He's a Rookie give him some Milk and Cookies

Here is a pic of the statue of Gandhi where the ferry building is in downtown San Fran.
My roomy Zully is also looking dignified in the pic. I like it, although it came out a bit dark.

Gandhi looks like an Arhat giving the fear not mudra. An Arhat is to Buddha what the 12 disciples were to Jesus. A Mudra is a hand gesture given by a buddha, arhat, or bodisattva in paintings, sculptures or drawings. Each mudra represents a complex buddhist concept canonically illustrated in buddhist religious artifacts. Don't I sound smart? I took a Buddhist art history class last semester. It was one of my favorite classes! I wonder what religion Gandhi belong to? Was he Hindu?

My title has nothing to do with my post but I heard it on the #14 bus on my way home after tooling around the Embarcadero. There was this guy that came onto the bus who was chatting it up with the driver. You know when you first get on the bus at the front to pay for your fair. He was just chilling out on the steps. Your not suppose to do that!! But I guess it doesn't matter since he is a buddy of the driver. The dude was having a good old time laughing like there was something incredably funny he had to laugh loud enough for us to hear at the back of the bus. Zully, my roomy and I were on one of those doublly long buses so the guy you can imagine was extra loud if people on the back of this bus could hear him. Gosh, it took forever to get home. Zully and I were waiting forever for the bus to come and when we got to the Mission there were 2 big #14 buses that appeared in front of us. How does that happen? Its the same bus with the same route. I don't get it. I think the guy was shouting about Rookie this and rookie that because the bus driver in the bus ahead of us was apparently new to the job. Lo and behold when we stepped off the bus in good old Daly City there was a heavy blanket of fog to greet us. Welcome Home to Foggy daily city.

Tomorrow I plan on going to school to talk to my Study abroad advisor about what documents I need to have to include with my british visa application. If she can't help me I will email Ms. Lessware at London Met. I ask lots of questions, I wonder if these two incredibaly nice, patient ladies are annoyed with me yet. Since I 'm going to campus I might as well workout too. Why not. I'll be productive unlike most days. I hate not being in school. I feel lost when the semester is not in session. I'm really nervous about the experienceing the british university system first hand though. I dunno, can I hack it?

I'm going to suck it up and pay for a London A-Z street atlas, a new video ipod and digital recording attachement from Amazon. The street atlas is absoluetly essential. I'm going to start getting myself aquanted with the streets and neighborhoods of London. Also I need to start posting on the London group page on couchsurfing so I can get aquantied with CS Londoners that are soon to be my new friends and get some buring questions I have answered about life in the city. ansered. The reason I feel like I need a new ipod is because, well, I stepped on my old one, it no longer works. I had a nano before but I think getting a video ipod would be useful for the video podcasts I plan on making when I get to London. I'm taking a creative digital video class next semester and I would like to document my life there. I feel like i need a recorder to attach to my ipod so I can do some more interviewing, a had so much fun inerviewing people last semester with my final art project, and my recordings coming from my ipod will be Mac friendly which is always important.

Here is a photo of a HSBC bank on Irving in the Sunset in S.F. which is also in London. You can barely make out the Sutro Tower which is an unmistakable San Francisco landmark, right above the bank building in the background.

I think that I'm going to open an international student account there when I arrive in London.

Personal DNA report- generous artist

WARNING- each separate link will open a new browser page to some of the pages I was at TODAY!!

This is who I am...today....maybe tomorrow as well...

Generous Artist
I found out about this test when I was 1) on couchsurfing (because I'm a member) 2) on the Free Hug campaign-London meet page 3) checking out the free hug campaign website 4) and forum, 5) then found myself at Area Trace No Search's blog, which was linked to 6) Girl*Next*Door's blog This is where I found out about the test and also how I found out about British comedian, Lee Evans


He's cool. I don't think he is super duper funny however given my current interest in all things British I was trying to soak it all up. He does quite a bit of physical comedy and his material is pretty universal.

Yeah I do this a lot, hopping around one site to another and another and another with each and every link. I never know where each link is eventually going to lead me. It can be quite fun at times. It's not very random, though. I tried doing a small art project inspired by John Cage's chance operations but my navigation from links where not very random, still very subjectively driven. I think it would have worked better if I would have written a program that would randomly select and go to a link on any given page. Hmmm, interesting, but my programming skills are pretty poor. Which reminds me I need to write down my ideas for art projects to get a head start on the next school year. Oh yeah, and I also need to work on my as of yet non-existent website.

