London Gets Dark Really Late

This has been an adventurous week for the Southwestern London Program. While some students are already tired of the site seeing, and are in turn just want to shop, others are unable to get enough of the marvelous sites around London.

On Thursday, June 26, we finished up our first week of classes. By this point, many people were exhausted and opted to take a nap before heading for a night out. Others decided to continue to explore the city. After the napping and the meandering about town, many students from the program decided to go out to a local, posh nightclub to congratulate themselves on finishing an atrocious amount of reading in a four day span. While at the club, the DJ was playing some nasty tunes that got the club grooving, and made the students from the program break out some dance moves that would rival Justin Timberlake or Michael Jackson from the 80’s. We even decided to get table service so that we could have a seat and a bottle of alcohol to sip on while we danced circles around each other. However, in typical European fashion, the table ended up being quite small, and only two people could sit down. But that did not stop the party!

Friday, June 27, brought all new adventures as many of the students were woken up by the dorm maid coming to empty the trash in the dorm rooms at around 9 in the morning. This probably would have been more of a welcomed wake up call had it been 15 minutes earlier so that students could have at least gotten the free hot breakfast that ends at 9. The day continued with a guided tour of the Tower of London by Professor Epstein. Professor Epstein is one of the most knowledgeable people on the history of London and conveys his knowledge in an interesting way. While at the Tower of London, students saw many things, but the highlights were probably the location that Ann Boleyn was beheaded and the Royal Jewels. The Royal Jewels are literally in a vault…yes, like a bank. Students were in aw, over the 563 ct. diamond in a scepter that students in the program calculated to be worth more than $110,000,000. And that is just for the diamond on the top of the scepter.

After the Tower of London, the students joined the professor for a drink at a nearby pub to reflect on the Tower. While that was fun, the students could not stay too long because they had to scurry off in order to be spotted at another posh club in London later that night for one of the student’s birthdays.