Tag: Europe

January 1, 2019 – Dear Axel (OOTD #433)

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I hope Axel doesn’t read this.

Alright, so after my exhausting New Year’s Eve party experience, I slept in until about noon on January 1. Classes were canceled, and so there was nothing in particular that I had to do that day. I took lunch with my host family and their daughter, and we chatted about what Kentucky was famous for. Turns out, they were familiar with KFC and bluegrass music — which I guess, while not my favorite, aren’t the absolute worst things for Europeans to know you state by.

After our two hour meal, I excused myself (for some reason, they wouldn’t leave the table until I said something about needing to go — which was a little annoying, because I was afraid I was somehow forcing them to clean up before they really wanted to). I told them I was going to go for a walk, which was absolutely true.

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bonjour 👋

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What I left out was that I was going for a walk to meet up with some guy from around town whom I matched with on Tinder.

Alright, so here’s the point where I hope Axel doesn’t read this — I wasn’t necessarily looking for anything romantically in him, and I don’t know if he was hoping that I was. I just wanted someone to show me around town, and in his bio, he mentioned that he was really good at English. I’d been speaking French almost nonstop for three days, and the opportunity to hold a conversation in my native tongue seemed relaxing.

So I met up with Axel, who was a bit awkward, but an overall harmless dude. I asked him to show me around, which was a little hard since it seemed like everything was closed for the holiday. But overall, he was a pretty easy guy to talk to — I definitely dominated the conversation, perhaps because I was better at English and perhaps because I was just overall the less awkward of the two of us.

Of the two or three Tinder dates I’ve ever been on, I don’t think I’d rank it much higher or lower than any of the others. I mean, the fact that it was in France made it pretty cool — that was definitely a much more interesting location than the time I got coffee with someone in the Subway of the Student Center.

What was unfortunate, however, was that after Axel and I parted ways, I somehow lost my glasses. Somehow, in between taking those first pictures at the school at this last picture in the park, my glasses disappeared. My first guess is that they just fell out of my pocket at some point was we were walking along, meaning that there’s no chance that I’m going to get them back.

My second guess, though, is that Axel stole them. Why would my Tinder date steal my glasses? I don’t know. But Axel, if you happen to read this — which I kind of hope you don’t — I’d really like my glasses back s’il te plaît. Je dois voir, et il n’est pas probable que nous nous reverrons déja. Tu peux rendre mes lunettes maintenant. 

That’s about it for today. Thanks for reading, and I’ll see you in the next one with more updates on my travels. Don’t forget to check me out on Pinterest, Instagram, Facebook, Bloglovin, Twitter, and Tumblr! For business inquiries, shoot me an email at lensembledujour@gmail.com!

Jacket: Hollister

Top: Thrifted (flea market)

Turtleneck: Free People

Pants: Banana Republic

December 31, 2018 – Le Réveillon (OOTD #432)

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I don’t believe I ever imagined spending New Year’s Eve in Vichy.

I mean, I always assumed I’d make it to France one day — I mean, it’s such a huge tourist destination, and it’s an easy place for English-speakers to travel to. Besides, I speak un peu de français — pas très bien, mai j’essaie. 

But I always figured I’d go in the summer for vacation, and that I’d see Paris like all of the other American tourists. This small spa town had never really been on my radar, at least until Notre Dame offered me funding to visit.

Let me give you a little context — Notre Dame has a ton of money, and they like to give it to students who can do things that will reflect well upon the university, so that they can then make more money. I, as a student with little money who seems to end up surrendering any money I do make right back to Notre Dame, am happy to take advantage of any opportunity Notre Dame has to give me money to go do something academic.

I heard from (of all people) my Russian literature professor that the Center for the Study of Languages and Cultures was offering grants to students to go abroad during the winter break to do an intensive language study, and I figured there was no harm in applying. Lo and behold, they gave me $3,000 to go to France for a week, enroll myself in some language courses, and stay with a host family.

And so that’s what I did. But of course, the trip was not without some difficulties — including one really big one that hit me the moment I got off the airplane in Clermont-Ferrand. Air France had left my bags in Paris, and, having basically just arrived in a new country where I only sort-of spoke the language, I was at a loss for what to do.

