so heres the plan for november:

~ florence ~ november 3-6 (to visit weitzel and noelle)
~ spain ~ november 6-12 (unfortunately no portugal)
~ vienna ~ november 16-20 (of course this isnt booked this yet, so ideally we're going to vienna)
~ paris ~ november 22-25 (traditional thanksgiving....in france, hmmm)

so yes, every weekend in november i will be abroad! neato!

today during my european politics class my teacher spent the entire hour going over how to write a formal university essay. which was a beautiful waste of everyones time. im pretty sure we're all in college and everyone knows that you have to have an intro paragraph where you state what youre going to talk about. and yes, you have to research (since some would call this a 'research paper') and reference those books and have a bibliography. and of couse it must be typed (really? are we actually talking about not typing an essay??). im pretty sure i wrote a 14 page essay, references and all, in 7th grade, thank you. just thought i would share my sentiments with you, it kind of made me bitter earlier (i think a nap would have been more productive).




and to those of you going to the woods this weekend for NOVEMBERBASH - i know that you will have an amazing time! i hope you know that even though i will be eating delicious italian food nonstop in florence, i am really jealous that you get to go to camp. i know that this short weekend will be a much needed break from school and the rest of the crazy aspects of college life to simply stop and play in the forest. you have a large number of jr high campers anxious and excited to be back at camp - so create for them a welcoming, fun, energetic, and genuine atmostphere which you all can thrive in. you get to spend time with awesome jr highers that i had the pleasure of working with over the summer and i hope you take advantage of this opportunity to give them the best weekend they will have all fall!

go sit out on the bgf with a hot chocolate and sing extra loud at campfire for me!
<3 ashley with red hair

so its almost 5:00 pm and its getting to be about dusk already. i dont think england should partake in day light savings time since it can already be pretty dreary here (although the weather was nice today)

so wednesday i actually went to class which was good. and after that i met up with the parentals to go on the london eye which was cool except it was cloudy, but whatever. heres a pic of it i took on the big bus tour we took on saturday. that evening as we were trying to find somewhere around leicester square to eat dinner we ended up walking into a movie premier - and it ended up to be the one for 'borat.' so we watched the small parade of people for sasha cohen/ali g/borat - there he is! its nice!

after that excitement we had tapas at a spanish restaurant then saw 'phantom of the opera' which was good to finally see on the stage. the next day my mom and dad came to new cross to check it out and all. after a brief tour of my flat and school we headed back into central london and went on a tour of the globe theatre, the one where shakespeare's company performed his plays. it was really cool especially how they tried to build it in the same way that it was originally built in the 17th century. after that we took the tube over to westminster to go to the cabinet war rooms and the winston churchill museum. it was a really cool museum full of high tech exhibits. we then wandered around victoria where we had indian food for dinner (suprisingly this is the first time that i had indian food here, it was good though). then we went and saw 'wicked'! which pretty much owned my life. and im going to see it again. every night.

friday we met at westminster abbey and went on our own little tour of the buildings - pretty much its a really cool old church that about 900 years old that has a million people burried in it. and again, its really old. we ate lunch at a little italian place in green park (near the palace) which was nice. we then went shopping in knightsbridge for a bit then got ready for tea at the lanesborough hotel at hyde park corner. tea, well it was really nice. we had champagne as well as tea, and sandwiches, strawberries, tea cakes and all. we also went to a really good restaurant for dinner in knightsbridge. so pretty much, that was the nicest (and most expensive) food i will ever eat in london, now i will go back to eating pasta. also, i would like to add that knightsbridge is a weird area because on the way to and from dinner we kept on walking by ferraris - theyre just sprinkled around the area (along with bentleys)(and the more common bmw and mercedes). knightsbridge makes atherton/woodside sane.

so on saturday the parentals arrived here in england and i met them at their hotel in knightsbridge (a very nice area in central london, its the area where harrods is). so yes, we went to lunch at the fifth floor restaurant at harvey nichols (which is a very nice department store, somewhat like neiman marcus (needless markup) in the states). we had champagne with lunch which was quite nice. we then went on a double decker bus tour of the city, checking out the major sites and all.

on sunday we ventured up to oxford for a day trip outside of the city. oxford is such a cool town with about 40 different small colleges that make up the university. the only problem though is that the rainy season has fully set in now so it was pouring a lot of the day. but still, its a beautiful old city with amazing architecture.

