Eleven Month Review // June - July

And like that, the months rushed by and my crazy journey in London came to an end. I went to London and came back to find three housemates missing and only three days of work ahead of me, a celebration and then a speedy exit. Hoovering my room, stripping the bed, rearranging the room back to it's original deosng and shutting the door on the best experience of my life. I have LOVED writing these monthly reflections and it reminds me so tangibly of all the memories that I have made and how each month I have overcome struggles and found ways to enjoy my time in spite of the things I have disliked about my hear, and also to reflect on all the weird things I have shared, discovered and loved. This is the last of these posts and I can't wait to resume these kinds of posts at University, the next journey of my life, halfway through every term. This post will be a reflection of my last month (and a half!) and there is another coming on my reflections on the whole year!

1)      Weirdest thing you have seen in London this month?

This is not the weirdest thing that I have seen (because that kind of thing is very blurred living in such a diverse place) but my weirdest experience by far was being approached while I was on Tower Bridge at four in the morning by a bunch of random guys who wanted to take a picture with us. I would normally be the kind of person who would cut and run, especially as I was barefoot in my pyjamas with a duvet wrapped around me. However, my housemates are more outgoing and went the extra mile by posting it on facebook, prompting many confused questions from relatives. It was probably one of the strangest experiences ever. Warning to all: don’t go to Tower Bridge on Summer Solstace early in the morning (or, in fact, ever early in the morning) because there are strange people everywhere.

2)      Particular highlights of this month

Unfortunately the only pictures I have of said sunset are on my
phone, of which the quality is pretty abominable when I transfer
my images to PC, so these are taken from Instagram.

Honestly, this is a tough one as it spans longer than a month, and as my last few moments were treasured I did a lot of things to make my time count! Lucky for you, there is a prelude to the aforementioned creepy men on Tower Bridge incident. At 2am on that Saturday I got a knock on my door and behind it a very panicked housemate. There was a fire right outside our house in the building next door which resulted in us calling the fire brigade, setting off our fire alarm, being evacuated and standing on one of London’s main roads in our pyjamas, cradling crying babies. After around 20 minutes we were given the all clear but the building next door still had their fire alarm going. Turns out that, like the oven glove incident, I am pretty calm in a crisis and only got my adrenaline rush once I got back into bed an hour later, and could not for the life of me get to sleep. My room also smelt like smoke as I had opened my window to check the fire and as the nearest window to the patch, the smoke wafted in a great quantity into my room. The smell was choking me so I moved downstairs to our sofa and as the sun started to rise, decided that it was too good of an opportunity to miss. Along with two other eager housemates, we grabbed our duvets for warmth and watched the sunrise over the Thames on the longest day of the year. It was absolutely stunning and one of the best nights of my entire year. We got back and still couldn’t sleep, so ate breakfast at around five in the morning, watched a bit of telly and nodded off... only to wake up two hours later to head off to queue for West End Live, an annual event taking place in Trafalgar Square which I have gone to nearly every year of late. 

It was scorching and I was ridiculously tired but it was so much fun to watch some amazing performances from talented performers from musicals, many of them in full costume. We left at around three in the afternoon having not eaten anything since our early breakfast apart from some nuts and headed to Ed’s Diner for a burger, chips, onion rings and fresh water! Best. Day. Ever.

The only shot of the Les Mis set where there weren't 436204297 phones in the air.

I also had the priviledge of getting a pretty cheap ticket to see Mis Saigon the Musical (£15, absolute winner). I may have forgotten my glasses (d’oh!) but it was incredible nonetheless, the singing was so powerful. This was accompanied by a journey round Soho taking many a picture. Other Saturdays were spent brunching with housemates where I discovered the beauty of Bill’s, wandering round the Tate Modern and meeting up with some school friends to wander along the Thames in the pouring rain and diving into The Real Greek for some yummy meze, which we made last until the rain finished and we could commence. This evening ended up with us going on a further quest to find cheap theatre tickets by power-walking through the West End to various theatres. It was a blistering walk which was to no avail but I suppose it wore off the effects of the meze!

And, predictably, June (and a bit of July!) was filled with walks in summer evenings and some cracking world cup games, watched in the local pub with some chips. Yum.

3)      Favourite/least favourite part of your work this month?

