Harlaxton 2017: Final Day in London

By: Benjamin Kash

Our last day in London started with a bang. And by that I mean a class quiz on short story authors and discussions ranging from a gang of schoolboys gracefully destroying an ancient house to a symbolic fox fur. The hours tick off until finally a metaphysical clock strikes 12 and in a typical High School Musical fashion we disburse into London faster than the Underground.

For our final day, some of my friends and I purchased tickets to Wicked the Musical in the West End. After some traveling woes, we arrived at the Apollo Victoria Theater. Elphaba and Glinda helped me fill in the blanks of the Wizard of Oz (and Grayson and Caleb haven’t stopped singing since), then we were back on the Tube and off to afternoon tea. My mango tango tea and pastries helped revitalize me from the emotional turmoil of Emerald City, but nothing could have prepared me for what would follow.

What started as a harmless attempt to clean our clothes would devolve into a rain-soaked, tide-pod-carrying adventure around the streets of London. The laundry machines in our building clearly despised me as they refused to operate correctly and ate all of my change. So in a misguided search for other machines we traveled across the street… in the pouring rain. Carrying dirty laundry in public while trying to avoid any water from dissolving your detergent may sound fun, but believe me it’s not. Fast forward a few minutes and you would have found us running around Seymour St. in search of a laundromat that Apple Maps claimed existed when it very much so did not. Finally, in our defeated, sullen state we stumbled upon the original laundry room across the street and successfully cleaned our garments. A 4 hour ordeal in all but a fun one.

With that, we concluded our final day in the melting pot of Europe. We have an early morning tomorrow then it is off to Harlaxton. Can’t wait to see what spontaneous adventures await us there!