Dear Readers:
This Sunday was amazing! I've been feeling a little lost in London, namely because it isn't Mexico. Whoever thought that phrase would come out of my mouth? But there it is. Anyway, today I found a little piece of home.
First off, 5 girls and I are assigned to the Wandsworth Commons ward, which is extremely cool because it reminds me of Harry Potter (WANDsworth) aside from the fact that it is a neat ward. So we all left at 8:30 am to get to our ward which starts at 10:00 am (we have to take the tube and a train to get there). We got there okay despite the fact that we almost ended up on the wrong train platform, we DID miss our station because we apparently didn't press the Open Door button fast enough, and then we accidentally walked a block up to a dead end before we realized we had exited the wrong side of the train station. Classic. :)
At church there were more Americans than Londoners. In fact, I don't even know if there were more than 3 native British people in that ward. There were some people from Africa and all over that I don't even know yet. It's amazing how diverse the church/city is over here! I got "called" (they can't really give us an official call because we're here so short a time and our records aren't in the wards) to be in the Young Womens. Cool! I'm excited. :) I get to teach in two weeks.
Oh, almost forgot. They have Sacrament last, so during Sunday School, the bishop comes up to us and asks us if we'll each bear our testimonies in Sacrament Meeting. And then he's like, "P.S. You're already on the program."...ok, he didn't really say P.S., but it was like that. :) So we bore our testimonies in Sacrament meeting.
Then, I had heard there was a Spanish branch and I really really really want to keep up the Spanish that I have, so I asked a guy in our ward who used to go to the Spanish branch how to get there. So the girls went back to the Centre and then I made my way alone to the Tube station and then found the right stop and exited and then I tried to find the chapel and...didn't find it. I found the road that the directions said it would be on, but the chapel was not on that street. So I was a little nervous, being alone wandering the streets with no idea where to go, but I decided that all I had was time so it was okay to wander for a while and as long as I knew where the Tube was, I could find my way home. Plus, I just sort of had a constant prayer in my head, "Please help me find the church, please help me find the church, please help me find the church and not get attacked :)". So I wandered back up the street and asked this random guy if there was a church on the street and he was like, "Yeah, just go up there and around the corner."
So I go up the road and around the corner and find a ginormous castle-like church, obviously not an LDS church, but I didn't really figure the guy would point me to an LDS church anyway. So in my head I was wondering, "Should I just go back home and give it up? Or should I wander around and try to find it because I know that I am really close? And I really want to go!" So I decided that I would just go up this one block and try to loop around and go back up the original street and if I didn't find the chapel, then I would go home.
Randomly enough, I walked down the street and at this intersection, Behold, the chapel! Seriously, it was a miracle. Divine intervention. It was so neat! And then I went to church and it was amazing! I just felt so at home! It reminded me of Mexico and it was so nice to be hearing Spanish again and feeling the Latin culture. I also got a Libro de Mormon so I can study the scriptures in Spanish. AND there were adorable Latin children, along with a lot more diversity, like in the first ward. It isn't just a Spanish branch, it's Spanish and Portugese and there are people from Africa and South America and all over! It's so cool!
However, this leads to a dilemma. Six hours of church weekly or no Spanish? So far I'm choosing 6 hours, but we'll see how long I last. :) Love you!
Sunday, June 29, 2008
Friday, June 27, 2008
What to do when you lose the group...
Dear Readers:
I woke up today after a sort of confusing night's sleep. My body kept telling me to wake up, but I was tired enough that I just kept telling it to be quiet and go back to bed, and it worked. :) Breakfast was good, although the apricot jam was sketchy. Then we had orientation with one of our professors and then the house manager guy. The professor understood the wonderfulness of a quick run through and then passed the time over to the house manager who ended up spending an hour and a half discussing the principle of how we should live in a foreign country and taking just 5 quick minutes at the end to go over specifics. Glad we truly got the vague principle of living together nicely. I don't know if I would've understood it without that hour and a half. It's a difficult one. (do you hear the sarcasm? sometimes it's difficult online)
Then we went on one of the walks around London, it was a downtown one, I think. We walked by the Thames and through this little garden and promptly got lost from the group, well, 5 of us did. But it was okay because we were wandering around and all of a sudden we saw Big Ben and then we wandered a bit more and found Trafalgar Square and the National Gallery. It was pretty sweet. So we went into the National Gallery for 2 hours and saw some awesome paintings, like Picasso, Degas, Monet, Van Gogh, etc., etc. Then we came back home and here I am. There is supposed to be a showing of "The Sound of Music" in some little theater outside tonight for free. Sweet!
