First up, Merry Christmas ! Or what's left of it, anyway.

Oh hell it has been way over a month since I last updated. I realise I only blog a lot when I have school, even though I'm supposed to be busier when I study... right? Well nevermind that's all gonna change next year ! #hardworking

Was tempted to just do a short offhand update about the past few weeks, but I thought after yapping so much about the uk trip, the very least I could do is do a detailed photo update of it. Esp since england is so amazingly gorgeous and I miss it so much and I wanna go back now now NOWWW

DAY 1: Manchester, Lake District

Right off the plane we attended a talk by the Lancashire Society and I almost fell asleep during the first half HAHA OOPS. But the plane ride was tiring so yeah.

Lancashire is so pretty and quaint ! Didn't hurt that it was our first glimpse of uk either.

it suddenly got reaaally cold so I had to scramble around in my luggage for some warmer outerwear and unfortunately the most accessible thing at the moment was my sister's puffy winter jacket, which did not make for very pleasing photos, tyvm.

lots of beautiful scenery on the bus ride to Lake District though

OH THE SUNLIGHT WAS PERFECT.

The weather in the next few photos looks amazing but you have no idea how freakishly cold it was. Eep I was shaking so hard but then I guess it was my own vain fault for only wearing like 3 layers HAHAHA.

Cruise around the lake

it got to a point where the top deck we were on was just unbearable so a few of us retreated downstairs to thaw

Photostop along the way to the hotel with these beautiful mountains

Throughout the entire trip we went back to the hotel pretty early everyday, cos the sky would turn dark around 4pm ): Such a waste of scenery shots, I know.

DAY 2: Lake District

William Wordsworth's cottage ! At Rydal Mount. Spent the day visiting his 2 homes + the various museums they built alongside/inside them. The town he lived in and drew inspiration from is just so pretty. I love quaint little English towns like that :D

all this is like his frikkin backyard

went for lunch in the little town, which is just a 2min bus drive away from Rydal Mount. The entire place is so small and accessible you can actually walk the distance between Wordsworth's 2 homes. I suppose that's why they were all pretty fit

after lunch was a bit of free time so everyone went off exploring

this turn-in leads right to his birthplace Dove Cottage. It was adorable - the pantry was below earth level so it was all very Laura Ingalls Wilder, yknow like Little House In The Woods kind of thing.

Sadly photos were prohibited so I didnt get much ): Right outside Dove Cottage looked a hell lot like the set of Sweeney Todd though, gave me those really pleasant shivers ^^

free time to wander around the shops before dinner; jing and I hit all the thrift stores. Hard to believe it's only around 5-6pm in the photos huh.

yummy yummy. We had so many fish&chips meals on the trip haha, not that I'm complaining

DAY 3: Nottingham

Camwhored in the hotel room a bit before leaving, since we were changing hotels. This first hotel at Lake District was actually the best of the 3, the room was HUGE, beds super comfy and mobile, food was awesome (the croissants!!!), company was great too - cos the 2nd night we went over to Raymond&Marcus's room to play cards w/ Justin&Kai. New friends ftw hehehehe

2 WORDS - KRISPY KREME

lunch at a supermart before the DH Lawrence tour. Yours truly the klutz managed to upset a steaming mug of hot chocolate all over myself which resulted in a bit of chaos and tardiness

On with the tour ! Walked around the area to see Lawrence's 4 different homes

Okay there are actually a lot more photos than this (though not a lot of people photos boohoo) but I'm too lazy to post.....

DAY 4: Stratford-upon-Avon

I have only ever DREAMED of coming to Stratford, so along the bus ride I was like trying not to pee from all the excitement.

Shakespeare's birthplace !

such gorgeous trees; can't even begin to imagine how beautiful everything looks in the spring

Free time again after lunch (fish&chips) to explore Stratford, which is so small I guess you really can finish the entire town in a day.

Happy girls we were HAHA, thanks to the great thrift stores and, would you believe it, H&M right smack in the heart of the town.

