Does anyone know what day it is? 6/27-6/28

We were meant to leave Chicago for London at 7:15 pm on Thursday, but since I’ve never had smooth travel, we sat on the tarmac for 45 minutes waiting first for a “push,” and then for another plane sitting on the runway. When we finally took off, Captain Champagne told us he’d speed it up a bit to try to make up for lost time, which makes me wonder why we weren’t planning on traveling at that speed in the first place. Shouldn’t we always be flying as fast as we can?

We got in at 9 am London time, which was 3 am Chicago time, and I don’t think any of us got more than 2 hours of sleep. Still, a group of us had decided to take the Tube in from Heathrow, and with the sunlight and the busy airport, we were feeling awake and ready to go. The chattiest transport person in London helped us buy our Oyster Transport Cards, which would have been nice, if we weren’t so eager to get on our way. Everything was going smoothly until we had to change trains at Earl’s Court and the elevator was out. So we dragged all of our luggage down the stairs, instead. And, for good measure, when we reached Waterloo station it was raining for the walk to the residence hall, but we felt a serious sense of accomplishment when we finally reached it.

After checking in, unpacking, and getting cleaned up (thank goodness), some of my classmates and I chose to avoid napping (which would complicate jetlag) by heading out to the grocery and the housewares store. The housewares store had pretty much everything we could possibly need: cookware, hair dryers, hangers, etc. We also had an interesting time roaming Sainsbury’s, examining groceries in the narrow aisles.

When we made it home, we had just enough time to put away groceries before meeting up with our professor for an orientation walk. The walk took us down the South Bank of the Thames, which was pretty nice, even in the rain. We stopped for pizza at a little restaurant, where Allison made friends with a cat, and we discovered “Chicago” pizza- barbeque beef, peppers, and onion? By dinner, weariness was coming on fast, but we did our best to counter it with Diet Coke. Then we took the Tube up to Leicester Square to find the cheapest place to buy theater tickets. We spent the rest of the afternoon/evening walking around Westminster, viewing such sights as the Canadian embassy, the Texas Embassy?, Trafalgar Square, Big Ben, etc.

I think one of my favorite parts of the day(s) was coming back along Westminster Bridge. The rain had stopped, and the bridge was busy with people. There were artists and salespeople, and the air smelled amazing from the food carts selling sausages and onions, sweet roasted nuts, and the restaurants along the Thames. By the time we made it home, it was late evening on Friday, and I was wiped out.

Still, when I heard that another of my friends from Dominican was in town, and was only available to meet up that night, I joined several of my classmates down at a local pub. That was a mistake. The place may have been wonderful under normal circumstances, but jet-lagged and exhausted, I just couldn’t process the very loud bar. When I commented that the bar was beginning to feel more like a boat, one of my classmates helpfully walked back to the dorm with me, and I called it a night.