Days 37, 38, 39 and 40

Wow... can't believe it's already been 40 days here :( I never want to leave!!

Day 37 aka we're from another country
The Harry Potter exhibit was a rip off. First of all, it was supposedly free if you dressed up as HP characters. Apparently our costumes weren't good enough because we didn't have official merchandise. I'm sorry we didn't A) spend tons of money to have an "official" school girl costume b) WE'RE FROM ANOTHER COUNTRY c) they totally let in a ton of British kids who were just as dressed up as we were. Then, we got in and there was a HUGE line to get your picture taken on a broom catching a golden snitch. Which is awesome but the line did not move. So we got out of it. The exhibit itself had about 10 HP film props and costumes. The rest were Legos and toy companies trying to sell you games. Luckily one lady let us pretend to ride the Nimbus2000 and Firebolt that were on display to be sold. So not the real props, but better than waiting in line.

my dork is showing so much right now.

Anyway, we left the HP room and the people who were BEHIND us in the photo op line were just getting in the door of the room. We toured the rest of the museum, which Sarah identified with a lot more than me, having never seen Batman movies before Christian Bale and not having seen Star Wars. Don't kill me. I got to pose with a giant Oscar statue and we got to sit on the couch with The Simpsons.

So that was cool. Then Sarah and I bought wands so we can bring them to the movie premiere and midnight release and just let our freak flag fly. Don't judge me...

After getting home a group of us went to a comedy club in Leicester Square and saw 5 comedians perform... the host was from New Orleans so he threw a couple of American jokes in for us. The 2nd to last guy was HILARIOUS. I thought he was even better than the headliner, who was still awesome. Afterwards we finally finished Harry Potter 2 and I went to bed early to go to church in a Russian Orthodox Cathedral in the morning.

Day 38 aka what time is it???
Well. I missed my alarm and woke up at 11 to Sarah asking me why I was still in bed. Oops. I will try to go again later... apparently they do the divine liturgy every day, so I might go on Wednesday. So instead I did nothing all day for a while. It was beautiful. Sarah and I met up with some of our friends for a "flash mob" at the Millenium Bridge.... but only like 60 people showed up. But we slow danced anyway on the bridge to our ipods and it was fun. :)

I can't really remember what we did after the flash mob... oh well.

Day 39 aka independence day!

Monday we watched the Prime Minister's questions on TV. The MPs are SO RUDE... it's like in Mean Girls when they cut to the clips where she imagines her life in the animal world. They will like talk and jeer over the PM or the opposition leader! It's ridiculous. AND we got back our papers. Mo should take a page out of Dr. Bradshaw's book because this was a 10 page paper due last week and we got it back in 7 days. Mo still has all of our papers from the 2nd day of class onwards. Afterwards Sarah and I went to Chipotle to celebrate being American! And got margaritas in the middle of the day! Nothing says America like burritos and day drinking. So then I went to TK Maxx, which was not as good as TJ Maxx at home. Then we went to theatre, and took a quiz on A Servant of Two Masters. When I heard about people having to read it for 211, they always complained... but I really liked it! And THEN we saw a British update called One Man, Two Guvn'rs. It was SO FUNNY. And in the spirit of commedia, they broke the fourth wall and improved a lot and it was just so great. The lead actor reminded me of Chris Farley and he did a fantastic job dealing with the improv and talking to the audience. At one point he (rhetorically) asked if anyone had a sandwich, and a guy threw one at him. And he just went: "This is the National Theatre!!! What are you doing??!" So funny. After we got back, Sarah and I started watching Harry Potter 3, but I went to bed before it was over since I had class in the morning.

Day 40 aka hey we're just going to walk you around in circles in a town you don't know but you can figure out how to get home on your own!

I have really come to loathe British Media and Society (the class, not the subject). I feel like we never talk about anything relevant, and if we do, it's just in passing to some digression. And we have really only done art as media. And now I'm ranting. But anyway, for the outing we went to Notting Hill Gate, which is famous as a film location for Notting Hill and other movies, and as a hangout for indie artists and famous artists of the 60s and 70s. Lindsay was going nuts because she loves the movie Notting Hill. If you remember, I commented on watching it while we were in Bath, so it was cool to see where the film was made. However, a lot of these outings are getting to be tedious because they're like "this is where this USED to be" etc. And it was SO HOT outside. After lunch and working on this blog (check out pictures/video on my older posts now!) I went with Catherine to Evensong at Westminster Abbey. Evensong is a small service that they do daily and the Westminster Boys Choir sing at it and it's really nice. I wish we had actually gotten to see it (we got there about a minute late so we had seats near the door and blocked by an altar), but we got to hear it and say the prayers anyway. Afterwards, we went to the Houses of Parliament! Which is exactly like when I went to Congress in 12th grade and sat in the gallery... they just talk and talk forever, and we walked in in the middle of a vote, which was unexciting. But I'm glad we experienced it! And they had comfier seats in the gallery in the House of Commons than in the Capitol. Tomorrow I'm heading to the V&A and going to Primark and New Look with Sarah in the afternoon.

Ta ta!