Reverse Culture Shock

I thought that was a big joke. But it's not. Well, to be honest, i'm not shocked by my own culture. Obviously. It's not hard for me to rejust being back in america on a cultural level.

It's difficult being back on a normal level. It's so difficult being back in my suburban town. Where i am stuck. Not having the tube just a few blocks away, and an entire magical city at my feet. Where i can do anything, even hop on a train and fly to another country. Anything. But instead, i'm back in the states and i can't even get into town.

It's like being dunked in hot water and then immediately thrust into freezing. Not time to really adjust. Not that i really thought i'd need adjusting. It's easy enough falling back into an old routine, or old habits. But i just spent the last four months trying to break out of my old habits.

I know it will get easier, and that eventually everything will fall back to normal but i'm not really looking forward to that either. I think what all us LDA kids are feeling right now, is that we just want to go back.   Although i love being home and seeing my family and friends who i have missed desperately--i really just want to go back to that city that i had begun calling my home.

America?

Well, I'm back. Almost a week. It's been a little difficult, some things i certainly have to get used to again. But it's getting easier. I do miss it so much, and i think i'm going to make a list.

But firstly, thanks for reading. I'm so glad i got to keep in touch with my family and friends through this little blog and i've had a lot of fun with it. And i'm glad you've liked it too!

I'm trying to decided if i should keep it up, make updates from Trinity...so let me know what you think. :D

But for now i'm going to enjoy doing nothing for once! Yay! And catch up on all the american television (like GLEE) i've missed out on! :D

cheers!
xx t

ps. Hopefully in a few days i'll have all my pictures that i took VIA disposable camera/my last polaroid. So those include our last night together and thanksgiving! I'm pretty excited! :D

Tim the Tube Man :D

I can't even begin to explain how unreal it feels right now. I'm done at LDA and have one day in London left? Egads.

So i won't. Instead i'll tell you about "Tim". I might have mentioned Tim before, but he's our tube station guy, and the nicest person--always ready with a smile and wave. We see him practically every morning, and he always loves to chat. I didn't realize this, but it looks like everyone loves tim JUST as much as we do...the BBC actually wrote an article about him! So now you'll get a little insight into who i see every morning. It's true, riding the tube can sometimes be annoying, crowded and rather sad because people are piling in. But every time i walk into warwick, or leave to head home--seeing Tim makes it so much more cheerful. We had to say goodbye to him on Thursday...i will so miss seeing his smiling face every morning.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/local/london/low/people_and_places/newsid_8358000/8358871.stm

My City

Yesterday i was walking home from the tube station after going to the Apple Store to have them check out Moby. Lately it's been warm (considering it's december) and a little rainy. Last night it was lovely--especially in oxford circus. It's so shopping/touristy heavy i don't usually make my way down there, but i must say with the misty christmas lights everything just looks so beautiful.

So anyway, i'm walking home from warwick tube station and I started to realize that in a week (just about) i'll be home. And that taking a quick trip to the apple store is not going to be as easy as just taking the bakerloo line to oxford circus. OR  even running down the street for a quick late night cookie from Tesco. Or even simply making some tea (because at home i don't have one of those water boiling tea maker things which i do here...xmas present anyone?). And i realized despite the fact i want to get home, see my family and friends and really return to the normal routine...I'm going to miss this city more than anything.

I realised (i still can't get used to this s instead of z thing) that i've lived here from 3 months, and that i've really found a comfortably place here. I never thought i could live in a city, and grated i have a lucky situation here but still...i've loved every moment. I do wish i had gotten more time to explore, there are some places i just haven't gotten to go. But that just means i'll have to come back.

I realized i would miss this place more than I realized. I was so worried about doing all my work (obviously i still am), and getting home, and everything else...that i forgot how much i was going to miss this places. My comfy little flat, everyone in the program, going to see shows every week....but I'm getting ahead of myself. I've decided that one of my last days I'm going to list everything that i've learned/will miss about london.

Alright, silly amounts of work this weekend, but Sinead and i are finding time to slip in some fun. We're going to the movies today and tomorrow we're FINALLY going on the London EYE. ( £16 later my friend.)

