Crouch, Touch, Pause, Engage!

I am about four days behind…and all of the days I feel like have so much to blog about!! So this is going to be a little long… here goes…This was a phenomenal 4 day weekend!!!

February 23- Thursday

            The day started with a solo grocery trip to the Tesco Metro. Class was a group project day, but part of my group was headed to Barcelona for the weekend, so that means we had a 4 day weekend! Anyways, the weather was absolutely gorgeous! I was unaware of this when I left and was sweating my north face was so hot. Anyways, it was definitely food shopping time because everything here is very fresh which means it all goes bad in a couple of days. So American bulk shopping doesn’t go well here. Plus there are 2 fridges for 8 girls, so we need to be conscious of our space…

            After that I just spent some time in a local Café, drinking my white chocolate mocha, and reading for school. After bumming around most of the day, Katie G (Neenz in future references) & I decided we really wanted to walk around. So after dinner we & 2 of the guys took the tube into London to walk around at night. We walked through Trafalgar Square, around Piccadilly Circus, and Leicester Square- picked up a bunch of postcards too! (If you don’t get one within the week don’t worry I still have much more to do…but if you send me your address I’ll definitely get the hint). We even stopped into M&M World-super touristy but hey why not. 

We didn’t do much else except enjoy the beautiful (sweater no jacket) weather that London has freakily been blessed with! That’s it for Thursday.

February 24-Friday

            The day started off with filling in those postcards I bought. Not too exciting, but it was time to send some mail off. After that Neenz & I decided to go exploring. She has a friend that used to live in Hamstead Heath, & we’ve heard that was a really nice (or posh) area so we decided to go exploring. Golders Green is another neighborhood that we’re assigned to for our GST group project, and since the two are right next to each other it was a good excuse for our work too. Hamstead Heath is so nice!!! Apparently Pierce Brosnan has a house in the area, and one of the spice girls used to…. Very very classy. It was another beautiful day too, so we were able to walk around a beautiful park, take artsy pictures with flowers, and just enjoy the sun and blue skies!

We even stumbled across some sort of zoo with deer, an ostrich, and lots of birds….

           

On the way home Neenz hadn’t been to Platform 9 ¾ yet so we of course had to stop. This time there was a line to take your picture!

Please note the contrast between my clothes last time I went & this time…so fantastic!!

We also stumbled across an M&S (Marks & Spencers). Not too exciting, except this place is one of many in London following a new trend…clothes and food. To me that just sounds really bizarre…but apparently it’s the new thing…we’ll see if that catches on.

Anyways Friday night, someone’s friends from Wales were visiting so we checked out Los Locos- a Mexican restaurant turned club. It was fun just dancing with each other! Most of us left early enough to get the Tube home (which closes around midnight).

February 25th- Saturday

            So Ginna Claire’s British brother Tim’s 26^th birthday was Saturday! So he invited some of us to his party. So that morning, Neenz & I decided we were going to go find new outfits! So we trekked to Primark. I’ve blogged about this place before, but it’s indescribable. A crazy, huge, cheap, fantastic, horrible experience you really have to experience on your own. Anyways, after getting separated looking for dresses & waiting in line for 15 minutes to try them out…it was a success! I bought 2- 1 I wore that night & one a friend borrowed that night.

^yes that is bright green & yes that other one has owls on it.

*London Fun Fact*: animals on your clothes are the next big trend.

So after shopping, buying a new pair of sunglasses, and having a nice lunch at Pret A Manger (which is one almost every corner here). We headed to go watch Tim’s league play rugby! It was another gorgeous sunny day, so we sat outside at watched a match!

         Rugby is so unique. People are falling down, being picked up, yelling obscenities followed by “sir,” and saying instructions such as “crouch, touch, pause, engage.” It was quite an experience watching it, needless to say, it felt very British. Sadly, they lost, so we headed home to get ready for Tim’s birthday party!

So the party. There is so much to blog about, I’m doing it in bullet points…

            -Tim is pretty well off so we started at his very nice house/flat to meet his friends

            -Felt very adult showing up with a bottle of wine for him & mingling with all of his professional friends

            -social cues are definitely different, but once we started mingling it was fun

            -next stop Public, the club

 ^Neenz, me, Ginna Claire

 
 So the club.

