Studying...

So the majority of the day today I actually did a lot of studying for class. I woke up and ate breakfast and showered and the immediately starting studying. I read from some textbooks and read some chapters in To the Lighthouse by Virginia Woolf. We took a break for lunch and some of us went out to this Indian restaurant called Khans. We had some very delicious curry there and then on the way back to our place we stopped at this really good ice cream place called Fenton's when I got a cookies and cream milkshake after this it was back to studying and I tried to get a little ahead on my studying. Then we had a brief fhe where we went out to eat some gelato and I went to boots to get a blowdryer and some hairspary. I am getting oriented to what is where around town now so I felt quite proud of myself that I was able to make to boots and back all on my own. After this I went on a walk for my London walks class around Kensington Gardens and took some pictures there. Not the most exciting day but it is always nice to be in London! TTFN!

 My nice curry, rice and naan lunch

 Gates into the Kensington Palace area

 Picture with the statue of Queen Victoria

 Beautiful sunset in the park (this is for you Amanda)

 Picturesque view of swans on the Round pond in Kensington gardens

 Beautiful fence design

Statue of Peter Pan 

Sunday in London

So today was a wonderful but a little bit crazy day. I was awakened this morning by one of the people in the group that I am supposed to go to church with telling me that our church was actually at 10 instead of at 1 as we had previously thought and that we had to leave in like 5 minutes. So I rushed to get ready but by the time I had gotten ready the group had already left so I just decided to go with a different ward. So I sat around and got myself ready a little better ready and then did some reading and sketching. While I was reading the fire alarm went off and there was craziness in the centre because there were only students left at the center and we had no idea how to stop it. We discovered that it had been triggered by a blowdryer which exploded in my room when some girl tried to use it and sparks had flown on to the floor. Fortunately there was no real fire but now all the plugs in our room no longer work so I have to charge everything downstairs now. So one of the guys figured out how to turn off the really loud fire alarm and we called the professors at church and let them know what had happened. So I went with a different group to a different ward and we took the tube. While we were sitting on the tube we stopped and the advertisement behind the lady sitting across from me but the part I could read said "What are you doing here, of all the places you could be?". It was kind of crazy because I had just been thinking about that and what I am doing here in London, so basically the London underground was talking to me. Anyways, we got a little lost on the way there but we did finally make it after asking some nice locals for directions and then we ran into some sister missionaries on the way there. The ward was a great mixture of people and they were all really friendly. Also there were quite a few Elders there and one of the girls in my group from BYU was quite taken with a Elder from London but is quite dismayed because he is on a mission and we cannot date while we are here so the possibility is doubly impossible. Still it was amusing to watch her enthusiasm. After church we headed back and we almost missed the last tube because it was closed after that for some problems on the line but we made it back and waited around for a little bit talking until it was time for dinner. Dinner was a delicious chicken, asparagus and pasta which I greatly enjoyed and we had a nice chocolate mouse dessert thing. After dinner we had a fireside where this guy who has lived in London all of his life came and talked to us about what it was like in war times when he was young in England during the bombing and other things. It was really interesting and he also showed us this amusing explanation of the English sport cricket which I will post in a picture below. After this I facetimed with my family for a while and got to hear about their week. It is really crazy busy here in London and we are doing things constantly but I am really enjoying it. I have a lot of homework to do tomorrow but hopefully I will still be able to get some fun London stuff in too. TTFN!

 Riding the tube to church!

 Cricket rules explained

 Sketches!

Seeing the town!

