Tube-Hopping and People-Watching

The last 5 days have been so insanely busy, I really haven't had free time to just sit down and relax until tonight. But I've also been having the time of my life. London was amazing (albeit expensive), but we got to do some really fun touristy things, and meet some cool people. And moving into our Dublin apartment was a much-needed break from living the life of a backpacker. It's still sinking in that this is my home for the next 3.5 months! But first, a recap of London...

For starters, our London trip was almost doomed from the start. My travel clock didn't go off, 

and we woke up 40 minutes late. We both skipped makeup and brushing our hair (not kidding, we were really roughing it that morning), and rushed to the airport, in time to make our flight. We arrived in London mid-morning on Saturday, and it took us a good hour and a half to voyage from Gatwick Airport to our hostel, near Russell Square. Because Meaghan and I are both small-town girls, navigating one of the biggest tube systems in the world wasn't exactly second nature for us. Luckily, with a little help, a little 30 minute ride in the wrong direction, and a little walking, we arrived safely at our hostel by mid-afternoon. And our hostel was quite a destination in itself. It's an 800-bed, "Voted Funkiest Hostel 2009", blue and green painted, pub-containing hostel. Definitely quite the experience, but we enjoyed our stay at The Generator Hostel. 

So after we staked out our beds, we were starving, and a little tired but we headed to Hamstead, where Meaghan knew of a really good crepe stand. Our 30-minute wait in the "queue" was more than worthwhile, though, because our ham/egg/cheese crepes were amazing. We then took a stroll around Hamstead Heath (a huuuuge park in Hamstead), and admired some of the beautiful townhouses surrounding the Heath. Then we met a friendly Australian, who chatted with us as we walked back to the tube, to head back to the hostel.

I think our second wind kicked in by the time we got back to the hostel, because we decided to go investigate the hostel's pub and see what there was to do. We got there just in time to enjoy the last ten minutes of happy hour, and happily forked over just £1.50 for Strongbow, a really good cider beer. We also sampled one of Generator Hostel's "signature shots", a combination of Bailey's and Amaretto, which tasted like a Starbucks frappucino. We hung out there for a little longer, and met MORE Australians (sidenote: we met more Australians in London than Londoners, fact.). Afterwards, we decided to take the tube a few stops up to Piccadilly Circus, which is basically the nightlife hotspot in London. As soon as we exited the tube station we were bombarded by people handing out fliers asking us if we needed a club to go to. We politely declined (read: plowed through the crowd like Moses parting the Red Sea), and found a really cool pub/club where we spent the rest of our evening. £8 was a little steep of a cover fee, but we figured "when in London...", and had a great time dancing (ALL they played was Black Eyed Peas and Lady Gaga), hanging out, and talking to other people we met from all over Europe. After a loooong walk home, even the squeakiness of the hostel beds couldn't keep us from a good night's rest.

I woke up Sunday morning and realized a few things: 1- Yes, that brief-covered butt on the bed across from mine was a male's, 2- There were actually two guys sleeping in that bed (because one was too cheap to pay for his own hostel bed), and 3- Our room smelled. BAD. Initially, we thought our room was supposed to be all-female, but it turned out to be fine.  That night the guys in our room were all from Dublin, and had lots of advice for us, and places for us to go in Dublin. And we pretty much left the room that morning ASAP, to avoid the smell. Someone had probably shut the window of something in the middle of the night. We spent the day touring The British Museum, the Tate Modern, and seeing other sights of the city like St. Paul's Cathedral. 

ALSO that day, we had a hilarious happening in room 017 of The Generator Hostel. Someone in our room had an admirer. Meaghan and I were just laying down, getting ready to go to bed, and

our Irish roommates had just departed. One of the Irish boys came back about 15 minutes later, holding a fruitbasket. He read us the note ("Yesterday night was WONDERFUL! I wait for you in the room 012. Come!") and asked if it was ours. It wasn't, so we spent the next hour hypothesizing whose if could've been. One of our other male roommates came back a little later, and I tried to ask him if it was his. After my odd question, he looked at me and said "I... no speak English. I... am French." Unfortunately I do not contain enough words in my brain's rollodex of French vocab to even begin to repeat what I'd just asked, so we just awkwardly smiled at each other, and he left. Thus the fruitbasket mystery remains unsolved.

The next day we decided to go to the famous Harrods, and then to the Notting Hill Carnival. Harrod's was pretty much the most overwhelmingly expensive store I've ever been in. Picture this: I'm standing in the stationary section, looking at a cute little leather-bound notebook. It was designed for you to chronicle favorite restaurants, hotels, museums, etc. for different locations, so that you can remember your favorite places. I liked it. It was small, cute, and useful. I checked the pricetag. £ 77. £77! As in, the equivalent of about $130 for a SMALL LITTLE NOTEBOOK. Suffice to say, the only proof I have of visiting Harrods is a keychain, 3 jars of jelly (3 for £2), and the memory of their delicious hazelnut gelato. That's really all I can afford. 