I'll be seeing you in a week and 1 day.
Love,
T

It's ALIVE!

Goodness.

If you hadn't heard, my computer had a little accident. It's rather a mystery, but basically we had some technical difficulties. But, for some miraculous reason we're back in business! So i didn't want you to think i'd forgotten about you! <3 On the contrary, Moby (as some of us fondly call my little white mac) just needed some time...to...wake up i guess.

Anyway, HAPPY DECEMBER! I cannot believe it's here. And that tomrrow is friday. One week and i'll have my last day of classes. I'll be home in 10 days? That's unbelievable to me. I can't believe i'm leaving so soon.

Love, T

Weddings, Bath and Harrods!

Well, playing catch-up again! But this one is rather fun! Lots to chat about! :D So we must jump back a few weekends ago, i guess we'll start on friday night. First, i guess i've got to explain.

My friends Sienna and Aylia go to school together in California, and they are the best of friends. They've lived together this past summer in LA and they love each other soooo much. You think of one, you think of the other <3 And they decided to get "married" (just like how matt and i finally did this summer, it's more of just a fun celebration). But we decided (because we're all drama kids) to have a little ceremony and each of us would take a part. It was SO lovely. We had SUCH a great time! <3 Sienna was the bride, Aylia the Groom, I was the maid of honour and Geoff was the best man. Then we had a few bridesmaids, Eddie was our Reverend...it was great. We had x-lovers and crazy uninvited in-laws. It was so silly, but we had so much fun. The ceremony actually was really sweet, they wrote each other vows and gave each other best friend necklaces (well they already had them but they put them on each other). Geoff even made a bouquet out of newspaper (it looked so good) and Sienna threw it! Alright, onto the pictures!

Maid of Honour, Bride, Groom and Best Man <3

(Don't they look SO lovely?)

Throwing the Bouquet!

Pandemonium!

(Steph ended up getting it!)

Glowing with married bliss! :D

hehe Best man and Groom <3

Making it facebook offical ;)

Cutting the cake (well it's actually cheese).

I just think this is really funny :D

It was one of the best weddings i've been too, although i've only been to about 2, but it was so much fun.  

It was great being with all these wonderful people, being silly and having a hilarious time. But also, it just reminds you how important the people you love are to you, and that sometimes it's nice to celebrate love, no matter what kind--be it friendship or romance, sometimes it's just nice to get together and celebrate it. Wow, i know that sounds cheesy, but there was a moment when each of these wonderful ladies was describing how important the other one was--and i must say i got a little teary eyed. (But are you really surprised by that?)

ALRIGHT. So the next morning we woke up rather early and took the bus to BATH! It was pretty much raining and cloudy all day, but we had so much fun! First we had lunch at this little pub on a side street of Bath. Had some yummy chicken fingers ;) And then we headed off to the bath house!

Ann, Aylia and Geoff...see they could have build the Baths!

Ok, i should explain this. After you do the Bath Tour you can have a taste of the waters in their restaurant. And, it takes like warm egg water. It's terrible. Ew.

Now, the bath tour is really cool. Before you can even go outside you have like an hour or so in their huge museum learning all about the baths! We had lots of fun, and you can also do a deal where you buy your ticket to the bath houses AND the fashion museum...which is of course what we did. So we then headed (in the pouring rain) from the Bath Houses over to the fashion museum!

It's a really quick museum (like 1/2 an hour) but its cool! They have so many different outfits from all different eras! From elizabethan all the way up to now! But the best was the dressing up area. Oh yeah. It was hilarious!

Trying to be the mannequin.

Corsets! She's SO tiny!

We even got Geoff to do it!

It was just as fun as it looks!

hehe, hats! (this was in the little kid section we technically couldn't play with...but they hats were too tempting!

So the fashion museum was fun, but really quick! So we ran out into the rain again and went to the museum i had been waiting for!