on monday my mom and i hung out while my dad did business stuff at lloyds of london (the home of insurance.....oh how exciting). we went to kensington palace which used to be the royal residence until buckingham palace was taken up. its fairly recent residents include princess margaret and princess diana. we then went shopping (well we looked around different shops seeing where the good places are) in kensington and knightsbridge.

yesterday my dad went to germany for the final leg of his business trip and he will be back in london within a few hours (so around noon today, wednesday) and my mom and i slept in, unintentionally. so instead of going to the globe theatre for a tour and all yesterday morning, we went to leicesters square to check out the cheap theatre tickets. we got tickets for mary poppins and phantom of the opera (for wednesday night) (and we're going to see wicked(!) on thursday). we then went to covent gardens andd cruised around there until i went on the backstage tour of the royal ballet and opera house (it was the actual tour unlike when i tried to go last week...). some fun facts of the opera house: its on about 2.5 acres of land (its huge), the entire time we were there the orchestra was practicing for 'sleeping beauty' which was fun to listen to, the building has burned down three times, and it was a dance hall during WWII. the only thing was that we didnt actually go 'backstage' which is huge (we looked at it through windows) and we didnt check out the costume department, but oh well. after that my mom and i stayed around covent gardens, went back to the hotel, had dinner, then went to see mary poppins which just opened here and its the first time its ever been done on stage. since my mom is here and paying for the seats, we had really really good ones, like orchestra seats. and the show was really great too!

on a side note: every kid in england has this week off so there are children all over this city, which is weird. until this week london was made up of people in business suits and tourists, but now there are kids *everywhere*

after i go to class in a few minutes for two hours (the only class im going to this whole week) i am meeting up with the parentals to go on the london eye (the worlds largest ferris wheel, true story) then we are going to see phantom of the opera tonight

peace out girl scout

so i havent been able to kick this cold - people who have it or have had it say it lasts for a week and a half. lame. it mainly consists of a cough and being exhausted. but last night i wasnt able to sleep because of drunken people running through my flat until 3:30 and the alarm from hell going off in claire's room. i was even drugged up with nyquil and benadryl to help me sleep, but to no avail.

last night my london theatre class went to go see 'a family outing' which is a show performed by ursula martinez and her parents. luckily it only lasted an hour. this performance was more in the category of 'performance arts' rather than theatre - it was a bit too contemporary for me. it consisted of her interviewing her parents about their lives with little interruptions (ex. her sister calling, the mom doing a dance to 'i will survive,' and her dad reciting act II, scene VII from 'as you like it'). it was like they were trying to pretend it was improv, yet it was scripted. as if they were acting on not acting.

so yes, today mary and i are going to (hopefully) plan what we're doing for fall break (since thats in a few weeks and all) then we're going off into london to do stuff and maybe see the film 'the history boys'. neato

last night i made a mexican crepe. yes, its true. i put nutella (yum!) on a tortilla and then cut up some fresh strawberries and raspberries and made myself a desert quesadilla, or rather crepe-illa. it was delicious.

so today i went to convant garden (one of my favorite places in this crazy town) to go on a backstage tour of the royal opera house set up by arcadia (the group i went through to study here). well it turns out that instead of for the 17th of october, its for the 27th. im not too smart it turns out with the whole reading thing. so anyways, i showed up at 2 because one paper from arcadia said it started at 2, but there werent any college age kids there, so i wandered around for a bit until just before 2:30. i asked an usher (note: weitzel - his name wasnt actually 'usher') about the tour and he said they just started because they thought everyone was there. so he took me into the theatre to where the group was. which i thought would be a bunch of students. nope, there were about 15 couples there who were at least 65 years old. so that was awkward for a little, then i assumed i had the wrong day, told the guide, and left.

so yah, that was fun. i went shopping for a bit and realized that there are only a few places in england that are actually descently priced (ex. h&m, topshop) pretty much everywhere else is really expensive (priced like anthropologie, and some of the shops arent even that cute). on my way out of h&m i was stopped by a woman who works for 'new woman' magazine and a photographer who asked if they could take my picture for a section of the magazine which features everyday londoners in their cute clothes. so yah, thats me, im pretty trendy. well only because i was wearing this really cool jacket i got in new york last summer (its grey with red stitching and a red bow in the middle). so yes, if im in it then it comes out the last week in november!

