Week 5ish?

Monday morning I got back from Amsterdam, which took 5 hours and 8 different points of transportation: car, train, airport, plane, airport, shuttle, train, tube, walking. It was pretty boring...but I made it back before class even with a 45 minute delay on my flight. After class, which we had in the park since it was lovely outside, we all went back to the flat and watched 'Shakespeare in Love', to prepare us for seeing 'Romeo and Juliet' later in the week. I had seen a few clips of the movie before randomly, but never the whole thing. It was funny and cute:) Favorite lines: "I know something of a woman in a man's profession. Yes, by God, I do know about that." (Queen Elizabeth) and "This is not life, Will. It is a stolen season." (Viola).

Tuesday, for our class outing we went to the Saatchi Gallery, a

contemporary art gallery in the upscale part of London. I don't see too much in the really creative pieces of art or understand it, but there were many pieces here that I appreciated and was intrigued by. For instance this room, on the right, was a room that was an entire optical illusion. It looks like a black floor when you first look at it, then it looks like a giant pool, and you are seeing what's below the black water. But it is actually a giant pool of oil, and it is a reflection of the room and ceiling that you are seeing! There was also a cool room made up of 300 speakers, experimenting with the feel, projection, and mixing of sound. The gallery was eye-opening, since I hardly get to see art like that a lot.

Tuesday night, we watched the second to last World Cup game between the Netherlands and Uruguay at Weatherspoons, which seems almost routine now! The Netherlands won wooo and gets to go to the finals, which I'm sure Emma and her family back in Laren are happy about. In art on Wednesday we went to the Tate Britain, and looked at a lot of Britain's (possibly) most gifted painters, Turner. His paintings were incredible, full of color, expression, and vision that made Turner one of the best.

Thursday morning, I met up with my friend from home, Shelby! She has a nannying job here in London this summer, so we finally got a chance to get together while we're both here! We met in the station and went to Kings Cross, just to see Platform 9 and 3/4's, a touristy thing they added for all of the Harry Potter fans:) We then shopped around Oxford Street a bit (I took her to Primark again, that insane department store!), then got some Pret to-go (we both had these wonderful Falafel wraps), and ate in a park near the Marble Arch. It was great to see and catch up with her for a bit!

After saying goodbye to Shelby, I met back up with the group and we all boarded a big bus for Stratford. Sarah and I sat in the back so we had a lot of room to stretch out. The two hour drive passed quickly since I read the play "Look Back In Anger", homework for our theatre class, and listened to music, even dancing a little when Sarah and I got bored near the end of the drive. We arrived at the super cute Craig Cleeve Bed and Breakfast. Sarah and I's bathroom light didn't work, so it was somewhat difficult showering in the dark. I have a bruise on my foot to prove it. We didn't have much time before we had to be at the theatre, so we all went to dinner at this really awful place that charged me a pound for tap water. It was probably the worst food I've had since I've been here. At least Stratford-upon-Avon was really pretty, and I enjoyed walking near the river.


We sauntered over to the Courtyard theatre (the Swan was being renovated) and watched 'Romeo and Juliet', put on by the infamous Royal Shakespeare Company. It was an interesting show: everyone was dressed in the Shakespearian style, except for the main couple Romeo and Juliet. Modern props and effects like bikes, cameras, fog, fire, projections, mars bars, etc, were used to give the play a more contemp feel and message. Even the dancing was really strange; it was a mix sort-of between Bollywood, Russian, and European style. I didn't really enjoy the first half much, since we were up on the third floor in an awkward spot. I noticed during the first act that there were four open seats down on the first floor though, in the second row (highly unusual, since most performances were sold out). So our theatre professor generously saved two of the seats during intermission, since no one was going to show, and Sarah and I got to watch the second half from there. It was SO much better! We felt way more involved, and could see the actors a lot better. Thank you Professor Fox! After the play, we were extremely lucky and got to have a talk-back with the crazy actor who played Mercutio. He was open and willing to share, giving us the inside on working with the director, being a part of the show, and inspirations for his character. But he did seem somewhat...crazy or cracked out a bit. Shelia, our teacher, even mentioned that he was speaking to us through a "Coke haze" and apologized, but we still thought he was great. After he left the B&B, most of us crashed, and Sarah and I had girl talk for almost two hours!

