Friday, September 18, 2009

Apples and Honey For a Sweet New Year

I’ve got about an hour before I go to Rosh Hashanah services with two-and-a-half Jews and one-and-a-half non-Jews (there’s a free meal involved), so I will try to write as much as I can as fast as I can.

Jeff and I walked over to a hostel near our dorm on Monday to check out the facilities. We aren’t allowed to have overnight guests in the dorms, so we need a plan for our significant others if they decide to come visit. On our way there we noticed a ton of paparazzi outside of the side entrance of the Natural History Museum. They were still there on our way back so we figured we might as well stick around. Jeff was bugging out thinking that Victoria Beckham was inside, so I asked a police officer if she was. He responded by saying, “Would I waste three hours of my time on Victoria Beckham? Anyway, I thought we’d shipped her out to you.” OK, so not Victoria Beckham. About five or so minutes later Prince William himself walked out of the museum in all his glory. He was there to open the new Darwin Center, and he as charming as I had imagined he would be. I started clapping as he entered his car because I didn’t exactly know what else to do. My only misfortune was that I did not have my camera on me. Later that night we went to the International Students House (ISH) for a Foundation for International Education (FIE) welcome party that included staff, professors, students and a DJ who played a “Grease” medley. We got free food and two free drinks so overall it was a good time. Plus they had a bunch of really awesome bean bag chairs.

Tuesday was our first serious day of rain since we’ve been in London. The rain thankfully stopped just as I was leaving class, but started up again as I was on my way to Tuesday night yoga. I squeaked up the stairs to the gym in my rain boots, and tried to conceal my rain garb in the corner of the classroom once I arrived. The class was awesome yet again, but I was definitely dreading the rain. The day before I had gone food shopping and I bought all the fixings for burritos. I had four hungry friends in the dorm that I wanted to try to get back to as soon as the class was over, but the rain just wasn’t on my side. As I ran flailing my hands in the air in the direction of the 49 bus on my way out of the gym, I realized that the bus was probably too full to stop even if I did reach the bus stop on time. I was correct and found myself consequently running toward the further bus stop. I later realized that I probably should have just stayed where I was in order to get the next bus, but lord knows I needed to burn those few extra calories. I finally made it back to the dorm and made five huge burritos and guacamole. As I was making the dinner, I had my little container of kitchen utensils and tools on the interior window ledge. When I went to reach for something the top came off, flew out the window, and landed on the roof of the computer lab. I was too hungry and determined to care, so I currently own a topless container. We didn’t eat until 9:30p.m., but I think we were all pretty satisfied.

I went to the gym on Wednesday before class and watched some TV special on the life of Puff Daddy while I let the StairMaster kick my ass. After writing in my theatre journal (I knew he’d ask us to write in one!), I headed over to class with Jeff only to be reminded that we were going to see a show the next night. Somehow the entire class forgot that this was happening, but nonetheless I was excited to go. We stopped into Waitrose after class to buy some sides for the chicken that Emily and Brian were making, and met a Hollister employee from North Carolina who is here to train before opening up a store in Italy. He told us that one of their stores in England is the most profitable store out of the entire company. I was wondering why so many people here have been wearing Hollister! We rushed back to the dorm in fear of the chicken being ready well before the sides, and I chopped, dropped and seasoned the potatoes we had bought while Brian chopped up the asparagus and mushrooms. The chicken was delicious as were the vegetables. After dinner Emily told me that she’d be going to the outdoor market on Portobello Road the next morning, so I thought this would be the perfect opportunity to go somewhere new and go to a place that I could write my paper on for British Life and Cultures. The assignment is simply to go somewhere and write about what you see, so I brought along my notebook and camera with me Thursday morning.

After getting a little lost, we finally reached a street full of amazing antique stores and thrift shops. I gravitated toward a store called Alice’s that was literally bursting with antique tea sets, seltzer bottles, sporting equipment, signs and much more. We walked further down the street and I took note of a bunch of the outdoor food and clothing vendors. My favorite stop of the day was a little place called The Hummingbird Bakery. As someone who worked at a cupcake bakery back in the States, I especially appreciated this beautiful little store featuring beautiful little cupcakes. I picked a red velvet cake that they placed in a Chinese takeout carton, and ate it while we walked back to the tube. It was absolutely delectable. It also happened to be my breakfast since the banana that I brought with me for breakfast was too mushy and brown for my taste.


Once I got back to the dorm, I quickly made a sandwich and headed to theatre class. At the beginning of the class we did a sort of playwriting workshop where we had to write a little vignette in the life of the fictional character Arnold Smith. All we know about this man is that he went to jail at some point in his life. As a Smith myself, I wrote how Arnold Smith was sent to jail in place of another Smith simply due to his last name. I think my professor found it amusing.

Thursday night we saw the play “Stockwell” at the Tricycle Theater in Brooklyn. It wasn’t actually in Brooklyn, but if you went there yourself that’s where you’d think you were. Anyway, the play was about wrongful killing of an innocent man, Jean Charles de Menezes, after the tube bombings in 2005. The play was done verbatim style and the actors took on different roles depending on the needs of the scene. It was extremely compelling and I felt that the actors did a beautiful job.

When we got back to the dorms I threw my clothes in the wash in fear of not getting a chance to do laundry the next morning (we’ve only got four washers for the all of the students in the program, crazy…). I hung out with Jeff and Brian for a bit and we watched clips of Nene from “The Real Housewives of Atlanta.” I went to get my laundry out of the dryer after my clothes were done, only to find them still damp. At this point it was around 1a.m. so I just went to sleep and woke up early today to put my clothes through another cycle in the dryer. I’m pretty sure I had a dream that someone stole my clothes so I was really happy to find them all in the dryer when I woke up.

Today I went with Jeff to the St. Pancras/King’s Cross Station to pick up our friend Tom who is studying abroad in Paris. After taking a picture at the fake “Platform 9 3/4,” we got lost for a bit and then found our way to Tom’s hotel.


If we had looked at a map earlier we would have realized that his hotel was pretty close to the one we went to during our first week in London. Seeing this, we decided our best bet for lunch would be at Cha Cha Moon. We all got the same crispy noodle dish with chicken and it was delicious. After lunch we went back to Portobello Road so that I could get more information for my paper and so that I could pick up some gifts for my family. Since we were already there we just had to go back inside The Hummingbird Bakery. I got an apple-caramel cupcake featuring an apple cake with caramel buttercream frosting, and took pictures of the interior of the bakery despite a sign that indicates, “No Pictures.” After spending possibly too much money and empty calories within a two-hour period, I told myself that I could not go back to this open-air market again. At least for the next week or so anyway. Now I’ve got to run to go to the Rosh Hashanah services that are taking place around the block. Tomorrow we take a trip to Stonehenge and Bath!

1 comment:

  1. Hey it's Paige! I'm at your house and we all wanna wish you a happy new year! Wish you were here! :)

    ReplyDelete