Thankfully, my host mother, who met me at the airport, was able to help. Naturally, she spoke flawless French, and I was able to communicate to her with my rudimentary conversation skills what had happened. I’m so grateful that she was there — I’ve never lost bags before, and I wouldn’t have even known what to do had it happened back in the US.

Unfortunately, I was forced to sleep in the same clothes as I had worn to the airport (which were also the same clothes I had worn all day for my last day in Qatar), as well as attend my first day of classes in that outfit. By the time my host mother texted me in the afternoon to tell me that my bags had been delivered to the house, I was pretty sick of that outfit.

Because of the holiday, classes were shortened to a half day. Since I hadn’t been there for very long, I’d had no time to make friends with whom I could spend my afternoon. The school offered some cultural excursions for new students, and, with nothing else to do and still a little afraid of going out on my own, I figured I’d take advantage of the programming.

Monday’s trip was a walking tour of Vichy. It was just me and another student, a Swiss high school student whose French was superior to mine. It was a little awkward, but I’m glad I got someone to show me around a little. It’s not like Vichy is a huge town; in fact, it’s quite small. It doesn’t really have a huge tourist presence, except for its spas and natural springs, and so I don’t know how else I would’ve learned about its history and culture.

In the evening, I returned to my host family’s house for New Year’s Eve dinner. That was the longest dinner of my entire life. 

I’m not speaking figuratively — I think it literally took four and a half hours from start to finish. By the end, I was exhausted, anxious from having strangers question me about my life in French (which would have been intimidating even in English), slightly intoxicated from all of the alcohol that people kept offering me, and absolutely stuffed from the four-course meal.

And it was a delicious meal! And the people were wonderfully kind — there were even some young adults about my age who were able to speak in English a little bit! Even if it was a little stressful in the moment, it was an important to have had that experience, I think. It was something of a trial by fire in French culture — there was nowhere to hide, so I just had to sit there and try to use my French as much as possible, and pray that I didn’t accidentally say something offensive. Call it exposure therapy.

By the time I went to bed at 3 AM local time (who knows what time my body thought it was), I was worn out. I mean, I’d basically been spending the last two weeks worn out, either from traveling or from studying for finals, so it wasn’t anything new. But what was new, at least compared to the kind of exhaustion that finals inflicted, was that the exhaustion felt rewarding. Sure, I was tired — but I was tired because I spent all day in a new culture, speaking a different language for longer than I ever had before and trying to make the most of my immersion experience. It was a good tired.

That’s about it for today. Thanks for reading, and I’ll see you in the next one with more updates on my travels. Don’t forget to check me out on Pinterest, Instagram, Facebook, Bloglovin, Twitter, and Tumblr! For business inquiries, shoot me an email at lensembledujour@gmail.com!

Sweater: Thrifted (Goodwill)

Skirt: Abercrombie

December 29, 2018 – Khuda Hafiz and Bonjour (OOTD #431)

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Translation: goodbye (Urdu) and hello (French)

Traveling is weird because it completely destroys your sense of time, especially when you’re traveling across time zones.

Granted, I shouldn’t have had much of a time zone change to worry about when going from Qatar to France, as there was only a two hour difference between the two countries, but it felt like so much more.

I left from my hotel in Qatar at about 11PM at night, after saying goodbye to all of my Indian and Pakistani friends who’d been a part of the conference. This time, I really do question whether I’ll be able to see them again — there will be one more conference this summer in the same series, and I suppose there’s a chance that Notre Dame could give me funding again, but I doubt it. Perhaps I’ll get to see them if I ever make it to India or Pakistan, but I don’t know when that will be.

The moment I got into the cab for the airport, I was out like a light. I guess five days straight of staying up until 1 or 2AM in the morning and getting up at 6AM for class really takes a toll on you — especially if those five days of sleep deprivation follow about four months of less extreme but more prolonged sleep deprivation during the regular school year.

I wish I had been awake to see the city pass as I left, but I was just too exhausted. In fact, I was so tired that I completely forgot to check in for my flight online before I got to the airport. It’s not that that’s such a big deal, since I was able to just get in line to check in when I got there, but I feel a lot more comfortable when I travel internationally if I can cut the amount of time waiting in line by as much as possible. I get nervous about missing flights, especially when I’m in a foreign country and an unfamiliar airport. I’ve yet to miss a flight when I’m on my own, and I want to keep it that way.

