Sleeeeep

My sleeping habits are destroyed. Tonight marks the 3rd night in a row I've been up until 3:30AM. I haven't even been doing anything. I've been watching videos and stuff. Why am I up?

I'm not doing much this weekend. A walk on Saturday and maybe some football on Sunday. Other than that, some work hopefully and that's about it. I REALLY miss my bed at home. That's the one thing I am homesick about. I want to stay in England for a very long time, but I want to sleep in MY bed. Or any bed that is firmer than the bed I'm sleeping in.

It's funny. Most people who went abroad, it seems, made a lot of friends from that country. I think. But I have only one good British friend here (George is from Jersey, not England). It's just really weird to think when I come back here I won't see the people with whom I've grown close. Hell, in a few months, we'll be in 4 different continents. It's kinda ridiculous. Leaving is going to be really hard.

I still have a lot of things to do here. Next weekend I'm seeing Cambridge, the weekend after is ROMA, the weekend after will be Thanksgiving and then maybe Wales or something, and hopefully the next weekend will be Paris. After that, a few days in London, and then back home to the real world. Hell, I feel the real world hitting me now with all these applications I'm trying to complete. Blah. Blah blah blah. I'm 22 years old and I don't want to be grown up. Not yet. I'm too much of a kid to be grown up.

Maybe that's why I'm continuing in school. It seems like the real world starts when school ends. Hell, I won't be in the real world for years then. That's okay.

I need to find a job for when I get back, just for a few months. I would love to work at somewhere like Disc Replay, but they probably won't be hiring. It'll end up being somewhere dumb, and I'll be bored at work until I can go to grad school. Ahhhhh

I've been sitting with my headphones on for about an hour since I finished my show. Nothing has been playing. Wat.

I'm running out of money. Someone win the lotto for me. I just want to see a million more places before I leave; is that too much to ask? Well, it is kinda impossible, with time and whatnot, but come on.

Seriously though, I cannot wait until I can say goodbye to this wretched bed. It's terrible! I sleep well, but I wake up feeling like garbage. Also, the wifi here is terrible. It's weird, you have to pay for everything here because the tuition is pretty cheap. Which is actually really okay with me. My financial aid would cover the crap outta going here on this tuition.

I kinda want to go here for grad school. Only because there are so many things to do here, and so little time. So many clubs and societies and events and DJ Fresh which I missed tickets for and other things. But I will probably want to work in the US, so I've been told I need to grad school in the US, which is fine with me as long as it's not in Illinois. It'll suck being away from family and friends and girlfriend, but it'll be so much better because it'll be a new place to explore and have fun. This is the longest, by far, that I have been out of the Chicago suburbs, and I like it. Chicago will always have a place in my heart, but I think it's nigh time to move on to better things. But I need to do my GOSH DARN APPLICATIONS before I can do that. But, being 3:37AM, I am going to sleep. Then tomorrow I will do application stuff, and shop, because I needs me some food from Tesco.

I've actually been eating okay. Too much meat, but I do have a bag of corn, that counts, right? I did eat some too. I almost bought Ratatouille, holy crap I spelled that right the first time???, but I realized even if I felt adventurous I wouldn't eat it. I still have a crappy looking pizza with probably vast amounts of freezer burn in the freezer. Let's actually get rid of that tomorrow. Yorkshire puddings are the best. So good.

This post has been my tired, uncomfortable, sad, introspective thoughts for this evening. Thank you for being a medium in which I can vent properly.

Want a postcard? Send me your contact info on facebook, email, or telepathically and I might send you one! Yay!

K night

Get Involved!!

North Central really wants you to get involved. With such a small school, and with so much going on, there are a lot of ways to get yourself out there. It's a really good place to get stuff done.

HOWEVER

Essex puts North Central to shame. Holy wow, there are so many things to do here. There are over 150 clubs and societies. Yeah, you have to pay to join most of them, but you get a lot back. This is what I've been involved with this term:

Ultimate Frisbee
Brazilian Jiu Jitsu
Mario Kart Society
Travelling (sic) Society

Nothing is every day (hell, even American Football was only three times a week) so it fits in well with my schedule. There are so many other cool societies. I almost want to go to grad school here just so I can do everything. But then there's the whole wanting to work in America and whatnot (I actually would LOVE to work out here for a while. Is that so wrong?)

