Booze Culture Good, Booze Ban Bad

The weather is amaaazzzing here in London. There's a little breeze and it's sunny, so I'm busting out the Rainbow sandals and Ray Bans (does that make me a brand whore?). London has really come alive with the great weather. I took the bus home from The Castle today and people were out in swarms walking home or to the tube from work. The after-work pub crowd was spilling out onto the sidewalks pints in hand on every street. Soooo nice. One thing, among many, that I will miss about London is this casual attitude toward alcohol. People enjoy the beer. They have a conversation over a pint or two, whether it be at noon or nine. It gave me a warm and fuzzy feeling to see everyone so relaxed and happy on a Wednesday afternoon.

Then... I opened the London Paper. Newly elected Mayor Boris Johnson has announced an alcohol ban on the Tube, bus, tram, and train in an effort to reduce "small crime," which he says will reduce "large crime." God damn. This is infringement on the culture that I have come to love about London! Unless they can stop drunk people from using the tube or bus, they can't prevent the type of crime that they're targeting. In my experience, the passengers drinking on the tube are having their Stella like a cup of coffee: casually sipping while reading the London Lite. They are not behaving aggressively or violently.

I suppose that in time, we'll see if the booze ban leads to any positive results. But until June 1st, find me sipping a Kronenbourg on the Northern Line with the other sexy people, haha.

"Sexiest Passengers" Travel Northern Line

Ahem, I travel on/live on the Northern Line. So this article is absolutely factual and appropriate for posting. Eat your hearts out, Central Line snobs!

Here's the article from the Londonist or read it here.

Between Morden and High Barnet travel the sexiest passengers on the network according to the results of Qype's Love on the Tube survey.

About 300 people completed the cheeky survey and the prevailing wisdom is the Northern Line's where it's at for ‘spiky-haired indie kids’ and ‘hot City types’. Unsurprisingly, no mention of the swollen handed alcoholics or the billion tourists who get on between Waterloo and Leicester Square.

Dowdiest is the Hammersmith and City line, which seems a little unfair considering it also has its share of 'hot City types' and runs through to uber-cool and good looking Ladbroke Grove.

Still, half of the respondents claim to have tried to jump someone underground, which is something to be proud of, although 90% admit to a totally loss of balls in such a situation and lament 'missed moments'.

Saddest of all though, are some of the truly terrible chat up lines that people have heard on the tube, including “Stand back honey, I would hate to see you get hurt” and “Would you like to ‘get off’ here with me?”

Um. No.

Smiles and Some Doom

Living on a tight schedule of school and work is a tough adjustment following 6 weeks of flying by the seat of my pants. It's not so much that I have a lot of classes or lectures... I don't. It's just that the sense of urgency and anxiety about revision is creeping up and days are just going by. Combined with the impending doom of exams, I really want to savor this last month and a half in London by hanging out with people who I potentially will never see again for the rest of my life. That's dramatic, yes, but also a real possibility. I haven't seen some high school friends for a few years because we're on different coasts. Different continents could prove an even greater obstacle.



That's all gloom and doom, I know, but I've been almost all smiles since coming back to London. I returned to work today for the first time in 2 months and was unfortunately greeted by a notification that I need to have over 100 pounds deducted from my salary for running a credit note incorrectly through the system almost 3 months ago. Yes, I am pissed. And no, I have no real idea how to accept a credit note at the till. And that's why, as a part-timer (and an irregular part-timer at that), I always ask someone else to do it for me. And now... here I am in the red and owing the damn company money. So for the next three days I work, I am paying off debt. Bollocks, as they say. Bollocks, bollocks, bollocks.

Still, the day turned out to be good. Selling spring merch is far from the hassle of eager ski-loving shoppers. I could relax a little bit more and have fun with co-workers. Anyways, work again tomorrow. Afterwards, I'm heading to Waterloo with an LSE climber/co-worker (yes, my two worlds merge) to check out the Cans Festival. It's a street artist exhibition featuring Banksy and other artists. Oooh, I walked by one of Banksy's newest pieces (shown above) the other day while walking to a friend's flat on Essex Road... cool stuff.

Another thing. I've learned that in situations where you can grin and bear it OR complain, you should always complain. When my showers were perpetually lukewarm, I just accepted it and took cold showers. Then I complained and I had warm water. But still, my water pressure, even water volume, was sub-par. Only now with a month and a half left did I complain. And now I have amazing water volume. You can actually hear water running now when I take a shower. Soooo glorious. Lesson learned: complain. Always complain. Haha.

Alright. That's all for now. Take care everybody.

Back in the Groove

I'm finally back from my 2-week romp through Austria, Hungary, and Croatia. School is upon me for the first time in 6 weeks, and there's definitely a readjustment period that I need to get through. Still, I can't help but enjoy it since it's my last month and a half in London.

Now down to business. I'm not sure if I can actually summon the will power to summarize the happenings of the trip in one go. So, as they say, a picture says a thousand words.

