Elizabeth's London Experience

A State-side Update

2009-09-19T19:23:00.001-07:00

I had so much fun writing this blog last spring while I was in London! I truly miss living in such a fun and beautiful city. As a reader, I hope you enjoyed following my semester experience. Through using his expertise on tracking web traffic, my father was able to conclude that I had many hits each day while I was updating this blog actively - very exciting feedback for me!

I have had a few readers contact me with insightful questions about my trip. I am still (and always will be) happy to answer any questions anyone has about studying abroad/London/etc., so please do not hesitate to contact me!

With that, if you are interested in reading more from me, I have created a new blog where I am currently writing about my senior year at IU! Feel free to check it out: http://elizabethiu.blogspot.com/

Thanks so much for being such a loyal reader!

Cheers,
Elizabeth

What I Did In Italy - Part 2

2009-06-16T23:44:00.001-07:00

"Just A Romer"
"Rome if you want to"
...And other cool songs where I can change Roam to Rome

Sorry I never finished the Rome Part 2 entry until now! Better late than never, I suppose!

Tuesday:

Derek and I rode to Rome via a bus from the Siena bus station to a smaller bus station in Rome (the big one has trains, busses, and an airport). When we got to the bus station, we were disappointed to find out that the walking directions were not going to help us because we were literally fenced into the property. So we finally figured out how to hop on the metro and took it one stop to Bologna Square. Our hostel was really easy to find from there, and the hostel was cool because its theme was global travelling.

The guy at the front desk told us some inexpensive places to eat near the university, so we ventured toward that direction for lunch. It started pouring when we were walking, and when we went to the restaurants, most of them were closed for an afternoon siesta. So we ate gelato for lunch. Totally justified.

Next we walked up to the Trevi fountain, and explored that area. We also bought the Roma Pass, which came in handy a lot! It gave us free travel on the Metro for three days and free admission to two museums of our choice. From there, Derek and I started sightseeing around all of Rome. That night we went to the Pantheon and walked around and saw as many ancient ruins as possible. Also, it would be silly if I didn't mention that we chose to eat at a Chinese restaurant we found (instead of eating Italian food for the first time during the trip). Although the restaurant had awesome decor, the food was not up to my standards.

Me, my broken umbrella, and some light drizzle in front of the Pantheon.

Wednesday:

Wednesday we woke up and went straight to the Colosseum. I sang the song from the Arthur cartoon to Derek way too many times (he unfortunately had not had the pleasure of seeing that episode). It goes, "AAAAAncient Roooooome....It's not like hooooome....COOOOOOLLISEUMMMM!" And those are the only lyrics. Here's some pictures:

A picture of the interior. You can see the passages under where the floor used to be.

Me and Derek at the Colosseum. We found another American couple to take this picture.

Then Derek got a hold of my map and decided to start highlighting our route around Rome so that we could see where we had been and what we had seen. Needless to say, by walking way more than I was used to, we saw almost every single landmark in Rome on Wednesday. Here's some pictures:

Me overlooking all of the ruins of Ancient Rome.

Me sitting inside the Roman Forum.

Me at the Trevi Fountain when it WASN'T raining!

Thursday:

On Thursday Derek and I woke up early and went to Vatican City. We stood in line for about an hour waiting to go into St. Peter's Basilica. It was pretty cool inside. Very big church. Lot's of pretty things to look at. The weather had really cleared up by Thursday, so luckily it was a sunny day to stand in line!

To my disappointment, we ended up not going to see the Sistine Chapel (pretty much the sole reason why I wanted to go to Vatican City), because we didn't want to wait in line anymore. So we took the metro back to the center of Rome and went to all of the last tourist sites on our map that we did not hit. I think I liked the Spanish steps the most, because they were such a cool hangout! Derek also bought some paintings for his family from a street painter by the river, and I really enjoyed talking to the man briefly. I think he liked us too, cuz he threw in some extra wood paintings of his with Derek's purchases. Here's a picture of the Spanish steps:

A child playing with his grandfather at the fountain in front of the Spanish Steps. The fountain is really old.

Friday:

On Friday we took the metro back to Florence and I got to have dinner with my sorority sister Rachel and her friend Lauren who also goes to IU! They both studied in Bologna this spring and really loved it. We ate at a fun outdoor cafe, and I had some really delicious pasta and white wine. It was so much fun to see a friend from home!

When Derek and I went back to our hostel, we had a really rare and gross experience. We ended up finding bugs in our sheets and on our walls! So we got our money back and walked to the hostel we stayed at the first time we were in Florence and purchased a room there for the night. It was probably around midnight when we finally got that all sorted out. It was a huge hassle, and also very surprising because the bug hostel had good ratings on hostelworld. But, I guess strange things sometimes happen when you travel! My recommendation is to have the location of a back-up hostel written down when you travel to a city in Europe.

Saturday:

Saturday morning Derek and I woke up and went to the train station, only to find that the train we wanted to take had left 5 minutes before we got there. Because we had an issue with reading the train schedule for that day (remember our language barriers), we had a scare that the trains did not go to Pisa once per hour like we had thought. Luckily, we were wrong and we grabbed a local train that made a stop in every city (Pisa, too, luckily). Even though the train took much longer than we expected, we still arrived at the Pisa airport in time to grab lunch before our flights. (Both of our flights took off within 5 minutes of eachother's.)

There were a couple issues at check-in, though. Derek's line was super long and barely moved, creating a scare that he would not make his flight on time. I ended up convincing the attendants in my line after the London line was finished to check Derek in for his flight, which I feel proud about since they barely understood what I was saying. Also, I got a weird look from my attendant when I checked in for my London flight, since my visa had expired two days before. Thankfully, I brought proof of my return flight to Chicago just for that reason, and she stamped my ticket.

Sunday/Monday:

Before I flew back to Chicago on Monday, I spent a lot of time by myself wandering around my old neighborhood, chilling in Hyde Park, and doing some casual London shopping. I also hung out with Christine and Erin at Hyde Park a little bit too, which was nice because the park was beautiful! Also, I got my bags out of storage, and I recommend to anyone who would think about trying this that they should never try to take two 50-pound bags on the tube. The tube is not always handicapped accessible, and I learned that the hard way by needing to pull both bags up many giant flights of stairs. I really lucked out that I had a man and a women (angels from God) come and help me with the longest flight up the stairs. I had literally sweat through my shirt when I got back to the hostel, and the man at the front desk felt so badly for me that he let me store my bags for free overnight. I really should have spent money on a cab!

Overall, my Italy trip was really great, and I'm glad I'm finally able to document it completely!

Just Keep Your Eye On The Prize

2009-05-15T22:44:00.001-07:00

The draft about my trip to Italy is still in the works, and will be published once it is complete and to my liking. Please bare with me, as I have had a very busy past two weeks with flying home to Chicago, flying to Tucson soon after to begin my summer internship, and then flying back to Chicago this weekend to tend to family matters. However, I have not forgotten about my Italy entry, so do not fret! I appreciate your patience with me.

In regards to my last entry, jet lag was a killer. My body was confused for three days after returning to Chicago. I would take long naps in the late afternoon out of necessity. I recommend thinking about and preparing for jetlag both on your flights to and from overseas destinations.

As for right now, if you have any questions for me about studying abroad (especially in London or even about my London program), feel free to comment and ask me. I will address them as best and detailed as I can.

What I Did In Italy - Part 1

2009-05-11T20:45:00.000-07:00

Saturday, April 25:

On Saturday morning I left Palace Court at 6:30 am to take a cab to Paddington station. I got there about 6:45 and waited around the station for 15 minutes for the Left Luggage office to open with everything I owned in tow. Finally it opened, and I easily stored my two massive suitcases. From there, I took the tube to Liverpool Street. At Liverpool Street, I got on the Stansted Express train and took it to Stansted Airport. When I was checking in at Stansted, I realized that I had signed up for online check in when I ordered my tickets, so they charged me a large fee for checking in at the airport instead. Budget airlines are so tricky with the ways they decide to charge more money.

Since I woke up so early that morning, my flight to Pisa Airport was pretty uneventful. I slept most of the way. The only cool part was when we were descending, the pilot flew over the Mediterranean Sea, which was a gorgeous turquoise color. We could see sail boats and the shadows of underwater reefs from the air. Also, we could see the Tuscan coast and the Leaning Tower of Pisa during the descent. The views were absolutely stunning!

When I got to the Pisa Airport, I just followed a group of three older British couples, because I heard they were headed to Florence as well. It was slightly complicated, since there are only two direct trains from the Pisa Airport to Florence each day. Either I had to wait four hours for the train, or I had to catch a bus to Pisa Central Station and then take a train to Florence from there. By following the couples, I found out how to buy a bus ticket, where the buses picked up, and how to get to Pisa Central. I went to the ticket counter right away and bought my ticket to Florence for 5.60 euro. Shortly thereafter, I tried calling Derek, and started to freak out that my phone didn't allow me to dial his number. I probably tried 30 times.

Somehow I got on the train to Florence after some wait at the station, and I spent the first half of the train ride desperately trying to find a way to contact Derek. I even called Talk Mobile's customer service internationally, and they were absolutely no help. Then I called two of my friends as well as my parents. I was really nervous about having used up most of my talk credit and not having a way to "top up" while in Italy, and finally Derek called me to see where I was. I told him that I had been freaking out because he hadn't sent me the name of the hostel or directions how to get there like I had asked him several times to do (since he had made the reservations), and I was really insecure in a foreign country by myself with no way of contacting him. He re-assured me that he would pick me up from the train station and that I didn't have anything to worry about anymore. (Of course he was 20 minutes late picking me up from the station due to him getting lost, and I yet again freaked out for a little while.)

After we found each other, we walked around Florence for a while enjoying the city. It's really pretty, and my favorite place we went that night was a pizzaria in the Piazza Signora. I ordered my meal in Italian courtesy of the handy-dandy Italy guidebook that I borrowed from my uncle Frank.

On our way to the hostel from the restaurant, we stopped at a delicious gelateria where I had my first taste of Italian gelato! Needless to say, it was devine.

That night we stayed in an 8-person hostel room at the Hostel Santa Monaca (which was pretty nice). It was interesting because everyone else in the room spoke English, even though everyone else was from Holland, Italy, and Japan. I really enjoyed learning about their reasons for travelling in Europe.

Sunday, April 26:

On Sunday, Derek and I wanted to get a head-start on sightseeing, so we woke up early and started walking around Florence. We stopped at a coffee shop along the way, where I hoped I could find a mocha. No such luck. That was the beginning of my disappointment in finding out that Italy did not invent the mocha, and that it must have been Starbucks. Also, Starbucks does not exist in Italy. Another interesting tid-bit about Italian breakfast is that it's not big, and includes just a small cup of cappuccino with foam and a "sweet" such as a donut or glazed croissant.

As for sightseeing, we went to El Duomo, the outdoor market, the Ponte Vecchio, and outside the Ufizzi. We didn't go in that art museum because the line was estimated to take 3 hours. It would have come in handy if we had reserved tickets in advance. With that, it was raining off and on the whole time, which means my pictures are kinda drab-looking. However, we did go inside the Accademia de Arte and saw "The David" as well as other cool statues! That was an amazing cultural experience, for sure.

Then, around sunset, we followed what our guidebook told us to do and we went to the lookout point (Via de Michaelangelo???). Even though it was really cloudy, it was a cool climb and had pretty views!

For both lunch and dinner we ate at El Dante Pizzaria. At lunch, Derek spilled water all over the table at lunch. We had the same waiter for dinner, who was very nice and recognized us as the people who spilled water during lunch. During our dinner trip we ate with our roommate named Lincoln from Singapore. Then the three of us went and got gelato before heading back to the hostel to go to bed.

Monday, April 27:

Monday morning Derek and I woke up very early and took the train to Siena from Florence. It was a pretty cloudy day with the occasional rain bursts. When we got to the Siena train station, we didn't know which bus to catch. Also, I was pretty hungry so I decided to get some food from the grocery store in the train station. However, when I took the apple up to the register, they started talking to me in Italian about how I needed a ticket for it. So I told them in English that I just didn't want it anymore. Needless to say, they didn't understand me, and I basically made a fool out of myself. The woman behind the counter went to the other side of the store for me to get a ticket for my apple, holding up the line. I felt so badly.

