Playa De San Juan y Hamburger Vending Machines-they do exist. Day 25.

June 16^th

We found Playa De San Juan on this day.  The other beach we were at was georgeous, but it was nothing compared to this beach. It was so pretty and there was A LOT less trash in the ocean which is always a plus when swimming in the ocean.

After beach-ing it up, we went back to the hostel. Then

 Now, I should mention that at this point, my feet were getting gradually destroyed day by day by these jerks:

I call them the danger shoes.  These shoes have damaged my feet more than any shoes have damaged my feet ever before. I blame my mom’s travel agent. She said you shouldn’t travel and wear flip flops at the same time. However, she did not know that I was going to travel to Spain and basically live on the beach, so I’ll let it go for now.  Since my feet were breaking, I bought croccs. They were really cute with my pretty dress. Lol.

Anyway, since my feet were extremely damaged, I needed band-aids. So, Jill and I went searching for some up on the rooftop.  Once we got there, we met a group of guys from Switzerland.. It was fun hanging out and learning about the different culture. 

After hanging out on the roof, we all headed out to the bars/clubs. Eventually, we ditched the Switzerland men, and kind of made our way back home…but not before making a stop at a vending machine.  

 Not just any vending machine though. 

A vending machine that had.......

HAMBURGERS in it!!

It was the most strange thing I had EVER seen!

After that, instead of going home, we made our way to the beach to see it at “nighttime.”  We hung out there and eventually, the sun rose. It was so so georgeous.

We finally ended up getting back to the hostel at around 7am and we slept so good.

More Beach & First Pub-Crawl Ever! Day 24.

June 15^th

 

The next morning we were woken up by a knock on our door and a man saying, “Housekeeping.”  We were all very sad to hear this, because that meant we probably had to get out of our comfy beds.  But, it turned out it was just our friend Chris and Autum! After catching up a bit with them we all headed out to the beach again!!

After the beach we explored the harbor area.

When we got home, we took advantage of the free paella being offered on the rooftop of our hostel and we also got a bunch of the 2-euro pitchers of sangria. We ate, drank, and had a great time.

A girl came up to us and asked if we wanted to go to the pub crawl later that night and we decided that would be lots of fun, aaaand it was!

At the first bar, we got free lollipops and glow-in-the-dark shot glasses! ...except just the lollipops were free, the glow-in-the-dark shot glass may have fallen into my purse.

Limbo!!

Jill made us "I have a boyfriend ...bitch" stickers to fight off the men.

Our whole group from London :)

I had never been to a pub-crawl before, but it was tons of fun! And luckily we were able to meet up with the rest of our group of friends that came to Spain too! It was a fun night!

Off to Alicante, Spain! Day 23.

June 14th

Today was the day that Jill, Allison, and I left for Spain!!

After a successful plane journey, we arrived in Alicante, Spain.  It was beautiful.  It was such a contrast from the gloomy weather in London. 

First, we tried our best to find our hostel, but we were not completely successful at first.  The paper from our hostel said that we could take one bus that would basically take us directly there, but that wasn’t the case because when the bus driver yelled at us in Spanish that it was the last stop we had no clue where to go.  We wandered around, tried to find another bus…Allison and I tried to ask people for directions with our limited Spanish. Somehow we got pretty close to where we had to be, but we were still lost.  We managed to ask a man walking by if he knew where the hostel was.. We mostly just pointed at the paper with the name of the hostel on it and said "donde?"..haha. BUT he led us there! We were so happy to have finally made it!

After settling in, we left for the beach.  We laid out, played in the perfect-temperature ocean, drank sangria and just relaxed.

 After the beach we found a cute restaurant and tried paella. I got vegetable paella and it was soo good.  Allison and Jill got regular paella and the craw fish stared at them..haha! :)

 As we were looking for ice, we discovered the rooftop patio and that determined that we were at the beest hostel ever.  This place had the most amazing view of the castle!

We hung out up there for a while before venturing out to explore the nightlife in Spain.  After getting some gelato, we were ready to go!

 

 It was a fun night full of dancing and things, and by the end of the night we stumbled into a KFC.  Then, we easily found our way home and went right to sleep.

The Theater Brothel. Day 22.

