Microsoft & Wicked

Today was our second full day in London!  We started off the day by heading off to Microsoft at 9:00 am.  We took the train from Paddington Station to Reading (Red-ing), where many large companies are based.  As we were looking for our bus, Anne read a the side of a bus which said “Reading” and turned to Maddy and said, “Oh, I thought that bus was just for people that wanted to read, but it says ‘Reading’”.  Oh, Anne…   After busing to campus we met Laura, who was our visitor director.  The Microsoft campus consisted of five buildings.  We did a quick walkthrough of all the buildings and then ate lunch at one of the many cafeterias.  The food was extremely delicious and super cheap!  The highlight was definitely the cheesecake, which was 1 pound 15 pence.  After lunch Laura arranged for a couple different employees to come by and talk to us.  They all told us how they first got into Microsoft, what led up to there, and what they were passionate about.  The last thing we did at Microsoft was take a quick tour of the tech center, where we saw their biggest selling products. 

Once we were done at Microsoft, we quickly stopped at our hotel before heading off to a dinner and a show!  We ate at a restaurant that had a pre-show dinner set up and ready.   We had the options of an appetizer (Welsh rarebit, garlic ciabatta, or bbq chicken wings) and a main course (fish and chips, chicken/beef burger, or a veggie burger).  After dinner we went across the street to see Wicked!  The play was absolutely amazing!  The British accents only made it better! 

Right now we all back at the hotel resting up before heading to Bloomberg tomorrow! 

P.S. Happy Birthday Issac! (Maddy’s brother)

(Written by Maddy and Kristen.)