I have met the other Canadians! Their names are Tyler and Catherine from Newfoundland and also in University (a rather rare occurrence as most are either still in high school, or just graduated). We had a few adventures together actually which I will get into in a minute.
This morning started out with our first Chemistry lecture of the forum, boron hydride chemistry. Fascinating lecture, and the speaker managed to make it very engaging, with demonstrations and even blew up a hydrogen bubble from a volunteer’s hands! He introduced his own research on a boron compound that he discovered fluorescence’s a brilliant blue under UV and is currently developing it as an organic dye for lasers! Very cool lecture.
Following lecture we packed a lunch and begun a journey on the tube for the London Eye! Unfortunately this part wasn’t thoroughly organized on the part of the leaders, and we ended up waiting over three hours in and around the park to get our tickets. In the end we received our tickets and decided to come back later once the lines were shorter. So instead I teamed up with my fellow Canadians and Mahima from New Zealand for a bus tour around London! Today was one of those days where nothing really wanted to work out, but after a few delays and stops we did get to see some of the fantastic London sights and history.
We didn’t have time to complete the tour around the London Tower Bridge and rather returned to the London Eye with our tickets. What an amazing view! Definitely worth going to see!
The really unfortunate part of the ticket hold-up was that we were unable to hear the top ten students selected to present on the research topics that they presented at the Bazaar last night.
The evenings are spent in the common room of Beit hall where we are staying where we can talk and really have the opportunity to develop some friendships. Tonight I entered a small fooseball tournament with a Norwegian and Indian. Happy to say that my practice with my brother came in rather handy for that.
Tomorrow is planned a trip to Hampton Court Palace which I’m really looking forward to!