June 23

TODAY IS THE DAY

Our play today was Macbeth, in the Globe Theatre, at 2. Our teacher let us come in an hour later, then we walked to the British Library to walk through a Shakespeare exhibit. "You have 90 minutes, no more, no less." She made us stand in that room, pretending to be interested for 90 minutes. Then, we took the tube to Borough Market, where a little German shop is (she's half German). She bought us German snacks...which makes up for the day. It was also really cool to see her swap from English to German with the shop lady. It's crazy to think that she doesn't even have to think about it, it just happens. In Spain, I could understand Spanish, but I'd hear it, then translate it to English in my head then figure out what  wanted to say in English, in Spanish, and respond. Now, this all happened within 10 seconds, but she just does it. That's amazing.

We stood for another 2 hours for the show, because the standing pit only cost 5 pounds. Our feet were killing us, especially those of us that had been on our feet since 11, and people around us were dropping like flies. I felt like I was at the Memorial Day thingy in front of the police station when all the band kids would pass out. We did leave at the intermission, though, because it was supposed to start down pouring at 4. It did. We just happened to be in a pub discussing the first half, but, boy did it rain. 

During our 6 hour class, we had a great discussion comparing UK and US elections. Here, they vote via paper and pencil. Literally, paper and PENCIL. My professor said they didn't have a pencil available to her, so she said she'd use a pen and they freaked. It has to be a pencil (hmmmm, sketchy). The paper is really just that, a piece of paper with Leave the EU [  ] and Remain in EU [  ], and they had to X their choice. How weird?! Then we explain, well, I explained, because JT hasn't voted yet, how it works in America. Showing ID's, having to sign, getting the little key card thing, doing it all electronically, she was amazed. In the UK they don't even ask for ID's, what? How do they know if people are voting more than once? I do not understand. It's such a large country but they still use paper and pencil. Also, also, they're all very open about their political views here, this issue especially. She kept getting texts asking which way she voted and when I told her that it was basically taboo to tell everyone how you voted in America she couldn't fathom why. It was an interesting day.

We, Katie, Nicole, Aleesia and I, went to a club later that night, which was super fun and we were out until 2, which is late for the British (but early for the Spanish). We danced a lot, my feet were killing me, but it was amazing. Then we got McDonalds, of course, and stayed up watching the Brexit vote.

It was so nerve-racking watching the results come in. The numbers never fluctuated from more that a 3% difference. I saw the results be exactly 50/50 and one 52/48 and another 49/51 all within 5 minutes. Obviously, the city of London voted to remain, which is why Nicole, Christian and I assumed that would be the choice...it wasn't. While watching, each new reporter had their decision under their title, so it would give the name of the reporter and then "leave" or "remain." That would be like putting "democrat" or "republican" under each reporters name in the US...it's just a super weird concept to me. I only stayed up until 4, when the vote was consistently 100,000+  votes for leave,so I called it and waited for he morning when CNN would send me a news alert about it.