The New Love of My Life: Amsterdam

  

So I spent this past weekend in Amsterdam and it was absolutely amazing. I met up with Aly and Rachel and it was so nice to see some familiar faces from home. Aly came with two girls from her program in Belgium, Janice and Katie. I got in on Thursday night with no big travel issues and when I met up with them we headed back to the hostel which was smack in the middle of the Red Light District. It was a pretty hilarious first impression of Amsterdam because to walk there we walked right past all of the red lit windows with women gesturing to the men (and at times to us). It's a strange contrast to the beautiful canals that run down the streets with swans in them. I was disenchanted with the swans, because I've heard time and time again that they're vicious. Everyone else seemed to be on team swan.

It wasn't until Friday that Rachel got in so we just hung out and explored Thursday night. Friday we got up at 10 and wandered the city, saw some of the big churches and the palace, which sadly had construction so we couldn't really see any of it. But as we walked around I fell totally in love with Amsterdam as a city. It has so much going for it. Architecturally it's beautiful and I just loved it the whole time I was there. When Rachel got in she and Aly and I hung out for a while just the three of us and then met up with Janice and Katie at the Van Gogh Museum. Loves me some Van Gogh so I really liked the museum. It's amazing how much better paintings look in person, because some of them I had seen reproductions of over and over again and the prints don't hold a candle to the real thing. Then at night Janice had found a pub crawl that we went to meet up on and it was really fun. I actually ran into two people I knew. Avery, Tricia's best friend from home who lived with us this summer, was there with Gabby's friend Molly! It was so strange running into them but really fun to totally randomly bump into people I knew in Amsterdam. Also the pub crawl was fun because it was a nice way to get to experience the nightlife there with some sort of guide steering you away from places that might be dead. 

Saturday we tried to get up and out again, so by 11 or so  Rachel and I were headed off to the Anne Frank House (Aly had been before). It was rainy and freezing out so waiting wasn't exactly a picnic but I'm so glad we did it. There's no way to describe it other than intense. Most people don't talk too loudly as they walk through and there are lots of guides and video clips to guide you through the house, which is rebuilt but not furnished (as per the wishes of Otto Frank). It was really emotional walking through, especially when you get up to the annex where they talk about the arrest and deportation of the families in hiding. It's amazing all of the documents they've been able to preserve and that definitely adds to the experience. All in all it was definitely a make you think kind of place. 

Later we did lunch (bagels! haven't had one since being here), hung out, went to the flea markets and went to Rembrant's house which was really interactive and different from the other museums. It was a good day and we got a lot in. We tried to do cheap Chinese for dinner. It was.. cheap Chinese. Then we went out for a bit with some Germans from our hostel and it was a fun but relatively early night (back by 1 or 1:30 maybe?).

Another key part of our trip were the other people in our dorm room, which I'll mention now because our Saturday night interactions with them were hysterical. On one side we had some guy who I honestly couldn't describe if I had to because he stayed in bed literally all day. We had to tip toe around him because he just laid in bed and slept. We were convinced for a portion of the trip that he was a vampire (I was less convinced, since, c'mon, vampires aren't real). Then on the other side were these two Australian men who I would say were late 20's or early 30's. Katie was sick and so she was generally up coughing for a large portion of the night and so when they came back Saturday night (drunk, stoned, probably both) they kept making comments about her coughing. They actually offered to get her something for her cough, which was both nice and a plea to her to not cough. But then when they came back again (much more drunk and stoned) they were having long loud high conversations. And one of them couldn't stop laughing every time Katie coughed, so you'd hear her cough followed by an uncontrollable giggle. The best part of their conversation was when one of them said "Probably best we didn't throw that moped into the canal," to which the other replied "Yeah but it would've been funny." We had the exact same conversation (I wanted to try to get the 5 of us to push a car in) so many times on the trip. 