Anyway, after that we went downstairs and couldn't figure out the bus system because there was no bus map and the timetable was in Italian. After trying to figure out the bus system for about a half hour, we decided just to take a taxi to the hostel.

The hostel was very simple, but fine for just the night. It was kinda far from the city, but I hear it's the only hostel in town with linens. So we took a bus to the city and then started walking around. We ate at a restaurant that some friends of Derek's recommended, which was near the Duomo. Then we went and checked out the Duomo, the Piazza Central, and the big fort near the bus station. Siena is very old, and all of the buildings are an earthy reddish brown color. Also, the city is very historical, because back in medieval times it used to be a huge rival to Florence.

For dinner Derek and I went to a local pizzaria near our hostel that ended up being very delicious. I had learned how to say sausage pizza in Italian by then, so I had the sausage pizza and Derek and I both had the house wine. By the time we were done with our meal, the entire restaurant had totally filled up and there were people waiting out the door. It obviously was a good place to go according to the locals. The only downfall about that night was that after we were done with dinner (around 8:30) there was literally nothing for us to do around our hostel. I tried to go to the combination McDonalds/gas station to get something to read, and even the gas station was closed. I recommend bringing a fun book to read when you're travelling for times like that when there is literally nothing to do.

Sleep

2009-05-06T18:16:00.000-07:00

I am suffering from jet lag. Please be patient with the Italy update. It will come. I am giving you my word.

Greetings From Rome!

2009-04-29T22:38:00.000-07:00

Buon Giorno! I'm not sure if I spelled that right. But I hear just saying ciao is pretty informal. I wanted to be fancy.

Anyway, I'm sitting in my hostel right now in Rome typing this blog post. Derek and I have been having a crazy week. I will give a lot of details later, but for now I just wanted to type a brief update.

I am already done with my study abroad program. Last week I had finals. On Friday I had a really busy day because I finished my final paper for the equivalent of IU's Z302, went to City University to turn it in (very long commute), ate Chinese with Haley and Christine, and then I had to pack for home and get all of my stuff together for Italy.

On Saturday morning I woke up really early to take a cab at 6:30am to Paddington Station to leave my giant suitcases at the left luggage drop off. (Hopefully they are doing ok there.) Then I flew Ryanair from Stansted all the way to Pisa. From the Pisa airport I had to take a train into the city, and then another train to Florence. I had a slight freak out because my phone was not letting me call Derek, but he finally called me and we figured out how to meet up.

So far we've been to Florence, Siena, and Rome. Today was our last full day in Rome, and we are waking up early tomorrow to take a train from Rome Termini to Florence SMN stations. Tomorrow night is our last hostel stay, and then we are both flying out of Pisa (I have to take the same complicated route to get back to the airport) at the same time, but I'm going to London and Derek is going to Seville. Crazy planning was involved, but it's been a fun week.

Well, that's my update for now. I will write with fun details later!

Apparently, I am a hayfever sufferer

2009-04-22T09:52:00.000-07:00

It is becoming hayfever season here in England, and apparently I am one of those afflicted with the allergy. I've been taking a Boots-brand hayfever pill once a day in the morning, which helps for about the first 12 hours, and then makes it challenging to sleep. I looked at the prevention tips online for hayfever (at medinfo.co.uk if you must know), and prevention is not in my favor. Here they are, accompanied with why I am suffering so much:

1.) In the summer stay inside between 5pm and 7pm, when pollen counts are usually high. Keep windows and doors closed, especially at these times and when sleeping. I am always outside during this time due to commuting. Also, my roommates and I basically have to keep our windows open at all times or else it gets unbearably hot in our room.

2.) Use an air conditioner or filter when possible, at home, work, and in the car, to remove pollen and other allergens from the air. There is no air conditioner or filter in any building that I frequent.

3.) Damp dust and vacuum your home regularly, to minimise the presence of pollen and dust. My roommates and I have discussed how the Palace Court cleaning lady never vacuums our room thoroughly. I also do not have individual access to a vacuum.

4.) Airing bedclothes in direct sunlight is also helpful. I do not have direct sunlight to air my bedclothes.

5.) Be aware of the pollen count (usually broadcast along with the weather), and avoid areas of high pollen concentration, eg long grass, lawn mowings, and trees if allergic to these. If you need to work in these environments consider wearing a mask and goggles. I live next to a giant park called Kensington Gardens.

6.) Avoid unnecessary extra irritants such as smoke and chemical fumes. My sole mode of daily transportation is the polluted underground tube system.

As you can tell, I have all factors against me. Sleeping has become difficult, because now I have nose, eye, and throat problems along with an unfathomably uncomfortable mattress.

I also just got home from taking my only written final exam this week - marketing. We had two hours to choose five out of ten questions that he asked, and form detailed answers. I studied a lot, but I do not know just how detailed he wanted me to be. Out of seven people in the class, I was the last finished, though. Pretty typical of me. It has been very difficult to transition from being graded primarily through multiple choice exams at IU to all essay exams at City/Arcadia.

Now for some fun blog topics that I jotted down as they came to me while I was at Starbucks studying for my marketing exam (it's air conditioned so it was good for my health...that's my defense).

First, customer service at Starbucks is very different here in a negative way. They do not ask for anyone's names, and using a credit card slows down the process instead of speeds it up. No one is accustomed to "swipe cards" here, because the Brits use a pin number like a signature.

Second, if you are a big ziplock baggie and full gallon of milk fan, you should probably not study in Britain. Instead of ziplock baggies, they have baggies that stick together at the top like stickers/post it note glue. It's extremely awkward, and makes it much harder to put food into the bag and seal it perfectly. My best description of my attempts would be if you peeled off a really long piece of scotch tape to use on something very high, and the tape just flaps in the air and sticks to itself instead of staying straight.

Third, the Body Shop is much bigger here than it is in America. You will see a Body Shop in every city in Britain.

Finally, I find it strange that expensive cosmetics are sold in Boots - the equivalent of Walgreens or CVS. For example, the Boots store near me has an large, all-inclusive Lancome counter. There are some Boots stores that have every high-end cosmetics brand inside the store, just like you would see in Macys or Dillards back home. Why do the cosmetic companies place their products in Boots as a distribution outlet? I have yet to find out.

Ok that's it for my thoughts this week. I move out of Palace Court on Saturday, which is starting to get really depressing. I've loved living with all of the people in my program, and I'm going to miss them a lot when I go home. Only three of us who live in Palace Court go to IU, so it will be weird saying goodbye to so many people.

By the way, I think I already mentioned that I'll be in Italy next week before I fly home. I will try to update from internet cafes as best as I can.

Just A Roamer

2009-04-15T14:23:00.000-07:00

I've been quasi-sick since Monday, which I'm trying to get over. I can't diagnose the problem, because it's like a cold with some extra weird symptoms. I'm stuffy, have extremely irritated eyes (in a way that's never happened to me while sick), and I'm very achey. Today after I got home from work/class I took a 3 hour nap, and still woke up feeling as achey as I did all day. Wish me luck that my health improves!

So tomorrow is my last day at work. I'd have to say that I feel ready to end work, only because I'm sick/tired where the manual labor is more difficult this week and because I need to start studying for all of my finals next week. Yesterday was the first and only day that I skipped work all semester, and I did so in order to work on my internship dissertation.

Speaking of my internship dissertation, it's all done! Thank goodness. I turned it in this morning. It ended up being 43 pages single-spaced including a four page bibliography and lot's of appendices. I ended up writing around 8300 words, which my supervisor said was fine despite the maximum word limit of 7500. My big concern, though, is that UPS printed it so that the page numbers got screwed up, and I didn't have enough time to re-print it because I would have been late for work. I let the Arcadia office know that it was UPS' fault, so hopefully it's not a big deal.

On a happier note, it was like an English summer here in London today! It was around 70 degrees and partly cloudy. The entire day I was sweating because it was so humid and I didn't realize it was supposed to be so warm.

The tube was extremely hot today, especially the central line. I'm not sure why the central line always seems to be the warmest. I've finally determined that the Northern line consistantly smells like pollution, while the other lines do not. I'm not sure if that's because the Northern line is older or the deepest (which I've only heard because someone told me that people hid out in the Northern line during the blitz because it's the deepest). Regardless, it is not pleasant and I'm glad I only take the Northern line twice a week. I take the central line every day, and I'm glad that it's usually a nice experience...especially since it's warm in the wintertime when it's cold outside.

Oxford Mission: Find The Gatsby Bridge

2009-04-11T14:47:00.000-07:00

It has been rainy and cloudy all weekend here in England, but Derek and I decided to go to Oxford today after not doing much of anything yesterday.

We went to Paddington Station around 10:45, and just missed the 10:51 train. We stood in line to buy our tickets, and they ended up being 20 quid...which was definitely more than the 14 quid I paid to go to Cambridge. Then we planned to catch the 11:21 train, and went to get breakfast and wait. For some reason, when we came back to the platforms at 11:18, the platform that the Oxford train was leaving from was already erased from the board. So we missed the 11:21 train as well. We hung out and went to some of the shops at Paddington such as The Body Shop and Boots to wait for the 11:51 train. Finally we got on that train and took it all the way to Oxford.

When we got to Oxford, we went to the tourism booth at the train station, and I grabbed a free advertisement for the hop-on-hop-off bus tour only because it had a map of the city in it. The Oxford campus was an extremely easy walk from the train station. Derek and I decided not to take the bus tour, and instead just walked around ourselves using the map as a guide to where we were. We had fun just seeing everything, but if you want to learn the significance or history behind any buildings, I don't recommend doing it our way.

Almost all of the buildings at Oxford cost money to enter, so we only really walked around the outside. There were tours from the Oxford information center, but we did not want to pay to get in on one. The only landmark that was truly important to me was seeing the bridge that is mentioned in the book The Great Gatsby. In the book, Jay Gatsby shows his friends a picture of him under the landmark Hertford Bridge at Oxford, and wrongly convinces them that he actually attended university there. Now I have a picture just like it.

We also passed by the college that C.S. Louis and other famous authors studied at. The Christ Church college is famous for having some of the scenes of one of the early Harry Potter movies filmed in their staircases. Derek and I did not get to see where it was filmed because, again, it cost too much money. Seriously, we felt every building cost 3 quid to get in to and it wouldn't be worth spending all of that money for each individual building. I honestly do not know how Oxford gets away with charging that much to tourists. Perhaps they do so in order to keep the number of tourists to a minimum...and allow only the truly dedicated to roam around. Pity I'm not wealthier, because I really wanted to see what a classroom looked like.

We also walked by the Oxford Castle because it was 6.50 quid to get in and we didn't know what attractions lay inside that would be worth the expense. There was a giant hill next to the castle that cost money to climb, and there were small children just swarming all over the hill. Also, people dressed in period costumes manned the entrance to climb the hill, and I saw a man at the top dressed in a scary black hooded robe. I took a picture because he reminded me of a dementor.

A dementor on the hill at Oxford Castle

Tourists lined up to see where a few scenes were filmed in Harry Potter

Christ Church College at Oxford

Oxford Castle

Derek and I thought there would be nothing cooler than to be able to tell people your school was called University College

*Side Note*

Finally I just want to quickly put to rest a rumor that you may have heard. Before I left for England, I was told that "you can't find peanut butter there." This statement is not true, because Marks & Spencers sells their own store brand creamy peanut butter. However, if you are a chunky fan, you are potentially out of luck. I hope this sooths any worries that may have been keeping you up at night.

And My Reward Was Half A Chocolate Easter Egg

2009-04-08T00:20:00.000-07:00

Last night I had to work at a store event for top customers, where Stella McCartney came and helped style the women. Christine and I were in charge of the coat check and handing out goody bags when a customer left. All of the top customers were very nice and very pretty. Also, I got to wear Stella clothes from the spring/summer collection. For the first half I wore a light blue blazer and seagull printed dress. For the second half I wore jeans, a blue and white ship passenger list print top, and the light blue blazer. I really liked the second outfit.

