9/13
We didn’t know what we wanted to do today, so after some Googling and researching fun places over a breakfast of dry cereal and rice cakes (our fridge is still not working…), Catja suggested that it would be a jolly day to go to the Royal Air Force Museum, an hour bus ride away in Hendon. As the daughter of an Air Force classical trumpeter dad, Catja grew up going to Bolling Air Force Base, the Air and Space Museum, and Udvar Hazy to see many planes, old and new. Zoe, also an enthusiast of small, somewhat obscure museums (shoutout to the New London submarine museum), agreed and asked our lovely flatmate, Hebe, if she wanted to come. Always game for an adventure with her quirky American friends, she happily joined.
The museum exceeded our expectations. It included six hangars of airplanes, ranging from very early, Wright-brothers type planes to WWI and WWII bombers to modern stealth planes. It was also super interactive! We played games that tested our ability to report locations of attacks on a map, scope out suspicious locations from a helicopter, and protect a database from malware. Although very simplified from the real jobs, it helped us understand all that goes into working for the RAF.
Although it was a very cool experience, it also had its poignant moments. The US does not have many visible reminders of wars like WWII other than Pearl Harbor. London especially was hit hard by bombings and the Battle of Britain, so we learned about individual stories of loss. One that hit Catja particularly hard was an excerpt from a WWI pilot’s letter. The pilot, Captain Albert Ball, died in 1917 at age 20. A fighter ace, meaning he shot down five or more enemy aircraft, he wrote to his family that although he was grateful that he had survived intense battles, he was “tired of always living to kill.” He was so young and yet dealt with intense situations many of us never do.
After a long afternoon of learning about aircraft and missions, we returned to our flat to prep for Catja’s date night. Catja got freshened up and anxiously danced to “Rain is a Good Thing” by Luke Bryan with Zoe, who apologized to Hebe for playing such American tunes. Date night involved tapas in Southbank (very yummy) and a pub quiz in Pimlico (very fun, although they lost). Zoe and Hebe played along in a far corner of the pub, ready to give an emergency exit if needed and to lend ears for a debrief on the train ride home (P.S. Zoe and Hebe beat Catja and her date by over 20 points…clearly he is not good enough for her).
9/14
We started Thursday by taking the Tube and hour down to Clapham to pick up a TV, air mattress, lamp, and other random home items from Catja’s Fulbright-Roehampton friend who is moving back to the States. We filled our backpacks and got back on the train, arms full with the TV and mattress. We can only assume we looked a bit ridiculous, but at least we now have a TV!
After arriving back in Northwest, we headed to Sainsbury's to pick up some snacks for our picnic with our lovely friend from Conn, Nick. Nick met us at our flat and we walked to Gladstone Park for lunch on the top of the hill. We debriefed on all that has happened since we moved out of Conn and the many adventures ahead (including a potential road trip to Wales even though Zoe and Catja can’t drive manual, let alone on the other side of the road yet). Midway through our picnic a man sat down about ten feet away from us and started singing along to his music, which was playing through a speaker. In the midst of our conversation, he turned to tell us that our accents are “bangin’,” which was definitely a first for us.
We then headed back home to give Nick the grand tour of our flat, which takes all of 3 minutes to complete. He left soon after, then Catja decided to get ready for a night on the town to celebrate her Fulbright friend, Juan’s, birthday. She wore her hot pink Barbie pants and did her eyeliner like Vic from Maneskin and listened to her hype up music on the Tube to Salsa Temple in central. She and her friends got drinks and took a beginners bachata class together, which was nerve-wracking at first but ended up being so much fun. Everyone was so friendly, and Catja was whisked away by a stranger to improv dance together even though she warned him she was very, very new.
