Tenterhooks- a True Story

If a person is on tenterhooks, they are in a state of uneasy suspense or painful anxiety.  This originates from the hooks or bent nails that hold cloth stretched on a tenter (thank you, dictionary.com).  On a side note, a tenter is a frame that cloth is stretched on so that it dries evenly.

The reason I bring up tenterhooks is because I was thinking of the excitement of getting ready to come over to London.  I know that you have packing to do, flatmates for find, money to sort out and summer jobs to wrap up, too.  But I remember being in your position.  With all that going on, I just wanted to get on the plane and come over to London!  My anxiety wasn't painful and there wasn't really any uneasy suspense, but I was waiting impatiently for that departure date to arrive.  I was so ready to be in London!

Everything I'm about to relate truly happened.  You can ask my mom.

There are only a few highlights of my own departure and arrival in London as a study abroad student that flash across my memory.  I knew what I wanted to pack, and I had everything laid out in organized piles in my room at home.  Of course I knew that they needed to be in a suitcase to get them over to London, but there they sat in my room until around 2am the morning of my flight (I think I was leaving O'Hare around 10am to connect to my transatlantic red-eye from Newark later that day) when I panicked and chucked my neat piles into my duffel bag and backpack.  I think I spent a lot of time sitting on my duffel, struggling to get it closed, and not a single moment of that night sleeping.  Another memory was my arrival at O'Hare.  My mother came with me to the check-in desk, and while I was waiting I was going through the checklist I had been sent.  I had my acceptance letter to show at the border, but I had completely forgotten to ask my parents to write me a letter of support to say that they would help me financially, if I needed.  So, very quickly, while waiting to check-in, my mom scrawled a note on the back of Bill's big summer quiz, which used to be posted to students in a big pack of papers (only some of the questions have changed in the last decade), to say that she wouldn't let me go broke while abroad.

This next bit now causes me to shudder, since immigration is now a large part of my job.  When I arrived in London I hadn't really slept on the flight and I hadn't slept a wink the night before, so I was perhaps a little loopy from lack of sleep.  One thing I do know, there were two border agents at the desk I approached, the trainer and the trainee.  As a result I received a thorough questioning from the trainer who seemed to be setting an example.  I was baffled when I was asked my mother's maiden name, because she didn't change it when she got married.  Then, more importantly, they asked me how much money I had.  That was a much easier question, knowing the contents of my pockets.  "$5," I said.  "$5?" he asked.  "Yes," I said.  No problem, I hit that one straight out of the park.  He just stared at me.  "Anything else at all?" he asked.  "Nope," I said, still batting 1,000.  "You're telling me that you've just flown over from the USA with an empty bank account and no credit or debit cards?" he asked.  "Oh.  Of course I have those.  I thought you wanted to know how much cash I had on me."  Batting 500.  And I completely forgot to show him the note from my mom (though the state of it would probably just have attested to my disorganization even more).  Batting 0.  He rolled his eyes and stamped my passport, and I entered the UK.  In my defense, I hadn't had much sleep, but I'm not here to make excuses for my moments of delinquency.  I was a bit of a numpty that morning.

Me as a study abroad student.  I'm the one in the middle

The moral of my story is this: no matter how ready you think you are, get some rest and don't panic.  The upside is that I'm able to bring experience to my job. 

-Claire

PS- I'm pretty sure it's not usual to be asked your mother's maiden name at immigration.

Four Month Let!

Last summer Bill, Sarah and I all wrote posts about where we live as an effort to get conversation about housing rolling.  What that turned into was Bill slamming South London (he is a passionate North Londoner, and Sarah and I both live south of the river).  This summer we are taking a new approach.  Sarah has put a poll up on our facebook group so that students can get a jump on organizing groups for housing.  Living in a group is great for cost cutting, and they usually range in size from 3-6 people.  Bill has emailed a document with information about housing in his last group email.  Have a look at it and start preparing yourself for the flat-hunt, if that's the route you choose.  There is also info about pre-arranging your housing by going the homestay or dorm route.  These options may cost a bit more than a flat found during the first week, but you can usually move right in when you arrive.