mary met up with me for a bit and we continued shopping (dont worry, i only bought a few shirts, i didnt go crazy or anything...its too expensive to go crazy) then i headed back to delightful new cross. rumor has it that my flat will actually be getting wireless at the start of next week, but my flatmates have been saying that for 3 weeks now so im not holding my breath (but i hope they prove me wrong!). tomorrow im off to the theatre with my class to see 'a family outing' so that should be exciting :)


ps peanut butter and jenny - thanks so much for the amazing mail! i love the tshirt and letter!

i have officially been in england for one full month today. and ill be home exactly 2 months from today fyi

anyways, yesterday i chilled in the library for a few hours putting pictures online (including ones from camp(!)) so here you go:
http://community.webshots.com/user/ashalay23



ps thanks to my parents, kate from rocklin, gemma, and ashley with blonde hair for mail! mail makes me really really happy :D

hello, so heres an update on how my busy week has been

(the main thing you need to know is that ive been to the theatre 3 nights in a row, sweet!)

last sunday robbie, mary, and i went to camden market to check it out (which i went to last time i was in london). we soon discovered that there were way too many people there - the streets, stores, and market place were a zoo and i dont like being surrounded with strangers pushing me around (what can i say? im a fan of personal space). so we left and went to meet up with my flatmate jen and her sister and friend who were visiting. we met them for church at westminster abby, which is london's notre dame in a way. its really cool and really old (and one of the places they ran around in in the davinci code). we also cruised around that general area up to trafalgar square. so yes, that was fun, then that night robbie and i went to the hobgoblin (the pub next to my flat) for quiz night and met some cool people including this young married couple from nebraska (they were cute and really nice)

so on monday i went to class (english) then i met up with rob and tom(!) whom neither of us had seen until monday, so that was definitely exciting. we ended up going down to toms house in forest hill which is only 2 train stops away from me

tuesday i went to class (history), which, sorry uncle frank, was sufficiently boring but thats ok. i took lots of notes like i always do. that night i hung out with tom and robbie again which was good fun

wednesday rolled around with my anthropology class (including my crazy greek TA) and london theatre, which is turning out to be a joke class that im loving since i get to see plays for free then talk about them with an awesome teacher who realizes that the class in a way is a joke. then i met up with tom and robbie and we went to meet toms girlfriend of 6 years over in putney - a really nice area in south london where people actually live, its not sketchy, its clean and has restaurants, shops and other places you can actually go. so needless to say, i really enjoyed being out of the ghetto. we went to wagamama's, a noodle bar, then cruised around the town only to return to natalie's flat and play cards.

thursday robbie left to go to crew and stay there for a month and i took a nap. that evening i went to see 'piano/forte' at the royal court theater in sloane square which was really good. the set was beautiful and the acting was great. it was pretty intense (you pretty much watch a family implode) but so was the show last week (homestead).

friday i went with mary and her friend alicia (who is studying in spain) to portobello road to check out the market. portobello road is in notting hill (yes we looked for a blue door and a travel bookshop, but were unsuccessful)(if you dont know what im talking about, maybe you should go watch 'notting hill') and it is home to a really big market which consists of vintage clothes at not so vintage prices unfortunately. later that evening we went and saw spamalot at the palace theatre! which was great, and i like to brag that ive already seen it with the original cast in new york because i can. it was great (except for our seats which were pretty bad) and tim curry was in it here too.

yesterday consisted of going into central london again with mary and alicia to hit up the half price ticket booth in leicester square to get tickets for evita. but they only had the really expensice ones, and we're cheap students. so we went to the adelphi theatre on the strand and asked if they had cheap tickets. i think we got the last ones! so yep, last night i saw evita! which is one of my favorites, although, once again, our seats sucked. so i think i might try and get organized and sese it again in the next month or two and get a better seat so i can see it again. the woman who played eva was the first woman actually from argentina to play the part, and seh was great. it was interesting listening to it live and hearing the differences in the music from the movie with madonna and antonio - the part of eva is definitely for a soprano, so they lowered it for madonna. they also cut out some music (just a little bit here and there) for the film. i love the movie though, dont get me wrong

today im taking it easy, i have a sore throat (lame? yes)

on a side note, i would like to share a funny story with you about a short conversation with a guy on the tube. this random man tapped my shoulder after noticing my gamma phi beta bag and the conversation went something like this:
"are you part of that group?"
"yes"
"thats very prestigious"
(what is this guy talking about?) "well, its my sorority..."
"oh. but its very prestigious right? you must be a mathematician"
"um no" then i tried to explain what it was, but really it was no use
i hate math

cheers

well a lot has happened since my last post earlier this week, so i will try and be concise, but with pictures and everything im not sure if that will happen......

