1st week in London!

Friends,

I have been in London for about a week now and have been pretty busy! I was having a lot of trouble finding wireless internet earlier in the week (the only place I found was a McDonalds nearby) but now I am all moved in to my flat and classes have started here too!

Although I've only been here for about a week, it feels much longer than that. I feel like I have already been able to see a lot of London. I have been able to check out Big Ben, the London Eye, Camden Markets, local pubs, and other attractions. Last saturday, my friends and I spent all day in the British Museum and it was really cool. My school also had a boat cruise event for international student on River Thames one night. It seems like I've already done a lot but I'm sure things are going to slow down now that classes have started.

Classes here are really different than they are at Davidson. First off, I will never complain about webtree again. Registering for classes here is almost impossible. Its like they don't want you to take any classes (its not that bad...). Anyways, my classes are all sorted out now and it looks like I won't have class on Wednesdays(which is today)! Classes meet less often and students here are expected to be more independent in their learning. There aren't too many assignments during the semester so the final counts for most of your grade in the class!

Enough about school, last sunday I was able to visit All Soul's Church and really enjoyed it. In fact, I am planning on going to their student bible study tonight.  Its really strange to hear people sing hymns in British accents. The church is about a 30 minute ride on the tube from where I live but on the weekends now, part of the tube is going to be closed because they want to repair the tube before the Olympics next year. So last week, I had to walk 30 minutes after getting out of a 20-minute tube ride to get to church...Too bad there is not a Rich circle here where I could just meet up with people for rides!  I am still not use to having to leave like an hour before to get somewhere thats only a few miles away...

Thanks to everyone that I have already skyped with! It's been really nice to hear from people because I'm starting to feel a bit homesick. I hope to skype with everyone soon!  I also heard from Ben Krause earlier today that people on the classics trip are in London now! I plan on seeing them soon! It will be nice to meet up with some Davidson students.

Hope the first week of classes goes well for everybody!

Eugene

Traveling

Friends,

I am currently sitting at a coffee shop in the Istanbul airport typing this post on TextEdit because I can't connect to the internet here. I will post this when I get internet. I have about 2 hours before I can board and there's not much to do here right now because it's 6 am here and everything is closed. I've flown about 12 hours from HK to Istanbul and am not sure how long the flight is from here to London.

Since my last post, I have been spending alot of time with my dad and other relatives in HK. To all my ping pong friends out there, I've been playing an insane amount of ping pong and also got a new paddle. I've also tried to run some shorter distances but my achilles is still bothering me...Other highlights in HK include watching fireworks on New Year's Eve from the building where they filmed part of the Batman movie, eating tons(literally tons) of sushi, and shopping. One noticeable difference between HK and the US is that Christmas is much more low-key here. It seems to me that not too many people even celebrate Christmas here, and Christmas seems to be more focused on Santa instead the birth of Jesus...

It is a bit strange to think that I won't have any family and friends waiting for me at Heathrow. Even at Davidson, I am close to home and can see my family pretty often. I have no idea what the next six months will be like....Anyways I should check on my next flight and explore the Istanbul airport some more!

Eugene