The Countdown Begins!

I will officially be home in 10 days and thus the countdown begins!!!

I have a presentation due at 8 AM and an exam next week but then I am outta here. Its time to start packing I suppose. In the spirit of returning to the states in 10 days, here are 10 reasons why I am excited to go home (in no particular order).

(1) No more UCL classes. GW is superior.

(2) I will stop spending my life's savings at a rapid rate

(3) I get to see all of my friends and family again... ah, how much I miss all of you.

(4) Back to my real bed! This cardboard box they call a mattress is not so great for my scoliosis.

(5) Healthy food. I realize if I tried I could do this is London, but its more expensive and I just don't.

(6) A pedicure. My feet look like a barefooted nomad's. Miles and miles of walking and Primarck flats have killed them. They are super embarrassingly ugly.

(7) Driving. This is something I always miss whenever I am at school. I really just want to drive around with my windows down blasting embarrassing music.

(8) Being Busy. I have too much free time here. I don't know what to do with myself. This is not a joke- I like to be busy and no matter what at home I can find ways to keep myself busy.

(9) Sports. Aka summertime tennis and bike riding and trail running and other things that are so much better in a city thats not as huge and crowded as London.

(10) Never dealing with abroad related issues with Bank of America. This is the major one. I am over it.

And here are 10 things I will miss about London...

(1) Euston Tower Starbucks- they know me, they know my order, its like my home away from home

(2) Indian Food- Brick Lane will be greatly missed.

(3) West End shows- I have recently become obsessed with them.

(4) Being able to travel cheaply and go random places.

(5) The Roadhouse- passion fruit cocktails- explanation enough

(6) Camden Town- cyber dog and chin chins

(7) The friends I have made here... its safe to say I doubt people at GW will have a Kawaii party with me :(

(8) Royal Wedding Souvenirs- they are endlessly entertaining

(9) Museums- i guess i just need to take better advantage of all of the ones in DC

(10) Quirky British TV shows

OK, I really need to stop procrastinating. This presentation is due in 6 hours and I still have a lot of work to do.

An Example of Wedding Madness

A friend (hey Kels) sent me this link. I think it perfectly describes the madness surrounding the Royal Wedding.

Please Enjoy:

http://www.dangerousminds.net/comments/man_gets_prince_william_and_kate_middleton_tattooed_on_his_teeth/

Will & Kate

Today is finally the day the UK (and really the whole world) has been waiting for- The Royal Wedding! I had no idea how seriously people would take this. I mean, I knew there would be celebrations and it would be all over the news, etc, but this was probably a bigger deal for these people than the inauguration was in the US. And trust me, the inauguration was a big deal. London was empty this morning except for a few key places such as Buckingham Palace, Westminster Abbey, and all along the parade route (obviously) and Hyde Park and Trafalgar Square (where public streamings were going on). It was almost eerie. Besides the random royal wedding decorations adourning the street, all I saw was empty roads and dark buildings as I made my way to the festivities.

People started camping out towards Buckingham 4 days ago! I can't even imagine waiting in one spot for four days! Don't get me wrong, I love a good royal romance story just as much as the next person but heading out at 6 this morning was about as early as I could do. A few friends and I headed to Trafalgar Square where they put up big screens and threw a little wedding party of its own. There were souvenir booths, food booths media tents, and yes even people selling champagne so noone would have to miss out on toasting to the young couple. I stayed in Trafalgar from the first live broadcasting of the events leading up to the wedding until the couple's procession arrived at Buckingham Palace. Then I headed back to my room and watched the infamous kiss on the balcony on live youtube streaming.

My thoughts on the wedding:

(1) Kate Middleton looked beautiful! I loved her dress (yay Sarah Burton) and her hair and her make-up (which she did by herself I may add). I thought it was the perfect combination of more understated while still fitting for a grand cathedral and a wedding that estimated 2 billion people were watching throughout the world.

(2) The service was a bit long and boring at times but lovely nonetheless. I guess with that much hype around an event you have to drag it out for longer than 30 minutes.

