Canadian Thanksgiving

Yup, it’s a turkey, pumpkin pie, stuffing, veggies and more! Unbeknownst to AoY Canada celebrates Turkey Day with the best of them. It’s just a month early. But I say it’s never the wrong time for turkey so I grabbed flatmate and we trucked over to Tower Hill to spread goodwill and deliver pie. Our hosts were both Canadian, one of which is in my program, and the invitees were like a couples advertisement for the holidays. There was a Norwegian, a South American Irish, a few Brits, another Irish guy, and a couple of Americans to complete our little U.N. of feasting. One of the more interesting dishes was parsnips done up like sweet potato fries. They were very tasty and I finally had a comparison to offer non-Southerners to yams! One girl was allergic to dairy (my greatest nightmare) so the Gospel Bird had to be rubbed with oil instead; it made the inside a tad drier but no ill effects were suffered. An enormous complement of vegetable dishes including turnips, potatoes, carrots, and others accompanied stuffing from a box (just add water!) which surprisingly tasted like stuffing rather than cardboard.

A few events leading up to dinner precipitated my bringing a store-bought dessert rather than making something from scratch. First, T’s laptop was stolen from her library. I would say I was shocked that such theft occurs at academic institutions but people at my pseudo-Ivy stole everything that wasn’t bolted down and even that wasn’t always a deterrent. I hadn’t planned on putting criminology studies to use so quickly but I was more than ready to tackle any suspicious characters on my way into the library. The security guys were slightly less helpful than doorknobs. They had security videos, yes, but they weren’t focused on the study carrels. Fine, okay, but what about the hallway? As the gentleman explained that the thief could possibly have brought a bag and placed the pilfered goods inside, T and I both thought there might be a chance that the guy (or girl, can’t be sexist here) could have cased the joint, swooped in and walked down the hall a bit before placing his new property inside. Our suggestion that on the off chance there might be video footage of such an event met with stern resistance. “We can’t just go through people’s bags and accuse them because it might be your laptop!” Great, now the anal retentive side of the Brits come out. Another thought that maybe search the cameras a bit before and after the estimated time of the robbery t see if someone was lurking around the area met with similar rebukes. Sherlock Holmes would be humiliated by his countrymen.

After leaving T to fill out a “Loser Report” which made us both smile a bit, it was off to Tesco to buy a ready-to-bake pie crust and filling for cherry pie with ice cream and sauce. The first monkey wrench was the ongoing problem of no Internet, hence no recipe. Okay, no big deal-how hard can it be to throw pre-made filling into a pie shell after baking it and bake it some more? I felt confident enough in my culinary prowess to survive without “Charleston Receipts” but find another slight hiccup in the discovery that BRITS REALLY SUCK IN THE GROCERY ARENA OF LIFE. No pre-made Pet Ritz crusts that are ready to pop into the oven at 325 for 15 minutes but rather some pastry dough that you have to mumble incantations over for 12 hours and cut with butter and roll out and stretch and refrigerate overnight. There were some stale shortbread options but at this point I had three hours and a limited amount of patience. My desperation and dismay must have transmitted to a woman nearby because it’s like my mother popped over from SC and started advising me on my different options in the face of adversity. I had a tin of ‘custard mix-just add water’ and pie filling as one option, a refrigerated backed good as another, fresh fruit to curry, frozen pies-the lady just took it into her mind to navigate me through the waters of British cuisine as it were. I thanked her but as my basket started getting weighed down further and further by things minced and pre-packaged I felt myself getting panicked at the thought of putting something (like flaky banloffi pie with clotted double cream) back on the shelf in the hopes of saving everyone arteries. One apple tart and lemon meringue pie later I hustled back to grab flatmate and run for the tube.

Dinner was great fun and the conversation was diverse a there were about four social groups colliding over poultry and pastry. A few of the non-single men had attended LSE the year before and had good tips on how to navigate the British education system (I’ve decided that guns blazing and wide open is the best method of action), job hunting ideas and ways to get around bureaucracy (really, they mean socialism but I’ll let that slide). Differing ideas of what constitutes Thanksgiving provided endless amusement for the Europeans and T and my’s “Night ya’ll” as we headed home elicited a quick chuckle from the entire party.