So today I started out by rushing over to Portabello market with some of my friends. We got there pretty early and one of the shop owners told us that the market is "lazy on Saturday" and therefore things don't really get started until 10 in the morning but it was great for us because it wasn't too busy while we were there. We walked all the way down the street just looking and then on the way back made some purchases. I gained a cute scarf and pocket watch necklace from some little shops and my friends got various other things such as bone china teacups and wood phone cases. We also got some nice pastries for breakfast. After this we headed back to the center and gathered up things to go to the science museum. On our way to finding the science museum we saw the hyde park chapel and stopped in for a bit and talked with the missionaries there. It is a beautiful chapel and they have a fun and high tech little visitors center there. Also outside of their door they have this bright sign that says "Book of Mormon available here!". My friends and I thought how amusing it would be if someone came in looking for tickets to the book of mormon play (which is widely advertised here) and instead the missionaries were like actually we have something better, the actual book! You see signs for the book of mormon play everywhere but there are also a considerable amount of I'm a mormon signs too. I have seen them all over and today I got a picture of a one on a double decker bus.   After this we went into the museum and went to the exhibit we were assigned to for a project for class. It was a pretty cool looking science museum and I actually did learn some about the atmosphere like I was supposed to for the assignment but my friends and I did end up losing each other a couple times during our time there which is extremely inconvenient when you can't really call each other on the phone. You don't really realize how much you use your phone to contact people until you can't. After the museum some of my friends wanted to check out Herrods and I went even though I was getting very hungry because it was like 2 in the afternoon. So we went into Herods and realized that there was no way we were going to be to spend our money eating there so we went to this little pizza place called pizza express. It was a sit down restaurant which doesn't seem very "express" to me but the pizza was quite good and we all ate it down quickly. After this we went back to Herrods which I got bored of quite quickly. I saw no point in looking at stuff that there was absolutely no way I was going to buy. It was all ridiculously expensive and honestly I was disgusted by that store. I mean nobody needed anything that was in that store and it just disgusted me that there are enough people with that much money to buy stuff at that store that that store is able to stay in business even though it is just a ridiculous show of flambouancy. I mean if I was rich I would definitely not waste my money with stupid things like freakishly expensive bedazzled shoes or designer underwear for children. Also I found it very interesting that they were also advertising for The Great Gatsby movie there. I mean I understand how the ridiculous displays of wealth in the great gatsby match up with Herrods but then again we all know how it ends for gatsby so are the people at Herrods trying to warn people it will be the same for them...     Anyways after Herods we just couldn't stand the expensiveness so we went and bought mcflurries and the nearby mcdonalds for just a pound. Ah spending little money and getting satisfied with the product is so wonderful! After this we headed or to the Peacock theater where we bought some student discount tickets to the play "Some Like It Hip Hop". I actually really enjoyed the play more than I expected I would. It was quite amusing, the dancers were very skilled and talented and they also had some great singers. It made me and all of my friends feel like dancing and they encouraged everyone to cheer and yell during the play since it was "hip hop theater". In the last curtain call they encourage everyone to get up and dance some moves. We were singing and dancing all the way back to the tube and home. All in all it was a rather busy but enjoyable day. Tomorrow it will be exciting as me and some of my classmates try to navigate our way to our assigned ward in London. Fortunately, the ward is not until later in the day so we don't have to wake up too early. Well I'm off to bed in London. TTFN!

 Shopping on Portabello Road

 Hyde Park Chapel

 I'm a Mormon add on a double decker bus!

 First play in London! 

 My acquisitions from Portabello Road

 Pocket Watch necklace

Classes!

So today we spent a lot of the day in our classes that we will have hear while in London. For breakfast we keep having these wonderful yogurt cup things that have like coco flake things to the side that you can dump into your yogurt. I had one with banana yogurt this morning and it was delicious. So our first class is Humanities and the Environment which I admit I was at first hesitant about because I am not really much of a nature person but this was a really great in the first class today and I feel like it will be a great class. We first talked about what natural places are of importance to us we discussed that they have value to us either because of past meaning on narrative that we have in regards to the place or we just have an unexpected and unpredictable reaction to the place. I think I had an experience with this last time when I went to the British Museum. I was super tired from jetlag and I really wasn't really too enthused about the idea of going to a museum but once I entered the British Museum and started looking around I was completely thrilled with it and I couldn't get enough of it. My teacher pointed out that these unexpected reactions cannot be fabricated either. It's like when you listen to that great song that totally pumped you up when unexpectedly heard it for the first time. You can go back and listen to it again but you can't force it to have the same meaning as it did in that unexpected reaction. My teacher also pointed out that while we often view it as such, nature is not something going on around us be we are a part of nature constantly. Also in our age of information he points out that we can't really oh I didn't know about my relationship with nature because we have so many sources of the information available to us. After this talk about nature we discussed the play The Tempest which we had previously read. We discussed the meaning and purpose of the characters in the story and had some entertaining readings by members of my class. I am really excited to see how the play will be interpreted when we see it at the globe theater on Tuesday. I amazed that there are so many wonderful opportunities around me and I wonder how I will be able to take advantage of all of the opportunities that I would like to. We had a brief break in between our humanities class and art class where we all ran off to grab something for lunch. Some people ate sandwiches and I had some leftovers of the chicken curry and rice that we had lunch. I have realized that I actually really don't mind living here with all these people so close to each other, I actually am quite enjoying the communal environment. Also all of the people on the study abroad are very high caliber people so I guess that makes it easier to live with them too. In my art class we did our first sketch. The teacher stacked some chairs in an interesting arrangement in the center of the room and then he instructed us to use an open format (where it is just section of the objects, the objects continue off the page) to draw a section of the arrangement. We had to use only straight lines and we had to make sure we were understanding proportions. It was hard for me but we have an assignment to practice this type of sketching three more times before Tuesday so hopefully I will get better. After that we went on one of the walks for our London walks class just exploring the general area around the London center where I have already been quite a bit. We found out where portabello road is and we have plans to go there tomorrow morning. After this walk we sat around working on assignments for classes and looking up tickets for plays and musical. There are so many available and I am really excited to see some like Singing in the Rain.  We just had a wonderful dinner of sheperds pie and now in a little bit here a guy from the Church is coming and telling us what wards we will be assigned to while we are here in London. I already feel like I have been here for a while and I am really enjoying London!

