Arundel

Hello again! 

I hope you're all well. I'm great, although I'm always tired. Long days, staying up late and getting up early don't work well for me. 

So, this is what I've been up to lately...

On Friday, the Gappers and our boss went out to a lovely dinner and drink at another pub in Ardingly called the Gardener's Arms. I had my first drink in England since arriving - a huge apple cider. The food was delicious - much nicer than the food at the Ardingly Inn. After, our boss dropped us home and the Gappers went back to our common room to have a few drinks and chill out. It was a lot of fun. 

On Saturday morning, I went to Leatherhead to umpire one of the U14s netball games, and then came home, packed and Jess and I headed off to London - the Head of Ardingly Prep kindly dropped us to the train station at Hayward's Heath where we caught the train to London Victoria Station. We eventually got to Jess' great aunt's house in Kensington where we were staying the night. Jess aunt, Fay, lives in an awesome part of London and right near loads of famous people. Some guy from Queen and Westlife live across the road, Robbie Williams is moving in soon, Robert Pattinson lives around the block, as does two of the girls from Little Mix and Cher Lloyd. She also knows where we can find David Beckham too, so one day, Jess and I are going to find some of them :P Fay was absolutely lovely and hospitable. Her late husband was also the Australian Ambassador or something so she has met the Queen quite a few times and had lunch, dinner, tea with her. She's very interesting. 

This is a very cute squirrel in Fay's backyard.

Jess and I then walked to Westfield up the road for a little shopping. After that, Fay made us a lovely dinner and we headed out into London to meet up with the boys and also some other Gappers from a school nearby. Stopping briefly for a bathroom break in MacDonald's in Leicester Square, I saw a friend from back home in the line to the toilets, Steph Jackson. Was very weird but cool. 

The night was short lived, although it was fun while it lasted. The boys didn't organise accommodation beforehand, and after trying to find a hostel with vacancies, they decided to give up and cab it back to Ardingly... $280 AUD later, they made it back to school. By then, Jess and I were already in bed. Poor things haha. 

The next morning I slept in and then Jess and I headed to King's Cross Station to check out Platform 9 and 3/4 from Harry Potter. We lined up for ten minutes to get our photo and then a lady who worked there gave us a choice of scarf - I chose Griffindor obviously.

From King's Cross, we hopped on a red double decker bus to Oxford Street to get in a bit of shopping. Then, we went to Trafalgar Square... Here is Jess and I in front of a giant lion at Trafalgar Square. 

Left - London Tube map outside a station. We had a late lunch/early dinner at a pub -our first fish and chips (wasn't great unfortunately) - and then got on a train back to Ardingly, ready for work the next day. I also did a much needed clean up of my room, so here are a few pictures of it... It's very tiny. Also, after the half term break (in 3 weeks), my room is being painted and I'm getting new furniture thank God. 

Taken from the entrance to my room. I have a lovely window sear that looks out onto the North Quad 

My bed, bedside table and radiator (would die without that ugly thing, it keeps me warm), and the second picture is taken from the far corner of my bed of the only storage I have. Hopefully those will be replaced because my stuff barely fits in it. But it;s good... despite the size, I love it because it's home (although a temporary one) and I have lots of pictures on my wall so I don't get so homesick. 

Today (Tuesday) was the first day I've worn 'smart' clothes to work. Normally, we all wear our sports kits every day because we usually have sport most days and they're really comfortable, but after swimming on a Tuesday morning, I don't have sport so I can wear the smart attire we're expected to. So many students were like "Miss Olsen, why are you dressed nice?", "Why are you wearing that?" etc. One girl told me I should wear my sports kit because I don't suit smartwear. They didn't believe me when I told them that we're actually supposed to wear that. Pretty funny. 

Anyway, this morning was very cold, 1 or 2 degrees from memory and there was crazy thick fog all over. Was a weird surprise when I looked out my window this morning. 

Yesterday was also cold, but no where near as foggy. More frost than fog. In some parts of the school, it looked like it had been lightly snowing (which is actually expected in 2 weeks!)

Oh and I almost forgot why I named the title 'Arundel'. I am now a member of the Arundel house, which is blue! I wanted to be patriotic to my old house colour (i.e. yellow), but considering I don't own a single yellow thing, I picked blue. How exciting. 

Love you all. Miss you lots, if you're ever free to chat, let me know, I'd love to hear from you. 

Lots of love, 

Maddi