Days FIFTEEN SIXTEEN AND SEVENTEEN

Days FIFTEEN SIXTEEN AND SEVENTEEN. A Polish and Three Americans girls go into a pub. And lightning. My bed is more important than my blog. Sorry for the delay. I moved to Fullham on Friday morning. My amazing flatmate that picked me up on day one at the bus stop offered to help me take my things to my new place. I was floored, seriously such kindness I need to pay it forward. I got there earlier than I needed, but I was glad I had help. It's like a hotel compared to the other place. My room is cheery yellow, high ceilings, lace curtained window, two chests of drawers, a wardrobe, and a double bed....better than the mini single I have been trying to sleep on for the past two weeks that was more like a cot. Anyhow, Sue is nice, she showed me around a bit, showed me how to use the appliances, how to lock the front door, flush the toilet, turn on the hot water for the shower, you know the typical household things. Then I unpacked a bit. I unloaded the big suitcase and was so glad to put things in drawers and not pick things out of suitcases. An hour later i was on my was to school to study a bit before class. The class.....we used the puff pastry we had made the day before and cut it into a tart shell for our fruit tart. Baked it, mine turned out a bit wonky. I think I folded it one too many times the day before. Oh well. It's just a pastry, life goes on. I made pastry cream for the third time in our classes. I have the procedure down, I just need to work on memorizing ingredient amounts. Cut my fruit, assembled, whalla. A fruit tart. In looking at my pictures, nothing but fruit and no chocolate. I want chocolate classes. In demonstration class, we learned how to make eclairs. Chef Touille must really like us because 80% of our classes so far have been taught by him. Attendance wise, I am the last one on the list (last alphabetically in group c). I have to listen to "here" "yes chef" 42 times before he gets to my name. I've been trying to jazz it up by saying, "hello!" "Ola" "namaste" when my name is called. Thursday night I said my favorite, "aloha!" Chef asked me where his flowers were to have a lei, and I told him I would bring them tomorrow. Classmates giggled. He didn't believe that I actually would. Friday night when he called my name, "konnichiwa" came out of me....and "chef is it tommorow today?" He being a bit confused and trying to make a joke back said "I guess so" "Good. Here are your flowers!" And out I popped a small bouquet of carnations. The class roared with laughter and applause as I went up to him and gave him flowers. He thanked me laughing and said no one has ever bought him flowers before. I never bought flowers for a guy before either. Class on eclairs was good. I have made them before in my lifetime so it wasn't as foreign as puff pastry or pastry cream. This is another possibility for our final exam (lemon tart being another). I took a lot of notes. The only thing readable about the class was that it ended at 930, and we had class the next morning at 8am. I feared I would miss my alarm clock. Nope. Got there at 720. Everything was closed so I couldn't grab a breakfast sandwich like I planned on from the corner cafe. All of us were really tired and it was hard to be making a possible exam item so early in the morning. It's like we live in the building. I did alright. They need to be consistent in size, shape, fondant (not like fondant in the states, this is more like Lisa's/Mel's pumpkin cookie frosting kind of fondant) and decorative design on the top. I tried to stay within the 2.5 hour "exam time" so my design wasn't that creative but I wanted to get done on time, and with a minute to spare, I finished. We had a demonstration class afterwards where we learned to make rolls. Not Aunt Erda rolls or aunt Marilyn's either, standard restaurant style white bread rolls. (He did make wheat too, but I forgot to taste it.) He also made soda bread. We'll be making both on Monday. It was an instructor that my group has only had for health and safety so far. These chefs can be crusty one minute and softies the next.....just like the bread. Ha! He asked us how our eclairs turned out and gave some feedback. He asked us if any of us knew what eclair meant in French. No one in all three groups speaks French. Lightning. Eclairs means lightning. I think everyone was excited to eat and eat bread we did. Class dismissed early. Yay! I went to lunch with Vermont and Poland. We walked and walked like the pioneers trying to find a place to eat at. We went to some famous hotdogs and champagne place (bubble dogs) but the kitchen was closing for lunch service. we were not going to wait for 2 hours, so we went across the street to a cafe and ate. We had already made plans to do something for dinner too. We left each other. I knew I didn't have that much time to do anything, but I needed to get groceries and laundry detergent. Got that done, took a shower, and headed out. Didn't know there was a soccer (football) game to crowd my subway ride from 40 minutes to an hour. Boo. I met up with Vermont and Poland and found that California joined us for the night. We were pioneers again and just walked forever before finding a pub with not a lot of people in it. Should have taken that as a sign. Vermont and I ordered nachos to share. The description sounded good. When they came, it was bottom of the bag DORITOS with melted cheese on top and jalapeños. I don't remember the last time I ate Doritos. I don't like them, but I was so hungry I ate them anyway. We both avoided the cup of "salsa" on the plate aka ketchup with onions mixed in it. It was nice just to get out and do something other than cook with my classmates. Today I went to church at the Hyde Park 1st Ward, the ward where I am living now meets there. It's a great building, just south of Hyde Park, Royal Albert Hall, and Victoria and Albert Museum. The ward from the looks of things wasn't as diverse as harrow. A lot of people bearing testimony in American accents. The RS Pres is American, Bishop is British. I met a couple that just moved in the ward. I exchanged numbers with her. Walked through the Victoria and Albert Museum for a brief moment on the way back to the tube. Came home, put my pajamas on, watched general women's broadcast, rewriting some of my notes, wishing I had excellant memorization skills, writing this saga of a novel and have been trying to stay awake so I don't fall asleep before 5pm. Hoping to do some ironing tonight, studying, and watching Downton abbey and facetiming anyone that wants to FaceTime with me. Congratulations on making it to the end of this report. Goodnight....or good afternoon....or good day wherever you are