classes are underway. i don't care much for my theatre in london class because it's held in a room with no windows for four hours, but i love my literary london class.

yesterday tim, aaron and i went for my first plate of fish and chips after class then for some espresso. they decided to go to the pub and after much convincing (okay, it didn't take toooo much convincing) i joined them for a beer. we met a few middle aged men from dublin who thought aaron was this famous swedish soccer player who also has blonde dreads and always sticks his tongue out when he scores a goal. they didn't seem too disappointed when we told him he wasn't and bought him a game of pool and me a very large beer.

some of the girls from the study abroad program started talking very loudly about how "weird" british guys are. with the exception of four girls i have met, most of the girls in our program are very spoiled americans who came to london to hang out only with other americans and have no desire to experience british culture, but to complain about it. well, now that that is off my chest, i will mention that tim, quinn, aaron and i are taking the ferry to dublin in a couple of weeks for a long weekend. everyone i have spoken with has said it's beautiful and i've been reading a bit of james joyce and that makes me want to see it. oh, and we are going to to the guiness factory. jealous?

i found a new cafe to have coffee in in the morning near my place. it's called amici which means friend in french, i guess. besides having a corny name it is adorable and has tables outside with umbrellas and big windows and i spent the whole morning reading there. the workers on the tube/underground are on strike right now.. hopefully for just twenty four hours.. but this means that everybody is taking buses and cabs and holloway road is loud and crowded and resulting in all sorts of catastrophes i can watch from my window. london is one big beautiful mess right now.

yesterday was my first day of class. we went on a tour of bloomsbury which is absolutely gorgeous and spent time in the peace park (where there's a statue of ghandi in the middle) and then to the british museum. after class was over, i snuck away from my american counterparts and ended up meeting a girl from australia who is living here for five months. we decided to share a sandwich and get espresso in a sidewalk cafe on museum street.

after she left, i got out my map which i'm horrible at decoding and ended up just wandering around. i bought myself a long scarf at a corner store.

when i got home after taking the tube in the wrong direction not juts once BUT twice, i made it back to my flat and tea like a little english girl and read a few essays by virginia woolf. then six of the guys and one other girl and i found hopped on the tube and found a corner pub and i played typical english songs on the jukebox and drank a stella artois. yum.

more later.

london is amazing.. i live in a flat with three guys from the west coast. i've learned a lot of new card games in the past few days. the flat is on the top floor of a place on holloway road in north london. i have a huge window without a screen that looks out over the main road. as you can imagine, i spend most of my time with my head out of the window watching everyone pass by.

on the first floor of our apartment building there is a pub called "big red." my first night in london was spent drinking carlsburg and listening to a beatles cover band.

the weather changes every second. the mornings are a bit chilly and sunny, and by afternoon is warmer but overcast and then the minute you feel comfortable enough to take off your jacket, it starts pouring rain. i've been waking up early.. like around six am.. and finding a cheap cafe to eat some toast, drink coffee and write in my journal in. the rumors are true, the food really is disgusting here. i have been eating toast with nutella on it and drinking carlsburg. i think it's a better alternative to america's no-carb craze.

i had my first class today - literary london. my instructor is taking us on a tour of bloomsbury, where virginia woolf lived, later this afternoon. i think i might go down to camden afterwards. i guess they have a great market and kind of an indie crowd or something.

i'm in an internet cafe right now. the italian guy who owns it started playing a lot of three doors down after he found out i was from the states. he keeps pouring me coca-cola and asking me if i want to go on a date. uh oh, now he wants to know my star sign.

i think i'm seeing the world through rose colored lenses. it has been beautiful here and i have been falling in love with london all over again. yesterday i woke up early because the sun was streaming through my window onto my bed and i made tea and wrote in my journal and then tim came over and we hopped onto the tube. the first place we went was a place the history class toured called st. dunstan's. it is a church that was bombed during the first world war and all that is remaining is the structure. the inside is open to the public and overgrown with flowers. i just laid in the grass and wrote in my journal and soaked in the sun. next up was westminster abbey. i had the BEST sandwich i have ever had. it was called sandwich sofia. perhaps i'll name my first daughter after that sandwich. haha it was avocado, bacon, tomato and brie on a baguette. yummy. we walked to st. james' park (the park in the film "about a boy") afterwards and sat in the sun some more and then went to harrod's where i bought my mother some english tea because that is definitely the only thing i can afford in harrod's. i keep asking myself where this trip has gone? i only have around fifteen days left, five of which will be spent in london. yesterday i was standing on the london bridge and tim said, "i'm really going to miss this place." but the fact is that we are so young that we don't have to miss it. we can keep coming and going, we can keep saying goodbye.

one's destination is never a place, but rather a new way of looking at things.
henry miller

i'm sitting in an internet cafe that is playing classical music. it's really warm here today.. probably around seventy degrees.. i just finished doing laundry with katie.. this afternoon we saw "the woman in black," a play that was supposed to be scary but seemed a bit hokey to me. i have one more essay to finish up for class and then i am finished and i'm off on my backpacking adventure with nathan. i can't wait to see him.. i miss seeing the people i know and love every day.. the other night i went to dinner at a four star restaurant called tamarind and sat next to ben kingsley of "Gandhi." i think i got my fifteen minutes of fame through osmosis. it's all over now.