Day 34: Bones

Went to the Wellcome Collection last Thursday with the Honours Seminar to check out the Skeletons exhibit, which has just ended. Very interesting... had 26 different skeletons from London laid out in a single large room with black walls, with the skeletons laid in display cases end to end how a graveyard might be. There were descriptions on the cases about where the bones were found, to what time period they have been dated, and what might be inferred from various markings and damages to the bones about the life of the person.

We had discussion today in the seminar itself about the exhibition. I felt that since some of the descriptions of the people were too detailed to be anything but at least somewhat contrived, one of the main intentions of the exhibit was to convey information about the average person from different time periods in London and to connect with the average person in the present concerning history and the continuous nature of locations. Our seminar professor thought it was a larger statement about human mortality.

Interesting, to say the least. Take from it what you will; it was an interesting and thought-provoking exhibition, perhaps more just "amusing" in some sense to the average person than deeply intellectual and perhaps existential, as my professor suggests. But that's just my take.

Actually, the point of this post was to mention that before we discussed the Skeletons exhibit, we talked a bit about the current financial crisis, specifically focusing on the [possibility of an actual passing] bailout bill and what it might mean.

I am going to try to withhold from any specific political or fiscal statements since this is actually a lighthearted London study abroad blog, so I just want to mention how I find it interesting being over here in the UK during such a huge time for the US. UK papers and people are definitely talking about the financial crisis, as it affects them greatly as well (e.g., Bradford & Bingley), but I feel like it's not in the same way people at home are talking about it.

Same general feelings go for the election.

It's just strange that I can't even pinpoint what is different about being here versus being at home during this time for the election and the financial crisis... any thoughts (especially from any Brits here)?

Day 33: Home sick and a bit homesick

(This is for Monday)

Stayed home sick on Monday, and boy, do I wish I could have been in my actually-comfortable bed at home. It wasn't that I was feeling too horribly, though; I really just needed to force myself to do absolutely nothing for a day to give my body a chance to really recuperate.

I headed to the nearby Exmouth Market for my adventure of the day (really, I just wanted to get lunch and re-stock up on orange juice) and got a burrito, as close to Chipotle as I will probably have for months. Quite exciting. Vegetarian fajita burrito, no beans, mild salsa, cheese, a bit of sour cream, salad (lettuce), and guacamole. Yum.

Day 32: Back in London

(This is for Sunday)

Headed back and was in my room by noon on Sunday. So nice to be back to my bed, as uncomfortable as it is. And though Dublin was great, I was looking forward to being back in London, partially because of the comfort in being somewhere you know, but also because of the size - I just love that there is so much of London I still don't know and haven't been to.

Day 31: Rhymes with "both"

(This is for Saturday)

Saturday morning we headed to the Guinness Brewery, as every good college student must do when in Dublin. Personally, I could have skipped it and spent more time in the city instead, but it ended up being pretty interesting and had a great view at the top. Sadly, I was sick and chose not to redeem my free pint at the bar, but I'm sure I'll make up for it later at some point. The "Gravity Bar" in the storehouse is the highest point in central Dublin, though, so that was nice to make it to. And the history of Guinness was pretty cool as well.


After Guinness, we headed out to Howth, which was a fairly short train ride from central Dublin. In fact, I think we spent more time trying to find the train station than we did on the train. Howth is considered a suburb of Dublin and is a beautiful fishing town on the coast. It's amazing to see a beautiful place so close to a fairly large city that hasn't yet been completely commercialized. Up on the hillside was plenty of land and smaller homes (along with larger ones, too), but no resorts or anything of the sort. Refreshing.

When we arrived, I saw a few things that reminded me of some people at home:

Grandma - because of the script writing and pretty light blue color:

Grandpa - Howth Angling Center, what more needs to be said?

Mom - the pretty hanging baskets and that one brighter pink color you like:

Dad - fresh fish!

Adam - just look at the resemblance:


Howth was gorgeous and relaxing, exactly what I needed. We ended up sitting at this one place for a long time, dangling our feet out over the water. Here are a few pictures from near the harbor (harbour?), but take a look at the album for more with descriptions.




