Oh, blog. I apologize for neglecting you these past few days. The sun finally emerged in Britain, and all the land rejoiced, and I lost interest in technology and regained interest in the great outdoors. And being pantsless.
Sky's out, thighs out.
(Unfortunately, I don't know these people, nor did I take this picture.)
I'm also sorry for being in class for a full week and not having written about it yet. Since I am, you know, here to be a Serious Student of Acting. (And you have no idea how Serious it is. Today Magdalen specifically outlawed Frisbee and jumping on the grass. I told you they take grass very Seriously here.) Don't worry, I'm being attentive and diligent in most of my Real Work. I've learned the definitions of many Shakespearean words and several songs about frogs. I think Chekhov and I might even be moving past the rocky first stages of our relationship.
But more on classes later, because this weekend I opted for a crash course in experiential education.
FRIDAY
Don't worry... my Friday night did NOT involve pink flamingos in pools, passed out DJs, or maxed out credit cards. But it was my first real night out on the town in Oxford, not counting a couple of pub escapades.
At around 11:30, my friends and I set off for the Purple Turtle, a club in downtown Oxford. Unlike Deer Park, which is an actual park with deer, the Purple Turtle does not have turtles and is not predominantly purple. We got there at around midnight and the bar area was pretty crowded, but the dance floor as empty save for a group of guys doing the Macarena to some Europop-electronica-dance pop-something. Lindsey and I joined in, and after that things at the Purple Turtle really picked up, so I can comfortably pretend that it was because of us.
My activities at the club that night will remain undisclosed. Suffice it to say that one of the things I've missed most since coming here is dancing, and I definitely did a lot of that on Friday. A lot. Also, British clubs play interesting music. "American Idiot" and "Mr. Brightside" occurred back-to-back, which would have triggered an overwhelming rush of seventh grade angst if Josh and I hadn't been having so much fun dancing in a corner.
SATURDAY
Saturday was Londonday. For most of BADA, actually - we ran into fellow students on buses, on street corners, even in bathrooms. And London is, you know, a really big place.
It's also a really excellent place. Historic, picturesque. ...Olympic. Here are some
1. Not only is Fleet Street a real place, it boasts an actual barber shop.
But do people really get haircuts here? Like... really?
2. Street performers. Street performers everywhere. Not just shoved into corners of subway stations or relegated to squares in sketchy areas like in America. No, here they're a part of the cultural landscape, just like those red telephone booths. There's a covered market in Covent Garden - the area near the West End - and as you walk through it you can hear a string quartet and a woman singing honest-to-blog opera. (Viral advertising for the nearby Royal Opera House?) Even in Oxford, bari saxophonists are a staple of Cornmarket Street. Take notes, America.
3. Cheap fruit! I made the mistake of having almost £0 with me, but I was luckily able to find a pear and a banana for under 35p each. I got a fruit salad from covered market at one point, but the cantaloupe was kind of... spicy? My feelings about this are still unclear.
4. American restaurants! The group I was travelling with had pretty diverse food needs (Anna's gluten free, Maggie and I are vegetarians, and all Zach wanted was a hamburger), so after combing Covent Garden we wound up at Maxwell's. Looking at the menu we were like, "Yeah, this is pretty American," and sure enough, it advertises itself as American food. I have no regrets. My veggie burger was awesome. Anna also ordered her first legal cocktail! And we had a beautiful waiter named Nikola who loved us - he got all of our orders right and everything. The only questionable part of the restaurant, really, was the music. They had a CD of about five '70s songs that they played on repeat. Like "Funkytown" and "Play that Funky Music White Boy" on repeat. Which is sort of not how we do it in America, but that's okay.
5. American comedy!
While the rest of our group saw Professor Umbridge in Sweeney Todd, Anna and I went to see The Sunshine Boys, a Neil Simon comedy starring Matilda's dad and Uncle Vernon. If you have the means, I highly recommend seeing it. It is so choice. Danny DeVito and Richard Griffiths play members of a comedy duo who reunite eleven years after their professional break-up, and they had exactly the chemistry required of people who have acted together their entire lives. And Neil Simon is just so good - for two thirds of the play you think you're just watching something kitschy and funny, and then in the third act it hits you that you've just spent an hour and a half falling in love with the characters. All of the dramatic notes were perfectly struck.