so i have class monday - wednesday, leaving a long weekend for me to enjoy. my schedule goes a little something like this:
monday: 4-6 european culture and society
tuesday: 2-3 european politics (and a small seminar for an hour after that every other week)
wednesday: 12-1 religion, morals, and symbols (with an hour seminar after)
4-5 london theatre (and then we see a show either that night or thursday night)

so yes, my politics class mainly focuses on germany since 1945 this term. the teacher speaks slowly and this first class was rather boring, but i have hopes for it. my anthropology class, religion, morals, and symbols, is really interesting and it is taught by an elderly hippyish man from the black country. my TA for that class who teaches the seminar is a greek man named michelangelo! which is exciting and he is very animated when he talks to a rather quiet class. my theatre class is great - its only open to americans and our teacher is really great. we saw 'homestead' on wednesday evening which is being shown at the theatre museum right up the road from where 'evita' and 'the lion king' are playing. my teacher actually wrote and directed the play which features a cast of about 8 women. it was wonderful.

thursday morning my friends mary and cailin and i were meeting up in front of our flats to go to bath when i received a phone call from my friend robbie - an aussie from camp for those of you who dont know him. he had told me before that he was trying to get a flight into london from brazil (ah yes, quite the world traveler) on friday, but it turns out he was actually coming thursday morning. which caught me by suprise (i know, im a great person). so anyways, he met us at the waterloo station and the four of us took the train up to salsbury, the home of stonehenge. we had to take a bus ride to stonehenge since its a bit out of the city. when we were driving out there we were picturing walking over a grassy hill and seeing stonehenge - oh what a sight to behold! wait, there it is, on the side of the road. yep, way to go kids.

but it was still cool to see dispite the rainy, windy weather. it is the greatest henge in all the world! what is a henge? well first they built strawhenge, then woodhenge, but a big bad wolf came and blew them all down. we then returned to salsbury mid afternoon in search of lunch, however everything was closed. except for dominoes pizza, quality. after we inhaled our food we hopped back on the train for bath.

once in bath we ran over to the roman baths to take the tour (with cool hearing devices). the roman baths were really neat, especially since most of what they built (especially in way of plumbing and all) is still there and in use. its a pretty big site as well, with possibly more areas however its hard to tell completely since theres a huge city built around it. after the baths we went to find somewhere to eat dinner, and we ended up at the pub the litten tree which was cool and we made friends with the dj. after dinner we went to the backpackers hostel there (my first hostel ever!), dropped off our stuff, then went back to the litten tree for the remainder of the evening.

the next morning we went to breakfast then off to the actual baths in bath that people can use. for 20 pounds you can chill there for 2 hours. we went to the rooftop pool which has amazing views of bath - the pools there are all naturally heated or something, so its quite nice. then we went to the hot bath downstairs for a bit. after that we headed off to the steam rooms - there is a big room with a shower in the center and four round rooms in each quadrant of the larger room which make up the steam rooms. they were intense. its weird when your breath is cool and refreshing. but i really liked them - especially the eucalyptus and mint room. we then returned to the rooftop pool for the remiander of our time.

after all of that excitement, we went to grab lunch (i had my first pasty ever, man the english eat healthy....) then we checked out the abby in the center of town which was beautiful and quite big (those catholics know how to build 'em). then we returned to the train to come back to london.



the past few days robbie and i have been hanging out doing cool things, including hanging out with tom - another camp kid (who, it turns out, lives a few train stops down from me, neato). so yes, thats my story. since its tuesday i only have class tomorrow then its the weekend again, sweet! it hardly feels like im in school (although i am, dont worry, tuition isnt being wasted or anything)

anyways have a lovely evening

ps. happy birthday jake!!