We decided to try to walk over to the cliffs and just explore for a while, finding this rope along the way:


We soon made our way up to some hills for some even more beautiful views. Here are our shadows:


Hm, well if I keep going at this rate, I'll end up posting all of the pictures in the album.

Anyway, it was a great day to relax before heading back early Sunday morning for London. I'd love to get back to the Irish countryside sometime, but I think Dublin was even more expensive than London.

Howth was quite the highlight, though, and I just wish you could all be here to enjoy it too!

Day 30: Off to Dublin

(This is for Friday)

Headed off to Dublin on Friday from London's Stansted airport, which is actually over an hour away from central London. After running through Stansted to make our flight, we arrived in Dublin around 6.30pm and took a bus in to central Dublin. After checking into our hostel, we headed out in search of food.

From Dublin - 9/28

Our hostel was right on the River Liffey and just at the edge of the Temple Bar area, so we found a place to eat in no time. I had a nice pasta bolognese while Derek and Kelly got the roast of the day - lamb. I figured Irish food is not quite my thing.

After dinner we kind of walked around the area for a bit and saw some interesting things on the streets, including a guy doing limbo under fire and these two fellows:


We eventually ended up at a pub that a friend of mine who studied in Dublin last spring recommended, the Porter House (thanks, Kelly!). It was quite the place, with three floors of Irish pub goodness and a live musician who is probably the fastest strummer I've ever seen or heard.


We ended up going back to the hostel fairly early since we were pretty exhausted, but it was a great first day in Dublin.

Check out the album here for more pictures, by the way.

Day 29: Working life

(This is for Thursday)

Had my internship all day Thursday again... and I'd like to point out that I am now able to stand on the Tube without holding on to anything while reading the paper the London Lite. This is quite a point of pride, and I feel like I am one tiny step closer to actually living in London instead of just visiting.

Day 28: Finally caught up!

(This is for today - go figure.)

So, I'm finally caught up to today!

Anyway, one quick thought before I head off to bed early:

The director of the London Program emailed us the other day announcing a photo essay contest, and the first deadline has to do with UK culture and experiences. I think I might do one on Brick Lane and have already made an album of 26 photos ready to be looked at and narrowed down more. The essay calls for 3-5 photos. Hmm... 750-1000 words will be fun, too, though. Not sure where I'd like to go with this, but I'm thinking of making it as much of a standard photo essay as possible (as opposed to just playing into the program's grading system) so that I might be able to use it for some kind of media portfolio or something in the future. But honestly, more importantly than that is just making it what I want it to be (which I guess would also probably not quite be what the London Program is necessarily looking for). I could be wrong, though.

Due date is Oct 17 or something like that, so I guess we'll see where this goes between now and then.

From Brick Lane - 9/21

P.S. Thought I'd be in Dublin during the debates this weekend, but perhaps not? (Debates, not Dublin) An interesting turn... Oh, and anyone with any Ireland suggestions, please let me know! I think I will be in Howth on Saturday for much of the daytime, but this isn't concrete yet.

Day 27: Christianity & Islam

(This is for Tuesday)

From Sept 19-22

Have I said how much I like this class before?

Okay, so the reading is really interesting (not that this means I am always interested while reading, if that makes sense), and the professor is very knowledgeable. A very interesting class I wish I'd had years earlier; I'm learning a lot about Islam (and Christianity) and some of the intentions and thoughts behind much of it (at least I hope). I'd go into more detail, but this head cold has really got hold of the brain part of the head.

Day 26: Food.

(This is for Monday)

From Brick Lane - 9/21

Can I just say I had an amazing weekend of food?

Went to an amazing vegetarian restaurant Friday, Michelle cooked on Saturday, and then I had Indian food on Brick Lane on Sunday.

It's funny, one of my flatmates told me yesterday that she's heard Brick Lane has the best curry in the world.

Of course, I made some smart comment along the lines of, "Wow, it's even better than in India?"

