Old News

Written 1/21, I forgot to post it. Oops!

This trip is already flying by. It’s time to take a second and reflect.

Last Sunday was the first sunny day of the trip, and it was wonderful. I met up with my cousin Dianna, who is living in London, and I hadn’t seen in 10-12 years. I wasn’t sure how it would go, but I shouldn’t have been worried because we had a great time. We caught up on everything we’ve done since high school (she had several more years to cover than me) and she showed me around London, a LOT of London. We spent about four hours together and only sat down for a half hour in the National Portrait Gallery Café. We walked from Leichester Square through Chinatown and SoHo, around Oxford Circus, down Carnaby Street, through Trafalgar Square, over the Thames River, along the riverbank and back over the river to St. Paul’s Cathedral. We were both exhausted by the end, but it was really great to see so many parts of London and gain perspective about where everything is in relation to each other. I haven’t gotten much of that because I usually take the Tube everywhere. I’m really grateful that Dianna was so cool about spending her Sunday showing me the city. I had a really enjoyable afternoon.

On Tuesday I started my internship at a political consulting firm. I was really excited to work at the company, but it’s been a really slow start. British offices have a very different vibe than their American counterparts, or at least my experiences have lead me to that assertion. Right now I’m just reading a lot of government reports and copying and pasting data into spreadsheets, so there’s not a whole lot to report.

In other news, I had my first awful experience on the Tube yesterday. Apparently the system doesn’t actually live up to the godly standard I imposed on it, but today was fine, so all is well.

Brilliant!

It’s a week in, and I love London more than ever. The weather here is awful, it has rained or snowed for at least part of every day, but I’m used to it and refuse to let the weather interfere with my fun. I haven’t taken too many pictures yet because the grey skies don’t quite invite beautiful pictures, but I’ll keep working on it.

The last few days sort of blur together, I feel like I’ve been here so much longer than one week, so I’ll go over the highlights.

Tuesday morning we had a tour of the Parliamentary archives, which hold every important document that has passed through Parliament in the last several hundred years. All of the old ones are printed on parchment on different sizes, and kept rolled in cubbies. The rows of documents looked like something out of Harry Potter.

Later that afternoon I wandered around Covent Garden in search of rain boots, which failed pretty miserably. I walked from shop to shop in a super touristy area that’s London’s equivalent of Boston’s Fanuil Hall. The best part of the afternoon was watching a string quartet of 20-somethings dance while playing music in the market. They were fantastic! The cellist stood and was stomping and jumping and twirling with the rest of them. Watching them play and dance the Can Can was the most impressive. I wish I had enough talent for that.

On Wednesday evening the whole program went to see the musical Blood Brothers in the West End. The show was weird, it definitely wouldn’t survive on Broadway, despite its long run in London. The music was so-so, the story was depressing, and a significant portion of the show was spent watching adults pretend to be children, with varying degrees of skill. The show was redeemed because the main character was played by Sporty Spice. It definitely wasn’t my favorite show, but I was excited to see it for “free.”

A few days ago a five of us walked from campus to the British Museum, which has artifacts from Britain and several other civilizations, including Rome. There was tons and tons of Etruscan pottery, which was the bane of my existence while doing the museum circuit in Italy. Despite the fact that I saw the Rosetta Stone, a statue from Easter Island, and parts of the Parthenon, the building itself was the coolest part. It was massive and gorgeous, I loved it.

I spent this afternoon walking around Camden Market with my roommate Kelsey. Camden Market is actually a huge stretch of Camden Road (in Camden….surprise surprise!) lined with cool shops and both indoor and outdoor markets. We spent a few hours wandering around (including lunch of steak and ale pie at a really great restaurant). We only ended up exploring some of the area, but it was filled with stands and shops for souvenirs, clothes, accessories and food. A lot of the clothing there was of the black/neon/skulled/grommetted variety, the 16 year old in me was foaming at the mouth at the sight of neon tutus and matching hats.

On the way back from Camden, Kelsey and I stopped at the rail station to pick up tickets to Paris for next weekend. Success! Give me all of the tips you’ve got. Please.

The Beginning

It’s day 3, and I still love London. Love. Love. Love. Love. Love London.

I was severely jet-lagged and delirious on Saturday after two flights and a stop in Switzerland, but got to my apartment building without trouble and was able to maneuver my two 50 lb. suitcases without incident up to my apartment, from now on referred to as my flat.

I live with two girls and two guys, including two Northeastern students and two from California. I was concerned at first because the three of us girls have a triple room (I sleep on the bottom of bunk bed) and I've had a single for the last few months. But it’s been fine, even though our mattresses are terribly uncomfortable. The small bedrooms have forced all of us to hang out in our huge common space, which is absolutely gorgeous. I really like all of my roommates, we’re all very different but get along well. We all seem to be opposites in a way that makes up for each others shortcomings.

