Night of the Drunken Roommates

(Part 3 of 5 detailing my vacation to London)

My sleep was interrupted on my 2nd night in London, by a large group of my roommates entering the room. They were obviously drunk and were swearing extremely loudly. Suffice to say that that night was not fun, and I was glad to leave them behind the next morning.

After breakfast, I traveled to downtown London and walked across the Thames river on Millennium Bridge (the same one that was destroyed by death eaters in Harry Potter 6.) It was refreshingly cool that morning, which was a nice contrast to the heat in Spain because it actually felt like it was November.

I went to the Tate Modern, a modern art museum, and strolled around inside for a short while. It was interesting, but not exactly my taste in art. However, I was surprised to see "Whaam!" by Roy Lichtenstein. I had done a small art presentation on him in high school, and it was cool to actually see his work in person.

I left the museum for the tube station where I was supposed to meet Laurel for the day, and waited for her. And waited. And waited. . . and waited. Finally, after 40 minutes of waiting, one of the station attendants told me that there was a second station about a block away. I was not amused. Fortunately, as soon as I arrived at the other station, I found Laurel right away.

We headed out to the Borough Market, which is a street market where vendors sell all kinds of food. It was very interesting to see because nothing like it exists in Chicago. After seeing all of that food we both decided that it was time for lunch and we stopped in a nearby cafe to eat. I was excited that they had Eggs Benedict because I would eat them practically every Sunday when I was back home.

We remained at the restaurant for over 2 hours just catching up and talking about our experiences abroad. It was nice to have the chance to talk to a friend, and we were able to commiserate about the stresses of being away from our friends back in Chicago. We both thought that it would be strange to return home and have a whole new group of freshmen who don't know us, but know our friends already. I know that I am especially worried about being left out of experiences that everyone back in Chicago are sharing, and I think that it might be jarring to try to reintegrate myself back into my circle of friends.

After much conversation, we said goodbye for the day and I headed off to Shakespeare's Globe Theater. I was surprised to learn that it was actually the 3rd Globe Theater (the 1st burned down, and the 2nd was abandoned) and that it only opened in 1997. The theater itself was incredible and it really felt like a time capsule to another era. I wish that I had been able to see a performance there, but the theater season ended in October.

When I returned to the hostel, I went on a computer in the lounge to look up directions. I also checked my Facebook and email and was surprised to find that I had a TON of messages. I'd been away from my computer for just 3 days and already I had over 4o messages to check. They would have to wait though, because it was already time for bed and to pray for a better night than the previous one.