Transistioning

The transition to London (while transitional) thanks to my getaway to Philly was no less easier to transition to.  I found myself sleepy and hungry, with limited options since everything is so foreign to me.  London's food has gotten poor reviews from the time I left AZ all the way up to my neighbor on the plane who frequents here often.  I decided to go to a hospital (which had a nice cafeteria) and at least the food was recognizable.  Its roughly 5pm or it could be 6pm I haven't seen a clock yet outside.  I am sitting at McDonald's people watching because they have free wireless.  What I notice about London besides it being the smoker capital of the world is that people seem busy.  There is a huge diverse group here with the young, old, black, white, Asian, and Indian population.  You can tell we are close to Paris because people dress very stylish and trendy despite age, or background.  Its interesting not to see as many obese people as you might see in the states (just a mental note) which might be because they either have horrible food options or they walk everywhere.  I plan to try to stay up as late as I can, perhaps catch up with Jason and get ready for adventure tomorrow.  I am thinking I might go ahead and do a tour (highly recommended by many who visit here) and then just relax.  I have started taking pictures but none that I can make sense of yet.  London is a pretty awesome city, that I can tell you and perhaps I will bring back a little more than stories with me to the states.

Cont.
I spent the remainder of my day walking around the city getting my bearings together. London can be overwhelming when you first get here especially without knowing anyone or knowing how to get anywhere. It helped me to just sit somewhere and create a plan. When I left McDonalds I decided that it might help if I connected with Jason. I lost my cell phone at the airport so when I got back to the dorm I had to wait at the front of the building to ensure I could catch him. I had to do this because Jason didn’t know I was in London since I lost my phone before I communicate I made the plane. As I waited I met many friends. My first friend a young Italian boy named Daniel who was an exchange student who was here to brush up on his fourth and least used language, English. He approached me to help him with the laundry machine and me being my open self ended up talking with him for over an hour about his travels and life in Italy. As I was giving him a quick easy “American” lesson (his words not mine) his Spanish friend from Spain walked up and discussed his travels and his endeavors to learn English as well. I was thinking that I didn’t count on when coming to London meeting Italians and Spanish boys. I guess London is the melting pot of Europe. I’m not sure that it looked all too well when Jason passed me he sees me sitting in the middle of two young guys. At the time none of that mattered because I finally felt safe and happy in his arms. I had to hold myself back when I saw him from screaming because it has been what over 5 days since we had seen each other last. It’s funny too because once we were together things just gelled and plans went into place as I knew they would. For the first time he was able to share all that he had seen and done freely with excitement. He stressed how rigorous the program was, and that he really just needed to relax and rest. Relax we did, and over all the evening was as perfect as I could have imagined. It is awesome to be in love and to connect with your soul mate after being so far from each other for so long. I remember being so grateful to hear Jason talk and felt so happy to listen to all that he had to say with no interruption.


Once Jason left I had to try to work on getting to sleep at midnight London time and 4pm Phoenix time. Yeah… that’s hard to do! I watched a movie and listened to my books and finally fell asleep. It is day 2 here in London for me and you all are on your way to bed since it around 10-11pm yesterday and 6-7am here in London (I know confusing) and my day here begins.