Sunday we had to check out of the hostel and we wandered, did touristy shopping and hung out until Aly, Janice and Katie had to leave for their trains. That left Rachel and I to do whatever we wanted for the rest of the day. We poked in and out of touristy shops (lots of souvenirs to be had), wandered the Red Light District (definitely highest concentration of erotica shops anywhere in the world) and when it started hailing (yes, random hail) we wasted 5 euro at the disappointingly small "Hash, Marijuana and Hemp Museum" which was no facts about the Netherlands culture as affected by legalization and much more about how hemp helped with ship building. Ships are kind of boring compared to the rest of Amsterdam.. 

It was nice to have Sunday to just hang out and wander around and Rach and I had a lot time to chill out. I got home late Sunday after a series of minor travel delays: flight was delayed an hour, I forgot my UK university acceptance letter and had to convince customs that I was in fact a student at a real school in the UK, I missed the last tube and then my Oyster card wouldn't work on the bus. But after all that I made it back to Goldsmiths. I'm definitely excited for next weekend's Paris trip when a.) I don't have to deal with airports and b.) I'm traveling with Madelaine so I don't have to do everything alone. 

More to come either before or after the Paris trip. For now I have to go watch the Celtics undoubtedly kick the Heat's ass at Sports Café.

The Past Week

I'm not sure why but it seems like time absolutely flies here and I hate it. I realized the other day it was exactly two months until I leave. Okay, so two months is a long time. But I'm already hating the idea of leaving. Especially since I start traveling this weekend and am realizing I have a limited number of weekends actually in the country. Tomorrow I head off to Amsterdam. I'm a little nervous to do my first big kid travel around Europe. I've flown from the states to Europe by myself multiple times but never around the continent alone. I also kind of forgot that Amsterdam, unlike London, my little haven of pseudo-English, actually speaks another language. Apparently the ticket machines to buy train tickets when I get there don't have instructions in English, so I had to print off a little instruction sheet of how to buy travel tickets on them. Cute, I know.

The past week a lot has happened I feel like, although I didn't actually do all that much. I've been to two more plays. One of them was this crazy circus-like interpretation of Goethe's Faust and it was pretty awesome. Not everyone in my class liked it, but I thought it was really fun and interesting. Granted I don't know much about Faust so who knows if my opinion has any merit. Then tonight we went to see this play called The Country. In it there was this British woman playing an American and oh my god I wanted to kill myself when she spoke. She did what so many Brits do when doing their best "American" accent and was a total valley girl. At times it fit her character.. but not really. And everything had this mocking, sarcastic quality that literally made her unwatchable. I know that I have a bad British accent, but even the kids who think they have good American accents here put on valley girl voices when doing impressions. It gets old..

Then Saturday I went with Hannah and Tom from my flat, two girls from downstairs, Alex and Amee, and Amee's friend to Portobello Market (yes, again). It was really fun but it's getting cold here so I was freezing my ass off the whole time. I think something happened to my good New England cold tolerance during the boiling summer in Philly, because I'm a pansy when it comes to cold now. I hate it. Despite the cold though we had fun browsing at Portobello, and then headed to Camden Market after. Camden is really cool and "punk artsy." We got there late so the market stalls were closing but it was fun to check out the area. We got food cause they had tons of little shops with Chinese, Indian, even some Mexican where you'd get a bunch of food for £3 so we ate dinner there. It was a fun albeit exhausting day. Then Saturday night was a little, erm, rough so I didn't actually get my act together to do anything on Sunday except wallow in bed and pretend to do homework while actually just streaming football (athde.net and ch131.com have been my saviors tv-wise).

I'm getting used to my Monday schedule of actually having class, although I don't think I'll ever be good at the 9 am class.  Luckily I've got friends in the class so I generally drag myself there and then nap after. Yes, I do realize that some people actually get up at 6 or 7 every single day and go to work, but I'm also guessing they don't stay up till disgusting student hours every night and refuse to give up going out those nights.

