Me again!! I have lots to report today, in no small part due to the fact that Katie and I took a trip to Oslo, Norway last weekend! I had a relatively quiet week apart from a horrendous date that I went on with a guy from New Zealand. I had met him at a bar the weekend before and he seemed like a nice person, apart from the fact that he seemed to enjoy staring at me creepily, so I agreed to go out with him on Tuesday night, thinking 'What could I possibly lose?' As it turns out, I lost a minor portion of my sanity that night.
The evening started off well enough when we met up in Covent Garden and tried to figure out where to go for dinner. We finally settled on a nice Italian place. This is where the fun part of the night ended. The conversation followed a set pattern which went something like this:
Me: So, why did you decide to move here?
Bad Date Guy: *Stares* ..... *Snickers for some unexplained reason*
Me: What's wrong?
BDG: *Stares* .... Nothing's wrong, why?
Me: Ummm... no reason...?
BDG: Yeah ummm... yeah, just wanted a change. *Stares*
Me: *Twitch*
Repeat for approximately 1.5 hours, during which time I
1. Considered running out of the restaurant as fast as I possibly could.
2. Considered slapping BDG and telling him to stop being creepy.
3. Considered faking an emergency phone call, i.e. the classic getaway excuse.
4. Excused myself to go to the bathroom only so I could kill some time while trying to think of things to say to him and how to end the date.
In the end, I ended up promptly requesting the bill upon completion of my apple pie and told the lovely chap that I had to go do my food shopping... at 9pm on a Tuesday night. It seemed to work though, as he didn't question my motives and even texted me later that night to say that he had a great time and would like to see me again. I would much rather walk on burning hot coals than see him again. In my defense, I would just like to say that I insisted on paying half the bill for the meal so I didn't just get a free meal then take off!!
Anyway, onto Oslo - what a gorgeous place!!!! We landed at an airport that was a 1.5 hour drive from Oslo, so we took an express bus into the city and the drive was gorgeous!! The landscape looks exactly like Ontario on the way to the Kawarthas where Katie's cottage is. It was so stunning and was hard to believe that we were in Norway and not back at home in Canada. We arrived in Oslo and quickly found our hotel, which was actually a ship 5 minutes from the central train station in the harbour!!! The ship had been transformed into a hostel and even had a pirate flag on it!!!!!! Our little cabin room was tiny but had a very comfortable bunk bed and our own bathroom!! The included breakfast was excellent as well. It was definitely a different experience and we had a good laugh over it. We basically spent the weekend walking around Oslo and taking in the city, but didn't get a chance to visit any museums. Oslo is a very leafy city with big wide sidewalks that people love to stroll down.
Skip ahead to 2 weeks later - it's now 8th Nov... oops!
Anyway, where was I? Oslo - yes, gorgeous city and lots of gorgeous blonde people there as well! There seemed to be tons of children everywhere as well, but very well behaved, which was a nice change! It was a really lovely break from the madness of London but we were still happy to get back 'home.' When you live in London, other cities are great to visit but you find that you run out of things to do very quickly in comparison. Here in London, there is literally never a shortage of things to do - even people that have lived here for years say that they haven't managed to do even a fraction of the things they'd like to because there just isn't enough time! It's fabulous!!!
I'm trying to think of what else I've been up to! I've mainly been working and going out really! Work is going great - my coworkers are absolutely fantastic and I'm being given a lot more respect and responsibility within my team. I work for the sales team and they've been inviting me to their meetings, and even invited me to the big sales offsite day at the Four Seasons Hotel in Canary Wharf. It consisted of presentations on the various aspects of the BNY Mellon sales world in Europe, the Middle East and Africa. I was really excited to have been invited to that and it was a great networking experience.
That was just this past Tuesday, and that night I went into the West End to meet about 11 of of my coworkers and a few friends to see Spamalot, the Monty Python musical, and have some dinner. It was a fabulous night and Spamalot was unbelievably hilarious!!!!!!!! I almost died laughing. If you're into that kind of humour, I highly recommend going to see it!!!!
I don't have any travelling weekends planned at the moment as I'm completely broke! I'm hoping to do a couple of trips in the new year, hopefully to Krakow and back to Scotland, because I fell in love with it last time I was there. Right now I'm just really looking forward to heading back home for the holidays. It'll be weird to come back here after flying home just for a visit, but that's all part of the experience of living abroad for a while! Katie and Andrea are heading home in December for good, so I won't be living with them anymore. I'm hoping that being without them won't make me incredibly homesick - we'll see!! I suppose that'll be a good test as to whether I'm really settled here. I have my friends at work and my flatmates, but don't know many other people otherwise!
I should probably get going as I'm at work - today is quite quiet - but I hope this update made at least a little bit of sense! Apologies for the massive delay in posting - I haven't been able to concentrate very well on anything for the last couple of weeks - not sure why!