Spring 2011 flat hunters

The flat hunt is something of an ICLC tradition.  For many of you it is something you have never done before, and you will continue using the skills you pick up throughout your life when finding a place to live.  Bill, Sarah, Heather and I are here to coach you all the way, so even though you will be swimming in the deep end, we have never known any students not to make it out the other side of the flat-hunt.  For some of you signing your name to a lease may be the first time you have put your name to anything other than an email account.  A lot of students mature significantly while flat hunting.

The story of my group's flat-hunt nearly a decade ago has gone down into ICLC folklore.  In some versions of the story we were wandering the streets of London like 6 hungry, homeless students.  In other versions we lived in a palatial, penthouse flat.  Just to clarify, it's all true, with a little exaggeration.  Yes, we were all theater majors, yes, life was all drama, but just remember, Drama is something people can major in.  Looking back, the real issue was that our friends were housed and we were not (for much of the week).  In reality  we had options.  We saw a lot of flats, and we said No to a lot of flats.  The flat that we finally settled on was one that seemed too good to be true.  Until the estate agent explained that the owner was desperate to let her flat, so much so that she had reduced the rent, we thought it might be a scam.  From Tuesday morning when we first saw it until Thursday afternoon when we decided to revisit the flat, the time that passed felt like an eternity of never ending flat viewings.  We signed Friday morning and enjoyed a lovely weekend of moving in and finding a local grocery store.  I can't remember if this predated Google, but it definitely predated having internet in our flat, so we had to find a store on foot.  Three of us went left and three of us went right and the group that found a supermarket phoned the other and tried their best to give directions.  Again, more drama ensued.

Most students find flats in the first couple days.  Everyone finds something by the end of the week.  This is one of the most frequently read responses in our evaluations when we ask, What 3 things do you think are essential for us to tell you when you first get here?  The Spring 2011 group said, "I think it was important to hear everyone say that we would find a flat no matter what because everyone was so nervous about it", "Don’t stress about housing, you WILL find a place to live", "Don’t panic, you will find some place to live and you will figure out how to get around".  A few people have asked to see what the private landlords that we have contact with have available already.  We will post this information when you arrive.  It changes so quickly that orientation week is the earliest we can give you accurate information.  Students have tried to prearrange with private landlords in the past and have been disappointed with the flats they discovered they had signed for without seeing.  This is mostly a question of expectations and we recommend that you see what is being offered before putting anything on paper.

Things you can do before you arrive:
1. Find people to live with.  Remember that it is only four months and that you will probably be out enjoying London and traveling more than you will be hanging out in your flat.  We have set up a facebook group called Ithaca College London Center Fall 2011, which you are welcome to use to meet the other students coming over.
2. Think about how you will access your money.  At the end of the first week here you will need to pay 1 month's rent in advance AS WELL AS your security deposit (a few weeks worth of rent).  This is a lot of money and most people pay it in cash (check out the previous post about accessing your money while abroad).  Keep an eye on the exchange rate at www.oanda.com.
3. Do a bit of research on areas in London.  Recently we have had students living in Bayswater, Edgware Road, Hammersmith, Fulham, West Kensington and even a group in Kilburn.  Go to www.tfl.gov.uk and become familiar with the tube map.  You can also research bus routes from there.  Buses that stop near the London Center are the 49, 74, 430 and C1.

This is how excited you will be when you are done flat hunting!

Most importantly, stay open minded and enthusiastic.  You are here to experience life in London.  It will probably be like nothing you have ever done before and nothing you will do again.

-Claire

What Fall 2010 said...

As with any Ithaca College course, students fill out evaluations at the end of the term here.  One of the most popular questions is, "Do you actually read these?"  Bill, Sarah, Heather and I always smile and answer yes to this question.  Fall 2010 students, if you thought this was an empty response, prepare to be wowed.

