Friday, 2-23-96
10:00 AM ish London
4:00 AM E-Town
“Yesterday, all my troubles seemed so far away…” J/K I just had to write that for some reason, cuz it was going through my head!
So anyway, yesterday we had a field trip to Greenwich for architecture class. It was a cloudy, cold, & drizzly day… But, it was cool to see the Queen’s House & Greenwich Naval Hospital. After Douglas Scott-Michaels’s in depth tour & lecture of the grounds & Queen’s House, most people went home. But, Ruth, Paul, Anne & I opted to plug on! We climbed up a steep hill behind the Queen’s House to the observatory (kinda like a planetarium w/ telescopes & astronomical history). Then we explored everything it had to offer (for free cuz Ruth convinced some lady that our Queen’s House tickets only passes were for the whole area… ☺︎).
My favorite part was standing on the Prime Meridian (longitude 00’00’00)! We took lots of pics. & I, the sucker that I can be sometimes, even plunked down a £1 for a little card that said the date & exact time (according to Greenwich Mean Time ☺︎) that I stood on the Prime Meridian!
Then we went down to the Naval Hospital to check out the great dining hall & chapel, which were beautiful!
Then, very hungry & tired from all the walking & standing, we headed back to Pembridge, via bus (cuz we were in the area, of the building, in Docklands, bombed by the IRA, a few weeks ago, which kept the train from running all the way out to Greenwich… We actually saw the ruins of the building from the bus! YIKES! It looked like mostly bashed in windows & a bit deformed from the windows of the double-decker bus we were in..) & the train.
When we got in, we were all so hungry we chowed in the kitchen, for at least an hour, making up for the lost meals while on our Greenwich adventure! While eating Kerry Weston showed up to check in for her ISA “London Weekend!” It was so great to see her & we both sorta screamed & ran to each other for a big hug, when she entered the dining room! ☺︎ We caught up quickly & I introduced her to my housemates, that were hanging out & chowing w/ me & then she headed off to check into her hotel & to go to her free ISA dinner at T.G.I.Friday’s (now there’s some real British food)!
She said she was tired & wanted to just hang out & catch up last night, so invited her back to Pembridge after she settled in & got her free dinner. She came back about 9 PM & it was great fun to chat & find out how she was doing, how she likes her program & Galway & Ireland in general etc… It was also cool to hear what she knew of AΦ, back in Chambana, from her closer friends (that I don’t know as well) that keep her informed w/ their version of events…
But anyway, it was really great to see Kerry & spend some quality time w/ her… It helped to know she has experienced many of the same feelings as I have studying here so far away from home… And that when she first arrived was homesick as well.
When Lori got back from working out, she joined Kerry & I for a beer at the Earl of Lonsdale Pub, down on Portobello. It was relaxing, not very crowded, & there was live music (a great one man band doing a lot of good covers, of recent songs, acoustic on his guitar) & after we took Kerry to “The Fish Pond” for our fav. chips!
Then, all of us tired… Kerry headed back to the hotel where she is staying this weekend, to rest up for her big day of sightseeing today w/ her study abroad friends from Ireland! She promised to stop by again before she leaves to go back to Ireland. And has agreed to host Lori & I for a night & a day when we go to Ireland in a few weeks!
When Lori & I got in she went up to write letters & I chilled on the couch in the lounge for a bit… I ended up playing one hand of “Rum 500” w/ Erica & Kelly & then I watched part of a movie about life in Vietnam, during the war, as a marine & the boot camp training marines received prior to battle. It was disturbing, but as Kelly said, supposedly very realistic! She told how her father was an officer in the marines in service in Vietnam for 2 yrs. during the war. I shared that my dad was there as well, for a year, but thank God never had to be in combat, due to his journalistic abilities, which he boasted about & then got a related assignment, writing casualty reports, in Saigon, I believe… I hope never in my lifetime, or ever in the future, will a war come about, involving the US, where so many soldiers will be needed that they have to draft people etc… Well, on that solemn note, I will be on my way.
Ron gets into Waterloo Station tonight at about 8 PM! I am gonna possibly work out this afternoon & do e-mail & take care of some other necessities… Before I got to meet his train! ☺︎
CHEERS! ☺︎
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Note from Present Day Kathy: Most of my entries I feel like I wrote relatively maturely for a 20-year-old, however the beginning of this one not as much, but that’s okay. I didn’t write these at the time thinking anyone other than me would ever read them, so I doubt I was concerned about how my words and random cheesiness was perceived.
I love that some of my friends/housemates/classmates and I stuck it out at Greenwich to see as much as we could that day. I do recall how cool I thought standing on the Prime Meridian was and am glad that I got a picture of me doing so, as well as the souvenir with the date and time on it. I also forgot how (not her real name) Ruth would do things like that to save money. Not that it was very ethical, but at that age and time in our life I appreciate her creativity and don’t think it’s a big deal that I went along with it.
I also didn’t remember that we saw where the IRA bomb had detonated, including the ruins of the building, on our bus ride back from Greenwich.
I am glad that my college friend/sorority sister, who was also studying abroad that semester, (not her real name) Kelly and I were able to meet up a few times while we were across the pond. I appreciate how nice it must’ve been for both of us to see a familiar face from back home. When I went abroad I wasn’t expecting to get to see many, if any, people I knew from the States, and so the times I did get to connect with Kelly, and others, were definitely comforting, as well as fun opportunities to catch up.
I Googled The Fish Pond and it appears to have closed in 2012. ☹︎ That’s certainly another nostalgic place it could’ve been fun to take Bob and the kids on our planned trip in August 2020 to London. However, I am sure there will be plenty of other places to go, including ones where we can find yummy chips.
I found it interesting that some of my housemates and I watched a movie about Vietnam together and discussed our dad’s experiences there. As with many things I wrote about in my journals, I have no memory of doing that. One of my present day favorite TV shows, This is Us, has a story line this season about Vietnam. My parents also watch the show and, thus, in recent months I’ve talked some with my dad about his time there, during the war.
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Reminder: Unless I’ve been given permission to use people’s actual names, in most cases I’ve removed or replaced the names of the real people who were part of my journey/experience there, in effort to protect and respect their identities/privacy in my London Semester Journal entries. I will also not share details that I think and feel are too personal for anyone I interacted with, my loved ones, and me.
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Here’s the back story of My London Semester Journals from 1996, including what prompted me to revisit and decide to share them here in 2018. And here’s a list a list of the entries, which I will update as I share them.
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