Aside from that, I am spending a lot of time missing Mexico, unfortunately. It's hard because it's such a similar situation, being in a foreign country in a big group of students, wandering around in a herd, but without all of my friends. I know I'll get to know the people here, but right off the bat, I just wish all of my Mexico friends came with me to London. Anyway, I'm sure things will brighten up soon, though not necessarily the weather. :) It rained today, lovely, lovely. :)
I woke up today after a sort of confusing night's sleep. My body kept telling me to wake up, but I was tired enough that I just kept telling it to be quiet and go back to bed, and it worked. :) Breakfast was good, although the apricot jam was sketchy. Then we had orientation with one of our professors and then the house manager guy. The professor understood the wonderfulness of a quick run through and then passed the time over to the house manager who ended up spending an hour and a half discussing the principle of how we should live in a foreign country and taking just 5 quick minutes at the end to go over specifics. Glad we truly got the vague principle of living together nicely. I don't know if I would've understood it without that hour and a half. It's a difficult one. (do you hear the sarcasm? sometimes it's difficult online)
Then we went on one of the walks around London, it was a downtown one, I think. We walked by the Thames and through this little garden and promptly got lost from the group, well, 5 of us did. But it was okay because we were wandering around and all of a sudden we saw Big Ben and then we wandered a bit more and found Trafalgar Square and the National Gallery. It was pretty sweet. So we went into the National Gallery for 2 hours and saw some awesome paintings, like Picasso, Degas, Monet, Van Gogh, etc., etc. Then we came back home and here I am. There is supposed to be a showing of "The Sound of Music" in some little theater outside tonight for free. Sweet!
Aside from that, I am spending a lot of time missing Mexico, unfortunately. It's hard because it's such a similar situation, being in a foreign country in a big group of students, wandering around in a herd, but without all of my friends. I know I'll get to know the people here, but right off the bat, I just wish all of my Mexico friends came with me to London. Anyway, I'm sure things will brighten up soon, though not necessarily the weather. :) It rained today, lovely, lovely. :)
Thursday, June 26, 2008
What to do when your seat mate gets sick...
Dear Everyone Who Wants to Read this:
After little deliberation, I decided that a blog would be a better way to keep more people updated about my life this summer. So without further ado, and without much ado at all to start with, here is my first entry.
I started my trip to London today, or rather, yesterday at noon Mountain Standard Time. I arrived in London today at roughly 3 PM GMT, which I believe is the abreviation for whatever time zone London is in. While the flight from Vegas to Houston was rather uneventful (I did sit by a charming hick guy from New Orleans who was wearing an orange shirt, a hunting baseball cap, and reading hunting magazines and his wife behind him was always like, "Baybah, is thayt a train-yard?" as she looked out the window), the flight from Houston to London was a bit more exciting. First off, I got on the plane, found my seat, and realized that I didn't have a seat mate! Hooray! Every traveler's dream!!! Unfortunately the plane was delayed an hour due to technical difficulties, but no matter, I had two seats to myself!!!! Oh wait.
So some hornery old man had taken some seat other than his own in the row next to me. The flight attendant told him any other seat than that because someone was probably coming that would sit there, but he just sat there anyway. Well, the other guy did come, like a 30-year-old Indian guy from Sacramento. He just came and sat by me because my seat was open and I looked friendly I guess. How lucky.
