Hannah Montanna in London

Madison dont get to excited this does not mean that I saw her but just that I have been listening to Rock Star for like the last two hours while I have been studying... granted it isnt really studying music but it is still really enjoyable to listen to! Listen to it there for me and sing it as loud as you can!!! Lots of Love, Megs

Sunday in London...

So I am still in London and loving it! Today we went to church in a ward that took us an hour and a half to get to... first by tube then by train and then walking... but the ward was really nice. There were about 50 people there and about 70 persent of them were of African desent although they almost all had British accents. I volenteered to help out in primary because the other girls really didnt want to but once I got there I began to think that it was a bad idea! The kids in there were out of control!!!! There were three girls that were all pretty good but the two boys were moving all over the place and I could hardly get them to stand still! I ended up trying to bring Samual the Lamenite to life but I dont know how well I did because I hadn't read the lesson at all but oh well I think that they might have learned something... I hope.

Riding the train was really fun but on the way home I was so tired that I ended up falling asleep on both the train and the tube. But there were girls there to wake me up and I made all of my stops! Dinner tonight like all of the food here is wonderful and there was a cheerly chocolete cherry cake for dessert but before you begin to worry they only serve dessert on sundays and we have been walking on average about 3 to 4 miles a day just around London doing assignments or trying to get were the fun is!

The rest of the night I did readings and wrote a field note. Not bad for pretty much not doing any real homework this week... (the reason I say real homework is because alot of our assignments are going places and looking at things or going on walks... for more info on the walks check out my class blog at http://meganslondonwalks.blogspot.com/ because I dont want to post it twice). It is getting late... so night and all my love!

Saturday on the Thames!

Today I went and did the walk on the Thames (it is one of the walks that we have to do for class). The walk was a really nice one right along the river but I ended up getting lost quite a few times... (imagine that!) The walk brought me along all of the bridges from tower bridge to hungerford bridge. This Saturday happened to be the Thames festival and so there were a lot of booths set up and a lot of places to eat. We ended up getting three mini pies: meat, chicken and mango, and chicken, cheese and avacado. Michele and I split them so that way we each got a taste and they were actual really good!

Also along the Thames under a bridge was a used book seller... the picture is above... and it has got to be the coolest place that I have seen in a really long time! I ended up finding this really sweet looking copy of Pride and Prejudice and Love's Labor's Lost and bought them for a little under 6 pounds. After the Festival we meet up with a larger group and went to a concert in St. Martins-in-the-Fields where we listened to Vivaldi's Four Seasons and selections from Purcell, Handel, Mozart, and Bach perfored by the Belmont Ensemble of London with Helena Wood as the violin soloist. It has got to be one of the most amazing performances that I have been to! The whole situation was perfect although our seats were in the balcane and we couldnt see the performers but being in the church with the classical music made us all wish that we could be dancing in Pride and Prejudice or be transported back in time. It was a wonderful day!

The British Museum

The British Museum was amazing! It was so large that it took us 2 hours to go through just the Greek, Roman, and Egypt rooms, we didn't even try to make it to the rooms that were devoted to England or we would have been in there all day and we had to leave something to do on other days! The classical exhibits were beautifully done with great explanations and examples. I saw the frieze from the Parthanon and another temple (below) that were transported here from Greece, along with statues from both Rome and Egypt! But the most exciting historical object that I saw today was the Rosetta Stone!!!! It was a lot larger then I thought but it was just as wonderful as I had hoped. Of course I couldn't read it but I enjoyed pretending and gazing! It was a wonderful day, but then everyday is wonderful when one is in London!!!

Shakespeare on the Street

After going to church at the historic Hyde Park Chapel we went on a little walk around Hyde Park and Kensington Gardens. The walk was beautiful but the problem was the shoes that I wore and the rain that was coming down. The combination of the two lead to some really nasty blisters on both of my feet, one of which popped on the walk home so now we are on the watch for infection. This is a picture of the blister that didn't pop but still really is sore. After church we walked home and took the round about way in Hyde Park and saw the outside of Kensington Palace and walked down Embassy way where most of the embassies are, except we didn't see the American Embassy.




After we had been home for a bit a few of us decided to head over to Regents Park where the Regency Festival was going on. To get there we took the Tube which was my first time being on it and I have to say that it is not a bad way to get around. It wasn't that confusing and we didn't have to wait for more then 5 to 7 mins for any of the tubes. We took the Circle line down to Regents Park and were walking over to the festival but were distracted by these two men that were standing on top of a Post office box yelling at this man that was holding a flag. At first we were worried because it looked like they were protesters or looked like they were going to cause problems but then we were told that they were a group of actors that did Shakespeare plays on the street and used props that the people in the audience brought with them. They also had people in the audience that played some of the really small parts that didn't have lines like the actors in the play and the ghost was a man from the audiance that played a toy flute. The videos give you an example of what it was like although you cant really hear it and the pictures below are the actors using the props of the pink flowers to hide behind during the To be or not to be speach by Hamlet as he dug through the trash.

After we went home, ate dinner and had a fireside a few people decided to go out and invited me and Emily on their way out. We said yes and we got on the tube and headed to Westminster. Along the way we got on a tube line that was called The Bond and Hilary, Michael and Laura decided to be Bond, James Bond and the Bond Girls.

Right out of the Tube station is Big Ben! My first glimpse of Real, Real London! I loved it!!! By the time we headed back it was about 11:45 and we caught one of the last tubes home and it was an adventure as we stopped and thought that we were stuck for a while, but in the end we made it home all in one piece! First day of class is tomorrow... Can't wait!

Finally HERE!

I have made it safely to London and have been doing some housekeeping, making the bed, unpacking, going for walks, finding out where the stores are, and trying to stay awake so that the jet lag is not so bad... but it is almost 4pm here and they keep telling us that we just have to stay awake for a few more hours but as everyone knows when i am tired I really dont make alot of sense and there are alot of long pauses while I try and figure out what is going on around me. I am loving London!!! In the Centre I am in the large room with the 13 other girls. I will post pictures of what the rooms look like in just a bit... I think that I am going to go for a walk and walk up again... staying wake is really begining to be a problem.