Last Night

Well, it is my last official night in London. I'm sad to be leaving it so soon....I feel like I just got the whole hang of it.
This morning, Neil left me to go back to California.
Then I went walking around Oxford Street and did some last moment shopping.
NYU-L provided a BarBQ in Bedford Square's gardens, which was delicious and somewhat sad. I love how I didn't even recognize half of the kids there. I'm wicked social.
Paul told me to Facebook him to keep in touch, and Nigel gave me a hug.
Tonight, apparently I will be stopping by at Rob's flat for a little get together. Then I'm meeting up with Oz at Oxford Circus to say goodbye. Then I might finish the night with NYU kids at Print Works (just because I feel bad if I don't...I hate Print Works).
My flight's at 2pm tomorrow, so that means I'm out of here around10am.

Oh London, I'll miss you dearly. Europe, I miss you already.

The next time I'm writing in a blog, I'll be in the US again.
If you are interested in potentially keeping track of me while I'm in the states, I have a Domestic Kim Times.



Otherwise, the next time I'll be writing on this blog will probably be....in January, when I'm in Paris at Sciences Po.

Prodigal Roommate

I have never been so upset about cleaning out a fridge & cupboard in my life.
When Erin left, she had left a LOAD of stuff behind (including clothing): CD cases, a first aid stash, some toiletries that are usable, books, notes, etc.
Ok I can understand that, to a degree.
But when Julia left this morning, she had left an entire slew of food behind. This I am not OK with.
To name a few: boxes of Bisquick, vegetables, fruit, boxes of cereal, condiments to the wazoo (including 3 jars of jam!), cartons of eggs, old chicken, 2 bags of sugar, 2 bags of flour, food that grew legs, cheeses, whipped creams, a pack of Red Bull, a few Fosters, and 3 bottles of vodka.
Most of it I had to throw away.
I donated a boxful to charity.
The rest of the stuff, though, brand new stuff, and definitely salvagable, but opened, so not donatable. Neil and I are trying to get rid of if all as much as possible. I made biscuits. I might make some kind of coated baked chicken (chicken fingers? cereal-yogurt coated? who knows). We made a lot of eggs with onions.
Not to mention I have my own food to try to get rid of ASAP.
This is ridiculous.

I'm going to the gym to work this off.

And The Verdict Is...

Done.

Time to give Neil the full attention he deserves. And to nap.
Note: Neil is my good friend from NYU who just studied the semester in Ghana.

Andy Was Here...Now I'm Alone

While Andy was here, I actually met British people I liked! It's so sad that the last 2 weeks of class I meet mutual friends that are good people that I would want to make a true effort in keeping communication with while in the states. And they were all very smart AND socially capable, so the conversation was always flowing with ease! IT WAS SO NICE! But now...alas, c'est la vie...

He came pretty jetlagged, so we basically called it a....day when he got here. We got lunch at Tito's, made him go to Tesco's for groceries, napped for a few hours, and then I cooked him dinner while studying (he was just chilling). His friend, Nicola (spelling?), from an Oxford chorus, called at night. We met her at her flat on Bond Street, had some tea, talked for a few hours, and I made him walk all the way back (a few miles, middle of the night, but I loved it).
Andy is a skytzophrenic. He slides in between a British/American accent, depending on who he talks to. NUTS! I will admit, however, that I was also guilty of similar issues all weekend.

