Here I am… as I wake up from a good 12 hours of sleep I become happy in a sunny Sunday morning in England. You might ask: Sunny morning in ENGLAND? I respond: Yes! There is a beautiful sunshine outside!!!! Look ------------------------>

And you, in a classical rational conclusion quickly make the obvious subsequent question: Why don’t you go out NOW and enjoy the sun? And I respond: Because I’m warm and comfortable here inside and I’d hate to ruin that in a 4oC temperature. :)

Yes… sunny days in England are not exactly what I was used to in Brazil… but what the hell… it is still a sunny day and I’m very happy about it.

By the way, the last two days have been great! I have finished part of my obligations, cleaned my room (MIRACLE!), and even went to London with friends! Seems that things are improving and I’m starting this week with good mood and high expectations.

Everything started with a freezing wait outside the Student Union. The snow was falling and I had no tickets for “Wild West Night”. “Since when Royal Holloway’s’ Student Union started being this huge success?” I wondered… but hey, my friends were going inside and it was a Friday night!

As I managed to convince a guy to sell me his ticket for £5, and tried to dodge his girlfriend who insisted to have a friend who would buy it for £10 I was sure that I was not getting that old. Old people don’t stand out in the snow, pay overpriced tickets, and squeeze in a cue just for fighting in the bar for a beer. :)

As soon as I got in I saw Paul (a.k.a. freenchie) and Al (a.k.a. the Greek Malaka) and got myself a beer. What came after that is somehow blurry on my mind. But as I try to conveniently forget (or pretend to, so I won’t have to tell you what happened) I have a small smile in my face, sure that it was a great night.

For you to have an idea of what I am talking about, here are two pictures of the Student Union in a typical night. It is hard to think that you would have a nightclub (almost...!) in your university! Well... here in England they do, and it is fairly good. Sometimes they even have live shows, but most of the time it is just techno-dance-wannabe-hip-hop music. Clean teenager fun... :)

The next day, as I ate something and drank some coffee (yep, I didn’t sleep) I tried to put all the kit in the bag for the basketball game. I was still a bit drunk and I had to be in London with the guys for a game at 12:00. So me, Cherm and Jaime (who Cherm insists calling Javier, no one knows why) went flashing to the station to get the 10AM train.

As we got to London and went to Imperial College Sports Centre, I was impressed by Tanaka Business School. Impressive building and, accordingly to Cherm, it was the result of a £65m donation from a previous student. I wonder which former student would donate £65m to UERJ… and even wonder what would be the results if what that happened.

Imperial Sports Centre was even more impressive. Everything was shinny and new! It was inaugurated in 2005 and had everything from swimming pool to electronic lockers (don’t set up a weak password guys!). The court was great, but the rim was awful… there were some bolts over it and it was made by cheap wood… well, you can’t be perfect…

The game went on and I can tell you: What a game!!!!

We won on extra time, after Cherm scored a basked 2s before the end of 4th quarter. Royal Holloway and Imperial have a story of friendship in Basketball. It was very nice to greet the guys in the end of the game and be congratulated for being a good sportster by their captain. As some of us went away, some of us stayed for a street basketball tournament (which we were slaughtered). More fun!

To finish the day I decided to stay a little more in London to go with Jaime to a Japanese restaurant that Emmanuel, another Spanish
friend that I met the other day, told him about.

Great restaurant and great food. I went for sushi as it is almost impossible to get cheap sushi in London and it looked affordable. I was very happy with it in the end.

The funny part of the night was seeing Jaime trying to get the chicken with chopsticks… a disaster!

After a great day, Jaime and I went to waterloo to come back to Egham. This was the result of a busy day and 48 hours awake.

So, as I wake up in this sunny morning I fell happy and refreshed to go back and study XML, WS-Security and… oh oh… I’m late again! See you later guys!