            -had to be on a guest list. We were on Tim’s guest list, but not the VIP one which meant higher coverage & lots of confusion.

            -eventually we had a blast with the 4 of us that were there plus Tim & his friends.

            -super super posh. Like even beyond posh (apparently the royals have been spotted here & the entire Wales rugby team arrived later on, but after we left)

            -we had fun dancing with each other & it was such a different experience!

            -about 12:30 three of us decided it was time to catch the night bus home.

So the night bus.

            -took over an hour & a half

            -lots of local 20ish guys on the bus rapping about Piccadilly circus on the way to a casino for a friend’s birthday….

Tim’s birthday party ended up being a lot of fun. It was definitely a different scene being with locals, especially locals that are pretty well off in London, but still so much fun.

I’m sure I’m not talking about nearly as much as I want to, but this brings us to:

Today, February 26^th.

Around noon, quite a few of us headed into Camden to check out the market. I absolutely loved today & fully intend on going back! The first part we walked through was much more of a New York market style with people bartering & trying to get to buy their things. I actually made a purchase of this big super soft sweater that I haggled from 25 pounds to 16! I was quite proud of myself!

 The main street has lots of open stores, stands, etc, along the sidewalk. This scene is definitely an arsty scene. It’s a high student population too. Once we kept on walking, we got past that market and made it into the Camden Lock Market. This was more our scene. We found the food area with ethnic stand after ethnic stand, and I really enjoyed my fresh dumplings & rice for lunch! (And of course a Strawberry Dream Boat crepe later for dessert) I could eat every meal there for a week and never get bored!  

Anyways we kept walking, ended up making another purchase of a British shirt with Neenz (2 for 20…I had to help her get the deal), and just loved walking around!

 We honestly probably didn’t even see a quarter of all the market had to offer. There was everything there from clothes to jewelry to art to music to food…Can’t wait to go back! And of course it was another beautiful sunny, blue skies, kind of day! I know there's so much more to share, but I kinda have work to do....yes I do go to school here too...

This weekend was phenomenal…I wish I could put my finger on why. We explored a lot, had a great time, the weather was beautiful… 3 months is not enough time to do everything & travel everywhere! This week will be a bit more of business work, and then Neenz, Liz, & I are off to Paris on Thursday!! So excited!!

  

*London Lingo*

“That’s quality”

“He was steaming”

Mate, chap, sir, miss

Sorry- not lingo, but they say it all the time!

Loo

Miss! Miss! Miss!

It’s been a few days since I’ve written, but there’s not too too much to update you on.

Sunday, February 19

            Just like I predicted…lazy Sunday. I went to the noon Mass which was so much better than the latin choir Mass I went to the week before. I wasn’t cold, the music kept me awake, and the whole atmosphere was just much better. Plus I got to sleep in, so no complaints at all for that! The rest of the day was pretty lazy. I was productive in doing some work, but I don’t think I left the flat much if at all.

Monday, February 20

            Monday was my first full day at St. Marylebone National School. It started off a bit rocky with not very clear instructions, but then once we got our time table (schedule) it all went smoothly. So here’s my Monday schedule.

Arrive at 8:15 and go with my Year 8 Form (homeroom)

Period 1: Church service- it’s a Church of England school, so they have service every Monday. This week was about reverence, and it was definitely interesting to sit in on.

Period 2: Year 11 English class

Period 3 & 4: Six Form English class (year 12 & 13, coed)

Lunch

Period 5: Year 7 English class with a First Year teacher which is basically the equivalent to our Teach for American program

Period 6: Year 8 English class.

Done at 3:30! It’s exhausting, but all I really did this time was sit and observe. The biggest difference I’ve noticed (other than the whole system/set up) was the terminology.

“We have revision for our mocks for our AS.” UM WHAT. But most of it got explained to me eventually over the day.

More fun changes

            *All the teachers are called “Miss.” Just Miss, no name.

