The beginning...

So I'm finally getting around to writing a blog post after having been gone a whole week. I actually did write one a few days ago but I accidentally deleted it which was incredibly frustrating. 

Anyway, Sophie, Lana and I arrived in London early on Thursday morning, flying into a cold, dark but brightly lit city. Soph had a bit of trouble getting through immigration (the person who processed her visa put the wrong dates on it) which was a scary moment for us all. We thought she might be detained or sent back to Australia; thankfully it was all good, but she'll need a new visa soon. We then managed to navigate our way through the underground to get to our hotel in Russel Square. We spent the day shopping on Oxford Street and trying to stay awake - thankfully the sun was out and the rain kept away.

On Friday, we decided to check out the touristy things in central London, hoping we'd luck out with the weather again. But, as we arrived in Westminster and stood on Westminster Bridge to get a good view of Big Ben, not only did it start to pour, but it also hailed on us so much that it almost looked like it had snowed. We got absolutely drenched and frozen. The rest of the day consisted of purchasing plastic ponchos, checking out Buckingham Palace and St. James Park and having a nice hot coffee. That night we went back to Oxford Street and had a delicious and nutritious warm waffle with strawberries, chocolate and cream for dinner.

Sophie and I on Oxford Street

Bronte and I getting drenched on Westminster Bridge

Sophie, Lana, me and Bronte in front of Buckingham Palace

Statue and Buckingham Palace - the only time the sun was out all day

Oxford Street at night:

On Saturday, Lana and I lugged all of our suitcases and bags through the underground to get to the right train station to get us to Hayward's Heath (a town near both of our schools). Jim, the deputy head of the prep school, picked me up from the train station and drove me to Ardingly and gave me a brief tour of the massive grounds. There's a large reservoir (which we actually haven't had a chance to visit yet, but hopefully we'll do that this weekend), woods, a gym, a swimming pool, a medical centre, a large chapel and so much more. The school is huge. He showed me where I'll be living for the next 11.5 months and I met the other gappers, Josh, Jess and Joel who are all really nice (pictured to the left). 


We're living on the top floor of the prep school, on the same floor as the prep girl dorms and the floor above the prep boys dorm and the Headmaster's flat (the Headmaster is living with his wife and kids in the Housemistress' flat while she is on maternity leave; he and his wife are really lovely and are the temporary Houseparents until the end of Easter Break). We live in the 'Gap Flat'; Jess and I have the small rooms and the boys have the big rooms, although I think we're supposed to swap next term. Next to our flat is a small common room with some couches, a window seat, a TV, DVD player, VCR, Nintendo 64 and a fridge. We have a kitchen down a couple of floors where we can make tea and have a biscuit or some fruit. 


That day we went for a walk into the town of Ardingly. It has two pubs, a Chinese restaurant and a Post Office. Haha. We went to the Ardingly Inn (pictured to the right) for a drink and then walked back in the rain, just to shower and then go back to the Ardingly Inn again for dinner with some of the teachers. I think Jess and I even got ourselves a dog-walking gig. 


We've now had two full working days here at Ardingly and we've just started our third (I have a break now). The past couple of days have been fun but tiring. I've been running all around the school, learning teacher's names, student's names, building names (they have weird names for everything here so we have to learn them all, like the Under, Pavillion, Over, the Bricks) and try to remember what we have to do in each of our duties. The kids are all very enthusiastic and excited to have new gappers; they're mostly all friendly and welcoming. I have to be called Miss Olsen by them, although they've figured out our first names and try to call us those instead. Or we just get called 'Gapper' which they're not allowed to call us, but many do anyway. 

Today I'm mainly with the really little kids (like ages 3-6) as well as some sport duties. It's still very cold although not as bad as I was expecting, it's apparently unseasonably warm at the moment. I was told that this time last year, they had three feet of snow, so it's quite mild. Jess was told that it's expected to snow next week which I'm hoping because it looks amazing here when it snows and I've never seen snow before. 

Missing you all a lot. Love you, 
Maddi xo

<--- The chapel at the college. 














The view from my bedroom of the college: 

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