Anyway let’s go through the highlights of the past 12 days. I’ll try to keep it limited to the highlights or I will have a novel. I left off two Mondays ago when I was about to go make ziti for Joy and Hayley and they liked it so much that we decided to make dinner together every Monday night, and we would each pick a different dish to make. Joy made breaded chicken this past Monday (and btw breadcrumbs are different here! They’re literally crumbs of bread, not evenly crushed and with no spices on them at all. They are crunchy and chunky so we ended up adding our own spices and trying to crush them further but they still didn’t work as well. We’ll have to crush them up thoroughly before using them in any other recipes.) But I’m getting ahead of myself.
Tuesday my Third World Studies professor decided that the projects would be individual and not group-based in the least, after all that stressing. Thanks. And I wanted to get it over with so I volunteered to go the following week. I don’t think anything else eventful happened that day.
Wednesday (Feb 18th so you can get your bearings) we had the Shakespeare walking tour at 6pm so I missed my night class (yay!) and we met at Blackfriar’s Tube Station (which as of this coming Monday will be closed for 2 years for construction work!) and as Joy and I were walking to meet our tour group, we saw none other than Jess Durante and Mike Takach, who were with their Shakespeare class going on a tour by their Shakespeare professor! I hadn’t seen them since the first day I was here so it was weird but at the same time completely familiar to see them, and it was so funny that we were both doing Shakespeare tours the same night! I told them I’d see them at the Globe with a laugh and left to find our tour guide. The first thing he said to us was “I hope none of you are too disappointed, but we won’t be seeing the Globe tonight. I’ve learned not to include it on my tours because everyone usually goes to see it on their own anyway.” Well let me tell you, buddy, I was disappointed! And so was my aunt who had wanted souvenirs and pictures to show her high school literature class! Ugh. Yet another thing to put on my to-do-before-I-leave list. The tour was decent but nothing very exciting; he did bring us to parts of London that we probably wouldn’t have found on our own, but he mostly pointed to buildings and said “this major Shakespearean landmark used to be here” and then speed-walked to the next site, snapping at us when we were too snap-happy with our cameras. But oh well. I did walk down the road that Shakespeare lived on...
...and I got to see the birthplace of Milton...
...as well as the fragments of the wall that was originally built around London when the Romans ruled in the early ADs (If I remember History of the English Language correctly, sometime before about 700 AD, but I could be wrong).
(statue of Shakespeare above the graves of Heminge and Condell who published/performed most of his works)
(totem pole of heads inspired by Shakespeare's "All the world's a stage..." speech)
Thursday I went to my class, stopped at Mortimer’s on the way back with Christy and Megan and got a delicious pain au chocolat – chocolate croissants are sooo delicious and I could probably eat them any time of the day. Then Joy, Hayley and I did a Primark run since later that night, we would be going to an 80s Roller Disco. Yes. As in an 80s theme club with alcoholic beverages, disco music, and roller skating. In case you don’t know, the last time I went roller skating was when I was 10 years old. In Fredericksburg, Virginia, for my 5th grade skating social. With the help of some friends – Paul Loehr I distinctly remember – I had strapped my roller blades on and had gotten out on the rink after practicing (and falling, and crawling) on the carpet. I had successfully made it to the far side of the rink, football-field-sized in my memory, inching my way along the handrail, when they called for everyone to clear the rink for the hokey-pokey or some equally-dangerous game. I panicked but managed to inch my way all the way around to the exit without getting in trouble. That is an infamously negative day in my head for various reasons – it’s the day we found out we were moving to New Jersey, and it’s the day my mom’s arthritis took a turn for the worse – so I don’t associate skating with anything remotely fun. But Hayley and Joy were excited about it so I decided to step outside my comfort zone and embrace something that I blatantly wasn’t good at. Dressing in 80s gear is always fun though, and we went all out, complete with matching pink legwarmers from Primark and coloured tights. I also sported some killer purple glitter eye liner. We were a sight to be seen.
