Sightseeing and such

So Thea and I had our first authentically tourist day in London! We woke up fairly early and were out of our hostel in time to get to the National Gallery when it opened at 10am. Thea and I took the highlights audio tour, so we got to see all of the most famed works like da Vinci, etc. The tour was really impressive, very informative and detailed, and we were there for an hour and a half.

Next, we were going to make our way to the south end of London, so we hopped on the tube, but the lines that would take us there were closed so we were a little bit thrown off. But we were able to find the corresponding bus route, so the two of us legitimately had a Londonesque double decker experience. It surprisingly didn't take that long, and we grabbed lunch at a pizza place in St. Catherine's docks before heading over to the Tower of London. It is a MASSIVE castle where many of the British kings and queens have lived, and where a lot of notorious people have been executed (Anne Boleyn, Jane Gray, etc.) We also got to see the crown jewels and they are fabulous, particularly the Imperial Crown of India. Additionally, we got some sweet views of the Tower Bridge.

After that we walked over to St. Paul's Cathedral, where we walked up a total of some 800-odd stairs to get to one of the highest points in London, and certainly one of the best views. You could see practically the entire city, it was pretty overwhelming. I got a little bit dizzy going up just from all the stairs! Afterwards we went to the Tate Modern, which was also a really cool museum, with an especially incredible urban photography exhibit that i loved. We were sort of museumed out by that point, not to mention tired from walking around the south end all day and those stairs, so we hustled back to the station at St. Paul's (the closest one whose lines would take us to Leicester Square) and met up with Corbin, Katherine and Kristen, all USC kids from Cambridge. It's been really good to see them the last two nights, sort of extending my Cambridge experience and making it easier that it's ended, haha. Now Thea and I are back at the hostel and my internet time is about to run out again, but I'll try to update again tomorrow- we're going to the British Museum and Library!

Cambridge: fin

the last several days of Cambridge post-essays were so much fun! Wednesday after class, I went back to Grant Chester with Ning, Jeff and his friend Shawn who flew out to visit him. We went swimming in the Granta, which feeds into the river Cam. It was chilly, muddy and kinda gross, but so much fun just to splash around and be silly. Since it's been really humid/warm all this week, it felt doubly nice. That night, a group of us went to a club called the Fez, and after we got back stayed up in the garden watching daylight come out and being generally ridiculous.

Thursday night was the last dinner at Selwyn Dining Hall, so it was a formal one. We all got dressed up fancy, the boys looked especially dapper in their suits and ties, and enjoyed our last meal all together. They served us wine which was very enjoyable :) To celebrate our final night in Cambridge, we didn't even go out anywhere but stayed in my room and had a low-key, chill night enjoying each other's company. I am so sad that the program is over, I've met such amazing people who I've become so close to in the last 4 weeks. When I left for Europe ago, I never imagined that I would form such close bonds with everyone, but the friendships i've forged have far surpassed my expecations. At least the USC kids I will be able to have semi-regular reunions, and everyone else is required to visit me in LA!! Here's a USC group shot:

So this morning I checked out of the room, Rex and I took a cab to the train station and I was off to London for the second time! I found the hostel and Thea, and we spent the day wandering around. We went to Westminster Abbey and the Churchill War Room/Museum, both of which were really interesting and engaging, and also large and slightly overwhelming, haha. This evening we met up with Corbin, Katherine and Kristen who are all still in London, and we got Indian food (my third round since I've been here, mmmm) before seeing Spamalot, which was excellent and hysterical. I liked it even more than Avenue Q.

Well, I'm writing this on the computer at the hostel and my internet time is about to run off. Sorry I won't have any more pictures for a while, but I'll try to keep updating regularly! To all my Cambridge crew: keep it debonair.

Freedom!!!

So I finished my papers this weekend, which is super exciting because it gives me the rest of this week to fully enjoy the remaining time I have left here at Cambridge! I leave Friday morning and will be taking the train back to London, where I will be meeting up with Thea and resuming my adventures there :) But until then, I am content to live it up here. I will be really sad when it ends, I've met some amazing people and while a lot of them I'll be able to see again at USC, some of them I won't and I'll miss them a lot.

Corbin's birthday was Sunday, so that morning we went to Kings' College and met up with his friend Tomoko there for brunch. It was the same full English breakfast but at a later time than 9am, so I preferred it, haha. This pic is of me, Tomoko, Corbin, Meredith and Nick. That night, we had an ambitious night planned out of clubbing and pubbing but we only made it to the Anchor before realizing that we were all too exhausted to continue. All of my running around on little sleep finally caught up to me that night and it was the first time since I've been here that I've slept for more than 8 hours at night (except the first night when I was seriously jetlagged).