In the end though, I managed to navigate my way to the gate and get there on time. From there, it was a six hour flight to Istanbul — the majority of those six hours which I spent passed out in my chair.

My travel debacle began when I landed in Istanbul. I had only an hour to make it from one gate to another, and apparently, that was not nearly enough. The security lines were terrible, and it seemed like there was hardly anyone working. I was lucky; I found a group of French people behind me in line who were headed to Paris as well, and so I followed them as they pushed their way past people in line. We probably didn’t make any friends, but we made it to our gate on time (just as they are doing last call!) and so I guess making some Turkish people mad was worth it.

The travel debacle continued, however. After a fairly simple (which is not to say stress-free) transfer in Paris to Clermont-Ferrand, I was on my way to my final destination at about noon. I arrived in Clermont-Ferrand, a very small airport, where I was to meet with my host family who’d transport me back to their home in Vichy.

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That part went smoothly — my host mother was standing there with a sign with my name, and she was very friendly. What didn’t go smoothly was the acquisition of my bags, because apparently, they never made it from the Charles de Gaulle Airport in Paris.

And so, instead of a second, clean outfit after I arrived in Vichy, I had to keep the same one on that I had worn all day on my last day in Qatar. And then I had to sleep in it. And then I had to wear it the next day.

How will the story end? Will I get my bags? How will I survive in France with my limited French, and my semi-competent social skills? Tune in next time for the thrilling continuation of my French adventures.

That’s about it for today. Thanks for reading, and I’ll see you in the next one with more updates on my travels. Don’t forget to check me out on Pinterest, Instagram, Facebook, Bloglovin, Twitter, and Tumblr! For business inquiries, shoot me an email at lensembledujour@gmail.com!

Top: The LOFT (thrifted, Goodwill)

Pants: The closet of a friend of mine

 

 

 

December 24, 2018 – Christmas Eve in Germany (OOTD #426)

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Spending Christmas Eve in Germany was not in my life plans about a month ago.

A month ago, I had assumed I’d be spending my winter break split between Qatar and France — Qatar for a conference on Islamic theology and peacebuilding funded by my university, and then France to immerse myself in French language and culture for a week, also funded by my university. If I was going to wind up in any other countries along the way, I figured they’d just be short layovers not really worthy mentioning — kind of like the time I was technically in Abu Dhabi for two hours for a layover during my flight to Nepal.

https://www.instagram.com/p/BrxXHKljs3A/ 

But, as it turned out, once my flights were organized by the conference coordinator, I got an extra long layover in Munich, Germany, on my flight to Doha, Qatar on December 23 — a whole seven hours! Initially, I figured I’d just hang out and explore the airport. I’ve heard good things about the Munich airport.

Remembering the fun I was able to have in Bucktown, Chicago during my long layover in O’Hare on my flight home from Nepal, I began to wonder though if maybe I’d be able to do the same for Munich. I’m not the most comfortable traveling by myself to foreign countries, though I don’t know if anyone ever really is, but I’ve been getting more confidence over the last few years, especially having traveled to London and Nepal semi-independently.

After doing some research (namely consulting the TripAdvisor forums), I decided to go for it and try to see the city during the seven-hour layover. There was another Notre Dame girl going to the same conference who wound up on the same flight from Philly to Munich, and after telling her my plan, she agreed to go too. Neither of us had ever seen Germany and neither of us spoke German, but we figured we could function for a few hours.

I departed Kentucky midday, and then I had a medium-length layover in Philadelphia. From there, it was a nine-ish hour flight — at which point, we arrived in Munich at about 9:00 AM local time.

Immigration was a piece of cake — the officer only asked how long I’d be there, and then he sent us on our way. From there, we purchased the less than 20 USD train tickets to Marienplatz, as the TripAdvisor forums suggested.

If there was anything I loved about Germany, it was the S-Bahn train. The New York Subway, the London Underground, the Chicago L — none of those public transport systems have anything on this German train. It was clean, quiet, modern, and perhaps most surprisingly for me — perfectly on time. There was even a screen where you could see estimated arrival times for each stop, and how those ETAs changed based on how long loading and unloading took each stop. The future is now, I guess.

