London Bridge is falling down...Because I'm in town!*

I went on my first "big" trip this past weekend, and where else to go first but London? After all, "when a man is tired of London, he is tired of life," according to Samuel Johnson. All right, so maybe there are other places in Great Britain outside of London. But being there was so surreal, like stepping into a novel. Even things as mundane as Tube stations and streets brought up connections in my mind:

Baker Street: Sherlock Holmes (and Basil of Baker Street!)

Fleet Street: The Demon Barber of...

Tottenham Court Road: My Fair Lady

King's Cross Station: Harry Potter

And then we ate dinner at Ye Old Chesire Cheese, a pub on Fleet Street from the seventeenth century that was a frequent haunt of Johnson and Charles Dickens, and well, it blew my mind. ;)

It was such a whirlwind trip--Friday night we explored a lot of the different neighborhoods of the city, from Chinatown to Little Italy to the West End, to the Theater District (which reminded me of NYC).

We saw the Tower of London Saturday morning (really it should be called the Towers of London) and the British Musuem that afternoon. I had a totally inaccurate perception of the Tower of London; it was actually a massive area enclosed behind castle walls, with several towers. Some parts of it were scary (the torture exhibit and seeing the inscriptions of prisoners on the walls gave me chills). But given how infamous the Tower is, it wasn't the dark, dungeon-like place I thought it would be. There's still guards there, though, to protect the amazingly beautiful Crown Jewels. The British Musuem was also incredible, though I have to go back because we didn't get to see it all. The Egyptian Room was my favorite, and not just because of the Amelia Peabody novels!

Sunday we saw the National Portrait Gallery and the National Gallery, again not all of it because by then we were dead tired! The Tube, as nice as it was (way more reliable than the Metro in DC) had closures on the very lines we needed, so we ended up having to do a lot more walking than we planned. The upside was that we saw more of the city. The downside was that it was hard to walk around the musuems, especially with a heavy pack on your back. But it was worth it for the famous artwork, and I especially enjoyed the portraits. And I got to see the actual portrait of Richard III!! I'm a bit ashamed to admit I flipped out a little when I saw it. ;) But then again, I also had a breakdown seeing Parliament and Big Ben for the first time.

The last bit of the trip was seeing Buckingham Palace, in the rain, unfortunately. It was at the end of a long Mall, weirdly similar to the National Mall in DC. The flag was flying, so the royal family was in residence! I didn't get to meet them this trip...maybe next time... ;)

This trip was also the first time I'd stayed in a hostel, which was...interesting. On the whole, it was all right for a cheap place to sleep. It was like staying in a slightly dirtier-than-usual dorm for the weekend. The room was ok, though I was glad I was with friends, it made it more fun. I learned a couple of lessons for future reference: Like Arthur Dent, never travel without a towel! And soap. Hostels don't provide anything. But it wasn't sketchy at all, so I have no issues with roughing it in a hostel again in the future.

And the food was delicious--I had Yorkshire Pudding and Spotted Dick (don't snicker, that's what it's called) for the first time. Yorkshire Pudding was my favorite; it isn't pudding at all, but a fluffy, crispy biscuit with a hole in the middle for gravy. Funnily enough, Spotted Dick isn't...never mind. It's actually a dessert of fruitcake and custard.

I can't wait to go back!

*Apologies for the awful title

Watching the Inauguration from a foreign country

I watched President Obama's inauguration today in a huge crowd in the Student's Union!!

It was really cool to see how excited everyone was here. The Union was decked out with American flags and red, white, and blue balloons--I felt like I was back home again! ;)

It was especially nice to see everyone cheering for America again. The only awkward part of the speech was Obama's reference to "the enemy" we faced during the Revolutionary War. Um....yeah.

All in all, I thought it was a good speech, very grounded in history. I also liked his call for responsibility. It didn't have as many "soundbites" as I thought it would, and it was more sobering than many might have liked, but I thought it was fit for the times. It was what we needed to hear. Now the real work begins.

Coventry and Stratford-upon-Avon

A little late to post, but this past Wednesday I went on a guided tour of Coventry with the International Office. It was awesome because I got to meet some other Americans, two from California and one from South Carolina! Of course, everyone actually from Coventry jokes that there's nothing there, but it's really a nice city--at least during the day. Our tour guide was enthusiastic about it, at least (more on him later). We saw some good sights, like Coventry Cathedral (the ruins of it, bombed during World War II), the modern cathedral, an excavation site and museum of a church destoryed by Henry VIII during the Dissolution of the Monasteries, and a statue of Lady Godiva. I love that myth: Lady Godiva cared so much for the people of Coventry that she repeatedly asked her husband to lower the taxes. Finally, to get her to stop bothering him, he told her he would if she rode naked through the streets of Coventry. She did, and no one looked at her except one man who was then struck blind by her beauty (we know him as Peeping Tom). And yes, she was in the nude in her statue. ;)

I went back to Coventry on Friday with Damon to look at the shops and get a phone (yay) and he showed me a park that has a map on the ground showing the timezones of all of Coventry's sister cities. Coventry actually started this practice, by becoming a sister city to Dresden (in a spirit of forgiveness). And guess what I saw on the map? None other than Coventry, CT! I can't seem to escape going to university near a Coventry...

