London Study Tour

DIS, the school that I'm studying at here, has what they call "core courses" which usually are similar to what your major is at home.  Throughout the semester, you go on two extended trips with this class; one to western Denmark and one week long trip somewhere else in Europe.  I went to London with my core class, European Trends in Communication, last week.  I've never been to London before so I was definitely excited.  I also love these trips because they're completely planned for us and as you probably have figured out by now I much prefer to be led around by a guided in a super touristy group than to try to figure out big cities on my own.

Big Ben and London rain with some friends

Day One:

We left for London early Sunday morning, checked into our hotel and went into the city for the first time for lunch.  One of the first things I noticed about London was that it reminded me a lot more of America than anywhere else I've been in Europe.  There are Fridays restaurants, TJ Maxx's (didn't exactly have time to shop though), LA Fitness, Costco, etc.  So being the Americans that we are, for our first lunch on our own we were determined to find the fast food chain Chipotle.  It's a super Americanized Mexican restaurant with really good burritos, etc. that they don't really have anywhere else in Europe.  We found Chipotle, ate our burritos, then, being the stereotypical Americans we are, killed some time in Starbucks (which they also don't have in Denmark or anywhere else I've been) before meeting up with the group again at the National Portrait Gallery.  We walked around the National Portrait Gallery for awhile as a group.  It's basically just a museum of portraits of famous people.  It was all right.  Definitely not one of the highlights for me but still kind of interesting.  After leaving there, we went to the London Eye which is a giant ferris wheel that takes about a half hour to complete one rotation.

In typical London fashion it wasn't exactly a bright and sunny day.

Some of my classmates in our little bubble way up above London.

It was kind of a bummer that it was so dreary out because it made it hard to see too far away but it was still a really cool, and kind of scary, experience.  After the London Eye we walked over to where we were eating our first group dinner.  DIS feeds us really well on these trips and for dinner we had a three course Indian meal.  Not really sure why it was Indian food.  I heard one of our tour leaders say that they were trying to feed us different types of food that we wouldn't normally eat in Copenhagen.  Whatever the reason it was delicious.  Spicy but delicious.  I like spicy.  Then it was back to the hotel where we all crashed since we'd been up since 5 that morning.

Day Two:

Our second day in London marked the beginning of our business visits.  We had a continental breakfast at our hotel then it was off to a law firm called Schillings.  They work with reputation crises of high profile individuals such as Tiger Woods, JK Rowling, etc.  We talked with them about managing reputation and the like because our core course is focused primarily on communication.  One of the most recent topics we discussed in class was the importance of reputation, how to manage reputation, etc. so the lecture fit in with that.  After Schillings we ate lunch on our own then met up with the group again for a lecture from a freelance journalist and media studies lecturer.  She talked about the changing landscape of television in the UK and showed us a bunch of video clips.  After she finished with her schpeal we headed off to the British Museum.  Meredith and I made the mistake of going to the bathroom before we all left for the museum so of course our group left us behind and we were wandering around London on our own for awhile but we eventually found the museum and met up with everyone else.  We had tickets to a special exhibit about Shakespeare which was surprisingly interesting.  They made a mini replica of the Globe Theater (didn't have enough time to see the real one) in the Museum.  It was neat.  After the museum we had some time on our own before meeting with the group again for a group dinner at an Italian restaurant.  So of course we went to Platform 9 and three quarters from Harry Potter.

Unfortunately we Muggles didn't make the cut.

DIS gave us the directions to the wrong restaurant so we showed up about 48 minutes late but no one seemed to care (probably because it was their fault).  We ate soup, pasta and some sort of pudding for dessert.  Then we had the rest of the evening on our own to do whatever we wanted.

Day Three:

We began our third day in London with an hour long bus ride out to Wimbledon.  This was definitely my favorite visit of the trip.  Our visit started with a mini lecture about branding and how Wimbledon distinguishes itself from other tennis tournaments, etc.  Then came the fun stuff.  We had a really great tour guide who led us around the grounds for about an hour and a half.  

Wimbledon was unreal.

Before I say anything else I have to talk about what our tour guide told us about the grass there.  Wimbledon is the only tennis tournament that uses grass courts and they therefore have to take extreme measures to make sure that the grass is perfect.  And I mean perfect.  Our guide told us that they have a separate 100 square meter location that is sectioned off into square meters.  On each of the square meters there is a different type of grass.  There is a tennis player robot who they make skid on each meter of grass for 13 hours a day for 13 days.  They then evaluate which type of grass holds up the best and if one is better than the grass that is currently at Wimbledon they replace all of it.  They also have one employee (poor guy) whose job it is to count every single blade of grass.  Our guide said that at the last count there were 54 million blades on Center Court.  If it starts to rain during the tournament they must cover up the courts as soon as possible so the grass doesn't get damaged.  Apparently they have competitions each year to see how quickly they can cover Center Court.  The current records holds at about 22 seconds.

