Mind the Bloody Gap

This video was taken quite awhile back in the fall and I just haven't had an opportunity to put it up so I thought today would be just as good as any. Today I'm bringing you through Hyde Park and Kensington Gardens. As one of the largest parks in London, you can spend all day exploring the various gardens and statues.






Now as some of you may know my parents are here visiting for the holidays and we spent the day yesterday at Hyde Park. Every year they have a Winter wonderland holiday fair which is similar to a german christmas fair. There are roller coasters, crepe stands, and fritte shops as far as the eye can see. There are stands where you can order gluwein (mulled wine) to keep your body temperature up, or fried donuts to pack on the pounds...to keep your body temperature up. They are very concerned about keeping you warm you see :). There's a small ice rink to skate around and little stalls selling everything from wooden ties to german ornaments. A wonderful day out in the park and if you click on the link below you'll be connected to photos of our fabulous day.

http://picasaweb.google.com/Kkilsdonk/DadAndMomSTrip2009?authkey=Gv1sRgCNmEhqfBgdDwOw#

Sorry this has taken so long. But you always save the best for last!!!!







and PS...After watching this again, I realized I look slightly preggers in the video. I assure you there's no bun in the oven....just tasty christmas treats :)

"Oh its the pleats. It's actually an optical illusion. It's the pattern on the pants. It's not flattering in the crotchal region. I'm actually taking them back right now. Taking them back to the pants store. Oh, this is awkward."
(If you know what this quote is from...I like you)

This video takes us to Caversham wildlife park. A magical land where I got to chill with all sorts of crazy aussie animals. Kangaroos, Koalas, Tasmanian devils, Kookaburras, Echidnas (looks like a mixture of an anteater and a porcupine), Wombats (meet Big Bubs in the video), Wallabys (mini kangaroos), Quokkas (uber mini kangaroos) and many more. This was by far my favorite day of the trip!!!!! All I had wanted to do the entire time I was in Australia was just share some conversation with a local kangaroo and oh boy did we have some laughs....or they just laid there while I screamed with the excitement of a 13 year old girl when Hannah Montana walks by. Either way the day was amazing and I hope you enjoy some of the video.

So I’m going to have a couple different entries about Australia so I figured this first one would just be about some of the cultural differences I noticed.

One of the first things I noticed about Australia is it looks so much like home. The city of Perth reminded me of Milwaukee. Buildings were quite similar, and other than it being really hot, you could have mistaken the two cities. As for houses, one thing I found quite interesting is that every house in Perth has a fence around the yard. At first I thought it was quite impersonal and closed you off from your neighbors…but the weather is so beautiful all year round that people spend A TON of time outside. Makes sense that you would want some privacy so everyone’s not staring at everyone else. Second thing I noticed is the roofs. Everyone has either tile or metal roofs on their houses. Not a single shingle to be seen. And I was also surprised at how green everything was already in Australia. At the time we went out there spring was just beginning (the whole opposite seasons thing). Since in america stuff is just growing in at that point it looked like the height of summer there. Well since it gets so darn hot in the summer everything dies and gets brown, so their “green” season is the winter. Weird.

Now malls in Perth look pretty darn similar to malls anywhere but one thing I found quite interesting is that people pushed trollys (carts) around with them everywhere. Like grocery store style. They bring them into every store because there are grocery stores in malls. It is very strange walking in a clothing store and bumping into one. And another thing about malls. It’s clearly getting towards the holiday season so many malls are starting to put up their Christmas decorations. First of all its pretty weird to have Christmas in Australia because its about 100˚F and people go to the beach and have barbeques where they…PUT ANOTHER SHRIMP ON THE BARBIE! But the funny thing is they have all sorts of Christmas decorations with snow on them. I mean snowmen and fake snow to spray on windows. Most of these people have NEVER seen snow before. I think they’re just jealous of Wisconsin and its 6 ft of snow. Who wouldn’t be I ask you?!!?!?!

So interesting things about the way aussies speak. Since many of you are from Wisconsin, you are fully aware of the “up north” accent where people would say “yeah der hey”. Well many Australians end every single sentence by saying “eh” at the end of it. It’s the strangest thing. It’s like Americans adding “like” into every sentence. Second interesting thing is Australians say “reckon” all the freaking time. “Do you reckon we’ll ride the kangaroo to work today? I reckon we will.” Here is the weirdest one. I was having a conversation with Joel’s brother Josh and he was telling me how he had been out for tea 3 times that week. I thought to myself…ohhh. How civilized . It’s like England and they go out for tea all the time. Nope. In Australia. Tea = dinner. Wait….what? Yep. Tea is dinner. I asked around to many different aussies and not a single one could tell me why dinner is called tea. Just plain strange if you ask me. Now, just like the entire country of Spain has a lisp, Australia has this condition where every word must be shortened and an IE or IES is added onto the end. Sunglasses = sunnies. Mosquitoes = mossies. At one point I was shopping with Joel’s mom and she said “Let’s go look at Chrissie decs”. I stood there puzzled beyond belief until we walked by Christmas Decorations. Yep. Chrissie decs = Christmas decorations. Let me tell ya, It took me awhile to translate most things.

