I HAVE SO MUCH TO FILL YOU IN ON.
I’ll try to be somewhat organized… okay first of all:
I SAW THE 1975 IN CONCERT IN LONDON.
Let me tell you though, it was stressful and a half just to get my ticket to go! I ordered it way back in July, setting my shipping address as my house in the states (which was crazzzzyy expensive to ship). When it got to be time for me to leave for England in September, I still hadn't received my ticket. So I got on and changed my delivery address to Kent. After being there a couple days, I still hadn't received anything. Getting a little nervous, seeing as how the concert was the next week, I emailed the company. The next day I got a response telling me that my supplier (for the ticket, not drugs) "miscounted his stock" and didn't have any tickets for the October 1st show; but, he did have one extra for the September 30th show. He offered to refund all my shipping expenses if I chose to take the ticket. Now I was confronted with a problem. I had already planned to meet up with some other kids studying abroad in London for the October 1st show... Meaning, I didn't know anyone going to the September 30th one. I was in a bit of a predicament: do I go see this British band perform IN BRITAIN by myself or do I just get my money back? As you can imagine, the parents advised me not to go. Not trying to sound like a little teenage girl but I reallyy wanted to go to this concert. I was struggling to decide what to do when I turned on my music. You guessed it, The 1975 came on. Matthew Healy’s voice pretty much confirmed for me that I was going.
I know I'm all big and bad doing this study abroad stuff all on my own but not gonna lie, I was a bit concerned with going to London by myself especially because I'd have to stay overnight seeing as how the concert wouldn't get out till busses and trains had already stopped for the night.
On our way to Leeds Castle on Sunday, I was sharing my bittersweet story with this other American girl, Ellie, who I met at the International Dinner. Ellie is from Portland so needless to say, she has impeccable taste in music. When I said it was to see The 1975, she said she was all in to go if there was any way we could find her a ticket. Not letting myself get too excited because I knew tickets were just about all, if not all, sold out, I told her I would definitely check when we got back to campus. I found a pair of tickets for the Tuesday show on Ebay (UK edition ;P) but they wanted a lot for them and we really just needed one... Decided to check StubHub just in case... Annnnd success!! I used my super speedy ninja skills to grab the only remaining ticket for that night at the lowest price (can I get a BOOYAHHH). Got it all ordered and we would just pick it up on our way to the concert. Nice, cool, all is good! Almost... I still didn't have my ticket. I've already done a long narration how I got Ellie's ticket so, long story short, my ticket finally arrived to campus 2 hours before our train for London was supposed to leave. Talk about just in time.
To continue with this theme, our train was supposed to leave at 4:25. Ellie got out of class at 4. Canterbury is approximately a 10 minute drive from campus. Dean, our awesome English friend, bless his heart, offered to drive us to town so we didn't have to wait for the bus. Dean picked us up at 4:10 (this was the first time riding in an English car…sooooo freaky). He channeled his inner James Bond (or my father) and got us to the train station at 4:18. Just in time.
Once we got on the train, concert tickets in hand, we were officially allowed to get excited. We took our seats on the train and it justtt so happened that the boy sitting across from us was listening to his iPod at that volume when earbuds can't quite keep to themselves. These rebellious sound waves just so happened to be part of a song called "The City" by this one band who just so happens to be called The 1975. "WE'RE GOING TO SEE THEM TONIGHT!" The boy, a little startled, pulled one earbud out, "What?" I really gotta work on this not freaking out at people thing... After he established that I wasn't some crazy person yelling at strangers on trains, we had a good talk about music. He told us that the concert hall, (Alexandra Palace but apparently all the cool kids call it “Ally Pally”) was located on the top of a hill and gave you a really awesome view of London at night. So, as you can imagine, by this point Ellie and I are just overflowing with excitement.
Not quite done with my “just in time” bit. We arrived in London at 5:30. Doors for the concert opened in exactly one hour; and we still had to pick up Ellie’s ticket. We navigated our way to Great Portland Street only to find ourselves in the “200’s”. The StubHub office was at “29”. It was currently 5:50. If only I had taken Dr. Matthew’s speed-walking class… We were bookin it though and made it there a little after 6. The woman at the StubHub office told us it would probably be faster to take the underground to get closer to the venue, so Ellie got to have her first big Tube experience right during rush hour. The Tube spit us out not far from the hill that “Ally Pally” was on. We joined a big caravan of other people going to the concert and together, we made the trek up the hill.
When we finally got to the venue, about 6:45, we were greeted by THE LONGEST LINE I HAVE EVER SEEN. This snake of a line was seriously insane. We made our way along the (HUGE) building, down the stairs, and back down the other side of the hill to join the line. Once it started moving, it didn’t take too long to get in. Definitely had a Dorothy moment when I walked in to this building. I guess the stadium that Deck the Hall Ball was in was a little bigger but this was a pretyyy ginormous venue. You walked into this main atrium area with all sorts of food and merchandise vendors. We stopped to pick up a tour shirt and continued on through the massive doorway leading to the concert area. Considering there WERE SO MANY PEOPLE, we got a pretty good place and as the concert went on, we got an even better one. The opening band “Circa Waves” was pretty good! They sang a song about being “a long way from home” and Ellie and I decided they wrote it about us. Summary time: the concert was just absolutely amazing. They were such incredible performers and guaranteed the fact we saw them at their home base made it such a special show. They kept telling everyone what a big deal it was for them to be playing there, and consistently thanked everyone for their support. It was just great. It was really cool too because for their song “Me” which is a super sensitive, personal song for them, Matthew Healy asked everyone to please put their phones away and just listen. He said “Most of you have only seen us on a screen, so now is a chance for you all to be present now with us in person. Plus, this song is super important to me, so please just be here.” Pretty amazing. Ahhhhhh <3 So happy everything worked out for me to be able to go.
