Fan girl.

Be prepared, long blog but if you want to hear about a weekend full of magic, adventures and some self discovery then I suggest that you bear with me and my rambles!

Friday morning was filled with chaos. I awoke to my alarm at 7:00 a.m. snoozed it and had the internal debate of "if I sleep 10 more minutes then I will have to take a quick shower...10 more minutes and I will have to skip breakfast...10 more minutes and I will have to scrunch my hair instead of straightening it" but those extra 30 minutes would prove to be the best decision to get me through the adventurous day that lied ahead. The day called for: missing the Harlaxton shuttle, forgetting confirmation tickets, Bri leaving her camera, Bri and Elloit missing the train, realizing Haley and I did not know where our hostel was, searching for addresses, directions and underground stops on the 15 minutes of free WiFi that the train offers, taking on the tube station completely on our own, running up the Underground steps and arriving to the next train before anyone else. All before 1:00 p.m.!!

I've looked forward to this weekend since the beginning of the semester. Dubbed the "Harry Potter" weekend, my friends and I planned to go to the Harry Potter studios to relive our childhood "classic" series to the fullest. I remember the anticipation felt all over the world as each book and film were released. The first book was released in 1997 (I was 5 years old) and the first move in 2001. When it comes to books, my childhood memories will be filled with thoughts of a far off, magical world...yes I know it's fictional but I mean I do live in a castle, well almost!
The studio taught me that:
1. The sets where the scenes of the Great Hall, Gryffindor Common Room, boys dormitory, Snape's potion class, the Burrow and Professor Dumbledore's office are smaller in real life than they appear on screen.
2. The Great Hall floor is actually stone and the room does not have a full ceiling.
3. The posters hanging on the walls of the common room are actual drawings from the child cast.
4. Hagrid is played by two people, one being a ex-rugby player who is 6'10".
5. The books in Dumbledore's office are British telephone books covered in leather.
6. The wand boxes in Olivander's Wand Shop are hand painted with the cast and crews names on the outside.
7. There were full time animal trainers staffed for the creatures department...think Hedwig, Fang, Scabbers, and Crookshanks!
8. The stone sculpture in lobby of the Ministry of Magic was HAND CARVED!!
9. The castle is really a (large) model that fits in a room.
10. and my personal favorite, there is a box of Cheri-Owls on the Burrow shelf.

There were people of all ages, from all over the world that came to visit this studio. It goes to prove that J.K. Rowling knew what she was doing when the idea of a young boy finding out that he was a wizard came to life.

Out front

 

Recognize these?

 

 

After reluctantly leaving "Harry Potter World," Haley and I decided that we wanted to visit Trafalgar Square since neither of us were able to the first weekend that we were in London. This is where this trip started to inch towards one of my favorite parts of my Harlaxton experience. We decided to get off the tube at a station near Trafalgar and then walk where ever we felt inclined. After realizing Trafalgar Square was roped off for a concert later that night, we decided to find Big Ben...a 180 turn and we saw him dominating in the skyline and headed that way. We eventually made it to Big Ben and wandered around Parliament, the London Eye and the walking bridge cuts over the Thames River. While walking, Haley and I laughed about how we were conquering London all on our own. Dubbed the "Twiddle Dee and Twiddle Dumb" of the group, most of the time we let the others decide where to go and just follow. In fact, Jenny looked quite shocked when we told her we were going to find our hostel by ourselves earlier in the day. We kept talking about the feeling of independence that we felt had grown inside ourselves since leaving good ole' Bowling Green less than three months ago. Never in my wildest dreams did I ever think that I would be conquering the streets, the tube system, finding a hostel and simply loving a big city like London!

We eventually made our way back to our hostel, the London Backpackers. We wanted to have an early start the next day and were exhausted from all the traveling that day. We got checked in and headed up to what would be the sketchiest hostel room that we have stayed at thus far. We flipped the lights on to see 5 sets of 3 tiered bunked beds...that's right a maximum of 15 people could stay in our room, oh and it was mixed gender. I claimed the top most bunk (since I'm used to it anyway) and carried ALL my stuff up with. While I was changing in the bathroom down the hall, the guy on our bottom tier asked Haley for cigarette papers before leaving a stash of weed just sitting on his bed. I was very uncomfortable sleeping in this room but luckily it was only for one night. I mean, everyone has to have some sort of sketchy hostel experience while studying abroad...right?

The next morning we had plans of heading to Portobello Market but a downpour made us rethink our plans. We decided to head to Oxford Street's Primark. Think Forever21 on STEROIDS. I have never been in a store with more clothing options/people in my life. I was wondering why I kept seeing people trying on clothes over top of their clothes throughout the store until we got up to the dressing room line...it was at least 30 people deep and completely robotic. The workers stuck a number plate into the wall, typed how many clothing items you were trying on in and then counted everything when you came out of the room. It was definitely an experience and after about an hour and half of being in the store, Haley walked out with TWO items. I was just to overwhelmed to even buy anything!

We eventually headed towards our second main goal of this London trip, a boat tour headed for Greenwich which houses a museum for the prime meridian of the world. When I went to Ecuador last winter I was able to visit the equator and straddle the northern and southern hemispheres and after finding out the prime meridian cut through England, I had to visit there. I mean who doesn't want to say they have straddled all the hemispheres of the world! The boat tour itself was very interesting. We were able to see many of the big sites of the city from the view of the Thames River.

Greenwich is a wonderful little city...from what we saw at least. Haley and I high tailed it to the museum because we thought we were running behind on time. The slope started to increase and before long we were running up a hill, much like Western's! Let's just say we were both heaving at the top. We didn't look through the museum as much as some, but took some fun pictures straddling the line. Fun fact: there is a green laser that beams a light out along the line for up to 15 miles!

Top two are from the prime meridian & bottom two are from equator.

 

We were both exhausted on the train ride home but the weekend was one of reflection. The English countryside, from the view of a train window, is something that I will never forget. I looked out to see men walking through their fields, church spires lining the skyline, a rainbow stretching across the horizon, terraced houses that are filled with the love of an unknown family, the bluest of skies littered with puffy, white clouds and the greenest of grass as spring nears everyday. I really can not believe how much I already feel like I have grown as a person since being here. I can't wait to go home and take this independent spirit and make plans to travel to places all across the U.S. Seeing beautiful sights throughout Europe is making me wonder what I am missing that might be in my backyard...well you know what I mean. 

I'm so glad that I was able to share this AMAZING weekend with Haley too. We have gotten closer throughout this trip and I can now say that she is a very good friend of mine and our journey's will hopefully not end when we get back to home soil.