Now as for food. Food is pretty similar to America as far as I’m concerned. They do have great asian food though. Just kinda like we have great Mexican, they’re so close to asia they have awesome Chinese/Japanese/thai you name it. There are McDonalds, KFC, Hungry Jack (the Australian name for burger king since the name was already trademarked) and subway as far as the eye can see. I do have some new favorites though. Chicken Salt is my new best friend. Its salt put on chips(fries) that has chicken flavoring. Seriously AMAZING. Next thing. Tim Tams. SOOOOO delicious. They are these chocolate biscuits that are great if you did them in tea. Sooo yummy. Third. Curly Wurly’s. Little chocolate caramel candy bars. Divine. One thing that did disappoint me though is that aussies do not drink fosters. Apparently it’s a different recipe in Oz and its kinda like Schlitz or Milwaukees Beast for them. Still didn’t stop me from trying to make everyone say “Fosters. Australian for Beer” though.

So in this video I’m just showing you a bit about Perth, the beach, and Margaret River which is aussie wine country…a lot like napa valley. So I hope you enjoy!!! :)

Well hello there everyone. I'm so sorry its taken me awhile but I've been out in australia for a bit and have been settling back in the past couple of days. I've been trying to sort through all of the videos that I took in australia and it is taking me a freaking long time to get through all of them so I thought I would give you a video that I took before I left for Oz. It's a venting video about some annoyances here in London.







I'll explain all of the wonderful things about australia once I post the videos so right now I'll just share some stuff that has been going on here lately. This past week we've gone to our regular pub quiz on thursday nights. Its held at a pub called the Gypsy Moth in Greenwich. It has three rounds. One pictures, one music and one random. Pretty standard pub quiz and this week was fun because it was my friend Guy's birthday on friday so we had cake with sparklers on it.
Then friday night we headed out to a pub around picadilly circus called The Living Room. It was a wonderful night filled with jager bombs and and copious amounts of wine. I got to see a bunch of people I haven't seen in about a year which was wonderful! And at one point my friend Mark poured a dirty martini into his guiness and claimed that it was actually good, guzzling the whole thing down. The whole night ended with a nightbus home at 3.00am where I passed out on the ride home and hobbled to the door in bare feet because lets face it ladies....stilettos look great but only last so long.
night was halloween and we headed to our friends flat to carve some pumkins. We then went out to a pub to for some drinks. There were a few people who were out with costumes on but it was actually quite sad for me. Having been out in Madison for Halloween...nothing really can ever compare. Other than that I'm still on a job hunt and Joel and I are still searching for the perfect flat to move into. So hopefully both of those will fall into place nicely!
Until then I will work on cutting down the countless kangaroo videos for you. Til next time :)

Well for todays video I'm bringing you to Baker Street and Regents Park. Unfortunately I don't have time to write a long entry for you now. I have a bunch of errands to run tonight but I'll write a nice long blog tomorrow before Joel and I head off to Australia tomorrow night. :) SOO EXCITED!!!!

So todays video brings you through Camden Market. Camden's group of markets in now the fourth most-visited tourist attraction in London. It is the largest street market in the UK and attracts around 500,000 visitors a week. You can find everything from Gothic clothing to club wear to formal dresses here. It's just such a good time. I've read that a lot of important designers have gone down to Camden to try and get ideas. Designers like Dolce and Gabbana, Georgio Armani and Stella McCartney. As for other famous ties to Camden, most of the pictures and craziness associated with Amy Winehouse took place in Camden. She used to live here and the title for this post is actually a quote of hers at the Grammys referring to the fire here in 2008. In the christmas carol, the Cratchet family lived in Camden...but before the alternative revolution I believe....Although Tiny Tim would look wicked with a couple piercings. Mary Shelly author of Frankenstein was born here and Charles Dickens lived here. Camden also has a huge britpop music scene with Coldplay, Radiohead, Oasis and Blur all starting out here.

But the best thing about Camden is the people. People with head to toe tattoos, blue mohawk hair and platform boots 8 inches tall. Mostly the people tend to be punk or gothic here and It's just fascinating to people watch. There are also a lot of cheap food stalls that you'll see in the video. Mostly chinese and indian food. Cheap meal and cheap stuff to buy. JACKPOT!