Last night I met up with Khushboo at Revolution and we got to party together for the first time!! It was seriously fun, I got her to drink the Absolut Chambulls (our crew's staple drink there) and we danced together of course, we were a little bit ridiculous. Hopefully I'll get to see her a little bit more this week before I leave!

normalcy

Sorry for the lack of updating!! So it hasn't been a very exciting last few days here, it's been kind of low-key since I've been doing research for my papers, finally. I've been doing a lot of reading in the Selwyn garden the last couple of days since it's been so nice outside! I just take out a blanket and my books and iPod, it's really relaxing. Although the lawns are so well-kept-up, the grass isn't that springy/comfortable, but it's still nice.


On Tuesday, Jeff and I went out to high tea for the first time which was yummy. We went to a place called Auntie's tea shop, and I got the standard cream tea which came with a cress and egg sandwich, two scones, and of course tea. It was a cute little experience, definitely an authentic British one. And the scones were delicious with the clotted cream and strawberry jam!



And yesterday I got my first ice cream cone from one of the many vendors that line the streets of Cambridge. This doesn't sound that exciting until you actually see the double scoops- it's a double cone!!! Super cute, right?? Although a bit melty.

Today we went to The Eagle, a really famous pub in Cambridge that I hadn't been to yet. I had my first British fish and chips which were simultaneously excellent and greasy. We also had pints of Carling, a really tasty lager, and glasses of water with ICE and LEMON!! (you probably don't understand how revolutionary this is, but in Britain all eating establishments are opposed to ice in drinks. The customer service in general is also markedly worse than in the states.)

My papers are going well, I'm almost finished with one and expect to get the other done before Sunday night, which is Corbin's birthday. That way, I'll have all of next week to explore the last of Cambridge, see anything else that I haven't. On the to-do list are punting (actually doing it ourselves this time), the Botanical Garden, Trinity and St. John's College, so I'll have more to document here. Plus, I'll have more time to blog once I actually get these papers done!! Next updates will be both better and more frequent, I swear. (And better-formatted... sorry about that, but I'm too lazy to fix it or make it look prettier right now.) Hope you're all doing well! :)

London: my first taste

In a nutshell… London was AMAZING! I’d flown into Heathrow, so it wasn’t exactly my first time there, but obviously I hadn’t really had time to see any of it while I was there, so I was really looking forward to exploring the big city. Thus follow my exploits, replete with many a picture (yay!):

We departed kinda later Friday than we’d intended because it took a while to rally the troops (there were 6 of us total and I was the only girl… haha), but we finally left Selwyn a little after noon, and walked over to the train station which took maybe 20 minutes. The train to London lasted about 40 minutes because it was the express one that didn’t stop until it got to London. We embarked at King’s Cross and from there immediately transferred to the Underground to tube over to our hotel, which wasn’t too far away from our stop at Great Portland Street. Our hotel room was pretty cozy what with 6 people! We arrived there probably around 4 and just chilled in the room for a while before hopping back on the tube to go get dinner at a pub and meet up with some other USC girls. We all then went to see Avenue Q, which was hilarious! I’d heard some of the songs before but never actually seen the musical, so that was really entertaining. Afterwards we went back on the tube to Soho and spent most of the night at a place called Bar Soho. The drinks were kind of expensive but it was a really fun time anyway. At the end of the night we all packed into our room (3 of us on the bed, 3 scattered throughout the floor space).

Saturday, we wanted to wake up around 10 so that we could meet with Kimberly (our program director) for lunch, but we’d been out late the night before and missed it. Four of us (me, Jeff, Corbin and Chase) were going to see King Lear at The Globe that afternoon, so we tubed it over there before the show started at 2. The performance was incredible- I’d read King Lear freshman year so I could follow the story, and the acting was really stellar. And watching a Shakespearean play acted out in a replica of the original Globe was seriously cool. I’m really glad we had seats though, there were a lot of standing seats and the performance was at least 3 hours; that would have been a long time to stand!

After that, we went back to the hotel and met back up with the other two (Rex and Nick) before going out to an AMAZING Indian restaurant. Seriously, talk to any one of us and we will keep gushing about it. The naan was incredible. British Indian food is renowned and I now know why… we are going to get some for sure back here at Cambridge. Later that night, most of the group went to an underground indie club close to our hotel, but Jeff and I wanted to go out to Soho, so the two of us met up with another USC student Ning and went to Heaven, an ENORMOUS club- it had three separate dance floors/DJs and like 5 bars throughout. We stayed there really late, by the time we left it was daylight again! But it was a fun trek home to our hotel (the tube was closed and we didn’t know the bus routes well enough, so Jeff and I walked all the way back to our hotel). Here is a triumphant picture of the three of us having survived to the morning:


This morning, we woke up around 11 because we had to check out of our hotel by noon. We did so successfully and split up again. Armed with our packed bags, Jeff, Corbin and I tubed to Westminster and saw Big Ben, and also walked around the House of Parliament which is a really neat building, although there's so much security and restricted civilian access you can't see that much of it. We then had a hilariously awful lunch at a local pub before walking over to Buckingham Palace. Unfortunately, there weren’t any of the guards around, but it was still neat to see. It's actually a pretty underwhelming building- grey and rectangular, but the front gates are gorgeous and they all have gold incorporated into it. Afterwards, we walked to the tube station at Victoria, which took us back to King’s Cross where we caught a train to Cambridge and got back around 5pm.

