As the first week here comes to an end...

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Hello, again! Hope everyone's had a good weekend and hopefully better weather than what we had here! I had a fabulous weekend... saw/learned some cool stuff, established some good travel stories, got to know a few more people in my program, and over all just had fun.
Yesterday we got up early to see the "Trooping of the Colour" which in essence celebrates the Queen's "birthday" (or more technically, the date of which she became Queen). It's sort of like a parade... the British guards and bands march starting at Buckingham Palace and then down towards a street called The Mall (mall as in shall) and so on... The British Guards were followed by others riding horses and what not, then the Royal Family (Camilla, William, Harry, etc.), and then the Queen herself rides in a carriage pulled by horses. Once they all return back to Buckingham Palace, the Royal Family came out on to the Balcony and several jets flew over the Palace. It was definitely a very cool thing to see! My friend and I met a police man who was standing along the street, and we talked to him for probably like 2 hours while we were waiting for it to start! He was telling us all sorts of interesting facts and we kept bombarding him with more questions about it! He was a really nice man and was sort of like our own personal guide the whole morning!
After we finished that we went home for some lunch and then headed to a Market Place that's only open on Saturdays, called "Portobello Road". It was so much fun... there was so much stuff to see! People were selling jewelry, fresh vegetables and fruits, antiques, watches, clothes, pretty much everything! There were very diverse people there as well, I probably heard about 8 different languages within the first 5 minutes of being there!! Anyways, I bought some fresh veggies there and also bought a bracelet.
Once we were done there we took the tube back home, and then a few of us went out to a night club to celebrate my friend's birthday. It was definitely an interesting night! The club was really fun-- we read some great reviews about it and it really did meet our expectations! There were two huge dance floors, the place was huge and spread out with different levels and a few bars as well. We just stayed for a few hours and then after that decided to call it a night. Little did we know that we had a much longer night ahead of us! Since the tubes were closed, we decided to take a bus back home and just got on the first bus that we saw. That was our first mistake... it took us to the far southeast end of London and we are just slightly southwest of the center of London. After we realized that, we got off the bus and tried to take another one. Well that bus said it wasn't going the direction we wanted to go, so then we went to get on another bus. When we went to get on that bus the driver told us he was ending his route. So we're sitting here, late at night, cold and tired, on the way opposite side of London-- we just wanted to go home!! Luckily, not long after, another bus came that was going towards where wanted to go. We immediately ran and jumped on that and that took us back to where we familiar with. However, my friend who said that he "knew where we were going" told us that we missed the stop that we were supposed to get off at. Surprisingly, I knew where we were at (this is where running every day comes in handy) and told everyone to get off and we walked about a mile home. I thought Dad would be proud of me to know that I actually had a sense of direction last night, considering that is a big weakness of mine! ha. Well, we did make it home, very very late, but it was overall fun until we got to that point!
Today we headed to Camden Market, which is another market that is actually quite different from Portobello Road. There were a lot of hippies and different things to see--and I thought Portobello Road was diverse! Whew! However, it was a lot easier to barter here. Almost every place that I went into the people were trying to sell me something for cheaper than it was originally priced. I bought a cute shirt for 10 pounds... it was originally 15, then he offered 12, and then I said 10. It was sort of fun! haha. Now I'm sort of relaxing, as it was a late night last night, and now I think I'm going to go walking for a bit to continue familiarizing myself with more of the area, probably go for a run, since I didn't go this morning, and then go to mass in the Westminster Cathedral, which is supposed to beautiful. Maybe if I have time I'll go and read in St. James Park, but I have to get to bed early tonight as tomorrow is my first day of work!! I'm so excited!!!
Well, that is about all for today...Happy Father's Day and hope everyone had a great weekend!!

p.s. sorry I didn't post any pictures with this one... I had a little trouble with my camera so I had my friend take them for me... I will put some up later!

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