Dear Spring 2011 ICLC students,
One of the questions that we ask in the evaluation of the ICLC is "What 3 things do you think are essential for us to tell you when you first get here?"  Here are some of the most popular answers:

• "Learn about buses"- Buses are part of the Transport for London (TfL) system.  You can use your Oyster card on them, and the fare is less than that of the Tube.  You only have to tap your Oyster when you get on the bus.  They are great for getting a sense of the geography of London, especially from the top of a double decker bus.  Buses run throughout the day and night (24 hr buses and night buses) so they are particularly handy after the Tube has closed for the night.
• "How to set up internet"- You must have a BT landline in your flat and have it switched on to get broadband.  Though you only want it for the 4 months that you are here, the minimum contract is longer so build the cancellation charge into the cost of turning the line on.  You can get your internet from other providers (Be There does short contracts), but the BT landline must be on.  If your flat does not have phone access you can get a dongle (that's what they're really called here, I bet they might be called something else in the USA).  Dongles can be bought from mobile phone providers and work on the mobile phone network.  You can buy a pay as you go version that you top up in the same way as you do a pay as you go mobile phone.
• "The deal with transportation"- One of the most user friendly public transport systems in the world is London's Tube (this is what we call the subway).  The different lines have names and are color coded.  The system closes around midnight each night and opens around 5am the following morning.  It can be accessed with paper tickets, but are more cost effective if you use an Oyster card.  You must tap your card on the reader to enter the barriers and then tap it again at the barrier to exit.  As students you are eligible for student Oyster cards, which give you a 30% discount on travelcards (travel passes for a week or a month).  You can also top them up with prepaid money on them.  London is divided into zones in concentric circles and prices vary depending on which zones you are traveling in.  TfL has a website with info about all the forms of transport they offer www.tfl.gov.uk.  On most weekends there is construction work on the Tube and many line and station closures.  You can check the website for updates on travel disruptions, or sign up through the website to have the weekend closures emailed to you.  
• "How Tube strikes work"- This past fall we also experienced Tube strikes.  These are union strikes, usually scheduled for a weekday beginning at 5pm and lasting around 24 hours.  Tube strike days are usually good ones to have plans to take the bus or walk wherever you need to go.  Bear in mind that these strikes DO NOT CAUSE CLASSES TO BE CANCELED. We are all crossing our fingers that there are not more Tube strikes.
• "Emergency numbers"- 999 is the main number for the emergency services in the UK.  112 is used through much of Europe and is also an option in the UK.  911 can also be used, but it is not the best.  I'm not sure how the different numbers are routed to the emergency services, but just to be safe use 999 or 112.
• "Introduce the professors"- Most of our faculty are of British extraction, with a few exceptions.  They lecture for us part time, and many also work for other universities.  Courses are structured more towards the British system than American, so there is more focus on essay writing than quizzes.  
• "Get rent money out for rent early"- Most landlords take cash payments that students either deposit into the landlord's bank account or the landlord comes and collects.  Most do not accept checks in US dollars.  It can be very difficult to set up a bank account when you arrive here, so don't rely on that.  Because you are most likely going to have a limit on how much money you can withdraw per day start taking out your rent money a few days in advance.  Also remember that you will also have to put down a deposit with your first month's rent, so allow for the extra days of withdrawing cash during orientation week.  Unlike the USA which asks at the ATM if you would like to withdraw from you checking or savings, UK ATMs will automatically take from your checking.  Make sure that your money is in your checking, NOT your savings account.
• "Common real estate agency practices"- Different estate agents will offer different deals, but remember that they are all trying to sell you something.  We have copies of old leases that you can read to see what they are like here in the housing room during orientation week.  Some you will need to chase up for internet access if that was offered as part of the flat.  We want you all living in safe places so remember to check for things like the record that the gas boiler (if there is one) has had its annual check.  Get everything about the flat in writing and if you aren't sure, feel free to ask any of the ICLC staff about it.  Clarify how and when your deposits will be returned to you when you move out of your flat.
• "Relax, you'll find housing"- In the same vein, someone also recommended a reminder to breath.  These two are pretty self explanatory.  Same with "We will find a flat".  This statement is a fact.
• "British slang"- We have a small dictionary of this waiting for you in your orientation pack.
• "Learn that your [fake] British accent just doesn't cut it"- I fear this led to an awkward evening in a pub?  Not sure.
• "There are no trash cans here, beware!"- That's not strictly true, though you will probably notice that you can't find a bin when you are looking for one.  There are generally none in train and Tube stations.  London has much experience in anti-terrorism measures, of which this is one (bombs in trash cans), and I believe this practice goes back to the days of the IRA.  I'm not sure if this is a fact, and I'm open to being told I'm wrong, but there are nonetheless fewer bins in public areas than you may find in America.

