Deck them halls and all that stuff

ChristmasChristmasChristmasChristmasChristmasChristmasChristmasChristmasChristmasChristmasChristmasChristmas.

Just so you know.

So far, this holiday season has been pretty fantastic. The first ever British/American Thanksgiving Feast of Excellence and Majesty and Thankfulness was a success, although there was one minor hiccup when I was asked to recite the story of Thanksgiving. I think I got the general idea across (pilgrims and Squanto and how the Native Americans basically saved our asses), but I may have also mentioned smallpox blankets, which I'm pretty sure was a completely different thing. 

My friend has an awesome kitchen with two ovens, so she hosted and helped me with the preparation. It was definitely the most advanced cooking I've ever done, and I only had to call my mother four times. A personal best.

Since then I have buried my head firmly in the sand with regards to all the work I have to do over the break, and have just been listening to Christmas music non-stop and stuffing my face with mince pies at every opportunity. I've put up Christmas lights in my room, pasted snowflakes to my window, bought a cheesy Christmas jumper, and watched Love Actually twice. Also, German Christmas markets are a thing here, so there is sausage everywhere and I can't stop eating it.

Today I went for a walk with some friends, and we passed my very own Christmassy pub:

That's my name! Well, sort of. We also walked down Regent Street in search of economically-priced cardigans, but struck out. Considering the fact that we passed an Anthropologie, J. Crew, Banana Republic, and what must surely be the Burberry flagship store, we may not have been on the right street for what we wanted. The lights were pretty, though:

And we passed by this intrepid crew, killing it with the Twelve Days of Christmas:

Speaking of which: 

FIIIIIVE GOOOOOOLD RIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIINGS!!!!!!!! No, I'm not a soprano or anything. Why would you ask?  *blows raspberry*

Sooo, that's the story, morning glory. I'm back in the states from the 19th–4th, so it's kind of like I get to have two Christmases. I'll really miss London while I'm gone, but can't wait for the Herald Square Macy's and the big tree at 30 Rock! Roll on next Thursday! 

How much does a letter weigh?

Today I went to the post office to buy some stamps. At home, I'm used to just swinging by the post office and picking up a book of twenty five stamps so that I can have them on hand. I didn't know what to expect here, but I figured it wouldn't be too complicated.

I was not prepared for the third degree from the man behind the counter. His words are in caps because that's what he sounded like. If you don't feel like reading, you can watch this. It's basically the same situation.

Can I buy stamps here? YES YOU CAN BUY STAMPS. IF THERE IS A QUEUE THEN YOU HAVE TO JOIN THE QUEUE BUT THERE IS NO QUEUE RIGHT NOW SO GO AHEAD. Okay... so... I'd like to buy some stamps please.

*At this point he gives me an exasperated look while shrugging his shoulders and holding his hands apart, and I start panicking because I don't know what else he could possibly need to know and I feel like an idiot, so I just kind of stare at him like, "I'm a foreigner. So are you. Can you maybe just tell me what to do?"*

WHAT ARE YOU SENDING? Um, just like a regular letter I guess? Or maybe a postcard or a Christmas card?

HOW MUCH DOES IT WEIGH? (What? How would I know that?) Well it would just be a piece of paper, so... HOW MUCH DOES IT WEIGH! I don't know! It's just a piece of paper! Like a regular letter! HOW MUCH DOES IT WEIGH!! TEN GRAMS? FORTY GRAMS? HOW MUCH?? Ten grams, I guess?

*Let me just pause here to point out that the last time I weighed anything in grams was in Mr. McLaughlin's science class at Reading-Fleming Middle School. That was seventeen years ago. Continue.*

WHERE ARE YOU SENDING? To the US. (That one was a fair question. I should have specified that it was international.) 

HOW MANY? How many? Um, five? (I actually wanted way more than five, but I wasn't prepared to say how many I wanted because I'm used to just buying a pack. I was also getting the vibe that it's not normal to buy a lot of stamps at once here, so I just said five and hoped that I didn't sound stupid.) 

FOUR POUNDS NINETY. For five stamps?? FOUR POUNDS NINETY! Okay.

Good grief.

Reading Week, or: It's not Christmas yet

It's Reading Week! No classes means a chance to catch up on all of the reading we're meant to be doing. For neurotics like me, it's basically a chance to spend a week panicking and feeling like all of my coursework is due RIGHT NOW. Hence this masterpiece of organization:

It's so beautiful. Check boxes. Colored tacks. I can't even. Gah. 

This afternoon I was meant to meet a friend at the British Library so that we could register for passes to use the reading rooms, but she wasn't feeling well and had to cancel. As a Very Responsible Student there were a few things I could have done at that point, as I was already out and had my laptop with me. These things were: 

(1) Continue on to the BL and register myself anyway

(2) Head to school and do some work in the library there

(3) Both 1 and 2. 

