Au revoir Londres

As predicted, my final month in London was a whirlwind of rushed goodbyes, cramming for exams and trying to pack my life into one manageable suitcase.  I'm the kind of person who cannot work for anything in advance and need to be under serious pressure to be productive, and thrive off the stress that comes with it, but nothing quite prepared me for the stress that fell on me in the final weeks of my study abroad year.  With four exams to write, my days fell into a nice routine of getting up early, studying, meeting people for lunch, a little more studying, and a good couple of hours at the gym, followed by evenings out having fun, all whilst making plenty of 'to do' and 'to pack' lists with excellent intentions of starting them all 'tomorrow'.  When it came to five days to go, with three exams still left, and a very empty suitcase and a very full room, we started to panic.

I say 'we' as Jenny and me have now become some sort of joint being, affectionately known as 'Cenny'.  It turns out Cenny do not bring out the best in each other and tend to make terrible joint decisions about life, as if one of us doesn't want to do something, we simply won't do it.  For example, two weeks before we leave, I suggest that maybe we should spent $30 each and ship a box of stuff to Calgary so we can have light bags for travelling, Jenny responds 'NO I'm too poor to spend that I'm just throwing ANYTHING away until it all fits in my case I don't even care what I have to throw away it will fit in I am not paying to do that'.  Whilst on the way to go out for dinner and drinks (logical).

Case closed; Cenny cannot ship a suitcase if Jenny is not going to ship a suitcase.  So on the night before we leave London for good, after already throwing the majority of my stuff away, Jenny is wailing in her room because her case is 28kg or something ridiculous.  Literally it's at the point where we're pulling out packets of paracetamol because EVERY LITTLE HELPS TOTALLY GOING TO GET 8KG OUT THIS WAY fucking retards.  What do we end up doing?  Getting up at 6.30am the final day in London, the day of our last exam which we haven't started studying for, to ship a suitcase to Calgary.

Cenny are looking forward to having other people in their life, because frankly, it's getting a bit weird now.  We're currently sat in matching dressing gowns in twin beds, in silence on our laptops.  Help.  More Cenny updates as travelling continues (Jenny has also decided to stop writing her travel blog because everything that happens to me happens to her, so welcome Jenny readers).

ANYWAY the final weeks in London, whilst being stressful and flying past, were so sad.  I would like to give some personal shout outs to my favourite things about London and Western.  Shout out to:

• Campus Hi-Fi for providing amazing hangover breakfasts and catch ups
• The Spoke for doing THE BEST bagel in life (spinach swiss mushroom and roasted red pepper cream cheese - I miss you more and more as time goes by)
• Pino Mattheos for being a source of entertainment, stress-reliever and surprisingly effective sledge
• Jack's for being disgustingly cheap with dirty dancing
• Cobra for providing us with an escape from hip-hop and Bud Light
• Adele Knutt for being my hero and love of my life
• Cowboys for teaching me to two-step
• Ceeps Bingo for the free popcorn and sex toys
• Weldon Library for always providing me with someone to talk to and never a place to work
• Goodwill and Dollarama for just everything I own
• Anybody and everybody who has invited us to parties, nights out and just for general fun; we apologise for being the hideously embarrassing people we are
• Christina's Pub for providing us with terrible service and a halfway house
• Aleco for teaching me to make waffles
• The rabbits that like to make an appearance when I'm doing washing up looking into the garden, you are my fave things ever
• The boy who wanders round the gym who is the twin of Marius from Les Mis; myself and Lauren would like to apologise for the bursting into song and excessive staring
• Whoever wrote 'you are beautiful' in the cubicle in King's library bathroom; it's nice to have a little self-esteem boost when you're going to the loo
• The hot dog man for always being there when I just really want a hot dog (this one is heavily sarcastic, you fucker.)

This year has simply flown by and I have met the most incredible people who have really made it a year of my life which is going to be pretty much impossible to top.  Western is such a good university where I've actually learnt to love my course and have real interest in it, something I'd written off ever happening.  So much love and appreciation for everyone who has been a part of my time here, and I very nearly almost cried sat in the Spoke for the final time when Oasis 'Champagne Supernova' came on and I felt all emosh.  Until Jenny thought it was Wonderwall (help, please).  But we're off on our travels for six whole weeks and I could not be more excited about what's to come, apart from trying not to think about how fast I'm going to be on the plane back to little England and back to reality.  More on that when I get the chance, but for now; thanks London, it's been a blast!