JANE AUSTEN! Yay! :D It was this tiny little house, but it was so cute! They had this guy at the front door dressed up as a man from her era. It was really cute. First you go upstairs and have a little introduction to Austen, her time in Bath and basically her life. And then you go on this little tour downstairs of some costumes and books and such. It was kinda small but was really sweet. And of course i got some stuff in the gift shop--but the best part is the tea room. On the top floor they have a little tea room where you can go and have scones, cake and tea. It was FANTASTIC. Everything was so yummy, and all of us thought we were going to die we were so stuffed!

Classy (Please note, we did not have tea yet...we're just that cool.)

SO MUCH FOOD. WE ATE (practically) EVERYTHING!

Scones, cake, cucumber sandwiches, clotted cream, jam, and tea <3 SO delicious. We got what they called the Mr. Darcy (of COURSE).

Sorry, i ate everything. my bad.

So, the Jane Austen museum was lovely. Had so much fun! Sadly the guy dressed up was gone after we finished our tea break, so there is not picture with him (despite the fact we really wanted one).

And then we walked home, it was so dark (even though it was 5PM)! And we took the bus home! Bath was wonderful, and I certainly recommend you go! (It's about a 3 hour bus ride from London).

And then, Sunday, Sinead and i decided to head off to Harrods! If you don't know Harrods is a HUGE department store, kind of like Macy's in NYC. With window displays and a silly amount of christmas decorations inside. The first 1/2 we were there was "browsing only". It's so overwhelming, it has 5 floors, and each one is so decadent. But it was lots of fun. This christmas their theme is Wizard of Oz! And every room was playing christmas music. It made me want to run home and start putting up xmas decorations (THEY even played some ELLA! I was so happy)

It's huge.

We waited outside the store with a CROWD FULL of people. It was crazy!

Oh, you know, just your everyday department store...

Christmas WORLD!

Sinead <3 The toy section was like 5 rooms, it was AMAZING...they had so many different toys, it was hard not to buy everything. Especially the ignoramus stuffed animals!

Because of the wizard of oz theme, they had one room FULL of red slippers for you to try on. And i believe most of the £'s go to charity. :) Nice job Harrods.

It was overwhelming but really cool! It's just so huge, and there are so many different rooms full of EVERYTHING. From pet world, to pianos, to books and £5000 jackets! But it was lots of fun.

Alright, i'd say thats good for now. Later i'll update all about Ireland...with my lack of pictures. Sadly my camera loved ireland so much it decided to say there. But i can steal some pictures from Ann.

Again, i hope you all had a lovely thanksgiving! i can't believe i'll be home in 2 weeks. It's crazy.

Cheers, (and love)

Tierney

Happy Thanksgiving!

This is the first thanksgiving i've ever spent away from home. Like my dad, thanksgiving is one of my favourite holidays because its full of amazing food, hilariously good times and some rather fond memories.

The United Kingdom doesn't celebrate thanksgiving...although i do think they look at it as a cute little american holiday. I have seen some thanksgiving food signs (at wholefoods and tesco), but we've had classes and basically just had a normal thursday. It's strange thinking that college students all over the country are leaving school and heading home to see their families.

We are all homesick and wishing for yummy thanksgiving smells, so we've all decided to do a potluck thanksgiving! Sunday we're all coming together bringing different things and having a big dinner together! Sinead and I are signed  up for Stuffing...we shall see how that goes! :D

Tonight I'm going to see Cat On A Hot Tin Roof which i am so excited for! I've been waiting to see this show for ages and ages (as you will know if you've been reading for the last few months). I got the tickets in september!

I promise tomorrow i'll tell you all about the last two weeks! Ireland and Bath! This week has just been busy because we have our shakespeare showing tomorrow (So my group is presenting Taming of the Shrew!)

I hope you all have a wonderful thanksgiving!

Full of family, love and lots of yummy warm food.

Especially potatoes!

And don't forget to think about everything you're thankful for <3

xx T

(As the British would sign off)

Bad Blogger.

I know, i know. BUT, it's been a crazy few weeks. Weddings, bath, Ireland, Movies...so much. I promise i'll update you bit by bit this week. And a lot is happening this week too. Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, Thanksgiving and our shakespeare showings! It's insanity!