After the show, we began our search for the hostel we were going to be staying at (YEAH FIRST TIME IN A HOSTEL!!) I have lots more to write about so long story short, we got lost getting there and were very close to considering “sleeping on the streets of London”. We found a cab service though and that was probably the best £8 we have ever spent. We would have been walking all night to find this place (moral of the story, when you don’t really know where exactly you’re going in a big city at night, just take a cab). But yes, no worries, we made it to the hostel okay (which I was having some major deja-vu because this place looked EXACTLY like a place I have dreamt about before…but it was actually a really messed up scary dream so I was trying not to think about that part too much. Anyway, the first hostel experience wasn’t bad! We were sharing a room with a guy from Spain so I got to practice my Spanish a little bit! He was kind of overly friendly and kept telling us how “bonita” we were so I think between this and the not-very-comfortable mattress, and all the adrenaline I was feeling after getting to see The 1975 (in Londonnn), I didn’t really sleep too well. We woke up early the next day, had some breakfast and began our day-in-London adventure!
Ellie hadn’t been to London yet so we decided we would definitely go to Parliament and Westminster Abbey area. Seeing as how our hostel was kinda out in the boonies, we figured we would do some things around there before we headed all the way back into the heart of the city. I pulled up my “Banksy London Tour Map” and it just so happened (maybe I should have titled this blog “It just so happened”…) there was a Banksy location on this west side of town (cuz Banksy’s a G…west siiiiide). So yesssssss I got to see some more Banksy ((((: This one was the “Master Artist” one that he actually painted in broad daylight with people around! He installed a covered scaffolding the night before so that the next day, he was able to create his masterpiece while the unsuspecting public walked by. #champ.
What was cool about this location too is that it was on “Portobello Road” which is famous for it’s big “Portobello Road Market” (yes they do sell HUGE Portobello mushrooms but no that isn’t all they have;)) This area is part of the district Notting Hill which is definitely worth visiting. Take caution though because there are a lot of fun, cute little shops that lure you in pretty quick. What is most dangerous, for me at least (I didn’t say “Elyse”, Dillon :P) is THERE IS A BANKSY STORE. Thank goodness Ellie is so nice and patient with me because I was extremely excited about this shop and was walking around just repeating “Ohmygoshthisisthebeststoreever” over and over. BUT SERIOUSLY THEY HAD SO MUCH BANKSY STUFF. They had dozens of prints, magnets, canvases, framed-pictures, posters, you name it all of Banksy!! It was kind of amazing. OH! And they even had wall decals!!! For those of you who don’t know, my amazing friend Bridger specially ordered me a HUGE wall decal from New Zealand of my absolute favorite Banksy piece- The “There is always hope” girl with the heart-shaped balloon. I had put it up in my dorm room at school because I knew I was going to be a CA in that room for a couple years. When I decided to do this study abroad, I knew I’d have to part ways with my beloved wall decal. Although it’s not exactly the same, I found one at this shop! So that kind of made my day even more (:
Onward! Next we visited this one road that apparently is pretty popular. Some musical group named an album after it or something… Yes, we got to see Abbey Road!!! (((: It sounds silly because I mean yeah it’s just a crosswalk, but it was honestly so much fun walking across! And we got a good ab-workout from watching everyone else do it too and of course, take their album-cover picture (: There was a group of older people in front of us that oh my goodness I should have recorded it…it was just priceless. They were very precise and everything had to be just so and one of the men kept repositioning the photographer. Ellie and I decided we would need to come back with two other people and not smile or look at the camera next time so we could take a serious, official picture like these guys did. Regardless though, it was so much fun and really cool to walk where such legends and downright geniuses have walked.
From there, singing Beatles songs, we navigated the tube back to Westminster Station so I could introduce Ellie to my new friend Ben. We got ourselves some AMAZING Sicilian pizza and a nice mixed berry cider and had a little picnic in front of Westminster Abbey. Awesome ending to an awesome trip. From there, it was time to make our way to Victoria Coach Station and return to Canterbury.
We made it back to campus just in time (haha sorry, again with the just in time!) for the big 50th anniversary celebration that was going on. Not only did I pick an unbelievably beautiful campus, but picked a good time to come! This year, the University of Kent celebrates their 50th anniversary so they are having lots of events and celebrations happening throughout the year. First Carroll’s centennial celebration now this 50th! Getting to go to all the celebrations (: They had their official unveiling of the “Kent Eye” they built on campus in honor of the anniversary. Yes, relation to the London Eye—There is now a gigantic ferris wheel on my campus. I have a ferris wheel on my campus. How cool is that?? ((: There was also live music, food, and speeches by important university personal (Dr. Evans, their president has nothing on you). The night concluded with a nice little firework show (okay, it was big. My concept of impressive fireworks is just skewed after Symphony Under the Stars…).
Overall, just a veryyyy solid last two days. I am so excited to share it so thank you all for reading this! I know it was quite long this time…
Hope you all are doing well!
Keep Calm and Rock On.
Cheers!
E