Ok so I know I've been terrible at this...

I have written 7 entrys in my journal since the last one! I seriously am on on the go all day long. When we stop and have tea or just sit down for a minute i whip out my journal and jot down the bits that I can. I'll try and do BOTH journaling and blogging. I'm just so busy! I thought I was busy with school but we just sat down about 20 mins ago. We had been on the go from 10-3:30 sitting only for about 20 mins for lunch and 10 mins on a bench. Our class has been going really well. Today we went to the South Bank for the first time which is where parliament, Big Ben, the London eye, and all of that good stuff is. We worked on a "Bridge Project" where we were all split up into groups and went to the various bridges across the river. There we took all different shots. Today I used the Nikon we rented which is a pretty lofty yet amazing camera. I'm trying to upload those pictures as we speak. We're still working on coming up for a theme for our project. Each student with have 4 pictures from their theme printed. I'm still not quite sure how i want to narrow mine down. So far what I've really liked shooting have been children, brightly colored urban landscape, people interactions, alley way life, macro shots of still life, and some film stills. So that is basically what we've done today. Later this evening we're going on a "Jack-the-Ripper" walk so that will be pretty interesting. Plus free! If you didn't know already, the British exchange rate is TERRIBLE the dollar only goes 1/2 way here, so for example, the average shirt would cost you about 20 pounds which would equal right at 40 dollars. dang a lang.


Anyway, I guess I'll now catch up on the other exciting things from the past few days.
The night of my last post, some of us went to Nottinghill and took some pictures of the neighborhood. They can be found on that last facebook album. That area was so cute! The weird thing was they didn't have curtains so you could see inside their houses! Especially since they didn't have lawns. It would be amazing to live in London, super fun. But I don't see how anyone could raise a family inside the city. Especially since the tube (underground) is soooo fast paced, scary, and crowded. Anyone riding the tube is in between the ages of 15 and 60. It's definitly the easiest way of getting around and not too terribly expensive.

So anyway, after Nottinghill we went back to our house and went to sleep. The next day we went to the Westminster Student Graduate photography show. It was in this run down store house but it was amazing. Each person put their stories and a postcard with a sample picture that the viewers could pic up. Definitly made me want to know who was behind all of those cameras and photos. The photography assistant teacher is this lady named Eileen. She is sooo passionate about what she does it radiates.

The next day (26th) we went the the Harrow campus of Westminster which is just north of the city. We got a tour of the photography department and looked at slides of past student's pieces. After lunch at the campus we headed back to Oxford Circus, looked around at the shops then went to this comedy show. The comedy show was a live television deal and i guess is a pretty famous tv show in England. It's called Edinberg Live or something. It was great though and the host even talked to us from the stage! He asked each of us our name and when he came to my friends Lindsay and Jill and I, he asked us where we were from in the States and what we were studying. When we came back we booked our plans for PARIS! We are going friday the 13th of July and are taking the "Chunnel" under the water over to Paris. Yeah, amazing...and we get to have lunch on the Eiffel Tower, a cruise boat tour, bus tour, see Notre Dame and go to the Lourve! YEAH SWEET HUH! All for about 178 pounds....yeah its a lot. But totally worth it!

Ok now i think we're almost caught up

On the 27th, we were sent out on a project for class where we walked through the West End and SOHO area where Leicester Square and Carnaby St. are. The area of Soho was kinda shady but it has some GREAT alleys which is perfect for my theme. Leicester square is surrounded by all the best cinemas so I think we will try and go there to see Harry Potter. We tried to focus and find one shot of each of the following: urban landscape, portrait, still life, documentary shot, and film still. Once we got through Leicester Sq we were right at Trafalgar square. There we went to the National Gallery and will hopefully go back there saturday or sunday. There we saw some of the most famous paintings in the WORLD! Such as paintings by Erasmus, Raphael, De Vinci, Rembrant, and Jan Van Eyck. So awe inspiring!

So after that full and busy day we went back to the flat to get ready to see my now favorite musical...WICKED! This musical was absolutely breathtaking! I got the chills from it like 20 times from the music. I can't believe i hadn't seen it by now. But it's soooo cheap to get tickets here so we jumped on the opportunity! I still just get chills thinking about it. The music, dancing, effects, comedy, everything. VERY well put together.

Well I think it's time I sign off for now. I know this is just the stitching of the quilt that I'm making here but there really isn't any more i can do for the time being. I'm going to refuel and take a nap.

I'll try and write sooner! I miss all of you guys!

xoxox,
Erica