When we stepped out into Marienplatz, the town square, I admittedly didn’t know what to expect. I’ve hardly ever studied German language or culture, and I was too lazy to do much studying up before I went. I had almost no preconceived notions of what a German city should look like — but rest assured, I was not disappointed.

I saw a lot of different things over winter break — the colorful Doha skyline, sand dunes in the Middle East, gothic churches in France, a spring of supposedly magical healing water — but I don’t think anything had quite the same effect on me as seeing Marienplatz all decorated for the Christmas Eve Market. For context, the second you walk out from the Marienplatz S-Bahn stop onto the street, the first thing you see is the massive Rockefeller Center-sized Christmas tree in front of the spectacular gothic-style New Town Hall.

Coming from the US, and a relatively small US city at that, I don’t get to see much that even vaguely resembles Marienplatz very often. Notre Dame’s campus has some cool collegiate gothic architecture, and I do love God Quad with the basilica and the Golden Dome, but Notre Dame can’t compete with the feel a real European city. Everything there is so old — even stuff that technically isn’t that old, like the New Town Hall (which actually was only built in the 19th century), feels old.

One of my favorite things about travel is the ability to get a feel for a city — the facial expressions of locals as they walk through crowded train platforms, the ambient sounds as you maneuver through the town square, the kind of birds that nest in the crevices of buildings. If I had to describe Munich from my short visit, it was quaint. London, or what I saw of it in 2017, felt old, but somehow, Munich felt older. Munich felt a little quieter, a little friendlier — distinctively different from the sense of frustrated energy that exists in a massive city like New York or London. And I love the frustrated energy of New York and London — in fact, I’d love to be a frustrated, energetic New Yorker one day — but I also appreciated the slower pace of Munich.

In the end, my friend and I didn’t do much more than walk around. We did end up getting hungry and wander into a random restaurant, where I had the most German encounter of my trip: I tried to order water to drink, and instead I was given beer. I mean, I have nothing against drinking beer in Germany — in fact, that seems to be probably a pretty good place to do it — but I was still kind of surprised when I thought I was just getting water. It was good though. And what was even better was that it ended up being free, for some reason? Don’t know what happened there, but no complaints from me.

I was a little worried about getting back in time for our flight, but I shouldn’t have been. The train ran just as beautifully as it did on the way there, and immigration was once again a simple interaction. From there, it was another six hour flight in order to make it to Qatar. I got in at around 11 at night local time, and I didn’t stumble into my hotel until around 1:30. But more on that later.

To check out my full Munich adventures, I highly recommend checking out my Instagram story highlights from that day!

That’s about it for today. Thanks for reading, and I’ll see you in the next one with more updates on my travels. Don’t forget to check me out on Pinterest, Instagram, Facebook, Bloglovin, Twitter, and Tumblr! For business inquiries, shoot me an email at lensembledujour@gmail.com!

Top: The LOFT

Pants: Thrifted (Salvation Army)

Scarf: My mother’s closet

 

July 13, 2017 – Goodbye London (OOTD #67)

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It was our final day in London, and, not to be cliché but it was rather bittersweet.

In one sense, I’m glad to be going home, back to a country where the restrooms are free, my cords work in the outlets, and air conditioning is abundant, but of course, it’s also rather sad going back to normal reality. I’m going to have to return to work in a few days, start packing for school, coordinate dorm decorations with my new roommates – things I’ve been putting off thinking about since I’ve been here in London.

We started off our day in the same way as always – a crumpet, some coffee, and fresh fruit. Sue, our host, has been so lovely about letting us stay with her, even getting to know our breakfast preferences and having them set out for us on the table every day when we wake up. It’s because of her we’ve even been able to come on this trip – like seriously, is a broke college kid going to be able to afford a hotel in London for two weeks? No.

We brought her some chocolates when we first arrived as a hostess gift, but Amanda and I both felt like we needed to do something more. She suggested that I do a little drawing of her and her daughters, so over the last few nights, I’ve been working on doing this little doodle. It’s nothing special, but people like getting art, and I like doing it.

