London Development Journal

I love cities – always have and always will. There is always something breathtaking about the noises, the lack of space, diversity of people and activities that make the home of millions feel the exactly the same yet so foreign. Stalling a year in New York, I embarked on an adventure to London to gain an outside perspective, to travel, to test my independence, change a career path and most of all – grow up. Through a series of fortuitous events, I left for a year long adventure to the Old World. Many thoughts ran through my head. Would my adventure in London be a freefall from what I was experiencing in New York? Would the other Mountbattens like me? Would my colleagues at UBS appreciate my media-only background? How would I adjust to non 24-hour subways? Ahem, the tube.

I landed into London with a sense of excitement, a bit of worry but most of all jet lag. My wisdom of London was based on two week-long trips to the city, work experience in New York City for two years and an English boyfriend. I was a bit scared of becoming too all-knowing of London with the resources I had at hand. I knew coming in to try to not make comparisons, to take London for what it is - a diverse city of millions with infamously bad weather, double-decker buses and cooler accents than I would ever own. I knew there would be rude, hurried people, obscene amounts of wealth, many different types of cuisine, nightlife, persons and old buildings right next to new. Not much to my surprise, I felt that the atmosphere here is the same back home. I quickly settled onto the enclaves of Shoreditch and Soho. I found my favorite café in Flat White and my local pub at The Eagle. My food cart on 53rd and 6th became the carts of Whitecross Street Market. Primark became my Forever 21.

I immersed myself into determining my right locations for bars, restaurants and other potential London hot spots. Using my resourcefulness, I soon realized that being a Londoner was similar to being a New Yorker. Unfortunately, I did not find my New York Magazine for London. I tried to research the The Times as well as the Guardian. No luck. I was told, “Felicia, they’re not the New York Times, New York Magazine. These are national papers. The London-based focus is going to be harder to find than you would get back in New York.” While this person was correct in an aspect, there were good guides and websites to be found. I found urbanjunkies.com, londonist.com and le cool London. Nevertheless, we need a magazine of living in London.

While my personal adjustment to living in London was not much of a surprise, there was an adjustment in the professional sector. My previous work experience consisted of assistant work in a newsroom of a national radio news channel. The casualness and frantic nature of the place would be completely different to what I would experience working at UBS. Hello to defending one of the largest financial firms in the world. Goodbye exposing downturns of said company. Hello smart dress. Goodbye Chucks, t-shirts, undone hair and face. Hello hierarchy, team meetings and blocked websites. Goodbye YouTube and Perez Hilton.

The work life I have at UBS has been an interesting one. My daily 20-minute walk to the ‘Square Mile’ consists of passing by markets, too many Prets and EATs for my liking and well-dressed men with popped jacket collars. During lunch, I am mostly perplexed at the amount of sandwiches that one country can come up with. I’m slowly realizing that the £3.49 lunch combo at Boots is the best deal around. The food isn’t half bad either. Perhaps I should come up with a survey about good City eats and publish them for a London newspaper. Alas, I have so many things to explore and enjoy in this city of 8 million.

Overall, I have enjoyed my adjustment period to London town. Although I’ve been hindered by the supposed ‘Fresher’s flu’, I still love cities – always have and always will.

i will start blogging

someday very very soon.....

so over it

i'm ready for a change.

i heart guster

guster=awesome

People have too much time on their hands

Duke University...why oh why?

Cloak coverage draws poor parallels to Star Trek - Letters

The Worst Fans of All

Dispatch,

Why must you make music that draws such shitty fans? Please don't get back together for charity shows or events or whatever you want to do to raise awareness of some third-world plight. Because if you didn't know already, your fans suck. They are a hybrid of entitled suburban preps, frat boys, soroity girls, long island guidos, jersey girls....ugh

The worst part about this rant is that I attended the "Last Dispatch." I purchased all your CDs. I even have a t-shirt of yours in my closet somewhere. You made music that made me happy in high school. And no matter how I view your music today as somewhat sub-par to what I've discovered in recent years, you held a place in my memory and in my heart....that is until now.