I hope everyone is doing well, and I hope to see many of you in a month and a bit when I come home!!!!!!!!!
Lots of love,
Emily
Wednesday, October 24, 2007
Sunday, October 14, 2007
The last couple of weeks have been fantastic and filled with culture!! Last weekend I headed out to Walthamstow, which is the centre of the borough in which Leyton is situated, to check out old census records from my area to get an idea of who once lived in my house. I found out that the house has existed from around the 1880s, as before that decade, this entire area was purely made up of fields and a couple of streets of sparse houses! There was a massive building boom in the early 1880s, which is when this entire neighbourhood went up. There were no records of anyone living here in 1891, but the next census that was taken in 1901 showed that there were 6 people living in this house - two families of three people each. The first family was made up of a 23-year-old couple, James and Charlotte Holloway, and their 1 year old son, James. The elder James was a wood polisher, indicating that this area was probably a relatively low income area, as other occupations on the street included locomotive drivers and confectionary shop employees etc. The other family was made up of a 22 year old woman and her 29 year old husband, and the woman's younger brother, who was 11 - I can't remember their names! The house must have been split into two flats, but they still would have had to share the bathroom and kitchen just like we do. Next door there lived 12 people!!!!!!! I find that astounding as these houses really aren't that big!!! There was a family of 9 and then three other people in that house. Amazing!!!!
Anyway, after I left the archives library, I met up with Katie and we headed down to the Imperial War Museum to check out the renowned Holocaust memorial exhibit. It was quite disturbing but very well done, and I'm really glad we went. They have a lot of displays telling the stories of individual people who suffered or died in concentration camps, which I thought was extremely important in getting people to understand just what a devastating impact the Nazis had on the lives of Jews and many others. They also had some wonderful pictures of Jewish families and friends taken before the war, when they were enjoying themselves on the beach or having picnics - it's so difficult to imagine that these normal, happy people were put through such terror and torture. Well, this is depressing so moving on...!!!!!
I didn't have a whole lot going on this week before Thursday, which was quite nice as I wasn't really in the mood for going out. Just one of those weeks!!! Thursday night was fabulous thought - Katie and I went to go see the London Festive Orchestra play at this beautiful church in Trafalgar Square called St. Martin-in-the-Field, so named because it once used to reside in the middle of grassy fields!!! Can you imagine?! Anyway, the orchestra was this lovely, tiny little chamber orchestra that played concertos by Vivaldi, Bach and Pachelbel, some of my favourite composers of all time. We were sitting just a few rows from the front and had a great view of the orchestra. The show was spectacular, and Katie fell in love with classical music!!!!!!!! I made a convert out of her!!
Friday night was quite quiet as well - I went out for a couple of drinks after work but had to get home early seeing as how Katie and I had to get up early in the morning to head out to the Great Portland St. tube station to catch our tour bus to see Stonehenge and Bath!!! We had a great day, and I'll try to put up some pictures soon. Stonehenge was a fair bit smaller than I thought it would be but it was beautiful and really fascinating. It's so strange that no one knows exactly why it's there or what purpose it serves!!!! It was quite amazing to literally be out in the middle of the English countryside surrounded by fields and to be standing next to a mysterious historical site that's been around for about 5000 years. It's really difficult to wrap one's mind around!!! We then headed off to Bath, which took me completely be surprise as it's absolutely beautiful and situated once again in the middle of these beautiful rolling hills. I did not expect it to be built the way it is, but apparently in the 18th century architects were hired to design the city in such a way that it would be ideal for wandering around and enjoying, and so that it would attract the best of the best and be the fashionable place to be in England. It was extremely English and quite beautiful and I can't wait to go back. The actual Roman baths themselves were gorgeous as well, and you can imagine that they must have been just spectacular back in their hey day. We felt the natural spring water that flows into them, and it was so hot!!! I was very surprised as I didn't realize that water coming from hot springs was quite literally HOT! We had a great day there, and I was so tired when we finally got back that I passed out at 9.30 and didn't wake up until 12 hours later!
Today I met up with my friend Nicola and we went into the west end to attend a Jewish festival in Trafalgar Square and to go see a film. Nicola isn't Jewish but she's hugely fascinated with Jewish culture and history, so she thought it would be fun to check out the festival. We heard some Jewish music and wandered around the booths for a bit, then went off to have lunch at my favourite little Japanese place in Leicester Square. We had a fabulous meal and then went to the Curzon Soho theatre to see a French film called The Singer. It definitely wasn't the best French film I've seen but it was interesting nonetheless!!!!!!! I've developed a passion for French films, and I highly recommend checking them out if you get a chance - they're so much more passionate and realistic than your typical American film. I know it's a little racy, but Lady Chatterley was an absolutely stunning film (French) and I recommend renting it or seeing it in the theatre if it's available. Another great one that we saw was Tell No One, a murder mystery.
