First weekend of July

Thursday- 

A group of about 6 or 7 us had signed up a while ago to go back to Buckingham Palace for a tour, since the first time we went, we weren't able to get close or really see it due to a big 10K event that was going on. We had to meet there at 9:30, and we had a tour at 9:45. We got audio guides and were on our own to explore the Palace. It was really cool to see the inside of, and I learned a lot more than I was expecting to. It was similar to other palaces and things we have seen, with the style of furniture and decorations and art and such, but it's where the royals live, so it's still pretty dang awesome. We ended up spending a few hours there, ending in the gardens and at a gift shop.

Everyone split off after the gift shop, and Amanda and I ended up stopping at Pret for lunch and then heading home to get things done. My knee was really bothering me still, and even with wearing my brace and taking my meds and everything, I wasn't up for any more walking at all. I'm really hoping it starts to feel better again so it doesn't keep putting a damper on my last few weeks here. 

We stopped at the grocery store on the way home and I got fruit and stuff for salads (NEED MORE VEGGIES). We both just hung out at the house all afternoon and got things done and napped, ate dinner, etc.

We had a film night for a group outing (the film class had to go anyway, but we have two films that are for all of us), and we left early to get snacks on the way and then get there. It was at the Clapham Picture House, and we were seeing Spike Lee's first movie, "Do the Right Thing" that was made in the 80s. I wasn't excited about it at all, as I didn't know anything about it, and would have much rather seen a movie that just came out. (Also, while we were hanging out before going into the theatre, we got word that one of the girls in our group was leaving to go home, so it definitely put a damper on the evening. We miss you, Beth!)

When we got there, it ended up being a cool little venue with a bar and only 4 theatres. I got popcorn and was starting to get more into the whole thing, and when we went into our theatre and they were handing out free pizzas, I knew it was going to be good after all :) Turns out the event was put on by a local film blogger whose blog name is based on a line from the movie, and it was just a unique event to show this film. He explained the context of it all and introduced the film and did a raffle (Griffin won a bottle of champagne or wine or something!). 

The movie ended up being really good. They showed it on 35mm, so it had a totally different feel than movies do these days, which made it seem a lot cooler. It was definitely a powerful film that showed a lot of the anger and confusion of racial identity in the 80s, and it was seriously shocking at some points. Definitely worth seeing. Gets you thinking about a lot of things, for sure. The movie got out around 11 and we all came home right after. I was able to skype Kyle, which was so good and definitely cheered me up despite my knee getting even worse. Good way to end the evening!

Friday-

Almost everyone left early in the morning to go to Paris for the weekend. I didn't go, as I had done basically everything they would be doing this weekend when I went with my grandparents in 2010! I was really looking forward to a weekend with nobody here (there were only going to be 4 of us in the house). I woke up and found that the lightbulbs in both bathrooms and the hallway that they are on were all burned out, and there's absolutely no natural light in there, so it was totally dark and pretty freaky when it was just me in the flat. I wasn't able to find Charlotte all morning, but I left her a note about it and filled out a maintenance request, and was really hoping they would fix it before the night.

I decided to go to the Museum of London and explore, since it was free and only a few tube stops away and I hadn't been yet. It was basically the history of London from the very beginning, and it ended up being a lot of the same types of exhibits and such that I've seen at other museums. I wandered around the whole place, mostly just browsing and not really reading anything too seriously. It was a pretty confusing layout for a museum, and I just wasn't too interested in anything I saw, but I'm glad I went and saw it! Checked that off my London bucket list. I had read that the museum had a good gift shop and I was hoping to find something interesting for people I still needed gifts for, but I found nothing exciting and decided to head home. My knee was really bugging me still (the rain didn't help at all...), and I just was done for the day.

I came back to the flat, made soup and a salad, and watched Love Actually. I love that Madison House has tons of British movies- it's so fun to watch them and see tons of familiar places in them! Plus, Love Actually was one of the best movies ever, so it was a great thing all around! I was pretty lazy for the rest of the afternoon, until the evening when I met up with Tina. We took the tube to Leicester Square to head to the half price ticket box office and pick up our tickets for Rock of Ages for that night!

We ended up getting dinner at an Italian chain nearby, and I had a really good pizza. The timing worked out perfectly all evening- we weren't ever rushed and everything went smoothly which was awesome. After dinner, we took the tube back to Holborn and walked to the theatre which was only about a ten minute walk or so. We got there right as they opened the doors, and we headed right in to our seats! The theatre was so hilarious and definitely set the stage for the show from the second we walked in. There were bright lights and 80s huge signs everywhere and lots of neon and thongs and bras hanging from the chandeliers...it definitely felt like an 80s bar/strip club. Everyone around us was middle-aged women that were WAY too excited to be there...I'm pretty sure we were the youngest people there.

