Friday got significantly more exciting after class finished. My friend Peter, who took me with his friends on the camping trip to Cornwall the first weekend, graciously bought me a train ticket to participate in his going away pub crawl (he is super awesome and got an internship at CERN in Geneva next year, and was also leaving to visit his girlfriend in America so there was plenty of reason to celebrate). This all would have been completely fine, except that the train ticketing service sent the tickets, with a signature required, to Peter’s name at my address. Needless to say, when I went to go and pick up these tickets from the Royal Mail on Friday afternoon, they refused to simply hand them over. After an hour of coaxing and shameless use of American charm (thank you Amanda), they finally gave us the tickets! Definitely a good start to the weekend, along with the BURRITO STAND we happened across near our flat! It wasn’t even close to being as good as our real Mexican food in California, but it definitely hit the spot.
After taking a quick, but much needed nap, our group got ready to go out to Zoo Bar, which is more of a big club than a bar in Leicester Square. Several people in our group heard that this was a great place to go, and it definitely didn’t disappoint. We spent the night dancing, and were out so late that we missed the tube home (which was fine, because it wasn’t that long of a walk and we got to stop for Burger King on the way home).
I would be lying if I said it wasn’t difficult to wake up on Saturday morning, but it was definitely worth it. Our program took us to Brighton, a beach city about an hour away from London. When we were told about the trip, they said that “if you are gay, just a little gay, or not gay at all but love gays, you will love Brighton”. I don’t know how accurate that statement is because I did not notice THAT many gay people, but it was definitely a fun town with lots of shopping (for all you San Diego folk, it was very similar to PB). Because of its location on the beach, Brighton has unfortunately been burned to the ground several times (mostly thanks to the French), so all the buildings seemed relatively new. One of the only exceptions to this was the Royal Palace, which is where the royal family would come for their beach vacations. It was stylistically very interesting, with Indian design influence on the outside and Chinese on the inside.
At the end of the day I left my friends who were heading back to London on the bus, and got on the train to head to the aforementioned pub crawl with Peter. When I got to his house we had pizza, and shortly after went into Farnham to visit the pubs. These were by far the most legit English pubs I have been to during my stay in England, and it was fun getting to hang out with Peter and crew again. When we were done at the pubs, we went back to Peter’s house to have a small bonfire/enjoy the nice weather outside.
Sunday morning I was surprised with a proper English breakfast. Ok well it wasn’t completely proper because I didn’t have the sausage or bacon, but everything else. It was delicious! If it didn’t take so much time to make I would make one for myself every morning! Sadly I had to leave shortly after breakfast because Peter had to pack for his trips, and we had made plans to go on a Jack the Ripper tour that night in London with some people from my program, Crystal, and Amanda’s friends Genevieve and Doug. It was an interesting tour, except it was pouring rain and cold the entire time. Kinda put a damper on the evening… literally.
At the conclusion of the tour we sat in a pub to dry off a little bit, grabbed some food, and jumped on the tube to return home to our flats. We thought that since the tour was over that the scary part of the day was over, but little did we know it had just begun. When we were switching trains at the tube, Jennings and I made it on to the train, and accidentally left Amanda and Mike on the platform. We, along with the rest of the train who saw what had happened, were laughing hysterically, that is until we arrived at the next stop. As soon as the doors opened, a man who was either asleep/drunk/high/cracked out/whatever falls out of the train, and slams his head on the platform. Needless to say the mood of the tube immediately changed, and they had to shut down the line until the emergency staff arrived. Jennings and I were immediately not happy that we had made it on the train anymore! To offset the horrors we saw we came home and watched “Forgetting Sarah Marshall” before we went to bed. I had never seen it all the way through before, and it was hilarious! It was definitely a good way to bring up our moods.
Lucky for us, we did not have class on Monday morning, so we got to sleep in! Class that afternoon actually wasn’t too bad either, because we had speakers from the Today Show, the largest radio program in the UK, and from the author of one of the books the class had to read. After class, Amanda, Genevieve, Doug, and I went and climbed 311 stairs to the top of the Monument, which had an AMAZING view of the city of London. We were physically exhausted but it was definitely worth it.
On the way back to the flat we also walked by St. Paul’s Cathedral, which was also beautiful. I especially loved all of the flowers that were around the church – their colors were so bright, whereas most things in London look dull because the weather is almost always overcast. After our walk the four of us came home, cooked dinner (again!), and watched the fiasco of other students in our program trying to make weekend plans. Amanda and I had booked flights to Ireland last week, so thankfully we were not involved, but it was just as stressful watching the debacle as it was to be a part of it.
Tuesday was my first day of work! The other intern in my office, Sarah, is awesome, so going to work seriously feels like just hanging out with her. I also got to have lunch with some of her other friends who are also Parliament interns, so I got to meet a lot of other cool British people! The class met us at Parliament, and the MP (that’s what they call members of the House of Commons here) that I work for spoke to the class and Sarah gave them a tour of the Parliament building. I came home with the class, where we made dinner and decided to check out the Sports Café, an American place where, yes you guessed it, they have American sports on TV! And dancing, and cheap drinks. We didn’t stay too long because we were exhausted, but it was fun to meet other American students who are in London.
Which brings me to today, where I ditched class again and spent the day in Parliament; going to meetings, doing research, and having lunch with more British interns. I would be more specific, but I’m not allowed to be :) Yes, I am that cool. And now I am laying on the couch, looking forward to a chill, low key night. If you want to Skype me and say hi, tonight will be a good night to do it!
PS. To all my friends who have finals this week, good luck! Thinking of you all.
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