After the unfortunate fires that went through Camden Lock just a day before we had been planning to go (we were going to go right after we did Shoreditch, but we found out that morning that there had been some bad fires in that part of town), we didn’t think we were going to be able to get there during our time in London, but thankfully, they managed to contain the fires enough that we could still see parts of the area and market.

Camden Town was cool, but I don’t know – I might’ve liked Shoreditch and its market better. Perhaps that was partially because we didn’t get to see all of Camden Lock due to the fires, but mostly, I just liked how colorful and artistic Shoreditch was. Camden has its own quirky personality – there were some really awesome goth and alternative fashion stores that I could’ve spent hours in – and I loved the canal (I think it’s a canal?) that runs through the area, but it just didn’t quite have the same soul to it.

After spending plenty of money on street food, Amanda and I headed back over to West End for another show – this time, we got tickets for Les Mis, a personal favorite for both of us. By then, both our phones were in the single digits in terms of battery, and we were desperately trying to conserve their failing energies while still using their GPS’s to navigate the unfamiliar area. We actually might’ve spent more time walking around that area and looking in the shops, but once we found the Queen’s Theatre, we were too afraid to stray very far in fear of our phones dying and having no way to navigate ourselves back!

For real though, Les Mis was excellent. I’ve been a fan ever since I watched the DVD recording of the 25th anniversary Royal Albert Hall concert (which I still argue is one of the best casts ever – with the exception of Nick Jonas as Marius), and I know almost every song by heart, including the odd ones, like “Confrontation” and “The Thénardier Waltz of Treachery.” It was wonderful finally getting to see the show live in-person. The cast did a lovely job, and even with our terrible upper circle seats, I was drawn into the world the staging and sets created.

After the show, we walked back to the Tottenham Court station and took our final Cambridge-bound train back to Broxbourne, and from there, our final overpriced cab (7 pounds! For literally a five minute ride!) back to the house.

London’s been amazing, and [insert clichés about never forgetting the adventures I’ve had, being grateful for the opportunity to travel, yadayadayada]. I joke, but I do mean it. I’ve had a lot of fun out here, and I’m sad to be going back.

That’s it for today! I’ll see you in the next one. Don’t forget to check me out on Pinterest, Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and Tumblr! For business inquiries, shoot me an email at lensembledujour@gmail.com!

(Don’t let the sun go down on me, amirite?)

Top: Pitaya

Shorts: Abercrombie

Choker: Madewell

July 12, 2017 – Cambridge, CANbridge, CAN’Tbridge (OOTD #66)

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That was a dumb title, I know.

But hey, those are just a staple at this point at L’ensemble du jour. What is a blog post without a stupid, kind-of-but-mostly-not clever title?

By day 7, Amanda and I were growing tired of London. Its newness had worn off, and we were running out of neighborhoods and boroughs we wanted to see. Sue offered to take us out to see Windsor, but the admission prices were sort-of steep, and we are poor college kids who are only here in London by some rather lucky circumstances. Thus, we decided to take our Oyster cards and take a little day trip out to Cambridge.

You’ll notice I said “take our Oyster cards out to Cambridge,” and if you’re a London local, you’ll know that doesn’t work – Oyster cards only work on zones 1-9 throughout the Greater London area. But we are not London locals, and we did not know that wouldn’t work, so we wound up an hour and a half later at a platform in Cambridge with no way to swipe out to get into the actual town.


We had two options at that point – take the train out to the closest station where our Oyster card would allow us to swipe out, so we could buy tickets (which happened to be Broxbourne, the station we began at – and the station that I just mentioned was an hour and a half away) or find a railway worker, admit our mistake, and pay the penalty fee.

We opted for the former.

We hopped back on the Liverpool St train and prepared ourselves for a very long, very sad journey all the way back to Broxbourne. Thankfully, as luck, or perhaps God, would have it, we didn’t have to go all the way back to Broxbourne – the first stop the Liverpool train made was this little town called Shelford, which had a ticket dispenser machine right there on the platform.

In the end, it was probably only a 30 minute detour, but it felt much, much longer. It some ways, it was a happy mistake though – by using our Oyster cards to swipe out at Broxbourne, riding the train to Shelford, and then buying tickets for a ride from Shelford to Cambridge, we only had to pay about three pounds for the whole journey rather than the twenty-something it would have cost to ride from Broxbourne to Cambridge.