However, the key thing to remember is that I got to speak to Stella briefly! She was walking down the stairs to go to her waiting car, and I handed her a goody bag. She laughed happily and said, "I get one too?" I assured her that she could take one. She looked like a regular person, who just happened to be very skinny. It was cool that I got to see her smile, too, since she never smiles with her teeth in pictures. It's not an ugly smile, so I don't know why she hides it.

I worked from 9am-9:45pm last night, and now I have to go get ready to go back to work at 9 this morning. Then I'll be working on my internship dissertation this afternoon since I have no classes due to spring break.

We Conquered London. It Is Ours Now.

2009-04-05T07:34:00.000-07:00

This weekend Derek came to visit, and we did SOOO much in two days. I'm going to write it as a list, because there are too many landmarks to simply chat about.

Friday: Tower of London, London Wall, Tower Bridge, Tower Hill, The City, walked down The Mall, Buckingham Palace, sat on chairs in St. James Park, Parliament/Big Ben, Number 10 Downing Street, walked by Westminster Abbey, Trafalgar Square, walked by The National Gallery, and saw a movie being filmed with an actor that Derek recognized from the movie Rome.

Saturday: St. Paul's Cathedral, Millennium Bridge, Tate Modern, Shakespeare's Globe Theatre, Borough Market, Southwark Cathedral, London Bridge, Monument, walked by 3 churches designed by Sir Christopher Wren and another small market, Royal Exchange/Bank of England, and ended by walking the entire length of Portobello Road.

Today we've stayed in. Derek is out right now purchasing his ticket to Edinburgh at Kings Cross Station. My word of advice with that is to not go to Europe without a credit card.

I Don't Feel In Any Real Danger Because The Archive Is Basically A Bomb Shelter

2009-04-01T11:32:00.000-07:00

Today was the first meeting of the G20 Summit in London. Christine and I joked that this was the second time that the entire city shut down since we've been here (the first for snow).

Because all of the top world leaders are meeting in London right now, a large number of anarchist groups flew in to protest. Basically, I read that it was like a parade, where they started at Moorgate and walked by a lot of the major landmarks of London to show their distaste for the recession. Apparently part of the parade was supposed to walk right past the Stella McCartney store/my office! I cannot confirm whether that happened, because Christine and I left for class at 12:30.

Many Londoners were freaking out that instead of a peaceful protest, it was going to turn into a riot. I never once felt scared for my safety, though. Perhaps it was because I knew I'd be somewhat out of harms way, but I also never once passed a protester. A girl I work with named Kate said that her friend had seen some protesters on the tube this morning wearing dark masks over their faces. Also, I was told that people who worked in the banking industry were told to dress down in order to not look like a target. I believe most of the protests were about capitalism, wealthy people during the recession, and the banking system. There are a lot of photos of the protesters in Trafalgar Square. Here's a photo I found online from BBC.com of some protesters:

On another note, there's two more things I want to mention.

First, I began thinking this week about how different the tube experience would be if I were a foot taller. At 5'1'', I struggle to reach the highest rail to hold on to near the doors. However, I've noticed that really tall men and women are constantly tilting their heads down on the tube because the tube actually has very low ceilings. I feel that would be very annoying when the tube is very crowded in the morning to not only squeeze in with a lot of people but also to have to tilt your neck constantly. Despite being more confined, I still feel that the tube was much better than the Metro in Paris, though.

Finally, I thought I'd run through my Monday - Thursday schedule to give my readers and idea of what I'm doing:

Monday:
8am-9am: Wake up and get ready for work/school
9am-9:30am: Commute to work. Sometimes pick up Starbucks or Oi (bagels) at the Bond Street station
9:30am-1:30pm: Work at Stella
1:30pm-3pm: Commute to City University/Buy & eat lunch
3pm-5pm: International HR Management class
5pm-6pm: Commute back to Palace Court from City University

Tuesday:
8am-9am: Wake up and get ready for work
9am-9:30am: Commute to work.
9:30am-6:30 or 7pm: Work at Stella (Usually home by 7:30pm)
Usually home by 7:30pm

Wednesday:
8am-9am: Wake up and get ready for work/school
9am-9:30am: Commute to work. Sometimes pick up Starbucks or Oi (bagels) at the Bond Street station
9:30am-12:30pm: Work at Stella
12:30pm-2pm: Commute to my Arcadia University marketing class at Thoresby House
2pm-5pm: Marketing class
5pm-6:30pm: Commute from Thoresby House to City University/Buy & eat dinner
6:30pm-8:30pm: Arcadia University's Working In The UK sociology class at City University (mandatory if you are in the internship program)
8:30pm-9:30pm: Commute back to Palace Court from City University

Thursday:
8am-9am: Wake up and get ready for work
9am-9:30am: Commute to work.
9:30am-6:30 or 7pm: Work at Stella

I managed to have Fridays off as well as Saturdays and Sundays, but not everyone in the internship program was able to schedule it that way. I definitely recommend getting Fridays off if possible, though, in order to have a long weekend for relaxing, homework, and travelling.

Plaid Party?

2009-03-30T07:00:00.000-07:00

This weekend I stayed at Palace Court and tried to get some R&R while I cought up on homework. On Thursday night I went to a local pub with many girls from my house + Spencer (who also lives in Palace Court), and I went home early when the pub closed to go to sleep. Friday I worked on my to-do list and went grocery shopping/H&M shopping (since H&M is right next to Marks & Spencers in Whiteley's mall). At H&M I bought some clothes for Italy/Tucson, since I realized I did not bring a lot of warm-weather clothes that I can take to Italy at the end of this month. I'm really missing my sundresses. I literally only brought two pairs of shorts to London - one of them are Soffie cotton shorts. I may be sweating a lot in Italy, we'll see.

Speaking of Italy, I'm not sure if I've mentioned this, but Derek and I are planning to tour Italy for a week after my program ends on April 24th. We had to cut out some cities in the north due to his time constraint, since he won't be done yet. But we plan on flying into Florence, then heading to Siena -> Rome -> Naples. I haven't decided or looked at my funds yet, but I might want to visit Rachel in Bologna, too, if possible. We'll have to see. I really wanted to go to Greece while I'm abroad, but it's not looking like that can work out. Also, since I won't be going to Germany or Amsterdam due to my lack of time and people to travel with, hopefully I'll be able to return to that region and hit up Brussels, Amsterdam, Copenhagen, Zurich, Bern, Munich, Berlin, and Prague all in one second grand European adventure.

Anyway, Saturday morning my roommates and I woke up and went to Portobello Road market. Even though it was raining slightly, it was still PACKED with tourists. I feel more like a local than a tourist these days, so I felt really embarrassed about my American accent. My roommate Audrey and I started saying "pah-den" instead of "excuse me" in order to cover up our accents when trying to maneuver around slow walkers (a great pet peeve of mine in crowded places). Speaking of the word pet peeve, they don't call it that here. I forget what it's called but my marketing processor looked at us like we were crazy when we said that phrase. But anyway, I ended up buying a metal sign at Portobello Road that I think I'll hang up in either my bedroom at home or my room in Tucson. It is the sign for Notting Hill Gate, which is really close to my house. Also, the three of us bought cupcakes from the famous cupcake store on Portobello Road, and mine was very delicious (chocolate with chocolate frosting and silver sugar ball sprinkles).

The rest of the weekend I hung around the house with my roommates and worked on homework, etc. Nothing to report, but it was fun to be able to relax. It's so weird that I'm nearing the end of my stay in London! I'm going to miss it sooooooo much.

P.S. I'm in the market for a fringe/tassel key chain for my purse and also a pair of metallic shorts to create an outfit like this that Ashley Olsen wore in Teen Vogue several years ago:

If you know where I can purchase either item at a relatively low price, please let me know!

I Really Like Your Music

2009-03-28T06:34:00.001-07:00

Last weekend was so much fun! My friend Carly visited me from Wales, and her friends Michelle and Dominiqe stayed with me too. Michelle is also studying in Wales and Dominique is studying in Sevilla in the same program as Derek. All three girls go to University of Iowa.

Thursday night I went to Paddington station to pick up Carly and Michelle. We went straight back to Palace Court and hung out for a bit before going to Old Swan (a pub near by). We ordered Strongbows at about 11:40 without realizing that the pub closed at midnight. As the slow and inexperienced drinker that I am, especially when it comes to carbonated beverages, I was not finished with mine by the time they kicked us out. I needed Carly to help me out.

Then we went back to Palace Court and just talked and went to sleep until Dominique came. The only flight from Sevilla to London each day gets in around midnight at Stansted airport, so anyone visiting cannot use the tube once they take the Stansted Express to Liverpool Street tube station. So I guess Dominique took a bus and then a cab...which I'm sure was pretty chaotic.

Friday morning we woke up and went out touring. They wanted to do the hop on hop off bus tour, but I convinced them that I could navigate well enough that using the tube would save a lot of money. So we went to Harrods, Buckingham Palace, Parliament, inside Westminster Abbey, the Tower of London, and Tower Bridge. It was a really fun and touristy day.

Dominique, Carly, Michelle, and me at Tower Bridge

Friday night we met my friends Conor and Brian at a pub called Hayfields over on the east end of London by the Stepney Green tube station. The neighborhood was not as nice as Notting Hill (but really? what should I expect?), but the pub was awesome! It had karaoke, pool, and couches to sit on. It was a very relaxed atmosphere, and I think we were the only non-Brits there. I really wish we had a pub like that around where I live. I'd definitely go back if it wasn't a 45 minute commute to get there. We left the pub at 1am when it closed and we didn't get home until 3pm because of trying to figure out the bus system. But I'm actually really proud of us that we figured it out all on our own!

The four of us at Hayfields pub

Saturday we woke up and took a 10am train to Cambridge from Liverpool Street. Cambridge was so pretty! We decided to walk from the train station to the campus, even though we didn't know where we were going. We just started following the people in front of us, who we assumed were headed towards Cambridge. During a walk, we found Zizzi and decided to eat lunch there. Little did we know, we were able to sit next to a giant window overlooking a Cambridge athletics field. It was a really cool location to eat. Also, our waiter, Neil, was really nice. He said he was in Cambridge law at Trinity College and gave us all of these tips on what to do while we were visiting. He kinda reminded us of Kevin the bad-ass mathematician and DJ from Mean Girls.

We walked to the campus after lunch and saw a graduation ceremony taking place. There were a TON of tourists there. I bought a Cambridge sweatshirt and a Starbucks (typical...but I was tired from waking up early). I am in love with my sweatshirt, though. I'm wearing it right now.

After walking around and exploring, we stumbled upon the Cam river punting tours that Neil had told us to do. So between the four of us we paid 35 pounds to get in a boat tour that is sort of like a gondola, where a Cambridge student stands and drives the boat. Our guy was really nice and knowledgeable, I think his name was Sip. The best part of the tour was watching four people on four different occasions fall into the river because they were inexperience punters and had just decided to rent a boat. Also, there were students dressed as pirates who were punting down the river, who we tried to befriend from our boat. Overall, I definitely recommend that experience if you go to Cambridge.

The dock where all of the punters were

Our tour guide punting us through the river Cam

The pirates we tried to befriend

The four of us on in the boat

Saturday night after we took the train back from Cambridge we took a nap and then went to Redcliffe Gardens to have the girls meet my friends. Basically we all just hung out in the lounge in the basement for a long time before deciding to go to Troubadour. Unfortunately, when we got to Troubadour it was closed because of a cockroach infestation (gross!!!), which was really weird because it is one of the nicer pubs that I've been to. So Evan, me, and the girls went to McDonald's since I hadn't eaten dinner and then took the last tube home for the night.

Sunday I woke up and said goodbye to Michelle at 10 and then did some homework. Then Dominique left at about 1:15. After Dominique left, Carly and I walked around Hyde Park for a little bit and then came home and hung out/I did homework for the rest of the night. For dinner we went to Zizzi (again...this time the one by me), which was delicious yet again. All in all, it was a very fun visit from Carly and the other girls, and it let me experience what being a London tourist would be like.

