DINNER WITH SIR STEVE REDGRAVE

When I applied to come to Royal Holloway I also applied for a sports scholarship - (better known as STARS). I actually got this scholarship because of my rugby and we are given so much help and advice that helps us reach our goals and improve us as athletes. I'm injured at the moment and they've been very good in helping me, be it with an Osteopath or a strength and conditioner etc. Last night was the STARS presentation evening. This is where we received our certificates that stated we had officially received the scholarship. There are about 25 of us from the whole university who received the scholarship this year. Also, this year the presentation evening was held in conjunction with the honorary fellowship presentation. This year Sir Steve Redgrave was receiving the honorary degree which was coooool! After the presentation and some quick photos with Sir Steve we headed over to the picture gallery where we had a three course meal which was delicious!

We were sat on a table with people who had something to do with the university. I was on the rugby table, so there are four of us (2 girls and 2 boys) who have received the scholarship through rugby, and in between us were different people. I had really nice conversations with the people I sat by and as a result the evening flew by. Also sat on my table was three times paralympic gold medallist - Sophie Christensen! I got to hold her medals twice! How cool is that?!

I really enjoyed the evening, probably one of the most enjoyable evenings in university so far! Just because you got to meet so many different people (oh yeah, and meet Sir Steve!).

NEW ZEALAND RUGBY!

Early Friday morning I caught the train to Cardiff to see Nicola (: The train was close to an hour late arriving in the city but once I finally arrived we headed straight to Starbucks to grab a bight to eat and a coffee to warm us up - it was absolutely pouring it down and incredibly cold (typical welsh winter weather!). Once I could feel my feet again we caught the bus to my mum's friend's house to drop my stuff off because that was where I was staying for the night. Once we arrived back in to town we met up with Nicola's dad who had driven a bus load of people down to watch the Wales V New Zealand match that was on in the Millennium stadium that evening. We literally had only spoken a few words with him before Nicola and myself were running up the street! He had just told us that the New Zealand team bus was outside the Hilton hotel and being us we headed straight in the direction of the hotel!

When we arrived there we were just in time - Richie McCaw (NZ Captain and all round AWESOME player) had just stepped on the bus! We then saw world class players such as Ma'a Nonu, Piri Weepu and Dan Carter (OMG!). I have all of this on video, so once I upload it on to some format I will post it on the blog asap!

Once that jaw dropping excitement had come to a close (and after Nicola and I waved the bus off!) we went back to Nicola's flat for some coffee and a chance to dry up before we headed over to the local Weatherspoons to watch the match! We lost - but it was a much better performance than the last two matches!

Early Sunday afternoon I met up with Nicola in town for some brunch in a little place down Castle Arcade called 'Madame Fromage'. I had a ham, brie and cranberry baguette - yuuum! We then headed over to the train station (absolutely stuffed!) and we saw when we arrived that the train was delayed. Whilst waisting time around the station I noticed that ex All Black captain Justin Marshall, was sitting down in the station's cafe! So after some planning, we headed over to him and had a picture and a quick conversation! The train eventually turned up an hour late and the journey just got worse from there! There had been an engine failure at some point so we were running on one engine, a tree had fallen across the tracks so the driver had to go out and move it, there wasn't enough power in the train to go up an incline so we had to wait for another train to come and pull us up, we eventually got up the hill but then they couldn't get air in to the train so we had to evacuate, when we arrived at Reading the last train to Egham had left over and hour and a half ago so we had to wait a further hour and a half to get a taxi back to the Uni. So a 2 and a half hour journey turned in to a 12 hour journey! At least I got home and have pictures of NZ players on my phone to keep me happy!

LIFE RECENTLY: IN PICTURES

 

Here are just some pictures of what I've been up to recently

- London

- Hippies night

- Birthdays

 

LONDON'S CALLING

G'Day :)

Yesterday myself and two other friends headed in to London. We caught the train at around twelve and arrived in Waterloo in about 30mins. The reason for this trip was because one of my Friend's is doing Media Arts as her degree here and she had to film a documentary and seeing as she's from London it seemed as a good idea to go there and film. We carried the camera and a massive tripod around with us all day! It was so cold in London that my feet felt like they had literally turned in to ice blocks! My friend had managed to get permission to film on Westminster bridge and there is where we spent our day looking straight at Westminster and the London eye! After a couple of hours of filming we filmed the last shot at around 5pm. Seeing that we were in London and so close to Westminster we headed over to Whitehall and walked down to Number 10. We had a quick pip at the Prime Minister's house and Westminster Abbey and then we headed home out of Waterloo and back to uni! - A very enjoyable day! (:

CINEMA DATES AND ESSAY WRITING

Last week I wrote my first university essay! (Just thought I'd note that as a significant event!)

Last week was reading week, however, history doesn't get reading week (which is incredible because we have soooooo much reading to do!). It meant that the flat was really empty because most people went home for the week because they didn't have any lectures. We had about 6 people in the flat out of 17! We watched some films, did some work, went for some walks, watched some rugby (not all of Wales' game because it was just too horrible to watch!) and had a trip to the cinema to watch 'Taken 2' which was absolutely awesome!

Oh yeah, and OBAMA WON THE ELECTION! I stayed up all night watching the results and managed to have about 3 hours sleep! WOOOHOO!

Christmas is officially here guys. When I was in the cinema the christmas coca-cola advert came on, and you know when you see the coke advert that Christmas had arrived! Yaaay! I love christmas and I think I'm even more excited for it this year than for a long while. Probably because I've been away and christmas means that I'll be home for 3 weeks! I also love christmas songs and decorations!