As a side note, I realized that I really need to watch my mouth. There was this man sitting on the opposite side of the aisle from me on the train incessantly typing on his laptop, which annoyed me as I was trying to sleep. I faintly remember that I did, actually, end up falling asleep, woke up briefly to his typing, swore at him, then fell asleep again. In France I completely take advantage of the most-often-chance that people do not understand me. Not in England, and not a good habit for when I return home.
The audible hearing of the English language in general was a pure mindfuck. It really took me all of the first day to get used to it, bringing along the realization that I was and am really assimilating into the French culture without even being aware of it.
When we arrived it was still quite early in the morning (8ish - we gained one hour coming from Paris) so we had the whole day. Jen and I only got one hour of sleep from the night before so we were operating on whatever amped-up, leftover energy we had. We ate brunch at this lovely little French cafe called La Montparnasse in the Kensington district of London. I never appreciated scrambled eggs with toast and a cappuccino with sprinkled cinnamon more:
While on the topic of food, Kensington offered this gourmet cupcake shop called "Buttercup," which we just had to stop at.
{Select mango, mocha, red velvet and vanilla bean (already enjoyed)} Hello, breakfast for the remaining London days.
Jen and I were sent to go off to take the tube for shopping at Oxford Circus where we went to the famed London Topshop! I have never been so overwhelmed by clothes before (in a bad way). I hate shopping in general and this was like walking into a giant incubus of the shopping pet peeve; floors upon floors of clothes, it was comparable to the size of an office building. I would call Topshop the IKEA of clothes, literally, it had a cafe, salon, Topman (men's clothing floor) and an area for kids. For me, it was a one-time experience only, and in general, London's fashion style goes from very trendy to East Coast-conservative blah.
Oh, hey.
By Saturday I decided that London was a European America, if that. You could look at a grouping of people and the surrounding contextual environment and feel like you were in an American city. All fast food types that we have back home could be seen on every block (McDonalds, Subway, Starbucks, etc.), which are rarely seen, if not at all, in at least France and Italy, correct me if I'm wrong. When I went to one of the Starbucks in England, it was the first time I had chain coffee since I've been overseas. Let's just say I was not prepared for the shock difference in taste since I have been spoiled with cafe cremes, au laits and espressos from local French cafes. In all honesty, I'd compare the former to tasting like soot, as I would imagine soot to taste.
Buckingham Palace. Remove the blemishes of people and obnoxious gate. There was really no possible way to get a good tourist picture of any monument; there were either too many people (see below lack of "personal bubble") or obstructive ugly gates/construction stuff going on.
Big Ben! Down a ways is Westminster Abbey.
Jen and I both put off our journals till the very last minute, so Sunday was dedicated to completing them, which were due at 8 p.m. Paris time, 7 p.m. London time, and we had to get to the train station to return to Paris early, anyway. Back to La Montparnasse (the quaint French cafe in Kensington mentioned above), and some scrambled eggs and toast, two cappuccinos, my own chocolate and good eye contact produced a party invitation and the extent of writing equivalent to completing a Human Event paper, all enjoyably effortless :)
Mixed London Observations:
- I felt that most people in London don't understand the idea of a "personal bubble" in the sense of having the lack of a general order to walking on streets and the concept of a wait line. Crazy low-flying pigeons that aim for your face are included here.
- I could not tell half the time if people were pregnant and/or just had everything concentrated in the mid-section.
- Soo many lack of hyphens on signs. It got to the point where I wished I had a Sharpie to write them in.
- English are obsessed with Italian food, too, what is this. The main street where we stayed had at least four Italian restaurants. I guess it works because pub food is gross anyway. I ordered some kind of cheese and sun-dried tomato panini at this one non-Italian restaurant and swore it was Velveeta. Am pretty sure that was correct, for on the train back, some British girl yelled, "Pass the Velveeta, please!" to her sibling across the way. . .
- Jen and I were mistaken as Parisians, multiple times, and we proudly navigated around London completely on our own.
Though London was a beautiful city, we all decided that Paris is much more preferred if it had to come between the two.
I think the only high point of the day today was my choking on/throwing up water upon hysterically laughing and not being able to control myself mid-gulp before class started.
This week's study focus: Candide, Les Liaisons Dangereuses (like) and Maldoror.
