Brunch in London

Last Monday(no lectures during reading week!) together with Jan, I took the 10.02 morning off-peak train to London. Usually, from Guildford, the fastest train is about 38 minutes. That's what I love about Guildford- so near to London yet far enough to stay away from the hustle and bustle of a city life. Though I used to dream about living in the city- grabbing a take-away coffee, rushing through the undergrounds...well, you get the idea. 

Surprisingly, I am now actually feeling so grateful (genuinely speaking) to live in a peaceful small town which is just a stone-throw away from London. It's like whenever I feel like going to London, I can just hop on the next fastest train heading to London Waterloo (the trains are so frequent that you don't even need to worry about the timings) and at the end of the day I can just come back before midnight and sleep in my own bed. Of course, if only they would stop raising the ticket fares. Like seriously, stop increasing. The rate is getting ridiculous each year.

Anyway.. Back to last Monday.

Met up with Judith and Jia Huey at Foxcroft & Ginger in Soho after we took a detour to Her Majesty's Theatre to get our musical tickets for that night. Yes, it's Phantom of the Opera!! *gasps* (will talk about it in my next post)

A laid-back afternoon

Exams ended last week(finally!) and I'm proud to say that it went well. Perhaps not as excellent as what I expected it to be, I can still be sure that I definitely worked harder and did better than last term. After all it's all about improvements.

We're now in 'Reading Week' where I 'should' be preparing for the new term next week. But I just came back from the bloody battlefield and I absolutely deserve some quality rest.

Lunch/Afternoon tea with Ika after Malaysian Society's meeting. We went to Glutton & Glee near Tunsgate despite the gloomy weather (which started pouring soon after) and stayed for some time inside the warm, cosy cafe.  

I had Americano again. Not exactly sure since when this addiction started but I really enjoy the bittersweet aftertaste of this milkless drink; especially those with a tinge of sourness (due to the technique they used to roast their coffee beans.. according to Jia Huey). 

The cakes were good but I prefer the savoury ones- steak pie was amazing. 

10 years of Love for Harry Potter

I remember being skeptical at first when my aunt recommended me to read about Harry Potter and the philosopher's stone a decade ago. All I knew about Harry Potter that time was that there's this young boy who lived in a small storeroom under the staircase and later discovered his magical abilities.

To be honest, I was more of a movie fan initially. This is because the day I fell in love with this brilliant imaginary wizarding world was the day I first watched Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's stone. It was one of the longest movie that I had ever watched at that age and believe it or not, I was truly absorbed into the story.

Piqued by curiosity and some igniting sparks of interest, I began reading the books one after another. Then I discovered more fun reading the detailed version and that, marked the beginning of my addiction/obsession for Harry Potter ever since.

I knew about the Leavesden Studio of Harry Potter even before coming to England. It was just opened to public last year and this had been on my list of things-to-do.

After buying tickets online for me and my group of KTJ friends (who were all also dieheart fans of Harry Potter), the next thing we knew was that we were already riding on the special shuttle bus from Watford Junction to the Warner Bros. Studio.

 

Collected our tickets at the counter and look, how cool the tickets were! We were 'fighting' over our most preferred creature, with Dobby being the most demanded one. Oh well I got Fawkes :)