We Actually Have Jobs

9-22-2008

At seven in the morning, I awoke and went to ISH for breakfast. Interns receive £2.50 per day for meals, which covers exactly a three item morning meal and a small juice. More often than not, it looks like my three items will consist of scrambled eggs, two slices of toast (one white and one wheat for a well-balanced meal), and a sausage. Now I’ve heard that sausages can be called bangers here in Great Britain, however, I have seen no evidence to support that fact. I really don’t know which would be worse though:

“Good morning, can I have scrambled eggs, 

toast, and a hot sausage”

or

“Good morning, can I have scrambled eggs, 

toast, and a hot banger”

Sometimes I think Arrested Development just makes things up to be funny, but why would a comedy sitcom do something like that? Anywho, long story short, I’ve got my breakfasts in order, and all is good as far as morning nourishment is concerned.

Following breakfast I decided I would sample the National Healthcare System and stop by the clinic to have my tummy checked out. Since Paris, I get random intense stomach pains. The frequency of the stabbing pain has been lessening, however, I still figured it’d be worth checking out. Once I got arrived, there was the normal introductory paperwork, but it was much less intensive than that of a doctor in America. Long story short, I left without seeing a doctor and am waiting for a confirmation in the mail that my paperwork when through and that I can officially see a doctor here.

At 12:30 myself and the other interns made the walk to Great Russell Street where the Anglo American internship coordination offices are located, right around the corner from The British Museum. There all of our worries were put to rest, as many of us had not talked to our internship companies in months. We received a confirmation of our internship placement, a short synopsis of the company, and an A-Z London book which contains every detailed map of London you could ever want. They also explained to us how to dress at our internship. Perhaps this is because I have not worked in the ‘real world’ yet or perhaps it is a Britishism, but I have never heard of the three dress categories of casual, casual-smart, and smart. I was informed that my work is casual.

We all left that meeting on a euphoric high. As mentioned, most of us had no idea if we even had a job in London since we’ve heard nothing from our internships or Anglo American since our initial contact with them months earlier. Now, we knew. We were employed and were about to be functioning members of the London society. To celebrate our new employment, I bought a casual-smart (see, I’m using the terms already) satchel. Then Kallie, Megadeath, and I decided we’d celebrate our new jobs further by stopping in the closest pub, grabbing a pint or three, and people watching.

That night we hung out at the ISH bar for a bit and listened to a jazz trio consisting of a kit, bass, and trumpet. They were great individual musicians, however, without a harmonic instrument there was a void that need to be filled. No matter. We soon ventured further into London as it was Mike’s birthday at midnight. We cruised through the ever so popular Soho late at night, which is basically London’s red light district.

The only club we actually made it to was a chill yet upscale restaurant/bar upstairs, but downstairs was a scene from Dirty Dancing. The entire dance floor was full of tango/salsa dancers, and every one of them knew exactly what they were doing. My favorite was one guy with a girl on each arm. He was spinning them back and forth, to and fro, and never missed a beat with either one of them. We watched these dancers for a while as we dared not venture out onto the floor, but eventually the waft of body odor became overwhelming so we booked out.