It’s been brought to my attention that I am a HORRIBLE blogger. This is true, and I’ll freely admit it! Let’s see if I can recap what has happened in the last month.

 

Halloween

 

They apparently celebrate Halloween here more than I thought they would. Mostly I think young people use it as an excuse to party (but then, what DON’T they use as an excuse!) We went to the Marine House. Nicole went as a flapper and Michael went as a vampire. Nick and I didn’t dress up. We met up with Tipper (table tennis pro) at the party and played some foosball. Nicole and I went home pretty early from that so we could make sure and get the tube back and not have to walk.

 

Election Night

 

Election night was INSANE. It was one of the things I’m going to remember most about this internship. We got back to the Embassy to work around 8:30 and got home around 5am, just in time to see Senator McCain give his concession speech and to see President-elect Obama give his acceptance speech. Then we all had to call home on Skype. Luckily we didn’t have to go to work the next day, so we slept in and just generally did nothing besides venture into Chinatown for dinner with a crazy waitress who literally growled at us. Election night was so crazy awesome. There were around 2,000 people crammed into mainly three or four areas of the embassy. The only famous person I saw was Josh Hartnett, but I know others were there, including Andrew Lloyd Webber and lots of MPs. Burger King, Subway, and Kellogg had food stands set up with free food while we had some free whisky from a lot of people, including Jack Daniels. The first three and a half hours of the night I babysat a bad, and then after that I walked around for a long time trying to find everyone. Then Nicole and I hid out in the Consular section, where she works, so we could sit down and get away from the people. After that I somehow got roped into manning the bar, which consisted mostly of pouring Jack and Coke for a lot of very drunk Brits.

 

Cambridge

 

The weekend after election night we took a day trip to Cambridge to see the university and just the area. It was really pretty, despite the rain and cold weather. I was sad that we didn’t get a chance to go punting, but it was still fun. I tried a very British drink, Pimm’s. I guess the traditional way to drink it is with lemonade (7-UP), but I had it with coke. It was REALLY sweet, but pretty good. I also had a very amazing fruit tart.

 

Salisbury

 

We had Veteran’s Day off of work, since it’s an American holiday. Michael and I decided we were going to go to Salisbury and Stonehenge. So we jumped on the train and went out to Salisbury, which is a very adorable little village in the English countryside that someday I want to retire to. We saw the cathedral, which was amazing, especially when you think about the fact that it was built in the 1200s. After that, we went to a tourist information place to ask about the bus to Stonehenge, only to find out that we were 10 minutes late for the last bus! He suggested that we could go out to the ruins of the OldCastle, so we did that. We got there and it was closing in 10 minutes, so we couldn’t go to the main part, but we got to walk around the lovely field for awhile. Then when we got back into London we decided we would be adventurous and try the bus. It didn’t work out for us, and we ended up having to take the tube back anyway. When my parents get here, I’m going to have us do a day trip to Bath and Stonehenge. You can’t go to England without seeing Stonehenge!

 

Paris

 

The other major thing we’ve done is Nicole and I went to Paris last weekend. It was SO amazing. We went with a tour group. We got picked up Friday morning at 6:30 in the morning by a mini coach. There were about 14 people, mostly Australians (although there was one Canadian). Our tour guide was really knowledgeable and nice. We went across on the ferry and got to Paris around 3pm. The driver drove around for a bit and we got to see the Arc de Triomphe and then we went to our hotel. That night we had free so Nicole and I braved the metro system and went to the Louvre and got in FOR FREE because not only are they open late on Friday nights but under 26’s get in free. So we saw the Mona Lisa and all the other famous stuff. The next morning we went on a driving tour and saw the Arc de Triomphe again and Napoleon’s tomb and the EiffelTower and other major things in Paris. After that, we jumped on a train and went out to Versailles, where we spent a good 5 hours and didn’t see nearly the whole thing. Then we went back to Paris and got on a river boat cruise. It was so pretty, especially when we caught the EiffelTower sparkling. Then we went to a cute little restaurant and spent ENTIRELY too much on dinner and dessert. Then we went back to the hotel and nearly DIED because we were so tired.