Spotting the Trend...

Where will the new New York hotspot be?

New York Magazine proclaimed the death of 27th Street earlier this year. Will it be below 14th street? The Box, Socialista, GoldBar come to mind. Or will it be midtown? hmmm

Eat This: sugar Sweet sunshine Bakery

Do me a favor and please get your ass to the Lower East Side one time and have the cupcakes at sugar Sweet sunshine Bakery. I recommend the Ooey Gooey (chocolate cake with chocolate almond buttercream) and the Sexy Red Velvet (red velvet cake with vanilla buttercream icing).

Cupcakes are $1.50.

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sugar Sweet sunshine
126 Rivington Street
(between Norfolk Street and Essex Street)
New York, NY 10002
M-Thur, 8-10
Friday, 8-11
Saturday, 10-11
Sunday, 10-7

Ready to Bitch

As much as I have so many things to vent right now about how my life is going to hell, I have to restrain myself. There is no humorous tale of someone I saw today that ticked me off. No, it's just been a series of horrible situations that have simply added up. I like speaking with vague undertones.


I know life isn't that bad, but honestly I don't think I've ever felt so worthless.

New Foodie Hotspot?

In the grand tradition that three's a trend, Food & Wine's "Mouthing Off" blog notes that the Upper West Side might become a new "sweet spot." First, with the mound-of-goodness that are the chocolate chip cookies at Levain Bakery. Second, the long lines of the recently opened outpost of Italian gelatalitera, Grom. Now there's word from the New York Observer that Jacques Torre's Chocolate Haven will be another New York outpost one avenue from Levain. Can we even talk about more reason for me to be a fattie?

[NYC's Sweetest New Food Zone] Mouthing Off

Eat This: Pinkberry

When speaking with a co-worker who lives in L.A. if he liked Pinkberry, he responded as if I had two heads.

"Pinkberry? You mean Pink's Hot Dog, right?"

"No...[redacted], Pinkberry is a frozen yogurt place from L.A. It was all
the rage there last year now people are going psycho over it here now. There's one near you in [redacted]. Hmm...So I'm guessing you've never had it, huh?"

"I don't know what you're talking about lady. It's not Quiznos so I don't
care."

Perhaps I shouldn't have started a food review with a little anecdote of a co-worker's pop culture incompetence. Regardless, this L.A. based frozen yogurt chain has caused a frenzy among "froyo" snobs and New York foodies willing to try anything.

Started in 2005 by Young Lee and Shelly Hwang, the chain has grown
to 21 locations between California and New York. The cool, sleek interior is
like a green creamsicle where colored chairs and tables are the norm and $46 plastic salt and pepper shakers will be wave of the future. The frozen yogurt only comes in two flavors, original and green tea. They also have a variety of toppings from fresh chopped fruit to chocolate chips to cereals which I've read "make Pinkberry so good."

Okay, so I decided to checkout what all the hype was about. Consider me the few that left me so unimpressed. I ordered a small original (about $5!!) without any toppings. I dig in and immediately taste sourness. Is it supposed to taste like this? Did I get a bad batch? Ugh. I didn't understand why people waited in long lines for this stuff. To me it was just another overpriced, over hyped, sour piece of mess. When I told a Pinkberry fanatic my initial impressed, she informed me that I had to go again. It was one of those you need to try it twice type of things. I didn't get it, but I said to myself, "ehh...why not?"

The second time I went I ordered a green tea with a kiwi topping. Result? Better, but still not worth the $5 plus and the long lines to get it. My friend and I concluded that it would have tasted better with some chocolate chips instead of fruit. The yogurt with the toppings is a lot tastier, but that's saying plain toast tastes better with butter.

Overall, Pinkberry is a good alternative to the other froyo choices out in the New York area. If you are thinking that you are going to find a creamy custard-like substance, you will be surprised. If you love the way Greek yogurt tastes,
you should be in for a treat.