Finally in Cambridge, we were in desperate need of some refreshment, so we stopped in a Caffè Nero, the English equivalent of Starbucks. We got some well-deserved coffee, charged our phones, and rested up a bit before embarking on the 30 minute trek all the way out to central Cambridge.

Cambridge was a really beautiful town. It wasn’t exactly a small countryside village, but it almost felt like it; it was so different from the bustle of London. People were riding their bikes everywhere, the roads were uneven cobblestone, and I kept getting weird glances from the much more conservatively dressed locals because I was wearing a crop top.

We had wanted to go punting tour on the river in Cambridge, but unfortunately, we missed out on the final tour of the day due to some big group that was coming in later in the day. It was a bit disappointing, not being able to take this one actual guided tour we’d scheduled, but we still got to see the town and the school, so it was okay. We walked around some more, stopped in a pub where I got bangers and mash (very, very good by the way – but very, very heavy), and then got a rather overpriced Uber back to the station.

That’s it for today! I’ll see you in the next one. Don’t forget to check me out on Pinterest, Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and Tumblr! For business inquiries, shoot me an email at lensembledujour@gmail.com!

Top: Aerie

Skirt: Street vendor in New York

Choker: Madewell

July 11, 2017 – Just Let Abbey Road Be (OOTD #65)

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Do I get any points for that title? No?Day 6, we saw the famous Abbey Road zebra crossing, and let me tell you, that was an experience. Not wholly in a good way, and not wholly in a bad way, it was just – ugh, allow me to explain:

Abbey Road is just a road. I have no problem with that – they’re not going to close off an entire road and make it into a museum because some famous people 50 years ago took a photo there. But since it’s a road – like, a real functioning road, with cars and angry drivers with places to be – it makes it a real chore to cross it and take your silly touristy photo.

But Amanda and I were determined. We didn’t make it all the way out to London, I-don’t-even-know-how-many-miles across the ocean, to not get a picture to show our grandchildren. Plus, we’re both Beatles fans (I had a phase in middle school…), so we really wanted to see this famous spot.

Well, there were about 50 other tourists there at Abbey Road Studios that day with the same mindset, some of whom knew English traffic laws and some of whom didn’t. In England, it’s law that cars must stop if they see a pedestrian at a zebra crossing, so if you’re standing there waiting for traffic to clear so you can get a nice, car-free photo, you’ll be disappointed to see that the cars will all stop, lining up on the road if they have to, to let you walk.

So it’s rather awkward when a tourist just stands there as the traffic piles up at the crossing because the tourist wants the road to clear so they can get a good picture, and the traffic just wants the tourist to walk and get out of the way. Add into the mix, there are likely several other tourists all trying to cross the road at the same time as you, and you definitely don’t want them crossing the road with you and ruining your picture.
In short – it’s stressful, and, unless you’re a Beatles fan on a mission like Amanda and me, probably not worth your time.

I should also mention – before Abbey Road, we saw the Tower of London, something that Amanda was very interested in seeing. Personally, it wasn’t my favorite old building we saw (that honor would probably have to go to Westminster Abbey), but I’m glad we saw it anyway. It’s much bigger than I expected, and even though we were too cheap to pay the admission

to look inside, it was still cool to stand in such proximity to somewhere where so much history has taken place.


I also got noodles at this amazing place just off the Liverpool station that specialized in ramen. Shoryu Ramen, it was called – and it was really good. I’m a sucker for noodles, I guess it’s a part of being Asian, and this place was like a dream come true. The only Asian food we get in Kentucky is PF Chang’s and cheap takeout; these were real, high quality Japanese noodles. 

And that’s about it for the day, actually. We stopped by Baker Street just to say we had but found that the line for the Sherlock museum was too long to be bothered with, got tea again at the British Museum, and then stopped at a little art shop called jlkjfjlacmdls so I could buy a new sketchbook since I used up my old one on the flight over.

