The City of London

Today we learned all about old Roman London and then guess what- We went there!
I'm not going to bore you with all of the facts because while I thought it was fascinating, you may not. If by chance you do want to learn something new this is the article we had to read for class...
Click Here! to learn about Roman London

But here are some cool pictures I took while on the tour...

entrance to the City of London

Temple Church

Temple Church- Inside

Nights of Templar

New Roof of Temple Church after it was bombed in WWII

St Paul's Cathedral

Where Shakespeare lived and wrote!

WWII memorial inside Temple Church

The play we saw tonight was The Woman in Black - it was really good and really scary!! I'm interested to see what our professor has to say about it on Wednesday! 

..also had my first Guinness tonight! 

Weekends go by faster in London

This weekend just flew by! I can't believe that it's Sunday night already.

Things I learned this weekend


Spillage equals lickage...

Emma and Emily at The Court!

Instead of just saying "party foul" when something spills (while out at night), in London they say "spillage equals lickage" and the person who spilled has to actually lick up what they spilled.  Needless to say that is one part of British culture we decided to ignore. How did we learn this fun little fact? We met some locals on Thursday night at our new favorite location The Court- a pub a short walk away from our flat with excellent student deals on Thursday nights! We also learned that people from Manchester think that Londoners are 'snooty'. The girl we met actually pushed her nose up with her finger and said 'snoooooty!' ...also pubs here close at 1am so when the bar closed we wandered on home. 

 There are an infinite number of vintage shops around here...

We don't have classes on fridays so after sleeping in late- which was badly needed after our Thursday night adventures- we set out to find some vintage stores in the area. Well we didn't have far to go and we stumbled upon store after store. They had a lot of fur hats and jackets- Emily also found some nice blue spandex pants!! In one of the shops there was some great fun/funky swing music playing and when we told the guy- I assume he was the owner- we liked it he gave us two CDs of the swing music! It's a fun mix of all sorts of swing music - now we listen to it in our flat and it's absolutely fantastic! 

Avocados are cheaper in London...

On Saturday morning we went to Portobello Market which is just a few tube stations away. It's a two mile long farmers market essentially full of nick-nacks, bags, paintings, fruit, bred, pastries- basically anything you could think of! They were selling avocados 4 for 1 pound! Obviously we took advantage of this and came home with a total of 9 avocados. I also got the most delicious loaf of bread for 1 pound also. We will be going back there without a doubt! It was absolutely freezing though - well 26 but considering it's been in the mid 40s since we got here 26 felt bitter cold! To try and make ourselves feel better we kept bringing up how much colder it was at home- this helped but we had to leave the market by 11 because we could no longer feel our feet or faces! It was a good thing we decided to leave when we did because as we were leaving it seemed like hundreds of people were pouring out of the tube station. 

Burgers are cheap and bad in London...

Saturday night we went back to The Court for dinner - 3.50 for a burger, chips (french fries!) and a pint. We thought it was quite the deal! Which it was but it the burger was one of the worst I can remember and the fries were cold. Oops! But we were full and it was fun anyway! We came home early and to our pleasant surprise found some quality American Idol on TV- followed by Spice World. 

Crepes are delicious...

So we ate delicious crepes twice this weekend! On Saturday we wandered around the market with amazing crepes full of Nutella and strawberries. And then today (Sunday) we found the best gelato place near where we live and got crepes with nutella and two scoops of gelato. It was sooo good. Allie and I split one but Emma and Emily each conquered a whole one by themselves. We were so excited when they came out that I forgot to take a before picture- but there are some pretty exceptional after pictures. 

There is such a thing as bad Thai food...

Tonight we decided to get some Thai take out from down the street- it tasted like soap. Bottom line? Don't eat out here- not worth it at all. I will be saving my money to eat in Italy next weekend!

British Library - Day 1

I walked to the British Library today for my very first day of archival research!

Fun Facts

In London the second floor is actually the third.

After I registered for my library card (whoo hoo!) I got desperately lost in the massive building. I had my little map out and I was wandering around what I thought was the 2nd floor for a good ten minutes before I realized that I actually had to up another flight of stairs. There were so many people of all ages in the library. I was expecting to only see stuffy older people buried up to their eyeballs in books but there were actually a lot of university age students (not quite a majority but close). Everyone had their laptops and their plastic bags filled with notebooks and computer chargers - you can't bring regular bags into the library. Everything has to go into the locker room and you can only bring research related materials into the rooms carried in a plastic bag. People who spend a lot of time seemed to have their own bags - much sturdier then the ones they provide. There were a number of people (I assume Oxford students) that had bags that said OXFORD big across them. 