Furthur I march ahead

Two things:

#1:

Yesterday morning about 2am (which could be considering Sunday night instead of Monday morning, depending on how you look at it) I set my alarm so I could call back Sir Allan Hillson for Sir John Cass Residence Hall for student accommodation. How official does that sound? He gave me a call on Thursday morning around 7:30am my time last week, so I gave him a call back. After listening to the message he left me about 15 or so times to get the number I called on Friday 8:30am my time only to find out he was out of the office. The second try is a charm (well not really but who’s counting?) so I gave another ring yesterday early. Sure enough after talking to someone at the office who could barely hear me and cause me to spell out my first and surname at nearly the top of my voice (hopefully I didn't wake up my roommates), the phone was handed to Sir Allan Hillson. He was a bit concerned, which is the reason for him contacting my by phone rather that email?

Sir Hillson: "It says here on your application your ** years old" (sorry I'm not going to disclose my age, as of yet)

Me: "yes"

Sir Hillson: "Well I just wanted to contact you to let you know what you are getting yourself into"

Me: "you mean living with a bunch of teenagers. I'm well aware"

Sir Hillson: (small chuckle) "Well yes it can get quite noisy at times. The students living here range from 18-22. I just want you to go into this with your eyes wide open"

I kid you not; he said, "eyes wide open" like 3 times. I assured him that although I never lived in the dorms, or residence halls as they call it there I knew the age range of the students that live at halls and what they act like. I think I can deal, although I'm still not sure whether I'm going to decide to live there after all. It might be a nusence finding private accommodation but it might be better for me and not because I won't be living with 18 to 22 years olds. Hell I act and look like an 18 to 22 year old anyways. Meeting me in person you would be shocked to find out my true chronological age. I swear the older I get the more immature I get. It's quite sad.

#2:

A Milestone:

I told my landlord, whom I saw for the first time in at least a couple of weeks, I was moving out come September. This was after we had a short, uneventful conversation about fog. It was really, I mean really foggy yesterday. He said okay and seemed really sad. I don't think it was about my news. Perhaps it was about his wife, Sophia, my landlady, who recently was diagnosed with cancer. I hope she is doing okay, considering her ill health. It was easier than I thought it would be; it just slipped out. I'm a bit sad to be leaving the household. I'll have to say goodbye to roommates Zully, who has been my closest friend while here in San Francisco (Ahem, ur, Daly City, actually), and young Bonnie, who I was barely getting to know and liked. I have another roommate besides those two but I never talk to her so my feelings are rather neutral for her, naturally.


etc...

Which brings me to my former roommate, Delphine, who is back in her homeland of France. Delphine lived in the room next to mine for 4 months for our first semester at SFSU. She later moved to the city with her then boyfriend, now husband, the following semester closer to school. Before I tell get to the point of this story, let me tell you a fond memory I have of Delphine. Zully, Delphine, and I got into a conversation about ass kissing. Zully seems to think I'm a kiss ass because I get chummy with my professors. Delphine, instead of using the phrase “ass kisser” said "ass licker", which is a direct translation of the French equivalent. As far as I know I think she still says "ass licker" I like the phrase “ass licker”. It's quite graphic and unsettling but I like the French phrase better. Delphine is quite the character and a woman who knows how gets her way, so delightfully devious. I finally emailed her recently and she emailed me back!! Zully and I wanted to go out with her and Matthew for a last big hurrah before Delphine heads off to West Virginia (where her husband is from) and I set off to London. We missed each other, regrettably. She has been in Paris since mid June and is planning on going to West Virginia in September. Maybe she will still be in Paris by the time I arrive in London. That would be fab, to go to Paris, straight away. It's just so close, a 3-hour train ride away!!

and the Order of the Phoenix

Lets start off with what I saw in the theatre yesterday!! I suppose I am a Harry Potter fan, seeing all the movies (all 5 of them), despite not having read any of the books. For shame. I think I'll have to remedy that in order to be a proper fan. I'm going to buy the 1st hefty volume on Half.com, possibly. I went to Century, which is a 10-minute walk from my house for the bargain price of $7.50, for movies starting before 6pm on weekdays. Funny that still seems expensive. I don't have much to say about the movie except for...I liked it. What's not to like about wizards/witches, Hogwarts, and a world hidden away from muggles? I suppose I'm easy to please. I was considering going to Metreon, downtown where they are showing the newest installation of Harry Potter on IMAX, gotta love that, but don't love the price ($15). Do I talk about money too much? It's become a big concern of mine since the knowledge the dollar to the pound, you know. My money will only go half as far there. Scary.

