False.
Monday I went to one class, took a nap, woke up and felt like I had died. So, tuesday I missed class and went to the doctor for 40 pounds. She took one look at my ears and throat and told me that I had a bad ear infection and tonsillitis and put me on antibiotics. I could barely swallow and felt like total crap, so I was happy that something could help me.
Wednesday I did a whole lot of nothing, like watching tv and sleeping a lot to feel better. By Thursday, I had to get out of the house. Luckily, Sari Carter, one of my friends from American University who is studying in Copenhagen happened to be free in London so we met up. I put on a cute outfit to feel normal, and met her over at the O2 Center in North Greenwich. It's a musical venue as well as a sports arena so I took my time walking around and exploring before she was done with her tour.
O2 Center
After finding Sari, we decided to tour the Tower of London and see the crown jewels. Last year, Sari introduced me to the show "The Tudors" on showtime about the Tudor period of England and King Henry VIII. I got obsessed with the show and Anne Boleyn. It was only fitting we went to the tower together and saw where Anne Boleyn's head was chopped off and to see the crown jewels, of course. I was expecting awesome jewelry and was a bit disappointed when it was mostly silverware and crowns. But there were some gigantic diamonds, which were fun to look at and the guards were really nice to us. We got there at around 3:30/4 and the tower closed at 5 pm so we had to run. Everyone told us at the gate that we should give ourselves at least 3 hours to see everything, but because Sari was leaving the next day this was our only shot so we went for it. I have to admit, we did a good job running around and seeing what we wanted to see.
After the tower, we went to dinner in South Kensington at a Japanese restaurant and got some sushi. I ordered a hot saki which was amazing. I've always wanted to get one while eating sushi so I accomplished a goal. Go me! Sari had to run to see Wicked in Victoria, so she ran off but was free later on.
We met up for drinks at The Zetland Arms, a pub our flat always goes to because it's just around the corner. We then went to O'Neill's to meet up with some of her friends from the Copenhagen program. It was fun, but I was still sick and tired so I decided to call it an early night. Friday was another lazy day, but Saturday was fun.
I met a guy a few weeks ago at a club and we've hung out a few times since. His name is Dave and we've become friends, so he invited me to go outside of London and hang out in his town. He's on the tube so I hopped on and went to the outskirts of London to meet up with him. He picked me up from the train station and I got to sit on the wrong side of the car, which is very very weird. I found out from him that they call 2 lane roads "dual carriage ways" and they use miles per hour, not kilometers per hour! I was shocked. Overall, it was a very fun day.
Yesterday I did something else exciting! My international trade class went into the "City of London" which is the square mile that makes up the financial district of London. My goal in life is to end up working there- too bad my internship is no where near it. Anyway, I took a bunch of touristy pictures and after walking 3 miles I felt like I was going to collapse.
If you can tell from the picture, the city has very old and very new architecture. It creates a mixture of old world British Empire with the new financial aspect that has made London the number one city for finance, other than New York City of course.
The "inside out" building that holds most of the insurance companies. They insure BP and David Beckam's legs. The center holds the offices and the outside has all of the staircases, bathrooms, and elevators. Pretty snazzy.
That's my "professor," Frank. You can't tell from this picture, but he looks like Giles from Buffy the Vampire Slayer. He is hysterical and whenever he takes us on field trips, at the end he brings us to a pub and drinks with us. My kind of teacher. I cropped another photo. Maybe you can see the resemblence.
Frank
Giles
Am I right? I'm right. Don't fight me on this. =)
The Bank of England. It takes up an entire block. It started off as a small building in the 1600's and then as time went on, it started buying the property around it and adding it on. We went to the museum which was pretty cool. We saw how currency was put into existence and the start of Britain's National Debt. And we got to hold a brick of gold that was worth over 300,000 pounds.
We ended the tour at St. Pauls Cathedral. As you can tell, it was a GORGEOUS day. Not a cloud in the sky. Apparently it's going to be like this for the next 10 days. I can handle that!!
In other news, my interview for my internship is this week on Thursday at 11 AM. I hope it's better than I'm expecting. I'll blog after I find out more information about it.
Cheerio Mate!
Miriam