Jude Law and a Semester Abroad.
*takes deep breath, rolls up sleeves and begins to type*
Today is officially one month and a week of being in Leeds. Yay! I've downloaded Photoshop, and am able to connect to Livejournal at home (finally). So yes, this post is really overdue. Way overdue.
Leeds
Where shall I start?
Home for the next few months.
Okay well, I moved into my residence a few weeks ago: St. Mark's Residences. At first, I was hesistant about the place and wanted to dole out 30 extra quid per week to live in Leodis (Think: MKV). Residence here is kinda ghetto compared to even Waterloo's most runned down residences. Our stove is gas burning so we would have to turn it on, wait a few secounds for the gas to release and use our igniter/sparker to ignite flames (like on a BBQ grill). Our shower requires us to crank the knob all the way to the right, and pull on a cord outside of the shower. And this is the year when our residence finally installs Internet. I know, ghettooo (and lucky for us I guess too). But over the weeks, I've settled in and made the flat more homey. I'll post photos later since it's kinda...unorderly right now. So, this is home for the next few months, and I'm totally living on my own. Okay, not really on my own. June lives right across from me. And we have three other really nice roommates : )
First rainfall in the UK from my room window
The City Centre
The city centre is only a 10 - 15 minute walk from my residence, so it's really convenient to roam around, discover the city and of course, to shop. As I said earlier, shops close really early. The latest shop I've seen open around the university area was opened until 10:30pm.
Streets of the City Centre
Millenium Square: Currently hosting a WWF photo exhibition. There's a huge TV screen to watch football on and in February they set up an ice rink!
Corn Exchange: Doesn't really sell corn. But does sell leather goods and sk8er clothing.
Leeds Town Hall
Briggate Street: Home of various clothing shops including TopShop (!).
Victoria Quarter: Home of really high end shops.
Kirkgate Market: Sells fresh vegetables and meats and not so fresh candy at low low prices.
There are three major universities here in Leeds, so most things are catered towards students. So there's loads of pubs, clubs and shops. My university's student union alone has five different pubs and/or nightclubs. And an arena for performers. Last week alone they had Babyshambles (which I missed! ugh.) and The Kooks (sold out). Totally different from Waterloo (we did have Andy Stochansky play in the SLC for free once though haha) (Btw, I missed that as well. Urgh). Here are a few examples of interesting pubs and/or clubs:
The Library: A pub within, well, an old library.
Drydocks: A pub in a boat! There's even an anchor attached to it!
Halo: A nightclub in an old church.
Oh and the British? They're polite and dress really nicely. And they live on three basic things: Sandwiches (such a vast amount of sandwich shops, seriously.), beer (see above) and cell phones.
School
Has been good. I only have a few hours of class but they LOAD UP on readings. I'm knee high in readings right now, they expect us to go to the library, sign out a stack of books and read chapters from each book. Chapters! And this is only after one lecture. Aghhh.
Parkinson Building: Pretty much the main building for the university. We meet at the steps, we wait at the steps, we eat at the steps. Sometimes we even fight on the steps.
Anyway, I'll leave it at that for now. I'll update later on the what's been happening so far. : )