June 13 

Today we had a semi unsuccessful shopping outing.  I really wanted a backpack and board shorts for Spain, and underwear because I was running out of them and I was too lazy to do laundry at that point (plus there was just never ever time).  We went to Primeark (I think that was the name) and it was insane.  It was so crowded and huge and overwhelming.  It was impossible to get anywhere without getting trampled.  I managed to find a 4-pack of panties, but had zero luck on the board shorts.  I asked somebody where the backpacks were, and they told me to go “that way” and there were no backpacks there.  Then I asked somebody else, and they told me to go in the complete opposite direction.  I still couldn’t find them so I asked one more person and they informed me that they didn’t sell backpacks there.  That would have been cool to know the first time I asked.

At this point, I was kinda frustrated, but I got over it quickly because we had to hurry to the tube to get to class on time.

Class was super great this day for 2 reasons: We had it in one of the common rooms in the dorms. And, We did lots of improv exercises!! This made me miss theater a lot.  It was so much fun though!!

After class we had a small break before having to leave for the theater, so some of us went to get Mexican food at a place around the corner.  I was super excited for Mexican food because I hadn’t had it in such a long time..but I was not impressed.  There was waaaaaay more rice than beans, and the rice was all salty.  

I miss Baker’s.

We all made the journey to the Almedia Theater to see the Theater Brothel.

This was such a cool experience.  We were led backstage, through dressing rooms, and green rooms until we ended up on stage where we were asked a series of questions.  I can’t remember them all, but some of them were like

 “Epic, or domestic?”

“Do you like to play or observe?”

“Have you ever pretended to be someone that you are not?”

At one point, the person mumbled something and then growled at us.

This was all part of the selection process.  The Theater Brothel had 6 plays going on at once, and this selection process decided which 2 plays we were meant to see.

We were given 2 different colored tokens and were asked to wait in the lobby.

After some waiting, we were all directed to our assigned shows.

The first show I saw was called Tonight Sean Campion will Lecture, Dance, and Box.  This show was interesting.  It was difficult to grasp what kind of show it was going to be at first because we had no idea what to expect.  It turned out that it was extremely eventful.  As the title suggested, the actor lectured, danced, and boxed.  He would use members of the audience to “stand in” for particular random characters throughout the play as he lectured so there was some audience involvement. The overall “plot” of the story was that he was explaining the life of his relative that had many different identities.  I can’t remember all of the details.  At one point during the play, it seemed like he was possibly going mad and he stripped down to his underpants and ran around the lobby (where the play was taking place btw..not a stage).  He would also instruct us in making paper hats out of a paper filled with quotes that he would say at various times during the play.  By the end of the play, I felt that I enjoyed it, but I wasn’t sure why because a lot of it was complicated and extremely contradicting.  One of the girls who saw it with me felt like the play as displaying a man with “multiple personality disorder.”  As a psychology major, I liked the idea of the play surrounding the happenings of a mental disorder, but her interpretation of the symptoms of that disorder weren’t exactly right.  The symptoms of Dissociative Identity Disorder would not really be expressed in the way he was expressing them because he was so aware of all of the different scenarios and whatnot. 

...... Anyway, I apologize for the super-tangent.

The next play I went to was called A Prayer.  I was sent to a tiny dressing room and after awhile we all realized that there was a girl singing in the shower. She came out in only a towel and [her character] was clearly surprised to see us.  She ran across the room (still in just a towel which was not covering her ass at all) and threw on a dress.  She was in such a shock to see us…but it wasn’t really clear why at first.  We all figured we were supposed to be a certain character or group of characters in the play, but we could not figure out what.  She kept asking us questions about ourselves as a group asking us to perform tasks.  She asked if we could make things and she gave me paper and a pencil and a drew a flower.  She asked if we could destroy things and she handed my friend Marcus a glasses and he destroyed them.  She handed him a book and he destroyed that as well. The other members of the audience were kinda appalled at the damage to the book, but she thought it was amazing.  Eventually it was revealed that we were “God” to her.  The whole play was based on interaction and improv.  It most definitely intrigued me the whole time.  It impressed me how much the actress was able to think on her toes so well to have all the appropriate reactions, questions..etc.  I probably liked this play more than the first one.

After that we all waited outside for the other groups to get out of their plays and as we waited the actress from A Prayer was leaving and stopped by to say how cool it was that Marcus destroyed the book and she told her director and he thought it was brilliant. Hah!

Papers & The London Eye! Day 21.

June 12

Today I woke up semi-early to work on my paper and took a small break to go with Allison to print out Spain/Amsterdam things.  Then I came right back home and worked on the paper some more until I finally finished it.