Speaking of working, it is SO HARD to get things done here. I've done not too much (I am stalled by a few things, but still). It is just so hard to focus when there are 8 people in my flat who at any point can be in the kitchen having a good time. I have also been too busy traveling, scoping out Colchester, exploring campus, getting involved on campus, and not doing my work to do my work (what an awkward sentence).

Can someone come here and apply for grad schools for me?

Thanks.

Love, Adam

London

I went to London again this weekend and had a blast. Amy and I went to Greenwich, Madame Toussard's, on the Thames, and just around the city.

So we went to Greenwich first to stand on the Prime Meridian. Turns out you have to pay to stand on the actual line thing you see in pictures, and since we are college study abroad students, we were not about to pay for that. So we did the next best thing:

Based on the map, I am standing almost directly over the Prime Meridian. Yeah, estimation!

After that, we went on a boat tour on the Thames. It was crazy cool being on the river that is essentially the heart of London. It's definitely the reason why London was/is a huge city. We went under Tower Bridge, which may have been the coolest thing I saw all day:

After that we ended up in Westminster, next to good Ol' Big Ben. We decided to look around for food, and there was reliable information that there was a Five Guys near Covent Garden, which is awesome because the burgers here are so average. It was kinda expensive, so we were just gonna split a small burger. Then we got inside and smelled the restaurant. It smelled EXACTLY like the Five Guys in Naperville. We had to have a proper meal there. MFW I eat a good burger for the first time in months:

So good.

The next day we went to Madame Toussard's, the wax museum. It was pretty cool. About halfway through I got the idea to take selfies with the sculptures. This one was the best by far:

It looks so real (that's Freddie Mercury btw). Here are some others:

The last one is interesting. I was going to have Amy take a picture of Patrick Stewart and me, but we saw this lady taking a picture of him. She was taking forever, and I was about to just get next to the sculpture when we realized that it was also a wax sculpture. We were trolled pretty hard by Madame Toussard's.

That night the storm hit, and literally nothing was different other than the trains were way delayed. However, apparently a few people were killed by the storm, which totally sucks.


I think I'm gonna head to London once more before I leave (or more accurately, before Amy leaves).

So yeah. If you comment or something I can write a post about certain thoughts that you wanna hear. That's if anyone actually reads this far. Which I doubt. I'm definitely talking to myself at this point, so I'll talk to you later, me!

Ahhh Sorry!

So I definitely haven't posted in a while. I've been sick ALL WEEK. It's a pain in the butt. Anyway, I'm headed to London again to see more things and to see Amy again or whatever. So that's gonna be great. Apparently there's a huge storm that'll be bad Sunday night. Well I plan to be inside at that time, so I should be safe from the worst of it. Don't worry about me =)

When I get back, I'm going to have to start doing real work. U of Michigan apps are due December 15th, so I'll need that to be done while I'm here, which will be tough but doable. I'm sure other apps are due around then or January, but I think my main is U of M and then other places, but, to all prospective admission counselors looking over this, I would love to go to your school too, or else I wouldn't have applied =D

Anywho, I'm gonna go get ready for London and then sleep for a few hours. Until next time, stay classy, world.

Pictures

I'm in London this weekend, and Amy keeps mentioning that I don't have enough pictures with me in them. That's exactly my point, I keep telling her. It really makes no sense to pose for a picture. I guess I'm like Brendan Fraser's character Ben in Scrubs. I think posed photos are so fake. Before I mentioned I don't think pictures do much justice. Why would I then ruin the awesome scenery with my mug? I have a terrible posed smile; any of you who are friends with me on Facebook have seen this. I mean, I'll take a picture with family or friends or girlfriend no problem, but I kinda just don't want to take pictures with great sights. So I apologize if you wanted to see pictures of me and cool places. You'll [mostly] see just the places.

That being said, LONDON

This view, from the bridge by Westminster (Westminster Bridge?) was really cool. Obviously that Big Ben

Buckingham Palace. This one was interesting to me to take like this. Just the fact that it's such a famous place, but we were gated off from it. Weird, but I couldn't help but think of the fact of all the atrocities that had happened in the past at the hands of England and the fact that the royalty seemed to shut everything out and live in their own perfect little world. I don't think it's like that anymore, though.

Amy and I on the tube!