Friday, I made him go to the gym (YMCA). He left early for a date (it WAS a date!) while I finished up at the gym. Then I went home to study some more. When Andy came back, he threw a slight tangent, and let me know we were eating dinner with one of his other Oxford (straight) friends, Adam.
Let me just say for the record that Adam was very cute, Scottish, well dressed, smart, and funny. We had wonderful banter all night. And conversations. Great guy. Too bad I'm leaving in a week!
Adam met us at my flat, and we talked for a while in the living room. Andy, having plans with some gay guys to go clubbing or whatnot, wanted to go out and eat, so we walked around to find a quiet place to eat that would cater to someone who is gluten free and allergic to most fish (yeah, that's Adam). After walking a very large circle around the City of London, we settled for the Bleeding Heart Tavern. A British tavern owned by a group of French men with a French chef. Needless to say, the food was brilliant. I had some pig/black pudding dish. The chocolate mousse was scrumptuous. And the conversation was one of the better conversations I've had while in the UK.
To Andy's dismay, we talkd for too long, so his gay friends went home. So, we went for another walk around SoHo, Covent Garden. Long walk, long talk, I loved it. But Adam had to catch the last tube to whereever he lives, so we called it a night.
But no, it was not the end of the night. Julia decided to eat lots of pasta before getting completely wasted while mixing drinks, so we walked into the flat to find out she had not only been sick in the bathroom for a few hours, but she had mostly missed the toilet. Yes, people, the bathroom looked like spaghetti. And she had decided to go to the bed one time to sleep, but didn't make it back to the bathroom. Lovely. Andy and I, being completely disgusted, used the basement toilet to get ready for bed.

Saturday, Andy and I headed for Oxford. We first met one of his NYU friends at Victoria Station for lunch(she's from Chambers this semester...so I'll be seeing her more often). That was nice.
A 2-hour ride to Oxford. Andy's close friend, Fabio (yes, he's from Italy), met up with us at the train station and brought Andy and his luggage to his flat that him and his boyfriend, Alex (from Germany), share. The place was soooo cute, and they're a very adorable couple. Alex and I talked about middle eastern studies and politics while the other 2 prepped for an Oxford outing.
Andy and Fabio had me do the 2-hour walking tour of Oxford University in about 45 minutes. I was impressed. And it was a definite plus to be with Oxford students/alumn, because their student cards let us have access to ALL of the MANY places that tourists typically cannot enter ever. I was feeling mighty cool.
I saw a LOT of old buildings. Very pretty, Andy took pictures for me. And I also ate at Ben's Cookies (A MUST! AMAZING! so gooey, and chocolatey) with them. We walked around some beautiful gardens and really stunning areas. And the conversation was always entertaining and intelligent. Well, except for the fact that Andy can't get through 20 minutes without some crude remark.
Cream tea was wonderful, the scones were to die for (and the jam!). We mosied about for a little while longer, got caught in a rainstorm, and then headed back to the flat. Fabio had made homemade lasagna, and I felt sooo spoiled. A wonderful dinner, wonderful company. I haven't been so happy in England before! We talked a bit after dinner, ate some fruit, then I caught the 10:45bus back to London.
A woman (and her dog) sat opposite me in the bus. We had a wonderful conversation. She was an old secondary school teacher, and we talked about foreign exchanges, the differences in cultures nationally and internationally....women's roles in Muslim societies....really, 2 hours of using my brain, FOR ONCE!!! People to actually talk intelligently to! It was a great day.
Getting home sucked, but otherwise, I was feeling accomplished, encouraged, and reaffirmed into human society.

Now, I study for 3 finals. Happy Mother's Day (US only), Mom. I'm going to continue to freak out, now...

Guest columnist

After so many months of ruining kim's reputation, I figure I might as well post a guest column while that slut is studying for finals. So today I arrived in London and I wanted to take kim to a sex shop but obviously she wasn't having any of it (she'll cave soon! soon I say!) . I ended up standing outside the door to her classroom waiting like some hooker on a street corner for her to show up.

Obviously since it was actually a nice day outside in london (big big big shock and gasp) I ended up ditching her boring ass media studies class to go shopping instead. We went back to her flat and instead of having a wild orgy, I applied my clay mask cleanser to clean away the sins so already apparent on my face before going to lunch at this random sandwich place called Titties or Titos or something like that.

By this point, the jet lag had set in, and Whoresome, in a bid to keep me awake, dragged me to Tescos to pick up provisions for dinner (mostly sausages. Uncut sausages galore. oh and cucumbers. Why would kim want so many cucumbers? ;) )

Whoresome is currently sitting on the couch reading some exceedingly uninteresting shit in preparation for her finals while I waste time on her computer downloading gay porn and surfing how-to-be-a-crackwhore- sites for the best street corners to practice my trade here.

