A friend’s daughter is spending a semester abroad in London.

Any tips I can pass on to her? Any foods she should bring along she can’t get there (is peanut butter still on the list)?

Just bring her clothes, whatever electronics are needed for school, books if applicable. For food, cosmetics, toiletries, learn to use what is available there. It's not like London is the outback somewhere!

She certainly doesn't need to bring any foodstuffs with her:
http://tinyurl.com/clrw83a

What depressing reading that is btw .

She should bring clothes, electronics which are dual voltage, books she may need or want. The rest is, as Suze said, all available in London, and then some.

Not due to lack of availability but for convenience, six months of any prescrption drugs and a copy of her glasses/contact perscription if she wears them.

Recently, we were very surprised that a very common (in Canada) antiseptic, Polysporin,or its ilk, is not available at all, in any form in London at retail. We sought the advice of a pharmacist when we failed to find it and discovered that topical antiseptics of that nature (ie. containing anti-biotic ingredients) are not sold without a visit to a doctor.

Pretty minor stuff, and not everyone gets swimmers ear while on vacation,but you did ask!

LG - the version here is called Germolene and is similar to Polysporin.

http://www.boots.com/en/Germolene-An...ream-55g_5498/

Sorry meant LJ

You <i>can</i> get peanut butter in the UK, but last I looked (which has been awhile) it's more along the lines of the natural peanut butter, not the sweetened Jif or Peter Pan. So if she's a PB lover she might stick a jar in.

I *wouldn't* take expensive hair appliances, like my Chi flatiron. Even if she takes a converter (in addition to an adapter), they don't always work as well. She can get anything like that she needs at Boots, inexpensively, and it'll do for a semester.

Otherwise, the prescriptions advice is good (it's probably available there, but why mess with it?), and if there's anything she's really attached to, she could bring it. But anything you need, she can get there. The main things I remember missing during my semester there were Cheerios (I ate the plain ones, which didn't exist in the UK! - only Honey Nut or multigrain, as I recall, though it's been 12 years), and junk food like Doritos. But there's plenty of fun British junk food to discover!

You can buy sweetened peanut butter but it is pricey....oh how I miss it!

You can buy cheap electric items and other household stuff at www.argos.co.uk

The one thing that she needs is a home bank account with low (or zero) foreign ATM withdrawal fees - then money can be trickle fed from home weekly or monthly and it's easy to load emergency money to it.

Try to get multiple cards BTW just in case one gets "lost".

As for what else to bring - whatever is personal to her as run of the mill stuff can always be found.

I'd say just bring her favorite clothes and electronics as others have said. As well, at least six months of medicines. An open mind, sense of adventure is a must as well!

Our daughter studied in Nottingham for six months and set up an account with NatWest to do her banking. Before she left she did a bank transfer of several thousand GBP and used that to live on.

Make sure her passport has a long expiration date and her visa is in order (if needed).

As far as favorite foods - send them to her in a care package if she wants them. Or, better yet, hand deliver them when you go and visit .

Good Luck and have fun GBelle's daughter!!

If she's bringing in medicines, it's probably worth bringing a copy of the prescription (a) to show there's a legitimate reason for carrying six months' worth (not that anyone's likely to want to investigate, but you never know) and (b) in case she runs out and needs a repeat. But I'm guessing a healthy young adult won't need to.

The advice to NOT take hair dryer, hair straightener etc is very sound – England, indeed, all Europe, works on 240 volts, not 110 volts, so equipment may get fried. Voltage converters (transformers) are heavy.

Take a couple of plug adapters, so that devices like iPod chargers or phone chargers can be plugged into a UK socket. Check that any devices, like chargers for a laptop computer, are dual rated (look for 110/220 volt, or 110/240 volt on the device). Mostly these things are OK, but it is worth checking.

All good advice above! I am an American who lives long term in the UK, and have access to American products in a military commissary. I honestly can't think of anything important that isn't available from British stores, supermarkets, and pharmacies (chemists). Many of the products familiar in America are available here under different names. For instance, Tylenol is called paracetamol in Britain. As for breakfast cereal, I've come to prefer muesli over Cheerios, cornflakes or other American staples.

Thanks for your response, Jamikins...we did purchase Germolene, a great antiseptic cream, and, indeed, it did come in handy subsequently for cuts and scrapes.

But Polysporin is meant specifically for a condition called 'swimmer's ear' and comes in drop form for preventing and treating a low-grade inflammation of the outer part of the ear canal.

I think that the lack of this type of product without prescription in UK is designed to drive folks with ear complaints to their physicians and do not disagree with that aim as ears can be tricky...my comment applied to a VERY specific complaint/remedy.

BTW, I would smuggle in a jar of 'sweetened' PB for you next time we come (annual visitors) if you will trade me the name of a great hair salon that will 'do' my hair when I am in central London without a) forcing me to give up my hotel room for a night to afford it and/or b) making me feel as if I have wandered into a club intended only for under '30's!

>>I think that the lack of this type of product without prescription in UK is designed to drive folks with ear complaints to their physicians<<

More, perhaps, that they don't want too many antibiotics used too randomly "in the wild", so to speak, because they're worried about bugs developing resistance.

Agreed, Patrick!Antibiotic overuse is something to be avoided worldwide-wouldn't dream of suggesting otherwise.

Polysporin is NOT an antibiotic prep-just a mild anti-septic drop with gentle anaesthetic ingredient-useful for 'swimmer's ear' which kids get in pools all the time. Just suggesting it as something useful if OP suffered from this common affliction.

Polysporin DOES contain an antibiotic and therefore not available OTC in the UK.

At least the products in this link state they contain antibiotics
http://www.polysporin.ca/products

Well, you did say it had antibiotic ingredients, as the name (and various descriptions turned up by Google) would suggest....