            *at this particular school they can’t wear any nail polish & not much face make up at all really. Before Period 1 there were so many girls in the front reception area taking off their nail polish from half term…

            *half term: sort of like our spring break in-between 2 terms (school system is 6 terms I believe)

Sitting in a class of all girls, in their uniform, speaking with British accents..just blows my mind. One girl said that I had a cool accent….which is a shock to me seeing as the American “nonaccent” is not cool at all…

As of the class subjects, a lot of it is very comparable to our American English classes. Throughout the day we talked about topic sentences, essay planning, Yates, Macbeth, Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry, and more.

After spending the day at St. Marylebone, we had our Teaching & Learning class Monday night. Nothing too exciting to report from that, and that was Monday!

Tuesday, February 21

            Tuesday morning was just GST class & London Theater class. Nothing much to share just the usual. Oh. Except for the fact that Katie Gonino, and I had a serious class of the giggles. You know those days when nothing is really funny, but once you’re set off you’re done for? Yep. That was us. And it was even worse because we had to hold it back for not 1 class, but 2. We clearly thought it was hilarious, so I wish I could share it, but I know it won’t come across as very funny. For example, Brits say “toy boy” instead of “boy toy.” Yeah…didn’t think it would come across well via the internet. Oh well.

            Tuesday night we went to our second theater performance. This time we say In Basildon in the Royal Court Theater. This is the theater for new writing, and last night’s performance was technically the last preview before it opened today. The theater itself was very different than Old Vic from last week. It was pretty small, and we sat in these comfy leather chairs. The stage was in the center, and there were two sides of the stage where people sat. Almost like two half circles just around the poles…if that makes any sense. So that was cool. The play itself I’m still a bit undecided on. It was about a working class family that was very dysfunctional. I appreciated the plot, and I know a lot of people could relate to it. Even though I couldn’t relate, it made me very grateful to be blessed with a great family and great family relations. But like I said, the verdict is still off for my opinion of the play.

            The play was very slow. And “soapy.” I think if about 30 minutes could be cut out, it’d be much better. My favorite part includes the second half of Act 1 and the first half of Act 2. The rest dragged on a bit too much for my liking. Regardless, it was a very cool experience to see another type of play in another type of theater- especially since it’s a brand new play. So that was Tuesday!

Today- Ash Wednesday!

It’s only 11:45, so not much has happened yet today, but I did go to Mass this morning to receive ashes. So Happy Lent! I’m really blessed to have a Catholic church just 10 minutes walking distance. Well. That’s it for today! Sorry this blog has no pictures….it’s been a pretty low key past few days.

Raining cats and dogs!

Today was a day trip to the Cotswolds with International Friends with Liz. It was only the two of us from Elon, but I’m so glad we went! The Cotswolds is a rural, countryside part of England, and during our trip we went to 4 different villages (we had over an hour at each). Each village is so similar, but each also has its own flavor or personality.

First stop: Burford. We really just walked around High Street, and that’s about all there was to the village. Stone houses, pebble stone streets, and a cute little bakery and sweet shop. The buildings are all so ancient and quaint.

Second village: Stow-On-The-Wold. It was so windy here so we were freezing. We still walked around, found a sweet shop store and a chocolate kitchen, and walked around more. I have never seen so many tea rooms and coffee houses ever. So British.

Third village: Broadway. This village kind of got the short stick with us because it was raining during our visit, which is unfortunate since apparently it’s the most photographed village in Great Britain. Its unique flavor to me seemed to be the numerous amounts of art galleries. After getting wet from the rain we ducked into Tisanes Tea Room for lunch. Here I learned some fun British expressions such as ming (as in it’s so ming…not so great weather) or naft (really gross all around). I also learned the origin for the phrase “it’s raining cats and dogs.” Apparently, thatched roofs would be water proofed so they would be slippery therefore all the cats and dogs that hid in the thatched roof would slide off when it rained. Hence, it’s raining cats and dogs. 

Fourth village: Burton On The Water. This village was my favorite, probably mainly because the sun came out and the sky was nice and blue. There was this gorgeous river in the village too with some stone bridges. Gorgeous. Once again, we found a sweet shop so I could buy more local fudge and toffee. I definitely spent my fare share of local sweets today, totally worth it though! 

 After two days of day trips, I’m ready for a lazy Sunday afternoon!