He Was Getting Rather Shirty

2009-03-26T01:07:00.001-07:00

Hello! I've been very busy this past week, hence the lack of posts. My friend Carly came to visit me this weekend from Thursday to Monday morning. I will write more about that later, because it includeds touring London and a trip to Cambridge.

Also, I had a paper due in Marketing yesterday that was worth 35% of my grade! On top of that, I took my first final exam! I can't believe I have less than a month left for my program. I'm going to miss London so much!

The final was for the required sociology class I have to take as part of my program. It was a two-hour-long written exam that lasted me almost the entire two hours. My hand was extremely cramped by the end. We had to write answers to three questions at approximately 500 words each. I felt well prepared since I had made outlines for the answers, but very rushed.

Also, yesterday I decided that Gucci's summer line is my favorite of all of the top designers. I like how casual it looks, how it involves fun colors, and how it looks classy. Here are three of my favorite "looks" in their collection:

If I Had Fallen Through The Floor I Would Have Squished A Beatle!

2009-03-17T13:20:00.000-07:00

Literally...Paul McCartney was at the Stella McCartney store today. Of course I didn't get to meet him because I was upstairs in the office. But how cool is it that I was so close to Paul!?!

Also, I forgot to mention, last thursday Prince William was across the street from my office!!! He was attending a charity event at the art gallery. I got a picture of his Jaguar on my phone.

Additionally, Christine and I were told to make a delivery to Stella McCartney's house today. We got to go in her living room! She lives pretty close to where I live. I pet her dog. We stood in her sitting room. We talked to her nanny. We heard her kids playing. We're so freaking cool.

To finish with my awesome day at work, our boss told Christine and I to take a picture of two pairs of jeans. One didn't fit on the mannequin because it was too small, so our boss said that I would need to model them. I laughed and told her I'd probably have to grow five inches, but she told me to put on heels. So I am now the one wearing a pair of Stella jeans and Stella heels in a picture being sent to New York. I'm almost 100% certain that it will just be used internally, though.

So that ends my cool day at work.

You Brought A Guidebook To A Party?

2009-03-15T14:03:00.000-07:00

This weekend I went to Swansea, Wales to visit my friend Carly from my hometown who is studying there through a program sponsored by the University of Iowa. She is studying at Swansea University, and lives in the university’s student village in Swansea. It takes about 2.5 hours to travel to Swansea from London via a First Great Western Train. Swansea is on the southern coast of Wales adjacent to Swansea Bay. It is the second largest city in Wales after Cardiff.

I left London at 8:25am on Friday morning, and arrived in Swansea around 11:30. Carly picked me up at the train station, and we walked about 15 minutes from the train to City Center. There, we walked through a mall that had some good shopping and went to Tesco to pick up some food (The Tesco was enormous compared to London’s grocery stores – potentially even bigger than Jewel or Kroger would be! I informed Carly about how lucky she is to have so many food options.). Then, we caught the bus to the student village, which we picked up right by Tesco. It was nice because the bus stopped directly outside of Carly’s dorm.

Once we arrived at Carly’s dorm, we decided to take a walk around her neighborhood and explore. We were told that if you walked up the hill you could see Swansea Bay. So the two of us meandered up some windy roads, making sure that we were always walking up hill. Needless to say, by the time we got back to Carly’s dorm, I was exhausted, so I took a three hour nap. When I woke up, Carly had fixed me fish and chips for dinner! She is such an awesome friend.

We both ate dinner and then began to get ready to go out. Our plan was to invite some of Carly’s American friends over and then go to the club in the basement of Swansea University’s student union. So we get dressed for the night and head out. However, we ended up getting to the club around 11:30, and the line was RIDICULOUSLY long. They were saying that the club was at capacity, and they were using a one-in-one-out policy. We knew we would never be able to get in, so we decided to leave. Then, the bus that was supposed to come to pick us up and take us to the bar district did not come. So, we ended up just going home and hanging out in Carly’s room. Although I think Carly and her friends were disappointed, I had fun because it allowed me to get to know them better.

The next morning, Carly and I woke up early and took a train to Cardiff. From Cardiff to Swansea is about an hour and fifteen minutes on the train. So we arrived in Cardiff in the late morning, and I wanted lunch. We walked around at first joking about going to McDonalds. We walked into O’Neill’s pub and they weren’t serving food yet. Then I walked around trying to find a mocha because I was feeling tired. After exhausting three coffee shops, I ended up having to buy a mocha from Starbucks (ugh…I can’t escape my addiction). However, I was much more impressed with the service at Starbucks in Cardiff than any of my London Starbucks experiences. They actually asked for my name! Good job, baristas.

Ok back to business. So Carly and I decided to hold off on lunch while we drank our Starbucks and went to Cardiff Castel. The Castel was a fairly short walk from the train station, and it was really cool because it was such a historical monument smack dab in the middle of the city. Admission for students was 7.5 pounds, and we picked up an audio tour guide. We roamed the grounds of the castle ourselves, exploring where we wanted to. It was really cool, and we were able to climb up into a big tower with very steep steps. Also, I hit up the gift shop and bought some Welsh memorabilia. Overall, it was a very fun landmark to visit.

After the castle, Carly and I went to get lunch. However, by then we had joked around so much about staying true to our American brands that we actually started craving McDonalds. So we went to McDonalds for lunch. Shame. It was pretty much just like McDonalds in London – same menu and everything.

After our McDonalds visit, we walked around the shopping district and found many quaint shops and alley ways to explore with a lot of cool shopping opportunities. I ended up buying two new tops that are for spring, since most of the tops that I brought with me to London are warm.
After our shopping, we got back on the train around 3:30 and went back to Swansea. It was a long trip home, but I felt like I had a great experience in Cardiff!

When we arrived back at Carly’s dorm, we took a short nap and then Carly fixed me dinner again (pasta, bread, and wine…yum!). She spoiled me. Then we got ready to go out for the night, since our plans were to go to Wind Street with her American friend Tom and her Welsh friend Ben.

The four of us took the bus to Wind Street and I was immediately overwhelmed. Everyone was young, as if it was a row of bars at a college campus, but everyone was dressed ridiculously! There were people dressed up in costumes for no reason. Some girls were in barely-there dresses and some in tutus. Again, just because they think it’s fun to dress up. I felt too plain in my jeans, heels, and black tank top. Carly and I joked that we were going to go back to America and think that everyone dresses conservatively after spending a night on Wind Street. Even the two guys agreed that it was nuts! We only went to two bars on the row, one was a vodka bar (where Carly and I ordered Strongbows – not vodka) and the other was a regular bar that did not seem very popular. We chose to go to the second one because we saw that we’d be able to sit down. The whole experience of the night was very over-stimulating for me, and I found myself just staring at people instead of engaged in conversation with my friends. That has never happened to me before.

One more thing – I find it very difficult to understand Welsh accents. I couldn’t understand what Ben said most of the night, and then anyone else who talked to me was a lost cause.

This morning Carly and I woke up at 10am and quickly got ready to walk to the beach. It’s about a 2 mile walk, but it was totally worth it. Swansea beach was beautiful! We went at low tide, so we found a bunch of shells. I kept one that looked shiny silver, but I may have squished it in the pocket of my North Face. We’ll see when I get home I guess. On our walk home, stopped for lunch at a restaurant with a Welsh name I couldn’t pronounce and then got some candy at a neighboring supermarket. We finally arrived back to Carly’s dorm around 2, and hung out until I had to catch the 3:10 bus to City Center in order to walk to the train station.

Everything considered, I had a terrific weekend. It was nice to be with an old friend and meet some new ones. Also, Wales is gorgeous, and a truly different experience from London. Basically, I felt I spent the weekend in a suburb. It was not a trip to the country-side, but definitely a break from city life. Also, I joked with Carly that I was actually able to see the wilderness out her window. I feel I learned a little about Welsh culture, too. Such as how they have a well-known song that sings “Always piss on the English side of the bridge.” There’s a lot of national pride in Wales, and I was able to ask Ben about his childhoold, life in Wales, and Welsh cultural traditions.

Now I’m getting excited for Carly and some of her friends to visit me next weekend!

Bonjour! - That's All I Know

2009-03-11T10:58:00.001-07:00

Sorry it has been a while since an update. I'm working on balancing my schedule as best as I can.

This weekend I went to Paris with seven of my roommates that live with me at Palace Court. There, I was able to meet up with my boyfriend and three other IU students studying in Sevilla. Also, there were about 20 other students from my program in Paris, too. Basically, the Americans took over the city. Just kidding.

On Friday we left London via the Eurostar at 5:25 in the morning. We got to Paris around 8:45 and arrived at our hostel around 10. The hostel was extremely nice. It's called St. Christopher's, and it is one of the highest rated hostels in Paris. The facilities were very nice, and it gave us free breakfast and 15 minutes in the internet cafe (which I unfortunately did not utilize).

On Friday, Derek and I took the metro to The Louvre, and ate a cafe close by. Then, since the weather was nice, we decided to go to the Eiffel Tower instead of inside the Louvre. Although the wind was bitterly cold, the two of us went all the way to the top! It was a really cool experience, and I love being able to say that I've been to the top of the Eiffel Tower.

Friday night Derek took me on a really romantic date to a restaurant half way in between the Pantheon and Notre Dame. The outside of the restaurant had ivy on the walls, and the inside was a series of dimly lit rooms (because I hear the building used to be a home). We ordered the house wine, an appetizer, and an entree. I ordered the greatest meat I have ever tasted - a duck leg. It was so good that I actually exclaimed at the table that I was going to blog about it. So I am. It was delicious. As were the potatos that came with the meal. The service was also very lovely.

After dinner we walked around Paris at night a little and took some pictures outside of the Pantheon and Notre Dame. I kept singing to Derek the song "Our Last Summer" by ABBA from Mamma Mia because the lyrics talk about walks along the Siene and being by the Notre Dame. He didn't know the song so he had no idea what I was talking about. Very typical.

Saturday we took the Metro to the Arch de Triumph and the Champs E'Lysse (I probably misspelled those because I'm not looking them up). It was very fun, even though I felt extremely poor walking down the street. We decided to walk all the way to the Louvre, which again we decided not to go in because it closed at 5:30 and we got there at 4:30. What a bummer.

Sunday morning Derek left so I carried on my tourist activities with my roommates. After we checked out of the hostel, we went to the Musee D'Orsay. I LOVED that museum because I was able to see soooooo many Claude Monet paintings! I have always been a huge Monet fan, so I took a picture of every Monet painting in the museum. There were other works of art that were very cool to see too - such as Van Gogh's self portrait.

After the Musee D'Orsay we went to Notre Dame, which was cool because we were walking through while they were having their Sunday service. The music was beautiful and everything was very ceremonial. We didn't stay for the service, though. Instead, we went to get lunch at a cafe across the street. Luckily, I had Bita there with me that time to speak French to the server.

After the restaurant we walked around the shopping district, but realized that most of the stores were closed because it was Sunday. That was a bummer, but we decided to go visit the Catacombs instead. We had to wait in line for about and hour before we were let in. It was really creepy, and it definitely freaked me out to see the bones of millions of people piled up as if they were bricks forming a wall. I couldn't get into that.

We took the Eurostar back to England on Sunday night, and did not get back to Palace Court until 11:30pm. I was so tired by then that I basically just passed out on my bed, thankful to be home. Paris was alright, but I definitely feel like I enjoy London better. Maybe it's because I speak the language, but I'm not sure. I truly feel the tube is cleaner and faster than the metro. I had a lot of fun with my friends, though, and I especially enjoyed seeing Derek. No one can deny that Paris is a fun city.

My Fashion Career

2009-03-01T13:39:00.000-08:00

I have been feeling much happier with my internship lately. Christine and I finished organizing the archive of magazines last week, which had us both in the basement sorting boxes of hundreds of magazines. We sorted them by country, then alphabetic order, then year, then date. Now, we are very proud that the shelves are totally organized and labelled to make a magazine extremely easy to track down. It was a big project with a lot of manual labor, but it was so exciting to see the finished result.

