July 19th: off to London!

Sunday morning we got up to take the train to London. We had to leave around 10:30. A bus took us and our luggage to the train station, and then we had to go through two sets of border control: one to leave France, and one to enter the UK. Leaving France wasn’t too bad, but entering the UK was a little intimidating. While they were looking at our passports, they interrogated us on why we were going there, where we were staying, how long we were staying, how many people were with us, etc., etc. The guy that was questioning me was really soft spoken, so I couldn’t really hear what he was saying and I had to keep asking him to repeat the questions. Also, we weren’t allowed to tell them that we were in a study abroad group, because most study abroad trips are through a sister university that is in the country you’re going to, and they send you special documents. Our trip isn’t connected to another university, so we don’t have those documents, so we just had to tell them that we were traveling with a large group of friends. I’m pretty sure the guy could tell that I was intimidated, but he was really polite and let me through without a problem. On the other transfers that we’ve had, we’ve all sat next to each other on the trains, but that wasn’t the case with this one. We were all spread out across different cars. Luckily, I was seated next to Jenna instead of somebody I don’t know. We talked for a few minutes, and then, of course, I fell asleep for the rest of the train ride. I’m kind of sad that I missed going through the Chunnel, but I’m sure it was just dark. I didn’t wake up until a few minutes after we got into London. Unfortunately, we didn’t have a bus or anything to take us to our flats, so we had to haul our luggage through the metro system, referred to as ‘the tube’ here. It actually went a lot better than I would have expected, except all of blocking the stairs by hauling our luggage up and down them. When we got to our flats (not a hotel anymore, they’re actual student housing like dorm rooms), we couldn’t get in right away, so we sat around outside. Then, as it does the first day of any city we go to, it started to rain. The resident life supervisor was really great and let us come in and bring our luggage inside and hang out in the common room until we got our keys. We did our little orientation meeting to learn all of the rules and everything, then got our keys and headed up to our flats. We’re 3 or 4 flights of stairs up (I didn’t count, it made me feel better), and there are no elevators, so we hauled our luggage up some more stairs. When we made it up, we were all so excited about our flats. They’re so nice. We have 4 bedrooms that just have beds and closets, 3 bathrooms all with showers, a fully stocked kitchen, and a common living area with a TV. They’re so great. Julia, Amanda, Kylee and I all share a bedroom, and so far it’s been a lot of fun.
After getting in, we took an hour to rest and freshen up then went grocery shopping. The four of us that are rooming together got groceries together, and it was only about 80 pounds for all four of us, which was about 130 dollars (stupid conversion rates!). But we should be ok for most of the 2 weeks here, and 20 pounds a piece is way cheaper than it would be to eat out every night. The grocery store was closing 45 minutes after we got there, so we had to rush through like crazy, but we got almost everything we needed. Unfortunately, we had to carry all of our groceries home. It’s only a few blocks though. We stopped at a movie rental store on the way home to rent Harry Potter 5 to prepare to see the new one. When we got back to the flats, we quickly put our groceries away and headed back downstairs to meet Darrin for our walking tour of London. We got on the metro and went to Leicester Square, which is kind of like the Times Square of London. There are a few movie theatres surrounding the square, and those are the movie theatres that London movie premiers are done in. We walked around other parts of London and saw the Parliament building, Big Ben, and some other smaller sites. We got to see a couple of the Queen’s guards, which was pretty cool. After walking around London, we came back to the flats and just worked on homework and got settled in.