"Smile. It makes people wonder what you're up to."- Anonymous

Last week was one of those weeks where there is not one horribly, catastrophic thing that goes wrong, but rather the kind where a whole bunch of little things go wrong and they build up until you jut want to bury yourself under a heap of blankets. And after a hard day, my flatmates decided to have some loud party so now my head is throbbing.

But things are actually going well! The second term is off to a great start, and I have some great looking travel prospects for my ridiculously long break. So here are some things that are not going wrong:

I have started working as a volunteer homework tutor at a local library. The kids come from around the London area, many of their families immigrated here and the parents often do not speak or read English, and some of the kids struggle as well. But the kids are so sweet and smart, and it is so rewarding to see the smile on their face when they get the hang of improper fractions, or finally learn their spelling words. Plus, they’re really cute British kids!! They all call me “Miss” which makes me feel old, and they laugh at me when I use American terms- who knew this: “.” is called a “Full stop” here? To explain the differences to one of the 8 year-old students I asked her what she thought “pants” are, and as she thoughtfully explained, “pants are what you put on first, and you have to change your pants every day. Pants are essential” (referring, of course, to what we Americans call “underwear”). When I explained we call “pants” what they call “trousers,” she looked quite scandalized, and said “Miss, they teach you really bad English in America”

Speaking of adorable British children, I’ve been babysitting again. I always hoped to spend my nights with cute British boys, I had just hoped they would be over the age of two. Oh well, beggars cannot be choosers. But seriously, these kids are adorable, especially because they are at the age where they are learning to speak more. Last night as I was putting one of the little cuties to sleep, he said “buh bye” and “Night night!” which I had never heard him say before. It was the perfect cure to a long day.

Not that yesterday was bad, it was just long. But I did have a great lunch with my friend at Whole Foods, and then headed off to my wonderful art history class. I am taking Renaissance Art in London Collections, which means we go to a museum for each class and look at different pieces. It’s really interesting, and fun. Also, a lot of what I learned in Mr. Nici’s class in high school is coming back for this clas,s which makes me looks smart! I took some pictures yesterday at the V&A.

The V&A

Really cool chandelier

Cool Renaisannce stuff

Creepy babies on a fountain

This sculpture, besides being really great, is on all of the ads for the V&A, so I took this to kind of prove that I was actually there

Also, I have been meeting some new people, and getting close to people who I did not know as well last term, which has been great, and been keeping me busy. I have also been (somewhat) better at keeping in touch with friends from home, which is really great.

In other news, my classes are fantastic, I am at ten shows (saw Wicked from row L for 20 pounds!), I discovered the magic that is Borough Market, I have finally figured out how to get the water in the shower to do more than drizzle, the heat in my room is finally working, I am almost done with the wonderful book I am reading, I have renewed my addiction to the New York Times, and I think I may have found the perfect gift for my Mommy’s birthday. And, I’m sitting here, watching Lost on DVD, drinking really good tea and eating almond biscotti, and I have the day off tomorrow. Life is good.

"It is easier to be wise for others than for ourselves. " -François Duc de La Rochefoucauld

One of my best friends just left for her semester abroad, and several others have been roaming about the globe since the New Year. So, maybe I should have posted this earlier, but better late than never. So, here is a list of 11 things I wish someone had told me before I left:

1. Jet lag is real and it sucks. It takes my body about a week to adjust, and it seems, for me at least, that jet lag gets worse before it gets better. I was walking around in a fog, exhausted no matter how much I slept, had headaches, and could not concentrate properly. All you can really do is try to sleep on a normal schedule and wait for your body to adjust.

2. Culture shock is very, very real, and is a phenomenon studied in organizational psychology. It can lead to fatigue as a result of the strain from the effort required to make adaptations, a sense of loss or deprivation, feelings of rejection or isolation, confusion, anxiety, and indignation at being forced to adapt. There’s a whole chapter dedicated to it in my textbook, but basically, it goes back to our innate need to control and understand situations, and when that is taken away, we react very negatively. When we had this lecture, I found it quite comforting because it meant that I was not a failure for feeling some of these things. It is OK to feel frustrated, lonely, confused, and tempted to get on the next plane home. YOU ARE ALLOWED TO FEEL BAD. Once I acknowledged that this was what I was feeling and why, I was much more able to handle it, and things greatly improved (if only this lecture had not come at the end of last term!).

