A Month in the UK, No Way!!!!

Wow!! Somehow, I have already been in Europe for an entire month, meaning I am already a third of the way through my study abroad experience! I hope time slows down because I am trying to soak in every possible moment of this amazing experience I am having!  

My time here has been great so far and quite shockingly, I haven't even felt homesick (knock on wood)! I am patting myself on the back because I have actually done a great job embracing the moment, which is something I usually struggle with. Oftentimes, I never find myself content with the present and I am always looking forward to the future! But here in London, I have been taking in all the moments, whether they be good or bad! For the most part, I have fallen in love with Europe. But of course, no experience can be completely perfect, and I have had highlights and not so highlights of this experience. So these have been my favorite things of this experience so far and the things that haven't been as easy.

THE BEST:

1. Having a best friend to travel and enjoy Europe with! Thank goodness, Morgan and I don't get tired of each other! We realized we haven't spent more than three hours apart, which is actually really sad, but that's okay because we always have fun together!!! (don't worry, we hang out with other people too, we aren't that big of loners! We just are always together too).

2. The awesome people at City University and in the Arcadia Program! Through our study abroad program, we have been able to meet AWESOME people from different universities throughout the US and the world. It is such a cool experience to be outside of the Chapman bubble (not that I don't love Chapman, because I do - it is like my fav place ever), but it's cool to hang out with and meet people from other places too!

3. Being in a city! I love that everything is basically a 20 minute walk or 10 minute tube ride away! I have always wanted to live in a city, so I am very grateful for the opportunity to do so! There is just always so much to do and the shopping scene is great!;)

4. Feeling like a grown up! Being here really makes me feel like an adult! And I know college does that for a person too, but this, wayyy more so! I am in essentially a foreign country, navigating my way around without the help of my parents! Morgan and I planned an entire trip (flights, hotels, bus transport to airport, activities, etc. to Ireland, + more trips to come) without the help of our parents or anyone! It was all on us! And we successfully executed our trip, with zero mishaps! Maybe it's silly, but it feels pretty cool to me knowing that I am responsible enough to do all these adult-ish things!

5. Getting to check soo many items off of my bucket list. Before I left on this abroad trip, I had a pinterest board dedicated to studying abroad! There were all these awesome pictures on it of places that I dreamed of going! I am so glad to say I have already made so many of these come true! Between visiting Big Ben, Brick Lane, having high tea, seeing Kensington Palace, the London Eye, Platform 9 and 3/4, Trafalgar Square, Piccadilly Circus, Chinatown, Shakespeare's Globe, Tower of London, The National Portrait Gallery, Saint Paul's Cathedral, shopping at Covent Garden (favorite place EVER), Oxford Street, Harrods, and having the opportunity to excursion to so many places! The highlight of my trip for sure has been going to all of these awesome places, seeing so many great things, and making memories of a lifetime!!!

I'm still learning to deal with:

1. The drinking culture: When you don't drink, it can be kind of hard to be social with other people in the evenings. Drinking is a very normal social activity here and people are constantly talking about it, going to clubs, pubs, etc.!  And not that there is any problem with that at all because I totally get it, it just is not my nighttime activity of choice, which ultimately leads me to not doing very much in the evenings!

2. EXPENSES! Oh my gosh, things are so expensive here and the prices are deceiving. When I look at a sandwich at a restaurant and see that it is 11 pounds, my initial thoughts are "yes, this place is inexpensive!" haha jokes on me, because in dollars, that's actually about $16! Plus, every time I use my debit card (which is always), I get charged a handy dandy extra service/conversion charge, so yay for that!! My brain is in a constant battle of I want to do this cool activity, but oh my gosh, I can't spend more money! Looking at my bank account is a very stressful and terrifying thing that I try to avoid as much as possible!

3. SO much smoke! I guess I am used to my US bubble where smoking is pretty frowned upon these days, but all the locals smoke here!! The fire alarm goes off in my apartment building several times a week and I am 99% sure it is attributed to people deciding to smoke in their rooms! It makes me a little crazy! 

Even though I have had my share of frustrations with a few things, that's okay because I know that is all an important learning part of this adventure!:)

Thanks for staying up to date on my abroad adventures! 

Here's to embracing the good and the bad of each of our experiences!

<3Bren

Making London a Home

This past weekend, Morgan and I traveled to the town of Killarney, Ireland. It is about two hours away from the city of Cork! It was absolutely, completely beautiful. The scenery is gorgeous and I felt so absorbed in the beauty of my surroundings when we were there.

