I've been here almost a month??

It's hard to sit down and write a blog entry when there's so much else going on.

I'll just get some of this updating out of the way by bulletpointing, otherwise I'll perenially be weeks behind.

After we found out our internship placement, needless to say we spent the rest of the day after classes googling our new jobs and trying on first-day-of-work outfits. Having so little time to feel prepared before starting a job we'd never even interviewed for was weird...especially coming from NU, where I apply and interview for jobs and internships all the time, this felt really strange and unnerving.

My first two weeks there have gone well though: I work on the Equalities Team for the Greater London Authority (GLA) at City Hall. The City Hall building is fondly nicknamed "the testicle" by locals, but it's a neat space, down by the water with a great view of the city. My team consists of about 6 people, who work on various equalities issues like race, faith, gender, and bi/gay/trans. Those 4 issues, along with age and disabilities, make up the "6 strands" of disadvantaged people whose concerns the GLA seeks to address. My supervisor's name is Sue--she's lovely, very nice, kind of on the meek side, and I feel like I overwhelm her a little, but she doesn't dislike me. I also have another supervisor, Julia, on Thursdays, who is a little more my speed. My projects will consist of updating statistics for the annual "State of Equality in London Report" and then utilizing gender statistics from that report and a variety of other sources to create a "Status of Women in London" report in time to be useful for the mayoral elections n the spring. I'll also get to help out on a womens conference to be held in March, for International Women's Day--I'm considering flying back then if its something I get super-involved in. I didn't do too much work the first two weeks, but I went to a lot of meetings, met the mayor by accident in the elevator (and we discussed breakfast sandwiches??), and started to wrap my head around all of the statistics. Last week, I went out for tapas and to see Stomp with the team to celebrate some birthdays and work anniversaries, which was a lot of fun. The woman who is the big big boss, the advisor to the mayor on women's issues, is the British version of my old crazy boss from spring coop, which never fails to make me laugh.

Classes are going well too, I just turned in my first paper for my British Politics and Policy class--it was on civil liberties, and hopefully I get a good grade...I'm not so sure how my BS skills will stack up to the British grading system, but I guess we'll wait and see. I have a few more papers and exams, as well as my dissertation, that comprise my final grades. My professors are both pretty chill--we all think our Parliament professor would be fun to go out drinking with.

Edinburgh was the 2nd week we were here, and the Friday we got back, Jess and Laura, my two old roommates, came to visit! Jess is studying in Perugia (Italy) and Laura is studying in Belfast, so they both hopped on a plane and came in for a long weekend. It was SO much fun. We had a whirlwind weekend where I tried to play tourguide and show them the best parts of the city. We went out for delicious Moroccan food the night they came in, and then out with my friends to a weird club by school. Saturday, we were all over the place--Westminster, Portobello Market, the Tate Modern, all over. That night, we went to a great pub with a bunch of my friends. Sunday, we hit up Camden Market, and went to an amazing restaurant down by the Thames, where you could sit outside near heat lamps and wrap yourself in big wool blankets while you ate and drank.

All weekend, the three of us just kept talking about how lucky we are, and how surreal it seems to be in London, Belfast, Perugia, traveling to other cities. Our lives are just so unbelievable sometimes. It was fantastic to see them. The three of us are a wonderful team--really laidback, excited about everything, flexible, and wanting to get our hands on everything. We also encourage each other to buy too many cute things, but that's another story.

The weekend after they were here, I went to Dublin with 5 other kids: Mike, Jordan, Julia, Steph, and Miranda. We'd bought the tickets a few days after getting to London, and then promptly forgot to make accommodation plans. We scrambled around all week, and ended up finding an apartment for the first two nights, and decided to find a place for Saturday once we got there. Fly by the seat of our pants, if you like. Also, the apartment was for two people, and we were 5 people to a room, and that was going to be a bit of a challenge...

We flew out of Stansted airport, an hour outside of Londn, right from work on Thursday, and because of a flight delay, didn't end up in Dublin til around midnight, then had to get to our hotel--Jordan and I sketchily pretended to be a couple and got the keys to our little apartment and picked the others up on a corner and wandered around until we found it--SCORE. A huge king bed for the 3 girls to share, a flat screen tv and couch with cushions for the boys, a kitchen....so great.

The next day we spent wandering around Dublin, seeing the basic sights: St. Patrick's, Guinness Factory, St. Stephen;s Green, etc. Gorgeous. We did a bit of a pub crawl through Temple Bar that night, ending with the boys abandoning us on a street corner with Australians and wandering home to buy a Cosmo and frozen pizza, curling up on the couch to watch bad tv.