Lately, we've been working back up in the office. Usually, we begin the day by going through all of the magazines and newspapers that our office subscribes to and tagging any page that has a mention of Stella McCartney or her family. Then, we give any tagged pages to another intern who scans them and compiles the clippings into a bound press book.

Throughout the day, we get several deliveries from different magazines and newspapers returning clothes that we have sent out. When that happens, I go meet the fed ex delivery person downstairs and take the packages up to the office. From there, Christine and I would then check in the clothes into the returns binder by highlighting the item in the send out binder and moving it over.

When we notice that an article of clothing has not been returned, we then may be asked to make a phone call to the news media in possession and remind them to return it. That is called doing a call-back. At first I felt strange that they would be hearing my American accent, but then I got used to it.

Sometimes, when a delivery needs to be made within London, I may be asked to go make it myself instead of Fed Ex. I usually like to do that in order to get out into the fresh air, even though I tend to hurry as much as possible in order to get it done quickly. This past week I made two deliveries.

Another task I worked on a lot this week was to prepare boxes to be shipped to Paris for Paris fashion week. It was kinda cool seeing all the clothes that are going to be on the runway in a few weeks time. I feel like I know a secret that others wont know for a while.

I've saved the best for last so hopefully you're still reading this. On Thursday, Stella McCartney was being interviewed for a magazine in the VIP room at our office, and I got to see her walk down the hall. It was really cool, and I'm so happy that I at least got to see her even though I'll probably never get to meet her.

Well, that about covers it for Stella! I'm really liking the other interns that I work with and getting to know them a lot better. There's probably around 10 of us. Also, my boss Imogen is really nice too, and I write about her great management style in my weekly internship reflections all the time. Overall, I'm definitely starting to enjoy my job more.

Scotland Adventures - Regretfully Without Bagpipes

2009-03-01T05:11:00.000-08:00

I've been really busy this past week, so I am finally getting up a post about my trip to Scotland.

Last weekend I went to Scotland with my Arcadia program. To begin, we had to arrive at Kings Cross Station at the crack of 7:30am in order to make our train. The train ride to Edinburgh lasted 4.5 hours, but had beautiful scenery towards the end. There were seven other close friends from the internship program on my trip, and we all were able to sit together on the train. It was a nice ride because I also could access free wifi on my computer, which allowed us to watch some episodes of The Office as well as check email. My favorite part of the train ride was passing through some very picturesque harbor towns on the North Sea and seeing their lighthouses. (I have a secret love of lighthouses.)

A picture of the North Sea at a small harbor town called Berwick Upon Tweed. I took this from the train.

When we got to Edinburgh, our tour guide met us at the train station decked out in his kilt (which he wore the entire rest of the weekend). It was slightly raining for the entire day, but that didn't really put a damper on things. Pun. We arrived at our hostel, which was voted the best hostel in Scotland according to our tour guide, and I was thoroughly impressed with the facilities. It was right next to the Edinburgh Castle and was called the Castle Rock hostel (which I ended up calling Castle Hill hostel for the entire trip probably because I missed Alexa). After arriving at our hostel, Jess, Kristin, Haley, and Christine, and I scouted out lunch at an Italian restaurant that was DELICIOUS! I bought a panini, mocha, and a chocolate/caramel/cookie dessert, and all were incredibly delicious. Then, we had to climb up a million stairs to get back to our hostel and meet up for our tour of Edinburgh.

Our tour guide, Mike, talking in the rain.

Mike, our kilted tour guide that I already mentioned, was extremely knowledgeable about everything to do with Edinburgh and the Highlands. You could tell he really loved his job. Even though we were all standing in the rain for most of the tour of Edinburgh, he didn't seem to mind and was still extremely excited to tell us every story he memorized about every landmark. And honestly, I feel there were hundreds of stories. I was really impressed. This is what the first day looked like:

Me and Evan with a statue of Bobby, the dog beloved by Edinburgh and saved by the city's children.

Where JK Rowling wrote the Harry Potter books - the birthplace of Harry Potter.

Friday night, many of my friends and I decided to do a pub crawl that was advertised at Castle Rock. We got two pounds off the price of the pub crawl through staying at Castle Rock, which was nice. We ended up going to four or five local pubs, the first of which was bank bar. I even got to see a really drunk Scotsman get into a drunken fight with nobody! It was extremely funny to watch. He wasn't part of the pub crawl group, don't worry.

On Saturday, our group departed from the hostel at the crack of 8am to get on a big coach bus and drive to the Highlands. Kristin and I were the last on the bus so we sat in the front seat. I am actually glad that I was able to sit in the front seat for the first part of the trip because I had a great view of the Firth of Forth and its bridges. Then, when we got to the highlands, I had a great view of how beautiful they are as well. However, the bus ride was about 5 hours long and I started getting a little car sick after a while. The bus driver was clearly a local and drove much faster through the mountains than most people would. Needless to say, everyone on the bus admitted to feeling slightly nauseous after those 5 hours...but no one actually got sick thankfully.

My first view of the Firth of Forth!

The places that we stopped on Saturday were at the River Tay and Loch Ness. We were able to see a lot of lochs on the trip and learn all about the loch system and that boats can go through the loch system from the Atlantic to the North Sea in 4-5 hours. The lochs and surrounding mountains were stunning, and I felt like I was in central Colorado. Loch Ness was really funny because Kristin actually decided to wade in the water in order to try to pet a swan. Also, many of my friends decided to try haggis...which I skipped out on with no regrets. They said it was terrible.

Me, Matt, Kristin, Russell, Christine, Evan, and Scott in front of the River Tay (all Kelley students except Evan)

Some beautiful Scottish scenery.

Me at Loch Ness! Never found a monster.

After our trip to Loch Ness, we went to a local distillery called Ben Nevis. In all honesty, I truly disliked that trip. The whole distillery smelled terrible, was really ugly, and the free sample of whiskey at the end was not sometime tasty or calming to my car sick stomach. I'm sure some people would have enjoyed that tour, but I certainly did not.

Me, Kristin, Christine, and Haley at the distillery. I didn't like that whiskey at all.

Before I forget, I also want to add that Scotland prints its own money, so it looks different from the British pound. It still has the same value, but it does not have Queen Elizabeth on it. It's really different, and I wish I could have kept some to show off when I get home to the states.

Anyway, at night we stayed in a hostel in Obin, Scotland, which is on the Atlantic side of Scotland. We literally drove from the East Coast, to the North Coast, to the West Coast in one day. Obin was cool, and is a harbor town. I really wanted to eat fish and chips while I was there, but most of my friends wanted to go to a legitimate sit-down restaurant. We ended up at yet another Italian restaurant, where the food was very good. However, I still have not had fish and chips in Scotland.

After the Italian restaurant, we went to a local pub called the Larne where there was live music playing. It was really fun, except I still wasn't feeling well so I only drank half of a Strongbow (alcoholic cider) and had to call it quits for the night. After The Larne we went to another club/pub down the block, but only stayed there for a little while. They were playing a lot of American music, though, which was fun. Then, when I went back to the hostel, I hung out downstairs with my friends and then went up to bed.

Sunday morning we left the hostel at 9am (which didn't feel TOO early this time) and left to drive back through the highlands and to Edinburgh. We saw a gorgeous church that was built solely by one man in honor of his mother. Also, we drove through Calendar, which is a small tourist town, and Fort Augustus. These places were slightly south of the towns we went through the day before, which included Perth, Glencoe, and Inverness. Also, I got to see a cool castle and pet an old Scottish cow named Hermish. Finally, our last adventure before we caught the train back to London in Edinburgh was to climb up the hill that had a monument to William Wallace (the guy Mel Gibson plays in Braveheart). It was steep and took about 10 minutes to climb.

Hermish the cow.

Some sheep in front of the Campbell Castle.

Me, Kristin, and Christine at Loch Laggan.

The train ride home was somewhat of an adventure because our seats were double-booked so we had to find unreserved seats on a very overcrowded train. I ended up having to move several times, but was able to stay in a seat with a table after a while. That was very lucky because I was able to get some of my homework done.

Overall, the trip to Scotland was amazing and I recommend to anyone who likes beautiful landscapes to visit Scotland at least once in their lifetime.

London Trends

2009-02-19T12:19:00.000-08:00

London and Paris fashion weeks are upon us. Because of my internship with Stella McCartney, I feel I am very up-to-date on style. Let me tell you what the current trends are.

First, jumpsuits and denim hotpants (worn with tights) are both in right now. Make sure your jumpsuit is baggy enough (aka you are slim enough) that it does not look like you're wearing a onesie. As for the denim hotpants...if you wear them with black or purple tights and strappy high-heeled sandals, you will look incredibly cool.

You're probably wondering...'Eliz what do you wear on a daily basis because I could never see you wearing a jumpsuit?' Well, the rumor is true that people dress up more here. If I walk down the street in a sweatshirt, trainers, or sweatpants, people most likely assume I am about to work out. Because the weather has been around 50 degrees for a high this week, I've been wearing a lot of sweaters. Usually under the sweaters I either sport a solid tshirt or a button down. As for my trousers (do not call them pants!), I have been tucking my jeans into either my black or brown boots. Also, I now have a pair of black skinny jeans, which I can wear flats with. However, bare in mind, I'm definitely not the trendiest person on the street. I like to keep things simple.

'So Eliz...What's cool for street wear?' Layered looks that include something baggy (kinda like the baggy brown shirt the model is wearing in the above picture). Also, you can add in an extra long necklace or wear a scarf. Very large cocktail rings are in fashion now too. Fashionable shoes include leather boots (either high or ankle booties), or high heels with a bit of a platform under the part of the shoe that is not the heel but touches the ground. Here's an example of some Stella shoes that look like that:

If you go to London but do not want to spend a lot of money, Primark is a great place to pick up something fashionable for an inexpensive price. I've never bought anything there because I've only gone once and was overwhelmed with how large and crowded it was, but I have friends that buy things from there all time time. However, I have bought a few things from Zara and H&M, which are nice. Also, there is a store called Topshop which Londoners love. Those four are big London/European staples.

Finally, don't forget your trench coat when you come to London! Nobody wears any other kind of jacket.

Also, some new news:

-I'm going to Scotland for the weekend.

-Clinique bonus time is just as chaotic in London as it is in America

-Christine and I FINALLY finished organizing and shelving the magazines in the Stella archive today! Yay!

I Need A Little More Henge In The Picture

2009-02-15T06:40:00.000-08:00

Yesterday the girls in my house and I decided to take a bus tour of Stonehenge and Bath in order to celebrate Valentine's Day without men. We were at Stonehenge for an hour, and had a good time. You can't get up close to the rocks, though, so don't expect the trip to be a full-day experience. Also, a lot of them have fallen down over the ages. You can walk around all of the stones, but it's pretty muddy in the parts where there's no sidewalk - so make sure you bring shoes you can get dirty! I brought my Sperries, and the toes got fairly dirty even though I was careful. The views around Stonehenge are very pretty, with rolling hills and sheep grazing on the land. Also, we got a short description of the history of Stonehenge from Anderson Tours:

"Stonehenge consists of a series of large rocks which were arranged in a circular format known as a henge. The first structure to be built at the site of Stonehenge was the circular ditch and outer bank around 3000BC. The first stones were brought there around 2500BC from the Preseli Mountains in the southwest of Wales, around 137 miles from Stonehenge. These stones formed the inner circle, which was later rearranged to form a horseshoe. The outer circle was completed around 1500BC and consists of the largest stones in the monument. The stones weigh up to 50 tons each and it is estimated that at least 600 men were required just to move one of these stones."

A View of Stonehenge

Me at Stonehenge holding one of the rocks

A view of the rolling landscape and sheep at Stonehenge

After Stonehenge we took the coach (which is what the British call buses) to Bath. The initial decent into Bath was breathtaking! The whole city is built among hills and in a valley, and the buildings are all a pretty tan color that makes the city look old and quaint. I immediately fell in love with how picturesque the scenery and buildings were. Even though the weather began to get cloudy around that time, I could not help gushing over how much I loved Bath.