Now it's the week and I'm back to bolognese shells from a can (but I add some mixed herbs so it's not as boring). Or "homemade pizza" on naan with bolognese sauce (see a pattern here?) and shredded cheddar (again, with mixed herbs so it's not as boring). What will happen when I get bored of the same herbs?

Day 25: Brick Lane

(This is for Sunday)

Headed to Brick Lane on Sunday with a friend, Michelle, for our Images in Britain Through the Arts class. It wasn't really necessary to do the homework, but we wanted to check out the Bangladeshi area of London anyway and get some good food while at it.

Very lively place with all sorts of people. We ended up getting Indian food at a place where they offered us 20% menu prices, no service charge, and a free first round of drinks. I guess this is pretty common, and we got lucky because we were looking around a bit before most people ate too. A little wary that there was no one else in the restaurant when we entered, our fears vanished by the time we left as the restaurant had a full house. Great food! I'll put up the pictures soon. In the meantime, feel free to check out the Brick Lane album so far:

From Brick Lane - 9/21

Sadly, I may finally be getting sick and am going to get some rest for now.

Day 24: Life with a camera

(This is for Saturday)

Went back to Russell Square, but with a camera this time!

From Sept 19-22

So peaceful again... was nice to people-watch for a bit again. Also took way too many pictures of doors on the way there.



Also did a group dinner again Saturday night! The group was our fall break group, minus 2 people. Very fun, especially since there were a few people I didn't know as well.

Check out some more of the pictures from the album - I hope you like them!

Day 23: Life without a camera

Well, it was actually only a few hours. And I did have my camera, but the battery died and I didn't have my backup battery.

I took a different way home Friday from the London Centre because I had seen some guitar shops on the way from the bus and have been dying to play. Played some nice guitars, but I didn't find anything that had as good of a sound as the Ovation or Martin at home.

Headed to Russell Square after this because I spotted it on my map and figured I should take a new way back to see new things. My camera battery had died earlier while taking a walk around Leicester Square for class, but it was actually kind of nice going to the square without being able to use a camera. For a bit I kept spotting shots I wish I could take, but after a while just resigned to the fact I couldn't use my camera and stopped focusing on pictures I wished I could have taken. I ended up just sitting down in the grass where the sun was hitting (finally, it's been sunny this week!) and watched people.

I realized after a bit of this that listening to my iPod was as much of a preoccupation as having my camera and then took out my headphones. It's so nice to get rid of all of the things, the electronics or any kind of preoccupations. I'd like to think that when I'm holding a camera in my hand I'm much more observant, but is that really something you want to be all the time? Sitting in that square without my camera made me feel like I could just be. I wasn't some temporary observer trying to see what I wanted to capture of the place; I was living in this space at this point in time just like the other people around me.

What a beautiful Friday.

Day 22: Cooking

(This is for Thursday - a bit behind, I know)

Attempted to make a pasta with a white whine cheese cream sauce. Did not work. Ended up not cooking off the wine enough and then overcompensating with cheese. I then tried to boil off more of the alcohol, thus making my sauce into a nice, cheesy paste. Interesting-tasting, to put it nicely. I of course seasoned my bell peppers and broccoli well, thus making up for a small fraction of the horrible taste, but it still came nowhere close to making up for the paste.

Hopefully will have more luck in the future... got a Tikki Masala sauce on sale from Sainsbury's, so we'll see if this is any good at all.

Day 21: Alternative Theatre

I love this class. Went to "Painting by Numbers" today at a local pub theatre, and it was amazing. I love small-scale theatre. So much more realistic with less of that production feeling. Really provokes emotions because you feel a connection with the characters, as opposed to thinking you have to feel something because dramatic things are happening onstage.

Anyway, that's all for today! Just a few thoughts...

Day 20: BOE, Honours Seminar, Dodos.

BOE: Went to the Bank of England for my econ class today. Was a nice visit - went to the museum and saw a short film. The best part of the trip was just the fact that we were at the Bank of England... amazing. Oh, and I held ~$300,000 today. Gold bar. Probably the last time I'll be close to touching that much money.

Honours Seminar: I had the privilege of being invited to the London Program Honours Seminar, and tonight was the first class meeting. There are ten of us, and we basically chatted about why we chose Notre Dame and then various other things. It seems like it will be a great class, and the assistant director "teaches" it and is great. Very interesting guy.

