Thursday, January 24, 2008

Justice

Tonight I am going to see my first theatre production in London for my Reporting the Arts class. There will be two one-act plays by Harold Pinter: The Lover & The Collection. I have seen the advertisements for this show all over the tube, and they really roused my interest. And what do you know? Going to see the production is my first assignment in one of my classes.

Life-wise, I'm slowly adjusting. I figured that moving here would be much like the first time I moved to New York, but there are few similarities. When I first moved to New York, I was probably more open to making new friends, but now that I have made a solid friend base in New York, I generally don't like the cheesy meet-and-greet type of social environment. My roommate and I are getting along great (one week down, many more to go) and we hang out on occasion. I met someone new, though. My friend Austin back in New York would always talk about his roommate Ricky, and I heard the name Ricky so often that it was almost as if I knew the guy, yet I knew nothing about him. And I had never met him in person.

Ricky had the same experience with my name. Turns out, Ricky and I have that Reporting the Arts class together and we recognized each others' names immediately. He's this intelligent little gay boy who likes poetry and musicals and gets tipsy after one drink. He and I went out to a few bars last night, to explore areas other than King's Cross. (He's already been in London for a full semester, so he knows the city better than I do.) We picked a bar from the non-touristy guide to London that my brother gave to me for Christmas and decided that The Grenadier in Belgravia sounded classy, but not swanky. (We are poor.)

We ventured out to this bar, which was in a cul-de-sac that stemmed off of a small, curvy street. (I don't know how anyone but locals would ever find this bar, unless they had the same City Secrets book that I use.) Since it was a Wednesday, that bar closed at 11, and Ricky took me to a little Italian bar near Piccadilly Circus. It was unnoticeable from the street, another one of those you-wouldn't-see-it-unless-you-knew-about-it kind of pubs. It had a young crowd and a DJ that played old, pleasantly scratchy 7-inch vinyl records. It was fun (and the cheapest bar I've seen thus far).

I am going to try to see a band called The Duke Spirit play tomorrow night, and I'm really looking forward to it, but the details are still hazy and I'm worried my plans might fall through.

I will update about my classes soon.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

I like your writing.
Green Buddy