London Excursion

After my film seminar let out late Friday afternoon, I bussed to the Norwich Rail Station and rode roughly two hours to Liverpool Street station in London, where I met up with Goucher pals Debra (studying at London School of Economics) and Brendan (studying at Westminster). We got pizza, then dropped by Deb's flat in South Kensington. After some deliberation, we decided to take the Tube (subway) to Picadilly Circus, where there was a sweet three-story bar called O'Neill's.

Self in front of horse fountain-- Picadilly.

O'Neill's was a quality establishment and boy was it PACKED. The first floor was a pub, the second floor was more dance-oriented (if I recall correctly) and the top floor featured live music. When we went up there, there was a cover band doing '90s rock songs. The three of us had some fun goofing around to their renditions of tunes by Nirvana, Blink-182 and others. Then they broke out Rage Against the Machine's "Killing in the Name Of" and I sang along to every word. That part was awesome.

Fun fun fun!

The not-so-fun: having short girls marvel at my height, then having two other girls point at and then fondle my hair as I desperately tried to wade through the crowd to the bar for a drink...and the music was so loud in both instances that I couldn't understand a damned word.

We then crashed back at Deb's flat. In the morning-- okay, mid-afternoon, we headed to Portobello Market, where Deb spoke of a fantastic falafel stand. Indeed, it was called the Healthy Vegetarian, and their product had not only delicious made falafel, but oodles of fresh herbs as well. The eating experience was as follows:

First bite...

Stoked!

Needless to say, I bought two.

Needed to be done.

Deb wanted to check out the British Museum and this proved to be a great idea. It's free, camera use is allowed, and the facility is HUGE.

We checked out huge exhibits on Egypt, South America, feudal Japan, Native Americans, and ancient Greece.

Rosetta Stone.

Well, I feel prejudiced against...

I love how the Assyrians did beards.

Philosophers.

This one was on a Wildildlife album cover...

DON'T FUCKING TOUCH SWORDS.

That night I tubed to Covent Garden and met up with Raf, Sarah and Kevin. Kellene was hanging out with her cousin elswhere for the night. The three of us got a reservation at sweet, sizeable Belgian restaurant. As we waited at the bar for a table to open up I realized they would have frambois (Belgian raspberry beer-- the only kind of beer I like) and got my hands on a tasty bottle. The Floris brand seems to be more sweet than Bacchus and whatever brand the Fat Cat (a Norwich pub) had on tap. I wasn't complaining! I also sampled two other Floris fruit beers-- mango and honey. The former was so sweet it barely tasted like alcohol; the latter had a little bit of bitterness in its aftertaste. Good stuff.

After dinner we ordered a white chocolate mousse to share. Barring Mom's ice cream pie and apple crisp and a few select others, this is the best dessert I've ever had.

Deeeee-lishus.

Sarah and Kevin.

Then we headed to a pub to close out the night. Raf and I returned to his dorm and Sarah and Kev to hers at one of Middlesex University's other campuses.

Kevin and Raf indicating how different their time abroad is from that of school.

Kev was flying back to Berlin (where he's studying for the semester) the following afternoon. Raf and I met them at one of the thousands of kebab/pizza places that exist in the UK and had a nice goodbye lunch.

Raf has just bashed Kevin. Note Kev's facial expression.

Raf and I then headed to Camden Market, which is especially populated on Sundays- market day! There were punks, cheap/bootleg merchandise, record stores, tattoo parlors, and t-shirt stands everywhere. We briefly rendezvoused with Deb, who was incredibly generous in bringing along the toiletry bag I'd left at her place the night before. I bought a Sadus "Swallowed in Black" shirt, Voivod's Nothingface on vinyl, and a shirt with a very cool Darth Vader head print on it. We also purchased some gifts for friends back home. We bought a Belgian waffle covered in strawberries and chocolate and it was tasty nugs.

The most humorous moment of the weekend was when I approached one of many generic little shops stalking wares ranging from touristy stuff to bongs, and inspected what I thought to be a Five Hour Energy Shot sorta deal. Then I noticed the big "FLAMMABLE" lettering on the side of the small bottle. The foreign dude who worked at the shop approached me. "How many you want?"

"We're just browsing," I said.
"You want popper?"

