My Harrow Home

Since I've been here a full week, it's probably time I talk about my living situation, since it's a big part of my life over here.  I live in Harrow, which is a suburb just north of central London. I love the house-it's very English, meaning it is tall and narrow with terrifying stairs that will probably kill me. It's got five bedrooms (and a total of 8 beds), which means it's really large for the city. It's painted really brightly, all the walls are different colors and there are bright pictures everywhere.  It also has a sizable garden (English for "backyard") which I haven't really been able to enjoy because it's been horribly rainy and cold.

My room, which I share with my roommate Jordan (who is wonderful) is the attic room, meaning it's up  two flights of scary stairs and the ceilings are charmingly if somewhat dangerously slanted. Two beds, two desks, and a shared dresser and some really great skylights. The radiators only come on about once a day though, so it is FREEZING. All the time. Coldcoldcold. When they do come on Jordanne and I bring our laptops and blankets down and nest next to them.

The family I live with is lovely as well. Patricia and Finlay Fraser are fairly Irish and have four kids, three of whom I've met. Helen is the oldest at 20, and is usually in Sheffield studying maths at university but has been home for the week and I really like her. Her teenage years were basically just an episode of the TV show Skins, however, which is very dramatic.  Grace is the next oldest (also away at uni) and the most mysterious-I kind of see her as the golden child of the family the way everyone else talks about her. Will update you on if she has a halo, ect.

Alice and I

Alice (10 years old) and Michael (15) are the two Jordanne and I have the most contact with. As in, they are both in my room right now as I type this, eating our chocolate and playing on Jordanne's GameBoy. Alice is into street dancing and Instagram, Michael likes video games and he's quite good at art. He also goes to an all boy's school in Harrow that sounds horrible. HORRIBLE. Boys are so mean to each other. I quite enjoy having the two of them around, there's never a dull moment. In fact, the whole house is always pretty lively with seven of us here at the moment and friends and grandparents always dropping by, which is really fun.

They've been boarding students from varying countries for almost ten years, which is really strange to me. It means that Alice and Michael have grown up with just random people around all the time for almost their whole lives. Some stay for a week, some (like us) for a few months. It's strange to imagine, but also kind of awesome-they've built up a network of people they know all over the world.