Then we had the group trip to the London Eye! It was so cool!! I was so excited to be there. It went up so high and the view was incredible.

After the London Eye, Erin and I walked around the area and got really awesome nighttime pictures!

Then we had yummy dinner at Garfunkles.

When we got home, I stayed up with Autum and Erin till like 4am having heart-to-heart-girl talk. It was really nice and worth the lack of sleep :)

First Blog Update in Weeks!!

I am catching up on my blog instead of writing my paper that is due on Wednesday. 

I am the most responsible person I know..

June 11^th  Day 20

Today Allison, Jill, and I were going to print out our things for Spain and Amsterdam, but we had lunch instead.

We met up with everybody at S. Kensington Station to get to the National Theater for our backstage tour. The tour was really cool and interesting. We got to go inside 2 out of the 3 theaters.  We also went backstage and saw the prop room. We learned lots of history about the theater as well.

After the tour we were free to go, and when we got outside Riamba, a Spanish band was playing. 

Erin and I stayed and listened to them for awhile.  It was such a fun and upbeat band and there were a few people dancing. 

I wish I had danced.

Next we walked over to the Westminster Abbey to get some pictures with it

Then we wanted to go to Trafalgar Square, but we didn’t know how to get there so we just wandered.  Of course, without even trying we ended up at Trafalgar Square.  We tend to do things like that every now and then.

After that, we went home.

Soooo behind!

Hello friends!
So, I realize I haven't been updating like, at all. But things have been nuts and crazy-busy. I do have outlines for all (or most of) my days though, so I do plan on posting once everything calms down..(which may have to be when I come back to the states, which is less cool, but it'll have to do).

But we'll see, if I have time, I'll try to update a bit.


Apologies, but I WILL finish this blog eventually!!

I skipped a day...

Somehow I forgot to add this day...sorry!

Day 15- Natural Hist Museum Governor Inspector Day 15

July 6th

We woke up pretty early to go to the Natural History museum…even though it didn’t open until 10am. 

We got there when it opened, I enjoyed it, but not as much as I have been enjoying the V&A museum.  A lot of the Natural History Museum felt like a review on what I had learned in middle school. 

After the museum we went to the area where the Young Vic theater is and got some Chinese food. It was super tasty.

I am not completely positive how I feel about Government Inspector.  It was most definitely a unique and unusual play.. I may come back an elaborate on it some more at a later time.  Right now it’s about 2am and I need sleep.

After the play we came home and mostly just hung out.  It was nice and relaxing because I was mostly tired.

The Last 4 Days...

Disclaimer: This post may be long, but if you can make it through it, let me know, and I will give you a cookie. 

Day16.

July 7^th

Today I woke up to meet up with mom because it was her last day in London.  We got breakfast and then we went to her hotel so I could see what it looked like.

After that I figured out how to get home via the tube all by myself. I felt very accomplished.

Then I went with Jill to meet up with some of our other friends at the location of the Harry Potter Premiere. It was insane.  There were so so so many people!

This wasn't even close to how many people there were....

Even though we had no idea where we were going we somehow managed to run into where Rupert Grint (Ron Weasley) was!! That was really cool, but I didn’t enjoy the high and piercing screaming in my ears..lol!

We were not finding our friends because everything was blocked off, and we got to see somebody famous, so we just gave up and went to a sports bar to wait for our friends.  We got a bucket of beer there!

Once our friends met up with us we walked around Soho area looking for a place to go dancing..we found lots of gay bars. 

We eventually made it to a club called Z-something…I can’t remember. It was pretty fun!

After some time we went to a different bar and danced there-it was also quite fun.

Then we came home.  And! I didn’t buy any drinks the whole night (other than at the sports bar), but a good amount were bought for me..and that’s my rule now--saving money!

Day 17.

July 8^th

Today I woke up without my voice being fully there. :/ it also hurts.

Erin, Larissa and I had a crepe “breakfast” and it was delicious.

Then we went to the Tower of London.

I <3 colored doors.

HAHAHAHAH!

Straight out of Wicked? Yes, I think so.

Preeeetty!

Tower Bridge and part of the Tower of London! What up??

My favorite thing was seeing the Crown Jewels.  They were so so beautiful!!  One of them had the First Star of Africa which is apparently the largest diamond that has yet to be found! That was pretty incredible to see…it was so big that it looked fake.