Smoke Free England

Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, so cool, yes, yes!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Oh yes. This is perfect. I might really grow to love this place. Starting July 1st (it has already started) nearly all pubic places indoors will be smoke free according to law. This is sweet. Obviously I'm not a smoker. This is just as cool as when California became smoke free just before I turned 21.

Smokers in England, worry not, in California they have found ways to side step the law, such as outdoor "garden" areas that are attached to bars/clubs, designated smoking shops/cafes/hookah lounges, and there is always smoking outside.

It seems like there is going to be pretty stiff penalties for breaking the law
Here are the specs:

Non-compliance will be a criminal offence

Smoking in smoke free premises or work vehicles: a fixed penalty notice of £50 (reduced to £30 if paid in 15 days) imposed on the person smoking. Or a maximum fine of £200 if prosecuted and convicted by a court.

Failure to display no-smoking signs: a fixed penalty notice of £200 (reduced to £150 if paid in 15 days) imposed on whoever manages or occupies the smokefree premises or vehicle. Or a maximum fine of £1000 if prosecuted and convicted by a court.

Failing to prevent smoking in a smokefree place: a maximum fine of £2500 imposed on whoever manages or controls the smokefree premises or vehicle if prosecuted and convicted by a court. There is no fixed penalty notice for this offence.


Yikes. I don't think its that bad in California. It doesn’t seem like there is any enforcement actually, but it works, people comply. Apparently New York and Dublin are smoke free as well. Is that really true?

http://www.smokefreeengland.co.uk/

What with NHS, legal gay marriage, all sorts of cutting edge art, and now this I may never want to leave!

In my dreams...and then I woke up

My first dream in London!! I was wondering when it would happen, then sure enough. It was glorious. Mind you I have never been to London ever in my life. I've seen pictures as everyone has, I suppose.

It was a short dream between 7:30am-9:30am. My damn alarm woke me up from it. Don't you hate it when you have your alarm from the day before and you forget to turn it off or change it and you end up waking up before you really need to? I love sleep. I love dreams.

The people in my dream had a British accent, fun. Wait, now I feel like I had a continued dream. You know the kind where you wake up from the dream then go back to sleep to find yourself back in the same dream where you left off. Ever had one of those? I love those, when they are not nightmares.

I got woken up by a phone call on my cel. I didn't recognize the number so I didn't pick it up. I was curious who called so I waited for a message. That was around 7:30am. And guess who it was: some bloke calling from Sir John Cass Hall, the residence hall (dorm) I applied to in Hackney. He wanted to talk to me about what I'm getting myself into by living in the hall. I'm not used to hearing British accents so it was a treat to hear. He was trying to leave a number for me to call but kept on messing it up. I was thinking about calling right back but instead I went back to sleep. I'll call early tomorrow morning if I can decipher the number he left me. I might have to go to the website to get the number.

Okay so back to my lovely dream. I remember driving in one of those small European cars with either 3 dudes or one female and 2 dudes not sure. Things get fuzzy the longer I'm awake. But the steering wheel was not on the right side and we were driving on the right side of the road so I got quite a bit wrong in my dream. Sue me; I haven't been there yet so I don't really know what it's like. Well my dream places aren't even close to the real places no matter how well I know a place. I think I just got picked up from the airport and we were on a mission as I often am in my dreams. There was one guy who was hanging out the window most of the time who I think I was flirting with. We drove past this checkpoint where I had to show my passport and the agent ended up getting in the car and showing us his gun, you know just for fun. We ended up picking up this little girl who just lost her family and Dakota Fanning (how she looked like when she did 'Taken', the TV series in 2002) we went the beach or some pool, I dunno. Did we go to the Thames? I'm not sure, again its all getting fuzzy.

What does it all mean? I have no idea. I'm no good at interpreting my dreams. I'm just stoked that I visited my own personal, weird, convoluted London in my sleep.