So he really wasn't that bad. He was pretty interesting to talk to. He was opening up a restaurant in Sacramento but he was flying to London for his cousin's wedding, etc. However, I found out that he had been drinking at the bar because he had a long layover and I was like, "Charming. A drunken fool." But that wasn't even the bad part. He threw up!!!!!!!!!!!! Wait, was that enough exclamation points to convey my disgust, shock, disbelief? I don't think so. !!!!!!!!!!!!
Yeah, he threw up and ran away to the bathroom and the flight attendants didn't even do anything about it. They threw a blanket over the vomit and that was it. Finally I was like, "Um, can I switch seats?" (Even though it was my seat and extra seat to begin with!) So I switched to an aisle seat and ended up sitting next to this really nice guy from London, Joe, who was very sympathetic about the man who "was sick" up front. Joe told me all about the things I need to see in London and we chatted for a lot of the flight and slept for a lot more (slept is a rough term, mind you).
When we arrived in London and had to go through Immigration with this nasty guy who kept asking about the program and when I would say "We are staying here" or "we are studying" he would say, "I thought you were traveling alone!" Blah!
So through some miraculous circumstances, I met up with two of the program girls at the airport and we took a taxi to the London Centre and now here we are. We took a walk around Kensington Gardens/Palace to fight the jetlag and now it is about 3 in the afternoon in Utah and 10? ish here. So I think I did pretty good for the night. Anyway, love you! More good stories to come, I'm sure. :)
After little deliberation, I decided that a blog would be a better way to keep more people updated about my life this summer. So without further ado, and without much ado at all to start with, here is my first entry.
I started my trip to London today, or rather, yesterday at noon Mountain Standard Time. I arrived in London today at roughly 3 PM GMT, which I believe is the abreviation for whatever time zone London is in. While the flight from Vegas to Houston was rather uneventful (I did sit by a charming hick guy from New Orleans who was wearing an orange shirt, a hunting baseball cap, and reading hunting magazines and his wife behind him was always like, "Baybah, is thayt a train-yard?" as she looked out the window), the flight from Houston to London was a bit more exciting. First off, I got on the plane, found my seat, and realized that I didn't have a seat mate! Hooray! Every traveler's dream!!! Unfortunately the plane was delayed an hour due to technical difficulties, but no matter, I had two seats to myself!!!! Oh wait.
So some hornery old man had taken some seat other than his own in the row next to me. The flight attendant told him any other seat than that because someone was probably coming that would sit there, but he just sat there anyway. Well, the other guy did come, like a 30-year-old Indian guy from Sacramento. He just came and sat by me because my seat was open and I looked friendly I guess. How lucky.
So he really wasn't that bad. He was pretty interesting to talk to. He was opening up a restaurant in Sacramento but he was flying to London for his cousin's wedding, etc. However, I found out that he had been drinking at the bar because he had a long layover and I was like, "Charming. A drunken fool." But that wasn't even the bad part. He threw up!!!!!!!!!!!! Wait, was that enough exclamation points to convey my disgust, shock, disbelief? I don't think so. !!!!!!!!!!!!
Yeah, he threw up and ran away to the bathroom and the flight attendants didn't even do anything about it. They threw a blanket over the vomit and that was it. Finally I was like, "Um, can I switch seats?" (Even though it was my seat and extra seat to begin with!) So I switched to an aisle seat and ended up sitting next to this really nice guy from London, Joe, who was very sympathetic about the man who "was sick" up front. Joe told me all about the things I need to see in London and we chatted for a lot of the flight and slept for a lot more (slept is a rough term, mind you).
When we arrived in London and had to go through Immigration with this nasty guy who kept asking about the program and when I would say "We are staying here" or "we are studying" he would say, "I thought you were traveling alone!" Blah!
So through some miraculous circumstances, I met up with two of the program girls at the airport and we took a taxi to the London Centre and now here we are. We took a walk around Kensington Gardens/Palace to fight the jetlag and now it is about 3 in the afternoon in Utah and 10? ish here. So I think I did pretty good for the night. Anyway, love you! More good stories to come, I'm sure. :)
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