The Joys of Unpredictability

***This post was written on Sunday, July 1st 2012***

Sometimes the best things in life are the things that are completely unpredictable.

            When I woke up this morning I thought I knew how today was going to go, but it was nothing like I expected. It was better.

            My morning began with an incredibly breathtaking service at the famous, skyline dominating St. Paul’s Cathedral. The walk to the church was a cold, windy and rainy one, but Christopher Wren’s masterpiece is not called such for no good reason. As we climbed the steps into the doors of the cathedral the bells chimed from the steeple and echoed all around us, calling all Londoners to church at the 300 year old house of God. I stood in the rain and listened to the chiming in absolute awe, thinking of how this bell has been serenading the people of London for centuries. When I entered the sanctuary the breath was nearly knocked out of me. We were led to our seats which fortunately were at the front of the sanctuary, and I sat sharing the awe of my surroundings with the two new friends I had met on the walk over as we craned our necks to look into the top of the dome and dropped our jaws at the sight of beautiful paintings, mosaics, and sculptures. I was thrilled when a small orchestra began to take their seats and I realized that we had come to church on a Sunday during the month that the choir is accompanied by the City of London Sinfonia. This morning the worship’s music was set to Haydn’s Missa Sancti Nicolai, so all of the liturgy was sung in Latin by a choir made up of very young boys and men. Their voices rang through the marble sanctuary and it felt as though angels were surrounding me. Of course it could never measure up to my favorite place to worship—Kramer Chapel in Ft. Wayne, Indiana—but it was still something to be marveled at and an absolute pleasure, privilege and joy to listen to. Singing hymns to the tune settings of St. Columba and Kingsfold reminded me of hymns from my own church home and brought tears to my eyes. Little did I know when I ventured to London’s greatest church this morning that I was going to get a spectacular choir, orchestra, and organ concert. The service itself, being of the Church of England, did not quite line up with my own Lutheran beliefs but the music was so phenomenal that it was a morning I will not soon forget. 

FroYo in SoHo!!

After church, a couple of strangers from the British Studies Program who had come along to the cathedral invited Jamie and I to join them for a lunch of pizza at Gabriel’s Wharf. We took them up on the offer, and that was probably one of the best decisions I ever made. I had been hoping to tour of Westminster’s Abby, so during lunch I asked Amanda and Skylar (the two Southern Miss students we had just met) if they would be interested in going with me, and they both enthusiastically agreed to. We journeyed back to the dorm together and Jamie left to meet up with another friend, but the three of us set off on our own adventure. After realizing that Westminster Abby is closed to tours on Sundays, we improvised a new plan and hopped on the Tube towards Piccadilly Circus. Skylar said he wanted to find Soho square, so we attempted to wind our way from Piccadilly to Soho and ended up running into a Frozen Yogurt shop called Snog where the walls were painted hot pink and blue, glowing bubbles hung from the ceiling. A muscular young man covered in tattoos and wearing a neon blue shirt that was way too tight for him greeted us as he danced to the beat of the music. All three of us were drawn in by the promise of fat and sugar free frozen yogurt and further enticed by the options of natural, green tea, chocolate and mango yogurt with fruit toppings of our choice. I had a small green tea yogurt with raspberries and it was positively scrumptious. As we ate our yogurt we examined our surroundings and discovered that we had managed to wiggle our way into the, shall we say, “colorful” area of London. Okay, so there were gay clubs on every side of us to put it more succinctly. After noticing this we all had a good laugh and continued trying to make our way towards Soho square. We eventually made it to a Soho park, but then we decided to find our way to Covent Gardens which is a slightly classier area of London. In Soho park bohemians were sleeping on benches and strange sculptures of naked men were adorning the lawn. 

A very drunk, but very happy, Canadian ;)

Well we were almost to Covent Gardens when we took a turn towards Trafalgar Square instead so that Amanda could revisit this historical area of London. When we got there we were surprised to see there was a gigantic party going on in the square—apparently today was Canada Day! We wound our way through hundreds of very drunk but very happy Canadians and took in all of the sights, laughing the whole time at the fact that we had somehow ended up in the middle of this. After making our way back out of the wild, celebratory mass we set out on a search for Abercrombie and Fitch; Skylar has been working at Hollister for 6 years and was determined to find his mother ship. (Hollister is owned and operated by Abercrombie and Fitch.) So after hopping on the tube, asking several people for directions, and pulling up a map on Skylar’s iphone we finally found an enormous Abercrombie and Fitch on Regent’s Street. Walking into this store was like going down the rabbit hole; we all stuck together as we trailed through the maze of dark, perfume filled rooms. “Models” (really attractive employees) were standing everywhere and everything was absolutely perfect looking. But there were dozens of mirrors in every room, dozens of rooms, a couple of staircases, and….well, let’s just say I still think it’s a miracle we made it back out of there because none of us had a clue where we were the whole time. 

Upon exiting Abercrombie and Fitch we decided to head back to our dorms on Stamford Street when, lo and behold, we run into Hollister. This, of course, Skylar had to explore so once more we made a train and trekked through narrow, smelly, noisy, dark rooms filled with perfectly folded, brightly colored clothing. We went up the glowing staircase and down the glowing staircase and barely made it out of here alive as well.

Finally we were on our way back to the dorms and made plans to meet again in about an hour and head to a pub down the street for the Euro Cup finals. Several other USM students were already planning to meet there so we barged in—and brought a crowd of our own! While I was sitting in the courtyard waiting for Skylar and Amanda I picked up a half Spanish, half Itallian young man who is here for summer school and looking for someone to watch the game with, a Brazilian girl doing the same, Jamie, and Skylar’s friend Ben. Amanda joined us and we walked down the street to join in the festivities at The Thristy Bear. A large crowd of Southern Miss students had already congregated there so we grabbed a few ciders and joined them in the fun—it was an awesome night! We were all rooting for Spain who won 4-0  against Italy, so The Thirsty Bear was a happy pub at the end of the night.

Watching the EuroCup finals at The Thirsty Bear!

Tomorrow it’s time to wake up bright and early and begin my academic adventures with the first day of class! So goodnight, and I can’t wait to see what is in store for tomorrow!