The only bad part of the evening, aside from T’s laptop, was a case of either food poisoning or tea poisoning for yours truly. In a bid to stave off holiday lbs and boost energy I headed to the local health store on High Street Kens and purchased “Slimatee-For an energy and metabolism boost as part of a healthy regime” along with more vitamins (I now mentally pronounce them as “VITT-A-MINNS”-ewwww) and Nettle tea to detoxify. If it was the fat-free yogurt from Sainsbury’s that caused such illness I have 2 words for Europe: REFRIGERATE your food or PASTEURIZE it! If it was the tea, I can think of 200 hundred better ways to detoxify and slim down. NOT worth it!

I had gone out the evening previously with G and some friends from his MBA program to a posh bar in Picadilly. Originally I was to meet them at the Groucho Grille but after the near body-cavity search and background check required to see the hostess and ask about their party, I found my way to them at Cocoon, a very cool bar/restaurant where the girls were either stylish or hookers and the men seemed to be successful or foreign. The sushi looked tasty but a bit out of my price range. We all congregated around a table (thankfully, not one where you have to pay 300 quid) that was great except for the fact that we were perched on footstools. I felt like a leprechaun or frog that just alighted on a lily pad. One of G’s friends bore an uncanny resemblance to Tiger Woods, truly eerie in low light and all were friendly and entertaining.

One interesting fact I did not know about LSE before that evening-apparently, all LSE students have wild massive orgies and tons of sex all of the time. If the popular opinion (of five people) is to be believed, people must be getting it on in class and the center of the library at high noon and twice on Thursdays. Huh, well, maybe in the International Relations department or those wacky Econometrics students because I haven’t noticed any of that to date. Have they seen the majority of people at LSE? I highly doubt they are getting busy all over the campus (which at 12,000 people over two square blocks and seven building would give you a mean standard deviation of….damn stats!). I found this personally hilarious and upon relaying our apparent friskiness to other members of my program that too asked where in the hell this was happening. Ahh yes, it must be those Pakistani policemen-they truly seem the type to go wild-okay, bad mental images. Suffice it to say-THAT IT A TOTAL MYTH TO MY AND SEVERAL PEOPLE’S KNOWLEDGE! It must be that famous European belief that all American girls are sluts-seriously, ask a lot of random (not the world traveled upper-class I went to Cambridge) guys and they seem to think that Americans have all starred in “Girls Gone Wild” at some point. I almost feel bad in pointing out our country’s Puritan foundations. Fun weekend though!

The AoY is a bit under the weather. I have also learned that, much like a third world country, you either need to heal under your own powers or die slowly because there isn’t that much around to help you. I now feel that the British clearly do not have the same meth problems that plague America simply because they do not sell Sudafed. You can choose one of the following options to relieve cold symptoms: something nasal that supposedly cures the common cold which is interesting because scientists still have yet to identify the virus strain for the common cold; chesty cough syrup-I tried this once in an effort to make things grow larger (it did not work but tasted like shit); all manner of lozenges ranging from traditional Halls to honey; enough Vitamin C to kill elephants, or tea. They do sell Paracetamol, which is the local equivalent to Tylenol, but no Percocet or Nyquil or have any prescription meds available to you without a six month waiting period.

I must bring up the issue of tea again. Oh “VH1’s Fabulous Life in London” (we get 35 channels, I take what I can get) it is estimated that Brits drink 1101 cups of tea per person per year. You can even buy one that is diamond studded and contains diamonds in the bag for about seven thousand pounds. More money than sense, more money than sense! But I digress. As mentioned before, one of the nostrums available to cure anything short of the plague is tea. I went into a health food store and low and behold, they have tea for EVERYTHING! Looking for oolong I quickly picked up some detoxifying nettle and SlimDown tea (I think it might be more worth while to skip the afternoon biscuit ritual but that’s for a later date). British tea is like our cereal, I believe. We have every conceivable way to purge, sugar up, prevent, lower, slim, trim, boost and cleanse via grains and milk. The cereal aisle in Tesco looks like the Handy Pantry off of Highway 17 near Georgetown-you have Wheatie-Os, Cheerios, Wheetabix (if you have colon/fiber issues, this is for you), Smackie-Os, the fiber assortment and Special K. That’s it, in a giant supermarket. But the tea section, it’s like a smorgasbord of hot beverage options. I can barely get around the rows of loose, instant, pre-bagged, ball-bagged (insert giggle), hand-packed, and disc style. This subject could prove much more interesting to research at a later date but the Benadryl that I smuggled into the country is beginning to kick into effect.

