Looking Back: Three Months

If you’re interested, here are Looking Back: One Month and Two Month.

I have 29 days left until I fly home. I have 23 days left until I leave London. I have 17 days until my internship ends. There are 15 days until my parents arrive. I have 14 days until I finish my final fall semester. I keep counting all the days I have left. I am always counting down. It used to be I had months left, three more months, two more months. Now I only have weeks, although I find I tend to count in days. It doesn’t matter how I count it (four weeks or 29 days) the conclusion I come to is the same: there is not enough time.

I spent this weekend pouring over my guide book making my London ‘Bucket List’. I searched the interwebs for fun, quirky London adventures. I bought bus tickets to Brighton, to Leeds. I keep searching for that one thing to end this trip on. I feel like somewhere, just around the corner, if I just look hard enough I’ll find it–the London experience that will make me satisfied with going home. But it isn’t real. There is no one experience, place I can visit, tourist trap I can fall in, that will make me ok with leaving London. I am not ok with leaving London. I am not ready to leave.

Here in London I grew up.

In London I cooked my first meal. I discovered how to travel.  I learned about taking care of myself, and my friends, and making sure everything worked out. In London, I flew solo for the first time in my life. It has been amazing. It has been wonderful. I am sad to leave. But luckily,  oh luckily, I have four whole weeks, 29 long days left. After all my classmates and friends have flown home I still have days left in London. Then I get to explore Paris with my parents. There are so many adventures to be had and I am glad I get to have them. I am glad I still have time.

And London, it’s not going anywhere. I can always come back; I will come back.

 

Favorite adventure: Brighton, England
Favorite place in London: Anywhere in the City of London, which is different than just London.
Favorite food: Wine. Hey, it counts!
Favorite moment: Sitting in a little square reading F Scott Fitzgerald Jazz Age Stories (I totally recommend them) and looking up to see the ground covered in gold crunchy leaves. I realized then how at home I truly felt in this city.
Favorite thing I’ve learned: I love city living! I really do! There is something so amazing about walking to get your groceries, never having to drive, and having public transport that everyone rides (not just creepy, drunk people).
Favorite purchase: My ticket to Brighton. I had the most romantic day there.
Favorite thing in the upcoming month: My parents are coming in just 15 days and I get to show them ALL AROUND MY CITY!
Favorite photo: taken November 21 on the beach in Brighton.

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Oh Hay, Norway

This weekend I went to Norway.

It was an amazing trip and I’m so glad I went. I’m also glad Ellie went with me, traveling is fun with a buddy! At this point in time I don’t really have that many words. Instead I’m going to show you pictures of my favorite parts of the trip.

Landing in Norway.

Ellie and I spent the weekend in a hotel on the outskirts of Oslo. It was so tiny and filled with very Ikea furniture/design. Oh! The bathroom had heated floors. I will never be happy with normal bathrooms ever again.

Spaceship lamp.

View from the window at sunset.

View from the window on a rainy Monday morning.

I loved exploring the city at night. J’adore the quiet streets.

On Sunday, Ellie and I took a bus to Drøbak–a small town about few hours away from Oslo. It was a quaint coastal town. Norway reminded me a lot of America (wide streets, highways, pizza) and Drøbak reminded both of us of a quaint New England town; how charming.

The beautiful coast.

The sun, the waves, the beauty!

Norwegian beaches 🙂

Drøbak is also the “adopted” home of Santa. We went to a year round Christmas store (my favorite kind of store). We also stumbled upon Santa’s Post Office. I wish it had been open so I could have read the letters.

The walls are covered with letters to Santa!

I loved the weather in Norway! Red, yellow, orange leaves! Color! Crisp air! I love fall!

The perfect photo of fall.

Before catching the plane home on Monday, Ellie and I went to Vigelandpsarken (Vigeland Sculpture Park). It was a rainy, gray day and it was perfect for leisurely exploring the park and then shopping in the afternoon.

Angry Baby.

God is here.

This is my last planned trip with Ellie and I have to say, she was a great travel buddy! We worked really well together, bringing different things to the flip-down-tray, and having a really good time! I love Ellie!

My snow-bunny roomie.

Yay Norway!

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In Which You Catch Me In a Lie, But You Forgive Me (aka Springfest!)

Hey kids! I know in my last post I said I’d probably never write about campus activities again… well, I lied. But I think you’ll forgive me for this one because you get to hear about SPRINGFEST (and see pictures, of course). Today was the annual Springfest at Marymount and the theme was luau; which meant no burgers and hot dogs (at first I was disappointed). Instead we were fed a delicious, flavorful chicken that we ate out under the sun! Food is better when it’s eaten outside.

Oh yeah, you could throw pies at Res. Life. I hope they have this next year.

The weather today was perfect for an outdoor event. It was sunny, 84 degrees, and as the party went on it cooled until it was the perfect temperature. I spent the first hour or so with my friend Katie (she’s a commuter but a member of the fashion club so she had help set up and decided to hang out with me). Katie had submitted a design to the t-shirt contest where the winner had their design printed and received $100, which she should have won (there were sea turtles, dammit!); the t-shirt design that did win was pretty cute, even if there were no sea turtles. The first thing Katie and I did was pick up our free Springfest tee (our class received white t-shirts seniors had blue, I think underclassmen had green).

Inflatable things everywhere!

We wandered around so I could to take photos for you guys! There were so many inflatable things (what do you call them?) on the grounds! One was a pirate themed obstacle course where you raced a friend. There was a “surf” thing where you tried to stay on a moving surf board. That one was fun to watch because the faster the surf board spun, the farther the person riding it flew when they finally lost their balance. The one I really wanted to try was the rock climbing on a giant Easter Island head (google it). Unfortunately, I wore a dress—but Marymount has had a rock climbing wall of some sort every Springfest that I’ve been here so I’ll try next year (that means you get to try too)!

Have you ever climbed a giant head?

At the bottom of the hill there were water activities! There was a water slide that I was going to try but it cooled down way too fast! There was also a dunk tank. After Katie left, Kenneth and I and some friends headed down there and saw that it was abandoned. Our very brave friends Tim and Matt decided to be dunk tank dunkees for us to play with! I’m happy to say that we made the dunk tank popular again. Haha. By the time Kenneth and I had left a crowd of twenty or so had gathered to try and dunk people. Kenneth got the first legit dunk on Tim (he had previously been dunked by Samantha because she pushed the button you’re supposed to hit with the softball). Oh, sorry no photos–I’d already taken Frank (my camera) back to my room.

My friend Emily flying off the surfboard.

In addition to the chicken and sweet potato fries for dinner there were delicious treats. There was a smoothie company that handed out delicious smoothies with little umbrellas! I loved the strawberry so much that I went back for a second, only to find that they had packed up. Boo. There were also snow cones and a pop corn machine. Ada was running the cotton candy machine, which means I got the biggest bunch of cotton candy ever. It was devoured immediately and I swear-I will be hopped up on sugar all night. All in all, it was a delicious afternoon.

Spun sugar! Yum! Mine was blue though.

The only downside to my adventures today is that I didn’t go to math class. For some reason I kind of assumed that Friday evening class would be canceled for Springfest. Apparently, the University administration does not agree with this logic. I have no idea why I, as a junior, would not realize that classes were still on. Drat. Oh well. I had a really great time and it was the first time I’d actually spent more than thirty minutes at Springfest. I’ll defiantly wear shorts next year so I can actually do activities! You should, too :).

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