Thursday I went to my class, stopped at Mortimer’s on the way back with Christy and Megan and got a delicious pain au chocolat – chocolate croissants are sooo delicious and I could probably eat them any time of the day. Then Joy, Hayley and I did a Primark run since later that night, we would be going to an 80s Roller Disco. Yes. As in an 80s theme club with alcoholic beverages, disco music, and roller skating. In case you don’t know, the last time I went roller skating was when I was 10 years old. In Fredericksburg, Virginia, for my 5th grade skating social. With the help of some friends – Paul Loehr I distinctly remember – I had strapped my roller blades on and had gotten out on the rink after practicing (and falling, and crawling) on the carpet. I had successfully made it to the far side of the rink, football-field-sized in my memory, inching my way along the handrail, when they called for everyone to clear the rink for the hokey-pokey or some equally-dangerous game. I panicked but managed to inch my way all the way around to the exit without getting in trouble. That is an infamously negative day in my head for various reasons – it’s the day we found out we were moving to New Jersey, and it’s the day my mom’s arthritis took a turn for the worse – so I don’t associate skating with anything remotely fun. But Hayley and Joy were excited about it so I decided to step outside my comfort zone and embrace something that I blatantly wasn’t good at. Dressing in 80s gear is always fun though, and we went all out, complete with matching pink legwarmers from Primark and coloured tights. I also sported some killer purple glitter eye liner. We were a sight to be seen.
We got off the tube (yes, we attracted plenty of stares) at Vauxhall where the Roller Disco was nearby, but to our dismay, no one in sight was sharing our enthusiasm for retro fashion faux-pas. A guy came up to us on the escalator and asked us if we were going to the roller disco, and after jokingly replying, as if offended, “What makes you think that?!” we learned that he was going there as well, albeit not in 80s gear, for his friends 21st birthday, but that he didn’t have directions from the tube station to the actual address. He accompanied us as we got lost despite having written the route down, and we eventually found the place, which we’ve since seen in the daylight, and it is a dump wedged underneath a railroad bridge. At night, though, it is transformed into a roller rink time machine. Joy and Hayley insisted that they were awful skaters but let me tell you, they had NOTHING on me. I took about 20 laps with the instructor next to me, who came to my aid the second I stepped (rolled uncontrollably?) onto the rink, and he taught me to bend my knees, point my feet outwards at angles, and to step gently left right left right left right. Doesn’t sound too hard but I guess I am very lacking in the coordination department because I really couldn’t get it. I kept at it though because I didn’t want to give up and could actually get around without holding on or losing my balance by the end. There were people there for whom skates seemed equivalent to sneakers though, because they were out there doing tricks and busting moves to the music like it was nobody’s business. After I semi-got the hang of it, I had a lot of fun, and if I kept practicing I would get better. I did fall once, and even today I can feel my bruised tailbone. A guy offered his hand to help me up and proceeded to have a conversation with me despite my awkward physical position and obvious painful tailbone shock which ended in him asking for my number. I’m not sure what my facial expression was (confused? annoyed? incredulous?) but I replied no thanks. Who knew that 80s Roller Discos were places to pick girls up (literally!)?
(me and an instructor)Friday I didn’t do much. I lazed around, did some homework and some research for my swiftly approaching presentation for which my topic was now Neoliberalism’s Effects on Latin American Education Systems and Literacy Rates. I applied (of course on the last possible day) for the NCHC Conference, my final one, which will be in D.C. this year! I submitted my thesis from research methods on Lolita, and hopefully Nabokov’s fancy prose style will seem interesting enough to the Student Interdisciplinary Research Panel judges, but just in case I submitted for poetry as well. As far as I know, Amy, Flor, and I are the only ones who submitted. I hate that our honors program is dying. But nevertheless it should be a fun trip – I can even see Joy while I’m there! We attempted to go see a movie on Friday, but it ended up being almost sold out and not discounted for students, so we decided just to grab a bite to eat and head back home instead, because we had an early call in the morning. I was grateful to save the money, and we ended up getting 99p McFlurries at McDonalds even though we didn’t know what the candies were. Smarties = M&Ms. Ironically enough.
Saturday morning we checked out Portobello market in Notting Hill – and it was HUGE. Started out with antique stores and gradually moved into jewellery and accessories, which somehow transitioned into a full fledged farmer’s market. I got some produce – 14 plums for £1! It was definitely worth it to keep pushing through to the back of the market, because the prices got lower the farther you went. Still not entirely as cheap as I would like it, but pretty good. I would like to get another ring I think – something slightly chunky but that I can still wear everyday for a little extra pop. I’d definitely like to go back there in the future. We were worn out after it though – a long day, a long walk, and an INSANE amount of people really tired us out.
(necklaces that were so bright in the sun that a bee actually came over and repeatedly landed on them trying to pollenate - kind of sad!)