 A view into our classroom at the London Centre

 My favorite window in the building, a rounded window with a window seat in the classroom

 My first attempts at sketching, the chairs below and above a portion of the buildings across from us

The stairs! you have to climb about 8 flights of these to get to my room

London Walking

So today we had orientation for our classes and basically to orient us to the London center. After that we went walking around London on the first of our "london walks" for the London walks class that is part of our curriculum in class here. We took the tube down to the tower of London and then walked over tower bridge to the footbridge (which was the one from Harry Potter that the dementors destroy), took the footbridge to St. Paul's Cathedral and then walked up to trafalgar square, past the London eye, took pictures at big ben and parliment and took the tube back to the center. On our way back on the tube there was awesome signing band with a violin, a guitar and a banjo singing on the train so we enjoyed their music and gave them some of our change. All in all it was a pretty walk. Then when we got back to the center we had this wonderful chicken curry. Now we are going to try and get tickets to the show Macbeth that is here starring James Mcavoy. I will post some pictures I took on our picturesque walk today.

 in front of the tower of london

 Walking on tower bridge

 looking out on the river thames

 tower bridge

 st. pauls

 law building

 a double decker bus and a telephone booth

 trafalaga square

big ben 

the band that serenaded us on the tube

Well I slept through the night here in the UK due to some nice melatonin medication. Yesterday I enjoyed the rest of the day here at the London center chatting it up with people and walking around hyde park and the general area to try and stay awake. We also had a wonderful meal of soup and bread here. After dinner i walked around the town some more, found a boots, and purchased my tube pass for the next month. I made myself stay awake until around nine here which was super hard but I made it. My room is up 7 flights of stairs here in the London center so its quite the journey when you forget something up in your room. This morning I got up and wanted to take a shower but unfortunately the shower I tried to use only had burning hot water. Not what you would expect huh? So I moved to a different shower but it is unfortunate because that means only one of the three showers in our bathroom that is supposed to be shared among twelve girls works. Then I attempted to use the blowdryers that were left here to blowdry my hair but they all didn't work so I think I will have to go back to Boots (a store here in the UK) to get one. So for this morning I blowdried my hair using the hand dryer in our bathroom and then there was a leftover straigtener in the center that actually worked so I used that too. Breakfast was awesome and I am ready to face another day and beat the jet lag! I will try to post more pictures and info later today. I did post a couple pictures to facebook from yesterday too. Maybe I will try to find a way to post them to the blog. Well I've got to go off to orientation for our classes now. TTFN!

I MADE IT!

It has been a crazy ride to get here but I am finally all nice and set up in my cozy little bottom bunk in London. Yesterday was a pretty short day for me and I spent most of the time on the plane. It was hard to sleep on the plane, especially since people around me kept turning on their way to bright reading lights but the flight was pretty empty so I was able to take up two seats to try and sleep on. When we arrived in London my phone which is supposedly able to work over here in the UK was not working so I was not able to text my parents or whatever to tell them that I had made it safely to London. Then everyone one on my flight that was in my same study abroad group had all booked before hand for them to all take a shuttle together so my parents had arranged for me to get a ride on my own through another shuttle service. Unfortunately for me when I arrived at the shuttle station no one was there. I was sitting around worried when finally an Indian man and his daughter came up to the same shuttle station. So the Indian man went and found someone and then in a little while someone showed up to help us about 15 minutes later. The guy who did show up did mumble something about an employee showing up. Anyways I finally get on the bus about an hour after I was supposed to. I was calmly sitting on the shuttle bus and then the bus driver said it was my stop. It didn't seem quite right and so I reconfirmed it with him and he said this was this place. So I grab my stuff and start walking around to figure out where exactly it is and I suddenly realize I am not in the right place at all. I try to use my maps and things on my phone to figure out where I am but my phone isn't really functioning correctly. Finally I look across down the street and there is a park which I determine to be hyde park. Fortunately from looking it up before I know that where I need to be is near hyde park so I finally find a map near hyde park and I determine that where I need to be is on the opposite side of hyde park than I was on before so I hike with all of my luggage across hyde park and down a couple streets where I finally reach my destination. So it was crazy getting here but I am feeling pretty comfy in my little spot now and I am just trying to stay awake and beat the jetlag!

 So excited that I made it!

My little lower bunk space!