In this picture you can kind of see the houses built among the hills

Bath Abbey

We got off the bus at Bath Abbey, and then immediately took a tour of the Roman Baths, which is a building built by the Romans surrounding the only natural hot spring in Great Britain. Here's the history that the Anderson Tours description says:

"When the Romans discovered the therapeutic value of the water, they built their famous baths - now one of Britain's finest remaining Roman monuments. Once the Romans left, it was not until the 18th Century that the value of the springs was rediscovered and Bath became not only a healing center, but also the center of 18th Century style, etiquette, and fashion."

The Source of the hot spring (you can see the steam and the rock is very orange)

Me sitting on a rock next to the Roman Bath

That helps me describe how excited I was to see the famous Bath Pump Room that I read about in Jane Austen's Northanger Abbey last December! It was really cool to see the scenery from that book come to life! The pump room was a meeting place for the citizens of Bath, and Catherine, the heroine of the novel, goes there a lot for tea and socializing.

Outside the Pump Room

After the Roman Baths we went to lunch at a local pub. This might sound astonishing....but I had my first taste of fish and chips while I was there! (I usually don't eat fish much, but I thought I'd been in England too long without trying it.) It was just baked cod and french fries, so it was definitely tasty. I also ordered tea and fudge - which was amazing!

After lunch we roamed the shops of Bath for an hour, and I found some great brown boots on sale! They have traction on the bottom, which was the order winner for me since I'm going to Scotland next weekend and need some good boots. I regret not bringing my rain boots to England, but they also would have taken up a lot of space and weight in my suitcase.

The coach ride home from Bath was long, and I listened to music and slept the whole way. Then, I went to the grocery store before going all of the way home and picked up some food. I also went to a different grocery store this morning to pick up the rest of what I needed, since it's hard to carry everything in one trip. The two grocery stores I go to here are Tesco and Marks&Spencers. Tesco is a lot like Jewel with lower prices and more generic foods. Marks&Spencer has higher quality foods (lot's of organic) and probably is slightly more expensive. However, they have sales and promotions a lot. I ended up buying two giant packages of hamburger meat for 5 pounds today, which was a great deal. (I'm going to freeze them, don't worry Mom!)

Some food differences I want to write about real quick are that organic products are a lot more expensive here, they don't sell American or Swiss cheese, there's no individually wrapped pudding or Jello like Snack Packs or those Jello packages, and there's no Macaroni & Cheese. Also, most brands do not exist and the ones that do go by a different name (Dannon goes by Dannone). Finally, types of bread are different, such as "wholemeal" instead of "whole wheat." It's tricky, but I'm getting used to it slowly!

I hope everyone had a happy Valentine's Day!

It Pays To Be Friends With Important People

2009-02-13T10:24:00.000-08:00

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!

Gun Control

2009-02-11T16:25:00.000-08:00

So Christine and I were walking home from Queensway tube station today after a long day of work and two classes, when all of a sudden we get to our block (all residential town homes) and there's caution tape blocking the entire street and sidewalk off. Now, the only other time I have seen this happen was last summer in Tucson when every street intersecting with Campbell was blocked off in order to allow President Bush to pass safely down the road. This time, however, I knew the president was not driving down my street. After some prodding, Christine and I finally convinced the police officer monitoring the caution tape barrier to tell us that "there was a report that there MAY have been a gun on our block." Not a shooting...just the existence of a weapon itself.

In America, we have the right to bare arms. However, in London, it is a HUGE deal if you are caught with a gun because owning or carrying a gun is completely illegal. However, I still think it is extreme to block individuals from returning to their own homes on the possibility that a gun is within a quarter of a mile. As far as I know, no gun was found, because ten minutes later they took down the caution tape and let us pass. Moral of the story, I am very safe in London.

To finish, I just want to state that during our overseas orientation, we were told that there were a total of 49 gun deaths in England last year. In America there were tens of thousands. I definitely chose a good place to study abroad.

No Rain In Spain

2009-02-08T12:00:00.000-08:00

I went to Sevilla, Spain this weekend to visit my boyfriend, and I had a really great time! There are a lot of Kelley students studying in that city this semester, so I was able to visit some of my other friends as well.

On Thursday night I left work a few hours early in order to get to Stansted airport to make my 6pm flight. Unfortunately, a bad chain of events took place that wound up with me getting food poisoning at the airport. In the morning, I realized someone had taken my bread out of my refrigerator, so I couldn't make a PBJ sandwich to take to work for lunch. So, I grabbed a Marks & Spencers pre-made soup that I had bought and brought it instead. It served two people, but by the time I ate lunch I was starving enough to eat both servings. Needless to say, the soup must have been expired, because by the time I was on the Stansted Express train to the airport, I was already nautious. I wont go into detail about the goings-on at Stansted and on the airplane. You can just use your imagination based on what you know about food poisoning.

However, the actual journey to Spain went very smoothly. The trip to the airport was fairly easy. I took the Central line from Bond Street to Liverpool Street, which is a big station. It was a little challenging to find where to buy tickets for the Stansted Express, but luckily I speak English so I could read the signs. I bought a ticket for my return trip, too, because I knew I'd need to hurry to catch the last train at 12:30am Saturday night. The Stansted Express takes about 45 minutes from Liverpool Street. Then, at the airport, I was able to use a self check-in machine. I recommend bringing a carry-on duffle if you study abroad, because it really came in handy that I didn't need to check baggage this weekend.

The actual plane ride seemed smoother than plane rides in America, too. Much less turbulent. I think my plane flew at a lower "cruising altitude" so there was less choppiness. Also, with RyanAir, all of the drinks and food on the plane cost money, so I recommend bringing cash with you. On my flight home, my water cost 3 euro...but it was necessary. A final thing to mention, RyanAir lets passengers off on the tarmac, so bring a coat on the plane if you don't want to stand too long outside in cold temperatures.

When I arrived in Spain, Derek was there to pick me up! It was so amazing to see him right away. He had taken the bus to the airport to pick me up, and then helped me find out how to take a bus back to the center of the city. From there, we found another bus that took us on a long journey to a stop close to our hotel. However, since Derek was not familiar with the hotel (and many of you readers know he's not exactly Mr. Rand McNally), it took us another half hour to meander around the area and find our hotel. In Derek's defense, though, the streets were not labelled too well and it was dark ouside.

When we arrived at the hotel, I was astonished with how nice it was! We really lucked out on the price of our room. We stayed at a 3-star hotel called the Hotel Eurostars Regina. The people at the front desk spoke English and Spanish, and the whole place was extremely nice. It even had a courtyard we could look out on! Our room was on the second floor, and, although it was a double, somehow we had three beds (you can only see two in the picture). The shower was really nice, too - which was a relief. Here's some pictures from the hotel:

The next day Derek had a test until 2pm, so we were not able to start sightseeing on Friday until later in the day. The weather was gorgous, though! It was much warmer than London and even though it was supposed to rain all weekend, it only sprinkled once for a little bit! I really lucked out. We walked around Sevilla for a while to find food (I had nothing in my stomach), and I was really surprised to find how annoying it was to find cheap food in the afternoon. Most of the stores and restaurants were closed for a siesta, and the tapas bars that were open were like 5 euro per tapa order. Finally we walked to the Universidad de Sevilla, where we found a restaurant called Casa Blanca that sold inexpensive bocadillos (I'm not sure if I spelled that correctly), which are sandwiches.

After eating on Friday, we went to the Plaza de Espana, which was AWESOME! There were people playing music, a cute puppy, and it wasn't very crowded. It was so pretty, and we went when there was really great lighting because it was late in the day. Also, we ran into some other Kelley Honors friends, which was random but fun! Here's a picture of me and Derek at the Plaza de Espana, as well as the group we ran in to.

After visiting the Plaza de Espana, Derek and I went to his homestay so that I could meet his senora. She was a very nice Spanish woman, and humored me a lot with my out-of-practice Spanish. I kept trying to tell stories in Spanish that failed miserably because I was rusty with my past-tense conjugation as well as limited with my vocabulary. However, I was still able to hold my own and understand the majority of what was being said. At her house, I also had my first Sevilla cafe con leche which was delicious!!! I also really enjoyed the pasteles that she served, even though they were basically cookies and donuts. But as many of you readers may know, I love anything that has chocolate on it.

After that, Derek and I went to El Centro Ingles to go shopping and have him fill up his cell phone minutes. Then, we met Ethan and Alan (two other Kelley Honors students) for a tapas dinner. It was very yummy, and I never asked what I was eating. I thought that would be the safest option.

After dinner, we met up with Clarisa and went back to our hotel room to chat and drink wine. I was able to hear about everyone's experiences so far with their families and their adjustment to the Spanish language. It was very interesting to compare their experiences with my own. Honestly, I feel like the two programs are total opposites.

The next morning Derek and I began our sightseeing much earlier. We first went to get cafe con leche y tostados in a nearby cafe that was close to the Museo de Bellas Artes. Then, we went into the Museo, and I saw a TON of beautiful paintings. There was a lot of religious artwork, which contrasted greatly with my experience at Tate Modern.

Then we walked along the river and saw the bull ring and the Torre del Oro. Next, we walked to the Royal Castle, where we both were able to get in for free (I used my international student ID and they let me in free...I'm not sure if they were supposed to do that). The castle was probably my favorite landmark because the architecture and the gardens were so big and gorgeous! I can't choose a picture to post because I wouldn't be satisfied with just showing one part of such a beautiful place.

Then we walked to the cathedral, which happened to be closed for an important religious service. We were kinda bummed about it, since apparently the cathedral is the third biggest in the world and going up in the bell tower is really cool. So instead we walked around and went to find some food before we started heading back towards the hotel.

After we checked out from the hotel, I went straight to the airport, but we got there really early compared to what was needed. I'm very used to the long lines at O'Hare, and I barely needed to wait in line for anything at the Sevilla airport. My flight home was uneventful, but then getting back to Palace Court was a journey.

The Stansted Express was late at 12:30am, so I didn't get back to Liverpool Street until around 1:45am. At that time, I was surrounded by a lot of drunk people and trying to figure out which busses ran at night to take home. (The tube closes at midnight.) Then, I finally got directions to take a bus to Thorsby house, which was close, where I waited outside on the steps for 40 minutes for some of my friends to get home and let me in. I was able to stay there until the morning, when I finally took the tube home at 11.

That concludes my adventure to Sevilla. Right now I have a really bad cold, and I'm trying to get healthy. Wish me luck on improving my health this week!

Back To The Grind

2009-02-03T00:34:00.001-08:00

The tube is back open again. That means City University is open today, and I have to go to work all day.

This is a really cool picture from the London Underground website:

By the way I forgot to post the terrific news that I planned a last minute trip to visit my boyfriend in Sevilla, Spain this weekend! I'm very excited. We got a great deal on air travel and our hotel because no one wants to go to Southern Spain in February. I'm so excited!

There Were 3 Inches Of Snow In London Today And...

2009-02-02T09:21:00.000-08:00

the following events happened in this order

-above ground trains close
-all bus routes stop
-all public and state schools close
-most tube lines close
-"snowed in" neighbors shovel walks and steps using large brooms
-FedEx completely stops all deliveries
-milk and bread sell out at grocery stores
-City University closes until further notice
-only half of the Stella interns are able to get to work
-mass chaos*
-the London economy crashes* (again)
-slow-paced riots in the streets due to every one's dire fear of the slush*
-shovels and snow plows are imported to England, where they are viewed as a new technology*
-life as usual ensues on Wednesday, February 4th*

*yet to happen, but very likely

To Note: With three inches of snowfall, this is the biggest "blizzard" to hit London in 18 years!!!

Here's an article you can read if you are further interested in how the Brits react to three inches of snow: http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2009/feb/02/snow-london-travel-chaos

My First Taste of Snow From The Atlantic Ocean

2009-02-01T12:03:00.000-08:00

It snowed today! This does not happen often in London. Hence the reason why they felt the need to create a beach of salt on the sidewalks. Walking home from our sushi dinner at Yo Sushi in Whiteleys, we discovered that Queensway is the new London Riviera!

snowing outside of Palace Court

This is what Bayswater looked like at 7:30pm

This is the amount of salt necessary to prevent British people from slipping in 0.1 inches of snowfall.

