Another trip to London and more Cambridge

I went to London again last weekend, this time with friends I met here. We didn't have classes on Friday, so we took the train that morning. There were eight of us total - Elizabeth, Sean, Sammy, Michael, Matt, and Peter from Michigan St University, and Nimra from Pakistan. When we arrived, we found our hostel in Piccadilly and then walked down to St. James Park, past the Horse Guards, and to the National Gallery. The National Gallery is huge (and free - yay!), and unfortunately we got there only an hour before close so I didn't get to see nearly as much as I would have liked. From there, we went to dinner at a pub near the hostel, where Elizabeth got her long-awaited first fish and chips (I seem to get to witness this moment for a lot of people...). We found a little bar/club up the road called The Warwick that we went to that evening, which we later learned from a Londoner back at Cambridge is known to have the worst music in all of England. Maybe that was just his opinion though, becuase it seemed fine to us!
On Saturday, I had a ticket to see King Lear at The Globe theatre, courtesy of Cambridge and paid for by USC (well, I probably paid for it somewhere along the way actually) so I met up with the USC group and we went to lunch and the play, while my MSU friends did some sightseeing. The Globe was really neat. It looks just like you would imagine it to have - a round (duh) building with three levels of seat, plus the Groundlings who pay just a couple pounds to stand near the stage. Cheap, yes, but for a three hour play like King Lear? No thanks... The play was fantastic though, with great music and terrific actors and actresses. My MSU friends went back to Cambridge Saturday night, and I met up with Nimra and we went to her friend's flat in London for the night. I got to meet several of her other friends as well, as Pakistani and studying in London. Some of them are friends with people who run a very posh club at High Street Kensington, called Amika, so we went there that night (and didn't even have to pay the 20£ cover - ridiculous!) As soon as we walked into the club, I thought it would be a really good idea to step on some broken glass in my open-toed heels (does sarcasm come across in a blog? I hope so) and so we spent a while in the kitchen with the bartenders pouring gin on my gushing toe to stop the bleeding. Good way to start the night for sure. I got all bandaged up and we went back to our dancing only a little worse for the wear. We got back to Nimra's friend's place about 4:30, caught a couple hours sleep and then caught the train back to Cambridge so I could start some really exciting work on my papers. Sunday night, Sean and I went and saw Wall-E at the theatre in town (it had just come out in the UK) and if you haven't seen it, you definitely should.
The weather has been gorgeous all week - mid 70s - which has made walking around town fantastic, and writing papers agonizing. Tuesday night, Elizabeth and I went to dinner and then to see the ballet Sylvia by the Royal Ballet, which was being shown at one of the movie theatres in town. Not quite the real thing, but still really good. Elizabeth was a dancer growing up as well, so we both sat there with our legs twitching. It was actually really neat to see a ballet on a movie screen, since in a theatre you don't normally get to see the expressions on the dancers' faces, and you also really see just how muscular they are.
I spent a lot of time this week out in the gardens of our college enjoying the sunshine and trying to do some reading. It is definitely difficult to concentrate when it is so beautiful and there are so many things you want to do and people to have fun with!
Thursday night we went and saw The Dark Knight, as it came out that day here. The theatre was packed - I think everybody from our college was there, or at least everybody I knew or had ever seen! Again, really good movie that you should definitely see. Heath Ledger does such a good job as the Joker - thoroughly creeped me out at least!
I'm spending the weekend at Cambridge working on my papers. Hopefully I'll finish soon so I can enjoy my last week here! I can't believe my trip is almost done...