In London!

Hello All!

Yes, it is true, I have arrived in London and even managed to accomplish the improbable feat of surviving my first day!

The flight over was pretty uneventful. I sat next to a cute little old Indian lady and thought to myself "She'd be fun to talk to" and promptly conked out (aided in large part by gravol) as soon as the plane took off. When I woke up a few hours later, still in mid-flight mind you, the lady had disappeared! This presented me with a moral dilemma. On the one hand, yay leg-room! On the other hand, how does a little old lady disappear on a plane?! In the end, the former of those two won, and I put my legs up on the seat upon which she once sat and promptly conked out once again.

As for London, well, London is London as someone living my residence so eloquently put it yesterday. The residence is as close to the heart of London as one can get, meaning the area is a little bit grungy, but charmingly so...or at least I hope I come to see it that way. My dorm room is larger than expected, but faces a rather busy street, so you hear traffic and sirens all day and night long. When I mentioned this to my dad, he rightly pointed out that ANY street will seem noisy compared to the street we lived on in suburban Waterloo population less than 90,000. I'm thinking the street noise too is something I shall get used to.

Nesma and my grand plan to buy all the necessary housewares in the first day went down the shitter because we had to wait around in the residence until 2:00 to check in and then gathered information on opening a bank account until 5:00 and then met up with Rini, Sam, Roni and Ant (old friends of mine from Kuwait days who now live in London). So we met up with them, went to a pub, then to a Belgian restaurant, which took us until about 9:00 or so, at which point I realized that I had no linens, pillows, sheets, blankets, etc. and it was now hopelessly late to acquire any. Nesma was kind enough to loan me a pillow for the night (THANKS NES!) but it was still a rather chilly sleep. I should add too that Nesma and I went grocery shopping after the restaurant last night at a store that stays open late, and upon buying cereal, juice, milk, etc. for this morning's breakfast, we realized that we had no vessels in which to place these items for consumption, so today we went out and got some plates, cutlery and a few other basics, but still no sheets/blankets/pillows...I really need to get on that.

Well, this has turned out to be a rather lengthy entry already, and I can't really think of what else to add, I guess you can post specific questions in the comments section. I'm safe and well and looking forward to getting started at school. Also, pictures are soon to follow, I've only taken one so far and haven't even uploaded it to my computer, but rest assured, my shutter-buggery is only on temporary hiatus.

Salaam to all

Edit: I wish to correct the popular misconception that London is a perpetually overcast city where it frequently rains cats and dogs...I'd liken it more to donkeys and hippopotami