Back to Reality

Reality is that which, when you stop believing in it, doesn't go away. ~Philip K. Dick

So the fun is over (ish). On Tuesday we had our orientation meeting to start actually settling in London. We woke up and headed to a building in Shepherd’s Bush, not knowing what to expect. We got there early (this will be a theme over the next few days). We were first escorted to a small office that already had a handful of people in it. The number quadrupled over the next few minutes as more people joined in. It was then that BritBound ran into some trouble. While we are heading into the season of bigger groups of people, they typically have a bigger room available. That wasn’t the case today, and instead about twenty of us were crammed into a very small room. Because of the large group/small room size, they decided to do a shortened version of their usual orientation meeting. And this meant a lot less information and one-on-one time. It was very general which got a bit frustrating. We were attending in order to find out seemingly crucial information about living in London and as it turned out we learn more from Sandra and Imogen than the people we are supposed to. It’s not entirely their fault, but there definitely could have been a better plan in place.

                After the orientation meeting we all headed to what was referred to as a Traditional Pub Lunch (included in our package). Ironically, we ended up at Wetherspoon’s, which is where we went on our first day in London. Also, when I think traditional pub lunch, I think fish and chips. Not that I wanted to have that, but I figured that would be an option. Instead you could only have these £4 burgers or 2-in-1 meals for £8. And only soft drinks to drink. Sarah and I both got veggie burgers. We sat with an Australian girl who had just gotten in the night before and a New Zealander who was heading up North the next day. I can’t help but feel that in a smaller group we would have met more people, and maybe some that weren’t leaving for jobs elsewhere. They were nice to talk to and the veggie burgers were delicious, but overall the whole day seemed lacking. You barely saw the actual people that worked there and they seemed to only want to sell you things at really high prices. I wonder what it would be like with a smaller group. Better, most definitely.

                After lunch we headed to Waterloo. It was there we did our first ‘nesting’ action. We had thought, originally, that it would be the actual orientation meeting. That didn’t pan out so it ended up being something as simple as buying tickets. You see, Sarah and I are both die-hard Kevin Spacey fans. Like, I’m not kidding, if you got between me and him I would probably cut you. Anyways, he was doing a one-man play at The Old Vic called Clarence Darrow (http://www.oldvictheatre.com/whats-on/2014/clarence-darrow/) and tickets went on sale that day so we went to grab some. His theater sells tickets to people under 25 for £12 so we grabbed a few of those. The date of that show is May 28^th, which means we are officially making longish-term plans. Because Kevin Spacey.

                We grabbed some pizza to make for supper at Sainsbury’s and got home nice and early and spent the rest of the day finishing Gone With the Wind, watching The Five-Year Engagement and getting halfway through West Side Story. On Wednesday, Sarah had her bank appointment. We were warned that we should be on time or else we may never be allowed to register with the bank at all, which nhad chosen to register with Lloyd’s, through Britbound, and were briefly stressed out when they couldn’t find Sarah’s appointment. They still got her in, though, and would have gotten me in too but I didn’t think to bring my passport. Oops.

                After the appointment we took the tube to Victoria where we visited Sandra at her work. Once she had finished (and we learned a lot about what they do from her boss, which was actually pretty interesting) the three of us went to lunch at a pizza/pasta place in Victoria station, which had an all-you-can-eat buffet special. It was pretty good, especially the pepperoni pizza. Then Sandra went back to work and Sarah and I took the train back to the flat, where we once again watched some movies (and applied for like twenty jobs between the two of us). We finished West Side Story, Blades of Glory and Never Been Kissed, so clearly it was a productive day. We also made chicken. I know our cooking skills sound impressive but you literally take the food out of the package, put the food in the oven and take it out eventually. So don’t be thinking I learned anything.

                With Thursday came my own bank appointment, also at Lloyd’s. It was actually the same guy who did Sarah’s and he let her come in with us. I waited politely outside, reading my book. She came in and read Lord of the Rings or The Hobbit or something like a weirdo. Taking friendbians to a whole new level at the bank. The entire process went quite smoothly. I didn’t need to prove my address or anything and I just needed a passport. It took maybe twenty minutes. After my appointment we took the tube up to Abbey Road, where we saw Abbey Road Studios, wrote on the wall outside and each took pictures crossing the iconic street. We technically crossed it multiple times, but there’s only pictures of one crossing each.

                We then boarded a bus that took us to Trafalgar Square. We got a little lost and ended up in St. James’ Park. We ended up having lunch at some American-Italian restaurant I visited several years ago, on the way to Westminster from the National Gallery. They had a pretty decent lunch special on and the macaroni carbonara with bacon I had was awesome, though the portion was quite large. We then headed up to Leicester Square. We had talked about attending the The Amazing Spider-Man 2 premiere. Originally, our plan had been the scope the place out, head to the National Gallery and return around 5:00pm. I had attended The Dark Knight premiere several years ago and showed up at that time and ended up three people back from the gate. This time, they gave numbers to the first five hundred people and the rest of us had to cue in the square. When the put us in the barricades we were down by the TKTS booth. We would be able to see the photos taken with the Spider-Man logo but I highly doubted the actors would come down as far as we were. Ultimately we decided to leave. Had we had a better spot, it would have been worth standing for three hours. But it wasn’t the case and we weren’t dying to go anyway. Although I really really really wanted to see Dane DeHaan (probably the only person there who was but whatever, I’m like freakishly obsessed with him).

                We ended up going to Surrey Quays to see The Quiet Ones, which came out in theaters today but you North Americans won’t get for another few weeks. Ha. It was a half-decent horror film and it killed some time. It was basically what we expected it to be. We wouldn’t have even thought about it but we’ve seen adverts for it on literally every third bus. You did a good job, Mad Men. We headed back home after the movie and spent the rest of the night eating chicken nuggets (with Nando’s Peri-Peri sauce I found at the corner store) and watching Kill Your Darlings and Lawless. If I can’t see Dane DeHaan in person you can bet your ass I am going to have a marathon a