Instead, I went to the new Fortnum & Mason at St. Pancras station and played with their musical Christmas biscuit tins. Oh my goodness, y'all. This was the greatest thing that could possibly have happened. First of all, let me just say that I have been doing my best to keep the Christmas at bay until after Thanksgiving, but it is not easy when all the department stores are already decorated and there are puddings and mince pies and musical biscuit tins. 

I wasn't planning on indulging in Christmas today; I just thought I'd go for an innocent walk around St. Pancras station. Maybe pop into Paperchase and get some markers. But then F&M was there with their Christmas goods, and I was weak. I went in. 

There followed a brief moment of confusion when I read this:

Even though my brain knew better, for the flashiest of flashes, I thought, "Are these musical biscuits?" It made me think of one of my favorite scenes from Bedknobs and Broomsticks, when Paul, reading a jar that he found on Ms. Price's shelf, throws out this totally logical puzzler: "'Poisoned Dragon's Liver'... does that mean they poison the dragon, or just the liver?"  

This, however, was not quite as complicated, and it took me all of no seconds to realize that there was no way those biscuits were going to sing to me, and there must be another reason for the tin to read "Musical Christmas Biscuit Selection". I commenced further investigation... 

And lo! The tin itself plays music when you wind it up, and it is magical:

IMG 1664 from Molly Kernan on Vimeo.

If you listen very carefully, it's playing "The First Noel". There were also ones that played "Jingle Bells" and "We Wish You a Merry Christmas". I, of course, wound up each one to hear it play in its entirety, multiple times, to the delight of the man behind the counter. I'll bet he can't wait until I come back. :-) 

Apple Day!

Today was Apple Day! I didn't know about it until I went to Borough Market and suddenly there was a parade of people in costumes, and a band! I'm much too excited to write anything substantial, so this is mostly just visual aids to show you what a good time it was. Look!


IMG 1592 from Molly Kernan on Vimeo.

Apple Day is a fantastic day of harvesty appley celebration that America needs to implement immediately. The merry troupe in the video above put on a play for us which they called "The True Tales of Robin Hood". (Spoiler alert: Robin is a lady and Marian is a man.) There was audience participation, bawdy jokes that hopefully went way over the heads of the kids in the first row, and much smashing of crockery (during which the kids in the first row were duly ushered out of the way and ordered to cover their eyes in case of flying shards). 

Also, there was this guy:

And this majestic stag with his girlfriend:

There was also Morris dancing, which is a traditional type of English folk dance. It's kind of hard to explain, so here's a short clip of some Morris dudes working it with sticks:

IMG 1602 from Molly Kernan on Vimeo.

Tradition! Okay, so it may not look terribly exciting, but it dates back to at least the 15th century so give them a break. Also, they have bells tied around their shins, so that's pretty cool. And did you see the guy playing the tiny accordion? It's so tiny! 

In between the acts of the Robin Hood play, some other dancers came on stage and did a different Morris thing. They were of a rather advanced age, so their dance just kind of looked like four guys wrestling with each other while standing up: 

Their dance was nice, but I'm not sure if you managed to catch the real superstar in that picture, so let me zoom in a little. Check out the lady onstage who is absolutely killing it playing the pipe and the drum AT THE SAME TIME:

Piping with the left hand, drumming with the right. Talk about a one-(wo)man-band. I have a hard enough time playing two-handed piano, and I took lessons for ten years. (You were throwing your money away on that one, Mom.)

In conclusion, I also had a delicious pork sandwich with cheddar cheese, caramelized onions, and some sort of apple cider chutney on top, and an apple turnover. Apple Day is pretty much the best day. Get on it, America. 

The blarg goes live

I couldn't be bothered to write anything today, so here's a minute of me talking about absolutely nothing:

UPDATE: The storage expedition was a success. Bins were purchased. Sweaters have been stored. There is now room for shoes in the wardrobe. *Insert triumphant music here. I like Berlioz's Hungarian March, but go with whatever makes you comfortable.* 

Driving the bus, and other joys of public transportation

Anyone who has ever lived in a city knows that proximity to public transportation is real estate gold. Fortunately, my residence hall is literally right next to a tube station and a bus stop. The tube is generally faster, but the bus is less expensive, and I kind of like it better because my new favorite thing to do is sit in the very front seat on the upper deck of the bus and pretend to drive:

I KNOW, RIGHT? So fun.

So yesterday I was waiting for a bus at Trafalgar Square. It’s a fairly busy area with a lot of buses, but I was the only one waiting at this particular stop for a few minutes until an older couple walked up to stand with me. Generally people stand in line, but it was just the three of us so we wound up in kind of a cluster. After a few more minutes the bus pulled up, and the woman turned to me and said, “Would you like to get on first? You were standing here before us.” 