I can't believe i just have three weeks left. It's going to fly by and snail along all at the same time. I'm excited to get home and see everyone, but i'm also so sad to leave this place. I think it's going to hit me harder than i expect. But we'll see.

Updates soon, i promise.

love, T

'If I'm asleep, don't let me wake. If this is real, don't let me dream.'

So I noticed Aylia playing Sudoku the other day and said "Urg, i can never figure that silly game out. Egads." And thus she and Geoff taught me how to play, well, mostly Aylia at first and then I started playing and Geoff helped me out. I've "won" three games myself and it's extremely satisfying.

So now, everyday as I'm heading home i snag my evening standard, read the news on the tube and then do the Sudoku. It's rather fun. Thanks London for making the Evening Standard free!! Although, reading the news everyday is getting rather depressing. So, sometimes I just skip right to the Arts section or the Sudoku.

Last night we went to go see a spectacular show called Life As a Dream! You man recognize Dominic West who has been in a few movies (like 300) and that show Wired. He was brilliant, and just so captivating. I loved the show, the production was so good and i really thought all the actors were clear and very believable. I totally got lost in the show. One of the young actors, Rupert Evans is coming to talk to us next week...which everyone is ecstatic about (not only was he a great actor...but he was rather attractive ;) ) So we're all excited.

It's crazy that tomorrow i will have exactly a month until i go home. Egads! It's going to fly by. Especially because next week is break! Off to Ireland for a few days, this time exploring the west coast. I'll be in Shannon for the first two days so if you have any ideas please please i'd love to know. Then off to Galway to see my friends DJ and Jenna.

Must go, Shakespeare calls!
Cheers, T

Ps. My title quote is of course from Life As a Dream which has a beautiful script. I believe it was originally written in Spanish and this recent translation is LOVELY. There are some beautiful speeches :D

Oh Procrastination.

I think i'm still swooning a bit over Bright Star. In a few days i might write a proper review, until then i must find other ways from procrastinating over my Theatre History paper.

Well, all i can say is thank god monday is over. It's a very busy day for us LDA kids, and very physically demanding. I guess it's never as bad as the hype leading to it is, but i do feel like crawling into bed and sleeping forever. Although, with lines to memorize and a paper looming over my head that does not seem to be a likely prospect.

Although this week may turn out to be pretty exciting. I'm seeing what seems to be a lovely show wednesday (nice turn from our last excursion). And we're getting tickets to see a Ballet on thursday, Sleeping Beauty. I cannot tell you how excited i am for that. You may not know this about be, (maybe it's because of my Lack of Grace) but i LOVE LOVE Ballet. I've always wished i could be a ballerina although i wouldn't like the bloody feet. But it's just so beautiful and perfect. Mhmm. Well, I'm very excited for thursday and promise to give a full report.

Alright, enough time wasting, I'm off to "work on my paper". Which probably means futzing around on the internet a bit more.

Love and miss you, T

Ps. I come home so soon, it's amazing. The next few weeks are going to FLY BY. Which is really a bitter sweet idea for me. I'm excited to come home and see everyone but my heart aches thinking i'll have to leave this city, the program and these wonderful people.

"And so live ever -- or else swoon to death."

"For myself i know not how to express my devotion to so fair a form: I want a brighter word than bright, a fairer word than fair. I almost wish we were butterflies and liv’d but three summer days — three such days with you I could fill with more delight than fifty common years could ever contain.” (Letter to Fanny Brawne, 1 July 1819)

It was all i wanted it to be and more.

Every frame is breath-taking.

 Man i love Keats.

Bright Star

Go see it. Please.

<3

ps. This is my 50th post! Happy 50th little blog!

...Continued!

Alright so continuing along with the catch up...the next week was kind of busy. I already told you about the Julius Caesar presentations, which went well.

On wednesday we had our normal Masterclass, this week was with Samuel West who you might recognize from Howards End (He's the really cute one with curly hair).

