Packing: I may have overpacked. I tried not to, I swear. I discarded pairs of heels, and tank tops, and I only brought one towel. But It’s hard not to when you look at the conversion rates. Did I really want to spend 40 pounds on my conditioner instead of $28 (don’t check my math), or 70 pounds on school supplies when over the last 3 years of college I’ve accumulated enough junk that I can take for free.  So, all you gals thinking you’re going to show up in fall with one suitcase, you’re wrong. Once you pack the peacoat and first pair of saddle boots, you’ll see just how small that suitcase is…oh and remember, under 50 lbs, please. (But on the brighter side, if you do have to leave basics behind, I passed an H&M and a “TK Maxx”–yes, K–in Kensington, London.)

Traveling: Getting here wasn’t all that bad. Taking off at sunset and arriving at sunrise can really mess with you though. But the hard part comes when you get off at the airport. Since I wasn’t heading in straight to school (and I had no hotel reservations yet) my mom and I “winged it”. So after attempting to the get a bus ticket to a place the bus doesn’t go, we were directed ‘underground’. Surprising the bus is typically cheaper, but the underground is far more accessible. So we arrive in South Kensington, packs on our back, with maybe an hour of sleep from the plane ride, and wanting to shower, and we had no reservations anywhere. We stopped at an internet caf� (don’t be fooled, there are cheap ones out there on every corner) looked at some local hotels and there prices, and since we had no phone yet we thought we’d just show up and ask if they had rooms (the internet said they did). Apparently this is blasphemous. “You mean you don’t already have a reservation,” he says in a nasally annoying French accent. Obviously not buckoo or we wouldn’t be asking about your availability. And apparently some of this “cute little places” don’t have the computers for booking. So after they jacked the price up and we widdled in back down, it came back to the fact that they sucked and we walked out, to which the other French concierge say, “good luck finding a place elsewhere” in a French tone you thought was only in cartoons.  Eventually found a place, still paid too much, but a lesson was learned: buy ahead of time and BUY ONLINE! Buying on line can save you 30-50 pounds… serious American dollars.

Location: London, UK