This past week went by rather slowly, which is a good thing because I don't want this semester to fly by like the last one did.

We had training at the BBC on Wednesday and Thursday. It was a really good two days (9:45-5pm) They gave us more free things, including a notepad, pencil, pen, cookies and coffee!!!

I discovered 3 cups of coffee throughout the day really does help me stay alert... or it might just have been our research trainer who taught us different ways to find information, how to talk to a celebrity's agent, as well as getting ideas in order.
Annnddd... I got an official BBC Nametag, however I cannot divulge any information for the next 10 years.

So, moving on...
Wednesday night, I went to the National Theatre again, this time to see Once in a Lifetime. It was pretty horrendous.
But, on Friday night, the BBC girls went to see Matthew Bourne's Edward Scissorhands which was fantastic! I loved the costumes and choreography. We think Matthew might've been in the audience, but nobody acknowledged him, so maybe it was a look-a-like.

Thursday, Jon came to visit!! It was kind of a surprise, but quite a good one.

Saturday, Imran, Michelle & myself went to Sainsbury to pick up more groceries. If we had a car, or lived closer, I definitely could've bought £15 more. Next week!

Then Michelle had a brilliant idea: a toga party. Since they gave us extra sheets, we thought everyone wouldn't have an excuse. However, only a few people dressed up with us...

James, Me, Michelle

Today, Jon left to go back to Prague. I am sad, so I am being a bum and not going to Trafalgar Sq to see the fireworks for Chinese New Year which is happening right now. *sigh*.

Oh well, Happy Chinese New Year!

V&A

I've been trying to motivate myself to go to the Victoria & Albert Museum, and James kept saying that over the weekend, we should do something cultural... Imran made it happen. Saturday afternoon, he says to get ready to go. We left later than we had anticipated, but we called James, and then Ethan, Nick & Colin decided to join. So off we went, got lunch at Tesco Express, and hopped on the Tube. Unfortunately there's construction being done on the Picadilly line, and we were accidentally separated, but found each other, walked a bit, passed by Harrods and H&M (which I am going to tomorrow morning)... and finally arrived at the V&A... It was grand. and Free admission is always great.
here is the group of people you can often find me with (Zach and Chris are missing)

Me, James, Ethan, Imran, Michelle, Colin & Nick


A Chihuly chandelier!

We all enjoyed the museum, but agreed we need to go back. Afterwards, we found ourselves in the Earth gallery, which would've been neat if Nick didn't want to see Dinosaurs... so we found the actual Science museum, and didn't realize the line to the dinosaurs was about 30 minutes long... so we took a quick glimpse and went back.

For dinner, the 7 of us, plus Zach, went out for Indian food. It was sooooooooooooo good. Michelle and I shared Chicken Korma. And all the Nan and Paratha... YUM! i just wish it werent so expensive.

And after that... we decided we needed to dance (or maybe that was just my excessive complaining to everyone that I wanted to go to a club more than a pub). Ended up at Printworks, which was lame at first, but once people arrived and got drunk, there was dancing and lots of it. Had a good time, and a nice way to unwind a 5-day week.

Erin, Imran, Me, Saela

If you see an elephant, you take a picture with it!

Arggh, i started writing a new post and Safari crashed.

Ok here it goes again:

I forgot to mention that on Sunday afternoon, Mary Jane gave us all £10 for dinner..each! Michelle and I went to this gastro pub called Dukes (??) off the Strand and we got authentic British food. I got Fish & Chips with mashed peas ... pretty good food! But dessert was delicious- I got this Apple/Sometypeofberry Crumble with Custard and Michelle got Chocolate Cake with Vanilla Ice Cream. I found out I really like custard. The bill came out to be £22, which would be pricey had we gone on our own, but c'mon... free money!

We've been walking everywhere. I think I am losing weight, however I do find myself eating a lot of fried foods. (I really need to cut back on Fish & Chips).