He was the leading man in Enron and came to talk to us. So far this has been my favorite masterclass. Sam was so eloquent and interesting. And he really cared about our comments about the play, he genuinely wanted to know what we thought, and our critiques of the show--especially from the American POV. Not to mention, he is rather adorable. We all had a really nice time hearing about his life and career in the theatre/film. Just an all around really cool guy, and i think i learned a lot from what he had to say. It looks like Enron might make the switch over to Broadway someday (right now it will be opening on the West End in January). If it does make it to Bway, i'd really love to see how it's changed. Because it's the English (almost) interpretation...some of the choices they made might not be taken the say way in the USA. Especially the 9/11 scene. That was difficult to watch, and in my opinon, not really possible to do in the heart of NYC. But we'll see.

We have had twednesday the last few wednesay's. We've had some pretty great tarts. We finally tried a Treacle Tart, which i thought was delicious. And we recently found this new tart place. I had this white chocolate cheesecake tart with raspberry sause. IT WAS DELICOUS. so good. So tarts are going well.

This was the Royal Festival Hall

Thursday we went to the symphony. It was lots of fun, and the music was beautiful. My favorite part was Beethoven's 7th (which is Aylia's favorite of Beethoven's symphonies) and it was my favourite part of the night! The Conductor was one of the best parts, he was so much fun to watch, sweeping over all the strings. I love watching the cello and violin players, i think it's so interesting. I've always wished i could play something like the fiddle. It just seems like such a playful instrument.

Anyways, so HALLOWEEN was saturday!  I seriously had no idea what to be, but i found this really silly fun BRIGHT PINK dress so i decided to just go as a Red Velvet Cupcake. Strange, i know...but Aylia very helpfully came up with idea to go along with the dress.

See so the dress, the Hearts on my face to represent the Candy hearts found on cupcake and the wooly cap represents icing...and well the silly pipe was stolen from Geoff for this photo.  He was watson for Halloween and Aylia was Nurse Chapel from Star Trek! (She made her costume!):D

It was a really fun night because all the LDA kids hung out with each other, we had a big party downstairs in the big first floor (actually floor -1) flat. And then afterwards we just hung out in our apartment watching goofy shows :D

This week wasn't too busy, kind of a normal week. Tuesday we went to Kensington Palace, which was really interesting. Got to see a lot of Princess Diana's beautiful dresses and learn about the house. I liked a lot of the huge halls and paintings.

Wednesday we had a "special mystery Halloween themed" masterclass! And we learned...THRILLER! Michael Jackson's "Thriller" Dance! It was really really fun! Although i am movement challenged, i still think i did an OK job! It was fun! :D

LDA Zombies!

I made a video, which i will hopefully be posting soon. But there is also one on facebook that sabina put up for us (this picture i also stole from her).

Last night was our performance night, and we went to go see a double feature of Opera/dance. Well. The opera was HORRIBLE. Just Horrible. We were seriously all appalled at how bad it was. If you know anything about Opera...it was "bluebeard." urg. I'd honestly would just like to forget it! The Rite of spring was much better (although anything would have been better).

Oh thurs was Nov. 5th, or Guy Fawks day. It's a big deal here, there have been fireworks the last few nights! Tonight we're heading out to the BIG firework display. I'm sure there are going to be TONS of fireworks. We're really excited! :D

I have a paper to write this weekend (LAME) and lots of memorizing. Taming of the Shrew is going really well, it's lots of fun! And it looks like our final play with Richard the last two weeks of term is going to be Beatrix Potter! I can't remember what story, but i think it's going to be really neat.

I promise that i'll be updating a bit more frequently now that my bandwidth is back up! That's whats so great about saturday ;)

love you all,

T

The Last Two Weeks! <3

Hey Everyone,

Sorry about the lack of posts, but it's been a crazy few weeks :D The saturday after we got back from break  we had an excursion out into the country! We first stopped by the Petersborough church, which was beautiful! But we weren't allowed to take pictures inside so i only have a few outside shots. It was lovely, althought our tour guide was a little...*snoooore* but it's alright, the church was beautiful!