More to come later, when we go street walking after dinner (to a cafe of course. The brothel, we'll visit later) .


Slut.

I'm Alive

Just to say that if you're reading this (cough cough, family), I'm alive. I've been pent up for days now, trying to study and write final papers.

Friday, I went out with some random guys (Bob & Rob) from class. It was fun, we went to a few pubs, hung out with a few other NYU kids (which was potentialy awkward), danced, and I taught Rob how to salsa. Well, tried to...

Last night, Oz and I met up late and went to some place called the Zoo Bar (a slightly sketchy place with many-a-wasted Brits dancing on bartops...really, a treat for all) with some of his Barcelonian and Istanbulian friends. Seeing as many of his friends there were religiously Muslim, we stuck to sodas, and the two of us kidded with each other and goofed off while making fun of the people in the bar all night. I tried to show him how to dance like an American. He didn't get it. And he made fun of my English.

Today, my laptop and I have been inseperable while I attempt to outline this media paper I am writing. Though I completely disagree with my own paper, the thesis statment is: Hollywood hegemony exists in the global film industry because of its overall superiority, especially in business tactics, quality for the popular public, and professional education. Any takers?

The paper's due on Thursday, Andy is coming to visit on the same day, finals start on the 15th, and Neil comes that day, too. This will be a trip!

Edinburgh, Scotland

Denysha, Eliana & I went to Edinburgh for the weekend. We got flew into and landed on Saturday at around 10pm. As soon we landed....crap....we realized none of us had money to use for this trip. Ok, we'll work with it...right? College kids have no money, right? We'll be fine. Right.
So we shuttled to the center of town to grab another shuttle to our hostel. Little did we know when we reserved at the Globetrotter Inn that it is a 30min. drive from City Centre. Slightly inconvenient, but we were rolling with it.

The hostel itself was nice. It sat right on the water with a grassy knoll in the back. There was a bar lounge, a laundry room, a computer room with movie theatre, a gym/spa, mess hall (free breakfast!), etc. And the dorms had cute little nooked bunkbeds. The bathrooms were big communals.

When we got there, our hostel was teeming with old (& very drunk) British men. They were loud, sociable, and ready to amuse (which they did oh so well). We were encountered by one on the shuttle who talked about how much he didn't like Tony Blair but woah that chic was gorgeous over there.
Keep in mind that none of us were used to listening to Scottish accents, which are very different from the English accents we've grown accostomed. So, understanding what was going on and what people were talking about was (though very nice to listen to) extremely hard.
We went into the bar for pints of water. Sat there for a while, listening to the 80s rock in the background, exhausted. Eliana went up early to bed. Then, Denysha's afro became the main topic of the men around us. They started approaching us like we were the only women in the bar. Oh wait, we were. One was nice enough to explain that it was a party where one of them, "the groom", was left by "the bride". Oh, good. We went to bed quickly after that.