Then last night was my flatmate Charlotte's birthday so we made plans to go to Pacha, one of the relatively big clubs. We had people over before and got to get all dressed up so it was really fun. Again, the cold made catching the night bus less than pleasant, but when that's the only complaint I call it a good night. I love the club scene here but I always prefer to go with large groups of people I know 'cause it's just more enjoyable that way. It's definitely fun to go out with all the F-Block (that's my building) kids because it's generally a good big group and everyone's pretty chill. A good time was had by all, although the cleaners who came this morning were not exactly delighted that we had a good time all over our flat before going out.. an interesting relationship is developing between us and them. They hate us, we acknowledge that they have the worst job in the world and their hatred is valid, but think the notes they leave are funny. Best by far was the night that no one else had cleaned their dishes (I don't have dishes, all throwaway plates and cutlery) and the cleaners threatened to throw them out if they weren't cleaned by the next day. A few people hadn't cleaned theirs so Hannah, in a moment of alcohol induced brilliance, tried to hide all the dirty dishes in the oven. We awoke to a loving note-- "Nice try flat F, we will be back in the afternoon for your dirties. You're preventing us from cleaning the oven." Mind you I'm 100% positive they have never once cleaned that oven.

Now I'm having a low key post-theater night watching the Yankees with increasing despair since I was really hoping tonight would be the end for them. As a real member of the facebook generation or whatever you'll call us, I'm wishing I had an extra computer so I could watch the game full screen while also writing this and booking my hostels for my trip to Paris. My need to multitask is mildly frightening. I have to go to bed at a real person time tonight (1?) so I'm trying to use the next hour and a half to actually be productive. I'm hoping I'll have some good stories after my weekend in Amsterdam with Rachel and Aly.

Friday Boredom

So Madelaine is off to Dublin this weekend with fellow Arcadian-ites (Colin and Alyssa), Caroline has moved out of our lovely New Cross flat and into one in Central London (although we never got confirmation that she actually made it there... hmm...) and I'm sitting in my room bored on a Friday afternoon. I officially have too much free time. I think I'm about to head either to follow in Madelaine's footsteps and wander around Harrods for a bit or, depending on how cold it is, I'll take my sketchbook somewhere and people watch. Might as well take advantage of London with my tons of free time. Then hopefully tomorrow and Sunday I can round up some troops to do another market or two with me. I'm hoping to do Brick Lane Sunday, where I've heard I can find some great Indian food. I have yet to try any Indian since being here, which just might be the biggest failure of the trip thus far.

It's been a strange week since it feels weird to be here enjoying London when so many people are dealing with difficulties back home. But my thoughts are with Marin and her family during this terrible time, and I'm sending all my hopes and wishes for the best possible recovery to Lorna.

Here's to hoping a new week brings better news and fewer reminders of how quickly life can change. Trying my best not to sound corny, but alas, I've failed. Sometimes you realize the reason corny lines exist is that they sum things up the best.

Pictures

With Annie at Buckingham Palace

Buckingham Palace

We deemed them the "blues"

A chocolate wonderland we stumbled upon

The chocolate wonderland had a grocery store too- and lucky charms!

Star Wars at Buckingham: My Morphing into an Ameri-Brit

So I'm sitting here debating whether or not to go out tonight. By which I mean do I go to the HobGob and stick around New Cross or join the Americans at Sports Cafe right near Picadilly Circus. I'm not sure how it's happened but at the same time that I'm becoming more British (I said 'whilst' the other day..) I'm also becoming increasingly American. An American bro, to be more specific. It may be my attempt to normalize my life a little bit while I'm here, but I've found myself at 3 am watching college football, going to sports bars and chastising the Brits for not drinking enough beer. But tonight is sort of the night to go to Sports Cafe and hang out with the Americans, so I might find myself caving again. After all, I have to take advantage of every opportunity to play beer pong I can, since the chances are few and far between. Also, I have so far failed on my quest to find red Solo cups here. Once I do find them I've promised my flatmates an American night where we play flip cup and beer pong and all those good ole' fashioned drinking games.

