I started the day off by heading to Ramsay Hall for breakfast and eating some Kellog's Corn Pops and a croissant. After breakfast it was time for class--our last class of the semester. We took a final and did a class presentation on advertising in the Underground. I feel confident regarding both of those and I don't see any reason at all why I should not make an A in my class. My grades so far have been good and even though there are still two papers left to grade for me, one of them is an extra credit paper, and the other I feel I did a good job of covering my topic. So, I expect I will make an A and I look forward to that.
After class we went to lunch. They prepared what they said was chili con carne, in fact it was just beans and ground beef with a few spices and, of course, French fries. It was all pretty decent. It was our last meal in Ramsay Hall and I can say with all honesty that I'm not disappointed. Even if we were scheduled to have breakfast there tomorrow, I'd probably go down and get some orange juice and that's about it. I think tomorrow morning I will go to Gregg's and pick up something from there for breakfast. After lunch I went to my dorm to get the silverware I pilfered from the cafeteria and bring it back. I had thought about just leaving it in the kitchen here since there's no utensils in it, but I figured it was best to bring it back to where I got it from.
I then went back to my dorm room and took a nap for a while. I was still tired when I got up, but I got dressed and then made my way to the Victoria & Albert Museum. The V&A, as it is referred, is a nice museum. It's worth checking out, if anything, for the sculptures and other works of art there. It's got a lot of pieces of fashion, furniture, decor, and just general culture of Britain. It also has a room of several large Raphael "cartoons" of Biblical scenes which are amazing. One of the main exhibits I would have liked to have seen, an exhibit on Japan, was closed. I could look in and see a suit of samurai armor and several swords, but the overall exhibit was closed to visitors. They had some Asian art work, but most of it was from India and the Middle East. I am personally more fond of the art work of Southeast Asia, China, and Japan. But, it was a pretty good museum. I only spent about an hour (maybe less) in there because a lot of the stuff in it I wasn't too interested in.
Not to mention: I am getting a bit tired of museums. In the past five weeks I've seen a lot of museums and art galleries and as much as I love and respect these places, they get a little old. I am always amazed by some of the sculptures and things of that nature, but when you see an enormous room full of them, they start to lose their luster and I don't care for that. I'd rather be impressed by them. That's one of the reasons why I wouldn't want to live in London. I imagine that most of the people here at not impressed with South Bank, the Globe, Tower Bridge, Westminster Abbey, etc. I would hate to feel like that towards those places. I would hate to pass by them and see them so much that they would just become normal buildings to me. I'd rather be in awe of them. But, I guess that is just what happens.
Once I got back to the dorms, I chilled out for a bit and just took some time to relax. I watched a few old Full House episodes on my computer and didn't really do a whole lot. At 7:15 p.m., several of us got together and made our way to our restaurant destination. We had decided that tonight we would do one final hoorah as far as meals go and go all-out and have a nice, expensive dinner at a fancy restaurant. So, Amanda, Katie, Donald, Gideon, and I all went to a Spanish (not Mexican) restaurant called Camino. We got a little bit lost getting there, but we managed to still find it and make it on time for our 8:00 p.m. reservation.
The restaurant itself was beautiful. It was dimly lit and very elegant. The wait staff was fairly friendly and very helpful. We started the meal off with some bread and extra virgin olive oil. We had intended on ordering "pan con tomate", but it would have required us rubbing in garlic on the bread and squeezing tomato on it, so we decided we would go the more simple route. Donald also got a latte. We then ordered our main dishes. Amanda and Katie had lamb, while Donald and Gideon ordered a rib-eye, and I ordered a fillet. Donald, Gideon, and I also ordered a dish of roasted potatoes, onions, peppers, and a free-range fried egg (and of course spices) all in a skillet. It looked and sounded a bit unappetizing, but once the waitress mixed it all together it was outstanding. Gideon dubbed it the "Spanish hash brown". It was a perfect compliment to my fillet (which all came with three potatoes). I ordered my fillet well, but it came out quite pink and in retrospect I'm glad I ordered it what I did. Apparently their version of well is not the same as ours back home, so if I ordered it any less than that I know I would have been disappointed.