Now I have 2 favorite places in Camden. The first one is a Moroccan cafe called Marrakech. Has the most amazing moroccan mint tea and baklavas. There are booths out front where you can wallow away the afternoon smoking flavored tabacco in a shisha pipe. Upstairs they have a cute little room with moroccan lanterns and views of the market stalls down below. I could sit there every afternoon on the cushy couches getting lulled into a zen state by the mint tea and fab moroccan music.
Second fav place is the exact opposite of my zen haven and directly across the way from it. The shop is called Cyber Dog. I have a short clip of the outside of it in the video...unfortunately I couldn't take any pictures inside. (They watch you like a hawk) It is this CRAZY store with the two giant robots outside and inside the techno music is so loud you can't hear yourself think. (everytime I go in I feel like I should have a glowstick and that the whole place could errupt into a spotaneous rave at the drop of a hat) There is a DJ downstairs and I'm certain that the criteria for employees requires neon hair, eyeliner (on both men and women), black nail polish (on both men and women) and at least 5 visible piercings. The store is filled with the craziest club clothing I have EVER seen. Neon green pvc tops with strategic cut-out holes and bright pink skirts with foam hoops in the bottom. Here is the website. Go and check it out if you get a sec so you can get an idea of how funky the clothing is. http://shop.cyberdog.net/
Well I hope you enjoy your journey through camden town.

Hey everyone back home,

So here is another video for you. This one is in chinatown and covent garden. The video in chinatown was shot on sunday when Joel, our housemates and I headed out to meet some friends for Dim Sum. One of our friends speaks cantonese and ordered FAR too much food for the 12 of us to finish off. As a lot of you know I don't have the best stomach and boy it did not like that dim sum...so Joel will just have to go without me from now on.

While Joel and I were out in camden market that day he decided to bring me to the Australian shop. Since Australia is a colony of England it is much easier for Australians to get visas here...hence why there is an aussie shop. There are just so many of them here. So we headed to the shop and he showed me all of his faves from back home but then I turned around and noticed that there was a canada section in the store. I was OVERJOYED!!! In the shop was Rice-a-roni, Kraft Mac and Cheese, Reeses Pieces and Angel Food Cake mix!!!

I know that it may sound strange to you that I would get so excited about american food but its one of the few reminders I have from home. I don't know any americans here and its really really tough missing everyone and everything from back home so much. The only american voices I hear are in movies or on TV and I can't discuss plans for Halloween or Thanksgiving with Chandler and Joey from Friends. Just being able to eat Rice-a-roni makes me feel like I have a piece of home here with me.

Then if that weren't enough, Joel brought me to a store called cyber candy. It has different candy from all over the world. I found tootsie rolls, milky way midnight and cans of Mountain Dew and A&W Root Beer. I have never been able to find this stuff before so I am just thrilled to be able to enjoy it all.

Enjoy the short clip below.

So I realized after I finished this next video that I never put in any info about the Globe theatre. I just played you a lovely little ditty from Spamalot. So just a couple of things about the globe. It is not Shakespeares original theatre. It is redone and was finished being built in 1997 so hasn't been around very long. The original theatre was torn down 1664 to make room for more housing. Also miss Becca, I'm fairly certain I got my art comment on here switched around but hey...I tried.


Other than that what have I been up to. I went to see a comedian earlier this week named Ed Burns. He's an irish comedian and was freaking hilarious. I met my friend Sarah out for some shopping on thursday and then went to see Cloudy with a chance of Meatballs last night in 3D. Such a clever and funny movie. I would recommend you all go see it if you get a chance. And Joel and I have put in some serious hours on Lego Batman. We are not nerds at all.

But enjoy the latest instalation in Kate's guide to London

So this is the third video that you should watch. This takes you from Fortnum and Masons through Picadilly circus, Leicester square and then ends at Gordons Wine Bar.




Its actually beautiful today so I'm going to head out and see some more sights and then I'll post them for you all :)

So here is the second video that I did. Its from Trafalgar Square over through Green Park

Well hello everyone.
So as most of you know I've recently uprooted my wisconsin butt and relocated over the pond in foggy old London town. I thought I would start up this blog to keep you all updated of whats been going on with my life. So far I've just been trying to get settled in and catch up with all my friends here. Don't know how many of you have done a big move before but its quite a large change and it kinda messes with your head a little bit...knowing that a lot of the people you love are far away and you're not sure when you'll see them again. So in a three hour long conversation with my amazingly beautiful sister she had a great idea to take a video camera along with me through london so that you guys can be a part of my everyday life and so you can see what its like for me here....kinda feel like I have you all with me. So I've put together a few videos of central london for you all to watch through and I'll be doing more as time goes along but I hope you enjoy!!!! Just to let you know though, not sure how often I'll update this but keep on checking back...hopefully not just sporadically (thank you Clueless) and I'll have updates for you :)

So watch this one first!