The fall 2010 groups also says to the spring 2011 students:

See you all soon!
-Elsie (and Claire)

Scootering through Orientation Week

I would like to measure this fall's orientation week against a loaf of bread.

This summer, for my birthday, I was given a bread machine. I love making bread in it, though I sometimes get frustrated because I don't make it through the whole loaf of bread in the course of a week, by which time it starts growing mold.  In an effort to waste less food, I haven't made a ton of loaves of bread.  But on Monday evening of this week, when I had come home from a day of feverishly preparing the ICLC for the arrival of 50 new students, I thought I would make a loaf of bread.  Normally orientation week has the building buzzing with students coming in and out all day reporting back on flats that they have looked at, finding out about how to withdraw enough money to put down a deposit, how to set up internet, where to go for their internship, which areas of London are both nice and affordable...  With all this excitement happening in the building I could foresee very little opportunity of popping out to get a bite to eat, and with a loaf of fresh bread at home I decided it would be a good week for homemade sandwiches.

Fresh fall '10 faces, straight off the plane

It's now Thursday, and the building is pretty quiet.  By Wednesday evening most groups of students either had flats sorted or very promising leads that just needed a bit of finalization.  I, as it turns out, have the time to go out and get something to eat if I want.  I'm not going to, because I have been responsible about making sandwiches each morning this week.  Actually, I'm beginning to think that I should continue doing this, because I have tallied my bill for lunch this week and it comes to an average of about £1.50 a day.  I can't complain on that count.  I can also report that this loaf of bread has been the perfect size to make for a week of sandwiches, with very little left over.  I think by Friday afternoon the whole loaf will have been eaten!  This will be a real first for my bread machine and me.

I baked that bread!

Knock on wood, the housing experience seems to be going pretty smoothly.  When I was a student here my group was that last to sign a lease.  I think it wasn't until Friday afternoon that we signed.  That afternoon felt as if it came years later than the Tuesday afternoon three days earlier that we started flat hunting.  With any luck, those feelings of complete exhaustion and weariness won't be plaguing the fall '10 students.  You can sit back and enjoy the feeling of satisfaction that comes with having a place to live.

The Common Room isn't usually this empty during Orientation Week

It looks like everything is coming together for the semester.  The builders have nearly finished all their work in the bathrooms, though I would keep an eye out for 'Wet Paint' signs around the building.  The students are hopefully getting a bit of free time to be tourists in London before the term starts.  And Bill, Sarah and I all got to take a turn on the scooter belonging to Pete, the builder.  As for my bread, I have learned that with diligence I can eat a whole loaf on my own over the course of a week.

This is Bill's scootering face

-Claire (and Elsie)

Maybe it's because I'm a Londoner...

Reader, should you ever need to provide an example of bias, prejudice or arrogance, read on.