(3) The couple is adorable together.

(4) That was the most interesting guest list to watch enter.

(5) Prince Harry absolutely must be my future boyfriend.

(6) The kiss from the balcony was a little bland (especially the first one but they kind of redeemed themselves on the second one)

and finally...

(7) I really really wish I was invited.

Remembering Why I Love London

Lately I have been feeling a little homesick. Well, not really homesick, just kind of ready to go home. I feel like I have had my study abroad experience and now its about time to head back to where I've known people for longer than 2 months and I have my normal routine, etc. Don't get me wrong I love my study abroad experiences thus far and honestly I am sure that as soon as I get home I will probably want to hop on a plane and head back to London. But let's just say I was hitting a bit of a slump.

But then my mom came to visit and my friend Fernando just came in to visit and something about showing people around my life in London makes me realize how much I really do love this city. All of the options I have. From West End Musicals to Museums to Great Coffee to Happy Hours with Passion Fruit Cocktails.

Its good to have a reminder every once in awhile about how luck I am.

With all of this being said, Fernando and I are heading off to Brussels early tomorrow morning and then on to Amsterdam before heading back to London. Always on the road.

Bright Dresses, Feather Headbands, and Fur Coats

Translation of title is--- Its London Fashion Weekend!!!

For the record, sadly no I was not invited to attend a designers runway show. I did however get to buy a ticket to fashion weekend, which is an ongoing event the few days after the official fashion week. They take one of the main tents of fashion week and host a catwalk that shows some of the highlights from the past week. You can also get tickets to enter the designer sample sale where everything is marked down a lot, up to about 80% off I'd say. Of course, I bought tickets to both!

What may not be apparent by how I actually dress is that I really do love fashion. What I don't like is spending the money or energy on being fashionable so alas I where the same basic outfits over and over again but thats life. My dream for years and years was to work for Teen Vogue. And yes, this was my dream before the hills and no I do not aspire to be LC. Anyways, I have been so excited about this catwalk/ sample sale because I have never been to a real fashion show and I figure that London will be even more fashion forward than New York, right? Plus designer clothes at 80% off isn't bad either. Maybe I'll buy some stuff so all of these chic London girls stop showing me up with their fantastically grunge wardrobes.

Sarah and I got to the tent around 3 30 and the show started at 6, so we had time to look around at the sale and do some shopping. I kind of forgot before hand that a $600 pair of shoes at 60% off is still way over my budget, so for most of the clothes I admired and walked away. I did buy one dress though! Its a bright orange, flowy dress. It was only 20 pounds. I can picture myself now walking through the sand in Cannes then throwing on my color-blocked sandals (that I do not yet own) and walking through the streets of the Riviera. Yeah, embarrassing imagery. What can I say? I like to imagine where I will wear clothes before I buy them. And I am going to Cannes in April so it's perfect!

I also bought a fashion weekend gift bag. Not because of the stuff inside of it though. It was all lame. They gave me mouthwash and hairspray and mentos and I honestly haven't even looked through it all yet so maybe there's something good hiding deep inside. I bought the gift bag because of the bag itself. Its a regular tote but it has a sketch of the building and says London Fashion Weekend and has purple straps. I really just want to go shopping with it at trader joes when I get back to GW and make everyone jealous when they read it and think I was invited to some exclusive show of London Fashion Week. That really is my sole purpose for buying the bag. Well that and the purple straps. I do love purple.

Moving on- the show itself was OK. It was really cool to actually be inside of the tent, and some of the clothes were great (especially the series on bright color-blocking, I'm kind of into bright colors at the moment if you haven't noticed), but the way it was set up was weird. I guess I was expecting like a normal catwalk type thing, but it wasn't. There were weird interruptions throughout of ads or this random woman talking. It was fun nonetheless though, so I am glad I went. And I am really excited about my new dress.

Work it Girl!