The trip? Totally worth it and I have no regrets in going, despite the freezing weather, gusty wind, and fairly consistent rain! However, travelling was not as easy as I anticipated. I always heard how easy and cheap it is to travel around Europe, so I had the expectation that it would be a breeze! True, it was very cheap! Our round trip flights were about $60 each and all the transport to and from each airport was only about $25 each! So, the travel part was cheap and that was definitely a perk! Go Ryanair! Getting there and back though was veeerrry involved! To and from Ireland required six different bus rides, two tube rides, a train, and two planes!! It was about nine and a half hours of pure travel each way (and the plane ride was only one hour of that time, the rest of it was spent on buses, trains, tube and waiting)!! Considering Ireland is really only about an hour away, we were kind of bummed at how long traveling took and it proved to be pretty dang exhausting!

I loved Ireland and would highly recommend going! However, all the travel made me realize that I really want to make London a home and I don’t have a desire to travel somewhere new every single weekend I am here. Travelling is stressful, involved, costs money, and is kind of a lot of work. And sometimes, I feel a lot of pressure to travel every possible place I can since I am here in Europe and I want to make sure I don’t miss out on any experience! People always talk about all these cool places they have been and all the places they want to go and it makes me feel like I should want to go to all those places too. But then I have to remember that this time I have to study abroad is really about me and how I want this experience to be. So because of that, Morgan and I set a list of our top priority places. So, we have tickets to Amsterdam and Wales during our program, and then France and Italy for travelling after our program ends!! I totally understand the desire for people to travel every weekend and completely support that. But I have decided that travelling every weekend is not for me because I want to experience as much of London as possible and to really make it feel like home. Plus, after all, there is so much to do here in this fabulous (and quite large) city!!!

Not to be a negative Nancy though because our trip to Ireland seriously was soo awesome and we loved it!! So here's a little about it!  

Morgan and I did the six hour Ring of Kerry bus tour, which was definitely the highlight of our trip. Our tour guide was incredibly entertaining and we were able to stop at several different viewpoints, villages, the Killarney National Forest, etc.! We loved it and it was a great way to see so much of Ireland considering we were there for such a short amount of time!

So here are some of the highlights from the Ring of Kerry!!

And this is the adorable town we stayed in, Killarney:

I'm so lucky to have had the opportunity to travel to Ireland! It was such a great and worthwhile experience! 

Thanks for reading!

<3Bren

The Rumors Aren’t True – Food in London is Great!

Before I left for London, I had always heard that the food isn’t that great and it has no comparison to places like Italy, France, Greece, etc.! I came to London keeping that in mind and anticipating fairly mediocre food!

I am happy to say that thus far, those rumors can be dispelled! I have had great experiences with food in London. I guess perhaps when people said that the food wasn’t that great, they probably just meant traditional English food like shepherd’s pie or fish and chips. But, the food that I have had has been really great and there has not been a single meal out that I haven’t enjoyed. Plus, we don’t have an abundance of money and everywhere we’ve gone has been delicious and affordable.

So, from my two and a half weeks here so far, these have been my favorite places to eat!

Pret: (they are EVERYWHERE here, literally) – it’s like the Starbucks of London. But they have a delicious kale, cauliflower mac & cheese.

Cereal Killer Café: Super famous, amazing, totally worth it place on the artsy Brick Lane! The café was equally as artsy as its location, but also super cute! There are 100’s of cereal options to choose from, any type of milk you could possibly imagine, and countless different toppings! I got jif peanut butter cereal, vanilla milk, strawberries, and oreo crumbs! Couldn’t recommend this place enough, such a great concept!

Ben’s Cookies: Great recommendation from my fabulous big, Holly! These cookies are amazing!!! Soft, flavorful and so many different kinds. I got peanut butter chocolate and Morgan got white chocolate macadamia nut!

Kimchee: This udon in sweet soy sauce is amazing! We’ve already been to this place twice!

Orangery at Kensington Palace: We enjoyed our first afternoon tea here and it was actually really good (most pricey place we’ve been, but it’s all part of the experience)! The 26 pound per person tea came with loose leaf teas (I got the herbal lemon and ginger), lots of mini sandwiches, traditional English scones, and a good amount of miniature desserts. Plus, Will and Kate were right around the corner from us!;)

Zizzi: Italian food near Covent Garden – such a good place! It was a freezing afternoon, so warm Italian food was perfect. I got a pizza with a pesto base, mozzarella, goat cheese, spinach, butternut squash, caramelized onions, and pine nuts! It was everything I could possibly want in a pizza! Morgan landed on a ham, cheese, chicken, mushroom calzone! I’m not a fan of mushrooms, but other than that, it was great!

The Spaghetti House: These are a low-key chain here, but they make a killer avocado bruschetta!

The Real Greek: Really good place, in a really random location (at a mall haha)! But the Greek food was super authentic. 

So as wannabe food critics, here is our take on food in London! It has been a great second week in this awesome city, and I am so looking forward to all that is to come and more cool places to try! And I promise to try some traditional English food too!:)

<3Bren