Pounds, not dollars. Pence (or just 'p', as they say), not cents. Tube, not subway. Toilet, not bathroom. Everything was unfamiliar and I had to adjust to these customs. Nothing was new, I was just placed in a different environment. However, when everything is unfamiliar, you see the world in an exciting way.
Every morning I woke up in London. (Technically, I was in Stratford, not London. But you know what I mean.) It was so much cooler than waking up in my bed in New Jersey. Commuting to school every morning was crazy. I woke up around 7 AM, showered in the teeny bathroom of my ensuite dorm room as my elbows hit against the walls each time I moved, and left for the tube before 8 on good mornings. I would grab a quick coffee and croissant from Pret and head off to the station...or complete chaos.
The London tube is much cleaner than New York subways, but the tube itself feels much smaller because the walls are curved. So if you're standing on the edges, you have to crane your neck and scrunch over, which is really bad for your posture. And you have to stay in that position for thirty minutes, if you don't want to lose your spot to the other angry commuters.
For some reason, no one likes to stand in the middle of the aisle in between the seats, because it's awkward if you suddenly get pushed over and end up on top of someone sitting down. So everyone squeezes into the open standing areas right by the doors, which means no one else can get on. There is a lot of glaring and muttering going on (like "Why aren't you moving in?") but no one actually says anything to each other.
Also, it's really important to "mind the gap," because there are signs everywhere, plus the announcements, and also the conductor reminding you again every few minutes.
I would somehow make it, amidst all this stress and chaos, to Holborn Station (even the names give me nostalgia now), which was the closest to Kings College.
Being in class as the only one with the American accent felt so strange. Nothing is more obvious than an accent, and I felt like I had to drop the r's or something. (Even when I asked for water at a restaurant at a cafe, I thought about doing it in the British way, but never actually tried it.) When you become the one that stands out, you naturally feel like you need to do something to fit in.
But my accent didn't matter anyway, because most of my time I spent alone, wandering the beautiful city, and didn't have much reason to talk. After classes were over, I would casually walk out of the building (the school of Virginia Woolf!) and casually walk over to Covent Garden and pass by the Lyceum Theatre or some other amazing landmark.
Eating alone was easy in London. I found new cafes or went to either Caffe Nero or Costa, London's coffee chains, and for simple, healthy food I would go to Pret (Pret is a staple in London), Wasabi, or even Kimchee (for Korean food!). There would be other businessmen and women, students, who were grabbing a fast meal in between their work. Even in those simple moments where I sat alone with a coffee and a sandwich, everything felt so different, new, and exhilarating.
Every day was an adventure. At least in the beginning, when everything was new. We love new things, but we also adjust quickly and get used to our surroundings. When things get familiar, we mistake that feeling as getting tired or sick of them. It's really hard to appreciate what you have all the way to the end - only when it's too late and you're looking back do you truly understand what you had.
