The World is Full of Philosophers

Last night some crazy Indian parents (or maybe an entire family) got drunk and ran around the entire Rosebery Ave dorm complex, singing hymns, I kid you not. It was rather ethereal.. I'm lying in my bed after being up 36 hours straight, and all of a sudden I hear the very well-matched, harmonious sound of angels right outside my door and traveling down the hall. The chorus climaxes, and dissolves into laughter behind a just-slammed door. Ahh, but the fun is just beginning; the song re-establishes itself again and again as the night moves on (even at 12:30 AM, local time).

Rosebery is an older brick building just off Rosebery avenue in near-central London (really closer to Camden than anything, but about 1 mile north-east of the London School of Economics and the Houses of Westminster). The same as any city: the cars are always going by, but with more of a London-esque ruddiness to the noise pattern. Perhaps the sound bounces back off the omnipresent, low-lying clouds. Every now and then a siren blares in the distance. People are perpetually walking by on the street, which I do not have a view of from my fourth-floor dorm bedroom. Fortunately (or unfortunately, we'll see), Rosebery has its own pub which opens up into a central commons area near the Southern wing. I live in the northern wing, meaning that as drunken students wander out into the evening, I (as well as everybody else in the adjoining wing) hear every song, every yell, and every young babbling english bloke journeying toward his own room.

Freshmen live in the wing closest to the bar. The drinking age in London is 18. Ohhh UCI, if only we had such an arrangement. Interestingly enough, the youngsters here seem somewhat mature, drinking-wise. But they are as scared and unsure as any group of college freshmen just starting their first year-- I'm aware of what an old man I must be.

I very much like the new room. Quickly I transformed the room into something more comfortable, but the in-room sink is very cool, and the bed is actually somewhat comfortable, barring the continuous inebriated cacophony. I'll have to join in, and then I'm sure I won't care.















I was making dinner yesterday (well, drinking orange juice, which amounted to dinner after bumbling around in a semi-comatose state post-travel) and met a few of my roommates in the common cooking area. The dorm sensibly puts all us grad students in the same area, and so last night was "Meet-the-known-world" night. Two fast-talking Indian dudes, the shy Chinese guy who lives next door and listens to extremely feminine music (totally thought he was a girl at first), Emilio the Canadian who's studying Foreign Policy and likes to cut up pieces of lamb with his new knife, and Peter the Slovakian. We all stood around and talked about mining while Emilio hacked away at his lamb-shoulder (we figured it was the shoulder when he showed us how the joint worked.. I got a kick out of that).

How interesting to stand in a room with a bunch of total strangers and discuss such weighty economic concepts. I found myself referencing Jared Diamond's Collapse in order to keep up with the conversation.. apparently there are 6 canadian mining companies that work in Montana. Slovakia is very interested in mining uranium-- apparently two companies were recently started. Hmm.. uranium.. apparently it's a very complex, polluting process-- lots of acid involved. The remaining acid is stored in some sort of dammed up pond, which, if there is too much rain, can collapse and spew out into the surrounding ecosystem. Very nice. I'm not sure that the economic benefit outweighs the risk, as there exists an economic disincentive for the mining company to care about externalities, such as the water table or soil quality in the surrounding area. The results of this have already been seen in Montana, which has suffered some pretty huge economic disasters in certain mines which, at the default of a bankrupt mining company, had to be dealt with by the local taxpayers.

Such a necessary evil.. I'm going to have to pick Peter's brain more about the mining process and what kind of solutions/ government policies exist to keep the environment clean in the long run.. especially in Slovakia. My prediction: there aren't many.

Today I wandered up to Barclay's (about a half-mile jaunt up St. John's Street) where I discovered that there exists NO WAY to change my American dollars into Pounds, unless I create a UK account, which generally takes 6-8 weeks and is really somewhat useless as B of A charges me nothing to go through Barclay's. Still, I might create the account.. Who knows, the dollar may continue to do well (I certainly hope so), and it may be worthwhile to buy a few thousand pounds in December.

Walking in London is quite an experience: fast paced and totally backwards. I still can't get past the habit of looking the other way first (I can't actually remember which way that is right now.. I think we go L-R in the USA, while pedestrians in the UK look R-L). The backwards traffic also dictates that people tend to want to pass you on the left instead of the right.. walking is an unsure thing. I'm usually really sure-footed walking through people, but the traffic tempo and pedestrian practico-inert field is alien in this city.. alien and yet familiar. I'll come up on somebody and start to shift my body to one side, only to find that she's already shifted her position directly toward where I'm going. Smile and stumble on.. I wish I had a skateboard here, but I think I don't deserve to. I'd probably kill myself and a maim a number of pedestrians. I'm eager to purchase a bicycle, as I'm sure this is the most effective means to navigate the city, but I think I need to walk around a few more days in order to better understand the traffic patterns.

Right now its 5:52 PM on Thursday. I'm about to go to a yoga class just down the street (power yoga), which sounds wonderful, excluding the $22 cost (definitely going to have to perfect the home practice). There is a gym down the street for about $90 a month which might be worthwhile, as they have a perfect space for practicing yoga. LSE has a much cheaper gym located about 1.5 miles away, but the hours are shorter and I'm not sure if they have a yoga space. I'll have to figure out which is more worthwile. The gym has a sauna. I'm not sure if anything can top a sauna in foggy-ol' London ;)

... If you'd like to comment on anything, or just say hello, please feel free to post to the blog, or hit me up via email. Much love to everyone! Tomorrow I venture over to the LSE to register; pics and stories to follow.