The nice (?) thing about that day was that we finally got to experience the infamous London rain. It’s been beautiful and sunny and even kind of hot these last few days here, but we hadn’t seen any of the cloudy skies and rain that London is known for. That finally changed as we were coming out of the British Museum. I don’t know, it’s not like I’ve never seen rain before, but something about being there in London, wearing a navy blue blazer, walking the street and actually knowing where I was going, and not really minding the rainfall, that made me feel like a real local.

It was cool.

That’s it for today! I’ll see you in the next one. Don’t forget to check me out on Pinterest, Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and Tumblr! For business inquiries, shoot me an email at lensembledujour@gmail.com!

Jacket: Chaps (thrifted)

Shirt: Target

Jeans: Abercrombie

July 10, 2017 – Two Hills and a Caged Elephant (OOTD #64)

Published on by lensembledujour7 Comments

I’m beginning to feel ever so slightly like a local.


Of course, I’m not, and any local who heard my strange mid-Atlantic-ish, Philadelphia-ish accent could pick that out immediately, but I’m definitely losing my tourist-y vibe.

By Monday, our fifth day in London and the halfway point on our trip, we were able to navigate the Underground and National Rail with ease, we’d picked up on the local vernacular (“crisps,” “toilets,” the like), we could count exact change, and, on a sadder note, the newness of the whole thing was beginning to wear off for me.


When I first arrived in London, I was in awe of the place – it’s just so old, and I wasn’t expecting it. Well, I guess I was – London’s old, that’s obvious – but I’d never seen anything that oozed cultured antiquity like this, not even some of the cities in China, which are probably even older.

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But by day 5, it wasn’t so new anymore. I could pass a several hundred year-old pub on the street without my jaw dropping, and that was a shame. Awestruck wonder is nice while it lasts.

First up on Sunday, we took the Tube over to Notting Hill, another thing that was on Amanda’s bucket list. I’ve actually never finished the film Notting Hill – I started watching it on my laptop during our layover in Detroit on our way here, but I never got to finish it. I liked the bit I saw though.


Even without having seen the film, Notting Hill was pretty cool. There are rows upon rows of these beautiful rainbow-colored houses, making for some fun backgrounds for my pictures. It was a bit odd taking pictures in front of other people’s houses though.


We got lunch at this charming little Italian place called the Portobello Garden Cafe. It’s tucked in behind a clothing store, and we had the hardest time finding it, but it was worth it – it had some of the most beautiful outdoor garden décor I’ve ever seen.


After Notting Hill, we moved on to the next Hill on our list – Primrose Hill.

Primrose Hill is essentially a park with a big hill in the middle that gives you a nice view of the London skyline. Also, there was another red telephone booth (this one missing a door), so we took the opportunity to take more of the dumb photo booth photos.


The final stop on Monday’s journey I sadly have no photos for. We went to Union Chapel for a Cage the Elephant concert, and we weren’t allowed to have any cameras or phones in the venue as they were performing songs off their next album. It really was a shame – I would’ve killed to have taken pictures to show how close we were to the stage and just how beautiful the venue was.


I’ve said that Shoreditch was probably my favorite day on the whole trip, but Cage the Elephant was probably my favorite single event. The amazing band coupled with the gorgeous venue made for a truly remarkable experience.

That’s it for today! I’ll see you in the next one. Don’t forget to check me out on Pinterest, Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and Tumblr! For business inquiries, shoot me an email at lensembledujour@gmail.com!

Jacket: Hollister

Shirt: PacSun

Shorts: Abercrombie

July 9, 2017 – Shoreditching (OOTD #63)

Published on by lensembledujour14 Comments

Oh dear, it’s been a while, hasn’t it?

When I started blogging, I promised myself I wouldn’t let it go so many days between posts that I had to apologize to my readers for my tardiness, yet here I am.

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Am I "edgy" yet

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In my defense, London has had me distracted in the best way possible. There’s so much to see and do here, and every morning, I found myself eager to get up and start the day and every night, I found myself exhausted from the day’s adventures.

No need to worry though – my dear friend Amanda has been doing an excellent job documenting my outfits over these last several days, so the daily blog posts will continue from now on, just with a bit of a delay. Perhaps it’s better this way – gives me more time to distance myself from the day and give a true reflection, eh?