Aside from the mind-boggling selection I must the flatmate’s quest for a coffee pot. While AoY loves a good double espresso or grande skinny sugar-free vanilla latte which I also feel quite smug ordering at Starbucks, coffee is on the list of banned foods. The unfortunate discovery came at a client site in Atlanta where a medium sized Dunkin Donuts coffee resulting in jittery nerves, extremely shortened patience and expanded temper-I was banned for the next three months from the store by my co-workers.

But to return, T apparently suffers no dire consequences from java and loves flavored coffee. We found a French press at Marks & Spencer’s but she really looks for the 21 cup industrial strength, ulcer-guaranteeing American coffee pot. Every store we go into that just might sell coffee pots gets examined thoroughly. I can safely report that there are precisely three coffee pots for sale in London that meet American standards. Tea kettles however, remind me of the array of nails available to manly men at the Home Depot. There are so many ways to boil water that I sometimes think the Brits are secretly conducting nuclear tests in their tea kettles. Upon our arrival our landlord assured us of two things: he had given us a new toaster and the automatic tea kettle was brand new from Argos. I personally hate the tea kettles because they make the water too hot. Microwave a cup of water for 1:33; hot enough to brew but you needn’t wait a half hour before sipping without risking your tongue lining. The electric kettles can reach lava-like temps in less than two minutes. At another client site I would constantly forget tea mugs everywhere after I had stashed them in two feet of snow in an attempt at refrigeration.

But the tea kettle. You can buy them separately, together on sale wit ha toaster, as part of a kitchen package that includes: toaster, tea kettle and spatula which apparently constitute the entire repertoire necessary for a British chef. Want a desk fan for those toasty summer months in a city without central air conditioning? Have a piping hot cup of tea to go with it from your very own kettle! Buying a new car? We’ve built the steamer right into the dash! Pay bills, win a kettle! The list continues but suffice it to say, flatmate continues to hunt for the elusive Krups 12-cup design with automatic drip and timer.

Despite feeling a bit lurghee (I’m not sure of the spelling but I am told by a Brit that it comes from the Bogeyman and is a phrase coined for those feeling groggy, stuffy and scratchy) I tried for the FOURTH time to open a UK bank account. I was highly tempted to just fly to Switzerland as they must be faster about such matter than the stalwart British. This time, fortunately, the line was down to a manageable hour-long wait and I thankfully had the right paperwork, family connections to the British mob, DNA results, and IQ to open a student account for one year. While waiting the quintessential Jappy girl from Manhattan yapped into her cell phone for twenty minutes to her daddy about setting up the account, the details, blah blah blah. It would have been tolerable but she did this while the bank rep was attempting to actually open her account. When I saw Miss New York hold up her finger to shush the woman for the second time so she could make sure that her Gold Card wouldn’t be canceled, I almost left. I was truly afraid that this lovely Brit would see my US passport and refuse to help thanks to my predecessor. Way to go Team America.

Great items of the day spotted on High Street Kensington…
-Hotel du Chocolat – If you have estrogen get to this store! Beats Godiva, Lindt or any place else in terms of whimsy, fun and price. In particular they have great gift set including a 27 piece box of chocolates that are all wrapped with individual messages of why chocolate is better than sex. One of my favorites: “Why is chocolate better than sex? Because even a small piece of chocolate will satisfy.” Genius! Another one: “Why is chocolate better than sex? It can wait until you are in the mood.” They also sold plush chocolate lab stuffed animals that made me miss Holly terribly.
-Orsino Vintage – A true vintage store that carried a great deal of Puccini from the 60s and 70s, some great Spanish shawls and Chanel bags from the 30s. Prices do reflect it but the store owner has a dog that is very cute and friendly. Looks like I will have to buy my Halloween costume elsewhere, however.
-McDonald’s – First time in three years I’ve been to McD’s for lunch and it was worth every single mile I will have to run tomorrow. ¼ pounder with cheese and a Diet Coke-doesn’t get much better than that.

Long Hiatus:

Sorry sorry sorry! I officially cannot blog for the following reasons: A) Internet, as noted previously, is sketchy at best. B) I have a desire to NOT embarrass other people so editing of events is required unless I want my parents and their friends to know exactly what students do on Friday nights (it’s nothing bad I promise! We play Scrabble) C) I have no idea if this is boring or not.