Go to my Picasa to see all the albums or click individually below.

Above is a picture of Jared and I as we got a little picture happy at the ruins in Dvigrad, Croatia. As it said in our guide book, you can really let your imagination run wild. There are no signs, no gates, no fences, no educational information of any kind. All we knew is that it was abandoned due to plague in the 16th century. We walked on walls dating back to the 15th century and we actually climbed into the church of St. Sophia. We were the only people in Dvigrad at the time (hurrah for low season!), which made it even more surreal. Ok, enjoy the photos.

Salzburg photos

Vienna photos

Budapest photos

Istria photos

Pula photos

Scervusc from Pest

Hello all. I'm currently in an internet café on the Pest side of Budapest. The Hungarian currency, the forint, has been very kind to us and has been a large factor in redeeming Budapest after arriving on the first discouraging night. As is usual, darkness makes everything look a little bit sketchy and the fact that we had zero money due to no ATMs and almost no ability to communicate upped the stress level.

That said, most everything else has been flawless. Well... besides a lot of stuff being closed due to a transit strike on our first full day of exploring, ha. Spring has sprung in Hungary! It's the first place I've traveled to where I can really just wear a t-shirt and jeans. The food is great and it's nice not to have to sell a kidney to support a diet including meat other than tuna from the can.

Walking around is, in one simple word, pleasant. Just walk. With my handy post-it from my friend Gabor, we've managed to try Hungarian dishes. Soft cabbage stuffed with pork, venison stew, and goulash. We still need to try the bean soup. Butttt we bought some Hungarian wine to try later at our flat. Our hostel is no hostel... it's a full-fledged apartment with kitchen, bathroom, breakfast nook/bar area, and bedroom. All ours! So nice to have our own space again.

Alright. I'm having a great time and overall, it's practically zero stress. We're heading to Zahgreb in 2 days and I'm not sure if I'll have internet there. Haven't had much access so far. Hope everyone is well. Vislat!

...And We're Off

A week back in London, while academically unproductive, was at least socially productive. Time has flown and with 2 weeks left of my 6 week break, I'm off to Austria tomorrow.

Just for all you curious folk, I'll be traveling to Salzburg tomorrow, followed by Vienna, Budapest, Zahgreb, Rovinj and surrounding areas, and Pula. I might update on the way to avoid a 2-week summary post when I get back, so check back in if you want to know what I'm up to.

Hope everyone is doing well.

Family Vacation! (With the Medveds)

First, a bit of business. I have reached the limits of a free Flickr account and rather than upgrade to a pretty account, as pretty as they are, I'm switching to my dormant Picasa account. Shockingly, I encountered a fair amount of problems uploading the web albums and had to resurrect my troubleshooting skills. Who knew there was any flaw in Google at all?

So now I'm in the process of organizing albums from past trips. Here's Sardinia and the Amalfi Coast in pictures and from a while back, Amsterdam, Paris, and Gtown's Spring Break in London.

Now onto the Amalfi coast vacation. Much like Sardinia, this trip offered an experience that differed from the typical student travel that I've been doing and will be doing for the rest of break. There weren't really museums to visit, although we did visit the Archaeological Museum in Naples. Never before have I been surrounded by so many phallic images. Penis pendants on necklaces, penis earings, flying penis statues WITH penises, penis wall adornments, and of course erotic frescos and statues, all from Pompei. Naples was the only real city we went to on the trip, and I think we were all glad that it was a brief visit. Besides for the garbage on the streets, check out this TIME photo gallery to get the full and shocking picture, I was a little taken aback by the traffic. Never before have I heard sustained honking and beeping for such a duration of time. It was a fun experience though.

Naples was only one day out of ten, but it's hard to recap where I've been. Most of the towns on the Amalfi coast are very small and vertical with windy roads connecting them and they tend to blend in my mind unless I have a certain restaurant or villa to distinguish one from the other. We stayed in two villas in a town called Positano, supposedly the most vertical town in the world? In Italy? Facts are fuzzy. Right outside our door (literally) was a hike to Ciello (I think), an extremely small town directly above us. 2000 steps later, we were there and having lunch in a small trattoria where we could see the three famous rocks of Capris. Ok, I won't go through everything and everywhere I went, but highlights include Pompei, the small hike up and around Mt. Vesuvius, the stair hike, and the drive around the island of Capri. Food and gelatto were another major highlight. I was constantly well fed, tummy well-stocked with local seafood, pastas, tomatoes, and mozzarella.

The Medved's know how to vacation and have a good time, and I was lucky enough to be along for the ride. I've got to say, I haven't laughed that hard on a daily basis since I've been back at Georgetown and that was a good feeling to have again. It was also nice to be around "family" again; they weren't mine but I felt adopted for the time being.

So now... I rest for a week and sort out my business. In good news, I will be back in DC by June 16th and semi-employed. Alright. A picture says a thousand words, so check 'em out. Hope to talk to everyone while I'm back in London.