London Love Letter

Hello, all.

I'm sorry for not writing as much as I should recently, but to be honest, my laptop is broken (dropped it as I was climbing the ladder to my loft bed and strangely now it's acting really finicky) and preparing for my final projects/exams is time consuming. This is a very busy and exciting time in my life and it's hard to sit down and just blog. Even this entry is not a true blog post! I cheated and copied an essay that I've already written below. Ohh, the shame of not posting original content!

At CAPA's departure reception I found out that I had been rewarded a Record of Achievement, which basically rewards involvement and cultural participation in the host city. I wanted to share with you the short essay that I submitted with my application. It's a little corny, but with only six days left in London I'm feeling pretty emotional and I think corny is okay, maybe even necessary, under the circumstances.

"The very first thing I did after arriving at my flat near Waterloo was to turn around and walk back out the front door. I hadn't gone very far, only two blocks, when I reached the south bank of the Thames. The fantastic sight that had me rooted to the spot with incredulity is now my favorite view in all of London. Directly across the bridge is the West End, to my left are the Houses of Parliament, and to my right is the City. On that first day, what that demonstrated to me was this: London is a true city - a thriving metropolis that is the social center, political capitol, and financial hub of England.

Several days later, I took the Jubilee line north to Primrose Hill for a sweeping view of London. It was a radical change of perspective, and one that I didn't fully appreciate at the time. I spent my first rainy afternoon wandering around the countercultural Camden Town Market. I'll never forget that sensory assault! The smell of fragrant Chinese, Indian, Mexican, and Italian food... the sight of burlesque, goth, 50s style, punk, and ethnic clothing.. the pierced and tattooed youth. That's Camden Town. A tour of the State Rooms at Buckingham Palace was perhaps the perfect foil to that experience. The Palace, which serves as both residence and office of the British monarch, is an impressive, stately building. The interior was amazing - immaculate, elegant, and dignified. I still dream about those rooms. Lying beneath the white sheets of my functional loft bed I picture their extravagance and their color. Buckingham Palace is an iconic sight, but so too is the Globe Theater where I had the opportunity to watch Much Ado About Nothing later that week. The evening before the performance, my literature professor gave a special lecture in which he presented a brief Shakespeare biography, prompted us all to imagine what English society would have been like at the turn of the seventeenth century, and praised the flexibility and dynamism of the English language. By the end, I was beyond excited to experience Much Ado from a groundlings point-of-view, and the next day I watched enchanted as the play described to us the night before came to life.

I chose these three experiences because of their contrast, and more importantly, because they are all equally valid images of what is quintessentially London. The alternative scene in Camden Town, the tradition and decorum of Buckingham Palace, and the performing arts at the Globe Theater combine to form the rich picture I now have of this city. I mentioned that I didn't fully appreciate the importance of those first two views of London, one central and one distant. Now that I have explored the city, I recognize their significance. The change of perspective was important to understand that although I live at the center of the city, London is expansive and full of niches and subcultures and secrets. They are all important parts of what London truly is. Once I was told that there was something for everyone in this city, and I hoped there would be something for me. On that first day, standing at the edge of the river, I thought London was beautiful because of the architecture and the glittering water and the music of the street performers. It was purely aesthetic and anticipatory Now, London is beautiful because I have memories here. Those buildings and that river provoke an emotional reaction. When I stand there, I know that just beyond the hotels and gardens that line the river is Buckingham Palace, where Queen Elizabeth II may be working at that moment, and three miles beyond that is Camden Town, where someone may be writing music or getting a tattoo at that moment. Down the river is Sean Wannamaker's Globe Theater replica, where I will be going to see my BFA flatmates will perform A Winter's Tale on the day before Thanksgiving. I feel I have a family, I feel I have a home, and they both exist in London - indeed, in a way, they are London."