First Week Back

Last Saturday, I got back into Londontown in the evening. 

One week later, I've survived one of the hardest weeks of graduate school, yet. 

This week has been crazy with academic assignments, meetings, and trying to fit in a social life! 

On Sunday, jet-lagged and all, I headed over to my friend, Maryann's house to celebrate Founder's Day for Pi Beta Phi with some of my fellow sisters! It's one of the last few events I'll help plan and attend with the UK alumnae club! 

Monday was my last first day of school, ever. It's been a long-time coming! We also got access to the new MPA Lounge, finally. It will definitely be a great study space for the last months.

Unfortunately, on Tuesday, a 48 hour tube strike started. It's a struggle to get anywhere when the tube strikes happen. I walked home one day due to traffic jams. Thankfully, my walk home was fairly scenic...

Buckingham Palace

Italian Gardens

Suffering through the tube strike, I managed to complete two final papers. The first was my policy paper that was about MOOCs and public diplomacy. The second dealt with polarization in Congress. It was a week of late nights, coffee, and good iTunes playlists.

And, yesterday to cap off the week, I spent the evening with some of my friends catching up about breaks, talking about summer plans/post-graduation plans, and just relaxing! 

How was your week?

Wrapping up Spring Break

I'm about three days from the end of what is very much likely to be my last spring break, ever! 

Tomorrow, I head to Newark to spend the night to catch a 7am flight to London on Saturday. Talk about an early wake-up call on Saturday! 

I'm excited to be getting back to finish up my last semester at LSE. The first week back is going to be crazy due to a lot of assignments being due, interviews, a showcase event, a few parties, and a potential tube strike.  Not too excited about that last one...

Once the first week is over, I'll only have one more essay to finish and two exams. My exams are not till the middle of June. That leaves plenty of cushion time to relax for a few days before diving into the books.

Spring break was full of relaxation, seeing old friends I hadn't seen in years, spending time with my parents and animals, and just enjoying the last few weeks of freedom!

Stay tuned! 

Surviving the Tube Strike

If you follow me on Twitter, you'll know that I've been delayed a day getting back to London due to the Northeast storm. It's an all familiar event as the same thing happened when I flew back after winter break. Oh well, flights are changed, and I'll be landing back in London on Saturday.

New LSE Tshirt that sums up the school!

I've covered the big events over the past week in my post on JPIA. Yet, last week was another crazy week. I had a few job applications due last week on top of capstone work and preparing for the JPIA weekend.

Tube Strike Madness 

Last week was also the big London tube strike.  The last tube strike that I faced was when I studied abroad in 2010. We faced a tube strike almost every month during my four months abroad. So, I was really excited for the past year and a half to not have one. However, this past week, the talks went forward and the strike happened starting Tuesday evening and lasting into Thursday. 

Traffic Madness

Luckily, I have a bus that runs straight from my flat to LSE. Normally, it takes around 45 minutes to get from one end of the city to another. Note, my bus takes the Oxford Street route which makes up for the majority of the time on the bus. 

Unfortunately, during the tube strike, my commute to campus took almost two hours. I had planned on walking, but of course, it was down pouring.  I got through an entire book and cleaned up my iPhone during that time. 

On my way home from LSE, I actually walked halfway home to just avoid the traffic and idleness of sitting on the bus. 

Thankfully, on Thursday, I had booked a Heathrow Express ticket in advance to avoid the chaos of trying to figure out how to get to the airport. Needless to say, I was happy to say goodbye to the strike!