London: February 15th & 16th

This weekend I went into London with Lesley, Sarah, and Natalie. After a night of intense Valentine's Day celebrating, I had one of the worst hang overs that I've had yet. Apparently there IS a limit to Jell-O shots-- who knew? Rose was supposed to come with us but she was in worse shape than I was. So we got on the bus Friday at about 11:30, heading for London. We were going to meet up with Sarah's friend from home, Maggie, who is studying in London for the semester with a group of her friends from home. We walked around London for most the day and also took some time to discover what the London Tube was all about. And I have to confess, I loved it. Minus being rammed into the corner during one ride, it was the most efficient mode of transportation that I have experienced thus far. Granted, Oxford isn't big enough to need the tube and the buses are fine, but the speed of the tube is amazing. You had to take an elevator up and down, to and from the tube station, because it was so far underground. The stairs were only for emergencies.

We went to Harrod's to check out what it was all about, and I felt like I was going through different lands in every room. There's sports, clothing, groceries, perfume, candy, etc. It's amazing, we actually got lost trying to find our way out. We stopped at one point to have some tea and it was quite delicious. The waitress seemed really pissed though because we didn't want cream or anything in our tea. Unfortunately for her, her tip was small even when taking into consideration that tip isn't a big thing here. Then we took a trip through Soho, discovering that every street there has a different theme: furniture, clothing, electronics. It was crazy.

We met up with Maggie and her roommates then, but we had a little trouble getting into her dorm without Huron student ID. They weren't letting people in because there had apparently been a knife fight right in front of the door the night before. But we sucked up to the guard and wrote our names down for further verification, but he never checked. Maggie and us went out to a nice Italian dinner, where I had one of the best pesto dishes I've ever had. She and her roommates had also had kind of a rough night the night before, so it took us awhile to get dressed and ready to go out. By the time that we did, the pubs were all beginning to close, so we met up with these guys that Maggie had made friends with and went to a house party. This started out very awkwardly, since it was 2 boys bringing about 8 to some chick's birthday party. We began to ease out the door, which was difficult seeing as to how it was the smallest apartment in the world and there were a ton of people there, but we got stuck in the hallway. Alex (the boy that brought us) kept telling us to stay and grabbing us beer as incentive. Normally I would not be okay with this, but there were so many of us that I felt fine doing it.

And then I stopped feeling uncomfortable. I became the Toilet Monitor, since I was right by the door and people kept asking me if I was "queuing for the toilet?" and I said "no, but you're next!!" They seemed to like that, so I made a few friends, including a girl named Laney who constantly was going to the toilet and boy named Davyyd (pronounced "Dah-VEED", not David, like I had thought) who had a tattoo of his name on his throat. Strange, but helpful. We ended up leaving in the early hours of the morning and walking back through the blistering London coldness. The next morning we woke up late and went to Portabello Market (which was JAM PACKED with people!). I've really wanted to start collecting bracelets everywhere I visit, but I couldn't find one I liked so I got a silver instead. I also tried some REAL fish and chips (amazing, Dad) and then we went to look for the rest of the kids from St. Clare's, who had come in that morning. We went to Trafalgar Square where there was some sort of exhibition of people freeze framing around the fountain for an extended amount of time. There were tons of people taking pictures and it took us awhile to realize it was because everyone around the fountain wasn't moving, but holding poses of ordinary, everyday movements. It was so interesting.

Then we went into the National Gallery, but we were so tired and there were so many people that we left soon after. We met up with everyone at the London Eye (we thought they would be at the gallery but they weren't) and rode on that, which was amazing especially with all the night lights. My camera died, of course, but I plan on stealing some from everyone else. Then Sarah, Lesley, and I caught a bus back to Oxford while everyone else stayed the night in a hostel. Needless to say, we were glad to be back "home". Today we've just been sleeping and grocery shopping, which has been great.

Next weekend is Paris, which I am very excited for, so I need to go finish up my homework before Thursday rolls around!