(shot of the market with all of the multicolored shops along Portobello Rd)Sunday I went with Joy to see the Wallace Collection right off of Marylebone High St. She had to go for her Art & Society class project and I would never miss an opportunity to go to a free museum. We explored the Marylebone farmer’s market on the way there – small compared to Portobello, but much closer and more convenient, and I am a sucker for fresh bread and produce! It is only open on Sundays and closes at 2pm, but it is not half bad for a little local market. We saw the art museum, which was very nice, and I enjoyed the Rococo paintings that Joy’s project is on a lot. On the way back we stopped for some quick grocery shopping at Waitrose, where my £20-a-week grocery budget was wholly and completely destroyed. £32 and 2 grocery bags later, I left horrified at what I had just spent on the necessities and wanted to cry for the rest of the day. I hate spending money when I have no income. I was depressed about it for a good amount of this past week, but I just have to remember that I will earn the little I have back eventually and that it is okay to spend it because this is a once-in-a-lifetime experience and I don’t want to have regrets. ::sigh:: It still sucks though.
Monday I worked on my presentation most of the day and managed to finish it up a little after midnight – pretty good for me – and we had a lovely dinner of breaded chicken cutlets and rice. And seeing as the smoke didn’t take too long to clear out of the kitchen, the fire alarm never went off, so I consider us lucky. Freaking “breadcrumbs.”
Tuesday was Mardi Gras, which, I was stunned to learn, they don’t know about here, as well as National Pancake Day, which Hayley was stunned to learn I had never heard of. I was subsequently stunned to learn that it was apparently National Pancake Day in the U.S. as well, and IHOP was giving away free short stacks, because it was news to me. Maybe they just made it up this year. Regardless, I had pancakes to look forward to when I went to Third World Studies to give my presentation, which I thought went very well. Try to fit a presentation on a huge topic into 8 minutes and 5 slides – especially when I am such a big fan of talking. He approved my topic (and my topic was much less broad than that of the other three students who went) and was exasperatingly vague in his explanation of what we had to do – we had to demonstrate a theory’s pros and cons in a real life application – and yet when we had all gone, he criticized us for being too broad, not focusing our topic enough, and for taking too long in presenting. He actually interrupted my presentation when I was mid-second-to-last-sentence to tell me to watch my time – how rude! If I go over in my time, then deduct from my grade accordingly, but don’t interrupt me to tell me to hurry it up! I asked my classmate and he said mine didn’t seem longer than anyone else’s – I figure I might have done a 10-12 minute presentation tops, and 8 minutes is a ridiculous amount of time for an oral presentation anyway. It took me a minute just to say the title! Still waiting for the grade on that, which is 15% of my final grade. I have a report to do on the same subject that’s only 1500 words, and I already have about 750 from notes, which is due week 10, and other than that and the final I am done with that class. Yay!
For dinner that night we had pancakes. And the word pancakes should really be in quotation marks because they are not American pancakes. They are basically crepes. Very thin, watery batter that you put in the bottom of the pan and roll around until it coats the bottom. We made 3 each with the guidance of Hayley, and no, we did not coat them in butter and maple syrup – we topped them with a large scoop of Bailey’s Irish Cream Ice Cream and Dulce de Leche Chocolate Toffee flavoured syrup.
In the words of Rachel Ray, Yum-O! Hayley told me that I had made my pancakes much thicker than she usually makes them. They were about 3 mm thick. Joy and I told her that we have to do les pancakes americains at some point. But it was fun to see this version of them!
Wednesday I had class and then met Hayley and Joy at Oxford Circus because that night we were going to Fabric for an “Animal Rave!” Yeah I didn’t know what it was either. The flyer online said something about free face masks, face paint, a giant bouncy castle, chocolate covered bananas, glow sticks, snakes and ladders, all drinks for £2.40 with a student wristband, and a VIP room where you could get your picture taken with live boa constrictors wrapped around your body – but we were sold at the bouncy castle. We needed some alcohol so we went to the giant Sainsbury’s we had seen across from the 80s Roller Disco in Vauxhall. You’d be surprised what a difference a decent grocery store makes in your level of happiness. Tesco Express was disappointing, Sainsbury’s Local was manageable, Sainsbury’s Central was satisfactory, Waitrose was uplifting, and this gigantic Sainsbury’s was blissful. They had clothing as well, but it was mostly grocery store, and when I walked in I thought “Now THAT’S what I’m talkin bout!” and repeated that thought when we got to the alcohol section. The other grocery stores have a large wine selection but the hard liquor is usually limited to the basics and located behind the counter. We opted for Peach Schnapps for £5.65 and Lemonade (aka Sprite sans lime) for £1 and with that, we redefined the term “cheap drunk.” They also had a deli counter! Hallelujah! And I got some “thin sliced” roast beef that was sliced twice as thick as my pancakes had been. Oh New York. When we came back I had PB&J and a yogurt, and then read for the rest of the afternoon until it was time to go to my night class. I had a grilled cheese before class, at around 5:30pm, and then waited patiently through my aforementioned insulting linguistics class which was actually chock full of notes rather than awkward silences for once. I half-walked, half-skipped back to Marylebone after my class to get ready. Jess Durante was coming too, but Rachel and her friend weren’t able to make it, so it left our crowd to be me, Jess, Joy, Hayley, and Verity. The peach schnapps/lemonade combo was gorgeous and I couldn’t even taste the alcohol, which led to me drinking a good amount without even blinking, and unfortunately without recalling that I had only had a small amount to eat that day, which led to me becoming very very drunk happy. [I love you Mom! I’m sorry! Maybe you should just skip to Thursday afternoon right now!] After haphazardly grabbing everything I needed (oyster card, student ID card, drivers license, room key, money, phone, camera) and stuffing it in a wristlet we left, taking the tube to Farringdon. Thank god I wore flats.