Just on the catwalk after the show :)

Where Time Begins

So, this week is reading week. Meaning no classes. Meaning I am already 1/2 way through my lectures. It's crazy, by the end of March I will be done going to classes. Then I have April off, 2 exams in May and still have my flat through middle of June. That leaves a lot of time to be a tourist. Something I am becoming supremely good at! My latest tourist excursion? Greenwich.

So, I learned today, while actually in Greenwich, that it is actually in London, in Zone 2. I have always thought of it as its own city until I got there and saw the O2 stadium and other various London landmark buildings and until my directionally gifted friend informed me its part of London. It only takes about 30 minutes to get there via tube/above ground train. This just goes to show how huge London is. I think its about 700 square miles? That's one big city.

Greenwich is kind of exactly what I expected it to be. As soon as we get there its loads of British style red brick houses and then there is one section in the middle of town with majestic white stone buildings (the historic part, no doubt).

As everyone knows, Greenwich is home to the Prime Meridian and Greenwich Mean Time aka where time begins so to speak. There is other stuff too, like the National Maritime Museum, some college, The Queen's House which was one of the homes of many of the tutor Kings and Queens, the Royal Observatory, shopping, markets, restaurants, etc.

The Maritime Museum and Queen's House were average at best (well they were really beautiful on the outside, but there is nothing much inside).

The Royal Observatory was cool though. When you walk up the hill to get to it, you can take pictures on the Prime Meridian. Another thing to check off the bucket list. Since I went to the equator while in Kenya a few years ago, and the Prime Meridian today, now all I need to do is go to where they both meet. Anyone want to take a cruise with me to the Gulf of Guinea? I am beginning a sign-up sheet so let me know ;)

Oh hey, standing on two hemispheres!

Greenwich is also supposed to have some cute stores and a cool vintage shop but for some reason when we got done with all of the sight-seeing stuff at 5 everything was closed. So strange. I guess this just means that I will have to come back at some point.

Reading week continues, so hopefully I will get to do some more UK touring!

PS: Happy Valentine's Day! I just love holidays, especially one that involves sparkling wine and chocolate :)

Cultural Immersion UK Style

So, when I decided to come to the UK a lot of people were like "Why go somewhere that speaks the same language?" Or "It's just like a better/worse (depending on the person) version of the US?" Or "You should go somewhere more interesting and/or exotic."

Well, I am officially here to say that the UK is plenty culturally dissimilar. I mean sure I am not becoming fluent in another language while abroad or sure it's more similar to the US than many parts of the globe, but its not like I'm just in a distant part of DC or anything. I mean I've only been here for about 3 weeks and I have already been introduced to 2 new languages (native to the UK), eaten a whole bunch of food I've never heard of or tasted, and learned a whole lotta history I didn't know before.

First for the languages:

Croeso i Gymru means "Welcome to Wales" in Welsh, which is one of the weirdest languages I've ever heard by the way. I went to Cardiff, Wales Friday and the language spoken sounds nothing like it looks written. In fact, written it looks completely unpronouncable. There are approximately 10 consonants per vowel (I reserve the right for artistic exaggeration). Well that is until you take into count that y's are always vowels and w's are also vowels. Millenium Stadium, where all the rugby and soccer matches are played, is spelled Stadiwm y Mileniwm. And Wales is spelled Cymru though you change it to Gymru in certain sentences. And Cardiff Castle is Castell Caerdydd. Don't try to pronounce these out loud unless you know Welsh because you will inevitably mispronounce.

Second language? None other than Cockney or Cockney Rhyming Slang or whatever you prefer to refer to it as. Granted, it's not a language proper and its kind of along the lines of pig latin or jibberish but its different in the fact that it holds cultural and historical value, oh and the fact that its way more fun to learn. I have recently been introduced to Cockney talk by a lovely Canadian who's been here since first term, a dapper young englishmen, and a few others along the way. Its now officially my goal to learn as much as possible and annoyingly speak it to everyone who won't understand when I return to the states.