Life in London continues as before and I have yet another list of things that are really quite insane about this Communist country (that’s right, I said it-you’re all Communist!)

TV License-So you buy a used TV; you buy a FreeView box, which is a one time 40 quid purchase that gives access to 40 channels of British and American shows. THEN a bill for 130 quid (that almost $260 USD) shows up in the mail. You must pay this is you plan to use a telly (seriously, they use that word) to receive cable satellite or to use any DVD, video or stereo equipment. If you do not comply they have special license police that come to your home and issue a big fine. WTF?! It’s like a car tax. When T and I mentioned this to our dozen or so Brit friends and asked why the hell they hadn’t mentioned it in the “Moving to London” guidebooks they all acted shocked: “What, I thought that was common everywhere?” Only if you believe in Stalin, people.
Bank Accounts-Yes, still without terra firma UK bank account. I have all of the paper work, the correct number of photocopies, cash, blood sample, family lineage chart and proof of existence. Now it’s just standing in line for two hours. Apparently the ONLY bank that will allow students to set up an account in less than 8 weeks is NatWest and only ONE branch will set up the accounts. The “branch” consists of four people in a basement and a queue that continually goes beyond the door, down the hall and up the stairs. Maybe I can write my dissertation in line
Weather-Whoever once said that “foggy London town” has a pervasive steady drizzle is full of bularky. Picture patchy skies followed by torrential downpour. There is no drizzle-the drizzle doesn’t exist. This is good old fashioned roll-up-the-jeans and splash around rain complete with thunderstorms (ahh, home…). I don’t mind it, just don’t lie to me.
Weather reporters-T and I were watching our soon to be confiscated freeview when the weather report came on the telly. Now all of Ireland except of Belfast is not reported upon and Wales and England get the start treatment. But the kicker was when Perky Sue came on and reported the following: “well we’ve had a run of good luck but the forecast for this weekend is just terrible; Sunday will be just horrible with Saturday in not much better shape; horrible, just horrible rain and wet weather ahead for all of the UK.” She apparently missed the section of the weather girl handbook that suggested that weather plays a large part in the nation’s suicide rate so DON’T ENTICE PEOPLE TO JUMP!!!!!
Open 24 hours/unlimited­-Simply put, this does not exist. There is an enormous sign over Tesco (supermarket) stating “Open 24 hours.” In reality, that is “Open 6-11PM Monday through Saturday and 8-5PM on Sunday.” Maybe that is 24 hors for the whole week. And please educate the Commies on ‘unlimited supply’. I can’t get an annual gym pass because they have given out the allotment for the year. Pinkos! And there are no more annual Tube/Bus passes available for students-What, is everyone wearing RED now????

On the lighter side, AoY has interesting news. I must find a way to help the people of Britain and advance my knowledge of criminology whilst (yes, it’s always whilst here, or rather, heretofore). I almost took a job conducting surveys at Brixton prison. To give those not in the loop (including myself) Brixton is a largely poor area of South London with a huge amount of black Caribbean, Mediterranean, North African, Jamaican and other mostly black and Latino refuges, illegal immigrants or lower-class persons. Fine, okay. There were a series of riots in the 80s and 90s and racial tensions apparently still run very high around the area. Fine, not a problem. I went to school in Durham and lived in DC-nothing new there. My job would be to interview inmates at HMP Brixton and try to get a sense of their needs upon release. The goal would be to unite or reunite families and build a program that would encourage family and community involvement in repatriating/reacquainting (for lack of a better word) the newly released inmate. There are several similar programs in the US with varying degrees of success. Great, good, go community action!
Then it hit me-I’m supposed to relate to these people, find out their needs, counsel the families and devise a strategy on how to make them better citizens. Ummmm, PROBLEM.
1. I’m a white girl. The Brixton prison population (and yes, there is always a significantly higher percentage of minorities in prisons around the world but that’s another topic) is almost completely African or Caribbean. I’ve interviewed with white murderers before and that was creepy enough but they were Catholic church-going, Little League playing murderers (which should tell you something…). I would have to walk over a mile through Brixton to get to the jail unless I want to take the Prison Express (bus that specially runs from the Tube to the Prison)
2. I’m a white drawling Southern girl. Apparently there is no plate glass between interviewer and interviewee to promote a better relationship; give me that distance, please! Also, I’m sure we’ll have loads to talk about. Me: So you’re an illegal immigrant from Jamaica who has never held a steady job, received any education, you have an illegitimate child, a drug addiction, an invalid work visa and anger management issues. Aside from the anger management I’m not so sure of what to tell this guy. Don’t do drugs? Stealing is a no-no and results in a Time Out in federal prison? Go back to the warm sunny beaches of Madagascar?