 I had some amazing Indian food for lunch in the Library cafeteria. 

One number does not equal one document

Once I found the Manuscripts room - there are actually designated rooms for different types of archival documents- I had to request the documents I wanted. All I had from my secondary sources was a list of call numbers and I really had no idea what to expect. I could only request four items a day and I was expecting a small folder per number. I figured I'd blow through the four items by the end of the day. I went and sat down at my assigned desk and waited for them to bring me my folders. About 45 minutes later a man comes out with a cart with four massive (the size of a classroom desk) red books about 4 inches thick. I couldn't believe it. I suddenly understood why you could only reserve four things in a day- there was no way I was going to read it all before close. But the good news is I have plenty of research material!

Handwriting from the 1920s is hard to read

It was pretty hard to read all of the documents since they were all hand written in fancy script. I didn't really anticipate this and I was surprised how long it took me to actually read the documents. It was really exciting though to be reading all of the archival sources. As I was reading I kept recognizing passages that had been quoted in my secondary source research. It was so cool to think that Marie Stopes ( the women I'm researching) actually held these pages and wrote some these documents. As I looked around the room I also couldn't help but picture the authors of the countless books I've already read on the subject sitting with the same red books that I was. It was pretty exciting and also overwhelming. I think I'm just starting realize the magnitude of the research I'm undertaking this semester. 

A rainy day in London

Today was not the most exciting day- had my seminar class in the morning and my British theater class in the afternoon. Both seem interesting. My Professor for the theater class is very eccentric and clearly knows a lot about his subject. I'm really looking forward to it. We go to the theater every Monday night and then discuss them on Wednesday. He said he's going to give us a list of what we're going to see each week so I will keep you updated on what we see. I know we're going to the Globe to see Hamlet at the end of the semester though!

Between my two classes Allie and I went back the British Museum to look at another exhibit - Chinese and Korean pottery. I think this is going to become a routine for us- just to go see something different each day.

After class we started planning our trip to Venice! I'm so excited! We also got our flights for Amsterdam for the third week in February! It is going to be quite an eventful month.

Emily and I are also going to be traveling together for two weeks after the semester ends and we're thinking  about spending the whole time in France.

Tomorrow I'm off to the British Library where I'm going to have to justify the legitimacy of my research project. Yikes!

and school begins!

I had orientation for my walking tours of london class today which seems like it's going to be really interesting. Our professor seems very alternative and anti-establishment which could make for a fun class. I'll write about all of the trips we go on as they happen for sure! 

After class I went to a cafe for lunch with Emma, Allie, and Emily and then poked around the British Museum and found the Tibetan section- it's one of my life goals to go there someday. I'm just so fascinated by the culture and history - It was an amazing exhibit.

Then we had an info session about the buildings we were going to be taking class in and for our flats- wish that had happened before today but whatever now we know all the important things like when to take the 'rubbish' out and recycling and how security works. 

After that we went to find Covent Gardens again but got super lost and ended up just turning around and going home- oops! Always need to remember to bring my map! But we found our way back home so no harm done.  

Tonight we went to see Les Miserables!! We decided to go stand online at the box-office to see if we could get discounted tickets and we did- With our student ID's we got them for 30% off and the seats were incredible. I had never seen it before and I absolutely loved it! 

Tomorrow is supposed to be our first day in the archives so hopefully that goes well and I don't break anything!

ALSO! We booked a flight to Venice for February! Super excited about that- it should be a fun trip! 

A Tourist Day

Today we went out to Covent Garden which is an area of London with a lot of shops and tourist things. There were lots street performers and there was even an opera singer. We sat around and watched all of the performers for a while and wandered in an out of the stores. On our walk home we got a little turned around and ended up at the London Eye and then walked over to see Big Ben and Parliament! It was so exciting. We were really tourists today and shamelessly took pictures everywhere. I picked up plenty of post cards and I finally got a map.

Here are some pictures from the day....

KEW

Yesterday we ventured out to KEW (The British National Archives)

After meeting our group at 10 we all walked to the nearest Underground stations at Russell Square (only a few blocks away) and all had to get Osyter Cards - basically a metrocard but you have to pay 5 pounds to get the card and then you add money or 'top up'. It took a long time for everyone to get them - there are 14 students in our history group- major tourist syndrome going on there.