Dodos: Went to a concert tonight at University of London Union (ULU) to see a band called The Dodos perform. Absolutely amazing... they're so upbeat and energetic on the recorded songs, and live was just incredible.

Here's the trash can one of the guys bangs on with drum sticks during the show:


And here's the frontman rocking out:


A security guard came over and told me I couldn't take pictures with a "professional camera" unless I had a pass, but I had the perfect way to get around it. I was in the front and center, but in between the guard and me was a monitor. I was able to put my camera in my purse behind the monitor from the guard and shoot blindly. Kind of fun, and plus, I was able to pay more attention to the music.

Oh, did I mention they were filming the show for a DVD? I'll have to watch out for that - funny having Americans at the front of a show in London. I met a girl from the Netherlands there too who was also in the front.

Day 19: So, how do you really pronounce "Thames"?

Went to the Thames Festival last night! It was going on the entire weekend, but I didn't make it till the end for the fireworks. Absolutely amazing. We had a perfect view of the fireworks and people. Just beautiful watching the fireworks and reflections in the river. The grand finale was not one to disappoint, too; the fireworks looked as if they were coming out toward you to grab you.

Oh, and amazing people-watching. They were expecting a million people to be at the festival, though I'm not sure what the actual number was.

P.S. I've been slowly but surely taking a few shots every now and then with the Fed, my old film rangefinder camera. I might have found a place nearby that develops for [relatively] cheap, so I'll keep everyone updated on the status of my Ilford FP5 ISO 400 roll of film. :)

P.P.S. Oh, and it's pronounced "temz". Or "tem".

Day 18: 1312 photos later...

Just saw I've taken 1312 photos here so far. Wow.

Well, I promised more details on Stonehenge and Bath (and yesterday in general).

Stonehenge was amazing, thinking about how we still are not certain about what it was used for. The feat of building it is mysteriously formidable, and seeing it in person just adds to the amazement. The weather was beautiful, and the dynamic clouds definitely made for some better pictures than most midday ones.

At one point a man on a dirtbike holding a sheepdog in his lap road near us and started moving posts while the dog herded sheep. So cute.


We headed to Bath from Stonehenge. I wish we'd had more time in the town, but our bus came late in the morning, sadly. The drive over was beautiful, and the hills and countryside reminded me of Tuscany. The Romans must have felt somewhat at home here.

The history of the Roman Baths is something I was somewhat familiar with because of taking Latin courses in high school, but we all go the audio tour devices, which greatly added to my appreciation and enjoyment of the baths. I definitely would like to head back to Bath to explore the town more at some point, though.

Oh, and quick side story: When we were waiting to head into the baths, a cute old man rolled out a contraption and brought out a guitar and a violin. The device alone was enough to draw crowds initially, and by the time he had started gaining a larger crowd, we headed in. I got a few pictures of this, which are some of my favorite from Bath.





After arriving back at the flats around 8, a friend and I headed to the area of Shoreditch (about a 20 minute walk east of the flats) for the Homeless Gallery. The gallery is a one weekend-only event where anyone can hang up their photography. Though the concept is great, the best part of the gallery was the space it was held in. The Shoreditch Town Hall basement is so full of nooks and crannies with walls falling apart and bits of floor missing. This has definitely been a highlight of my time here in London so far.

We headed to the game, which was being showed at Sports Cafe, after the gallery to see the Irish become 2-0. So awesome!

All in all, an absolutely amazing day.

Went to the Thames Festival tonight for the fireworks. So fun! I'll have more on this later.

Pictures of Stonehenge and Bath are up , by the way.

Find them here: picasaweb.google.com/haleybeaupre/StonehengeAndBath

Day 17: Stonehenge + Bath

Quite a Saturday... will have more details later (and pictures).

