I was Skyping with Kel when she told me to just look into prices of the hostel around the corner because she now might be interested in a visit. I hung up with her and called Mel because she told me a few days earlier that she wanted to do the same thing for when Will is coming over Thanksgiving. I told her I was going to get prices and would she like to take a walk down the street. Within three minutes we were out the door on this beautiful sunny afternoon, walking toward the end of the block with the hostel on the right and the brand new wing of the Natural History Museum on the left. We were across the street from the entrance of the museum when we saw a black Bentley waiting at the bottom of this long set of stairs, the doors at the top of the stairs were wide open (as were the doors to the Bentley). A few yards away from the car were at least 8-10 people with cameras as a crowd began to form. We kind of just shrugged and moved on. Walked into the hostel, got price quotes and left. At this point, we are walking back toward Metrogate and we pass the museum again. I noticed that the size of the crowd had grown considerably and there were now police and security everywhere. I had seen this scene play out many times in NYC and LA, I knew we were about to see someone. We walked up to one police officer and asked what was going on. Mel said to him “This kid thinks Victoria Beckham is about to walk out” to which he responded “Do you really think I would be standing here wasting three hours of my life on Posh? I thought we exported her to you guys (the U.S.)” He then told us, “Don’t worry, you will recognize who it is.” At that moment, we turned around to flash bulbs going off and at the top of the stairs stood Prince William. How London-abroad-experience was this? Of course it’s the one time that BOTH Mel and I forgot to bring our cameras so I have no pictures, but I’m still kicking myself, that would have been an awesome memory to have captured. Instead, I found a news clip from that afternoon that I have included for you to watch. WE WERE RIGHT THERE!!!!!!!!!!
That night, we had a welcome reception on behalf of FIE. It was seemingly lame at first, but they gave us two free drink vouchers at the door so it better than I thought. Interestingly enough, while waiting in line to get myself a Strongbow, I feel a tap on my shoulder. I turn around and it’s a kid that I used to tutor with back in high school! He was also on my program from Marist. Small world, right? For the rest of the night, everyone just hung out, danced, and then we left when it broke up around 10 or 11. Twas a fun night.
As for my next few days, I’m just really tired of talking thinking about it so I’ll try my best to keep this brief. The following two days consisted of my Blackberry malfunctioning and me paying some creepy man too much money to fix it for me, two doctors appointments on opposite sides of London (both of which I got no answers and they both charged me a lot of money because I’m American and don’t have a GP in this country), me having to walk in pounding rains for the entirety of one of those days because there was no tube/buses in that part of Kensington so that was awesome being soaked for 6 hours straight. On top of all this, I came to a painful realization that 1) all the contacts that I brought with me to London won’t be of any use since I basically have to wear glasses for the next few months and 2) I’m spending so much money without realizing it because of this exchange rate. I just bailed on evening activities that night and laid in bed. Literally, my only salvation was the new high speed Internet in our building so I watched Greek, uninterrupted by buffering. It was glorious. Ok, that’s that, moving on now.
Two nights ago, I wasn’t really feeling in the mood to go anywhere, but Rebs convinced me to go to this club in the financial district because they were having some “hipster” party or something. Right up her alley! Not knowing what to expect (or wear for that matter), I just got ready in 2 seconds and we went to Imperial across the street to just hang out until they closed and then we would go into the city. At the bar, we met 4 other FIE people from AU and the six of us decided to go. We got all the way to the other side of London and then we never got into the club because you needed VIP wristband or 1000 pounds. We ended up just taking two cabs back to the West End and wound up at O’Neill’s again (that Irish bar I’ve been going to a lot in Piccadilly). You know your going to have a great time when you go there so we went inside. On the top floor was the band again so I got really into the music and began jumping with the crowds. Little did I know, jumping into a mosh pit does sometimes lead to your glasses (only form of vision for the next two months in London) falling off your face and disappearing onto the floor. Let’s just take a step back here to assess my situation: I’m in a dark bar. There are at least 80 people around me who are drunk, belligerant, and wildly jumping around. I lost my glasses and am basically blind to the world. I begin to have a bit of a panic attack thinking that they have been crushed by hundreds of feet. The only thing I think to do is get on all fours and try to find them so that’s exactly what I did. Feeling around in spilt beer and broken glass from pints that have been dropped, I can’t seem to find them anywhere. Some guy come up behind me and violently picks me up thinking I was just drunk and had fallen and couldn’t get back up. After explaining to him that I couldn’t see, he literally did the nicest thing that anyone has ever done for me. I think he felt my panic so he stood up and yelled for the band to stop, for the people to be quiet and stop jumping. He then announced that “THIS KID LOST HIS SPECS. EVERYONE GET ON THE GROUND AND WATCH WHERE YOU STEP. LOOK FOR A PAIR OF GLASSES!” All of a sudden, some random guy rises out of the crowd holding my glasses that were somehow come out of the ordeal without a scratch. I ran over and threw my arms around this guy and thank Jesus that I didn’t have to walk home without my vision. This is just going to turn into my best abroad story…
Speaking of glasses, I just got a new pair because I’m not in love with this current pair that I’ve had since high school. Since I can’t wear contacts for a while now, I wanted to get a nice new frame so I decided on the Ray Ban Wayfarer. No haters please, they don’t look bad on me so hey, why not?
Well that’s basically my life up until now. Tom, our friend that we know from back in DC who is the president of AKPsi at GW is arriving in London in about two hours from his study abroad program in Paris. He’ll be here for the weekend so that should be fun! Going to get myself out of bed now and outside on this Friday! Cheers!
First of all, you have the guy form of my glasses. Second of all, as cute as the Prince is, he's balding. Unfortunate, haha.
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