A Third Home?

I'm an adult now, I guess? It never really hit me until I boarded the plane to London with some of my closest friends that we were about to be in a foreign country without any adult supervision, beyond our own.

Rolling out of customs and into Heathrow was easier than I ever could've imagined. All of our luggage had made it, we bought our sim cards no problem and our cab driver was waiting under the International Arrivals sign holding a board with our name on it (how official). The drive from the airport to the flat was short and getting here and being greeted by a friend from home (who happens to be living in the same building) was one of the most refreshing things possible.

We carried our luggage up the stairs and entered our flat, tossing all of our stuff into the room before wanting to the local sainbury's next door to grab snacks and food because we were starving! Also, I'd like to publicly state that sainbury's will in fact be responsible for about 50% of the money that I spend while I'm in London.

In the process of defeating jet lag, we rearranged just about every piece of furniture in our room before we unpacked our belongs. Shortly after, we went on a walking tour of our neighborhood, Sheppard's Bush. There are two pubs just down the street from us, a bunch of cute little restaurants, along with Westfield Mall (what was once the second largest commercial centre in the UK) and Poundtown (which is really the old mall that is filled with pound stores and the reason for my happiness).

The next two days were filled with CAPA orientation activities where we made our way to our school and learned about the academic policies, safety protocols and the basics we'd need to know to survive in London. We ate lunch at Zack's, a cute little cafe just down the street from our school.

On our way back, we (got lost) on our way to Westfield Mall where we sat in awe over how nice the place actually was. When we walked in, we saw stores like Gucci, Prada, Louis Vutton and Coach. Immediately we couldn't even tell if we could afford to walk in this mall.

That night, we went to the Sindercombe Social which is a pub down the street from our apartment. There was live music and confusion from all of us on how to approach the bar, something that we'd never experienced due to the fact we're all underaged in America. It was a nice way to just end the day and talk with friends about how excited we are for these next four months.

Friday, the second day, was internship orientation with dos and don'ts for interviews and what is expected of us. This day was used to make sure that we weren't all freaking out over our internship placements and that any questions we had would be answered. We wandered around our school for lunch yet again, finding another cafe called Cafe Forum where we all panicked and ordered the cheese toastie.

After our orientation had finished, we had official British tea time at the local Holiday Inn (what?). We learned how to correctly stir our tea, hold our cups and were supplied with finger foods from sandwiches to sweets.

Friday night we made our way to Camden where our friend Tori is living. Camden reminded me of Wildwood; extravagant signs, little food shops, tacky little shops, etc. We went to two more bars, Free House which had a nice rooftop view of the street and the Monarch Bar which had more live music and was definitely my favorite of the three bars that I've been to so far.

On Saturday, we had another walking tour of our neighborhood were we saw the building where Dr. Who was created, found out how close we are to QPR's stadium and saw Royal Crescent in the Royal Borough of Chelsea and Kensington (the borough that Queen Victoria was born in). After our walk, we were placed onto a coach bus where we were driven by the Southbank and taken to St. Paul's Cathedral and Buckingham Palace (the Queen wasn't even home).

Sunday was just a day that we used to finally catch up on some much needed sleep. We ate lunch at a local burger place in Sheppard's Bush before venturing into central London to find our internships. While in London, we walked by the Shard and even got a nice view of the London Bridge, despite the cloudy, rainy London weather.

I can't wait to see what adventures these next four months bring me!