Basically, we went to Stonehenge and then Bath today with the Notre Dame program. Then after this, I headed to Shoreditch (an area of London a bit east of us) with a friend to see the "Homeless Gallery" -- a photography gallery where anyone can hang their work. It was in the Shoreditch Town Hall basement, which was definitely the coolest place to have a gallery. Right when we were done with this, we found out that ND was actually winning the football game and headed to Sports Cafe near Trafalgar Square for the second half and, ultimately, the victory.

Again, what a Saturday.

Day 16: Night on the Thames

Okay, so for today's official post...

Went in to work today to help edit a yearly book thing they do for clients... really cool. Was there for quite a while. They brought in delicious bagel sandwiches, little cakes and pastries, and fresh fruit. Then later on, there was champagne and chocolate cake to celebrate a birthday and an engagement. Awesome perks. And fun work.

Hm, just remembered something, though... headed to the Tate Britain with a friend on Wednesday to look at some things for class. Ended up making it only for about 15 minutes, but then decided to wander around for a bit. We found a cute little cafe and then ran into Westminster Abbey right as the sun began to go down. So beautiful. Saw Big Ben (well, Clock Tower) too.




We decided to keep walking and get on the tube if we got tired, so we headed up the Thames toward the flats. Absolutely stunning. We ran into this pub that looked pretty unique from the outside and went in to be treated to a gorgeous interior. (There are pictures in the album.) Got my favorite beer, Leffe, which I just recently found out actually is a Belgian abbey beer from Notre Dame de Leffe. What a coincidence.



And what a Wednesday night.

Here's a link to the latest photos: picasaweb.google.com/haleybeaupre/WeekOfSept8.

On the schedule for tomorrow are Stonehenge and Bath! The ND Program organized this trip, so there are about 50 students going. I'm really looking forward to it. Still can't believe I'm actually going to Stonehenge... I read an article in National Geographic about it in August at the dentist or something, and the whole idea of actually going still amazes me. Afterwards, I'm planning on heading to Shoreditch for this thing called the Homeless Gallery where anyone can hang their art. Seems like a nice enough idea; could be really interesting.

Day 15: Fall break, decided.

(It's actually Day 16 while I am writing this, but I figured I'd still give an update from yesterday.)

Here's the plan:

Oslo -> Frankfurt -> Barcelona

SO excited. Oslo is the main thing I am looking forward to at this point, but I know I will have an amazing time everywhere. There is a group of about 7 or so of us who booked the flights together, and I know that the 4-ish of us who are closer might end up spending more of the day trips together as well.

(By the way, Katie, I am going to Dublin at the end of this month! Can't wait!)

Will have more details on break in the upcoming weeks.

Thursday night after work, I headed to Regent's Park, which is only about a 5 minute walk from BBDO. It was so relaxing to just stroll around the lake and gardens.




I love people:

This one very elderly woman seemed to be on her way home from buying groceries and was carrying one small plastic bag in her hand, hunched over, making very slow, yet deliberate, steps. Her routine seemed to not mind about what path was the quickest through the park; even though she struggled with each meter of walking, she took the long way through the curve to walk directly next to the lake. I admire this woman.

Day 14: Fall break decisions

Trying to figure out what to do for fall break... there seems to be a group of 4-6 of us who wants to go together and do the same kinds of things, but it's so hard to choose exactly what to do? Can't complain about the choices here, though.

Right now we're thinking starting in Scandanavia (Sweden or Norway are likely) and then heading to Switzerland, Austria, Czech Republic, or Germany. Tough stuff, here. We'll probably avoid the larger cities like Rome or Paris for break and save them for weekend trips. I'm really excited to go hiking somewhere, though.

Any suggestions? Places to go to / avoid? Things to do?

Also, I went to the Tate Britain today and walked back along the Thames with a friend - absolutely beautiful. We stopped at Westminster Abbey and saw Big Ben on the way, too. Gorgeous. Love this city.

Day 13: Some Photos

Time to catch up on some photos...

Album is here: picasaweb.google.com/haleybeaupre/WeekendOfSept57.

A few highlights:

Piccadilly Circus is about a 2 minute walk from the London Centre (where we take classes) and is kind of like Times Square with the large screens. I go to the Underground station here to get to work.