We had Wednesday off (a rarity), but we wasted it by walking to Bedford Sq, and stumbling across a Sainsbury (God's gift to London), so we bought groceries, and I felt weird getting the super cheap stuff, like 35pence pasta sauce. I was pleased to find certain things are cheaper here. Of course, all imported American things are twice as much...like a pint of Ben & Jerry's is £4.50, which is approximately $7. EGAD

That night, we took the tube to Embankment Station. For our class, we had to see The History Boys at the National Theater. Stupidly, neither of us brought the A-Zed so we got kinda lost, and went too far, so we ran back, and luckily they let us in past 7:30 (curtain up). We were deemed as latecomers, but we didnt miss too much, I thought the scene they did in French was hilarious. Yes, 5 years of French did some good afterall. The actors were really good (not to mention, atractive young blokes). Also got some pictures:

The London Eye on the Thames at night.

Michelle and me on the windy Waterloo bridge.

Thursday was our first BBC journey to Elstree. It's a 30 minute ride on ThamesLink (their Railway train). So from 10:30-5, we got oriented with the place. It's where they film East Enders. Pretty exciting, too bad I don't watch it or know any of the actors. I've been intrigued by every television programme they show clips of, yet I rarely ever watch our telly. However! We recognized a guy who was an actor in Silent Witness.

That night, we went out with Chris, Ethan, Nick, Imran, Zach, Colin, and some others, to the Queen's Head. I chatted with the bartender whose name is Halo. He gave me and this girl Izzy free drinks, for whatever reason.... and we went on our merry way.

Michelle, Imran & Ethan

We stopped by another pub, but they closed early.

Friday, BBC at Elstree again. Two guys came in to talk about BBC Dramas and Factuals. Both really interesting. I would be happy to be placed wherever they could fit me, as long as I didnt just have to get coffee or cake for people. We had lunch there and saw all the actors still in costume. Fun times.

I was really excited because that night, we were supposed to go to ULU (University of London Union) since it's club night there and we wanted to mingle with real brits. When we got there, everyone was sitting, dressed in jeans and a t-shirt, while the rest of us were dressed rather nicely. *Sigh*. James did go up to a table of 19-20 year olds and they were pretty nice. They took us to LSE, another student union, but it was £5 cover, which isn't that much, but I only had that much left on me. Michelle & Chris didn't want to go, so we left, and took a few photos:

I don't know why I am so lazy to update, but here it goes:

Monday was our first day of classes. We had our BBC Writing class in the morning, which is on the 3rd floor in the boondocks of the building, but it's nice to have only 8 of us in a class with Steven. We saw an episode of Silent Witness, which he is the script editor for, and it's their version of CSI (though they claim to have done it 6 years before CSI.) Anyways.. it was good. We only saw the first hour of the 2 hour episode. We have to write a 30 minute script/pilot for our own show. Surprisingly to me, I chose to create a story in the Forensics genre. I am actually very excited to write, which is surprising again, as I've always hated writing. I kind of wish I was in screenwriting now. They have a pretty lax schedule.

Tuesday:
Class ALL day, starting with a BBC Induction. Pretty basic. Nothing fancy. We broke for lunch, of course I forget my wallet, so Michelle was darling enough to lend. We went to Pret a Manger- A spruced up version of Au Bon Pain. I got a Hoisin Duck Wrap to her dismay. It was really quite good!

Then we had a Theatre In London class. This consists of going to the theater every Wednesday then discussing it sometime in class the following week or so. I really wish there was a theater studies minor! I think thats all I'll be taking next semester (for my gen eds). I realize there arent enough hours in the day/week to take all the classes I really want to take, which i suppose is a good thing, however I dont have to think about it for another 2 months. But I digress...

Dinner, was spent on this choose 4 items to stuff in a box at this Indian/Chinese take away place. I was starving so it was delicious.

And after that we had scriptwriting which I started to fall asleep in. I didnt fall asleep completely, but i must've looked really great since there were 8 of us. I pitched my idea, which I was really excited about, however it's the most generic of all. It's really all about the money though, right?

OH and yes! I got a SIM card. It's nice to have access to people now (as scary as that sounds)

ANDDDD>.. Happy 7th Birthday Miranda!!! wow. time flies.