After winding down at a pub and saying goodbye to her friends, Catja had a memorable late night train ride home. Two random guys started offering everyone Fiber One brownies, chocolate digestive biscuits, and Doritos (in a big family-size bag which made Catja very jealous because she and Zoe, in their most American moment so far, couldn’t find bags of chips in Tesco that weren’t in single serving bags). They were a hoot, asking Catja for her Instagram and running down the train car in jovial embarrassment when she said no. It was a moment where you just had to be there to understand the unhinged chaos of it all.
9/15
Following Nick’s recommendation, we walked to Kilburn to visit Poundland for the first time, a magical dollar store equivalent that was the best spot to try British candy. We stocked up on Cadbury chocolate buttons, Jaffa Cakes, strawberry chews, hazelnut Happy Hippos, and Freddo’s frog chocolate. While we were letting our American sugar addiction run wild, Hebe texted us saying our new fridge had just been installed! We rejoiced and then ran next door to Aldi, where we bought the milk, cheese, vegetables, jam, and fruit we craved for weeks.
We celebrated our ability to cook and preserve food again by making sandwiches and having another park picnic. We have been here for over two weeks and still have not experienced a day of rain. The most we have had was a brief drizzle. It is surreal. But we basked in the warm sun for a while before returning to our flat.
Catja still had not finished the Gilmore Girls revival even though she started season one of the original series in our Sophomore year at Conn, so we decided to mark the three years since she started by watching the last episode and a half together. Zoe has watched Gilmore Girls so much that she probably has it all memorized by now, but she enjoyed rewatching her favorite moments with Catja and seeing her reaction to the very last line in the very last episode.
Before hitting the hay, we called Payton who is too far away in Pittsburgh, and caught up on all her shenanigans. One thing we do miss about Conn is having nightly catch ups and hangouts with our favorite people, but video calls help keep us conn-ected (I’m sorry).
9/16
Catja woke up late at 10 am, got ready in 20 mins, and hopped out the door with Zoe and a bagel with cream cheese (!!!) in hand. We went on the Underground and the Overground to Shoreditch, stopping by Brick Lane Book Store for cute postcards and walking to the pop-up installment, The Lego Piece Garden, on the high street.
We waited in line for 40 minutes trying to be patient with surrounding children, who had no sense of personal space or boundaries, literally falling at our feet. Although the pop-up event was catered to adults who wanted to build intricate flowers out of unique Lego pieces, kids were everywhere. Catja is usually a big fan of kids, but it was a lot. Zoe, coming off of a summer of teaching 8-year-olds science, was very tired of them.
We struggled to find enough pieces to build flowers, but we eventually ended up with something to add to the wall. Zoe’s was beautiful, a lovely yellow symmetrical flower. Catja’s was something only a mother could love - a colorful mishmash of any pieces she could find on the table and on the floor. We peeked at the resident artist working on their newest piece in the back and admired the samples of floral Lego designs on the walls.
Next, we walked to Columbia Road, which hosts a large flower market on Sundays and is featured in Maisie Peters’ “There It Goes,” a song that hits us very hard and is the soundtrack to our lives at the moment. We poked into all the small shops down the road, but it was very quiet without all the vendors lining the roads on a Saturday afternoon.
We made our way to a pub in Dalston, intending to watch the Spurs v. Sheffield game. However, we discovered a tragedy: apparently, there is a law banning Premier League games at 3pm on Saturdays from being televised as an incentive for fans to go to stadiums, even though that’s not very accessible for most people. In the US, we are used to streaming the games on Peacock or NBC Sports, so this was a highly unpleasant shock. After messing with VPNs and getting a weird look from the bartender, we gave up and sipped our lime sodas in sadness. Luckily, Spurs pulled through with a very very last minute win, which cheered us up.
We met Catja’s Fulbright friends at Dalston Curve Garden, an incredible hole-in-the-wall garden with a small bar and pizza oven. It was so beautiful and the perfect setting for a casual dinner hangout. We chatted and ate for a while before making the long trek back home.
Three cheers for an incredible game today! Nothing better than a Deki goal in the last few seconds!!
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