This past week was good-- start of classes lent a little normalcy to my life and I continued to do some of the touristy things that I've been meaning to. When Annie was here we did Buckingham Palace. I honestly wish there was a video of us watching the changing of the guard because we sounded like the most uncultured people I've ever met. For two Penn students it was pretty sad. As we walked up they were playing Star Wars music, which led Annie and I to the conclusion that Star Wars must have adapted the Buckingham Palace music for the movie. "I didn't know that's where this music was from!" It wasn't until the Beatles came on that we realized they were just playing a medley of random music. We also could NOT figure out what was going on with the hats-- some had horns, some had blue feathers, they appeared to be engaged in some sort of "band jam" battle of the hats. We probably should've read up on it before we got there, but that would've taken all the fun out of it. I walked away really wanting to know who designed those hats, 'cause someone had to wake up one day and think, "Oh man, best idea for a hat ever! It'll be bearskin, since bears are super British, and it'll be shaped kind of like a missile of fur." I want to have been at that planning meeting.

I also went to my very first British play on Wednesday, "Enlightenment". It just opened and we went for my London Theatre class. I liked it. Not the finest cinematic masterpiece I've ever seen, but I definitely enjoyed myself. Plus now I can say I've been to a London show!

Then on Saturday I went to Portabello Market with one of the Arcadia kids, Brent. It was fun and while there wasn't a ton of stuff I actually wanted to get it was definitely an experience to have been. We went towards the end of the day which was nice because it wasn't as crowded as I've heard it is in the morning. My only purchase was a pack of plastic hangers, which was pretty lame, but I really needed them so I guess it's nothing to scoff at. Then we tried to find a cute cafe to go to but caved and went to a Cafe Nero since we were both starving and nothing seemed to be serving food.

I kind of don't feel like it's the week right now since I didn't have class today. Plus we went to quiz night at the student union last night (kicked ass at some of the 80's themed questions, failed hardcore on others). It's hard to feel like I'm actually a student when most of my student activities revolve around the SU and its drink specials. I swear, I am going to class though. Even made it to my 9 am on time on Monday which those who know me will admit is super impressive; the amount of times Tricia saw me bolt out at 8:57 running to class last year was pretty embarrassing. Never on time.

Off now to buy a bottle of wine for my flatmate, Ollie, whose birthday commences at midnight tonight. More to come, as this week brings the booking of all of my trips, my second London show, and a potential trip to the London Eye and the aquarium.

Daily Reminder of Why College Classes (and Going Abroad) Are Great

You know that feeling when you're in class and think "I'm amazingly interested by what this professor is saying" and then you think "I'm amazingly interested by what the other students are saying" and then you walk out and think "I think I'm really going to like this class"? Yeah?

If not, maybe re-think your major, 'cause that's a real bummer.

I don't have anything to report except that I love my Modern American Fiction. I get to re-read "The Things They Carried" along with a host of other books, I love my professor, and my seminar leader is actually both interesting and interested. It feels like the perfect follow up to a Penn class I took, Classic Texts in American Culture, which was through the history department and covered major iconic texts from "Common Sense" to Stephen King's "Carrie". This class instead focuses on post-1945 fiction. Everyone makes fun of me for taking American fiction while in London, but now that I've been to my first class I know it was an amazing choice, because it really is a genuinely different perspective. And to be able to hear about America from a foreign perspective forces me to acknowledge that actually things in the U.S. are not like things in the rest of the world and our history is unique and strange in the same way that we view other countries as unique and strange.

In summary: it was a good day.

Lessons Learned

I'm finally starting to feel a little at home here in London. Maybe it's all the walking around and exploring or the fact that now I've been in New Cross for almost a week and a half. Might even be the fact that I triumphantly found my way home from a random tube stop on Sunday morning after crashing at UCL for the night. Whatever it is, I'm finding my feet.