 

The last morning we got up really early and went to the Mussée d’Orsay. Due to the clock we were using resetting itself from London time to Paris time, but us thinking it was still on London time, we ended up being there WAY too early and having to wait around 2 hours. So we saw everything in there and then found a touristy shop and bought lots of gifts.  And then we piled back on the bus and came back to London ! Not nearly enough time to see all of Paris, but just enough to know that I definitely want to go back.

Random Other Stuff

We went to see Avenue Q. It was HILARIOUS, but definitely not something I would go see with my parents. I had a blast. Nicole and I went to a Swedish Christmas Market last night. After we finally found the church, it was basically the greatest place on Earth. There were all these Swedes and Swedish food and Swedish crafts. It was the best. We tried this spiced and heated wine drink called Glogg and had some awesome cookies. So great. Love the Swedes! My people! Michael said he couldn't go because his family is Norwegian and he couldn't support the Swedes. So now we have a feud. He's West Coast and I'm East Coast. All in good fun, of course.

Next up Nicole and I are going to Edinburgh the first weekend in December. Besides the high likelihood of snow, it should be a really fun trip, at least for shopping. We've been told cashmere is crazy cheap there. We're flying EasyJet this time, so that should definitely be interesting...

 

So that’s what’s been going on in life, in a nutshell. We’re 6 weeks into our internship. Only 4 weeks left, and 5 weeks until my parents get here! Today we had our official meeting with Ambassador Tuttle and got our picture taken with him. He was very interesting and had a lot of interesting stories to tell.

 

Speaking of stories, I’ll leave you with a story about the embassy that broke today: www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1088188/U-S-embassy-guard-accuses-Obama-doing-deals-terrorists.html

So this weekend was our big trip to Amsterdam. While it ended up an amazing experience, it started out really rough!!

 

First, we were taking a bus. It’s a 12 hour drive, going from London to Dover, over the channel, through France and Belgium, finally getting to The Netherlands to Amsterdam. Anyway, we got “lucky” and got a driver who was either clinically insane or on drugs. Or both. Basically the first thing he says over the loudspeaker is “No food. No drinks. Well you can eat. And drink. But no big food. No chicken. No rice.” Nicole, who was sitting next to me, and I were like “What?” So then there were these four girls who were a couple of years older than me sitting in the bag. A few hours into the trip, the bus driver pulls over the bus and stalks to the back and starts yelling at them “Are you smoking? Who’s smoking? No smoking on my bus!” But they denied smoking so he went back up and went on his way. Then a little bit later we pull over at a petrol station somewhere in the middle of nowhere in Belgium. This is where the major drama begins.

 

The driver tells us we’re stopping there for 35 minutes. There’s some confusion over whether we’re waiting for another bus or not. Then he stalks to the back of the bus again, to these same girls. He yells at them to get off the bus, now! He accuses them of drinking. Once again, they deny it. But proof is not on their side. He pulls out two big bottles of vodka that are almost gone. He yells at them to get off the bus again. More shouting ensues. The bus driver calls the police and talks to them in Dutch (which of course no one in our area of the bus knows, as we are all either British or American, or the two who were Italian and Australian. But anyway no one back there spoke Dutch). The bus driver tries again to get the girls off the bus, who are now saying they won’t get off until the police get there. The bus driver threatens to leave them in the middle of nowhere. He tries to physically force them off the bus and almost pushes one girl down the stairs. So the police arrive and try to get the girls off the bus. But they’re talking to them in Dutch. So one girl tries to go up and ask a question and the policeman puts the girl in a headlock and accidentally elbows her in the face. Then he starts to get out his baton to hit her and we all gasp and he kind of realizes where he is. This is, of course all happening directly diagonally from Nicole and me.

 

They take the girls off the bus and talk to them for a really long time. We think the bus driver exaggerated, saying they had alcohol and drugs and were acting unruly. So the story ended up with the girls back on the bus, mad at each other and us on our way to Amsterdam.

 

It was pretty overwhelming for me when we first got there. The only country I’ve been to where a foreign language was the official language is South Africa, and we had family there to take us everywhere. Plus almost everything was in English, too. So being at this train station in Amsterdam where everything is in Dutch was a little scary at first. But luckily everyone I was with (Nicole, Michael, and Emmeny) are experienced travelers. Once we figured out the “honors system”-based metro/bus system we got our exciting day started.