When we got there (around 11:30), we couldn’t find a lot of the advertised stuff, but we, or at least I, was too drunk to care and we proceeded to get our dance on. We did see the giant bouncy castle, which we waited in the queue for, but while we were waiting they deflated it – apparently it was only open until 1:30. That didn’t phase us though, and I danced the night away, taking (mostly unflattering) pictures every 5 seconds. No guys danced with us, but we were having too much fun to think anything of it, and looking back at the pictures my facial expressions/dance moves might have been the reason behind that, but we had a great time dancing and it was a lot of fun! When we were leaving my heel got caught on the edge of the stair and I fell a little, landing hard on one knee, which also didn’t phase me. I sat there, shocked for a second, and Joy repeatedly asked me if I was okay. Sprawled on the staircase, I told her “Let’s not make a scene” and carried on my merry way. (Hence the title of the facebook album.) When I got back to my room I had some drunken aim conversations and caught up with some people I hadn’t spoken to in a while, and then went to bed around 4:30, setting my alarm for 8:30 since I had Modernism at 10.
When I woke up Thursday morning, I quickly realized that I was in no shape to attend my class. Not only was I chronically nauseous (in vain, I’m afraid), but I hadn’t eaten in 15 hours and had consumed alcohol instead, so I was weak, dizzy, and my limbs were shaking. I drank lots of water, managed to swallow some crackers, and decided to sleep until I wasn’t nauseous anymore. Not fun. And I really like Modernism. Next time we go out I will make sure I eat plenty beforehand, or we will just have to avoid Wednesday nights. I didn’t do much of anything on Thursday, except attempting to feel better and getting some reading done.
Friday I brought my camera (which had suffered almost as many injuries at Fabric as I had) to get repaired by a little shop near the British Museum, and then I walked around a lot for the rest of the afternoon. I walked around the Museum, up and down Tottenham Court Rd and Charing Cross Rd, went into some book shops, invested in a £2 copy of Moby Dick as well as a pocket-guidebook/mini-map of Paris, and headed up Regent St towards our campus. There was a rumour floating around that U2 was going to be showing up there between 6- 6:15, and when I got there a little after 5 there was already a crowd forming. Joy met me there and I had picked out a good spot on the steps of the church on Langham Place – U2 would be performing a surprise concert from the roof of the BBC building across the street! It got very crowded, and eventually they closed down Oxford Circus tube station as well as Regent St, letting the crowds fill the entire road. Finally by about 6:50 they decided to start playing, and it was unreal! There was the legendary Bono, complete with sunglasses, leaning over the railing of the BBC building roof and crooning undecipherable words to us as a helicopter swooped around overhead. And it was completely normal. This is London.
They played 4 songs – 2 that they had never played live before, from their newest album, as well as Vertigo and Beautiful Day, which we (kind of) knew the words to. I was freezing by the end because, after all, I had been outside nonstop since 3pm, and though it was a relatively warm day, my fleece was not appropriate for the after-sundown weather. Joy and I made a quick Tesco run before heading back, and I got some frozen fish and chips to make since it was the first Friday of lent. I gave up cookies btw! I had a lovely evening until there was a knock on my door. It was the girl who lives at the end of the hall, next to Hayley. I would have no problem with her except for the fact that she leaves the kitchen a wreck every time she uses it, doesn’t wash her dishes but just piles them up on the counter, complete with leftover bits of food in them, for 2 weeks at a time, leaves the oven/hob on, treats the kitchen garbage pail and its vicinity as her own personal dumpster, uses other people’s dishes if they are left out, and blasts her music (which I can hear loud and clear in my room, 4 rooms away) every morning at 8:30-9am. If you’d like the sparknotes version, she is rude. And she knocked on my door (with her boyfriend standing aggressively in the background) and asked me if I had used her pot.