DAY 5: Oxford

The extremely famous university town that boasts inspiration sites for famous authors as well as many Harry Potter filming locations !! Seriously another super pretty place





Behind this shockingly cool bridge is a tree, under which Malfoy was turned into a ferret

free time in Oxford consisted of Simone + Tess + me rushing around the shopping area to get One Direction stuff from HMV (omg lovelovelove), bargain shopping at Primark (I WORSHIP THERE) and Oxford sweatshirts etc from all the varsity shops along the road

so,

hardly any photos ):

DAY 6-8: London

Trafalgar Square O:

So Day 6 was a lot of crazy sightseeing (WITHIN THE DAMN BUS) around London, including Tower Bridge and the Tower of London. Once again, all these incredible historical sites I've visited only in my daydreams

after that we got the chance to walk to Buckingham Palace to see the changing of the guard !! Exciting but torturously cold; plus since it was winter the guards were all in their long gray winter coats and not their famous red ones ):

Westminster Abbey.. i think.

BIG BEN. I forced people to take like 8 photos of me w/ it cos I was so preschoolgirl-excited 8D

then we went to pretty Covent Garden for lunch !!

I love the buskers, the bustling arts&crafts market, the busy people streaming out of the subway and milling about the street. It all just makes you feel so ALIVE

Imperial War Museum - we spent close to 4 hours exploring the 5 floors of war exhibits, including the Holocaust Exhibitin

We had dinner in Chinatown afterwards, in this ridiculous little "Singaporean-Malaysian" Restaurant that was chock full of chinkies but served up really large portions of really good Asian food.That was a nice change :)

What was an even nicer change was the teachers agreeing to let us go to the annual London fair Winter Wonderland instead of retiring to the hotel early as usual.

The night walk through Soho was SO FUN, chatting and laughing w/ Grass+Joel gave me pre-fair high 8)

split off into small groups to take the rides and explore the fair. The rides and games put Uncle Ringo to SHAME HAHAHA

Everyone was so deliriously high after the 2hours at the fair. I'm pretty sure Joel and Mr Koh were a little drunk from the beer too omg super funny. We took the subway back to our hotel !

Eggcites.

Day 7 - the ~*GLOBE*~ and our free day around London !!!



that bridge is featured in Harry Potter, bytheway, hahaha

Artist and the Tate Modern (their gift shop was more entertaining than any I've ever been to)


inside the Globe !! If only it weren't Winter; the horrible construction would be absent and we might have been able to catch an authentic Shakespearean play there

After getting our lunch money from Kim the tour guide (a stnicks girl too, yay!), Simone/Tess/I rushed off to cross the HP bridge to take the subway to Oxford Circus for some heavy duty shopping

Lunch was cornies pasties and other pastries - cheap and quick !

(this way to Primark)

(just kidding)

Before we knew it, we blew 4 hours shuttling between Primark, H&M, F21, souvenir shops and a large Salvation Army along Princes Street. I was carrying so many shopping bags I lost the one pair of red 5pound shoes I bought at F21 along the way D: Made me so miserable when I realised

Quickly rushed down to Kings' Cross Station (HP alert) to be tourists, then had a quick Macs dinner (free wifi) before flying back down to meet the rest at Covent Garden to proceed to watch Driving Miss Daisy at night

It was terrible, just saying

SIGH, last day in London (and uk, basically). Was kinda glad to be able to steal a quick photo with the famous red postbox, albeit this one being a different shape from the more well-known one.

Attended a poetry workshop where I discovered I absolutely cannot write poetry to save my life, then they dropped us off at Springfield's shopping mall for last minute shopping. And I really do mean last minute; they gave us like an hour to grab whatever we wanted so Tess and I flew off to H&M for the last time.

Got some London froyo (HAHAHA) from Snog too. I loveeeee froyoooooo (L)

Then it was the flight home ):

ALL IN ALL, I LOVE UK SO SO SO SO SO SO SO MUCH EVEN THOUGH WE MISSED OUT ON A LOT OF GREAT SIGHTSEEING AND SHOPPING BECAUSE THE TRIP WAS MUCH TO SHORT BUT IM STILL REALLY GLAD I GOT TO GO COS I BONDED WITH A FEW PEOPLE AND I GAINED SO MUCH FROM THE TRIP AND I WOULD GO BACK IN A MINUTE. A MINUTE.