I learned much about our neighborhood, Clerkenwell (pronounced CLAHRK-en-well) through our walk and tour guide yesterday.
Zooming back to Saturday though, which was our Orientation at the ICA (Institute of Contemporary Arts)- this nifty Clockwork Orange-y place set in an 19th century building.
afterwards, they brought us out to Chinatown for a banquet style dinner. Pretty good food, and I got to meet the other girls in BBC. then they gave us more free money!! they felt bad that it was so late, so they gave us 15 pounds to each group of 5. Saela, Nick, Ethan, Mengfan and myself got together and explored the streets looking for a pub. We found Callaghan's (?) and had a pint there. It's nice not to get ID'ed.
here's Gnome:
here's Me & Ethan:
here's Nick, Mengfan & Saela:

London, Part II

I ended up waking up at 4am. Not happy.

Then I thought my laptop power adapter was fried because it would not charge. (I later found out something was askew with the poorly designed converter -- that made us unscrew the parts and do something with a spring but didn't come with instructions... i dont know)

Anyways, after we found our ways to terminal 3, which was a pain because of all our luggage, we met up with Nick our ICA guide (who is one of the nicest people here) and waited around in the airport for 3 hrs. We had just missed the first bus... however he gave us 5 pounds each to buy food/drink. I chose a brie, tomato & basil sandwich with a Fanta. He kept asking us who wanted money; probably the last time I'll ever hear that. FINALLY, the last person arrived and we hopped on the bus. We were all tired.


Fast forward to getting into our Flat. UGH, we got a rather small not so fancy room. It's nice enough, but when you walk across to the other building, and see flats that look like they've been decorated by Frank Lloyd Wright, should he be alive today, along with the corner windows and dishwashers, you can't help but feel a little resentful towards them.

So as we were standing on Flat 14's balcony, Michelle and I saw Nick and Ethan sleeping. It was around 2pm, so we banged on their windows thus waking them up.

(and of course, what's a photo album without a picture of Nick sleeping?)

But they agreed to go exploring for a cash machine and to buy converters & phone cards.
here's Ethan and me in front of a moving double decker bus:


After that, I had to meet up with Aunt Bicky at the Strand. I thought "finding Russell Square? piece of cake...it's right in this direction on the map". Um, 20 minutes later and I'm still looking for the darn thing. But I eventually find it and pay 3 pounds for a one way ticket. (!!!). The signs are very easy to read and I get to Covent Garden in a jiffy. (the Tube is MUCH easier and more reliable than the Subway) However, no one could tell me where it was exactly, so I went around in circles, until I asked the 5th person and they pointed me in the direction. So we got dinner at this cute trendy Italian place. Yummy food, and getting home was a lot easier. So here we are:


yay.

London, Part I

Gnome Chomsky... or until I think up a better name.
He's the mascot for my travels here. Wherever he goes, I go. and vice versa.

It is 9:33pm for me, and only 5:33pm over in New York. I am really tired, but I think I have adjusted pretty well considering. (Everyone else is passed out already! ugh)

The good news is, I finally made it. The plane ride was alright... I had barely any leg room, but between Michelle and the window was a space to stash everything. They gave us socks, an eye mask and travel toothbrush/toothpaste! I actually used the eye mask, and it was delightful.

& How excited were we when the guy offered us free wine to go with our dinner! At first we declined, but c'mon... free wine! So I asked him for 2 bottles, and how adorable are they??

I attempted to watch Broken Flowers. It was sort of painful to watch and listen to. But here's Gnome with Billy Murray:

Then the sun finally came up:
but look how many circles we had to fly in order to get into Heathrow!! We should've gotten there 20 minutes earlier, but alas.



OK, there was tons more, but I'm going to give in and say goodnight.

I'll finish this up tomorrow.. or at like 4am my time....

Less than 24 hrs and counting...

Ok, so Michelle and I are freaking out, but that's okay,
because in 21 hrs, we will be on British Airways, flight 114.
and we'll move into our awesome flat, and i'll get to see my aunt
and Chris, Ethan & Nick... and it'll be super.