Week 2 in London

Life in London is, to put it in one word, fantastic. While I do miss friends and family, I am having a very hard time imagining leaving this place. Since the last time I wrote, I have been attending classes, had my official interview with my internship, making friends with some locals, and exploring the city.

On Sunday, I had a day trip to Bath and Avebury. Bath is the home to all things Jane Austen, Nicholas Cage, the Bath rugby team (which apparently is huge), and Roman Baths. We drove to Bath this morning, which is about two hours away from London, and it is seriously one of the most picturesque little towns I have ever been to. I felt like we were walking through a painting, and it was fantastic. In Bath, there are these natural hot springs that the Romans built a bathhouse around, which is now converted into a museum. We went to the museum, and walked around the original bathing areas, which are actually really cool. The water is said to be magical, and there was a statue of a King whose leprosy was said to have been cured by the water in Bath. Also, in the museum were old remains of notes that people would throw into the baths, and they were curses on people who wronged them. They were really funny things like "Curse the man or woman into water who stole my gloves, and make the! m never enjoy the light of day until now to eternity." Must have been leather.

After the museum, we walked around the town of Bath, which is literally the definition of quaint, and I had the BEST scoop of creme brulee ice cream ever. Also, there was a rugby match that was just beginning, so EVERYONE was drinking a beer (it's legal to walk around with alcohol in public) and wearing blue and black rugby shirts. The english love their beer, dogs, rugby, and various innard meats (think liver, sausages, and kidneys). I will attempt to get up the pictures as soon as possible, but the town was amazing.

After we went to Bath, we went to Avebury, which is--dare I say it--maybe even cuter than Bath. Avebury is so much better than what I pictured of the English countryside. It is the quintessential English town with one town pub and the social center was hopping. Haha. In Avebury, there are these very large rocks, which are situated naturally in a circular formation. It was actually pretty cool for just being a bunch of rocks. Also, I may or may not have slipped a "that's what she said" joke in the Avebury church, which was pretty inappropriate, but only one other person besides God heard me, and he wasn't offended.

Saturday, some of my friends and I discovered Notting Hill, which is easily my favorite place in London. On the weekends, they set up an antiques market that lines the road for what seems like ages, and there are so many vendors with the COOLEST things. I found about 7 antique engagement rings that I would be perfectly happy with :). We had lunch in Notting Hill at this really hip little cafe, and I can't just help but to feel like I am actually cool. Haha. I wish I could describe the atmosphere of Notting Hill better, but it is just such a friendly and fun place and it is the PERFECT Saturday afternoon.

On Friday, I had my interview for my internship, which I am SO excited for! It didn't actually feel like an interview because my boss and I just chatted for about an hour until she was like "uh I guess we should talk about hours and stuff". The atmosphere is really great, and it sounds like I am going to have a lot of hands on experience. Also, when I told my boss that I was potentially interested in design, she got really excited and told me that she would have a lot of projects for me. I was also really impressed with the Company's list of clients as well. Since it's a licensing company, they create all of the merchandise like clothes, toys, cups and basically anything you can imagine for their clients, which include Universal, Pixar, MGM, loads of Sports teams in the UK, CBS news, and a bunch of random other things like sesame street, the WWE and Dilbert to name a few. Haha. Also, on my tour of the company, my boss showed me this room of all of their products that they ha! ve created, which is more like a museum or a shrine than anything. To say the least, I am pretty excited to work for this company. You can look them up at www.cplg.com.

After my interview on Friday morning, I met up with some friends at Harrods, which is the definition of extravagant. I have never been surrounded by so much couture in my life--it was silly. Not only does Harrods have literally EVERY designer you could ever imagine (think Oscar dresses and diamond encrusted shoes that are on pedastools that you are not allowed to touch unless you get someone to retrieve it for you if you have an extra 100,000 to drop on a pair of stilettos) but Harrods also has an extensive collection of art (even some Bob Dylan orginal paintings), an antiques selection, a bookstore, sushi, fudge, cookies, an entire "formage" room (which I had to be dragged out of considering my obsession with cheese), and so much more. Just to further illustrate the extravagance that is Harrods, there was a woman wearing a full length ball gown singing opera for all of the shoppers.

Monday through Thursday, I attended classes, which include sociology and economics. The sociology class is all about the national health care system in the UK, which is about 80% public, and the UK welfare system. The economics class so far has kinda just been a current events class in which we've discussed everything from Borris Johnson and adding another terminal to Heathrow to the recession in the UK, which seems to be a bit worse than that in the US. This is evident from the constantly falling pound, which is about 1.3 to the US dollar, which is a 23-something year low.

Anywho, at nights, we've been getting to know London's night life, which include various clubs around the city. We went to this one club with what seemed like the coolest and hippest 18-23 year old Londoners, and they danced to American music from the 50s and 60s like Bob Dylan and Elvis. It was pretty bizarre, but really really fun.

Anyways, I hope everything is great with all of you, and I miss you guys! I also just got a skype account, so you can find my at lfrick1988. Also, if you want to tell me about your lives too, you can e-mail me at lfrick@bu.edu.

Love you all!
Lindsey