Maiden Journey

First post, first post, first post! I wanted to do this for a little while, since I've been reading An American in London for maybe a couple of weeks. It's a blog, here at Blogger written by an American PhD student at Kings College who talks about her experience about being, well, an American expat living in London, fancy that. She has been there for 3 years and blogging strong. I don't know if I'll be as prolific as her or sound half way intelligent, but hey, not like anybody is going to read this anyways, right?

There are numerous options for blog hosting and I couldn't decide where I wanted to post. I've blogged before, not with any consistency on a few other sites, live journal and My Space to name a couple. Well, since I already had an account here because of school, well, here I am.

I'm still here, in the States as I call it, but not for long. I'm off to the UK, specifically London September 10th. I'll arrive there the 11th. Hmmm, I'll be arriving on foreign soil on the 6th anniversary of 9-11. That is going to be interesting. Wonder if I'll be considered a terrorist. I dunno, just a thought. The time is creeping up on me. All I can think about is the move. It's all I can talk about as well. I must be really boring people with London this and UK that. Lets hope this is a good outlet for me to blah, blah, blah-dee-blah about everything British that I'm obsessing over.

What am I obsessing over at the moment? I've been spending a lot of money lately. First was my round-trip plane ticket for $684, which was a big milestone for me, signifying that I'm actually going, things are serious now, say goodbye to California and Mexican food serious.

Then there was the faxing of the registration form for the classes I'm going to take in the fall, or as they call it autumn. Oh yeah, currently I'm an undergrad student at San Francisco State spending my senior year abroad at London Metropolitan Uni. It took me a full day to navigate London Mets website to come up with my schedule, a nightmarish day, where at the end I didn't care what classes I was taking as long as I had classes. I had to get a signature on my form from my academic advisor who I think wasn't actually in town. I emailed a PDF of the filled out form to him, he printed it out, signed it, scanned it and emailed it back to me, where I printed it out and faxed it to London, twice. Yeah, the first time I faxed it, I sent it to the wrong office. Ordeal! That didn't cost me much; set me back 5 bucks, but another big fat nail in the coffin. I mention coffin and allude to death because death as prescribed by tarot card readings means significant chance. As a human, a creature of comfort I dread change, no matter how positive it may be.

Next on spending agenda, registration fees for London Met, £390 (~$780). This is on top of my tuition fees. Most recent hefty fee (it just never ends), the visa application fee costing me only $208. I paid online yesterday, all furrowed brow and bated breath, when I finished my application. Thank you C. for letting me use your address on the form. You are my only friend in London, UK, or Europe for that matter. I made the mistake of choosing to submit the application along with all of the related documents in person. What was I thinking? This is what I'm obsessing about at this particular moment. I don't think I can even go back on that decision.

I needed to make an appointment at the consular office in L.A. I don't even have a car. I made an appointment in two weeks but I cancelled it. I'm still waiting for my unconditional acceptance letter from London Met. I need this for my visa. It would be too much of a pain to take bus or plane there because I still have to find a way to get to the British Consular by car (I wouldn't even think of public transportation, probably would take me 2-3 hours to get to my destination). I could rent a car but I don't have a credit card (I cut up my cards a year ago). I don't think I could use my debit card. I'm looking at spending $150 for the rental and gas, at least. Why? I don't want to go in person. I would have an appointment in the morning and would have to wait till 2 or 5 till I could get my visa and could leave. I want to send my stuff in the mail.

I had a cheap attack when I made my decision to file in person. I was thinking, oh I don't want to spend another $12 to send it by mail, I'll do it in person, there’s a British Consular office in San Francisco, right? Well, yes there is one but they don't deal in visas. Your regional consular is in L.A, a 6-hour drive or an 8-11 hour bus ride away. Remember you don't have a car anymore; you sold it before you moved up to the bay area. They have a visa help/question line, good place to call, right? I could ask them if there is any penalty for me sending it in the mail when I stated I was going to go in person. Oh yeah, it cost $2.49 per minute to call this phone number. Bloody hell!! I'm afraid to send it in the mail with a $12 check. They might turn down my application because I didn't go according to policy or something. I could be freaking out over nothing, maybe. Why does it seem that a big move always ends up costing more money than you plan on spending because you don't know better.