This past weekend I did a mixture of New Cross and real London (I know I shouldn't make that distinction, but I feel like it's okay since we're technically in Zone 2 so not in the heart heart of London). Friday night I went with Hannah from my flat to an event at the Student Union called Love Music, Hate Racism. It was live music which was pretty cool and a nice change from random pub nights. Then on Saturday I had a welcome meeting in central London that all the Penn kids from various universities were at. It was awesome getting to see people I know and I hung out with the UCL kids for the day. Saw Shom's dorm, went to the Tate Modern, walked along the Thames and, in true Penn fashion, went to a BYO (known to the rest of the world as a BYOB, not sure why we drop the last B). Honestly, only with other Penn kids would I wind up at what I can only assume is one of a small number of BYOs in London. I did get my very first fish and chips since being here. Not only was the meal great, but I felt like I checked off a little box on my to do list, right up there with the tea & crumpets. If I had to name a regret from the day it would be finding 2 bottles of potent wine for £3 each (Parents and dearly respected elders: ignore this?). Lessons learned from the night: more than a bottle a person is never necessary, and it is a fabulous thing to have friends with beds/floors to crash on when one finds oneself far from the Goldsmiths campus.

Other things I've noted/learned about London:
-There must be something in the air/water here, because my skin is suffering terribly since I got here. As someone who has never had terrible skin issues I'm appalled by the state of my face since getting here.
-I understand it's a tea kind of place, but apparently that also translates into very bleh coffee, a travesty for a caffeine addict like myself. Most places if you order coffee it's just an Americano, which is fine but generally weak and not enough to keep me up on a day like today where I was up at 7:30.
-Free museums make getting cultured so much more fun. So far I've done the National Gallery and a little of the Tate Modern and both have been so amazing.
-Hair dryers are impossible to find.
-Not having a British credit/debit card makes certain parts of everyday life that I take for granted much more difficult. Having found a hair dryer the other day I couldn't buy it because Boots doesn't take cards without a "chip" in them, which apparently the cards here have. Also I can't automatically top up my oyster card (a travel card for the tube/buses) because my card isn't linked to a British address. Not the end of the world, but an inconvenience nonetheless.

Also, classes started today. I finally feel a little bit like a real person, although not too much since I don't have any class again tomorrow. I had 2 hours of lecture and 2 hours of seminars today, all for my two comm classes: Communication, Psychology & Experience and Representation & Textual Analysis. I really like both of my lectures and it'll be interesting to see how they continue. The professors, one of whom is from New Zealand, both seem really cool and relatively laid back. The Psych class seems really interesting, despite the fact that one person made the obligatory first day "Are you saying there's no free will?" comment. The Representation class deals with semiotics, media construction and things like "truth" in media, including celebrity representations, all of which is right up my nerdy media-loving alley. Then one of my seminars I loved. The other.. eh. Maybe this is just my junior-year cynicism but I'm increasingly noticing how much college students like to hear themselves talk. And college is the perfect breeding ground for the kind of self-indulgent, narcissistic rambling that I have an insanely low tolerance for and I'm sure have also been guilty of before. But one of my seminars is full of people with seemingly uninformed forceful opinions who love the sound of their own voices. I'm sure I'll get over (or I wont and I'll sulk in silence...) but it was just more noticeable to me than ever today. Other than that, I can tell I'm really going to like my Comm classes. On Wednesday I'll have the first day of my London Theater class where we see a show every week and on Thursday I'll have my comparative literature class, both of which I'm excited about.

It'll be interesting to see how the experience of being here changes as classes pick up and I turn into a real class-going, essay-writing student. Luckily with the imminent arrival of the fabulous Annie Bellis (a fellow Chi O for those of you not lucky enough to know my favorite Kansas City dweller), I can put off being a real person for a while longer. I could get used to this..

Addendum: re-reading my own post I do in fact the irony of complaining about self-indulgent rambling on a blog, perhaps the most self-admiring and narcississtic of all media. Do I get credit for the fact that whoever read my blog chose to subject themselves to it, as opposed to the inane tangents that are imposed on the rest of the students in my seminar by the worst offenders?