Later that night I went back to Coventry with my floormates to celebrate a birthday. We ate dinner at Nando's a fantastic Portuguese chicken chain in the UK. Some of them went out to a club afterwards, but I didn't feel well so I just went back to the dorm to get some sleep before...

Stratford-upon-Avon! Lana and I went to the Bard's city yesterday, and it was wonderful! It was supposed to rain all day, but instead we got blue skies and sunshine...such a simple thing but it made me feel fantastic! It did end up raining, but the weather was (for once) kind enough to hold off until we got on the bus to go back. The city itself was cute, if a bit touristy. It had lots of shops and delicious food (I had a cheese and onion pasty for lunch and hearty lamb, vegetables, mashed potatoes, and mulled spiced wine at The Garrick Inn, the oldest Tudor pub in Stratford).

We visited four houses connected with Shakespeare, and all of them were lovely! Shakespeare's birthplace was the simplest of all the houses. His daughter and granddaughter lived in much larger and richer houses, and Anne Hathaway (his wife) grew up in a thatched roof cottage on the outskirts of town. We had to walk a mile to get there, practically through people's backyards. It was such a nice day that there were lots of people out walking their dogs, and Lana and I couldn't believe how old and pretty the neighborhoods are in the countryside. Stratford-upon-Avon is right on the edge of the Cotswolds, and I can't wait to visit that region again in the springtime.

Oh, and totally random: we saw the Coventry tour guide again leading another group! That guy gets around!

We learned a lot from the guides in each of the houses. Here are some random Shakespearean facts:

-Upper class men would "do their business" right into their fireplace, but the lower classes would use urine for clothing and in remedies and would leave buckets outside their doors for "donations" (!)

-The youngest son in the family had the jobs of turning the spit over the fire to cook meat and climbing up the chimney to get rid of soot (sounds right for Brian, ha ha)

-The Tudors weren't big on animal rights: They would often use dogs and chickens to do those same jobs!

-People never slept in their "best beds" but reserved it for guests

-Digging up bodies from graves and moving them for building projects was a common practice. Hence, Shakespeare's epitaph:

And, finally: Some of the churches over here have creepy, creepy statues:

So, all in all, I had a great time! Even better, I managed to resist buying a "Shakespearean insults mug" in the gift shops that they make you walk through to get out of the buildings. My favorite? "I was seeking for a fool when I found you."--As You Like It :D

Classes!

So, I have classes:

-The European World (1500-1700)
-English Social History (1500-1700)
-Religious Change in England, 1470-1558
-Georgian Britain (1700-1850)

A lot of British history, which is what I wanted. In my English Social History class, we're covering such cheerful topics as poverty, famine, the plague, crime, rebellion, riots, witchcraft...and London. ;)

I really like all my professors and seminar tutors (they're like TA's) so far. Everyone is nice and tries to be accomodating, considering I'm coming in around the middle of the course. It's a nice change not to have to spend 500 dollars on textbooks! I only hope I'll be able to get all of the material from the library, given that everyone in the class has the same reading list. I'm planning on buying one "textbook" per class online, just to always have as a reference.

For the most part, I'm happy with my schedule--no class on Fridays! That's never happened at UConn before! And no class before 10 AM!

When you travel...

"Remember that a foreign country is not designed to make you comfortable..."
---Clifton Fadiman

Wise words.

So, still haven't gotten all my classes yet, so I'm just going to show up at them tomorrow and see what happens! But, even better than classes is that I got to see Warwick Castle with Lana yesterday!

In retrospect, perhaps it wasn't the best day to go, because it was freezing cold. I don't know if I've discussed the British winter weather yet. Now, I'm used to the snow of upstate New York, I'm used to the nippy, bitter cold of New England, but I was unprepared for winter here in England. It's this wet, damp cold that passes through you like a cloud and chills you right down to your bones. It also doesn't help that I've only seen it sunny for longer than a half hour once. It's usually gray and dreary, and the "sun" starts to go down at 3:30.