Overall, it was a fabulous whirlwind weekend and I absolutely fell in love with London. My favorite part of being there was just walking around and absorbing the city’s culture and sights, even if we didn’t really have enough time to do much of touristy sightseeing. I definitely got a bearing for London and am really looking forward to exploring it further in two weeks with Thea! But now I’m back to the grindstone, class starts again tomorrow and it’s nigh time to start considering work on my essays… hmm…

HAPPY BIRTHDAY MOM!!!!!!

Sending birthday wishes all the way from England to Sacramento- hope you have a great day! :)


On with the bloggage: Two days ago, a group of the USC kids were hanging out in one of the gardens after class and chilling. It’s so beautiful outside, and it was a really nice and sunny day. The British are really big on upkeep of colorful gardens, so when it’s bright outside it makes it that much prettier. We continued after dinner too and transformed it into a midnight garden party. We’ll have to actually do a picnic out in the garden before we leave with sandwiches and wine :)

Yesterday, I almost overslept because my alarm clock didn’t go off, but luckily I only woke up 25 min late and was still able to catch breakfast. After class, Jeff, Rex and I went out on a run through the countryside out to Grand Chester, which is about 2 miles away from Selwyn College. It took us through some of the residential streets, and the actual trail ran through a lot of meadows, lakes and trees. I swear, I sound like a broken record but everything here is just gorgeous in its quaint little Cambridge way. We had a low-key night afterwards, hanging out in my room. A group of girls who live on my floor also stopped by and chilled with us, which was fun.

This morning I got to sleep in because my A class was cancelled. Instead, we had a field trip to the Fitzwilliam Museum, which is a Cambridge arts and antiquities museum. We only got to spend about an hour there looking at ancient Greek and Roman artifacts, which was really interesting, but I would like to go back to see the other collections. Tonight, I think the boys and I are doing a pub crawl, starting the Gallon Challenge. You have to drink a pint in eight of the different pubs in Cambridge over the span of two weeks, and are ultimately rewarded with an ugly XL t-shirt. Sounds worth it to me!

And we solidified the travel plans for the weekend! We are leaving for London tomorrow, taking the train sometime in the early afternoon, to check into our hotel (Holiday Inn at Regents Park- terribly exotic, I know). Not sure what sightseeing touristy kinds of things we’ll be doing, but we for sure want to see some musicals, Avenue Q and possibly also Spamalot. Saturday is when we get to see King Lear at the Globe, so we’ll have that also. And of course, experiencing the London nightlife! I’m ridiculously excited as I have not yet spent a decent amount of time in London, so I’ll be sure to blog all about it when I get back Sunday night!

shopping, eating and clubbing. (no wonder i love it here...)

Sunday Jeff and I met up with a group of the FL girls (the pic is with Taylor, Stephanie and the two of us) and we ate lunch at this cute little Italian restaurant called Bella Italia on the south side of campus, which we had not explored before. It’s right next to this really pretty lake where there was more punting, naturally. We walked into town and did a little bit of window shopping at Grand Arcade, which is basically the Cambridge mall. I didn’t buy anything because it mostly consists of high-end European retail stores which will suck away my money. That night was the first time all week that we didn’t go out, haha. Instead, we spent some time in the game room after dinner, which has, amongst other amusements, a set of huge Jenga blocks, so that provided massive entertainment. I also beat Corbin repeatedly at Connect Four. Afterwards we chilled in Chase’s room for a while until it was past our respective bedtimes.

Yesterday Jeff and I went shopping again, and this time I actually bought some things because we went to H&M which is relatively cheap (although it still makes me cringe every time I do the mental conversion of pounds to USD), and got two shirts, a sundress and a top for going out for £14- not too bad, right? We grabbed sandwiches at Pret a Manger, a little café slash takeout chain which is delicious. Last night, we went back to Revolution, of which I've included a pic of its daytime appearance, and had what I think was our craziest night there! The pic is of Lindsay, Laura and me- yay Helenes!


Today I’m going to Wagamama with Jeff, Lindsay and Laura (who’s visiting her) and then tonight we’re planning on having our own garden party in Selwyn J I also wanted to go to tonight’s lecture on the American presidential election, I think it would be interesting to hear about it from the point of view of a British academic. Tomorrow Jeff and I are determined to actually run and go out to Grantchester (I have no idea where it is and he partially remembers from last year, so it’ll be an adventure). We’re also trying to arrange for a group of us to go to London for the weekend, since we’re seeing King Lear at the Globe this Saturday anyway, we might as well spend more time there. Hopefully it all works out!