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.

The Initial Travel

I went to Greece about two years ago, so going into this experience I knew the flight would be one of my worst enemies. I have a hard time getting comfortable in those seats, the guy in front of me ALWAYS reclines to give me less room, and without fail there will always be at least one screaming child. Add the fact that I can't really sleep anywhere other than a bed/couch, and you've got yourself a nice little helping of misery.

Before I left my family and I met Malorie (my friend with whom I traveled) and her dad at Denny's, so that was pretty nice. I had a milkshake and the appetizer sampler (quesadillas, chicken strips, and mozzarella sticks) as my last American food.

As we arrived, I felt that saying goodbye was a lot easier than expected. The fact that I was going to be across the Atlantic for three months hadn't set in yet, so I wasn't sad or anything. I was, quite honestly, really excited to get the heck out of Illinois. I would obviously miss my friends and family, but on the other hand I was excited to do something I have never done.

We went through security very quickly, so we just played the waiting game in the airport. It felt like an eternity before it was time to fly. Once it was close to boarding time, the clerks or whatever you'd call them announced that our flight would be delayed because maintenance was still on the plane. Great. Finally, after maybe 45 minutes or so, we boarded.

It turned out we had great seats. It was the row where the number of seats in the middle switched from 5 to 4, so we, for some reason, had a ridiculous amount of leg room. As the plane took off, I noticed two children in the row in front of me, and as we reached altitude, the guy in front of me predictably reclined as far as his seat could go. Okay, that sucked, but Monster's University was one of the movies available.

This paragraph is dedicated to how AMAZING that movie is. The plot line might seem almost forced, but holy crap is it funny. Mike's roommate is a nerdy Randall with glasses, and Mike suggests Randall take off his glasses as he would be more scary. Immediately upon removing his glasses, Randall starts to squint and snarl a bit because he cannot see, showing how he got his evil look basically. So good.

K so I watched Monster's U, then eventually decided I would try to sleep. I looked for the tylenol PM I packed, and couldn't find the bottle (funny story, I put them in a little pocket that I didn't think about checking until I was in Dublin). So I didn't sleep at all, and decided to watch another movie. Pro tip: lock the door when you use the airplane bathroom.

We ended up landing and I had slept maybe 20 minutes. We got off the plane and saw a guy with a sign that said Michael Rooker, and I kinda regret not waiting a bit to see if it was THE Michael Rooker.

We planned on going to Dublin, but first we had to drop off our luggage at one of Amy's family friend's house (Amy is my girlfriend, duh). Malorie and I each had two checked bags and a backpack each, and I had another bag as well, so we had a crazy amount of stuff to carry. We took the blue line to the green line, then switched stations to take another train to their stop, then walked about five to ten minutes to the Yamamoto's house. As you can imagine, I was dead tired running on what was now 24 hours without sleep. Mrs. Yamamoto was so hospitable,  and made us food and let us relax there until we needed to leave for the other airport. So, naturally, we napped for about 30 minutes on her couches.

We then had to backtrack to get to another station to take a train to Stansted airport. That trip was so much easier to make with just backpacks. We got to Stansted about an hour and a half before our flight, so after security we had an hour to kill before our gate opened up. Neither of us were really hungry, but we decided to eat because we hadn't much all day (days?). When we headed to our gate, we saw two policemen with assault rifles. ASSAULT RIFLES. Just carrying them out there like "come at me bro." That was really weird.

More to come in my next post. Stay tuned ;)

Sorry for the delay

Last week I was in Ireland without a laptop or decent internet connection and I recently moved into my accommodation at the University of Essex. I promise I'll get some updates soon. Thanks for staying patient.

=D Don't worry, be happy.