We all shared a little bit of each other's meals. The lamb was quite tasty. The rib eye was good as well. I forgot to mention it, but Donald also ordered a dish of peppers stuffed with crab meat. It was also very good. The meal itself was fantastic. The fillet was great. The Spanish hash brown was awesome. Everyone seemed to be in agreement that everything was very good. After the main meal, the ladies and I ordered a dessert and Gideon ordered a beer while Donald had another latte. The dessert we ordered was somewhat like a chocolate muffin filled with melting chocolate on the inside. It was great. It also came with a scoop of orange sherbet and a raspberry side garnish. The orange sherbet was a perfect compliment to the chocolate dessert and a nice way to finish the meal. Even though it was rich, it wasn't filling in the sense that after all of the food you felt too full. The sherbet was light and the chocolate dessert was somewhat fluffy, so that it didn't feel like too much.
They brought us the ticket, and we spent a few minutes doing the math to figure out how much each of us had to pay. If I have no mentioned it yet: they don't divide up the tickets here. Every restaurant I have eaten at, they bring out one ticket and it is your job to divide it up if you so chose. I'm under the impression that dividing up the ticket by person is not how most people dine here. I'm thinking that people either go out to eat and one person pays, then another person pays the next time, or people order several different dishes and share, then just divide the check by how many people are there. Either way, I think its a very inefficient way of doing business. They've got the right idea by paying ahead of time at the pubs, but when it comes to meal tickets at other restaurants they really have made it more difficult than it should be. I don't think actually dividing the ticket up is that much of a chore, but that's the British for you.
It seems to me, from what I've witnessed, either we do a lot of things back home more efficiently or the Brits do some things that are just plain bizarre. I frankly think the Brits just do some things just to be different from everyone else. Not using the Euro even though they are in the EU, driving on a different side of the road, the ticket thing, I think are all just little ways for them to stand out. Of course, I suppose you could say the same thing about America. If I'm not mistaken, the U.S. and the U.K. are the only two countries not to use the metric system. Which, the Brits will sometimes use the metric and sometimes use the English system over here. Go figure. Also they way they do door swings can often times be confused. What you would think would be a pull door is a push door and vice versa. As Gideon asked tonight, "Why would you put a pull handle on the push side of a door?"
Either way, this is my next to last day here in England. It's been a phenomenal trip and I've had a wonderful time. It's strange to think that tomorrow will be our last full and final day here. It's looking like I might (finally) go to a show. Someone bought an extra Lion King ticket and I think I may go see that tomorrow evening. People told me that time would really go by fast while I was here and I wasn't too sure about it. The first week seemed to last a while, but then it seemed like all of a sudden I only had three or four days left. It's really something how it all works. This trip has really been a different, and fun, experience for me. It's like most things, there are some things I have not cared for and then some things I really have enjoyed. Overall I've been very pleased and grateful that I've gotten to have this experience. Getting to actually spend time in another country, with another culture, is really enlightening.
I suppose one of the things that surprises me most is that when people think of America, they can very easily associate us with the Brits. And even though we do have a lot of similarities, it's worth saying that overall we are so very, very different. The attitudes, the lifestyles, the culture, the way of doing things, are just so different from the U.S. even though our roots are founded in the U.K. I just can't help but think of what a culture shock it would have been for me if my first international experience was in a country like China or Italy or Peru, places that we don't historically draw our roots from. Even though most of my time here I've tended to bash London, I must say that I do love England. This is a very pretty country and the people outside of London that I have met have been nothing short of great. I think London, as a city and the people that live in it, have been a healthy reminder of just why I don't like what happens to humanity when it gets flung into metropolitan situations. I suppose I just prefer a more simple, slow and laid-back lifestyle to the face-pace of the city.
I guess I just can't help but feel that considering how short our lives are, it just becomes so difficult to truly stop and smell the roses when there are five million people around you, car horns blaring, and everyone (yourself included) is being forced to rush everywhere. That, and I like to be able to look into the sky and see stars. Sleep is a normal, natural part of human life. It's way for the body to rest and regenerate. Cities never sleep, and ultimately I think they suffer for it. But who knows. I may just be rambling and I may not know what I'm talking about. One thing I do know though that God has certainly taught me with this trip: be thankful.
Photos of today's excursions can be found here:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/8494714@N03/