This was so cool. I was in St. Pancras station, and the guy on the right started playing. I'm pretty sure he was paid to do it. Eventually he stopped, and then random people, like the boy on the right, came up and played. The best part was, everyone who played actually knew how to play, and played something beautiful. I sat outside a Costa Coffee for a bit and just people watched. It was nice

Okay, so I called this Superamerican on Facebook. Pretty self explanatory, but I loved this picture.

Standing right outside the National Gallery (awesome place, saw Van Gogh and other great painters) and overlooking Trafalgar square, with Big Ben all the way back there. Great view.

This was in King's Cross Station. Largely ignored, I couldn't help but feeling a bit somber as I came across this. Had to take a picture.

Tower Bridge from the Tower of London. Pretty cool place.

View from Tower Bridge, that triangular prismesque building is the Shard. Kinda funny, it seems almost out of place, and upon a quick Wikipedia look, it's not very inhabited (too pricey).

Tower Bridge from inside the Tower of London. Had to stop to take a picture.

That's about it. I saw the Crown Jewels, but we couldn't take pictures. Such pomp and pageantry. It was cool, but almost disgusting.

It's interesting that it seems like British culture loves the monarchy (not exactly sure if this is accurate). They kinda sucked for years and years, but then this Queen comes along and I guess she was pretty cool. Anyway, bed time.

Adios ;)

My Flat

So I'm living in a flat with 9 other ladies and gentlemen. half of us share a bathroom and shower each, and we all share a kitchen. At first I wasn't sure what to make of it.

I was told that the best way to meet friends is over food. I would like to validate that. Let me show you exhibit A:

Tacos! We were sitting around, and I told some of my flatmates my love for tacos. We then decided to have a taco night. We all pitched in to make them, and the three non Americans were introduced to my one true love (sorry Amy). Pictured, from left, are Mai from Denmark, Jack from England, Malorie, and Abi from Australia (though she's all German). We became really close over tacos. I've also made a few other pretty good friends, Arno from South Africa (goes to school in Thailand), Monica from Australia, and Rachel from Singapore. So I almost have every continent covered.

I'm really enjoying everything about the flat so far, so let's hope that all stays this way =D

Cheers

Dublin!

Dublin was amazing. We first got there really late at night, after over 24 hours of traveling, so the first thing I did was shower. Right after my shower I basically passed out.

The next day we took a walking trip around Dublin. Our guide was a "struggling actor," and he sure knew how to give a tour. We saw sights like Dublin Castle, Trinity College, and the Temple Bar. If you're not familiar, Temple Bar is actually an area in Dublin, although there is also a place called the Temple Bar, which looks like:

The third day was basically hell for me. I woke up around 4:45 AM, sat around until free breakfast at 7:30, then basically was miserable as we took a walk around Dublin. I had to go back, and ended up taking roughly a 6 hour nap, eating dinner, and then going to bed almost straight away.

I finally felt better when I woke up, and it ended up working out perfectly, because we took a day trip to Glendalough (glen-da-lock) and Kilkenny. We stopped near a church in Glendalough, and were greeted with this beautiful sight:

 Personally, I'm not a huge picture fan. Pictures like the one above are pretty cool, but the picture doesn't give you the experience. I will never forget the utter beauty of these places, the smells, the feel, and the silence. It was so quiet here, completely peaceful.

We saw a few more sights, non as amazing as Glendalough, and then we headed back to Dublin for out hostel pub crawl. We ended up seeing this amazing traditional Irish band in one of the pubs. Just check them out.The next two videos are both them, and these are the two songs that have been stuck in my head for a week now.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9_ITRd-D4sA
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f2aXFonTva0

That second song is called Molly Malone, and is basically the unofficial anthem of Dublin. The best part was singing these songs in an Irish pub packed with strangers from around the world. For a few minutes there, the Swiss, the Finnish, and the Americans were all Irishmen and women.

Our last day in Dublin was spent shopping and seeing a few last places. I decided to have Beef and Guinness stew, and let me say it was pretty darn good.

There's so much to say about the experience I'm getting on this trip. So far through Dublin I've had to navigate the London Underground on no sleep, conquer the ever infamous Ryanair, and then find my way from an airport to a hostel using only a bus and my feet. I've experienced so much about British culture and Irish culture in a week and it has been an amazing week.