Fish and Chips. On the side of the road. In the middle of nowhere.

I think to be a "city person" you need to want one of two things: either to blend into the crowd, or to be part of something bigger. I'm definitely the latter, and while I've been to my fair share of cities - New York, Rome, Paris, Chicago - I have never experienced anything like London. And I've been here three times before! It's much, much different to live here. I hate to say this to New York, because I do love it there, but London is more diverse, more visually confusing, and more unique. The States will always be my home, but the best thing about London is its unparalleled diversity. I know I've said that there is no such thing as a true Londoner, but honestly, you hear so many languages, smell so many foods, see so many skin colors it should be overwhelming, but it's oddly comforting. On my walk to work through Piccadilly Circus on Friday I heard three different languages that weren't English in the two blocks it took me to get there. Every group of people I passed were tourists, immigrants, business men from God knows where, students... But today on the tube I saw a man wilding gesturing, flailing his arms around. I figured he was another obligatory City Crazy so I moved away, but when I looked closer at his reflection in the window I realized it was sign language. Yet another form of communication to add to the list I've "heard" in the past week. Maybe Geneva belongs to the world, but I think London is the world.

Example: I went to this crazy, colorful, ridiculous parade at the mayor's Thames Festival a little over a week ago. There was a lantern procession with dancing of every kind: African, Chinese, Bolivian, and so many different kinds of music they became this one big and wild blend of pure sound. The photo above left is a group of little kids from some organization or another holding paper flowers that they had lit up with Christmas lights. They ran by fast, dancing and waving their arms, creating what was like a fireworks display on the ground. The photo to the right is... I have no idea. There were these weird HUGE puppets (or something like a puppet, I'm sure it has a name but I would just embarrass myself if I pretended to know what it is). They must have been made out of something really light because people would wear them on their backs and they had these poles in their arms attached to the arms of the puppet, which they would wave around and either scare the little kids or thrill them. I'm not sure which emotion I felt to be perfectly honest. But it was a sight to see and lasted for hours. If you're ever in London in September I highly recommend going to this festival. I spent two days down at the Thames that weekend and couldn't have possibly seen a third of what was there.

I've been so engrossed in London that after three weeks here I have yet to travel anywhere else around England. Besides learning about the country in my various classes, I don't think I've seen anything truly British. Some of the customs here reinforce the stereotypes - but only the good ones. For example, every day at work someone in the office goes around and asks if anyone would like a cup of tea. With just a spot of milk. During my lunch break, my boss asks if I'd like to "pop out for a bite", and the word "cheers" is thrown around with wild abandon. When I asked a coworker what it actually meant, she couldn't give me an answer. "You know... just, cheers!" I know there are a million words in the States that have "meanings" like that, but since I didn't actually know what cheers meant I thought it was very funny. Eventually I figured out its very loose definition is "thanks", which I like. What other country would have a hugely popular word be one of politeness?

Another truly English adventure I've had has involved fish and chips. London is very very expensive (don't even ask about my cell phone bill), so my friends and I had yet to try English fish and chips because all the pubs serve them for at least 8 pounds. That's about 16 US dollars. So one night we all pulled a Harold and Kumar and went out for a real meal of fish and chips, newspaper and all. Unfortunately it's no longer legal to serve it in newspaper as it's a health violation, but after about an hour we ended up riding the tube, getting off at Notting Hill Gate. My friend Rachel had seen, once upon a time, a fish and chips stand somewhere in the Notting Hill vicinity... I think. So we walked around for a while, and finally saw a beautiful, greasy, hole-in-the-wall fish and chips stand! The floors were a mess and it was completely empty except for the sketchy men who sit by themselves, but you could smell the chips down the street. And as an added bonus, they were 4 pounds for a huge amount of food :-) So the five of us all ordered our own serving, and even though there was no newspaper, we did get yellow half broken Styrofoam boxes which I guess in this day and age is kind of the same thing. With our food in hand we really had nowhere to go except back home but we really wanted that poor college student experience. So we headed next door to the grocery store, bought a six pack of beer for an absurdly low price, and parked ourselves on a concrete wall by the curb in the middle of the night in the middle of nowhere to eat our hard-earned meal.

Besides classes, work, and fish and chip hunting (we did this one more time that week) I've also been doing some touristy things like St. Paul's Cathedral, the Gherkin and the Tower of London... I could list all the things I've done to give you a general update on my life here, but that would be boring and it's not the touristy things that have been defining my life at all. I finally feel like I live here. AND Davidson has officially given me permission to stay for the year! So I have so much more time to enjoy everything this amazing city (and country) has to offer....
... after, you know, I've found my way there ;-)