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Pinkberry Locations:

• 170 8th Ave, New York
• 7 W 32nd St, New York
• 240 E 82nd St, New York

Eat This: The Treats Truck

Yummy, yummy, yummy is all I can say about this unique way to bring goodies to you.

This husband and wife team based in Brooklyn bake all sorts of baked goods from chocolate chip cookies to raspberry brownies load them up in their truck and set up shop in different areas of New York each day. The day I went they were across Hotel Rivington. As my friends and I walked pass the truck we were immediately drawn to all the baked treats that were on display in the glass window of the truck.

Then, a smiling lady came out with two full trays of samples. Samples!!! She quickly held these trays in front of us and encouraged to take as many samples as possible. I went for the rice krispy treats (they came in original and chocolate swirled-in) and as soon as I bit into it, it pretty much melted in my mouth. It was the perfect combination of butter, marshmallow and rice krispy cereal. The next sample I went for was the raspberry brownie. I don't know what they do to mix in the I assume the raspberry jam with the brownie mixture to make it still soft when you bite into it....but it was very good. I sampled the chocolate chip cookies and oatmeal raisin ones as well. Good, but not my favorite. I've certainly tried better.

I'm so happy I was able try some of their eats. I wish I got to buy and try more things, but at that time I was on my way to have some happy hour drinks (hehe). So if you ever see this around your neck of the woods, try it out. From $1-3 for these things, it won't burn a hole in your pocket.



The Treats Truck. Treats range from $1-3. Various locations.

OMFG:Part II

I'll be there on December 11, will you?

OMFG!!

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!

SPICE GIRLS ARE BACK!!

The archetypes of "Girl Power" are set to make an official announcement regarding their future on Friday. After weeks of circulating rumors to do a reunion tour, Mel C aka Sporty Spice-who initally opposed the idea of a reunion-spoke with BBC regarding the situation.

"For the first time ever, there is some truth in the rumors. We've been discussing it and it could possibly happen," the 33-year-old singer told BBC radio last week."I've always said, `I don't want to do it, the past is the past. It was amazing, it was magical. We could never recreate it,'" Chisholm said. "But this year people have been talking about it and some of the girls have expressed an interest in doing it." [Spice Girls]

If the announcement this Friday will be about a reunion tour, I will get to live out my tween love drunk and happy singing to them wherever they perform in New York. In honor of the latest news, I will dig up my old Spice Girls CDs, import them into my iPod, and listen to them for the whole week. OMFGGGGGG...I can't wait!

Manifesto

Oh my god. Look at this. ANOTHER GODDAMN BLOG.

I signed up for an account because I had to in order to get a grade. Read my first post to see why. I've been finished with school for a little bit over a year and have nothing to show for it. With a blog, it can at least appear that I do something with my time instead of fucking around.

What the heck am I going to write about you ask? (Okay, I'm going to stop with the questions. bad journalism practice.) My blog is going to reflect all my interests and random occurrences that I've come across working in the big ol' city. If you don't know me and have stumbled across this blog for the first time or are one of my friends with too much time on their hands (::cough cough:: I'm talking about a certain someone), you should be in for a treat.

I like almost anything under the sun-that means good food, music, Marc Jacob purses, the Red Sox, cute boys, politics, Guster, Barcelona, stupid industry jokes, stupid media people. I want to become the go-to girl for a hodge-podge of all things amazing and awesome...in my particular way of course. I'm probably not the best writer (yet) for this job, but I hope some day my stylings will lend me to become the female version of Bill Simmons and Brian from Guster(read their journal, he's fucking hilarious).

That's it. Perhaps not, but it's almost dinner time and I'm starving.

Ciao, ciao!

testing, testing, 1, 2, 3

In an attempt to change my blogging ways and with the help of my Editing and Layout class, I have created another blog. I suppose I am trying to move myself away from my xanga days. It could also be I am just biting off of everyone else. Honestly, I think I'm trying to find a way to avoid homework.

Ciao, ciao!