Here’s a question for the apprentice Londoners you are soon to become: what links Parliament, Buckingham Palace, Soho, St James’ Palace, Clarence House [home of Wills, Harry and their dad], Kensington Palace [post divorce home of their late mum], Hyde Park, Covent Garden, Oxford Street, the four Inns of Court [Lincoln's, Gray's, Middle Temple, Inner Temple – where solicitors and barristers are trained], Westminster Abbey, Westminster Cathedral, St Paul’s Cathedral, the Wren churches, the Old Bailey [the Central Criminal Court], the Royal Courts of Justice, Fleet Street [ancient home of the press], the City, 9/10's of the Underground, 11 of the 13 railway termini [including the Eurostar terminus at St Pancras], the Guildhall, Canary Wharf [new home of business], all three Olympic sites [1908, 1948 and 2012], over 150 Embassies and High Commissions, the 73 bus, the major museums [British, V&A, Tate Britain, Tate Modern, Science, Natural History, London, Docklands, Soane], all 5 of London’s Premiership football teams, Lords [the home of world cricket], 4 of London’s 5 airports,…? I could go on, but will restrict myself to three more, the Ithaca College London Centre, MY HOUSE and MY CATS! [OK, I know cats own you, not the other way around.] Have you figured out the common denominator yet? Right, they are all in north London because virtually everything that is important in London is north of the river. Sorry, Claire!

Second Question: of the 15 million visitors to London this year, how many have gone south of the river? Is it 1%, 0.5%, 0.75%, or 1.25%? Note well: I am not including the 2 coach loads of Japanese tourists who took a wrong turn in Parliament Square, crossed Westminster Bridge, only to be ambushed by Lambeth authorities demanding to see passports and visas and to inspect luggage for contraband. Since they didn’t have visas, Lambeth authorities imposed a crushing £500 fine on each person and confiscated their coaches, rings, cameras and watches. OK, Ok, I exaggerate, the above is ‘fiction’ [but fiction informs prejudice], but there can be no disputing the fact that the Thames divides London unevenly. The fates have favoured the north; they showered Heavyweight North London with rich and plentiful gifts, while casting only the crumbs to the South.

Oh, my colleague, my co-blogger, she who misguidedly raised London’s North-South divide, do not betray your south London affiliations. No one will take you seriously. It is better to sleep rough north of the river than to maintain a domicile in the south. It is more fun to spend a week at the dentist having all your teeth removed than to party in south London. It is more nutritious to exist on a diet of crisp bread and prunes than to sit at a south London table. Contrasting the merits of north and south London is a bit like betting on the likely outcome of a game between the NY Yankees and the winners of the Little League World Series. Of course, the south has some bits and pieces that merit a brief and hush-hush visit, like Wimbledon [that’s why no British man has won the title in over 70 years; it cannot be that serious if it’s south of the river], Greenwich [abandoned by the royals in the 17th century], Shakespeare’s Globe [wrongly located], the National Theatre & the Old Vic, but 95% of theatre land is north of the river. If officials at the US Embassy in Grosvenor Square [north London] read this blog, they might re-think the decision of the State Department to re-locate the Embassy south of the river. Finally, this blogger has to admit that there is an oasis of sanity and good taste in Colliers Wood south London.

Ah, Stoke Newington, the ‘new village in the woods’, its housing stock chiefly mid-Victorian, just off the old Roman road running from Bishopsgate in the City to Lincoln and the north, full of trendy up and coming lawyers, teachers, & other professionals, a little Istanbul given the number of Turkish eateries, clubs, flower shops & barber shops in the High and Church streets [immerse yourself by coming up and sampling some ‘Testes’, the actual name of one of or local restaurants], adjacent to Britain’s largest Hasidic community, where football allegiances are split between Tottenham [Spurs] and Arsenal [Gunners or Gooners], where foxes roam the streets and gardens at night, where the bibulous wait outside the Rochester Castle at 10am on Sunday mornings to resume their pint consumption of Saturday night, where house prices are lower because the tube doesn’t go there, where young artists, musicians and gay people live. Stoke Newington, STOKEY or just plain N16 is a microcosm of the diversity, creativity and inner city problems of this FANTASTIC WORLD CITY.

IMPORTANT NUMBERS are 149, 73, 76, 476, 243, 106, 67: no they’re not my lucky lottery numbers, they’re the buses that take you into and out of my turf, my manor. I’ve lived in ‘Stokey’ for 28 years and I’m a governor of a local primary and a local secondary school. I live in one of the five 2012 Olympic Boroughs [Newham, where the stadium is located, Waltham Forest, Hackney, Tower Hamlets and Greenwich]. My borough, Hackney, has the media centre, an important location for IC students from the Park school who hopefully will be interning here in summer 2012.