Just a sample of the walk on the way to class


The National Gallery, the building over from our class building:


Sequence of dinner from Friday night:

Food!

Excited to eat the food

Wait, where did it all go?


Just some police going by our flat:


On the side of the Victoria & Albert museum:


Adam:


For the Proms:


All of these photos and more are in the album linked to above. I hope you enjoy them!

Day 12: Field Trips

So, as you might expect, there are a lot of "field trips" we get to take for class. Tonight I went to a comedy club for my Alternative Theatre class. There were about 6 comedians, and I laughed quite hard at times... Quite the raunchy show sometimes too, though, as you might expect, but at least it was an MS fundraiser. And required for my class.

The opportunities here are endless. This week one of our assignments for a class is to go to the Tate Britain to look at a few works of art. Next Tuesday my econ class is going to the Bank of England. Sunday I took a study break by going to the Regent Street Festival. Today I was walking through Piccadilly Circus (the place with the Times Square-esque screens and such) to get to my internship, which is right near Regent Park.

I think tomorrow night I'll stay in and hopefully get some things done, so I'll probably get some more photos up. I know I keep saying that, though.

P.S. Everyone should be able to comment now, so feel free to try it out!

Day 11: Unphotographable

This is a picture I did not take of an elderly woman looking exhausted and taking a break from the Regent Street Festival by standing in front of a window display, unknowingly positioning herself next to the mannequins so that with her spacing, both horizontally and vertically, she could have been mistaken for a mannequin herself, had it not been that the mannequins were all modeling children's clothing.


(For reference: unphotographable.com.)

Day 10: Concerts

Friday night was great -- stayed in and cooked. Well, a friend cooked... we did stir-fried vegetables and chicken with a from-scratch sauce. Amazing. Not as good as Dad's cooking, of course, but a pretty good substitute while in London. Afterwards, we headed to a local pub where Sting's daughter's band was playing. I Blame Coco is the name of the band. Not too bad of a show. Very fun for a Friday night, and the pub seemed like a fun place too.

Contrast that with tonight's concert: The Royal Scottish National Orchestra.

A few of us headed out near Hyde Park to BBC Proms at Royal Albert Hall. (Photo courtesy of BBC.) We waited a while in line but got really lucky and got £5 tickets for the floor, standing room only, as opposed to about 3 levels up from there for £1. We were probably 7 feet away from the stage. The concert was absolutely amazing. The piano concerto was probably my favorite; we could hear the pianist exhale. Also, I'd never heard a Steinway in this way before. Something about the way he played the higher, softer notes reminded me that the piano's sounds come from strings. Almost sounded like a violin string being plucked.

We just got back from the show, though, and I am exhausted so I'll hopefully post more tomorrow.

Edit: Added the photos!

Day 9: Internship

Sorry I'm a bit behind... Will post one for today later on.

Anyway, first day of my internship was Thursday -- headed in with the other intern in my department (Hub Strategy) by 9.30 am (when the work day starts, how nice). We missed free breakfast by about 10 minutes. BBDO is awesome... they have free pastries and bagels and coffee (including lattes and cappuccinos) in the cafe for employees every morning before 9 am, and then after 9 everything is available for really low prices. Also, there's always dry food available for free during the day (bars, cereal, etc.). And then after 5 pm the cafe turns into a pub with really low prices as well! It sounds like people who work there actually do head to the pub, too. Very cool that people choose to hang out at work after work.

We got a tour of the offices (7 floors) with another Notre Dame intern (he's in finance) and then headed to the Hub office. We got more oriented with what Hub does, which is marketing planning and research. We're going to be helping with a lot of different things, including the annual global Hub conference, which pulls in everyone who is anyone in BBDO globally. They have internal and external speakers to talk about different trends or strategies for the upcoming year. Very interesting.

We also got introduced to some of our resources, one of which is access to every ad in any medium, which I think just sounds plain fun. Watching commercials and analyzing print ads... awesome.

Oh, and I almost forgot - they brought us out to lunch. ("They" being the 3 women we will be working with, all around late 20s, early 30s. They're so nice and excited to have us there.) We went to this place called Yo!Sushi, which has different locations all around London and has different sushi and other dishes going around on a little conveyor belt. The dishes are color-coded (or should I say "colour-coded"?) by price, and you can also order other hot dishes. So fun! Best meal I've had in a while.

