Our adventure in London begins

This blog was originally called 'Year in the US' but I had to change it to 'Taryn's Adventures Abroad' since we are now also spending 9 months in London. This way, it's generic and will be a great way to document all our adventures, wherever we may go :)

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I've been in London for a week now. I arrived on Friday 1 November 2013. It's been pretty cold! Today's temperatures are 3 degrees (min) and 9 degrees (max). Much colder than I would have expected for London. Fortunately, I've brought all my Boston winter boots, gloves, thermal tights and jacket to keep me warm.

Athol arrived at on 28 September 2013 as registration at LSE was on 1 October 2013. He is studying Political Theory at the London School of Economics (LSE) and is loving it. This is a new area of interest for him, so is loving the academic rigor, learnings and debates. LSE is one (if not the best) of the best universities to study Political Theory.

London is great, we stayed here for two months (April - June 2010) when Athol still worked for Bain & Co. and I worked for Old Mutual. We really enjoyed living here so I was excited to be living here again.

We are living right in the heart of London -  about 2 minutes away from Trafalgar Square, 5 minutes from Leicester Square, 8, minutes from Picadilly Circus, 10 minutes away from Big Ben and Westminster Abbey and 15 minutes from Buckingham Palace. So everything is within walking distance and very convenient. LSE is about 10 minutes away.

 

The one downside is that it is very noisy and always lots of people around.

I'm not sure LSE in in the heart of busy London. West End is very expensive as there are many theatres, fancy restaurants, Covent Garden, etc. Food and Rental is extremely expensive.

We had chosen to live in the LSE accommodation as we didn't have many other options. Trying to find accommodation from South Africa was difficult, I came across a few scamsters trying to pull a fast one on poor foreign students looking for accommodation. Luckily, our experience from Harvard has made us wiser so that we are not fooled by scamsters.

The accommodation is basic, we have a double room with two desks, chairs, cupboards, bookshelves, pedestals, lamps and bins. We are on the fourth floor, which faces the busy Northumberland Avenue. We have two large windows so we have a lot of natural light (when London gets sun!). The bathroom has a nice shower - its small but adequate.

My first day in London!

 My desk and our scullery (on the shelf! :) )

Athol's desk

 

We share a kitchen with a few other students - there are 3 fridges, a kettle, toaster, 2 stoves and ovens, 2 zincs, ironing board, vacuum and a little area next to the kitchen with a couch, armchair and 4 bar stools.  In the basement there is a laundry room with 5 washing machines and 5 dryers (costs $1.50 per wash/dry). There is a common room with couches and a TV, a computer room with computers and a printer and a study room. Real student life! :) There is a reception area downstairs with staff. This building is used as a hotel open to the public during the Summer holidays.

There are many little supermarkets nearby - Tesco, Sainsburys, The Co-operative, M&S, Tesco Direct and Spar. The Charing Cross station is also close, which has many shops like Burger King, Upper Crust, etc. The South African shop is also nearby, they sell all South African favourites like Chutney, Niknaks, Cream Soda, etc.

Last Sunday we went to buy falafel shwarmas and went to sit on a bench in Leister Square. They redid this square for the 2012 Olympics. There is now a William Shakespeare statue in the centre with fountains.

We live literally a 3 min walk away from the Thames River and from there you can see the London Eye and Big Ben. The one night we walked around to the London Eye and back along the pedestrian bridge which has great views of Big Ben. Reminds me of our walks in Boston, we used to walk along the Charles River to Harvard Square at 11pm at nights.

I've settled in nicely, so nice to re-united with my husband again :) thank goodness for Skype. Skyping twice a day and Whatsapp made our time apart much easier.  I had stayed back in CT to sort out a couple of things, in particular to get our book OAKY AND THE SUN printed and to manage our initiative READ to RISE to promote literacy by distributing books in Mitchells Plain. There is still lots to be done, but I can manage it from London, thankfully we have some people on the ground in CT.

So we will be here in London for another 6 weeks and then we will be back in CT on 19 December in time for our niece Hannah's birthday, Christmas and New Year. Then Athol's classes start on 12 January 2014.

So we've got 6 weeks this year to enjoy life in London! I'm keeping my fingers crossed for some sunny days :)