We're Back!

You may have been wondering where we’ve been for the past month. We took a break from school to go help settle the crises in Egypt, Libya and Japan. Too soon? We wish we could save the world right now but we’ve actually been playing tour guides for the past few weeks… not as legit.

Before we had two weeks of non-stop guests, we made a trip over to Oxford to give some guest lectures about the greatest county in the world: America. We were well received by the students and faculty. We both have some old friends that are Oxford students and they showed us around the campus. They were Auburn and Princeton alums so it was good to have some bonding time with fellow Tigers (see how it works for both schools?). In all seriousness, Oxford was absolutely beautiful! We visited places where C.S. Lewis hung out, saw some gorgeous churches and snuck into a couple of the residential colleges. The best way to describe our Oxford weekend is with the word “old.” Old buildings, old friends, and old habits (lots of ice cream and coffee). It was great!

Visitor Number 1: Kyle Greene

Kyle, Steph’s cousin, is an aerospace engineering major at the University of Central Florida. He enjoys reading Harry Potter and playing football (or as you Americans call it: soccer). This made him the perfect London guest.

The trip was a surprise to both him and Steph from his parents so Steph only had about two days to plan a week of London adventures. Good thing we’re locals and know all of the hot spots. We saw Stomp, ate some fish and chips and did all of the touristy things.

Visitor Number 2: Jennifer Palmquist

“Jenn”, Stina’s friend, is an English major at Princeton University. She plays volleyball and loves love (yes, you read that correctly).

Visitor Number 3: Caroline Jo

“CoJo”, Stina’s other friend, is a Woody Woo major (the Princeton school of International Affairs and Public Policy for you non-Princetonians). She enjoys shopping for shoes and saving the environment.

We spent the week taking the girls to all the best spots in London, not Buckingham Palace or Big Ben but the more important spots. We spent quite a lot of time on Oxford street shopping at Primark, Top Shop, Next and H&M. And even more time in the best cafes with lots of coffee and desserts. Don’t worry we showed them the historical, “cultural” things as well. The girls were on their Spring Break so we started every day’s activities at 2 p.m. We pretended like we were on SBXI too.

It was great to have all of these visitors and two weeks of Spring Break (after our own Spring Break-remember Madrid and Lisbon?) Unfortunately in the next two weeks we have some actual work to do, real classes to go to and long papers to write. After being here for so long we have learned the London way of doing things. We decided to make a compilation of some things we love about this city, some things we miss from home and some not so fun parts of living abroad. Use your imagination.

We have thoroughly enjoyed every moment of being in London and intend to make the best of our last few weeks. Sorry for the delay in putting up blog posts (Jack). There will be many more to come in the near future :)

Cheers!