The show was SO good and so much fun! I recognized or knew much more of the music than I was expecting to, and it was just such a fun and energetic show. Definitely different than any other shows I've gone to, so I was really glad we went. I bought the CD after, so I'll be jamming to some classic 80s tunes for a while, and I'm pretty stoked about it.

It was such a fun night overall, and so good to just be on our own without all of the group around! Much needed. Oh, and my lights were all fixed when I got home- yay!

Saturday-

I woke up around 9 or so and despite the rain, decided to head out and finally go to Portobello Rd. Market in Notting Hill! I've been dying to go for a few weeks and decided to just do it. I took the tube there (like 7 stops or so, so further away than most things we do), and then walked to Portobello Road. It was very crowded, which I had been told to expect, but I didn't mind at all. It was so fun to wander in and out of all the shops and stalls of antiques and random knick knacks and art/photography and souvenirs and such...I found so many awesome things for myself and other people! The market as a whole is over 2 miles long, but I didn't get to all of it. I had to leave at one point to go find an atm (turned out to be very far away, and of course that's when it started pouring), but I came back and continued until it turned into the food portion of the market. I picked up the best, biggest strawberries and a grapefruit from a farmer's stand, and then knew I needed to leave before I wanted to buy every fruit and veggie in sight! They all looked SO good and I was getting pretty hungry.

I decided to take a bus home, since there was a bus stop right near me when I decided to head home. I waited at the stop for a good 20 minutes or so, looking at all the signs and figuring out what I needed to do, and I thought I was right...but then the bus came and it was headed the wrong direction. So I went down the street to the other side to try to get the bus heading the right direction, waited 10 more minutes, got on the bus, and was on it for about 45 minutes or so until I got off because I had NO idea where I was or where we were going. I have no idea what the heck I keep doing wrong on these stupid buses, but I get lost every time. Luckily, I got off at Paddington tube station, and was able to take a tube two stops back to Notting Hill Gate which is where I had gotten off in the morning, and then switch lines to head 7 stops back home. I'm just never gonna try to figure these buses out. They win! I give up.

When I finally got home (after an hour and a half to go about 20 minutes away), I made lunch and had my fresh fruit, and watched a movie (the Babies documentary from a few years ago that follows four babies in different countries from birth until they're walking...don't judge. It was adorable.)

Kelly and Kristina came down and hung out for a little bit on their way to go out to dinner (I passed, as I had food here and didn't want to spend any more money). When they got back a few hours later, Tina and I watched Pride and Prejudice (with Keira Knightley) and it was SO GOOD. I'm loving these British movies. Stayed up to text Kyle for a while, and then crashed!

Sunday-

Kelly had invited the four of us in the house to have breakfast up in Flat E, so we met up there at 10 and she made scrambled eggs and pancakes and bacon for the meat eaters and had a bunch of fresh fruit, and it was so delicious! It was nice to just hang out with different people than my flatmates and to just chat and relax and eat yummy food- Kelly is the best! I love that she loves to cook and bake for us :)

I was feeling really crappy (thank you, sinus infection from hell) and took it easy all day (I'm starting to sound like a seriously lazy person, but this summer has been really busy and intense, I promise! We've done a lot and it's draining!).

Watched Bridget Jones's Diary for the first time, and read and journaled and caught up on my blog, wrote a paper for Culture By Design, made myself dinner, and now am just killing time being semi-productive waiting for everyone to get home from Paris! Hoping this sickness goes away soon, or this week is going to be realllyyyy not fun.

First week of July! Classes.

Monday- Media and Politics
Our outing (after a frustrating class of our teacher on his soapbox harshly criticizing topics that are sensitive and then not listening to our viewpoints at all) was to the Imperial War Museum- full of tanks and planes and lots of war propaganda that we looked at. It was a very thorough museum with  wars and conflicts I had never heard of, and we looked mainly at media uses throughout a few major wars. It was pretty depressing overall, but the propaganda was interesting to look at and see the  differences throughout the progress of time.

I think the rest of the day was just back at the house, getting reading done for my classes, etc. Nothing too exciting!

Tuesday- Media and Society
We spent class time talking all about our final papers in groups and critiquing them. We talked about our topics and our progress with the professor and it basically took the whole class time. Our outing was to the Jewish Museum in Camden where a sweet old lady took us upstairs to give us a rundown of the museum, and then we had time to explore on our own. It was really interesting to see the history of Jewish culture and people in London throughout time.

Afterward, a group of us found a cheap Italian pizza place for lunch and all devoured our pizzas. It was so nice to finally have free time in between our classes for once...usually we are rushed to get to Culture By Design in time!