Saturday, we checked out of our apartment, and had finally managed to find a hotel with a room available. We went to Trinity College and saw the Book of Kells, and did some more walking around, just seeing the sights. We watched the rugby game in the pub connected to our hotel, then went out, ending up at the Gin Palace?? So fun, made friends, sang crazy songs, and generally made a big scene. Sunday, we woke up to check out, and went to catch a train out of the city, north to Howth. My internship boss used to live in Howth, which is a fishing village about 20 minutes outside the city, and recommended that we spend Sunday there, hiking around the cliffs. We happened to be there on a market day, so we got fresh food and sat to eat and peoplewatch, then spent a few hours up in the cliffs, both on and off paths... I'm a city girl, and the rest of my pack are outdoorsy, so there were a few patches where I was a little nerved out, and my heavy weekend bag on my back didn't help matters. The views were unbelievable though, and the high we got from getting to the top made it all worth it. Pictures to come some time soon. We came back down, tired and muddy, and wandered around until we could get a table at a restaurant. After, we got a few beers at the pub by the train, then got a cab to the airport: our flight was crazy early on Monday, so we didn't bother getting a room and just crashed at the airport from 12-6 am. We just found tables and boothes to curl up in, listened to music, played cards, and watched people. We saw a guy get arrested for choking another guy who encroached on his sleeping space?! Then we caught our flight home, landed, hopped on a train back into the city, and managed to be on campus by 930 for our 10 am class. Needless to say, we all had massive trouble keeping our eyes open, but the weekend was a major success on all accounts. It was a great group to travel with, and I loved Dublin.

I'll try to get all caught up in one more post tomorrow, but I have work in the morning....

London Bridge: Isn't Falling Down, It's Where I Get Off the Tube Three Times a Week!

and three weeks later....

I've literally been too busy to sit down and write a legitimate blog post. And even now, I really should be working on my Policy paper that's due next Monday. I suppose it can wait.

So in summation, I love London. Our area is great--lots of restaurants, a silly convenience grocery store, two wine shops, a good local pub, a stationery store, a hardware store, and another pub. Also an amazing cookie shop. And the tube stop is 3 minutes from my front door. There's no real shopping, which is good, or I would be even broker (not a word, I'm aware) than I am.

The first week we were here was literally like summer camp. We went to intro meetings and classes, and seminars, and were pretty much on our own to get settled in and see a little bit of London. And see London we did. We went on a bus tour through the city, which got detoured because of a crazy biking event, and did exploring on our own. The programme also took us on a tour of Parliament, which is all I'll see of the place, since my internship placed me elsewhere. The first week was great to just settle in a little, have lots of time to get to know one another, and get our bearings a little bit.

The second week, we went to Edinburgh with the whole group, thereby wrecking any semblance of routine we managed to create the first week. Edinburgh was a 4 hour train ride through the countryside, and a really nice little adventure to take us all on in the first few weeks. We stayed at a really cool little hotel that felt like the Scottish version of our flats, and served cute little breakfast in the morning. We had lectures and the chance to sit on on Scottish Parliament, which was awesome. We watched a debate in the morning on whether or not the Scottish National Party had held up its end of the promises it made coming into office. The MPs were really intense and yelling and mocking each other: pretty sweet, and nothing I could've imagined going on in the Senate back home. It was a cool window into another political system. The UK has a devolved system, where Scotland and Wales have their own Parliaments, but also send MPs to Westminster. The building Scottish Parliament is in is also interesting--apparently cost a fortune, and seems a little unnecessary, but since my mom's an architect, I got a kick out of it.

While in Edinburgh, we also had free afternoons and got to do some sightseeing. We saw Edinburgh Castle, bought some plaid scarves, did a funny little tour of the underground part of the city, and hiked up a little mountain/hill in the center of the city. We ate and drank at some cool pubs, and generally wandered around the city. I liked the way the city felt: old and kind of grand, without being overwhelming at all. The architecture was cool, castles are amazing, and it just seemed...mature? London feels like a younger city, and is definitely more fun, but I liked Edinburgh a lot.

While we were there, we all had different roommates too, which was really nice to just bond with some new people and switch up the social scene a little bit. I loved taking the train there and back as well: its relaxing, scenic, and less of a pain than flights. Having a few hours with nothing to do but read and listen to music was definitely ideal.

We found out about our internships on Monday the 8th: and were due to start them Tuesday the 9th. There was a lot of hubbub the day before, because Gordon Brown, the new Prime Minister, was hypothetically going to call a snap election, which would have meant that MPs would have gone home to their constituencies to campaign, and nobody would have been placed in Parliament. I knew I wasn't getting placed with an MP because I didn't receive security forms, but there was a general spike of insanity in the flats for a day or two.

My placement is...drum roll...

At London City Hall, with the Greater London Authority, working for the Equalities Team, primarily on gender.

What does this mean?

I'm working on a team of about 6 people, who report to one or two of the advisors to the mayor. My projects will consist of updating the "State of Equality in London" report with this year's stats, then pulling all gender-relevant pieces out to compile a large body of data and trend for a "Status of Women in London" report for the mayor, as well as maybe working on a womens conference that will be held in the spring. I like my team thus far, and am going to dinner and a show with them this week, actually.

Got sidetracked editing Armine's Fulbright application, so I'll continue this tomorrow...bedtime!

week 1 in london: check.

i've been keeping a little notebook elsewhere, and thus haven't been "blogging" literally, but I have plenty of things to relate....

which will happen later, because im off to class :)

but all is well. it was a crazy busy week. I love the kids I live with, and I'm slowly growing obsessed with London. I'm going to look into work/grad school here for after I graduate (if that ever happens). I'm missing everyone at home a little, and as my roommate Miranda says, we all have FOMO--fear of missing out on things at home. but i'l survive, especially because everyone emails me! London holds a lot for me this semester, I'm excited. We go to Edinburgh tomorrow, then start internships next week, then a bunch of us are going to Dublin. Should be good! More later, I promise...