During the winter they have to use artificial sunlight to keep the grass healthy.

The grounds are beautiful. 

After leaving Wimbledon we had a group lunch at a Lebanese restaurant.  It was a bunch of tiny samples of food that everyone shared which was fun.  They had hummus!  We were all stuffed by the time we left and headed off to the Hampton Court Palace.  This is where Henry VIII (and all of his wives) used to live.

I wouldn't mind living there

We got a tour of the palace then had some time on our own to wander the grounds which were huge.  There was also a maze that we got lost in for a little too long.  After leaving the palace we had the rest of the evening on our own.

Our backyard is just a little smaller than this

Day Four:

We started the day with yet another business visit.  This time we went to Fishburn and Hedges which is a PR agency in London.  Two young employees talked to us for awhile about what PR is and what exactly they do as employees for Fishburn and Hedges.  After their presentation we had lunch and time on our own then we met up with everyone again at BBC.  

BBC headquarters 

At BBC we got a guided tour around the premises.  I was most looking forward to this visit in terms of relevancy to what I'm studied and was slightly disappointed that we didn't really have any time for questions or anything.  We were given a public tour (there was a couple families with us) which was still very interesting but not as personalized as I was hoping it would be.

Some friends and me outside the BBC building

On the tour we got to see some of the studios where they film their shows, we were shown how a green screen works and we played a version of the show The Weakest Link - Meredith won.  We had the rest of the evening on our own so a couple friends and I went to the Tate Museum which is full of modern art.  In order to get there we had to cross the bridge that the death eaters destroyed in Harry Potter.

Oh no the Death Eaters destroyed it!

Just kidding - phewf!!

Then it was back to the hotel for an early bedtime.  All of these days were exhausting

Day Five:

Thursday was our last full day in London.  We started the day with a bus ride out to Oxford.  Before touring the actual campus of Oxford we stopped at a palace.  It was another gorgeous palace but our tour guide was awful.  She was old and just talked about tapestries the whole time.  

Blenheim Palace in Oxford

Then it was off to Oxford the actual school.  We had some time on our own for lunch before meeting up with the group for a tour of the grounds.  I learned a lot.  For example, I had no idea that Oxford doesn't really have "classes" in the traditional American sense.  Our guide said that about 80 percent of lectures are optional and students instead learn primarily from a tutorship program.  They are paired with a professor who meets with them often to keep track of their progress.  Each professor has about seven students.  I also didn't realize how many colleges Oxford has - around 40 I think our guide said.  But he said to think of the colleges more as fraternities in America.  Students live in the colleges and belong to a specific college but there aren't really classes there because they don't really go to classes in the traditional sense.  It was all really interesting.  And beautiful of course.

One of the colleges at Oxford.

Oh and one more Harry Potter tidbit.  We saw the area of Oxford where a scene from Goblet of Fire was filmed.

Look familiar?

How about now?

Once we finished the tour it was tea time!  This was another highlight of the trip for me.  We went to a fancy hotel nearby Oxford and had high tea.  First they came around with tea in teapots for everybody - sugar cubes and all.  Then came the towers of goodies.  One of our tour leaders told us that you're supposed to start at the bottom of the tower and work yourselves up.  So, you eat the finger sandwiches first then the pastries and end with the desserts on top.  This is so that you fill up on the "cheap" foods before getting to the good stuff on top.

Yum!

After tea we were bussed back to London where we had the rest of the evening on our own.

Day Six:

Friday was our final day in London.  It began with a lecture at the University of London about communication and social media.  After the lecture we had some time on our own so we just wandered around for a little bit before meeting up for our final group lunch.  We ate at Jamie Oliver's restaurant Fifteen.  The goal of the restaurant is to give young unemployed people a chance at a career.  I think most, if not all, used to be criminals.  Jamie Oliver takes them off the streets and instead gives them an apprenticeship in becoming chefs so that they can do something productive with their lives.  Pretty cool concept.  I think there's a TV show about it.  And the food was delicious.  Our first course was antipasto and Italian bread.  We had salami, mozzarella, olives, etc.  Then came the main course.  I ordered a fish which was great; I hadn't had fish in awhile.  And for dessert I ordered a brownie with vanilla ice cream.  Needless to say I was uncomfortably full after all this food and didn't eat dinner that night which was fine because it would've been an airport dinner.  We took a bus to the airport after lunch and got back to Copenhagen late that night.

All in all it was an unbelievable trip and a great mix of touristy things with educational visits.  It was sad leaving but I have to say that I have yet to find a city that I'd rather be studying abroad in than Copenhagen!