Culture by Design- we didn't have lecture, but instead met outside of class and went straight to the Museum of Brands, Packaging and Advertising in Notting Hill. I was looking forward to this outing just because it sounded different from all the other museums we've been to, and I was right. It was AWESOME. It was a tiny little place, but it was jam packed with stuff, and I wanted to stay there forever. It started out going decade by decade from 1900 to today, with the display cases full of food packaging, toys, posters and art and propaganda, fashion, games, etc. Basically anything with a brand and a package was there. It was so cool seeing how the trends changed throughout time, and seeing how many things still have stayed so similar and so true to their original design and packaging.

After that area, the displays shifted to show brands from their original creation throughout time to today. It would show, for example, Coca Cola, from the original can through every variation throughout the decades, ending in the current design. It struck me as fascinating how little most designs changed over time. I think it speaks volumes about the original designs themselves, that they truly have withstood the test of time and stayed true to their focus, which I thought was really cool. We have another media analysis project to write about this outing, and I'm really excited about it.

After spending a little less than an hour there, we rushed off to Westfield mall to look more at branded space. We went to the area of the shopping centre known as "The Village" aka the reaaaaallllyyyyy expensive stuff. We were sent off in small groups to look around and go in as many stores as we could in the time allowed, with the goal of deciding whether the spaces were classified as a "shed," "cathedral," or "museum." Sheds would be stores were everything is out and in the open and more available and perhaps more busy and cluttered and chaotic. Museums are where you go to study things, they are less accessible, more on display. Cathedrals would be the least accessible, with people going with the intent of worshipping or paying homage to the items. It was really cool to look at these designer stores that way and to classify them and to realize I really didn't like or want anything I saw. I'm much more of a thrifter and bargain shopper, and I'm 150% okay with that.

After that, we were done with classes for the day! We had a group meeting at 6:30, and then we were done for the day!


Wednesday (4th of July!)- Writing in the Public Sphere
Discussed four articles that were more current and more about the Internet playing into the public sphere, and it was really interesting, as it was topics I had covered in my paper (that I got an A- on, yay!). I had time to come up to my flat during class and look at several major news sources online and to analyze their comment forums and take notes on their effectiveness and their content, which was really interesting.

Our outing was to the Foundling Museum- an outing I had picked since some of our outings were duplicates from my other classes. Read more about it here! (http://londonpublicsphere.blogspot.co.uk/)

Afterwards, I was off to explore a new area of town on my own, about two streets over from where Madison House is. It just happened to be a random area of the neighborhood that I hadn't really explored yet, and after walking around for a while, I realized it's because there really isn't anything to see or do there except eat at places I've seen around town already. I stopped at a souvenir shop to pick up things for people, and then came home to relax. We were going to go to the Globe Theatre in the evening to see Taming of the Shrew and we were going to have to stand the whole time, so I knew I wanted to take it easy all day so my knee wouldn't hate me TOO much.

Griffin and I left to head to the theatre and our group all met up there. We had "groundlings" tickets, and I was excited for them because it was the true Shakespearean way of seeing his plays, but also really nervous about my knee holding up the whole time. I had the okay from Rusty to leave at any point if I needed to, but I love Taming of the Shrew and I really wanted to be able to see it all.

We stood at the back of the ground area, so we had a wall to lean up against and a little ledge to sort of sit on, and that helped a lot. The play was HILARIOUS and very well done! There was even quite a lot of nudity (saw much more male butt than I was ever expecting to...) and I seriously loved it. Such good actors, and such an awesome experience, and I made it the whole time! Walking to the tube station was miserable and it's been a few days and my knee is still suffering quite a lot, but so worth it.

It ended about 10:30 pm, and walking home across the Millennium Bridge at night was SO COOL. I hadn't been down by the river at night yet, and seeing the city all lit up was incredible. The new Shard building that is the highest point in the city now lit up in crazy colors, and had these green laser beams that shot out and around the city, ending on points like St. Pauls...so crazy. It was the closest thing we had to a Fourth of July fireworks show!

It was a little weird being in England on the 4th, and it made me a little sad, which I totally wasn't expecting! I'm not a big patriotic, let's go America kind of person anyway, so I usually am not too obsessed with the holiday, but I really just missed being with my family and friends and seeing fireworks and just having a relaxing summer evening. I realized I really have missed SUMMER. It hasn't felt like a true summer here hardly at all, and I didn't know that it would actually be something I came to miss.

I'm looking forward to coming home and having hot weather (not excited about the humidity though...) and being able to go to the pool and beach and not having cold weather and rain every day. It will be nice to have a real summer in the States.