After the Tower of London we went on a hunt for soup. Specifically tomato soup.  We had so much trouble finding some! We went to one place that said they had tomato soup and we were excited! Then I wanted bread to go with it, but the only bread they had had cheese or meat stuffed it. So that was disappointing. THEN right before they brought it to us they came up to us and were all like, "umm so it's not actually soup, it's sauce for the bread..but some people eat it as soup" I was so frustrated (and hungry) it was in a soup pot!!! Grrr. Then we FINIALLY found a place called Dickens Inn.  It was mostly a bar, but we managed to find a quiet corner to sit.  While we were there, there was a wedding reception happening! That was cute and small.

When we got home I bought cough drops.  Also, Larissa introduced me to this yummy thing. I already forgot the name..

Day 18

July 9^th 

Voice was still gone today. But we had our day trip to Brightion!  Did you know that I was originally planning on studying in Brighton instead of London? Fun fact #27.

First we went to the Brighton Museum..we didn’t have much time there at all..but what we did see was pretty cool!

If you can explain what this is to me I will give you an additional cookie.

After the museum, we had a tour of the Royal Pavilion.  It was beautiful, but way crowded.  That made it a bit less fun.  But we learned tons of cool history! Unfortunately I didn’t write any of it down, so I can’t fully remember a lot of it..something about China..and the king crying over how beautiful a room is...

Next we went to the Brighton Pier.  It was so  pretty there! But way windy! The pier itself was different from how I though it’d be..I thought there’d be more shops, but there was mostly food and arcade games and gambleing.  We still had fun there though!!

 

After that we went to the Lanes shops which is a street with a ton of cool and unique shops! I got some cute new dresses there :)

After that we took the bus home and I skyped with the fam bam! That was wonderful because I miss those people.

Then I met up with people I’m going to Italy with after the program ends and we started booking stuff!! I am so excited! While in Italy, we’ll be going to Venice, Florence, Pisa, and Rome!! I can’t wait I can’t wait I can’t wait!!! I better be totally and completely healthy by then!

And then, some of us got ready to go out dancing

I was debating whether or not I should go out at first because of the loss of voice and the pain in the throat, but I decided to go. This was not my best decision.

We went to this place called Zoo Bar and it sucked!! It was SO crowded that you could not walk anywhere.  There were girls with stelleto heels stepping on me..drinks being spilt on me…and I already wasn’t feeling good in the first place.  A group of people we went in with left almost immediately after we got in and I totally would have gone with them if we hadn’t just paid 7 pounds to get in :/ I was so frustrated.  The other people who did stay all seemed to have a great time somehow, but I just couldn’t.  I also had like zero alcohol in me so that could have been part of why I was so bothered/irritated by everything. Plus, I started to feel more sick than I have since I lost my voice in the first place.

Eventually it was time to leave and the process of getting home was tough as usual.  We ended up getting a mini cab.

Overall..good day, mostly sucky night.

 Day 19.

July 10th

Today I woke up a bit earlier than I needed to to skype with the boyfriend and that was nice :) But I definitely felt sick.  My thoat hurt and I was coughing a lot more than I had been.

Next I took a shower and that helped a lot with the sick feeling, but not with the coughing. 

Larissa, Erin and I decided to go to Camdin Market.  I had never heard of this place before, but it’s a shopping place and it was so unique from any place I’ve ever been to!

It was a lot of bargan shopping—they would try to sell anything I looked at or touched to me and wouldn’t leave me alone..it was actually very fun though.  It was cool bringing the price down from what they first offered.  Although, I don’t think I’d like to do all of my shopping this way..it was pretty exhausting.  By the end of the shopping time, I  ended up buying some dresses, necklaces, a couple suveniers for friends, and a coat.

I have a coat problem. I love them so much, but I don’t live in a place where I need them.  But I LOVED this coat and it was a type of coat I’ve wanted for a long long time. You know what, I don’t need to justify it, what’s done is done and there’s nothing I can do about it.  On the plus side I do feel like a got a pretty good deal on it!

After that we were going to go to Brick Lane which turned out being way creepy.  There were tons of sketchy men standing outside of food places trying to convince us to come inside. We did not stay there long.

Then we came home and got some groceries and have just been hanging out.  I feel like I have to rest because I’ve been coughing more and more and I need need need to get healthy by Thursday!! (I'm leaving for Spain that day)!!!!