I turned 21 (on the 26th of April) ahhh :)
Me and my friend Sadhbh who was a month older than me but I knew my entire life(-If you know me, or knew her, or just follow my blog in general you will know that she passed away over 2years ago now) always said that we would celebrate our 21st together and have a massive party half way between our two birthdays... obviously sadly we were never given the opportunity to do that. It left me feeling like I didn't want to celebrate my 21st by having a massive party... It wouldn't have felt right.
That left me with a bit of a dilema as to what to do for it...
I knew I would regret it if I didn't do anything at all so instead I decided to travel to London (because I love London but hadn't experienced the nightlife yet) with a handful of friends for a break and a birthday weekend. I have been working so hard on building my career and getting myself out there without proper management or help that I felt exhausted and although I feel more fullfilled when I'm working on doing what i love doing and constantly striving and working on following my dreams in life I definitely needed a short rest.
I travelled with Julian, Tina and Donna-Julian is one of my oldest and best friends-I've known him since I was 12, Tina has fast become a best friend of mine in the past few years-we do loads together and we're always going off on adventures to random events and fun stuff and Donna is a friend to Julian and a lovely girl who has also quickly become a good friend of mine-she's very funny and makes me laugh so much!-so she's a a cool person to be around.
Although I have thousands of facebook friends (ive almost reached the limit on my friend page) and hundreds of pending friend requests left idle-I think in the age of technology and computers it is easy to feel like you need hundreds of friends when really all you need are the people closest to you (that's no disrespect to any of my facebook friends) but the people who you meet up with or chat on the phone to on a regular basis...The people who really care, know your number, who you can confide in and ask you how you are and mean it: they are the NB ones-I like when things are personal.
Unfortunately since I started modelling I've noticed some girl friends in particular got really odd with me so I've had to distance myself quite a lot and just stick to the people who I know in my heart are real and who keep me grounded. People who I know only want the best for me and not frenamys. For this reason I barely ever go out anymore-I am so concentrated on achieving my goals and also my fun is now when I am working on achieving them and taking part in something productive that I feel I no longer get any fun from going out especially to places I've been 100 times before. I no longer really drink-just rarely (this weekend) and I'm just focused on doing my own thing. That being said I was excited to see what London had to offer in terms of nightlife and general fun-not to go crazy or to drink too much but just to unwind, eat and dance with friends for three nights.
What we did:
Day 1:
We hit Dstrkt London for the most gorgeous (although pricey since you get no veg or extras) food and cocktails: we had planned on coming back to Dstrkt on the Saturday for the BackStreet Boys After party-which we were already on the guestlist for so we didn't stay in the club for too long-we wanted to see the rest of London so we headed off on a random adventure towards Mayfair and the centre of London(-where the club promoters can be quite annoying and pushy: more so than on a sun holiday where they give you free things :) ). We didn't stay out too late because we had travelled and stayed in Dublin getting little sleep for our early flight the night before and we were wrecked!
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| Mmmm Strawberry Dakery ;) |
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| Sex in The City style ;) |
It lashed rain which sucked! especially considering I heard it was lovely at home (but you'll have that). Never-the-less we went shopping on Oxford Street and I brought a few bits and bobs including fab shoes for that night (My shoes killed me on Friday and I learnt my lesson)-See my next Blog post to see what I brought/Wore/And where I got everything(Click here to go direct to the 'what I wore' blog post). We got dinner in a lovely restuarant down a quaint little side street and we sat under the shelter outside with the heaters on-it was actually really nice to sit outside even though it was rainning: it kind of made it cosier with the heaters if that makes any sense. I had warm cranberrys with almonds and cream for desert-I had never had it before and it was gorgeous!
