London

Well there's about 6 days now till I go away (!!!!!), and I'm excited but also quite at a loss for things to fill that time as lots of my friends are still at uni due to exams and stuff.

Sooooo on Monday night I decided to take a trip to London. I searched on a 'whats on' website and found a few art galleries with photography exhibitions that looked worth a visit, booked a train ticket and went down there on Tuesday morning. I thought the train would be loads but it was only £17 return (with my young persons railcard that has the expiry date rubbed off)

On the train down I texted my best friend from high school who i've not spoken to in a good few months and it turned out that she was down in london for the week, visiting a friend of ours who is at university there! That was a pretty weird coincidence. So we arranged to meet for lunch after I'd been to one of the small galleries.

The first gallery I went to was one reccomended to me by one of my future lecturers at Sunderland when I was there for interview. Its just called "The Photographer's Gallery" and it's in Leicester Square. There were two exhibitions on, one of a guy who'd photographed an abandoned prison called the Maze. It did say that he'd tried to exentuate the repetition and boredom of the place... and this really came across in the photos. As a result, however, they were just pretty uninspiring.

The other exhibition was Portraits of South Africa, photos of people in South Africa, dealing with issues of how they've changed since the end of apartheid. These were much more compelling. Each photo had a little snippet of information, or a quote from the subject as the photographer had spent time getting to know his models. It was a really interesting collection.

Sooo, then I met up with Jemma and Phil, my friends, and we hung out in a cafe, then an ice cream bar, and then wandered around shops a bit. Just cool to hang out with people you've not seen in ages. Especially since we spent a bit of time in a travel books shop cause Phil was buying a map of Russia, so I had a perfect excuse to wax lyrical about my trip to europe (I'm getting in early on the repetitive "well on my gap year..." talks :D )

Well then we parted ways and I headed on the Tube to Brixton (a place I'd not really heard of but I discovered causes people to make faces at you when you say you're going there.)

I got there and sort of found out why, I suppose. I shuffled through a dodgy market, looking for Electric Lane, where this gallery was. I found it finally and had to press a buzzer to be allowed in. This was a collection of five female photographers works. One documented the death of her mother and her fight with alzheimers. Each photograph had scrawled sentences at the bottom, which I think were quotes from her mother. I enjoyed the works but wished that there were more. The gallery was just two very small rooms. I'm not entirely sure I didn't miss out some of it, but none of the people there seemed very helpful and I'd already messed up cause I pressed the buzzer on the door twice and didn't realise the door had been buzzed open; so I didn't feel I could ask.

After I left there I considered exploring Brixton a little more... but found myself gravitating towards the tube station and headed for Kensington. Pottered around the high street there... nothing very exciting.

Oh, one thing I've not mentioned, I picked the worst day to go to London cause the tube was striking from 6.30pm. This meant that after that time I'd have to stay within walking distance of Euston where I got my train back to Rugby. So I ended up looking at a map in Euston station at around 6pm. I saw Camden Town on the map and it didn't look far, so I thought I'd walk up there and get something to eat. Unfortunately I mentally had it mixed up with Covent Garden, which I love, so was disappointed when I remembered that I hate Camden. I wandered up and down a bit but, frankly, the place intimidates me.

I finally plucked up the courage to go into a chinese restaurant and embarrassed myself cause I had to say "table for one" about three times before the guy understood me :/

I will admit that I was a bit nervous about wandering into a random chinese in Camden but I had a really good meal and then wandered back towards Euston. Still had about 2 hours to kill so I walked in the other direction to Tottenham Court Road where I knew there was an internet cafe. Parked myself there for about an hour and a half : )

When I stepped out of the cafe it was dark and immediately opposite was a building lit all in purple, so I grabbed my camera, thinking of the "buildings at night" contest on worth. (I've decided not to enter that one so it's ok that I mention it :D)

This led to a really enjoyable walk back along Tottenham Court Road, taking photos and not being bothered if people were wondering "Why the hell is she taking a photo of that?"

Got back to Euston just as my train started boarding.

Sorry that this is the most ridiculously long blog entry. I think I describe stuff in too much detail.