I've been thinking a lot about my London semester recently. I revisited my travel journal, and found an early entry where I discovered I was becoming a local. It goes as follows:

Sunday, September 23, 2007

I ventured out alone for the first time since I’ve been here. Granted, it was only for a ten minute walk from the South Kensington tube station to my residence hall on Manresa Road. All the same, it liberated me. For the first time, I felt like London was home, or at least that little corner of Chelsea, was home. My turf, my neighborhood, my people. I had a pleasant skip in my step as I walked, tea in hand by the white pillared homes. Past couples holding hands, jolly older Englishmen with their bags of groceries from Waitrose, women walking their King Charles spaniels, and bicyclist after bicyclist. For some reason, EVERYONE was on a bike today.
It was such a beautiful day to be just walking, too. I couldn’t wipe the slight smile from my face. And I found myself wanting to smile at everyone I passed. The mother carefully lifting the stroller that held her sleeping child was happy to exchange a grin. As was the older man out for a stroll who seemed pleasantly surprised that I even made eye-contact, his jovial ear-to-ear almost made me giggle. And I found something else to love about this city: random acts of smiling. In New York, people don’t bother to even make eye-contact, let alone smile. Maybe it’s that old world charm that still exists in England, but I’ve found, especially on serene and beautiful Sunday afternoons, that people are more than willing to share in your silent elation.

God, I miss it.