Living in London means being surrounded by culture. For example, in less than 5 minutes’ walk from our apartment, and without even crossing the London Bridge, we have the Tate Modern (Britain`s national gallery of international modern art), Shakespeare’s Globe Theater, Southbank Centre (Europe’s largest centre for the arts: theatres, concert halls and a cutting edge art gallery presenting over 1200 events each year), and BFI Southbank (the leading repertory cinema in the UK, specialising in classic, independent and non-English language films, operated by the British Film Institute).
I have been working at the Google-TechHub Campus in Shoreditch (the “Silicon Roundabout”) London for a few weeks. It is really cool. In no particular order, here are some things I love about this place:
A cafeteria (open to anyone) with terrace, foosball table, bitcoin machine, device bar (to test your developments in many different devices) and even a spacesuit! A small but well stocked library of tech books Very nice team, from security to reception, to admin, to social media… all of them Two levels of office space, one of them (supposedly) “quiet zone” Unlimited supplies of toast and tea, great wifi, and good scanners/printers A ton of areas to sit down and have a meeting, not just the “meeting rooms” Most importantly: the events.
We have been in London for a few days already.
Moving to a new country is not such an impossible task as some people imagine, but it is definitely quite a challenge.
The first thing you have to do is to forget comparisons. No place is perfect, and no place is completely awful. But one can’t help but to be stuck by “peculiarities” of the place. Here are some random ones we have been laughing or crying about:
Saturday, May 2, was our last day at sea. We got up late, but still on time to have breakfast at the Britannia restaurant. At 10 am we attended a very interesting lecture by Aldon Ferguson on Covert Operations in the Cold War. After yet another time change, we had lunch followed by an unexpected nap.
We graciously avoided the Guest Talent Show, and went to the Library instead, to catch up on some work and return the books we had checked out.
On Friday, May 1, our bodies finally caught up with all the pre-cruise accumulated stress, by sleeping until 1pm, taking into account the time change. So we headed straight to lunch (“would you like some coffee with your steak and kidney pie, dear?”), followed by a very nice walk around the deck.
After the afternoon tea we worked with our laptops in the Library. My wife decided to go back to the room early, so she could get ready for the formal dinner and Masquerade Ball, while sipping rosé champagne.
On Thursday, April 30, we made a resolution to get up early (7am is early even if you are not on a Transatlantic crossing!) so we could have breakfast at 8am and join the fencing class at 9am. There is something wonderfully stylish and timeless about fencing in the ballroom of Cunard’s Queen Victoria.
After the fencing class we went back to the stateroom to shower, and then straight to a Galley Tour, where we inspected the cooking areas.
On Wednesday, April 29, as the Commodore announced we were right “in the middle of our crossing,” we woke up really late. You realize how late when the steward greets you “good afternoon,” and you go straight to lunch (right after my wife’s immigration procedure). It was surprising, at least to me, that although we were half an hour late for that scheduled process, 80 people were still to show up, most of the from the USA.