Then we headed over to Stamford! It's such a beautiful old town! We were given a few hours just to walk around and check out whatever we wanted. They gave us a map with a few important destinations and we were off! Sinead and i had SO much fun walking around.

It was a very overcast day, but it really made all the colours of the town stand out. We walked around for a bit and then found the cutest place for lunch, Sinead got the most delicious looking hot coco i may have ever seen!

yum!!

There was a church FULL of just xmas cards! It was really really cool! <3 Then we headed back to the bus and went to the Burley House! It was HUGE, there are 300 rooms and something like 800 paintings! It was our first real look at a large manor house, and i really loved it! They have SO much property, i just wanted to jump on a horse and fly across the land! We left the house just at sunset and it was so beautiful!

OHhhh it is fall!

Pride and Prejudice?

Here Richard is explain the Mistletoe hanging in the trees!

Then we got back into the bus and started our 2 1/2 hour journey home!

That sunday Sinead and I went to Regents park again, but this time we went to look at the gardens! It was really fun! Of course the moment we sat down to do work it got WICKED windy and chilly, but we withstood it and got lots of work done. I still can't believe how nice the weather has been lately. Thanks London!

There were so many Roses! We couldn't all the flowers still in bloom! <3

ALRIGHT, thats enough for now! More tonight! 

Cheers, T

Sorry Sorry!

I promise to catch up with all the lovely things that have been happening, it's just been a very busy two weeks. Lots of memorizing and such, but everything is going very well. We've seen some great things, gone on lots of excursions and had some delicious tarts.

I have lots of pictures and stories to tell. And soon. I hope to post either tomorrow or thurs (most likely thus because i've lots of time in the middle of the day).

Love love love, T

Low Bandwidth! :P

Not that it's any excuse, but the lack of posts this week is entirely due to my low bandwidth. You may remember my qualms with the internet here, well because they put limits on us sometimes it's difficult to do as much as we'd like. This week...well, lets just say i've been trying to get in the USA TV that i've missed here across the pond and used up some more bandwidth that usual, so i've got to limit myself so i have enough for the rest of the week. Egads.

Thus, i promise a full (picture heavy) description of our trip to Stamford this weekend! As well as last week and this week twednsday and lots more ;)

Today we had our Julius Caesar showing for the staff. We've been working on Caesar monologues with Michael in Shakespeare for the last few weeks. It was nice to get it over with (i was Cassius) and fun to do. Richard said we did...an ok job, with some good moments--but i guess i'll find out more of what he thought in our individual meeting thursday. He's meeting with all of us to talk about how we're doing. So...we'll see how that goes ;) But in the end I felt pretty good about it. Now we can focus our full Shakespeare attention to The Taming of the Shrew. We're working on doing the play (cut down a bit). It's really fun! I'm Katherine in 3 scenes, one of which is one i really wanted. It's going to be really interesting and i can't wait to see how it all works out.

Alright, i've already used up more today than i wanted to so i'll head off, but look for some big posts in the next few days!

Love, T

...Do As The Roman's Do, Duh!

Alright, so i left off with us collapsing onto the couch! After much relaxing Rachel and I started making dinner. It was her night to make dinner, and so we started dicing! She was making this kind of thai noodles! A curry type thing! It was delicious and lots of fun cutting up all the veggies. I know that sounds silly, but as you know i'm not really a veggie person, but i hate everything and it was super super yummy! :D

Then after dinner we raced off to the Roma International Film Festival! Now, it was FREEZING! Seriously, it was so cold. We were both shocked because it had been a nice day, but waiting for that bus was torture ;) But eventually we got on the bus and got to the Festival! There were so many people there and lots crowed around that Red Carpet! We obviously assumed we'd see lots of Italian Movie stars...and there were rumours that we'd see Meryl Streep (but alas we did not). So we were waiting and we saw this HUGE crowd of people enter and this woman with sort blonde hair (see picture below). She's in the LONG black dress. Now at the time we didn't really notice her.