It is hard to write this because I have struggled a lot with leaving over the last month, with emotions going from “I can’t wait to get out of here, this job is so hard” to “how could I ever leave such an amazing job to go to University, am I mad?”. However, I have had some amazing moments and on a day when I really broke down, so many people were there for me and showed me how grateful they were for the work I have been doing there. There was one particular moment which brings a tear to my eyes when I think about it. I received a hug from a colleague after she spotted me sneaking away for a little cry and I honestly felt such a wave of love from her. It is a difficult emotion to capture, but it changed the face of the rest of my time left. I have also enjoyed the excitement of change that my job is going through. After I leave there are so many new and exciting things to look forward to and it looks like the whole face of the place will change for the better. In a way, that’s also my least favourite part because I am leaving at a really pivotal moment for the business and it is changing in all the ways that I anticipated and longed for when I was struggling, which is frustrating as I can’t reap the benefits! However, that is also extremely humbling as I realise that sometimes you have to leave things behind and move on, even though I have found that process a long and sad one.

This month I have discovered some truly joyous salads in my tastebuds. Wild rice, grape, roasted veg, feta, pomegranate seeds and regular seeds to top it!

I almost forgot this, but I also filmed a section for a documentary this month inspired by the life that I have lead this past year. It is for an independent company and they are getting stories of Christian faith from all around the world from Christians in the 18-30s generation. It was such a load of fun to film in the basement of my work (watching the crew try to stifle their laughter made me feel like I was doing a good job) and there was free pizza, too. I think being an avid Youtube consumer it made me realise how fun it can be to talk to a camera about yourself and about issues that you think matter.

Some of my favourite food on the menu all in the same day - that kind of stuff makes it hard to leave a place. University meals will not be up to this standard (stodgy nightmares, apparently)

4)      Hardest part of your work this month?

Leaving. Oh my goodness. Leaving somewhere you feel like you own, have a huge passion for and want to see succeed is actually heartbreaking, especially when you have thrown yourself into everything for as many days as I was physically able to stand up for that long. I know I have so much more to give to every aspect of that work: to be more skilled, the love more, to relentlessly sacrifice, and I worry that I failed or wasted time. So leaving with twinges of disappointment is hard. Even more than that, however, is leaving the people who you have got to know in community, shared your life with, helped out with benefits or grappled with life’s deepest questions. Wrapping up those relationships, even potentially having to cut them off, is quite painful and complicated.

In honour of Wimbledon I indulged in far too many of these homemade scones with clotted cream and I don't really feel too bad about it.

5)      Would you kindly sum up your working month in three alliterative words/phrases?

Tiring, tearful, triumphant!

6)      Weird habits developed this month?

Don't be ridiculous, I'm far too settled, independent and together emotionally to have these weird habits every month...

7)      What are you missing most about home this month?

Honestly, I’ve been so swept up with leaving that I haven’t been missing home, but dreading going back!

From L-R: Me, Helen, Naomi, Anna, Mair, Emma and Ruth. A lovely bunch.

8)      Best Housemate moment?

To be quite fair, there have been far too many this month because we have been trying to spend all our moments together! Before my departure to Greece, which will be saved for a later blog post, my housemates got together for our final evening. Unfortunately I had felt unwell during the day due to the heat, but that didn’t stop us having an absolutely cracking barbeque, gathering together in our garden in the sun and playing ‘rounders’ with the bread roll leftovers. It was a lovely moment to truly appreciate all that these girls have done for me during the year providing much needed support and friendship and a heck of a lot of laughter. The evening rounded off with a trip to the Shard, but two of us didn’t feel up for it so stayed and chatted for hours until they got back. It reminded me that during the whole year, the best moments outside of work have been the simple ones in this house. We don’t often have times when we are all together (as proven by the fact that we had our last evening a week before I left and two weeks before they even finished!) so when we do, they are truly special.

Pudding included melted marshmallow in Oreos or chocolate in banana on the barbeque. I was not a fan of the latter - who wants a mushy banana when it's not being made into banana bread?

My housemate Ruth preparing for the bread!

9)      Discoveries this month?

How AMAZING wild rice salad is and in general how much I love a good salad, especially if it includes pomegranate seeds (sophistication?); Peach Iced Tea; the wonders of Bethel Music which have uplifted me through some tough nights; my addiction to crunching ice; stretchy baggy trousers (a true game changer in this heat); how much I really am like Miranda Hart’s caricature of herself; the joy of reading books for pleasure; my love of mountains; the glories of a really good burger. 

It's been a rather emotional time. More blog posts with my final snaps of London and reflections to follow up. I have a whole bank of ramblings still to shove on this space of the Internet.

So long for now,

-Antonia