Hello friends! Well, we've made it to London! I arrived with Katie, Erin, and Renee two days ago at around 10 pm. Our entrance into the country was not the pleasantest however, since Renee and I had some not so nice Customs people who wanted to know every single detail about why we came to the UK and how long we were staying. Erin they just stamped through though, so I guess we were more suspicious. :-)
Our next hurdle was our luggage! We each had 4 bags weighing probably 75-100 lbs. that we had to get on and off the Tube. We then discovered that they don't have elevators in most tube stations, so we had to drag our luggage up and then back DOWN a huge set of stairs to get out of the station. And then at our hostel, we were on the 3rd floor of course again with no elevator, but luckily this nice drunk guy grabbed Katie's and my bags and brought them up for us so we didn't have to. :-) I like how friendly everyone is here, and I definitely don't feel like I stick out as an American.
On Sunday, we definitely agreed to take a CAB to our residence where we'll be the next two weeks - no more stairs for us! It was the strangest thing getting into the cab and seeing the driver on the RIGHT side! Walking on the streets is also quite interesting here, since you have to look to your right first when crossing, since the cars drive on the left. The cars speed like crazy and never look like they're going to stop. My goal for London is to not get hit by a car. :-) One day down and I've only had a few close calls...lol.
Yesterday we had some downtime so we explored the area a little. We're in the Kensington and Chelsea area, which is a very nice, expensive area, and has plenty of shops and retaurants everywhere. Brenda - I found the Accessorize! store and it was everything you said and more, haha. Trying to save my money though... We got lunch at this little cafe for £4, which doesn't sound like much, but with the exchange rate it's $8! I'm trying to not let the exchange rate get to me, but it's hard! We've decided that we definitely need to start cooking soon!
We had dinner last night at this Americanized burger & fries pub, and met several of the other students in our program. There's like 12 of us I think, with most of us from Iowa State. Some people went out last night, but we decided to get a good night's sleep to get rid of the jet lag, and go out tomorrow night hopefully with my cousin Sarah.
I will update more tonight when hopefully my internet at the dorm is working, but until then I hope you all have a great day! I would love it if you'd leave a comment after reading this so I know who's been here! Cheers!
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