Raf and I quickly exited and laughed heartily. Our good friend from school, Peter, had been offered poppers as well when visiting Camden on a high school trip. You can read about them here, if so inclined.

It was time to eat. The solution? Falafel, of course!

Surprise: I bought two again.

I even converted Raf to the cause.

From there, we went to the End of the World pub, another classy establishment. It's gigantic and is connected to/associated with the next door Underworld venue, where I'm going to see Agalloch with Tom M and Mattin a few weeks. Kellene, Sarah, and Kellene's cousin Kelly met up with us there and good times were had.

Afterwards we hung out at Kellene's dorm for a bit, then Raf and I went back to his place, watched the awesome 1990 Night of the Living Dead remake, and crashed. We woke up, tubed to Southgate and decided to eat. The solution? Falafel! I don't have any pictorial proof this time, though.

Raf and I hugged goodbye and I made it back to school around 5:30. What a wonderful trip.

Thanks to Deb and Raf for housing me, and much love to them and everybody else. It was so exciting to see you all.

Societies Follow-Up

Last Thursday, as mentioned, was a Deviant Society social at the Red Pub on campus, so I headed over there hoping to meet folks into similar musical digs. Immediately, someone takes note of my Celtic Frost hoodie and welcomes me over. I chatted with a few people over the course of the night. I'd say I was half-comfortable/half-not...some awkward personalities here and there, but really my fundamental discomfort is this: I don't feel the need to distance myself from others with even the loosest of labels. I don't wish to be labeled "deviant" just because I enjoy some heavier music; similarly, once I thought it through, I didn't want to be called "straightedge" when I didn't do drugs or drink in high school. I also do not consider myself a "dark" person in any sense despite some of the darker influences inherent in some of my musical interests. So yeah, there's that. Let's see how many further Deviant events I attend. Groucho Marx (and eventually, Woody Allen) once said "I'd never want to be part of club that wanted me as a member." Maybe that quote is applicable here.

Tonight was my first Wing Chun lesson. There were about 15 people total, including Rob (the main instructor), Ray (the society head and student instructor) and Dan (the other student instructor-- I think that was his name). We train from 7-9 every Monday. Today we learned the basic stance (which in and of itself is an exercise in muscle endurance-- makes your legs burn), the first part of the first form (a series of basic motions chained together like a kata would be in karate, somewhat), three different basic countering (bong sao, tan sao and fook sao), basic punching and kicking, and a series of counters for a wrist grab. There were also plenty of fitness exercises integrated-- we did ten sets of alternating five punches and five push-ups (they call them "press-ups" here), a painfully long plank, and sit-ups where we did ten punches every time we went up.

Ultimately, I'm beat and this will make for great learning and great exercise! I just need to get all squared away with the gym via an induction session so I can go at least two other times a week and, between that and Wing Chun, keep myself fit this semester. As I was leaving, Dan commended me on doing a great job. I thanked him for his patience...I hard time with a few elements of a particular exercise. Still, fantastic to be commended on my first martial arts class in nearly a decade!

I am so very excited to be returning to martial arts in any form (no pun intended). Some of the best days of my youth were spent sweating away in Sifu Rick Demile's martial arts academy-- and my learning there began at his garage on Madison Avenue, with no mats for the first few months, punching water-filled boat buoys. Years later, between weak cardio endurance from a pubescent growth spurt and looming Bar Mitzvah studies, I quit at the age of twelve. I always regretted it-- especially as childhood friends later ascended to black belt and assistant instructor positions-- and as a result, I've yearned to go back for the past few years, now and again. Buying a lot of old kung-fu films this summer only bolstered my desire. Now that desire is fulfilled. Awesome.

Contrary to Popular Belief, My Cell Phone is NOT a Sex Line

My flatmate Adam approached me at dinner tonight and asked what network I was using for my UK cell phone.

"Orange," I said, "Why?"
"Well, whenever I call you, there's this woman's voice as it rings and she says something about you being busy."
"What?'
"Here, I'll call you and show you what I mean."

And sure enough, over the dial tone, some sexy female voice goes "the person you're trying to reach is busy right now, but he'll call you back later. You see, he's a busy boy. A busy, busy boy!"

If only it were true.