Apparently on Wednesday night when I had retreated into typo-ridden AIM conversations, the other girls had returned to the kitchen, found our alcohol had been drunk while we were out, and decided (drunkenly) to make a point. This rude girl’s dirty pot had been sitting on the counter for a few days, and to get their vodka-vengeance, someone put other random bits of food in the pot – cookies, paprika, etc. It sat there all day Thursday and most of the day Friday, but apparently the girl had finally cared enough about her dirty dishes to take a closer look. Since the other girls in our hall were gone for the weekend, and she was convinced that it had happened that day around lunch time (because she is so conscientious about her kitchen utensils), that left either me or Joy as the suspects in the paprika-pot predicament. She was very accusatory, though it took me a while to realize that she was there to insinuate blame on me – my attitude had to change very quickly from removed yet sympathetic to defensive. I told her that I had no idea what had happened but I had not touched her pot, nor did I need to (nor would I want to – how long was it sitting on the counter dirty?!) because I had pots of my own and I am not one to touch anything that isn’t mine. She said “Oh, well then it must have been the other American girl,” and I tried very hard not to laugh aloud because the idea of Joy being malicious is just… well… unfathomable! I told her I was sure it wasn’t Joy and she said all right then, who did it? Someone from a different floor came to our floor and used my pot to make lunch? and I was at a loss for words. I hate confrontation and I am a bad liar and she was making me feel guilty simply because I knew who had done it, and that I was connected to them. I insisted that I didn’t know what to say, but that I didn’t touch her pot, and she gave up eventually, threatening that she wouldn’t hold a grudge but she would just like it cleaned, because she likes to cook too. Next time she leaves a mess in the kitchen (as of when I had dinner, there was a dirty roast pan left in the oven as well as an already-boiled potato floating in water in a cold pot on the stove, in addition to the signature smattering of dried pasta on the floor) I’ll say no hard feelings, I would just like this cleaned up because I would like to cook too. In any case, I quickly informed my friends about it and the responsible parties took care of it, and I actually got a reluctant, warped, self-righteous, tight-lipped apology from the rude girl today, but nevertheless there was an apology in there somewhere. Ah maturity.
Today I actually got out of bed without hesitation, opened the windows, did ab-jam, and was dressed and ready to go when I knocked on Joy’s door at 11:45. We were supposed to be meeting Rachel and Beth and seeking out Platform 9 ¾ at noon, but when Joy answered the door she had clearly just rolled out of bed. We made it to King’s Cross by 12:45, only to find that the actual Platforms 9 and 10 were under construction, and so the honorary Platform 9 ¾ had been relegated to a brick wall opposite some dumpsters off of Platform 8. Yes. Very disappointing. But I got my pictures (on someone else’s camera since mine is being operated on at the moment) and hopefully it might be back to its original spot before June 13. We wandered around the area a little and found the British Library, and the sight of all the books made me want to cry with happiness. The King George Library is four complete stories of bookshelves behind climate-controlled glass that only staff members have access to, but all of the leather-bound books resting there on the endless shelves looked so satisfied. They had a good home. And I loved them. I was content with just ogling them through the glass since I was clearly not worthy enough to hold them, open them, or read them. Maybe when I’m doing PhD work at Oxford hah! Definitely have to go there with Flor when she comes to visit.
As far as vocabulary lessons go, this word is a good one to know, and it comes up a lot. This is too long of an entry already to think of more, and I have laundry to do, so here you go.
rubbish – 1. n. garbage “I can’t believe you’re making me help you carry a week’s worth of rubbish to the bin.” 2. adj. without quality, crappy, substandard “Compared to the Evening Standard, the London Lite is a rubbish paper.”
And now, 7 single-spaced pages later, you are finally caught up dear reader. I apologize for the length but hopefully you enjoyed hearing about my occasionally embarrassing, occasionally humorous, occasionally poignant adventures. We go to see Hairspray with the Social Programme Tuesday night, and then Hayley, Joy, and I are off to Paris at the end of this week!
And I’ll leave you with a poem that I wrote. Finally. One. Hopefully there is more where that came from.
Looking outward from my seventh-storey Baker St. perch, I turn the handle, pull
Open the window, with effort, and welcome in the morning air, which seems as though its
Never been polluted – a lie, but a convincing one. Glaring young sunshine
Deceives me, has me thinking everything can be reborn. But all around me, tragically, dwell
Old buildings crumbling, scarred with time or scaffolding that hides architectural cosmetic surgery,
Not noticing the new eyes, mine and Helios’s, that gaze rapturously upon them.
Love,
Amanda
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