But enough about the weather--it's much warmer today, and the weather yesterday was certainly atmospheric for a medieval castle. I probably don't even need to say that I loved it! The initial views of Warwick were stunning, as was our entrance into the Great Hall. The castle was fully decorated inside, complete with creepily lifelike wax people, and seperated into different historical eras. So we saw the Warwick of the Late Middle Ages during the Wars of the Roses (my favorite part), the Tudor and Stuart periods, and finally the late Victorian Era. The scariest place by far was the dungeon, where we even saw inscriptions on the walls from people who'd been imprisoned there.

It was funny how the castle was totally biased in favor of Richard Neville, the Earl of Warwick, who led a rebellion against King Edward IV in 1471. There were some audio clips with him declaring "Our cause is just!" Yeah, right. I'm biased in favor of the other side--the Yorkists--but no one can deny that Warwick was an ambitious character. He's called "The Kingmaker" because he helped put Edward into power in the first place, by deposing the incompetent King Henry VI. Then when Edward married a commoner, Elizabeth Woodville, and started favoring the Woodville clan, Warwick decided he could no longer control Edward and could get a better deal by running back to support Henry. Henry never should have held the throne in the first place, because his branch of the family (the Lancastrians) had stolen it from the Yorkists a century before. So just cause, not so much.

Outside we walked all around, even up to the top of the highest tower. I don't know how people managed to get up there without railings--the steps were so narrow and felt like they went on forever. From the castle we had spectacular view of the town, and later we went into the town and saw St. Mary's Church, which has famous nobility buried there, including Earls of Warwick and Robert Dudley, a "favorite" of Elizabeth I. The only slightly off putting part was that the floor was covered in grave markers, so it felt like we were walking all over people's graves, which we probably were. And cobblestone is, unsurprisingly, extremely difficult to walk on, but I had a great time tramping around the castle!

Today I went to church at the Chaplaincy. Again, it was different from what I'm used to, especially the music, but it was nice. And I really enjoyed meeting everyone in the Music Group. It's not a full choir, like at St. Tom's, but a group with pianists, other musicians (flute, guitar, trumpet), and singers.

Continuing the random US-UK observations:

-No ice water at restaurants--you have to buy any drinks you want
-People don't just drive on the left, they walk and push carts at the supermarket on the left as well. I got some dirty looks as I was climbing up the stairs in the library on the right side and people coming the other way had to move to the other side
-Reserve. I've especially noticed it at Tesco's supermarket, where the cashiers are much less (superficially) friendly than Americans. In the US, I've always had cashiers mutter a "Hi, how you?" with the expected response of "Good, how are you?" It doens't mean that they really want to know--and you never admit that you're feeling terrible, actually--but it's a nicety. Here, the cashiers are silent except to tell you how much money you owe, and they don't even say "Have a nice day." I used to say hello, but now I don't even bother.
-Cider. Not like American cider at all. Not good at all.
-Fish and chips don't only come with fish and chips (predictably) but bread and peas as well! Adds some carbs and vegetables to the greasy deliciousness of fish and chips!
-I tried a Galaxy chocolate bar. It was creamy goodness.

There Ain't No Party Like An S Club Party, Christian Focus, and oh, right---classes

Well, at least I finally have some classes now. I'm definitely taking The European World and English Social History, and maybe a class on World War II and Georgian Britain. It's been so tedious figuring out my schedule. And after I thought that I was all settled, I went to register online and found out that one of my classes wasn't even listed! This is after I contacted the history department and the professor! Grr...

On the plus side, I did have a fun time tonight and last night. Yesterday I went to a concert at the Students' Union with a bunch of people on my floor. A has-been band from the 90's, S Club 7, was performing. It was kind of cheesy--that type of music always is--but I had fun. Even though I didn't grow up on them in the way everyone else had, I tried to join in the singing and dancing. It was pretty wild--the British really know how to party. UConn wouldn't have something like that on a weekend, let alone a Wednesday night. And yet Warwick has concerts every night of the week...

And tonight I went to the Christian Focus meeting and met up with Kevin again, which was great! I had a good time meeting lots of his friends. They're very funny and witty people, with that deadpan British humor that I'm still not quite used to. Kevin, Danielle, and I were teased a lot for being American, but all in good fun. We had some good comebacks; I think I mentioned something about a Revolutionary War? ;) I enjoyed the meeting even though it was different from what I'm used to. We started off with a meditation/prayer session and then heard a guest speaker talk about justice.

I've been doing some awesome new things here, it's just that all the administrative red tape that I have to go through is frustrating. I just want to start classes!

I felt very British yesterday...

After all, what's more British than tea and biscuits? ;)

I really like my dorm, and especially my floor (I don't know anyone on the second floor, it's like they don't exist). But my floor is great. Everyone's been really nice, and nearly everybody's friends with one another, so it's a good community. It reminds me a little of how Shippee was...though of course the Ship was in a league of its own.