This week I'm hoping to catch up with a few friends that I haven't had a chance to see recently, and then on the weekend Katie and I are randomly heading off to Oslo, Norway for a night!!!!!!!! We wanted to go somewhere, just anywhere really, so decided to look up the cheapest flight offered by Ryan Air and it happened to be Oslo - so we're going!!! I've always wanted to go to that part of the world, and even though we'll only be there for a short amount of time, it'll hopefully give us a sense of what the area has to offer. I hear it's quite beautiful so I'm really looking forward to it.
I must now go relax and read my book before starting another week at work!!! I hope everyone is doing great and keeping safe!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I miss you all like crazy!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Will write again soon,
Lots of love,
Emily
Anyway, after I left the archives library, I met up with Katie and we headed down to the Imperial War Museum to check out the renowned Holocaust memorial exhibit. It was quite disturbing but very well done, and I'm really glad we went. They have a lot of displays telling the stories of individual people who suffered or died in concentration camps, which I thought was extremely important in getting people to understand just what a devastating impact the Nazis had on the lives of Jews and many others. They also had some wonderful pictures of Jewish families and friends taken before the war, when they were enjoying themselves on the beach or having picnics - it's so difficult to imagine that these normal, happy people were put through such terror and torture. Well, this is depressing so moving on...!!!!!
I didn't have a whole lot going on this week before Thursday, which was quite nice as I wasn't really in the mood for going out. Just one of those weeks!!! Thursday night was fabulous thought - Katie and I went to go see the London Festive Orchestra play at this beautiful church in Trafalgar Square called St. Martin-in-the-Field, so named because it once used to reside in the middle of grassy fields!!! Can you imagine?! Anyway, the orchestra was this lovely, tiny little chamber orchestra that played concertos by Vivaldi, Bach and Pachelbel, some of my favourite composers of all time. We were sitting just a few rows from the front and had a great view of the orchestra. The show was spectacular, and Katie fell in love with classical music!!!!!!!! I made a convert out of her!!
Friday night was quite quiet as well - I went out for a couple of drinks after work but had to get home early seeing as how Katie and I had to get up early in the morning to head out to the Great Portland St. tube station to catch our tour bus to see Stonehenge and Bath!!! We had a great day, and I'll try to put up some pictures soon. Stonehenge was a fair bit smaller than I thought it would be but it was beautiful and really fascinating. It's so strange that no one knows exactly why it's there or what purpose it serves!!!! It was quite amazing to literally be out in the middle of the English countryside surrounded by fields and to be standing next to a mysterious historical site that's been around for about 5000 years. It's really difficult to wrap one's mind around!!! We then headed off to Bath, which took me completely be surprise as it's absolutely beautiful and situated once again in the middle of these beautiful rolling hills. I did not expect it to be built the way it is, but apparently in the 18th century architects were hired to design the city in such a way that it would be ideal for wandering around and enjoying, and so that it would attract the best of the best and be the fashionable place to be in England. It was extremely English and quite beautiful and I can't wait to go back. The actual Roman baths themselves were gorgeous as well, and you can imagine that they must have been just spectacular back in their hey day. We felt the natural spring water that flows into them, and it was so hot!!! I was very surprised as I didn't realize that water coming from hot springs was quite literally HOT! We had a great day there, and I was so tired when we finally got back that I passed out at 9.30 and didn't wake up until 12 hours later!
Today I met up with my friend Nicola and we went into the west end to attend a Jewish festival in Trafalgar Square and to go see a film. Nicola isn't Jewish but she's hugely fascinated with Jewish culture and history, so she thought it would be fun to check out the festival. We heard some Jewish music and wandered around the booths for a bit, then went off to have lunch at my favourite little Japanese place in Leicester Square. We had a fabulous meal and then went to the Curzon Soho theatre to see a French film called The Singer. It definitely wasn't the best French film I've seen but it was interesting nonetheless!!!!!!! I've developed a passion for French films, and I highly recommend checking them out if you get a chance - they're so much more passionate and realistic than your typical American film. I know it's a little racy, but Lady Chatterley was an absolutely stunning film (French) and I recommend renting it or seeing it in the theatre if it's available. Another great one that we saw was Tell No One, a murder mystery.
This week I'm hoping to catch up with a few friends that I haven't had a chance to see recently, and then on the weekend Katie and I are randomly heading off to Oslo, Norway for a night!!!!!!!! We wanted to go somewhere, just anywhere really, so decided to look up the cheapest flight offered by Ryan Air and it happened to be Oslo - so we're going!!! I've always wanted to go to that part of the world, and even though we'll only be there for a short amount of time, it'll hopefully give us a sense of what the area has to offer. I hear it's quite beautiful so I'm really looking forward to it.
I must now go relax and read my book before starting another week at work!!! I hope everyone is doing great and keeping safe!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I miss you all like crazy!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Will write again soon,
Lots of love,
Emily
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