Tuesday, November 11, 2008

Cheers!

(A Gorgeous Night, captured by moi)
(ROAR! lol)
(One of the coolest pieces of art in the British Museum)
(In front of the stage at The Globe Theater)
(Jesus In The Sand, on the River Thames)

These are just a couple random photos to give you a taste of my London trip. I took 300 photos during a 5 day trip, so these are just scratching the surface of what I saw & experience over in the Queen's hometown. This trip was probably the best part of my time abroad so far. I don't say that to discount Dublin in any way, because I've had & continue to have great times here, but during the London trip, everything came together for me. It was the perfect mix of exploration, discovery, education, inspiration, freedom, and comfort all in one vacation. Yes, I viewed this a vacation. Primarily, I thought of it like that because it was the only way I could mentally prepare for it without negative thoughts creeping in. You try traveling with the same group of 12 people who you've spent the last 6 six weeks in class with. I got nothing but love for the group, they're great folks, but spending as much time with each other as we do can make a brotha get agitated from time to time.

But I ain't tryin to dwell on any negative worries, let me tell y'all about the awesomeness of my time in the home of the Union Jack. 5 plays in 3 days, this was the plan & as you can tell, the itinerary was tight. On the first day, we got in, checked into our ridiculous hostel (more on that in a sec), and had about an hour to ourselves before we headed off for our first show. We had been up extra early, around 6am since we had to be at the airport at 7:30am that morning, so that first play (Creditors by Alan Strindberg; highly recommended) was a little rough to sit through. After the show & some dinner, we returned to our hostel & decided that we'd be better off staying in & getting some sleep rather than prowling around the city. Let me tell you about this hostel then. It's called The Generator and in my guidebook, it was listed as one of the most popular hostels in London. Sounds wonderful, right? Well, it wasn't exactly the dream hostel. First, true to its name, the hostel had a cheesy power plant motif to its design. Neon lights, sheet metal, orange & blue walls, a little metal fencing thrown in for good measure...you get the general idea. Next, the place is massive; there were about 800 people staying at the hostel. We saw at least 3 huge 20-25 people groups checking in while we were there, so just imagine the madness that could arise from such a scenario. On both the plus & minus side of things was the Generator Bar. On the plus side, the drink were cheap & the house mixed drinks were quality. On the minus side, the bar had these themed nights for each night of the week & we happened to check in on Karoke Night (insert horror movie music here). If you thought Karoke was bad in the States, conjure up a visual of a motely crew of foreigners taking turns butchering popular American songs from the 80s & 90s. It would of taken all of my dough for the trip to drink away the embarassment I felt for them as I killed time playing the world's worst game of snooker (the British cousin of pool). Actually, I think my snooker skills complimented the singing pretty well. A shame indeed, a shame indeed.

The next day we had free time around the city, went to see 2 shows, and were given a tour of The Globe theater. I got a chance to kill the majority of my free time in the National Museum (I'll pontificate on museums and such in another post) & then got my grub on over at Camden Market. The best part of the day though was our Indian dinner, which ended up being more of a feast than anything. This was an IES sponsored event, which meant they were picking up the check, which further meant I was indulging myself thoroughly. We get to the restaurant, Kwality, around 5:30pm & the fun started from there. Our program director, Ashley (its a dude), made the mistake of telling us that we could order like 3 or 4 appetizers & some drinks to start. Of course, we're getting the most delicious sounding dishes (sorry I don't remember them) and poppin' bottles of red & white wine to rinse our palettes with. He also orders us like 5 bowls of rice & mad naan on the side. What about dinner you ask? Why of course we get our choice of entree, no questions asked, so I really didn't want to imagine what that final bill looked like. For whatever reason, probably cause we we're shutting that place down, it was taking forever for our meals to come, which can only mean one thing: drink more wine. You know how a nice glass of wine enhances conversation? (isn't that like a scientific fact? if not, i'll prove it soon) Well, let's just say that we had more fun talking about any & everything than we had in awhile. When the food finally came, we stuffed our faces so much that even the White folk were scared about getting the itis. I've grown to really enjoy Indian food & its something I can imagine myself being completely in love with.

Saturday, day three. Alright, so you know that no trip anywhere is complete without a mention of one my embarassing moments. Ok, I have a reputation here for falling asleep during plays. I have my reasons for why this happens, but at the end of the day nobody listens to my valid excuses. Well, in order to keep myself from falling asleep, I decided that I would adapt my reliance on movie snack to include a reliance on play snacks also. My theory is that if snacked on something whenever I felt myself start to dose, I'd prevent myself from falling alseep & give me a quick dose of energy as well. Well, that reasoning definitely came back to bite me in the ass during our 4th London theater visit. We saw this show called Six Characters In Search of an Author (not my taste) and it was in this beautiful old Victorian theatre in the West End. Sometime during the second act, when my attention was grabbed again, there was a really quiet part where one of the main characters in the show was going through this revelation. I'm sitting there munching on my skittles, I finish the couple I have in my hand, and reach for another handful. I'm trying to be as quiet as possible, so I'm slowly reaching my hand into the bag sitting in my lap, but since I'm distracted by the play I'm not watching what I'm doing, and the next thing you know...Spppppssshhhhhh! The damn skittles splash all over the floor in front of me, in the middle of a classy West End theater. D'oh! Everyone heard & I know all the folks in my program knew it was my i'gnant self, so I was past embarassment at this point. Thankfully, my incident was trumped by a little old lady, about 6 rows up from me, later in the show. At the end of the show, one of the characers commits suicide & she shouts out "Come on! This is rubbish!" in her strong British accent, all while everyone else it silent & the stage lights are beginning to go out. People started giggling & let's just say that her sentiment was shared and the crowd showed this in their applause. Every show I've seen in Europe has had a double bow, meaning that they come back out to take a second, or sometimes even third, bow because the audience was so strong. This time, not so much; they barely received the double bow.

Ok, its extremely late as I'm writing this, so I'mma call it a night. More on London soon. I havent talked about my personal renaissance or the museums or seeing friends, so there's much more where this came from.

Peace & Blessings, y'all.

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