Cockney lesson 101 (aka some of my favorite words I've learned): Rosie is tea, dog and bone is phone, ruby is curry, Anchor Spreadable is incredible, Alan is flu, and Antiseptic is Antiamerican. How do Cockney rhymes work you may ask? Well, they are like rhyming word associations, so some are obvious like dog and bone phone but others are more complicated antiseptic. Septic tank= yank so antiseptic means anti-yank or antiamerican. Apparently you just have to learn the vocab and while new words are occasionally made you can't really make it up as you go.

Ok, now for weird food:

Raclette- its a swiss dish I think. Its this cheese that heated and bubbled and then scraped over potatoes and pickles

Mulled Wine- ok this isn't that weird but I had never had it until I got here and here its everywhere, especially outdoor markets because its so cold and now I'm officially a fan

Pies- the British will put anything in a pie. Just think Sweeney Todd.

pickled everything- they seem to love pickles, and pickled sandwiches and museums have pickled animals...

Mayonnaise crazy- they love mayonnaise and not in moderation

Chips vs. Crisps- chips are french fries, crisps are potato chips

OK and I am not going into all of the European history I'm learning because that is both boring for me to write and boring for you to read. In summary, however, it involves art museums, bus tours, castle visits and the like.

Weird Things About This Place

So, I have been here for about a week now and have had two full days of classes so far. I thought it was about time to inform all of you about some of the weird things about school in London. Some good, some a little less than good. Most good though, really, I'm not just saying that.

(1) Most of my classes meet once a week. And I have 4 classes, so unless I change my classes (which I may) I have 4 class sessions all week and one optional tutorial (aka discussion section). So far no classes on Friday and none on Monday until 2. Some of my classes are 3 hours long but it really doesn't feel all too bad because... leading to number...

(2) I get breaks in the middle of my classes. In my infectious diseases in developing countries class we literally stopped for tea. My professor said lets break for tea and everyone went to the cafe downstairs. It felt really stereotypical but in a really good way.

(3) Our student union has bars, like school sponsored, alcoholic beverage selling bars. And they have drinks for 1 pound.

(4) Students go out on Monday nights. But not so much on Thursday nights.

(5) You don't buy textbooks but you have about 5 times as much reading.

(6) Everything, food and gym memberships and coffee, are all cheaper on-campus. This makes sense to me but its definitely different than GW.

(7) Class meetings end in March, we have the month of April off, and May and June are only exams.

(8) Some of my classes have like 8 lecturers. Its an Intro course so I guess they're trying to cover all of the basics, but who do you get in touch with? Who's office hours do you go to?

Thats all I can really think of right now, but thats just the weird things about the school system. Once I figure out everything more, I'll let you in on all the weird language and cultural difference.

Room Pics as Promised!!

Yesterday I said I would post some pictures of my room as soon as I finished unpacking and today I finally found clothes hangers so its all done! And as promised, here are some pictures. And take it in because i doubt my room will ever be this clean and organized again.

The bed half of the room....

Isn't my new bedding cute? And notice my painting from kenya on the dresser... And yes that is my suitcase at the end of my bed with a lace table runner draped over it ...

And here is the other half of the room...

Desk, chair, sink, bright blue door, you know the usual suspects (and a new red coat because I left my peacoat in Marietta)

And now for the kitchen...

The bright blue paint appears again. I've decided I'm a fan of it. It brings a little caribbean to cloudy, rainy England.

I have a bathroom too but bathroom pictures seem kind of weird to me. I have a sink, a toilet, and a shower like every other bathroom. Nothing fancy but it works and seems to have hot water most of the time so I'm happy!

And if you haven't already, read my former post because this is just kind of a boring picture post.

Arrived in London! My Pride Has Not...

I'm here! and finally. That was probably the single most ridiculous travel experience I have ever had and that's saying a lot. So sadly I must admit that this time I have to blame myself rather than the airlines or other incompetent passengers, etc.

