Here’s the deal, Christmas lights are one of my favorite things. This is simply rooted in the fact that I love shiny, glittery things so when a city becomes decked out in icicle lights and store fronts are all light up I’m a happy person. I don’t think I’ve ever seen a place do it as well as London and with November basically being ‘Christmas Launch Month,’ I was able to catch all the lights before I left. Armed with a calendar of who was switching on lights when, Oxford Street & Kings Road were the two that we decided to hit up.
It may come as a shock since I pretty much spent most of high school and college going to concerts, but I’m not a massive crowd person. I’ll do it every now and then, but I can have a very low tolerance when it comes to people who feel entitled to push to the front and yet Heidi and I found ourselves standing in line to get into the main area for the Oxford Street switch-on where we would be part of the 10,000 sea of bodies. Luckily we were in good moods and the weather cooperated, so there we stood watching the video screens (since the stage was just a few dots to the side) to see some live music, the John Lewis holiday ad (that makes me cry), and the street come to life with lights.
Round two came on Saturday at Duke of York Square on Kings Road. This time we had live Reindeer, a choir of carolers, rain and candles (yes there were both and it was a game to see how long we could keep the flame going under the umbrella.. we lasted a while). Regardless of the rain, the lights were gorgeous and I got to see a reindeer..
The following Monday was our second to last class and consisted of a dinner on Brick Lane with plenty of good ethnic food. Our entire Drexel group was together for the second to last time, comparing travel stories and starting to prepare for the looming date where most of us would return home after a final few days of travel.
PS. I got so wrapped up in all this travel and whatnot that there is almost a months worth of posting about to come so stay tuned since I’ll be posting in order. On the horizon are posts about Oxford, Remembrance Day, the 5K I did, Copenhagen and my final week.
– AS.
