A good social programme this week! On Monday we had drinks at the pub, Tuesday it was a trip to Camden Market, Thursday we had a double event, for different interests: Football and Globe Theatre. Tonight, Lost in London will be holding a party for International students at Tiger Tiger! 
I accompanied the students to the Cock on Monday at 3.15pm, now that the bank holidays are over, we can start on our welcome drinks again! I had around 25 people there, lots of different nationalities: Japanese, Italian, Deutch, Spanish, Russian… to name a few. I was chatting to some Japanese students for a while, and was interested in how the situation is developing in their country at the moment. My questions were gracefully answered, however I was also told that these days, the questions people ask them are always the same! Always the Tsunami, and "how is your area", and "is it getting better at the nuclear plan", and "were you affected where you were at the time?" I understand it must become quite tirying for the Japanese people to always talk about their country's crisis… But I'm afraid the 
questions may keep coming for a while… Apart from this, the subject discussed were a little more light hearted: People who were meeting for the first time started making plans to go have some cocktails together, sing at karaoke bars, go to musical together. That's what Monday drinks are all about: meeting other students and getting together. London can be a lonely place when you first arrive, so join the Monday Pub Club! 
On Tuesday, Amy took a small group to Camden Market (3 students in total: 1 Spanish student and 2 Italian ones). Although it was a small group, they stayed together for a long time, enjoying the crazyness of the place, admiring the punks and their many piercings and platform shoes! They walked around and shopped in the Stable Market, they went for a walk along the canal, got a little lost in the small lanes, but finally found their way back to the market and had a beer and a chat there! Amy was really pleased, they had fun! 
On Thursday we had two events. Starting with the early one which Gavin and Charlie organised for the football players of the school. They went off to Battersea Park and met up with the Avalon School of English team. These guys were well prepared, came armed with substitutes and 10 supporters. The SGI team was short of one player (borrowed one from the other team) and had one supporter (they were not able, this time, to borrow any from the other team!) so thanks Aona for cheering them on!! In short, it was another defeat for the SGI team, but according to Gavin: "We can hold our heads up high!" It was 0-0 for the first 30 minutes, but when a penalty was awarded to Avalon by our OWN 
referee for a small push on the SGI part, the match took a turn for the worst. After their first goal, Avalon quickly got another one in the net and by half time it was 2-0 to Avalon. A tired SGI team came back for the second half, while the other team made a few substitutions and were still quite fresh. They scored a further 5 goals, while fouling Abdu (SGI team) repeatedly, which the ref just didn't seem to notice. SGI lost heart and this is how the score board stayed: Avalon 7; SGI 0. The SGI players were obviously upset, but Gavin did bring a smile back to their strained faces when he kicked the ball and sent his boot flying out of the pitch! He had to keep playing for a few minutes with only the one shoe remaining, but soon after, the game had to be interrupted due to the players' laughing fit getting out of control! Thanks for the cheering up Gavin! 
Last on Thursday was Owen's theatre deal: Hamlet at the Globe Theatre for £5 only! He met 8 students in front of the school and led the to this great theatre on the South Bank. Now, Shakespeare's plays are not easy. Students should go more for the atmosphere than for the English practice (English has changed in 400 years…) Maybe it was too much of a challenge, maybe the production wasn't as good as expected, I'm not sure. All I know is that the 8 of them left at the interval, agreeing that they couldn't understand any of it, and that they may find something more interesting to do elsewhere… So the Globe may not reappear on the social programme for a while! This is it for the week, more pictures taken this week are available to view on the SGI main website, check them out! And see you next week for the usual Monday drinks, a travel photo exhibition (not to be missed) a walking tour along the river and bowling!
10 New Year’s Resolutions for Learning English
It is hard to believe but we have almost reached the end of