First of all, I had been waiting to hear from UCL about housing since the 'middle of December' which is when I was told I would be informed if I had somewhere to live or not. Jan 4 rolls around (the day I leave) and I still haven't heard anything. I look at my address information listed on UCL's version of Blackboard and it vaguely says "Schafer House" with no room number or anything. Then I kept reading these emails about having to confirm housing and pay the deposit prior to arrival which I obviously didn't do because I hadn't received my formal offer so I didn't have the paperwork or anything. So, this is probably not my smartest decision, but I decided to hop on the plane to London with no idea where I would be living. And on the way to the airport is where the fun started...

As many of you know, I'm not always the most organized person in the world and I have a really convenient habit of forgetting things. And usually important things. Generally I'll forget deodorant or pajamas or underwear or something like that when I travel. Important, no doubt, but it can be bought. This time I decided to forget all of the paperwork necessary to get my Visa once I got to Heathrow... and realized while in the heart of downtown Atlanta, around 6 PM, in traffic. Probably the most annoying time ever because you're not at the airport yet so you feel like you should turn around... But of course time was not my friend. Oh and to top it off I forgot my coat on my way to one of London's coldest winters ever. Sitting on the kitchen bar so i wouldn't forget it. I give myself far too much credit.

Well, my mom and I came up with a somewhat genius plan. When she got home she would scan all the documents to my email and then when I got off the flight I would cry, get them to let me into a business class computer center or whatever those things are and print them off. We even had it down to how and when I would tell the flight attendants my situation and everything. It was the perfect plan. But do those things ever work out as you plan them, really?

I get to the check-in desk and things start getting better. I don't have to pay for any of my luggage and with a little rearranging nothing was over the weight limit. Then there is no line at security (a miracle of the most unexpected kind in the infamous Atlanta airport). Then there is a money exchange near my gate so I get some pounds etc. so all looks well.

The flight goes by smooth enough, I don't sleep very well and there is this odd old british man who keeps smiling at me but besides that no complaints. I watched the social network and they put lemon in my diet coke :) (Kelsey, if you read this I was thinking of you when he asked if I wanted lemon hehe it may be a sign that you were supposed to be in London this semester)

Then I get to the airport and there is no business center before immigration so that I can print my documents. And no one to ask so naturally I just go up to the immigration officer and explain my horrifyingly embarrassing situation which of course makes him give me the "you silly American girl face" but politely helps me anyway. Then with people line up behind me I plop my laptop on the counter and pull up the email attachments one by one. And somehow with a laugh he lets me into the country.

Then I get my bags, walk through customs without showing them anything (what's the point of customs if all you do is walk through it with no checks?) and once I'm sitting outside at the terminal I realize I still don't have anywhere to stay. And no phone. So I'm emailing my parents who are talking to housing while I wheel around my bags on a cart and look like a paranoid homeless person when I freak out that someone stole my wallet when it was at the top of my carry-on. I think it should be said that I'm generally a laid-back person. Most of the time I'm even unreactive to a fault. The lack of sleep and build-up of stress had really turned me in to a crazed maniac.

Then my parents call say that they talked to the residences office and they gave them the name of the place I'm staying I just need to go in and sign a form accepting the offer. Relief! Well, somewhat. I still had 2 bags and 2 carry-ons to drag around and 2 addresses to find that say only the street name and no number. Luckily however I got the nicest cab driver in the world I'm certain. He takes me to campus stays with me while I find where I need to go (and actually he was the one who eventually found where I need to go) and helps me with all of my bags. The only bad part of the cab ride was that it cost 90 pounds. For you US folks, please google convert that. It's quite a fun number.

Once I found my room, however, I must say its worth it. I have my own bed room with a big window and a sink and mirror and then share a bathroom and kitchen with one other girl. Its really a beautiful room, especially after I bought all of my bedding and started to put my stuff away (which is still in the process in case you were wondering)

And now I'm finally getting settled in and went to get groceries so I could break my 36 hour soy latte fast...

Let's just hope that all of my registration stuff in the next couple of days runs a little more smoothely. Oh and after already spending up my prepaid minutes I have decided that international calls are not in my budget so please send me your skype information if you want to keep in touch :)

Much love,

E