So prison didn’t work out. So now I think I will be working with person who have mental disorders and present with antisocial tendencies in a hope to identify factors to watch for in therapy sessions that suggests they will commit violent offenses in the future. The idea is that most people who commit violent crime that are diagnosed with a mental disorder almost always have been in counseling or sought treatment prior to their crimes. Our job is to develop tools to spot these potentially violent offenders by establishing a pattern. How cool is my job? It’s billed as unpaid but “the projects are very interesting and the environment stimulating.” Great, I don’t need money; I can live on your pristine city air alone! J



Friends have been made! Well, one “friend” wanted to get a whole lot friendlier but a simple “never going to happen” worked as dissuasion. Back to friends, AoY has discovered that people from different countries will befriend you even if the Brits will not! Our group of MSc students makes up quite the odd bunch: 1 Italian, 1 Russian, 1 Canadian, 1 Irish, 2 Brits (they aren't from London), 1 Pakistani, and a partridge in a pear tree! We went out for “drinks and curry”. AoY was unaware that this meant literally meant DRINK A LOT AND HAVE SOME CURRY. We started off in Tower Hill at a very posh upwardly mobile bar before heading to the famed Brick Lane. I am informed that Jack the Ripper killed people somewhere along the way (we ended up in Whitechapel) but first we had to buy our own beer to bring to the curry restaurant. Now that suited the laid back AoY just fine. 5 quid for four Hoegaardens instead 5 quid each? Now we’re talking! We ended up at some restaurant without a name and ordered something I couldn’t pronounce and drank our beer straight out of a can! Just give me a dock and I’m back home! We then wandered through the Goth crowd in Whitechapel before heading into a reggae club of sorts. Seriously, we were the ONLY ones without dreads. Two Americans had tagged along for the evening, being dorm mates of Irish. I shall call them New Jersey and San Fran because they never offered a name and it took immense teeth-pulling to get that much information about their home towns. I spent the entire night apologizing on behalf of all Americans (I figured that we voted them off the island so they moved to another one). Back to Tower Hill for some late night vodka and I ended up sleeping in Tower Hill. Great times, good people, look forward to Round 2!

A few parting oddities and words of the day I have learned over the past few weeks:

Chav/chavvy-A person of low or working class order that buys excessive amounts of Burberry (with the plaid visible) or Gucci or LV in an attempt to seem high brow and elitist. In America, we would call them posers or tools. (Oh, and often they wear head to tow Burberry to seem extra cool-literally, hat, shirt, boxer, pant, sock, jacket, fanny pack)
Anti-climb paint-Now I have touched this stuff and cannot figure out for the life of me what goes into anti-climb paint. It has a rough texture underneath the black but I have yet to succumb to a fatal malady, turn a funny color or become unable to mount stairs. I guess it’s slippery and there are usually spikes at the top of the railing but I’m mystified.Black cabs-Not all black-you just have to go by the shape. They can be green or pink or zebra striped. I guess it’s like Yellow cab in the States.
Discounts-they price things by the milligram or gram or mL or what have you. This would be fine except when I see “65p for OJ” it never occurs to me that it is 65p for one third of that OJ container. Do I have the option of removing 1/3 and just purchasing that? Why not just tell me that I’ll be paying 1.95 for the damn thing? I understand unit pricing but it’s literally like Want a liter of milk? Well, at 35p (which is a steal Tesco I will have you know, it’s usually 38p) for 200mL you might want to put down that fifth of a package of crisps you were considering and save up!
LiLo=Lindsay Lohan; ahh, Linds, LoLo and Lindsay were too easy
WOBs=Wives and Birds of the Ryder Cup players. Feminists are so proud right now.
WAGs=Wives and girlfriends of the Manchester United football team; and Posh is no longer a member she tells you!
CrissCross=they’ll still make you jump, even at a posh club in 2006. I've heard it ever time I go out. Just throw in some Croakies, keg beer and a dark commons room and it's back to uni days!

Shout out to the brother as it’s his birthday today. I stayed up until 3AM to call him at 5PM on technically the day before his birthday but it WAS his birthday in my country-Sisterly love :)