my four and a half month long summer has come to an end today with the start of classes. well, i only had one class today from 4-6 today which was cool. the class is intro to european culture and society and my teacher (called a tutor here) just finished getting her graduate degree in something historical at cambridge. there are about 15 or 16 students in the class, none of which are british (there are students from germany, spain, france, norway, america, russia, and maybe a few others). the first hour was spent on talking about the historical periods of europe in which europes identity changed. and the second half was a discussion about current european culture, if the english consider themselves european, what constitutes if you are european and other cool topics. being a cultural anthropology major, i really enjoyed it. although i am still confused on homework, or rather 'recommended reading' - you dont actually get assigned reading, they just list a few books in which you can pick reading from each week...? its weird and im confused.

last night i was able to spend some quality time with 2 of my flatmates jen (american) and claire (british, scottish, swiss, french - she gets around). we watched a few episodes of sex and the city and then we decided to watch a movie, and claire flipped out when she saw that i had wizard of oz in my small collection that i brought, so we watched it and ate lots of food. it was cool to finally have time to chill with some of my flatmates.

anyways, thats me today. i think tomorrow i might try and do laundry (i havent been able to do it since ive been here, gross? yes.) ive heard a rumor that there is a place to do laundry in the building next to mine (one of the dorms) which is good, because theres a laundrymat down the street and it costs £6 for one load in the wash (so thats 12 dollars). later

Happy October

Heres a bit of an update on what I have been up to this weekend

Yesterday cailin, mary, and I took the train down to brighton, which is located on the coast about an hour and a half south of London. And the guy at the train station hooked us up with cheap student and group discounts for our train rides to and from brighton which was great.

So yes, we arrived at 10:30 and walked down to the beach (which was full of pebbles, not sand) and walked along to the large pier. On the pier there are a lot of little kiosks, an arcade, lots of carnival games, and at the end there is a small theme park. The three of us stopped to get something to eat at a Belgian waffle stand which serves waffles on a stick covered in fudge, caramel, or chocolate (I got the chocolate). It was amazing.

After that we walked through town up to the royal pavilion which was “built by the flamboyant george iv.” It was so beautiful and so different. The pavilion is based off of Chinese architecture and it is surrounded by gardens. There is also a small museum there (free admission, yay) which we walked around in and enjoyed the kids room. We ate lunch just outside of the pavilion at a pub and restaurant called ha!ha! and it was super good. And after our somewhat late lunch we wandered around the lanes – an area of brighton hidden from the main streets where there are shops. The lanes are exciting because they are so small and narrow, so like a lane. We each bough masquerade masks there which are from italy and are hand painted, they are so cool! There were other ones there (worth a minimum of $90) which had feathers and more elaborate painting and rhinestones on them, but we’re cheap college student (but they were fun to play with for a bit). We then returned to our flats in new cross quite tired and hungry. But outside of our flats there was a flower stand so I bough some gerber daisies for my room which is quite nice. Yay fresh flowers! The rest of my evening wasn’t all that exciting (except for when mary and I tried to watch grey anatomy on the internet and it wasn’t streaming all that well)

This morning mary and I went to an all souls church off of oxford street. It had been recommended to her by one of her professors from back home or something so she wanted to check it out and I decided to tag along. It was a cool church that was pretty diverse in both age and ethnicity and it has a big focus on students here at uni (including international students). The sermon was alright, it just went on for daaaays. We then went to lunch a few blocks away from the church at a place called EAT: the real food company. As opposed to the fake food companies near it. Its like a prêt a manger, but better and a bit cheaper. It was really good, I even bought a few things to bring home for dinner.

It has rained a lot today. But it will rain, stop, rain, pour, drizzle, rain, stop, repeat. The weather here needs to take a chill pill. Or just go back to the sun and 70 degree weather we were having there for a while (its so obvious im from California)

So yes, im back at goldsmiths now. Its interesting being in an arts college (everyone here is either arty or a theatre nerd, or both) and its also interesting being in an urban setting. New cross isn’t the best part of London – there are sirens going off quite a lot, especially at night (don’t worry, I don’t go out by myself). And apparently there have been a shooting or two in the past few weeks around here in a club or something and the mini mart across the street was held up recently. But where else can you go to a kebab place and also get fries/chips, fried chicken (this country loves kfc and I don’t know why), a burger, and some weird british pie with liver in it. So yes, that’s new cross. im a thug. Right.

Ps I have my first day of class tomorrow (but I only have one class and its from 4-6, sweet)