Um, what? Get thee back with thy strange manners! (I did not say that to her. I actually let her and her husband get on first because they were older and I felt weird and didn’t know what to do, and also their oldness probably meant that they weren't going to climb the stairs and sit in my driving seat.) But I was not prepared for her level of politeness. Not that I expected rudeness, but there were only three of us so it didn't occur to me that I should expect them to let me get on first.

That tends to be a thing here, though. People queue at the bus stop, at elevators, and at restaurants that are not yet open for the day. Nearly everyone waits until the little man turns green before crossing the street. At the tube stations, they will stay behind the yellow line on the platform until the train stops. And if you get to the platform and there are tons of people already waiting, you stand behind the crowd that was already there and let them get on first. Then the train pulls away and your bunch steps forward and other people get behind you. It’s very civilized, as opposed to everyone trying to crowd onto the 1 at Penn Station like it’s the last helicopter out of Vietnam. But I’ve only been here for a week so maybe I just haven’t experienced real life yet.

Another difference that I’ve noticed, mostly in the tube stations, is the absence of garbage cans, and also, weirdly, the absence of garbage. In the subway stations in Manhattan, there are garbage cans like every five feet and also what looks to be the entire contents of those cans combined all over the tracks. I haven’t been able to figure out the math behind that one yet; so far it seems like No Garbage Cans = No Garbage, while Many Garbage Cans = All The Garbage. 

I asked one of the British girls in my department about the absence of garbage cans, and she said, “Oh, do you mean bins? Yeah, that’s because the IRA were putting bombs in them in the 80s and 90s, so we don’t have them anymore.” and I was like, “That makes total sense, and incidentally I am now afraid of garbage cans.” 

But I don't want to leave you with the idea of garbage can terrorism, so instead here's a picture that I took today of a random group of Steelers fans near Covent Garden:

Apparently the NFL had an exhibition game in London today: Steelers v Vikings. Although aside from these dudes I didn't really see any team loyalty. I saw some Patriots jerseys (ironic, no?), some Bears, two Eagles, a few Green Bays, some Saints, and one lonely Cowboy. An interesting spread, if I may say so. 

I made it!

Hello from London! FYI, it looks like this:

AMAZING. I have now been here for two full days. I was awesomely upgraded to first class for my flight out here, which was a brand new experience. Did you know that they give you a MENU after you sit down?? They have appetizers and champagne and real cutlery and the seats lie all the way down. And when you’re finished with dinner, they give you an international cheese plate and an ice cream sundae. I had already filled up on free cheese in the United Club before departure, but I’m not the kind of girl who says no to Brie at forty thousand feet.

That was awesome, although the flight was shorter than expected so I slept off and on for only about three hours and then when we landed I remembered that my carry-on weighed almost as much as me. So after walking through the longest airport terminal in the world with the heaviest bag ever and then standing in line for a thousand minutes waiting to cross the border and spending over $100 on a taxi because I couldn’t manage all my luggage on the tube by myself, I was pretty much exhausted and it was only 11am.

I couldn’t pay the taxi driver properly because I had this brilliant idea that I would save my cash and use my card instead, but his machine couldn’t read my card. I was about £10 short on cash, but as I was rifling through my wallet to see what I could come up with in terms of coin, he said, “Oh, you have dollars? That’s all right then. You can give me some of those. I’m taking my kids to Disney World in three weeks so I’ll spend them there.” I gave him a twenty and wished him Godspeed, and didn’t tell him that in Disney World twenty bucks will only buy you like two cheeseburgers and a maybe a small diet coke.

I checked into the hotel, allowed myself a few minutes of sitting down with my feet up, and then hit the street to see if I could find a place to buy a SIM card for my iPhone, which actually turned out to be way easier than I expected. They are EVERYWHERE here, and the guy at Carphone Warehouse was very helpful. I’m not entirely sure what I wound up with because I couldn’t really understand him, but his name was Callum and he said “cheers” a lot and my phone works, so I’m good.

That didn’t take very long, so I went to Westminster and walked around by the bridge where I paid £2 for a crappy cup of tea from a vendor, which was totally worth it because it was kind of raining and I was cold and starving and exhausted. And then I took these lovely pictures, because I live here now but that’s not going to stop me from acting like a tourist:

After heading back to the hotel and sleeping for about ten hours, I woke up and spent today at UCL doing enrolment-type things and going to useful seminars. And now I’m very sleepy, so I’m going to put on a channel I found that is inexplicably playing a Hoarders marathon, and try to stay awake for two more hours before I crash. Later!