When we got to KEW we all had to register to and learn about how to look at documents and all of that exciting history stuff. It was pretty amazing to think about all of the documents that are stored in that one building. We didn't spend much time there but I assume most of us will be headed back there on Tuesday to get started on our research.

In the afternoon we went out to find the Brunswick shopping center which is just a few blocks away. There, we got cell phones and some more grocery shopping. The phone plans here are much easier than in the US- for 20 pounds we got phones, 100 min and 300 text message for the month and then you can always 'top up' and add money for more if it runs out and then each month you get another 100 min and 300 text for 10 pounds. You also only pay for outgoing calls/text messages which is much easier than in the US with 10 cents for outgoing texts and 5 cents for received texts or whatever it is. It's nice to know that now if we get desperately lost we can call someone to help. A nice reassurance.

Last night we went out to a pub called O'Neills which was just a short walk away from our flat. It was really fun and thanks to Emily we managed to get there and back without getting lost!

Just a friendly reminder that we are in a big city now and not Hamilton, NY! 

Emily and I at O'Neills! 

Embarrassing Moment of the Day

 So there's revolving door to get into KEW and on the way out I was pushing the door and it was super heavy (or so i thought) and wasn't really moving so I started to push it with a good deal of force and it finally moved forward but  then the door sort of collapsed as I stepped out- I dont really know because I was facing the other direction walking out of the doorway as it came apart. Everyone was laughing and making fun of me obviously and our professor was absolutely mortified. Apparently, it's some safety feature and just pops back in but still- it was pretty bad.

Arrival at 15 Bedford Place!

So after an anxious month of packing and repacking I have finally arrived in London! I can't believe that I'm finally here. The trip over wasn't bad at all- we were on a huge double decker plane and there were many empty seats. Jordan and I got seats on the upper level and we had the row to ourselves. 


When we got to the airport in Heathrow  we met up with Allie (one of my roommates) and the rest of the group. After wandering around the baggage claim area of the airport for a while we finally found our way to the coaches that took us to Bedford Place- our home for the next few months!


We live on the third floor of the building ... dragging our suitcases up the winding staircase was quite the challenge. Our flat has two bedrooms a double (Emma and Megan) and a triple (Allie, Emily, and I) two bathrooms, a kitchen, and a living room. 

Hungry and exhausted, we dropped our bags in our room and went out in search of some food and caffeine. With Emily's help (Emily is my roommate who has been here for a while already!) we found the grocery store, a cute and delicious organic lunch spot called Pod, and many coffee places. It was a good first adventure ... we also found other important places like the nearest Pub, post office, and underground station. 

Fun facts from London

...you have to go to a post office to exchange money

after going to lunch we set out to exchange the rest of our US dollars for pounds - we went to about three banks before finally being told that none of the banks will do currency exchange- oops (apparently that's true in the US also- who would have known!) We went to the post office and got our pounds at a painful exchange rate, but hey, there's not much that can be done about that. I asked about the old bills you gave me Grandma and the lady said since they are so old I would have to go to the Bank of England to exchange them for current currency- sooo probably not going to do that but who knows! When we got back Megan and Emma did a little research on British money as we tried to figure out all of the pounds and pence etc. We also spent some time trying to figure out the exchange rate - that wasn't too complicated but it will definitely take some getting used to.

...cars are small and go very fast and come from all directions 

Now, I was warned how confusing it was going to be since in England the drive on they wrong side of the street but I figured I would just look both ways and be fine...well let me tell you, it's not the easy. It's so disorienting to have cars flying around corners from what seems like every direction. Because it's not what I'm used to there seems to be very little order in the streets. Another source of confusion- Do you walk on the left or the right side of the sidewalk? We observed and there didn't seem to be any consistency so each time we were walking towards people we had to do the awkward side to side dance...I hope we figure that out soon. There are also plenty of pigeons around and they are not afraid to fly right into you. I really hated pigeons before this- now they kind of terrify me. 

...just because they speak English doesn't mean you can understand them

During our adventure to the grocery store I found out that just because people in London are speaking English words does NOT mean that they are easy to understand. At the register I got extremely flustered when I couldn't for the life of me figure out what the cashier was saying. I would hear something something something BAG and then something something something CARD. I managed my way with a lot of smiles and nods but felt unbelievably stupid. 

Tomorrow we're heading out to KEW - The British National Archives for a tour and we going to try and get pay as you go phones and do some more exploring! 


...More pictures to come!