3. Trust your instincts. If your gut is telling you that the directions the nasty French lady gave you were wrong, don’t keep doing what she says or you may find yourself in a very sketchy area far away from where you were meant to be. If something seems to be telling you the way you are going is not safe, find a different way. Even if you wind up walking much more than you intended, or even splurging on a taxi, your safety is what comes first.

4. “If you never have, you should. These things are fun and fun is good!”- Dr. Seuss
Try things you never thought you would try. Do something different. Even if you hate it, at least you can say you tried it.

5. Work hard, play hard, but balance them, and plan for each. I set a goal for myself to get all of my papers and work for the end of last term a week early, so that meant I had the last week of the term to just enjoy Christmas time in London without anything hanging over my head. It was fantastic!

6. If you’re cooking for yourself, cook way more food than you think you’ll eat in one sitting, and save the rest. It’s so nice to know there are yummy things to reheat if you have a paper to work on later in the week.

7. You don’t have to forget that you’re an American. Bake cookies even if the concept is foreign to your non-American friends. Watch The Biggest Loser and Glee online if only to be able to talk to your American friends about them. Refuse to use Google.co.uk and stay loyal to Google.com. This helped me to feel connected to home, and established a stronger sense of normalcy for me.

8. Speak up! I had a lecturer who was using an example of “prefects” to explain a concept. I could tell a lot of the other Americans in the room and I had no idea what a “prefect” was but we were all a bit embarrassed. Finally someone spoke up, the professor laughed, explained, and from then on was careful to always explain uniquely British terms he used.

9. Walk. Besides allowing me to lose some weight (yay!) , it can actually mean getting somewhere faster or with less hassle than you would on public transportation, and it has allowed me to see some really cool parts of London I never would have seen otherwise. A great site is www.walkit.com (it tells you the fastest route, estimated time for slow/average/fast walkers, calories burned, and how much CO2 you’re avoiding)

10. Don’t be afraid to do things by yourself. I’m still working on this one, but often not having “someone to go with” has held me back from seeing a museum or checking out a market. It can be a really great experience to do things on your own.

11. Call, email, and gchat with family and friends A LOT. Yes, it’s great to make new friends, but homesickness can make you miserable, and it doesn't make you weak to want your mommy when you're sick, or wish your Dad was there when things seem to be falling apart. I have actually gotten much closer to some friends from back home than I was before I left, and I have come to appreciate my family so much more. Maybe distance does make the heart grow fonder, or maybe I’m just clingy, but I am so grateful for how much my relationships have benefited from my being here. I love my family and friends more than I can say, and I don’t know how I would have made it through last term without them.

“The journey not the arrival matters.” - T.S. Eliot

I love traveling; it’s the act of traveling that I hate. And by that, of course, I mean flying. Despite how much I love New York and London, traveling between the two is true torture, especially if I am on one of the older planes, with less leg room (and when someone my height is complaining about a lack of leg room, there’s a problem). To add to my misery, on the flight I took last night/this morning, my seat-mate, despite being very sweet, looked like she had a nasty case of the plague. Several other people on the flight spent the whole 6 hours coughing. As such, I am now popping vitamins like candy.
Flying makes me cranky. Saying goodbye to people I really love makes me depressed. The fact that the heat is yet again on the fritz in my flat means I’m cold. So I’m cranky, depressed, and cold and need to cheer myself up. So, I am watching a marathon of Season 2 of The Office and making a list of reasons all the things I still want to do before the end of term:

(I'll continue to update this list and italicize the ones I have done)

IN LONDON:
-Spitalfields Market
-Brick Lane Market
-Petticoat Lane Market
- Greenwich Market
- Borough Market (I have a thing for markets)
-London Transport Museum
-Queen Mary’s Gardens & The Inner Circle
-Foundling Museum
-The White Tower and The Crown Jewels
-Museum of London

-Hampstead Heath
-Clink Street Museum
- Natural History Museum
-Tower of London
-Hampton Court Palace

-Have high tea
-Go riding in Hyde Park again
- see Billy Elliott The Musical Again
- See Les Miserables 3 or more times
- Reach my goal of seeing 20 shows
-Explore St. John's Wood

OUTSIDE OF LONDON:
-Windsor Castle
- Royal Pavilion (Brighton)
- Canterbury Cathedral
- Leeds Castle
- Oxford University
- Cambridge University
- Bath

- Stonehenge
- Stratford-Upon-Avon
- Salisbury Cathedral
- Edinburgh Castle
- Paris
- Disneyland Paris
- Greece
- Rome- go to the Vatican and Galleria Borghese
- Germany
- Auschwitz/ Terezin/ Dachau (I’mn not sure I can handle more than one)