BO18

This picture kind of summarizes why I started loving London.



The alleys! I just love the London alleys and courtyards. Everytime I walk through one I consider myself lucky to live in this marvellous city!



The first couple of weeks I really hated it here. They drive on the wrong side of the road (cliche), the supermarkets are expensive and crap, it was too busy, you're forced to litter because there are no dustbins, everyone speaks a different kind of English and my uni was crap, public transport is hell (seriously I think that they use the underground as a sauna here)
The day I arrived in London, with 50kg luggage, was also the day that I first set foot in England. I didn't know what London was like. I kind of underestimated the size of the city. Its huge! I thought that my halls were on walking distance, guess again. After 10min I almost fainted and decided to take the bus (the bus-driver helped me with loading my luggage on the bus)
Its also very expensive. I arrived with €100 pocket money. Believing that would be enough for 1 student-month, just like in Holland. Now I know that €100 is just enough for 1 week!


I was considered crazy by most of my friends, who didn't understand my sudden urge to move (i decided it overnight).
But now I just love this city! Yesterday I smoked a shisha/narguila with a fellow student from Madagascar(!) in a Libyan café after we shopped in Little Lebanon.
That would be impossible in Amsterdam.
London is a real cosmopolitan city. Nearly every nation is represented here (I'm taking classes with a girl who is half Fijian and half Malaysian)
History is everywhere you look. You can easily get lost in the thousands alleys they have.
And Starbucks is on every corner. I just love Starbucks! Who said that globalization and "Mcdonaldization" were bad? Paris, eat your heart out! Ha!
I never, ever want to leave! (well my heart is still in/with Beirut, and I do hope that Beirut will be my final stop but still)

So I decided that Thursday is going to be London Thursday from now on. A weekly picture of lovely London.

( picture via Londonist)