 

First stop was the Anne Frank Museum where we bought our tickets. We grabbed some breakfast as this awesome little place next door before actually going into the museum. It was so sad in there, and so surreal to think that those rooms that you are walking through are the exact ones that she spent so many years hiding. Next we went back to the Centraal Station to buy the I Amsterdam cards. For 33 Euros we got free admission to a bunch of museums – including the Van Gogh one which was normally around 12 Euros – and discounts at a lot of restaurants, a free canal tour priced at around 12 Euros, and an unlimited 24 hour transportation pass so we could ride the metro and bus for free. Then we did the canal tour, the Van Gogh museum, Rijksmuseum, and then went back to the hostel. After checking in to our hostel that was really a hotel but cheap, we went back out to grab some dinner (pancakes) before checking out the Red Light District which was an eye opening experience.

 

Oh! We saw a celeb while at the Van Gogh museum. Nicole and I were waiting on Michael and Emmeny and all of the sudden she gasps and says “Seth Green is here!” and I looked up and sure enough it was, with like four other people! He is very short in person. I know he looks short in movies….but seriously I think I’m taller than he is! So we didn’t go get a picture with him, or bother him, since he just wanted to go look at some Van Goghs, ya know? But it was still cool.

 

After that we went back to the hostel where we crashed from exhaustion. There was some confusion this morning because the time changed in Europe at 2am this morning. But we grabbed a taxi (27 Euros divided by 4 people – not bad) and made it to our bus. The drive back was much more relaxed than the way up, and we slept basically the whole time.

 

All in all we had an amazing time in Amsterdam. I think if we’d had one more day to go to some more museums and see a windmill that would’ve been perfect, but I’m just not sure I’d want to be there long time. Pictures are up on facebook!

Obviously, I'm a horrible updater! I've been here over a week and all I've updated was that I actually arrived. I could make excuses, but the truth is, I'm just lazy :) But here we go:

The apartment is awesome. I was a little concerned about five people living in a two bedroom, two bathroom flat. But the flat is a lot bigger than I was expecting. In the bedroom, we have one bunk bed and then one single bed. I get the "honor" of being on the top bunk. It isn't so bad except getting down from it in the morning! The living area is probably everyone's favorite. We've got the large table and then a little bay window-ish area where there are three couches. Usually we are all in here, with Nicole and I dominating the tv. The tv here really surprised me. We get BBC America at my parent's house, so I've definitely been exposed to British tv. But...the truth is, most of the selections are American shows. Everything from Friends, Scrubs, Desperate Housewives to CSI to Wifeswap and Unsolved Crimes to Shot of Love with Tila Tequila and The Salt N Peppa Show. It's insane. So we're usually watching American television. You can definitely see the influence of America here. There is literally a Subway restaurant on almost every block, plus a Starbucks on EVERY block. Half of the commercials we see on tv are for Pizza Hut, which we see a lot, along with KFC, Burger King, and McDonald's.

London is amazing. The area that we are in is around a block away from the tube station and has grocery stores, restaurants, and anything else you could need nearby. We're just about three or four tube stops away from the Embassy and within walking distance of a lot of major attractions like the British Museum, the National Gallery and National Portrait Gallery (and so Trafalgar Square). It's taking a bit getting used to living in a major city, like the fact that every night we hear siren after siren after siren. And we can hear it when the buses go by, and feel it when the tube goes under us. It's also taking some time getting used to the things that are different from America. Such as the fact that you get charged a service charge for eating in at a restaurant. Or that everything closes early and a lot of things aren't open on Sundays (except, of course, American chain food places). It's a little like living in a small town, except it's a big city and there are no wal marts around.

My flatmates are all awesome. We managed to end up with a good bunch. We have Nicole from Western Michigan, Emmeny who is an alum of Penn State (and who is not working at the Embassy), Michael from William & Mary, and Nick from Georgia Tech (although he prefers to say he's from Los Angeles, where he lives when not at school). We get along for the most part. After a long week of being together basically 24/7 we had a little tension, but this is to be expected and we've all learned to have some time alone to cool off and regroup.