The next morning, I had a HUGE but delicious breakfast (I wasn't hungry until 4ish), including traditional poached eggs on toast! That was a treat after bad bowls of cereal I've had for a while...We then hopped back on the bus for a tour of Stratford-upon-Avon, on which we saw Trinity Church (Shakespeare's resting place), a tarp that was supposedly hiding the real Chitti Chitti Bang Bang, and Anne Hathaway's cottage (Shakespeare's wife). The cottage was surrounded by thousands of beautiful flowers,

and woods to walk around in. The house

itself was simple, and I think we all

enjoyed running around in the fields, walking through tunnel trellis's, lying on the picnic benches, and going through the gift shop more.

We ended at Shakespeare's home and birthplace in downtown Stratford. Ryan, Katie, and I split a piece of amazing carrot cake, which we've been craving since we've been here, and Sarah and I walked around the shops before we left (I bought some tea for my mom finally at Whittard's). We got back on the bus and drove again, this time to Oxford. There we took a two hour tour of the beautiful 'University', when it's more like a complicated college, and had a wonderful cafe dinner and Cadbury milkshake before we left for home.

Saturday morning, I did a totally spur of the moment and random event called Big Dance 2010. The city had dedicated this whole past week to dance, and this was the big finale, that was free to whoever wanted to participate. So I went out to the South Bank Centre at 10am and registered. There were five different groups you could sign up to be in and each group learned a different dance. Each group represented a different hub of London, as well as a continent, and that inspired your dance. There was Africa (in yellow), Americas (green), Asia (purple), Europe (red), and Australasia (light blue). I learned the dance for the Australasia group because it looked the most fun:) We rehearsed a bit and learned the finale, then had an hour break before we had to be back at the centre to get ready to parade over to Trafalgar Square. So I walked up and down the Thames River with iced tea and blueberry muffin in hand, getting a close view of the Eye and Parliament, as well as some of the entertainers on the riverside.
At noon, our group of blue practiced our dance once by the river, then were lead by some awesome drummers to Trafalgar Square. We danced the whole way there, and even the bridge was blocked off just for us to cross and dance on! We had to wait a while in the Square for all the groups to get there, and that wouldn't have been so bad if it hadn't been so hot...I can't believe I didn't get sunburned. At 2 we finally got to dance and it was really fun! Each group did there routine, then we did them all at the same time, then we mixed into each other so that all the colors were mixed, and performed a finale. Apparently, there was a total of 4,000 of us dancing, which is pretty awesome! It was a great experience, dancing with so many people I didn't know, from all over the world. My partner in the dance was a lady from France (that rhymed) and she was just there to have a blast. While I wish someone could have been there with me, it truly was a memorable experience, and I am glad I got to do what I love with others for the hundreds people watching. So far this is one of the only pictures I've found of it.

It took me about 3 hours to cool off after that, but later that night a group of us went out to Fabric, a popular club in London, and we had another great time dancing and whatnot. Sunday was a chill day, but my roommate Sam and I went out to Hyde Park to enjoy the beautiful day. It was really relaxing; going to parks like this is something I'm really going to miss in the States. We took pictures with a lot of fountains, saw a swan sleeping in the middle of a busy walking pathway, and saw the statue of Peter Pan that was absolutely, creatively adorable! That night we watched the final game of the World Cup, and the Netherlands unfortunately lost to Spain in OT. Oh well, at least they made it that far and I had a great time watching so many of the games this summer.

Song of the Day: "Walkin' on Sunshine"