Sunday, we headed out to explore the wonders of Edinburgh. In other words, we didn't know what on earth we were going to do.
The city is beautiful; it is surrounded by water and mountains, and in the center of the city is a large hill/mountain with a massive medieval castle covering it (Edinburgh Castle). The buildings were tightly packed on the hills. Nice green and gardens everywhere. Buildings battled between Greek, Roman, Gothic, Baroque, and medieval architecture.
We started climbing a hill towards the castle. I really wanted to go into the castle. The castle's entrance was 10 pounds. Agh, no, thanks.
We started to mosey down the Royal Mile (a mile-long road between the old castle and new Holyrood Palace....completely littered with stores, pubs, and other assorted fancifuls). We were trying to find free things to do, and there wasn't much.
We ended up at the bottom of the Royal Mile, and looked up. A mountainish hill you can climb on an open trail?! Oh, I was excited. The girls, however, were not. But, wrongly assuming it was Calton Hill, I made them walk up the hill. It was quite steep for a leisurely stroll. And, me being deathly afraid of heights, VERY dangerous. The girls were troopers for most of it. It was a breathtaking view of the city and surroundings.
Afterwards, we hit up a small cafe for a cheap lunch outside. To our surprise, we found ourselves in front of a place of Clairvoyant Cleansing! This interested us quite, and proceeded in. Eliana became annerved, and began to freak out about the whole situation. Denysha & I, having been in these places before, were happy. And besides, the atmosphere was positive, light, and airy. Nothing bad going on, here. We were in a room full of people reading tarot cards, giving reiki massages, and other joyous things. Eliana couldn't have stuck out more. Being so uptight about it all, women came to her asking if she wanted "help". Being unable to sit still, she kept blowing them off. Denysha & I just laughed and chilled.
After a while, we upped and left. We found a postcard ad for some sort of spiritual festival, Beltane, that night on Calton Hill, which we found out was actually a smaller hill on the other side of the city. Of all we knew, it was just a bunch of people playing with fire and talking about the earth. Why not?
We quickly hit up the National Museum of Scotland. We didn't end up staying too long, and we found ourselves sitting and talking in St.Gile's Cathedral for over an hour. That's one ugly cathedral.
Then we discovered the Real Mary King's Close, and opted to pay for this one tour. Basically, a few hundred years ago, Edinburgh's Chamber of Commerce decided to knock down a few of the tight neighborhoods in order to build a gov. building. But they left ruins undernearth. And these ruins were haunted with old people from the plague, as well as others. But we didn't know that until we took the tour. The tour was very informative, but also scary. It was extremely strange because you could see the old buildings and the dramatic slope of the earth. And it was DARK. And creepy. We wimpered the entire time.
After running out of that tour as soon as it finished, we ate some cheap kebabs at a hole in the wall. Some Scottish man talked to us about what to do around here for youth. Then we started to walk to Calton Hill for Beltane.

Beltane, where do I start? Well, this event is ENORMOUS, especially with all of the college students. We walked about 20 minutes to get to the back of the entrance line. People were dressed up, not dressed up, drinking, eating, painted in weird colors. Oh god, what have we gotten ourselves into?
So we walk up the hill to find a mass of people in front of the Greek monument. And the crowd was growing. Men in black capes and painted red were walking in a pack to one side. Were we in some sacrificial ceremony?? I asked someone, who said basically it was just a big party where people drink and some theatre kids dance around half naked to celebrate the beginning of May. Right, we knew that. But my Lord, did they put on a show. Drummers dressed in black, torches lit, lighting wooden structures on fire, blue men dancing, white painted women dancing. The crowd was very aggressive, and several times we all got swept up a bit or completely stuck (literally, physically). A procession. Drums. Tribal cries. It was sensory overload.
Though it was kind of fun, we ran out of that place 3 hours or so into it. We had to catch our shuttle, anyways (which, Eliana would like to let everyone know, she fell on her face while running to catch it).

Monday was a lot more low-key. It was Bank Holiday, so not as much was left open. We groggily ate breakfast (cereal, OJ, & toast for all). I went to the book swap in the hostel and picked up "The Alchemist". It was raining. We had to check out and carry our bags all day. We got to town with nothing to do. So, we walked. We first hit up the National Gallery and the Portrait Gallery. But we weren't much for museums, so we walked about a mile on the opposite side of the city to the college area, The Meadows. It was, all grass. That's it. So we chilled out for a while there. Then we walked over to Jimmy Chung's Chinese Buffet (I didn't explain, but, this restaurant was the meeting point for the shuttle, and became the topic of quite a many conversations). It was Chinese food, American style. Very very bad for you. But good.
Shuttled back to the airport 2 hours before flight, and read.
I finished the book. It was very good.

For the girls' defenses, I made them walk A LOT. Sometimes they were not very happy with me because of how much I wanted to walk, and uphill mostly. But they still did it mostly. Thanks, girls.