The only downside is that it is a first years (freshman) dorm, with all the craziness and noise that comes with it. British accents are considerably less cool when they're keeping you up at 1 AM. The walls are so thin, and my room is across from the stairs, so it's pretty bad. I have newfound sympathy for anyone who lived in Northwest freshman year. It's even weirder because I'm used to South, which was dead quiet. I think I'm going to have to get ear plugs, and take late classes. I've been getting up early everyday since I've been here and having trouble sleeping, which has made me chronically sleep deprived. I'm hoping it'll get better once I get on a regular schedule. I'm definitely sleeping in tomorrow and napping later!

Besides that, though, it's been fun. I've done karaoke (Sing Star) and watched two British shows, EastEnders and Little Britain. They were...funny. The first unintentionally; it's a soap, so the dialogue was terrible (everyone was shouting "You're evil!" at each other, and every character was homicidal). The second show was full of strange British humo(u)r. ;)

I also had real Earl Grey tea and biscuits (cookies) with people in the kitchen, which has been the gathering place where I've talked to almost everyone on my floor. It's really neat, because they come from all over Britain (the north, south, London) and the world (Pakistan, Nigeria, China, and there's another American girl from the University of South Carolina). I also met some French and Italian students at the study abroad orientation.

And, finally...today I got to ride on top of a double decker bus!!! It was annoying, because the airport messed up my visa, so I had to take a trip back to sort it out. The only good part about it was that I met some people on the train who gave me lots of advice about places I should visit, and I got to see more of the countryside and city of Coventry. The first time I came into Cov, it was too dreary to see much, but today was sunny so I got good views of beautiful old houses and town squares.

Oh, and public transportation in Britain is not that great. Both buses I took were at least twenty minutes late, and one of the trains stalled on the track for a half an hour! It might be because it snowed, and since England gets snow so rarely they don't know what to do with it. It's hardly anything compared to Upstate NY (or even Connecticut)!

Random US-UK differences:

-They don't sell twist tags seperately, they're included in the freezer bags
-Freezer bags don't have ziplocks
-A bag of crisps (chips) is filled with several smaller bags
-Tea bags don't have strings on them--so annoying
-They don't have American cheese, ha ha

I'm here

Well, now that I'm (sort of) settled in and have time to post...

I made it, finally! I'm in my dorm at school. The people on my floor are nice, I'm going to go out later tonight with them and get to know them better. My room is very nice, and it's a single, which is even better! At first I was so confused because we get into the building with keys, not with a card swipe.

But then, I've been confused a lot since I've been here. I had a severe case of culture shock yesterday (and the jet lag made it worse). Everything was way more different than I thought it would be, and I found myself struggling with the most mundane and basic things, like using the bathroom, the shower, paying at a restaurant, plugging stuff in. The guest house I stayed at last night was quaint and pretty but freezing cold (it wasn't centrally heated)! But they did serve us a huge, tasty English breakfast. I didn't know baked beans were for breakfast before!

And on top of that, I've had trouble understanding the accents of a lot of the people I've encountered--there are so many regional accents, and they don't sound like the British accents you hear on TV!

I'm feeling a bit less overwhelmed now. The campus is a lot bigger than I thought it would be; it's close to the size of UConn. But I'm finding my way around. I went shopping with Andrea and Danielle earlier, which was fun. It was cool seeing American brands that looked very different. Of course we had some issues, especially with pushing the cart on the rigtht (well, left) side of the aisle! I was so nervous when I took a cab to campus earlier today, and I'm so glad I don't have to drive while I'm in England!

Hello New Year, Goodbye USA

In the spirit of Great Britain (well, I'll be in England, not Scotland, but close enough)...

Should auld acquaintance be forgot, And never brought to mind?

Should auld acquaintance be forgot, And auld lang syne?
For auld lang syne, my dear, For auld lang syne,

We'll tak a cup of kindness yet, For auld lang syne!

Well, it's the night before I leave...it's come sooner than I expected. The nervous energy has really started to get to me now, and I'm sitting here thinking, What did I get myself into?!? By this time tomorrow night, I'll be on my way to England!

I'm really going to miss all my family and friends. And I think I'll miss my country, too. I'm pretty patriotic (hey, I watch 1776 every 4th of July!) but maybe going away will offer me both a more realistic and more appreciative point of view. It will be my first trip outside the US (going abroad at age two doesn't count, ha ha) and the longest I've ever been away from home. But I'm hoping that it will be worth it; I think it will.

From one of my favorite songs, from way back in high school (an Irish blessing):

May the road rise up to meet you,

May the wind always be at your back,

May the sun shine warm upon your face,

And rains fall soft upon your fields.

And until we meet again,

May God hold you in the palm of His hand.

Happy New Years to all! I'll miss you so much!

See you on the other side of the pond!