This is literally the view from the window of my room. As you can see, the snow didn't really get "heavy" until it became dark.

Seafaring Is Daring

2009-01-31T13:20:00.000-08:00

This week many of my friends from my program decided to buy tickets for the Thames River Cruise offered through the City University Student Union. The night was to be themed "Casino Royal" (James Bond), so I went shopping yesterday to buy a black dress, gold heels, and a black/gold/pearl headband. (Very Theta, I know!) All of us looked great! Every girl was wearing a black dress and every guy was wearing a suit and tie.

We took the tube to Temple station right along the river at 7pm and arrived at Temple around 7:45. We walked across the street to the dock, and met up with everyone else from the program who was going on the boat as well. The thing to note at this point is that I randomly saw Paul Mancini - who I went to elementary school with - and he was visiting some friends in London for the weekend while he studied in Barcelona. So random and such a small world.

So we get on the boat and it was very fun. There were two levels, the first level was well lit with tables and a bar. The second level was darker with dancing and a bar but also a place to go out side. Here's a picture of the view of Parliament from the deck of the ship as well as me and some of my friends standing outside on the deck (it was really cold).

So we were all having a perfectly fun time aboard ship up until around midnight. At that point, two sketchy British guys came up next to me, Christine, and Haley and started talking to us. I immediately got up to go to the bathroom as an excuse. However, Christine stayed with Haley because Haley was feeling sick and laying on the bench that we were sitting on. The two guys were very drunk and perhaps even on drugs. They started harassing Christine and then even took a campaign bottle and purposefully sprayed it all over her. The bartender came over to stand up for her, and that is when tensions started to escalate. The sketchy guys were banished upstairs but came downstairs very soon after and started trying to hit on another girl named Vanessa on the other side of the room who also happened to be in our program. Some of the American guys in our program were around to witness all of what happened, and they started rallying together to help defend the girls against the sketchy British guys. The sketchy British guys started to get really aggravated, and after the boys in our program asked them to leave us alone and go somewhere else they refused. One thing led to another and a fight broke out involving a few guys. The bartenders clearly had no idea what to do, so immediately the boat was told to dock as soon as possible. The sketchy guys were carried off the boat as well as some of the American guys I hear (not ones that I know well...but since there were about 100 Americans there from our program and visiting, I'm sure I will find out who they were). Overall, it was a very upsetting ending to what started out as a fun night, and I made sure Christine got home safely and tried to take care of her when she felt responsible and hurt by what they said to her.

Now everyone is home and doing fine. I just wanted to write about this because it really helped my friends learn that some men in Britain do not act the same as American men when it comes to leaving women alone.

A Tisket A Tate-sket

2009-01-31T12:43:00.000-08:00

So I went to Tate Modern last weekend with Haley, Erin, and Christine. The art was incredible, and I thoroughly enjoyed my experience. I also really love how most of the museums in London are free, so we didn't have to spend a single pence to see these amazing paintings. I wrote down all of my favorite paintings, and I'm going to list them off:

"Los Moscos" by Mark Bradford (this was made out of advertisements he found around his house for bands and events)

"Loa" by Albert Oehlen

"Water Lillies" by Claude Monet (you've probably already seen this but it's cool in person because the painting is enormous!

"Figure" (Woman) by Magda Cordell

"The Busy Life" by Jean Dubuffet (this one looked like it was made out of colored margarine...it was really cool in person)

"Black Virtue" by Matta (the shading in the sections with red were so amazing that I honestly couldn't stop talking about this painting for the rest of the day after the surrealism exhibit)

"Inflammatory Essays" by Jenny Holzer (these color blocks of essays literally took up a giant wall of one room)

"0 through 9" by Jasper Johns

There were also two artistic films that I really enjoyed watching. The first was called "Meet Joy" and it was both disturbing and fun at the same time. There were a group of people in the film that were constantly finding new things to do (such as pour paint over themselves and the rest, eat raw chicken, roll in a room of feathers, etc.). Although most of the activities looked disgusting, it was also very optically stimulating (and had really fun background music).

I forgot to write down the name of the second artistic film that I enjoyed. It was very strange to watch, and it included dogs, small children, and men in kilts. I found it confusing but intriguing. I hope that if you ever make it to London you will go to the Tate Modern.

Good Morning, London!

2009-01-24T02:24:00.000-08:00

I just woke up at 10:15, and I am the only one awake in my house. Several people went to the club Tiger Tiger last night and came back between 2:30 and 3. They said it was really big and really packed. I didn't go because I was not in the mood to spend 10 pounds to get in as a cover charge and I didn't have enough energy to dance. Instead, I decided to stay in for my first night since I arrived in London. Because Christine was feeling sick, we both stayed in and watched Bridget Jones' Diary 2. It was cute, and Colin Firth was brilliant as always.

Right now I am sitting in my house's common room staring at two beautiful houses across the street. Each of the houses are gated off, which probably makes them even more expensive than our measly 3.5 million pound residence. This neighborhood is fantastic, and feels incredibly safe - espeically in comparison to Thorsby house, which is in the same neighborhood as City University.

As many of you know who are reading this blog entry, my skin is very pale. Over the past few weeks, I've noticed that I fit in well with most other Londoners, because the Brits are not as obsessed with tan skin as Americans. However, many other girls in my program have already been to a tanning salon here to maintain their tans. Therefore, when I'm out with them, I still feel slightly like a ghost. It's a very interesting thing that I now know there are certain cultural things from America that people do not want to adjust to when arriving in London.

Last night there were whispers from my friends Haley, Erin, and Christine that we would go to Tate Modern this morning around 11am. I have yet to confirm if we will, but I will definitely write about it if the outing happens.

I suppose I should write about what I've done the last two days to keep you, dear reader, up to date with my goings-on. On Thursday, the London Internship program was required to attend two lectures at City University - the first starting at 10am. Therefore, I woke up at 8am in order to get out of the door by 9. Getting to City University early in the morning is a struggle because of the commute - we get on at Queensway tube station, take it across town to Bank, switch lines to the Northern Line and take the Northern Line up to Angel in Islington, and walk seven to ten minutes to City University from Angel. Thus far, I have yet to do anything productive during the commute, including reading the free paper that is offered at the tube stations. (Speaking of the free paper, it's not like free papers are in America at all. The paper actually is regarded very highly for what it is worth, and the people that give it out to you are employed to do so in order to continue to promote the paper and distribute it widely.) However, I tend to just get lost in my thoughts while on the tube, as if I'm continuously spacing out. I believe a goal for my trip will be to figure out how to be productive.

The lectures I attended on Thursday would not have been so boring if they weren't so long, the rooms were not so hot, and I had gotten 8 hours of sleep. Since none of those are the case, sitting through two lectures that were both over two hours long and discussing the current structure of the UK and then the entire history of the European Union was probably the most difficult thing I have had to do since passing through customs. I'm excited to read over my notes for those lectures, since I feel it will take me five minutes to review the material that took over two hours.

Bare with me as I describe Thursday night. It was not good news. I went to McDonalds for dinner down the street with my friends/flatmates Bita, Audrey, and Kaitlin. We were all really craving it as well as wanting to see how it was different from the McDonalds in America. I found it so strange that a.) The menu was probably only 25% on the menu offered in the States and b.) I ordered my food and then they told me to find a seat and brought it to me when my food was ready. After McDonalds, Christine and I made our way down to Redcliffe Gardens, where we were going to meet our friends before going out to a pub. However, because the group of people were so big, there was a misunderstanding where half of the group took the tube to Picadilly and went to On Anon and the other half (my group) took the tube to High Street Kensington and went to a local pub called the Student Union. By went to a pub, I mean, we arrived at the Student Union after walking quite far in drizzle only to find that the pub closed at 11 and we arrived at 11:05. After that, I was split up even more from the group, and some of the people in that group decided to just go back to Redcliffe, where I then followed knowing that I at least would not be further lost if I went back to Redcliffe. I spent several hours there with my friend Sharday hanging out and watching American TV shows online.

At around 1:30 in the morning, before everyone else got back, I decided to check my email on my friend Evan's computer. Upon checking it, I found an email from Bank of America informing me that they had recognized potential fraudulent charges on my credit card. Sure enough, when I logged in, my credit card number had been stolen and was being used to order crappy stuff like Abercrombie online. So I was awake until 3:30 in the morning on the phone with Bank of America trying to cancel my credit card, adding my father to my account so he can fill out my forms when the arrive at our house, and figuring out how I can get a new credit card. Everything seems sorted out now. However, the thing to remember is that the reason why my credit card number was stolen is because, in England, retail stores print out the entire card number on receipts that you have to sign. This move enables employees of the stores to have access to your card number if they feel like being unethical.

Friday I did not have to be at City University until 2pm, which was nice that I could sleep in. However, I did not enjoy the process of registering for my classes in the slightest. They sent everyone into a big room to find the professors of the classes that we wanted to take and have them sign off that we could enter the classes. There was no guidance behind what I should take, and I felt the professors representing business classes did not know exactly what they were talking about. Plus, there were so many of us business students from IU trying to take an equivalent to Z302, they had no idea how to answer our questions. Even though I felt like I was being a jerk, I finally think I found the exact information I needed to be able to sign up for the classes that I must take. I will now have two classes on Wednesday and one Monday morning at 9am (ouch).

I think that pretty much covers my update. I tend to not be home long enough to do time-consuming things, such as grocery shop, laundry, and update my blog. However, I'm definitely working on creating more time for those this weekend, so wish me luck!

What I Have Done In England Thus Far

2009-01-21T11:49:00.000-08:00

Hello! I just finished dinner and I decided to come upstairs to chill a little bit while everyone in my house watches a TV show before we decide our plans for the night. I am going to outline what I've done so far this trip as much as possible, so that way you at least know what my activities have been even though I will not go into detail. Also, feel free to comment if you want more information.

Monday:

arrived at Palace Court
met my roommate Audrey as well as the other people that live with me in the London Internship and City University programs. the freshmen and the students in the London Now program did not arrive until the following Monday.
went grocery shopping at Tesco
went to the cell phone store and figured out what plan everyone else seemed to think was a good idea. they all bought the same plan and same 5-pound cell phone at The Carphone Warehouse. I later went back to purchase the same plan as a sim card to use in my unlocked T-Mobile phone.
Went for a walk that was lead by our Graduate Resident, Phillip. He showed us a store called Marks & Spencers where you can buy organic groceries, towels, and sheets.
Went to a local restaurant called Cafe Diana, where the walls were covered in pictures of Princess Diana. The restaurant was not worth it, because the portions were way too small and overpriced.
After a dinner of Domino's Pizza courtesy of Arcadia University during our house meeting, all nine of us went to a local joint called Tequilla TexMex where we got chips&salsa and some drinks. Technically, it was my first legal drink.

Tuesday:

Went to our first day of orientation starting at 9am. Luckily, I wasn't jetlagged (thanks to my dad for helping with that!)
Met everyone in the program at orientation, which was held at the Thisle Hotel by the Euston Square tube stop.
Got lunch at an Italian restaurant by the hotel, which was tasty.
During the afternoon part of orientation, we had three members of Parliament come talk to us about the British government and they answered any questions that we had. After a heated topic about Palestine, I decided to ask each whether they supported Obama or McCain in the election. They didn't really answer the question, but said that they all felt Obama has a lot of hype to live up to.
At night, we ventured down to Redcliffe Gardens for the first time, where me and a few friends from Palace met the people who lived there. When there, we walked around there business center to find food and a pub that was open.

Wednesday:

We had the 2nd day of our orientation, where we learned about UK culture and safety. We also were able to sign up for Arcadia sponsored trips (I was only able to sign up for the Scotland trip, so I'll need to figure out how to go to Paris some other way).
I went to the convenience store called Boots (like Walgreens) where I bought all of my essentials.
At night, Arcadia paid for us to attend the musical We Will Rock You featuring the music of Queen. It was really fun music, even though the story line was kinda lame. Very cool lighting effects too!
After the musical, all 40 kids in the program went to a club in Leischester Square called Zoo Bar and had a really fun time.