Anyway, I have my first main start on Monday, so I'm very excited for that. We'll see what my projects will actually be and I'll really start going on actual work hopefully. I'm bummed I work in the afternoon though, so I'll miss the breakfast.

Oh, one last thing. The CFO of BBDO Europe is a Notre Dame alum, so we got to meet him and chat for a bit. Very nice guy, and I hear his office is covered in ND stuff.

Day 8: Londoners

Time for bed, but figured I'd put up a quick post.

Londoners are great.

Once you get over the initial cultural differences where Londoners seem creepy if they are being friendly, it's great to get to know some locals. (Of course, not all locals are great, but most are.)

Anyway, bedtime soon. Here is a bit of basic info about the program since I promised that:

There are 130 Notre Dame kids in the program.
We all go to class at the Notre Dame London Centre just off of Trafalgar Square (our building is literally next to the National Portrait Gallery).
We all live in two apartment buildings, which are right next to each other.
I have 6 total girls in my flat.
I have 1 roommate.
It takes ~40 minutes to walk to class.
I have an internship with BBDO Hubs Strategy (marketing planning).
I will do my internship for about 15 hours a week.
I will be in London until 18 December 2008.


Any other questions, let me know. And I promise to respond to the comments soon! I just need to write this blog sometime before 10 pm sometime.

Day 7: Think of Me

Yes, I saw it. Went to Phantom of the Opera at Her Majesty's Theatre on (somewhat) a whim tonight. I knew I wanted to go anyway, but it was kind of a last minute decision to go today.

Absolutely amazing. Every character was perfect. Different than the movie version, of course, in the way that the actors tonight would not have been as good for the movie as those who were in the movie were. (By the way, funny I saw Gerard Butler, who plays the Phantom in the movie, Monday night.)

The set and special effects were amazing, acting superb, and the singing. Oh, the singing. The Phantom was probably the highlight for me. You always expect the end to be the best and to be amazing, but this really blew me away. The emotion in his voice and that you could just feel how close he was, was more than amazing. I remember how much I love theatre and musicals. And live performances in general.

Anyway, today I decided to take extra time to take photos on the way to class. Brought my camera backpack with me and planned on wearing sneakers for the first time since class started. Good thing I did... I also went to Camden Town during the day and ended up staying there from about 11:00 till 2:00 at least. There were about 3 markets there, and I wandered around taking pictures. Did a bit of shopping as well. (Don't worry, Mom, it's something I should have gotten anyway before I left: a larger nice leather bag/purse I'm going to bring to the internship tomorrow. I'm not just blowing my money on hats and things -- oh wait, I did get a cute hat, too.)

Camden was great, though. Got some good, cheap food. Best raspberry white chocolate chip muffin I've ever had, with raspberries so fresh they tasted like they were right off of the bush. Also got a veggie samosa with cinnamon in it.

Here's a fun little story: I was in this little area of the markets near the river and had just taken a picture when a man walking his dog kind of came up to me and asked if I was a professional photographer. I explained to him I was a student who happens to love photography, but no, and he told me he was surprised I was American. He usually doesn't talk to Americans and thought I was British. Awesome, I've already been mistaken for a local, and I was even carrying a camera!

So, tomorrow is the first day of the internship at BBDO. I'm giddy with excitement for it. I'm heading over on the Tube with the other girl at the department from ND, and we'll be getting a tour and things before going out to lunch with people from the office. Afterward, we'll head to our desks and figure out the schedule and everything. I'll be sure to let you all know how it goes. I still can't believe that among everything else going on here in London with this great experience, I'll be doing an internship and working with real Londoners. Quite the opportunity.

Here are a few photos from the day (or earlier):

Mom, for you:

From Camden

Adam:

Around Camden:



For motorcycle-lovers:

Trafalgar Square at night:

Theatre:


A lot more photos here:
http://picasaweb.google.com/haleybeaupre/Camden