Finally, where lies my football allegiance in the country that invented the game? The cats give it away: Kolo and Sami – no Spurs fan would name his cats thus. And while on the subject of football, one of my favourite things, what’s the score over here? Alas it’s 3 to the south [maybe 4 if we count our postman who helps with odd jobs] and only 2 to the north. Although we are currently a goal down, Elsie, the other northerner on staff, would agree with me that the north is where’s it’s all happening. And if I might be prejudiced, she certainly is not. Stay tuned for the voice of sanity, Elsie’s blog.
-The only Dog from north of the river (and Elsie)

Claire's Camberwell

London loves its rivalries.  You can be an Arsenal supporter or a Chelsea supporter (or any of the other 9 football teams in London), you can vote Labour or Conservative (or Liberal Democrat or Plaid Cymru or Pirate Party UK or any one of over 100 parties listed standing in the 2010 UK General Election), you can be a North Londoner or a South Londoner (not to mention an East Londoner or a West Londoner).  The North/South divide created by the River Thames is one of London's oldest rivalries, as the water creates a natural barrier.  Both sides have their pros and cons: North London is better serviced by the London Underground system, while South London often has more affordable property.  For the first three years that I lived in London I was a North Londoner and proud of it.  It seemed that with each passing year I moved further and further north, going from Camden to Highgate to Muswell Hill, sinking my roots deeper and deeper into the north.  But then I left London.  When I came back I looked up an old friend who was thinking of moving and we decided that we would become flatmates.  I was beginning a job in London Bridge and she was starting work that would keep her traveling between Chelsea and Camberwell.  With two out of three of those locations in South London, that was where we decided to base our flat hunt.  In the course of about three days we had found a great flat in Camberwell.

Having grown up in the suburbs of Chicago I like streets with leafy trees combined with some sounds of traffic.  When we first saw our street I knew I already liked it.  With lovely terraces of Victorian and Georgian homes, a handfull of bus stops within 5 minutes walk and being virtually on top of a railway station, my location is both picturesque and practical.  I can travel to South Kensington in about 35 minutes, Marylebone in about 45 minutes and London Bridge in about 8 minutes.  There is an enormous grocery story about 7 minutes walk from my flat which is open 24 hours (excepting Sunday hours, which are shortened for most large chain stores in the UK) where I like to shop at with my flatmate around 10pm on Thursday evenings so that we can go "Weirdo Watching".  The theory behind this is that since this is a kind of weird time to go grocery shopping, the people there must be weirdos.  Clearly my flatmate and I are completely normal, and are just interested in people watching at the same time as picking up a few groceries after we have watched as much QI and Have I Got News For You as we can handle (I used to have a similar hobby when I was a student in Ithaca, though the trips would happen after watching about 4 hours of Law and Order).

Part of what makes Camberwell such an interesting place to live is the input from some of London's universities.  Camberwell College of Art (part of the University of the Arts London) and King's College Hospital (part of the University of London) give a bustling atmosphere to the area during the week, while it remains a quiet, residential area on the weekends where the pubs spill over with football fans.  Camberwell's cuisine comes from all over the world with restaurants serving Indian, Greek, Chinese, Afro-Carribean and loads of other foods.  For parks, there is Camberwell Green, Burgess Park and, my favorite, Ruskin Park.  Ruskin Park is situated on a hill, and from the top of the park you can look north towards the rest of London, seeing Battersea Power Station, the London Eye, the Gherkin and Canary Wharf on a clear day.  For wildlife there is a metal wolf near Denmark Hill train station that quietly stalks the small family of metal sheep across the road.

Though you wouldn't know it from my accent, I now consider myself a South Londoner.  This made me all the more proud to read that in 2005 Time Out London took a tally on various aspects of the North/South London debate and gave more points to South London.  Whoop!
-One of the three dogs (and Elsie)