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| Julian and Donna went to Heavan |
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| Tina on the Red Carpet |
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| (Wish we had more pictures) Me and Tina at the Soap Awards |
That night we were splitting up the group because Julian and Donna wanted to hit Heavan to see Tulisa and cover drive perform and although I like Tulisa- me and Tina heard the Soap award after party was on in Cafe De Paris and that it promised to be a good night so after pulling a few strings we got on the guestlist for that and decided to give the backstreet boys after party (that we were meant to go to)a miss and head to Cafe De Paris instead. We went out really late-about 1 o'clock and due to rain got dropped right outside the door of the club-little did we know the Paparatzi would be waiting there and we got paped coming out of the taxi haha (trying to get out gracefully in high heels and a tight dress is harder than it looks #BritneyMoment) we posed for a few pictures #InOurElement haha and as a result got to skip the entire line and go straight in posing for more pics at the red carpet inside the club. I wish I just knew where I could find these pictures because the ones I took on my phone are so blury!! :(
The funny thing about it is-normally me and Tina are with Julian or another few guys around somewhere and we hadn't really been out just the two of us in ages-we got surrounded left, right and centre by guys: including some soap stars and it was the strangest thing- maybe lads in the UK are much more forward than Irish lads(-I rarely get chatted-up in Ireland). Some were a bit rude-one guy was really nice at the start but then asked for my number and when I hesitated he told me to "F*ck-off then" and walked off, another appraoched me to talk about my boobs-again forward and blunt-but I thought it was a real asshole thing to do... Never mind-we were allowed into the vip section and partied with all the soap stars drinking complimentary champaign and free drink for the night. Over all a brilliant night was had and we met some really interesting people-it was strange to meet the soap stars in person as I feel I know them as their character but of course they're not really like that. We got invited to a house party with the Towie crew at the end but when we left the club we got soaked!! #terrentialRain!! Mark Wright and crew squished into a Rickshaw and expected us to squish up on their lap-there was paparatsi following them and I definitely didnt want to look slutty or like there was anything else in it only going to a house party in the rain so we decided just to get a taxi and headed back to our hotel instead. I don't watch the only way is Essex or Towie(I don't even know if they are different shows???) Tina told me who they were as she's a big fan of the show-but it was nice for me not to have any preconceived notion of them: They were all quite nice though :)
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| Had to 'Google image' him after...He's not bad on the eyes ;) lol |
Day 3:
On sunday we went to Camden Market-SO cool by the way! I'd really recommened visiting if you travel to London. The backstreets are so quirky and cute!-the food stalls are amazing aswell. Then we went for some site seeing visiting The London eye, getting some warm nuts (I've waited since Spetember to have these again #YUM), walking along the river, going to Big Ben and WestMinster Abbey and just having the laughs!! pretending we were really holy and kneeling and praying outside haha. We went out SO late on Sunday we eneded up just having drinks in the room and strolling around London-paying for 4taxis and not going to a club #Craziness! there wasn't much going on a Sunday night unfortunately :(
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| mmm Warm Nuts :P |
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| Crepes are my guilty pleasure ;) |
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| hahaha |
Some more site seeing-Buckingham Palace, cartwheels, flips and fun in the park aswell as shopping- got some gorgeous food in Harrods and met Angelina Jolie!!! at the Sheritan Hotel in Knightsbridge!!! She has the biggest lips I have ever seen and although she was wearing a baseball hat, what looked like pj pants and runners she was undeniably beautiful and gracefull! We were all SO sad to have to head to the airport-we had such an amazing time! and we were just settling in to it and feeling at home.
I'm going back in May but for work-not partying: meeting a managment company and hoping to work a lot more in the Uk-I'm not one to hang around: My dreams are too big for my own good :P lol.
Where We Stayed:
We stayed in the Pavillion Rock and Roll hotel in Paddington near Hyde Park-This is such a quirky funky little hotel. It definitely depeneds on what you are looking for but I would definitely recomened it! It's fun, cosy and we felt right at home there. It's more like someones house-with a purple lambrageni parked outside! and every bedroom is a different fun and original theme. Me and Tina stayed in The Honky Tonk Afro room while Donna and Julian stayed in the Cosmo Girl room. I really didn't want to leave the honky tonk room-It was such a happy place to stay and I would dare anyone to try to wake up in a bad mood in that amzingly fun, bright-cheerful room. Breakfast was included in the price at 150pounds each for the three nights and was delivered and left at the door each morning at any time you wanted-this was perfect for me as we ordered our breakfast for 9 each morning and it was ready and waiting whenever we woke up-which meant we never missed the breakfast time!(-has happened to me so many times!) It was a continental breakfast with orange juice, cereal, a crossaint and a bun there was also cofee and tea in the room.
Over-all a Brillinat Birthday with fun people and couldn't have asked for more!!
Lots of Love
Shahira xo
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