it too much and too restrictive. "Too pompous," I even thought to myself. On this visit, however, there was no such policy in effect and not only could we bring our backpacks, totes, and other shopping bags in, visitors were taking pictures galore. What a change!

My advice to all future London visitors is to visit the place. That way, you can say you've been to what is now one of London's attractions. However, there is no need to linger. A department store is a department store. They really are the same everywhere. I would even dare say that a number of upscale American retail stores led by Bergdorf's, Neiman Marcus and Saks Fifth Avenue located all across the 50 states beat Harrods any time in terms of merchandising and interior design.