Stonehenge, Bath, Stourhead, Wicked, Southall

It’s been a pretty busy and fun week! Because we’ve done so much already it’s hard to believe that we’ve only been here for two weeks. It seems like a lot longer. I really love being here in London. I think I’ll definitely be coming back to England in the future. There is so much to do, see, and experience!

Monday:
We had class in the morning like normal, and in the afternoon a small group of us went to buy tickets. I got a ticket to see Wicked with another group of ours that had bought their tickets earlier. Then in the evening we had an early dinner, followed by a trip to the Globe Theater to see Shakespeare’s As You Like It. We walked across the Millennium Bridge on the way and were able to see London Bridge off in the distance. Anyway, the play was so good! It was the second time I’d seen it performed, and we’d read and studied the play in my Shakespeare class last semester so I was very familiar with the story. I think I got quite a bit more out of it watching it performed by professionals.



Tuesday:
Not terribly exciting. I got up early and did laundry while doing some reading for class. I had class and played piano quite a bit. So yeah, nothing exciting.

Wednesday:
Amazing! We left at 8am to go to Stonehenge. Our coach was pretty awesome and our driver, Tony, is super cool. We watched Pride and Prejudice on the way. After Stonehenge we drove a bit further on to Bath and got to tour around up there. We saw the Roman Baths, saw where Jane Austin lived, and about a million other things in Bath. It was pretty cool. After Bath we drove to Stourhead, which is where they filmed the confrontation scene in the new Pride and Prejudice movie. I walked across the bridge that Elizabeth Bennett ran across, and stood in the Temple of Apollo where Mr. Darcy proposed to Elizabeth, but she refused him. It was so neat! It would have been even cooler if it was cooler… it was a super hot day and the humidity is driving me insane. I don’t know if I’ve ever sweat so much. After we finished there we got back on the bus and rewatched that scene of the movie. I’m so excited to say that “I was there!”


Thursday:
We had class which wasn’t very exciting, but after class we took the tube over to Westminster Abbey and chilled there. I got to see so many amazing tombs! Jane Austen! The Bronte sisters! Handel! Sir Isaac Newton! Charles Darwin! And countless royals. It was amazing! The abbey is so beautiful! Very nice gothic architecture. After that we went home and had dinner, then in the evening we headed down to the West End and watched Wicked!! Amazing! After seeing Wicked we wandered down by Parliament and saw Bit Bed, the house of Parliament and the London Eye all lit up. Awesome! I can’t describe how breathtaking it is. I think that was one of the moments that reminded me that I’m in London. I’ve seen pictures of these places so often and I was finally there in person. Having watched Dr. Who about a million times I was very familiar with the London eye because it shows up in about everything, and I couldn’t believe I was standing right next to it! So incredibly cool!


Friday:
We went to a Sikh temple in Southall, then two Hindu temples. That was pretty cool, but I think going there was when I finally got to stage two of culture shock. I was dealing with the English culture pretty well because I incorporated so much of it into my life back in to the states (music, movies, literature) but I wasn’t prepared for the Indian culture. When I got back in the evening I was mildly depressed which carried over into….

Saturday:
I was very much a bum on Saturday. I should have done homework but couldn’t keep focused. I got one assignment done, but that was all. I moped around a bit in the morning, then some friends dragged me from the computer and we went to Burger King for lunch. We had to have something American! It was the 4th of July! I got back, did a whole lot of nothing for quite a while, then in the evening we got some more American food again (Subway this time) and went to sit in Hyde Park. As we sat three we noticed a football (soccer ball) laying, abandoned in the grass and eventually we decided to kick it back and forth in our group. Kicking it in a circle became boring so we decided to actually play a game of football (soccer). That was a lot of fun! After we got back they started watching Casino Royal and I chilled and talked to a friend who just got back from his mission. I think toward the end of the day I was in a much better mood.

So yeah, that was the week. It was a lot of fun, very busy, and I can’t wait for the coming week! Later!