When I was younger I skipped a whole day of school to enter a Harry Potter dress up contest. Hair teased, Dad's tie around my neck and stick painted black in hand I proudly strutted my stuff as Hermione Granger. My friends told me I had wasted my time and my teachers told me I didn't have my priorities straight. But I lived with no regrets.
Last weekend my gorgeous London friend Elle and I made a bold move similar to my badass Hermione truancy days. We decided to skip the Kanye West concert at Penn State, which was happening for free, instead going to Philadelphia to see the much more indie, more hip and more English James Blake !
Regrets - none.
I knew we had made the right decision when we stopped at the train station in Philly and there was a barista coffee stand. You have no idea how much I miss good coffee - imagine not having a mocha or cappucino for two months ( Starbucks is no where near as good as coffee at home). That is me, the struggle is real. Several minutes later, freshly made mocha in hand we were in an Uber on our way to our Air Bnb in the old quarter of Philly, only to be amazed once again by the little retro, indie apartment we had booked. The word hip is going to be a common theme in this blog, but I'm telling you it sums up most of our experience in Philly. In our apartment there were photography lined walls, vintage stereos, retro bikes and two cats called Gin and Tonic.
There would have been no vintage stereos or cute cats at Kanye that's for sure !
After a sushi dinner nearby we headed to the concert which was held in an abandoned warehouse turned nightclub. And the theme of hip continues. These concertgoers were not Kanye West college students dressed in minimal clothing, reeking of vodka. This sub species of student wore crushed velvet, doc martins and ripped jeans, reeking of weed, rather than alcohol and occasionally turning to one another to discuss the finer points of post-modernism. And when James Blake came out at 9.30 they knew every word to his songs. James Blake is incredible ! I'm not just talking about how incredibly handsome but he is also such a talented musician, running a one band show playing piano, drums, looping and of course singing. We both walked out of the concert two hours later a little bit in love with James and his dreamy tunes.
The next day we explored Philadelphia, first of all stopping for real coffee and brunch at One Shot Cafe. I needed all the real coffee I could get before heading back to the coffee drought in central Pennsylvania ! We then walked to the centre of Philly doing the tourist trail along the way - the Liberty Bell, Independence Hall ( where the Declaration of Independence was signed) , the remnants of George Washington's house and Reading Terminal Market. Reading Terminal Market was half a square mile of heaven and I drooled over the freshly made donuts, waffles and cookies that permeated every corner of the building. There's no wonder I didn't win the Hermione Granger dress up competition, I couldn't get into character because unlike Hermione I have no self control. Twenty dollars later and probably several pounds heavier I still felt like I could bought more.
Unfortunately we had to return to State College to work. I'm sure Hermione would have written her six page politics report before heading to the forbidden forest to tackle monsters but not me, I had left myself a mere 12 hours to do it.
So was skipping Kanye worth it ? Absolutely. I'm sure Kanye was incredible but James Blake was very special, plus it was fun pretending to be a New Age traveller and not another college student for the weekend.
Last weekend my gorgeous London friend Elle and I made a bold move similar to my badass Hermione truancy days. We decided to skip the Kanye West concert at Penn State, which was happening for free, instead going to Philadelphia to see the much more indie, more hip and more English James Blake !
Regrets - none.
I knew we had made the right decision when we stopped at the train station in Philly and there was a barista coffee stand. You have no idea how much I miss good coffee - imagine not having a mocha or cappucino for two months ( Starbucks is no where near as good as coffee at home). That is me, the struggle is real. Several minutes later, freshly made mocha in hand we were in an Uber on our way to our Air Bnb in the old quarter of Philly, only to be amazed once again by the little retro, indie apartment we had booked. The word hip is going to be a common theme in this blog, but I'm telling you it sums up most of our experience in Philly. In our apartment there were photography lined walls, vintage stereos, retro bikes and two cats called Gin and Tonic.
There would have been no vintage stereos or cute cats at Kanye that's for sure !
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| Hipster Air BnB |
The next day we explored Philadelphia, first of all stopping for real coffee and brunch at One Shot Cafe. I needed all the real coffee I could get before heading back to the coffee drought in central Pennsylvania ! We then walked to the centre of Philly doing the tourist trail along the way - the Liberty Bell, Independence Hall ( where the Declaration of Independence was signed) , the remnants of George Washington's house and Reading Terminal Market. Reading Terminal Market was half a square mile of heaven and I drooled over the freshly made donuts, waffles and cookies that permeated every corner of the building. There's no wonder I didn't win the Hermione Granger dress up competition, I couldn't get into character because unlike Hermione I have no self control. Twenty dollars later and probably several pounds heavier I still felt like I could bought more.
Unfortunately we had to return to State College to work. I'm sure Hermione would have written her six page politics report before heading to the forbidden forest to tackle monsters but not me, I had left myself a mere 12 hours to do it.
So was skipping Kanye worth it ? Absolutely. I'm sure Kanye was incredible but James Blake was very special, plus it was fun pretending to be a New Age traveller and not another college student for the weekend.
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| Love was all around this weekend |
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| James Blake in action |
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| Smoothie at Reading Street Terminal |
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| Independence Hall |
Side note ! I thought it
seems relevant to mention how much travelling you get to do on exchange – as my
posts seem to imply I am getting to do a lot.
Travelling and exploring a new country is
definitely a huge part of a being an exchange student – particularly at college
when you have a lot more freedom to do so.
However, I think how much travelling you get to do really depends on
where you go to school. Penn State is only hours away from many tourist
destinations on the East Coast making the incentive to travel that much
greater. However I imagine that studying in the Mid-West or in the South might make
travelling more difficult simply because of the greater distances involved in
going from place to place.
How much travel you do also really depends
on how heavy your course load is. For
myself VUW only requires that I pass my classes at Penn State and my grades
will not go on my transcript. Obviously this makes the incentive to work hard less,
but I can imagine if my grades did count I would probably be spending more of
my weekends in the library and less so attending concerts four hours away!
Finally in regards to travelling abroad
from the USA you can only do so with the permission of the exchange
coordinators at Penn State. You must
gain a ‘travel signature’ on your visa from Penn State in order to leave the US
and come back again. Although I haven’t
done this (yet) I have heard it can take several weeks to get a signature so
pre-planning of these trips is absolute!
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