Another Week Down in Londontown

Alright, so this is going to be my last post from London for a week or so, because I’m heading on my Fall Break tomorrow, and going to be traveling all over Europe, so hopefully my entries will be from Spain, or Italy etc. But anyways, let me go ahead and update you about this past week and catch you up to speed on my life.

Alright, Monday was another exciting day at Xtreme Information, and I finished doing my research early, and actually took a half day, because I had a number of projects and papers to complete. So, I wrote a paper for my theater class, finished a project for my culture class, grabbed a meal, and then I went to a show entitled “The Disappearing Number,” which is a traveling show that came back to London, which is loosely based off a true story, about an Indian man who essentially discovered much of the math and theories that led to quantum physics and string theory that we have today. I know what you’re thinking, that sounds like the most ridiculous and boring show you’ve ever heard of, but it was actually quite compelling. It had a love story in it, used a lot of very cool visual and special effects, and was actually very entertaining, I loved it. You really didn’t get caught up too much in the math, because it was crucial to the plot, but not so crucial that you understood it. Some of the main themes of the show revolved around the fact that the only thing real in the entire show, was the math, the rest was just entertainment. Anyways, cool idea and cool show.

So that brings me to Tuesday, where of course I went to class, heard a speaker on international journalism which was enlightening. Then went to theater class, talked about the show we saw the night before, and then of course, in between classes I ate lunch with Vic, because it was his last day in London, so that was very cool to be able to see him once more before he headed back to India. I made sure he had a facebook set up and go all his details once more so that we could stay in communication wherever we are in the world, which was definitely nice.

Tuesday night was a night of rest and recuperation from all the stress levels of assignments, and Wednesday was another full day working at Xtreme on all sorts of various tasks, from going to meetings, to administrative stuff, to just basically working on the next edition of The Reel, that will come out next month. Also! I saw the latest edition of The Reel that came out for last month, and I was even credited in the overall production, there’s a nice spot for my name at the bottom of the brochure, since all of my photos were used in the final product, so that was awesome to finally see all my work come together into a finished product.

Thursday was great because instead of class in our classroom, we did an officially guided walking tour of the lower parts of London. Mom, you would have absolutely loved our tour guide, he was an older man, who knew absolutely EVERYTHING about London literature. We spent time traveling to the places where Charles Dickens used to work, stand, find inspiration for, even the exact locations that he talks about in all his works. We stood at the original temple that was built by the Knights Templar before the Crusades, which is now a law school, but we saw the oldest church/building in all of London that dates back centuries ago. We talked about Shakespeare, saw the original location of where the Globe stood, saw the ally way that is supposedly the spot for where Sweeny Todd was based, and even had the opportunity to see the publishing house where Dickens first caught the eye of Dr. Johnson (I can’t remember his first name) but he’s the individual that wrote the first British dictionary, and the pub that they used to sit and drink at after work. Lastly, we saw the church that inspired the first “tiered” wedding cake, as we are so accustomed to today and much more, basically it was a great walk through literary history, as well as see some great side streets and back “off the beaten path” parts of the city.

That brings me to Friday, and boy do I have another awesome story! Friday morning I had the pleasure of getting up early, and traveling down to Leichester Square, which is more or less like your "Broadway" big area, or Times Square in New York. But I didn't go to see a musical this time, I actually got to see another private screening of a movie that won't hit the states until January of 2009. It was a Ron Howard film entitled "Frost/Nixon" and is a movie about David Frost, the British entertainer, and his monumental interviews with Former president Richard Nixon, and all of the struggles that it took to actually uncover and get Nixon to admit his faults with the Watergate scandal. The movie was absolutely amazing, breathtaking, phenomenal, it was absolutely awesome, if you get a chance in January to go see it, please do, I was so into it, and loved it quite a lot. The acting is great, (Kevin Bacon's in it), and Ron Howard is quite the genius of a director, so I give it a 5 stars, two thumbs up, gold medal on the Josh Tate movie-critic scale.

However, the rest of Friday I basically devoted my life to packing. I’m currently still in that process today, because I leave for fall break this afternoon. I’m going to be traveling over the next 7 days to Barcelona in Spain, as well as Rome and Florence in Italy, before returning to the great city of London. I’m super excited to have this experience, and opportunity to travel so much, and cannot wait to see the Coliseum and other great landmarks of the ancient world. I’m hopefully going to keep you posted as I go to these places, but if I don’t I’m sure you’ll understand and there will just be a ridiculously long blog entry next time I get around to it, but that’s normal, so what do you care? Anyhow, as always, I hope everyone is doing well, please keep the update emails coming to my inbox and make sure to take care of yourself. I will catch ya on the other side of the world, so Cheers, Hasta la Vista, and Ciao!