Work at the embassy is so cool. I've met SO many nice people. Everyone seems to be so nice, from the guards, to the cafeterias, to the Foreign Service Officers, to the Locally Employed Staff. I've only been there a week, so the real work hasn't quite started. I can't talk about it, but it should be really good. This will be a very rewarding experience (AND will look very good on my resume), and I expect that it will just further cement the thought that this is what I want to do with the rest of my life. One thing that I'm looking forward to is election night. At every American Embassy around the world, election night is celebrated with a party and anyone who is anyone tries to go. We're all volunteering. It should be a long night - from about 8:30pm to about 4am (after, of course, a normal day of work of 8:30am-5:30pm), but should definitely be fun and a good experience. But other than saying my job is so amazing, I probably won't say anything else.

Nicole has previously studied abroad here, so she's one of our experts. Last Monday, before we started work, she took us around to almost everything: Parliament, Big Ben, Buckingham Palace, Westminster Abbey, who knows what else. We didn't get a chance to go inside anything, but I did take plenty of pictures. This weekend we went to the National Portrait Gallery and the National Gallery, which were both amazing and free! Last night we went to this place called The Sports Cafe which is basically like an American sports bar to watch the Penn State/Michigan game. It was pretty fun, and gave us the chance to hang out with some people from the other flats on our floor (there are three other flats and all are studying abroad - two of the apartments are students from Deleware). Next weekend we're going to take a bus to Amsterdam to see some museums there, like the Anne Frank one and the Van Gogh one. After that Nicole and I are looking at Paris, and then sometime after that we're thinking of a tour of the Scotland highlands. It should be fun!

Anyway it's getting late here, so it'll be bedtime soon. I'll update again soon(ish)!

Is it really only 8:44 AM central time? It feels like it should be MUCH later. Here's it's about 2:44PM, I think.

Our flight arrived at Heathrow at about 6:30AM - our scheduled landing time had been 7:10AM, but apparently we made really good time. Anyway, I managed to get NO sleep on the plane (partly due to the woman in front of me who could not stop fidgeting violently in her seat), So I've been awake for more than 24 hours, with probably another 6 or so hours to go before I finally get to sleep.

First thing we did when we got through customs (successfully!) and got our luggage was to go to a Starbucks. Nice and American! However, we were both REALLY tired and thought some coffee could help. So we sat and drank coffee and watched all the people holding up signs for people they were waiting to pick up. Our favorite was the person holding a "COLBERT" sign. Sadly it was an older couple, and not Stephen. So we sat there until about 9 when we finally got up and made our way to get our tickets for the Heathrow Express, which took us to the Paddington Station, which is relatively near our hotel. We managed to successfully navigate it, and after lugging my three suitcases and my giant/heavy backpack forever, we finally made it to our hotel a little after 10.....to find out that our room wouldn't be ready until 2! So we stored our luggage there and set out to find something to eat at about 11. We walked a few blocks each direction, and couldn't find something relatively normal to what we're used to, so we decided on the Subway near our hotel (and yes, there IS a Starbucks within about a block, too, but there's also a Cafe Nero right across the street, so I would obviously try that rather than go American again). It was good and was interesting how everything tasted different. One of the packs of chips was flavored prawns & sauce (shrimp & cocktail sauce). I didn't try those, though.

After that we went back to the hotel where we read (and I napped a little) until our room was finally ready. Now we're hanging out in the room, watching the BBC News. We got to watch the NYSE open, which freaked us out because we didn't realize it was so early in the morning over there! Dinner is served at the restaurant in the hotel from 6:30-7:30, so I guess we're just waiting that. I haven't taken any pictures yet, but don't worry! I will. Tomorrow, when I'm feeling refreshed and have had sleep and am meeting up with my flatmates finally, there will be pictures aplenty. Anyway i only have about half an hour left of internet (had to pay £3 for it). I just wanted to let everyone know we made it okay!!

Amanda

Hey everyone! I thought that starting a blog would be the easiest way to let everyone keep track of me and hear all the exciting things I'm (probably) doing! Since I don't actually leave until tomorrow, I haven't done anything exciting (except for successfully pack all my things in only three suitcases!), but I'll be sure to update as soon as I get there and get settled and everything.

Keep in touch! You can e-mail me at amg002@uark.edu , p191ju@gmail.com , or find me on MSN Messenger (P191ju@hotmail.com), AIM (Pheonixtears0921), or Facebook. I only get 1,000 minutes of internet a week, so I won't be on time all the time, but I'll be sure to get back to you when I can!

Amanda