On Saturday night a bunch of us from Hansard went to a pub in Covent Garden called the Freemasons Arms to meet up with people from the other study abroad program at Goldsmiths College, so I got to see my friend Laura! It was really great to see her, and a really cool pub, but I was too exhausted to enjoy it as much as I wanted to.

On Sunday we were scheduled for a free private bus tour of London, which was a perfect way to see the city for the first time. I saw all of the major sites from the bus: Big Ben, Parliament, the London Eye, the Globe Theater and Hyde Park. We got out to see the Tower Bridge (frequently confused with the London Bridge, which we drove over), Westminster Abbey and Buckingham Palace. It was freezing and periodically snowing, but it was so amazing to see the sites in person.

After the tour we went food shopping, so my roommate Kelsey and I made pasta. We spent the rest of the night hanging out with a few people from another flat and ended up with a spontaneous Glee viewing party. The guys immediately sprinted away from our flat…I can’t imagine why.

This morning I had my first (and second and third) experience on the tube on the way to a tour of Parliament. I can’t believe how easy the subway is to navigate! It’s pretty amazing. The stations are laid out well, even for transfers, and trains literally come every two minutes in the morning. Amazing! I’m so used to Boston’s dysfunctional T system that I could not imagine that solid transit systems exist in other cities. I am thrilled to be proved wrong.

I love Parliament. Both the exterior and interior look like a palace. We walked the path the Queen takes when she has her yearly visit to Parliament. We learned about the history of the huge building and the ornate decorations. We heard stories about visiting president’s speeches and monarch’s relationship with Parliament. The building has strange quirks. In the House of Commons there are lines on the floor that the MPs (members of Parliament) aren’t allowed to cross when approaching the table to debate; the lines are exactly two sword lengths away. How's that for history? I won’t know where I’m interning until Monday, but I feel privileged to have already walked the halls of Parliament.

After the tour a bunch of us went on an expedition to Oxford Street in search of things we mostly failed at finding. I did manage to get an extra adapter and a blow dryer, but still can’t find appropriate rain boots. Oxford Street is one of the main shopping areas, and it was bustling, even at 11am on a Monday. I’ll definitely go back there to check out Primark, a super cheap clothing and accessory store.

I ate lunch with my roommate Kelsey at Pret a Manger, a café/sandwich shop that seems to be on every other corner in London. It reminded me a lot of Panera, and the meatball soup I got was just what I needed to warm me up after a morning of wandering the streets of London. After lunch we headed to the LSE campus for the first time for an info session on our programs and our first class. I really like the professor, I think it will be an interesting, though intensive class on Parliament and British politics.

In short, I love everything. All of the people in my program are great. Though we’re mostly Americans, we’re from different parts of the country and have a lot to talk about. I’m not worried about anything right now (though give me a few weeks…I have to write a proposal for my dissertation), I’m just really thrilled to be here. It’s perfect.

Day 1

I'm safe and sound in London. Exhausted, jet-lagged and hungry, but thrilled to be here and excited for this opportunity. I've been in the city seven hours, and so far I love everything. I know these three months are going to fly by, so I'll do my best to absorb everything and report back. Promise.

To pack, or not to pack?

I leave in three days, and I am no closer to being packed than I was three months ago. Actually, I'm worse off, because I still haven't unpacked the clothes I brought back from Boston. I have piles of things EVERYWHERE. It's completely overwhelming. I know once I unpack, do the last load of laundry and lay everything out I'll be in better shape. But right now all I want to do is print pictures to hang on my walls in London, make sure my ipod is updated with lots of new music and get everyone's skype screen name.

Today I found out that I only have wifi access for 2,000 minutes each week. It ends up being over 33 hours, which is reasonable, but very different from what I usually use in the U.S. I won't be able to keep AIM, Gchat and Skype up all the time, which I'm actually excited about. Right now I am overly addicted to technology. I don't think 33 hours of connectedness a week counts as detox, but it's definitely the closest thing I've ever had to a technological cleanse. I think it will be healthy.

Yesterday I got a bunch of great recommendations from a friend who studied in London, as well as the info that another friend who I haven't seen in a long time studied at the same program. After e-mailing her, she raved about working for BBC Parliament, which is a possible placement for me too! She gave me a whole bunch of great tips about classes at London School of Economics, the internships and a great kebab place. She had an incredible experience at Hansard, and her advice and excitement was exactly what I needed to calm down.

Everything will be great. I know it.

If anyone has any tips for food/shopping/travel, please send them my way!

London Calling

In January I'll be taking off for the Hansard Scholars Program in London, a city that I’ve always dreamed about living in. I never really thought it would happen, it’s still pretty unreal that in a couple of weeks I’ll have to look in the opposite direction when I cross the street.

