My building as seen from the edge of campus (right across the street).

The shops under my flat.


That is the door to my building, number 16. That white thing normally is not there.

This is directly to the right of El Falafel. Pretty isn't it. The construction workers start around 7 am every morning (including Sundays)! They are very noisy. All the construction workers are always hanging around outside. At least one is always sitting in front of our door smoking. They also walk through our building a lot. I cannot wait until they are gone.

My street. I got up early one morning and took these photos. They are a good example of life here; you never know what will happen! I am constantly being surprised by people showing up at my flat to fix things or inspect things or the fire alarm randomly going off. There is no quiet here! Anyway, this morning I got up and found my street blocked off and this huge crane lifting tons of cement right over my flat!!

Somehow I just wasn't expecting this first thing in the morning.

The blocked off street, looking across the street to campus.

A close up of the sign on my building. I don't know what the Darien House was.

The view facing campus from right outside my front door. Unfortunately the sun was in the way. One thing you can see though is the fence. It is cast-iron super annoying! The street is blocked off where the construction is. This means if you need to go that direction you have to walk up to the corner, cross and come all the way back on the other side of the street. I have been getting better at jumping the fence. I don't like to unless it is dry though (which it usually isn't).

Our hall. On the left is the front door, in front of you is my door. I am standing at the end of the hall. It is tiny.

Our incredibly loud buzzer. You can here when anyone in the building gets visitors. Also you can see here the lovely paint job. There are holes, bluetack marks and chips everywhere!

These switches are everywhere! Anything electrical has one, even the shower and the refrigerator. I think that they are ae really good way to save electricity in general. There are somethings though thatjust shouldn't have them! Mainly just the refrigerator.


Our kitchen. The white pitcher on the counter is a kettle. It is wonderful! You just pour in water, turn it on and you have boiling water in less than two minutes! I am definitely getting one when I get home.

We have a washer/dryer in our kitchen! It is wonderful to have one as otherwise washing clothes costs a fortune here. However the dryer does not work. Clothes come our very, very wet. To dry them they need to be in for over three hours. Even then they are not fully dried. Consequently I never use the dryer part.

We do not have a full sized refrigerator. It is fine for two people, too small for three though. However since Annie moved out Pauline and I have not gotten a new flatmate so it has been just fine.
Our table. This is the only communal space in the whole flat.

This was the first week. My cupboard is way more full now. It has always been way fuller than everyone elses. I hate not having edible food around!

My room. This is from the first week before I had bedding. The white rectangular thing on the wall is the heater. It does not work very well.
Again, right after I had moved in. The whole flat was filthy then. It was awful so I spent a week or so living out of my suitcase and cleaning.

The closet. It is huge. The entire room is huge actually. I thought I was going to end up with some little hole in the wall, not big enough to walk in. As it is I definitely have more space than I do at home.
This is the main problem. This is my window. Those are workmen outside it. Until a week ago they were out there hammering at 7 am everyday and were there throughout all the daylight hours. Now they are working more inside. It was awful! I kept my curtains closed when they were out there but as the lighting in my room is so poor it meant that it was semi dark all day. Luckily it is a bit better now.

The molding in the currently unoccupied bedroom.

The view of the other side of the street from that bedroom.
See how dirty the window is? Everything was that dirty when we got here.

This is Bristo Square which is the part of campus right across the street from my flat. It is really pretty although usually full of skateboarders.

Here is part of the new Informatics Forum. I don't get to use it. It is only for research and they only let us undergrads in for three hours a day. Undergrads don't get to do any research here. It is an awfully pretty building.