Thursday:

We had our first class at City University, where we learned about what family life is like in Britain. I have a paper due next week that needs to include info I learned during that class.
At night my friends and I went to a pub called Walkabout, where my friend Erin met a British guy that she really liked. He later asked her out on a date for last night, and she had a really great time and is going out on another date with him this Saturday. However, I found Walkabout really boring, especially since it was an Australian bar instead of British.

Friday:

I picked up Christine from Redcliffe Gardens Friday morning, and we had an incident where we got on the wrong tube train so I jumped off really fast but she couldn't get off in time. Luckily, the tube is so easy that I just stayed where I was and she was able to get off at the next stop and take a train back within 10 minutes. No harm no foul, it was just funny cuz we were split up so fast.
Friday night I left for my homestay around 6pm and took a coach out to Woking, Surrey. My homestay family was so nice! I lived with another girl from IU named Kristin, and we had a great time. The dinner they fed us Friday night was extremely delicious and really filling. Plus they were really nice people all around.

Saturday:

The students in the internship program all had our homestays in Surrey, so during the day the program took us to the towns of Windsor and Eton. I was able to see Windsor Castle, which is Queen Elizabeth's official residence. Also, we ate lunch in the town of Windsor. Then, in the afternoon, we walked down to Eton and toured the town and visited Eton College (where the Princes went to school). It was all very cool and very old.
For dinner Saturday night Kristin and I had a traditional English roast, roasted potatoes, apple crumble, and something I don't remember the name of. It was absolutely delicious. I honestly don't know where people get the idea that England has bad food. They should just go eat dinner at the Grimshaw house and they will know otherwise.
Saturday night the Grimshaw family, Kristin, and I all watched the 2nd Harry Potter movie together because Kristin had never seen it. It had been a few years since I had seen it too, so I really enjoyed that.

Sunday:

We took the coach back to London around noon from Surrey. I don't really remember what we did that afternoon because it was really low key. Probably grocery shopping. I'm still really bad at cooking, but at least I'm eating three meals a day.
Sunday night we celebrated Christine's 21st birthday by taking her to Redcliffe Gardens, then out to a club called On Anon where we met up with people from Thorsby house as well. I think she liked it a lot, especially because there was another girl from Thorsby in our program whose birthday it was as well.

Monday:

Everyone in my program had a 10am class at City University, so we took the tube there. We found out when our internship interview would be the next day.
Christine and I walked to Kensington Church Street area to go shopping in the afternoon, and we both bought the same pair of black skinny jeans. Those are pretty trendy here in London, and they fit better in my boots than my flare jeans do.
I met my new roommate Kaitlin as well as other students in the London Now program, since they arrived on Monday. She's really nice!
Monday night we went back to Tequilla TexMex as a fun thing to do with the new residents. Also, we wanted to stay close to home because we all had interviews on Tuesday.

Tuesday:

Christine and I had our internship interviews at Stella McCartney. It was really cool to see the building. The interview was held in the VIP room. Also, it was extremely informal, and the PR Assistant just told us what our responsibilities would be. The only bad part was that I wore my high heels for the first time in a really long time and I got a major blister on my pinky toe that still hurts a lot.
At night many people in the program met at a club called Roxie, but we were completely unimpressed. All they played there was non-stop techno music. Five of us left early and walked to Zoo Bar, but I didn't have that much fun there either. The weird thing was that Matt, who was one of my friends from IU, had his wallet fall out of his pocket and apparently it was turned in to the bouncer at the door. As we were walking out and after he had already cancelled his credit card, the bouncer overheard us talking about it and told him that he had his wallet. Not even the cash was stolen out of it! He was extremely lucky and it was a really good lesson for all of us to make sure we have our wallet on us at all times.

Wednesday:

I had class this morning at 10am again, which taught us everything I'd ever need to know and way too much more about the British educational system. It was fairly boring.
After class, my friends Christine, Chad, Haley, and I went to go find a pound store (like a British dollar store) and ran into a random market in Islington. We shopped for a little bit in the market, but I didn't buy anything because I didn't know what I needed. After we were done shopping, we took the tube back to Palace Court - which is an hour commute from City University by the way.
Once home, the four of us went to a local pub for lunch called The Champion I think. I ate a really good sandwhich and fries (chips). I love how you can go to a pub here and not have to order alcohol.
Once I got home I ran some local errands with my roommate Kaitlin and the new boy that lives above me named Spencer. After getting back from those errands, I went with my roommate Audrey and another girl at Palace Court named Bita to a giant retail store called Primmart that is two tube stops away from our house. The store is huge, always busy, and sells clothes/shoes/accessories for SOOOOO cheap. I didn't buy anything because I felt really overwhelmed.
After shopping, I came home to take a nap, went on Skype, and then ate dinner. Now I'm about to have a chill night with people from my program, and I think they're waiting for me right now actually.

I hope this has been a decent update on what I've been doing. I can expand more on things if you want...just let me know. My fingers are tired right now, though, so until next time....cheers!

We Had Our Stella Interview Today!

2009-01-20T05:47:00.001-08:00

It went really well. Both Christine and I got the internship! She already wrote about it, so I'll let you just read what she wrote instead of me writing the same thing. Here's what she says about it:

http://christine-mindthegap.blogspot.com/2009/01/stelllaaa.html

My Journey Across The Pond

2009-01-19T08:07:00.000-08:00

First I am going to write about my plane trip. Sunday morning at 10am (a few hours before I was supposed to leave) I got a text from my friend Haley who said our flight was cancelled. So I immediately looked it up on VA's website and sure enough...the plane had been cancelled and had to emergency land in Dublin. So we called both Student Universe and VA to get me on a new flight, and Student Universe was able to put me on a United flight that left slightly earlier that day. It was all very stressful, but it was sorted out relatively quickly. However, only one of the three of my friends that were going to be on my VA flight with me was able to transfer onto my new flight.

The flight over was fine in most respects. However, half way through the Atlantic Ocean we hit a really turbulent spot that scared me and my friend a bit. The pilot came on the intercom and said "flight attendants get to your seats immediately!" However, the turbulence stopped after a few minutes, but it still was kinda freaky. Also, my friend and I sat next to a student from Jordan who had just finished his undergraduate degree in America. He was laughing at us when we were scared of the turbulence.

Since we flew United, we were able to leave from the domestic United terminal at O'Hare and arrive in the non-international terminal at Heathrow. This made travelling, security, and customs much easier, but we had to go from Terminal 1 to Terminal 3 at Heathrow when we arrived in order to meet our group. So with my super heavy suitcases, we grabbed a free luggage cart and made the half hour journey that includes many hallways, inclines, and declines. It was challenging...but we made it.

Once we arrived at Terminal 3, I introduced myself to the other Arcadia students who had arrived as well. Then, the first bus (of three that were sent to pick us up) arrived and took us to our residences. The lame thing was that I was the only one on that bus who lived in my residence and they decided to drop me off last! So I was literally on that bus for three hours before getting to my dorm. Five minutes after I arrived, the second bus dropped off the second round of people (which means they got to be one of the first stops instead of the last). It was somewhat frustrating, but it gave me a tour of London when there's traffic and I was able to see where everyone lives.

My dorm is pretty cool. The Arcadia University offices are on the first floor (or the ground floor as they call it in Britain). There's flats in the basement where freshmen live and where the laundry is. The freshman just arrived today, though, because their program didn't require the two week long orientation. Then there three are half floors that include the bathrooms, and then three floors of rooms that are triples. I live in the smallest triple in the building, which is fine since I don't have a lot of stuff. For the first week I just had one of my roommates here, Audrey, who is from Bucknell University and doing a program that does not include and internship. My second roommate, Kaitlin, came today and is doing the same program that the new freshman are doing. Everyone's programs are through Arcadia. There's a graduate resident who lives in the house and is a lot like an American RA. The final thing I should mention is that there are a lot of steep stairs to climb, and lugging my heavy luggage up them to my room on the third floor was a challenge.

I live in a building that is literally next to Hide Park and between to Queensway and Notting Hill Gate tube stations. The neighborhood is really nice, and there's a ton of shops and restaurants just around the corner. Everything is within walking distance that I would need. I really like my place.

I need to go now and get some things done, but another update about what I have been up to will come soon. Thanks for being patient while I spent time adjusting, exploring London, and having fun!

update coming soon

2009-01-18T11:04:00.000-08:00

An update is coming within the next few days. I just haven't had enough time to sit down and write EVERYTHING I want to write about my first week. But I have a list of the topics, so stay tuned.

My Last Night Stateside

2009-01-10T11:30:00.000-08:00

I am leaving for London tomorrow night, and it will not stop snowing in Chicago! I am already expecting a delay based on the weather forecast. It's supposed to snow in Chicago off-and-on throughout the weekend, and we already have several inches of snow accumulated from previous snow showers this week. There is also a chance that my plane will need to be "de-iced." Wish me luck! I am supposed to arrive at Heathrow airport at 8:50am Monday, January 12.

There is a six-hour time difference between Chicago and London. Because of this, my father has been making me get up earlier and earlier every day this week to prevent jet lag (which can be brutal during the first few days based on my own experience and the opinions of my friends who have already studied abroad). This morning I woke up at 7:30 Chicago time, which would be 1:30pm London time. I definitely will still have some jet lag to conquer!

With the London Internship program through Arcadia University, a student is assigned to live in one of three residences based on proximity to his or her internship placement. The three residences are Thoresby, Redcliffe Gardens, and Palace Court. I will be living in Palace Court with four other female London Internship Program participants. I have heard I will live in a triple room, with wifi access, and a communal kitchen and bathroom. The Palace Court building also houses the London offices of Arcadia University. Palace Court is located on the actual street called Palace Court, which is on the northwest side of Hyde Park.

Right now I am working on packing up the last few items I am taking to London. I have two 29" Delsey suitcases that are part of the company's "lightweight" line. In addition, I am bringing a backpack and a small duffel bag as my two carry-on bags. As a tiny 5'1" female, I'm quite nervous about the bulk of my belongings (especially since I've been told there is no elevator to my flat).

The weather in London is much more temperate than it is in Chicago. Next week the expected highs in London are in the upper 40's and low 50's. Here is a graph of the average monthly temperatures, which I got from visitlondon.com. As you can see, the temperatures vary much less than they do in Chicago and Indiana. Right now in Chicago I am suffering through 20-degree (F) weather with a lot of snow, and in the summer the temperature in Chicago can get up to 100 degrees. Very big difference. When I went to Brighton, England last June there were people lounging on the beach on a 65-degree day!

I also feel I should briefly write about the latest royal news in London. First, Prince William is NOT engaged yet, although many Brits feel it will happen this year. Secondly, Prince Harry has been caught on a video from three years ago saying derogatory things about Pakistani people. He has issued a formal apology.

Finally, I received an email from the mother in my homestay family this week introducing herself and her family. As part of my program orientation, I will be travelling to Woking, Surrey (just southwest of London) next weekend to stay with a family. I will be rooming with another female student on my program while at the family's house. During the day, I will be visiting Windsor with the program and touring around the shire (which is like a British county). The family sounds very nice, and they have experience housing students who are studying abroad! I am sure I will blog more about my experience in Woking when the time comes.

Well, wish my luck on my last night in the states! Tomorrow at this time (6pm) I will be sitting at O'Hare airport. I still haven't figured out why the times I write posts is recorded wrong next to the comments. Well, until next time, cheers!

A Quick Thanks

2009-01-08T15:55:00.000-08:00

Before I begin blogging about my London adventures, study abroad experience, etc, I would like to say a quick thank you to a few people. First, thank you to Richard Seaman for allowing me to use such a cool photo of the Parliament building, the Thames, and Big Ben as the background of my blog. Second, thank you to Shawn Conner from IU's Kelley School of Business for setting up my blog and creating such a cool title photo with me superimposed into Trafalgar Square. Third, thank you to my dad for helping me with the html code problems I came across when trying to make my blog look awesome. Finally, thank you to See's Candy for providing me such a delicious chocolate snack as I write this. I couldn't have written this post without the help from the aforementioned.