We didn't recognize anyone so we decided to head over to the bookstore and then walked around a bit. Finally we made our way to the theatre. There were long glass windows that looked out into the main part of the red carpet and this woman in black was standing in the center getting her photo taken by a group of photographers. We stopped and watched for a while. Rachel turned to me and said,"Tierney...i think that's Helen Mirren..." And i just laughed and said "Rache, that's not Helen Mirren...she must be an Italian Actress we just don't know and looks a little like Helen Mirren!"

Fake Helen Mirren

Then she headed inside the doors (right by us) with her entourage! I thought it might be fun to go see and take some pictures of this "Fake Helen Mirren" and as we reached the crowd, she came in and everyone around us called out " 'Elen! 'Elen! Over here!"  I turned, shocked to Rachel and said " OMG Rachel, She's NOT fake! I think you're right, it's the real Helen Mirren!"

You can kind of tell, but this is the best shot i got.

So funny! So after our quick little shot of Helen, we headed off to the theatre! (Also, solidified our Helen Mirren hypothesis because her film was showing at the festival at that time!)

The theatre was HUGE and really comfy! Then we got to see Terry Gilliam and Lily Cole (the lead female in the film) walk RIGHT past us! How neat! And after a round of applause for Terry, The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus.

Lily Cole

...can't really tell but thats Terry Gilliam!

Terry Gillam again!

So the movie was crazy, but what else would you expect from Terry? But did like it! I really loved Heath, of course but i was most impressed with this young man named Andrew Garfield:

{image}

He plays Anton and i really loved him. Not only is he adorable, but he's a great actor. I couldn't place HOW i knew him for the first 20 minutes of the film (it drove me INSANE) but then i got it. He was in the movie i saw at Cinestudio (Trinity's Movie theatre) called Boy A. I loved this film, i've very moving and he is brilliant. I remember seeing and thinking, i cannot wait to see what else this kid turns out. As we walked home all i could think of his how encouraging it is to see a young actor, doing so well! After doing a little research i found out he went to the Central School of Speech and Drama! (This is one of the most prostigous drama schools in London, and also the same school my beloved Sarah is studing at right now!) So that's pretty awesome!

It was a pretty exciting experience being at an International Film Festival! Lots of fun! And then, we took the long journey home. We were FREEZING! It was rather comic looking back on it, but at the time it was agony! We had to wait for two buses, and they took forever! We almost took a cab like 30 times...and when we got off the last time we ran to this little coffee shop that was still open and i snagged a warm hot coco, which was delicous. Then we finally trudged home, complaining about the bitter cold, wondering where the warmth had disappeared off too :(

The next morning Rachel and i headed back to Campo for some yummy breakfast. She had class from 11-1 so i decided to walk around myself. We had croissants and hot chocolate and then i began my walk about. First i went back to the Trevi fountain. There is a street full of vendors before you get to it, and as i walked along i bought some postcards, this beautiful glass beaded bracelet and some presents for people ;) Then i finally got to the fountain, It's just so beautiful! :)

Then i decided to walk over to the Pantheon again, and i went back in then got some Gelato and sat in the square. It such a warm and lovely day. I got the same caramel/Baileys combo from before. yum yum ;)

And last i went back to this big italian bookshop we walked past getting to Rachel's studio! It was huge, and really fun to look at all the italian books. I attempted to read some back covers but didn't get too far. Then i met rachel back at the studio and we got some panini's to go. (Actually panini is the the plural, you would say i got a panino. Oh us silly americans).

Then i hopped on the train, got a little lost finding my next train station and walked up a scary street, but i eventually found it and got on the train that took me to the airport. And after that it was smooth sailing! :D I flew home, customs was a breeze and then i finally got to relax.

I loved every minute of my Rome trip, and it was just so lovely to get to spend so much time with Rachel! She gave me the best tour, i got to see so much and we had a blast! But now I'm back into the full swing of things. This weekend we're heading up north to see...well i'm not sure what we're seeing but i'm sure it's going to be great. Although it's going to be FREEZING this weekend. We'll see how that goes. And i'll be sure to chat about my little trip to the National Portrait Gallery. It was so fun, i found it very inspiring!

Cheers, T