I love New York City, and I've heard London is very similar, but with better accents. London has a great music and theatre scene, beautiful architecture and tons of history. I think it will be the perfect study abroad destination. I'm excited to immerse myself in British politics through my two political science class I take at the London School of Economics & Political Science, as well as in my as-yet-undetermined government-related internship.

I assume that studying in London will be less of a culture shock than my five weeks studying in Italy, since I know the language. Still, I plan to learn all I can about British culture and politics, and explore the city as much as I can throughout the semester. I'd like to be really familiar with as much of London as possible by the time I leave. I've been in Boston for four years and there are still sections of the city I haven't explored, so I know it will take effort to fully experience life in London.

I'm eager to travel to other European countries as well. After living in Italy for five short weeks, all I want to do is travel. I plan to take a couple of weekend trips, hopefully to Barcelona, Paris and Prague, as well as travel to some other cities with my mom after my program is over. I traveled to several Italian cities over the summer and experienced a wide breadth of Italian culture between them, so I'm really excited to see other countries and get a taste for each culture.

I’m still trying to figure out how I’ll be able to leave my family and friends for four months, and though I know it won’t be easy, I know I’ll be okay. There’s always e-mail. And skype. And facebook. And aim. And Twitter. I’m sure I’ll be able to reconcile my feelings better once my feet are firmly planted on British soil and I’m living the reality. For now I’m just trying to spend as much time with everyone as I can and hug a lot, though hugs make it both easier and harder to leave everyone.

Back in U.S.A.

This will be my final entry about Italy. I don’t have enough time to detail my last weekend in Sorrento, Capri, Positano and Pompeii, aside from saying that it was by far the best weekend on the trip. Capri and Sorrento were absolutely beautiful, I took several boat rides, swam through caves, took a chairlift so high that my ears popped, saw ancient pornographic paintings, went to a karaoke bar and jumped off of a small cliff. That weekend I gained new perspective on my trip in the most beautiful setting I’ve ever seen, and I savored every minute of it.

Now, for some final post-departure thoughts:

I was surprised with how prevalent English is in Italy. A lot of signs and menus are in Italian and English. Words on most clothes, notebooks and bags are in English, which was disappointing. I had to search for souvenirs with Italian words on them. I went into the Disney Store hoping to find t-shirts with Disney characters talking with Italian word bubbles, but there was no Italian to be found.

Though I was not in Italy very long, I learned that Italians really love President Obama. Language barriers between college-aged Italians and my group of friends sometimes stopped much meaningful communication. However, a few times the barrier lifted when one of the Italians yelled “Obama!” Conversation would stall past that smile-eliciting comment, but I learned that Europeans really are hopeful that Obama will fix the problems the U.S. has helped create. Unfortunately, I’m not good enough at Italian to read a newspaper (though I did browse a few of the free commuter papers) and I never got to see a news cast, but I imagine the tone of Italian media’s coverage of America is much more positive than it was one year ago.

Italians have much different safety standards than Americans. Some of the ancient monuments have steep, difficult staircases and bridges that look like they’ll crumble, but continue to be trampled by tourists. When I was on boats in Capri and Positano I was never told where life vests were (there weren’t signs either), I wasn’t given instructions on safely jumping from the boat or cliff, and there wasn’t a single lifeguard in sight on any of the beaches.

I came to the conclusion that Italians are terrible multi-taskers. A café cashier would spend several minutes finishing a conversation with his friends without acknowledging your presence in his restaurant. Often, people stop in the middle of the sidewalk, not to tie their shoe or look at something in a window, but to put emphasis on a point of the story they’re animatedly telling their friend.

I learned a ton about Italian culture and history, and I loved all of it. I would go back to Italy in a heartbeat, hopefully one day I’ll get to do that. In the meantime, I’m content applying for my next study abroad in the U.K. and continuing to explore Boston. Future study abroad students beware: You WILL get the travel bug. Now, all I want to do now is see the world. Are there any takers for a financier for my future world exploration? Please?

In Italy, I learned to take things that would otherwise bother me and find the bright side. The lack of multi-tasking was endearing when I was finally able to categorize it. I don’t love the beach, but every time I started to get annoyed that sand was stuck all over my me, I snapped myself out of it with the realization that yes, I was covered in sand, but it was ITALIAN sand. It made it immediately better. I was able to take everything that came at me with a more relaxed demeanor than my Type-A personality is usually capable of. I learned patience. I believe that I am now more open to and respectful of points of view different than mine. I also both love and hate America more than I did before I went abroad.

Every experience in Italy, whether positive or negative, has made an impact on the way I view the world and the people around me. I hope that Italy was just the beginning. I look forward to continually learning more and exploring both at home and during any future experiences abroad.