I had Design as Communication in the morning. It's getting better. We worked on designs for creating a three dimensional design in Flash editing software. Ehh. We'll see how it goes.
After class, I went to St. Pauls' Cathedral for a Evensong service. I got there pretty early and just walked around outside. Here's a picture from outside the Cathedral steps overlooking the city.
Once entering, it was absolute beauty. So gorgeous inside. I had been very curious to see the inside, since the building dominates the London skyline. I wanted to go to a Evensong service because the choir was singing. I heard it was excellent music and I was not disappointed. It was an all male choir; I'm pretty sure it is typically men and women but it was a special service on this particular Thursday. If you wanted to participate in the service you got to go sit in the "pews" (I'm sure there is an official name for these seats, I just don't know what it is) directly next to the chior. It was a very surreal moment, another one of those, "I can't believe this is actually my life" moments. The stained glass and arches made of marble were so beautiful.
The music was of course outstanding. I'm not familiar with Catholic masses, but many of the hymms were sung acapella. I was somewhat surprised by that. I was also surprised how high many of the men could sing! It was really incredible! I also remember thinking how many young men (guys my age) were in the choir. I thought it was a bit strange. I imagined all to be middle aged. I guess I can't imagine spending every night of the week singing in a cathedral for an hour.
When the service was over, I walked to the back of St. Paul's and just soaked in the moment for a couple moments. I just stood in awe of how beautiful the building was.
I headed back to my flat and some of my friends and I planned to cook a Mexican dinner. THERE IS NO GOOD MEXICAN FOOD IN LONDON. It's awful. At home, I have this type of food at least once a week. My friend, Elizabeth is from Texas and she made homemade guacamole and it was delicious! So good! She also cooked fajitas, rice and refried beans. No one else really helped. I mean, I cut the peppers...does that count for cooking? It was really a great meal.
Elizabeth cooking dinner. Me watching. Typcial.
We shared it with her flatmates, Tom (I think he is from the "hick" part of England if that exists), Bill (a gay fashion design student from England) and Rachel (from Birmingham who is what you think of as a typical college freshmen). We started talking about what American names for items and the difference between what Brits say. For exam we say "sidewalk" instead of pavement and "flashlight" instead of torch. Tom observed that Americans have very literal names for things. Pavement is what it's made of but it's literally a "side walk". I guess it's really true, huh? Many things are just named for what they are instead of making up a name for that object. American culture is all about convenience. That is definitely one of the biggest things I have learned from this expereince so far.
I've got more blog updates tomorrow. Tonight is a night out on the town with some friends! More to blogging to come!
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