well hello london!

It is day 2 here in London, and so far, I am IN LOVE! lets start from the beginning shall we?
After much delay in the JFK airport, we arrived in London at about 8 o'clock on Saturday morning. Although we were advised against it, we took the tube into town. Let me just tell you that I handled that luggage on the crowded tube like a pro! After making it to the BEAUTIFUL campus, we threw our luggage down so we could walk the streets for a bit. We live literally a few meters from Sherlock Holmes flat on Baker Street. It is a huge tourist attraction, complete with hundreds of trinkety Sherlock Holmes tourist trap stores. We walked down a ways and were confused by the HUNDREDS of people in blue football jerseys until we ran into a local pub that was overflowing with these loads of yelling and chanting Chelsea fans. i guess there was a huge match going on, and to say that people get really into it would be an understatement. You could hear them singing from blocks and blocks away. There was one moment when a bus full of fans passed the pub, and i am surprised there wasn't a riot! There were police surrounding the pub just in case, and i'm sure they were needed at least once!
After we got lost at least twice, we decided to get some lunch. Now you may want to sit down for this next bit of news. For lunch we went to this really divey place (i mean REALLY divey. they shouted our order into a hole in the floor)but get this, i ate fish and chips... i know what your thinking right now, and it's ok if you don't believe me. But it happened. and don't be surprised if it happens again! like most people have told me, the fish here is not anything like what i have tried back home. thank goodness!
after a few adventures around the city (we went down leiscester square to see a few sites and to eat dinner)i finally made it into bed around 8. i was so proud of myself for staying awake for so long!
i woke up this morning after a good 14 hours of sleep, and i felt refreshed and ready to take on Camdon market. It is so great! i could have easily spent all my money in about 2 hours there, but i resisted, and only bought one thing. next, we tried to find a store called primark. you would think finding a HUGE store right on a main road would be easy, but no. it was a joke. There were hundreds of people on the street with bags from there, but finding someone that spoke english was hard enough, let alone someone that could give us directions. (we had one man tell us to walk 60 minutes in the wrong direction) luckily we just kept walking towards where the people with the bags seemed to be coming from until i looked up and oh so dramatically pointed at the sign and yelled 'it's RIGHT THERE!!!' at least 20 people turned and looked at me funny, but after 40 minutes of walking around, i was really excited.
Once inside, i realized that i will never again enjoy shopping in America. Primark is the best thing i have ever seen. There is everything there you could ever want. ok not food, but everything else. and it's CHEAP! like sunglasses that only cost 1 pound! if you know me at all, you know that this kind of a thing could be extremely dangerous to my bank account. luckily, i made it out with only a few things, some of them were even presents for other people. get excited friend, i love shopping for other people almost as much as i love shopping for myself! When we left the store we came out to our first london rain storm. i was only semi-prepared, and went out in flip flops and no jacket.. but i did have an umbrella! i slipped and slided all the way back to campus where i immediately put on actual shoes.
We were supposed to go on a tour of Westminster later on, but with the rain and all, we decided to postpone it until another day. Now it is just another evening of trying to stay busy so i stay awake!! i have not allowed myslef to take any naps, and want to get accustomed to my new time zone as soon as possible!
Tomorrow brings the first day of class, and i'm sure more amazing adventures! Stay tuned!
xoxo