6. Flexible, if skeptical, box office employees. This is about to get a little dark, so prepare yourself. My body doesn't do heights. Not all heights, but if I'm placed in the nosebleeds of a theatre staring down the Cliffs of Insanity at the stage, vertigo kicks in and my body freaks out. And of course that's exactly where Anna and I were sitting, since we bought the cheapest possible tickets from one of those knock-off TKTS booths. So I was sitting there feeling like I'm about to pass out or fall to my death or pass out while falling to my death, and finally I went to Anna, "You know, if I can't do this, I'll just wait outside for you, really, it's fine, I'm about to die, the room is spinning..."
Anna, being the rock star that she is, realized immediately that I am almost never in this state, and was also resourceful enough to go, "Why don't we ask the box office to change our seats?"
Me: No way. Not necessary. It's fine, I'll just go hide under one of those chaises outside the bathroom. I WILL BE SAFE THERE.
Ten minutes later:
Me: Yeah, let's go talk to the box office.
So we go down to the box office.
Anna: Hey, we bought these tickets from one of those half-price booths, and we didn't realize they were so far back - and my friend has vertigo -
Me: I'm so dizzy and dsaksladk; chaises and your theatre is REALLY STEEP and Snape killed Dumbledore aslkfdla;fk
Box office person: Let me see your tickets. (Examines tickets from sketchy half-price booth.)
Other box office person (aside, to co-worker): These are fakes.
Me and Anna (quietly): F#*%.
But then they changed our seats! And that's how, for the relatively low price of £25, Anna and I saw a West End show with Danny DeVito and Richard Griffiths from the mezzanine.
Despite all the awesome, my day in London left me with a few unresolved issues. Here are some
1. Hydrate. Seriously, how does it happen? There are no drinking fountains anywhere. Thank God for 17p 2-litres from Tesco.
2. Clean itself. There are no garbage cans ANYWHERE. As an American, I am accustomed to the liberty of flinging my waste about in all directions knowing that there is an 85% chance of it landing in a trash receptacle. As an American in London, I carried my pear core and banana peel several blocks before finding a place to deposit them. Yet London is still cleaner than many cities I've visited. What's your secret, London? House elves?
3. Hold concerts. Exhibit A:
That is a moat. Surrounding the Tower of London. And that is a concert. Taking place in that moat.
!?!?!?
4. Ice cream. Anna is an ice cream connoisseur, so when we discovered a place called the Ice Creamists in Covent Garden, we naturally had to visit it. I only sampled two flavors (Ferraro Rocher and peanut butter), but I found them pretty life-changing. The Ice Creamists boasts unique flavors like popcorn - containing actual caramel corn - and berry - containing actual fresh berries. That's not the questionable part. See, the Ice Creamists is the sort of place that would result if a sex dungeon, a pirate ship, and an ice cream parlour somehow procreated.
#marketing
And among the aforementioned flavors, you can also order a flavor called Breast Milk. Or one of several Vice Creams... alcoholic ice creams.
So that happened.
Overall, my weekend was pretty wonderful. My classes yesterday and today were pretty wonderful too. But the longer I'm here, the better I understand that sometimes, getting an education means getting up at 6:45am to do Insanity, going out that night, and getting up at the same time the next morning to go to London. Sometimes it means nearly being run over by cyclists because you still can't remember to look right-left-right instead of left-right-left. Sometimes it's being the only person in West End theatre laughing at a joke about North Carolina. Sometimes it's dancing to Call Me Maybe in a circle of random British men. Sometimes it's taking pictures in a rose garden.
But enough of that. I'm off to the Purple Turtle again for S-EX NIGHT.*
Stay classy, blogosphere.
(* Don't worry, Dad, if you're reading this... it's not really a brothel. I don't think.)