Later that day we ventured to The Notting Hill Carnival. I had read about it online before our trip, and it seemed fun-- a big caribbean-themed festival with music, food, etc. The Australian man we had met in Hamstead told us not to breathe the air at the carnival "if ya know what I'm sayin'", but we still really had no idea what to expect. As soon as our train

neared the stop, we started to get a better picture of what the carnival was: women in bedazzled rhinestoned bras and fishnet catsuits, EVERYONE wearing black/yellow/green, oh, and there were so many people on the tube we could barely move. Once we got off, it. was. INSANITY. Thousands of people crowded off the tube and we were practically carried with the flow of people up toward the carnival. Once we were "in" the carnival, the bass was thumping so hard I thought my heart would stop, we waded through a sea of crumpled Red Stripe (jamaican lager) cans, and, let's just say, the scent of caribbean celebration was in the air. Literally. All in all, it was a great time. We pretty much just meandered around like tourists, and eventually just plopped down on a bench and shamelessly people-watched for a good hour. Afterwards, we trekked across half of London in search of a Thai restaurant (we were both craving it), were finally rewarded for our efforts, and then went to bed early. 

Our last day in London was spent at Buckingham Palace. Basically, it was beautiful, and the tour was a lot more interesting than I expected. The palace contains over 400 rooms, and over 

70 bathrooms! It's decoration was mindblowingly intricate, and each room we went in was more ornate than the last. We also got to see a cool display about Queen Elizabeth's visits to all the British Commonwealths (all the countries that claim Elizabeth as their Queen, basically as just a figure-head), and the dresses she wore on the visits, and gifts she received from other countries. After our tour we finally found Big Ben (I had wanted to see it since we arrived), and then found Platform 9 3/4 in King's Cross on our way home. We had dinner at a little Mediterranean restaurant with one of the other girls in our hostel room. She's Australian, 18 years old, and has been traveling Europe by herself for the past 3 months during her gap year! We'll hopefully meet up with her again when she visits Dublin next week.

Wednesday (yesterday) morning we woke up, bright-eyed and bushy-tailed (well, as much as you can be for staying in a 12-person hostel dorm room and using communal showers for a week), and hit the trail back to the airport to make our way to Dublin. We felt calm, cool, and collected as we boarded the train amongst a stampede of suit-clad businesspeople. It wasn't until about halfway through our train ride, when the train started going only about 15 MPH through the countryside, that we realized we were probably going to miss our flight. And we did. We arrived to check in about 8 minutes after check-in closed. And because Ryan Air is cheap (until the gouge you on everything BESIDES the ticket price), they were going to charge us £140 to reprint and rebook for the next flight, just a couple hours later. Luckily after a little sweet-talking we got the ticket man to lower our tick price to just £100, and just a few hours later we were back in Dublin.

I'm almost done. Promise.

Because we arrived in Dublin after most of our group, we hitched a cab, which turned out to be a great decision. Now, prior to coming to Dublin, I've heard repeatedly that the Irish all have great senses of humor, and are really friendly, but in the past week we just hadn't met enough Irish people for me to judge that for myself. Well this cab driver had us rolling with laughter all the way to our apartment. He was full of colorful language, inappropriate jokes, and insults about the passersby and their apparel. He even called our study abroad program director and left her a great voicemail about how dizzy he was from going in circles because we couldn't find "the feckin' apartment". It really was a great "re-introduction" to our new home for the next few months.

After a lot of unpacking, and figuring out our new apartment (I'll post pictures next time, it's cute and cozy aka small), Allie and I decided to explore the pub just down the street from our apartment, that we had heard from previous study-abroaders, was the best place to go. We cheers-ed our first Guinnesses, and met a lot of other people from our program, which was fun. 

Today we took a bus tour of the city, which was fact-filled, but a little dry by the end of it. Probably the highlight of the tour was when we stopped at Phoenix Park, a big, beautiful park on the west side of the city, and we were all taking pictures near a very tall cross statue. Our view from the statue was great, we could see for miles. And in one direction, we saw what looked like a sheet of rain, approaching where we were. I heard someone say "hey- does that look like rain coming toward us?" and "Yeah, it's definitely raining there" and then BAM. Downpour. I wrapped my scarf over my head like Strega Nona, and we all ran for the bus.

We also experienced our first real Dublin grocery shopping trip today. We were so out of our element in Tesco (the grocery store) it was ridiculous. Not only had none of us ever done "real grocery shopping" (beyond satisfying our carnal desires for Chef Boyardee and microwave dinners), but we were in a sea of unfamiliar brands, and prices that make as much sense as if they were in monopoly money. Plus, after each of us struggled through the 3/4 mile walk back to our apartment from the grocery store, once we got to the kitchen we were feeling more victorious than Vince Vaughn's team at the end of Dodgeball. 

So, that is what I've done with my life these last 5 days. It's been chaotic, fun, tiring (I've seriously never walked so much in my life), and overall, great. I'm having an amazing time here and I can't wait for what the next few months have to offer!

Cheers!