day three: harrods and my first day of class!

Hello again! Today was my first day of class at the London School of Economics, and I got to do a couple other things as well....

Breakfast at the Delaunay

They had us wake up early to attend a welcome address at the school; the lecture was at 8:30, which means that I was waking up at 3:00 ET. It was really great. I actually got there so early that I went and had breakfast at the Delaunay (again...). After the short address, I tried to return to my dorm and sleep, but it was so warm that I wasn't able to. I had been thinking that I needed to purchase an umbrella, because it's due to rain the next few days, and I had the marvellous idea to take the Underground to Harrods!

Twenty minutes later I was shopping the gorgeous and far-too-expensive halls of Harrods. God, what I'd give for one of those Burberry trench coats. Of course, I had to spend lots of time shopping for tea, and invested in tins of Earl Grey and Royal Garden teas. I found a cute black-and-white Harrods umbrella but only got to glimpse at the gorgeous rooms full of chocolates, pastries, biscuits, and meats, because I had to head back to LSE. I know I'll return again - not only do I want to stroll through the beautiful mosaic-encrusted deli, but there is also a Topshop across the street (I've never been!) and Hyde Park is blocks away.

I met with a number of classmates for my Financial Markets class at noon for lunch at the school, and was able to meet students from the US and all over Europe. I was amazed by how many people are enrolled in the course - our class is in a large lecture hall that seats about 200, and most of the seats were filled for the lecture today. The lectures take place from 14:00-17:00 every day of the week, and small 'classes' (about 15 students each) meet every morning for discussion of the material. This is new to me, since William & Mary's classes are all very small. The Financial Markets course will essentially deal with portfolio management; and, in addition to the 1,000 page textbook and numerous additional readings, we were given these immense red tomes with all the class notes. Quite a bit of reading.....

Just some light reading material...

The trickiest part right now is fixing my circadian clock. Waking up 'early' isn't necessarily that hard; it's forcing myself to go to bed at 23:00 (which is actually 6:00 pm for me as an East-Coaster). If I let myself stay up until 3:00 am like I want to, I'll never wake up in time for class. I know it'll just take a few days to figure out, but it's not at all fun.

So tonight I already have a bit of reading to do (lucky me), and then I'll be trying to force myself to sleep... The worst part is actually the heat. It might sound silly because it's only 65-70 F here, but no buildings (that I've been in at least) have air conditioning, and trying to fall asleep indoors without AC or a fan is quite difficult. In an enclosed space, it gets warmer than you'd expect. But it's not much to complain about. I'm in a beautiful city, in a wonderful country, lucky enough to be studying at this amazing school!

london | day two

My first cup of British tea!

Well, I’ve made it through two days in London! I’m settled in here at High Holborn Residence Hall, and I’m starting to figure out my way around the area.   

I slept for more than 20 hours yesterday/today. After doing a tour of the city yesterday afternoon and cleaning up, I went right to bed and managed to sleep until noon today. So I am all rested up! Still, the 5-hour difference is going to take some adjusting. When I woke this morning (afternoon?) I walked two blocks down to Sainsbury’s for groceries. Though I’m sure I’ll be eating out quite a bit, I wanted to get some snacks to keep in my room.   

It is also much more difficult to find drinking water here. I would never have thought of it, but almost all the taps (at least in my residence hall) have signs warning you not to drink the water. There aren’t many drinking fountains, and when I was at the café yesterday, they didn’t serve water without request, as a restaurant would in the US. So I loaded up on bottled water at Sainsbury’s, and found a few other treats that I had never seen before and wanted to try out.

Then what water am I supposed to drink?? 

Of course, I had to get some English crisps; there was gooseberry yoghurt (which is more like whipped cream than the heavy, condensed yogurt I’m used to), apple and elderflower juice, and my very favourite cookies (which my friend Mike introduced me to!), caramel waffles. I’ve had elderflower juice and the waffle cookies before in the US, but they are very difficult to find, expensive, and usually sold in specialty stores. I also noticed that many more of the foods (even packaged foods) are locally sourced; many products are labeled as ‘British’ and have Union Jack decorations, far more so than you would see ‘US’ or an American flag on foods sold in American stores. Very cool and interesting. 

After shopping, I went to officially register for my class at LSE. Getting to the school is very simple: I follow Drury Lane (the intersection for which is right outside my hall) down a few  blocks and there I am. LSE has a more extensive campus than

I expected; there are quite a few academic buildings, the library, shops, cafes, etc., and it's very close to the Thames. I know I've stayed in Central London so far, but it is such a beautiful city. The shops, hotels, statues, gardens are all clean and picturesque. There are more trees and greenery than I'd expect in a city, certainly far more than in Chicago. It's lovely walking down a city street and being shaded by towering trees. 

After registering, I discovered that the Delaunay is just a few doors down from LSE on Kingsway Tunnel. I ordered my first cup of Earl Grey tea since I've gotten to the UK (ahhhh!) and some biscuits and enjoyed them at Victoria Embankment Gardens, down near the Thames. It was absolutely beautiful. The weather has been perfect: around 75, breezy, a few specks of rain throughout the day. The garden is across the street from the Thames, and has a surprising number of tropical plants growing along its walls. I learned that the public restrooms may only be used for a fee (50p), which is interesting.  

I've been trying to keep my mouth shut most of the time I'm out in the city. I realise Americans have a negative reputation, and though I try to not be a stereotypical ignorant American (I've so far successfully managed to avoid pulling out a huge map of the city and squinting at it dumbly in the middle of traffic) as soon as I start speaking I usually get a look. So I've been sticking to 'yes', 'no', 'excuse me', 'thank you', and whatever else is pretty accent-less as much as I can. I've caught on to switching directions: when passing someone else on the sidewalk, I know to pass them to the left rather than the right. Crossing streets, I know to look to the right rather than the left (a potentially fatal mistake to make!), though the major crossways for one-way streets have very helpful directions (Look left! Look right!). Why don't all cities have these?   

My room at High Holborn Residence Hall

I begin my class tomorrow. There's a welcome lecture for the new students early in the morning, and then I'm meeting up with my fellow Financial Markets classmates for lunch before our lecture begins at 2:00 (whoops! 14:00). Class is every day of the week, from 14:00-17:00. There's a midterm exam next week and a final exam at the end of the three weeks. I look forward to meeting my classmates (so far I've been out and about or sleeping, and haven't met many other students) and settling into a schedule.