Anyway, flashback to Sunday, July 9 – probably my favorite day for the whole of my trip. We saw Shoreditch that day, which, for those of you who don’t know, is a charming little neighborhood in London that’s basically a hub for hipster culture. There are dozens of amazing little vintage shops run by guys with beards and girls in beanies, and I spent more money than I probably should’ve in the Brick Lane Market.


But what was best about Shoreditch was that it wasn’t crawling with tourists like some of the other places we’ve seen have been. I get it, London is a big exciting city, and people from all of over the world flock to it as a center for western history and culture (myself included), but the huge tour groups and confused-looking people standing right in the middle of the street trying to read a map get a little annoying.


Granted, I’ve been that confused-looking person standing in the middle of the road before, but that doesn’t make it much less annoying.


Second best to the lack of tourists was the amazing street art in Shoreditch. I mean, just look at some of the gorgeous photos I got that day, and it had nothing to do with having interesting angles or particularly good lighting. It was all in the backgrounds; they’ve got some stunning works all over the place there, and I wish I could’ve stayed around to get even more photos.


I also had fish and chips from Poppies’, which is, according to Trip Advisor, one of the best fish and chips places in London. To be honest, I don’t really like cod, but this was pretty good. I don’t know, I’m visiting London, I feel like I have to taste the signature dish whether I really want to or not.

Shoreditch: 10/10 would recommend if you’re planning a London trip.

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It was as good as it looks, don't worry

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Art's pretty cool

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Street art is cool! (London edition)

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That’s it for today! I’ll see you in the next one. Don’t forget to check me out on Pinterest, Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and Tumblr! For business inquiries, shoot me an email at lensembledujour@gmail.com!

Turtleneck: Free People

Skirt: Abercrombie

July 8, 2017 – Unconventional Pride Outfit (OOTD #62)

Published on by lensembledujour1 Comment

London: Day 4


We told ourselves we were going to give ourselves a “relaxed” day today – it wasn’t. Now, that doesn’t mean it wasn’t still fun – but relaxing? You could probably cross that off the list of descriptive words.


We began by heading over to Waltham Abbey, a small, historic town just about 15 minutes away from Broxbourne. Amanda and I agreed, it was one neat little area. The oldest towns in America are only a couple hundred years old because, of course, our country is also only a couple hundred years old, but this, this just made Jamestown and Plymouth look like children. The church has been around since 1030 (or so the Wikipedia article says), and every building in town oozes with antiquity.


After walking around a bit there, we were dropped off at the station to catch a train into London….only to find out after Sue drove away that the Waltham Abbey station was closed. It was whatever, we were able to walk over to another one that was open, but it was 20 minutes of stress in my life I didn’t need.


We had originally wanted to go back to Oxford Street today, but, as we found out, the Pride Festival was going on in that area, so it was closed. That didn’t phase us though – we decided to go to Pride then, instead.

Since we didn’t know we’d be going, we didn’t have any rainbow attire, so we might’ve looked kind of out of place, but it was so packed and crowded, I doubt anyone was paying attention since the number one priority for most people was just to stay standing. I’m used to crowds, and I don’t mind them, but this was bad. There were moments I couldn’t move, I was so smushed up against other people. I’m sure they had really tight security, given everything that’s gone on in London in the least year, but it was an excellent place for a terrorist attack.


We got a few photos and decided to get out of there quickly.


After that, we hit up Buckingham Palace. We didn’t get to see the inside or anything, but the outside was enough. It was stately – beautiful, grand, and kind-of cold. I’m glad we saw it – it’s arguably one of the most British things in all of England, and as a tourist, it was fun to see – but it’s not like a museum you got to walk around. We got our photos, and within 20 minutes, we were done.


In my opinion – the best kind of tourist site!


Last on the agenda was to get some food and drink at a pub. We opted for this old one called The Camel, which, let me tell you, had the most delicious chicken pie I’ve ever tasted. I also bought a pint of ale, which I managed to get through maybe 3/4 of. The more I drank, the more I liked it – or, rather, tolerated it. I’m not an ale person, apparently.


That’s it for today! I’ll see you in the next one. Don’t forget to check me out on Pinterest, Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and Tumblr! For business inquiries, shoot me an email at lensembledujour@gmail.com!

Shirt: Forever21

Bralette: Aerie

Pants: the LOFT