Canterbury Girls go to Canterbury

Having finished my last paper on Friday, I had my weekend free for when Stephanie and Caitlin came back to London. We decided that it would be fun to take a visit up to Canterbury and see the cathedral there (not least because we all work in the office for Canterbury USC, home to the Episcopal/Anglican group on campus). Stephanie and I left a bit early for the train station to find coffee and hot chocolate, as all the cafes near campus were mysteriously closed. Unfortunately, Hilary and Caitlin got caught on a slow tube train when coming to meet us and missed the train, so they came on a later train and we ended up touring Canterbury seperately, but other than that slight hiccup, it was quite a lovely day.

We started out exploring the Westgate Gardens, which were absolutely gorgeous.


We then wandered up and down the main thoroughfare, which was loaded with shops and restaurants, ranging from old time pubs to Marks and Spenser outlets. We grabbed pasties from the West Cornwall Pasty Company (a popular pasty chain in England) and ate them as we walked. Our best discovery was the multiple used book shops, where I picked up two books for around 5 pounds (8 dollars) total. I'm becoming a very big fan of this second-hand book system in London; it seems more common here then it does at home. Then again, I haven't really looked beyond the nearest Barnes and Noble, so maybe I'm missing something. It's so much fun because you never know what random book you'll find on the shelf, and you can usually find books in relatively good condition for very cheap.

We finally made it to Canterbury Cathedral after spending 15 minutes looking for it (you'd be surprised how hard it is to find a giant Cathedral in a small city). Below is yours truly standing in front of this massive structure.

The cathedral is made even more impressive for the amount of decoration all over it. I was particularly fond of this statue next to the entrance:


The inside was so tranquil and peaceful, particularly the back part of the cathedral where the many small chapels are located, as seen below:

We lucked out in our time of arrival, as the 100+ person choir was practicing for their concert that night, so we got to listen to music for free while we explored the church. Full pictures will be posted at the end of this post. For now, enjoy the video below.





A shot of me and Stephanie:


After the cathedral, we made a quick stop at the city's Roman Museum, which had archeological finds from the Roman city that had been discovered underneath Canterbury. Then, after stopping at a place called Shake Shed for a mid-afternoon snack, we headed back to the train station, taking this lovely picture as we went:



You can enjoy more albums here and here.

Stephanie and Caitlin have sadly gone home now. But, life's still good because classes are now over, all my papers are turned in, and I only have one final in early May. For now, I look forward to my week in the Highlands and Paris, followed by an extended chance to explore London before I have to start thinking about studying, or perhaps worse, coming home.

Cheers!

Luzern, Geneva, and the Return to the Island

Hopefully I can wrap up the retelling of my adventures in this post, so that I can get back to telling you about life on campus. To be truthful, however, there hasn't been that much to report, as the sad realization that classes only continue for one more month couples with the realization that I have four research papers due at the end of that month, which means most of my spare time is spent in the library or in my flat rifling through books in an attempt to get these papers done as soon as possible so I can go back to having fun in my life. I will report that we have recently purchased tickets to see Romeo and Juliet at the Globe Theatre in May. The Globe is a recreation of Shakespeare's original theatre, so that audiences can get a taste of how a production looked and felt when it was first performed (right down to 5 pound standing area--though we opted for seats instead).

But on to the main attraction.

We arrived in Luzern on Tuesday night, after a lengthy day of train travel. It was snowing, which was both beautiful and frustrating, as we had to lug our suitcases from the bus stop to the hostel, no mean feat on slippery walkways. Thankfully, Switzerland's transportation system is MUCH better than Italy's. In Rome, stops went unannounced, meaning you had to either know the route well enough to know where your stop was, or guess and hope it was the right one. In Switzerland, not only are the stops announced, but all the buses are equipped with monitors that show the route, the next four or five stops, and which routes you can transfer to at the upcoming stops. So much less stressful to deal with.

On Wednesday, we decided to do the tourist version of Luzern, seeing the historic sites and taking lots of pictures. It was then that we discovered that Fasnacht, Luzern's winter carnival (designed to scare away the winter spirits), was scheduled to take place the next day! You can imagine our amusement when we discovered that we were basically hopping from country to country, going from party to party.

By far my favorite site in Luzern was the Lion Monument. Carved into a cliff face, it is a memorial to Swiss mercenaries who died in the French Revolution.



As you can tell by my second picture, it was VERY cold in Luzern, much colder than we had anticipated. I ended up wearing close to five layers on the second day, and was still not completely warm.

Thursday was a full agenda for us. We got up early to see the sites at Fasnacht, which were some of the craziest antics I've ever seen. Essentially, Fasnacht is a city-wide festival, where everyone dresses up, there's a marching band on every street and in every plaza, and an open bar every few feet. It literally ran all day, and we could easily have spent our time in Luzern just wandering about Fasnacht, enjoying the insanity. We didn't, however, as we had already scheduled a different activity: SKIING!

That's right, Caitlin's first time skiing EVER was on the slopes of the Alps. We took an hour-long train ride to Engleberg, where we rented ski equipment and took a tram to the bus route. As four out of six of us had never skiied before, we started on the "easy" slopes (easy in name only, IMO). Hilary and Vanessa did their best to teach us how to do such trivial manuevers as stopping, but there's a point where you've just got to get out there and try it yourself. And oh my, what dubious results. After a glorious first run where I did everything perfectly, I was convinced skiing was a piece of cake. On my second run however, I ended up having to choose between crashing into the ski lift or a snow bank (I chose the latter) and had to reevaluate my initial assessment. Luckily I walked away with no broken bones (but several nice bruises). It was a glorious day, with the sun shining and a clear blue sky, and was great fun; skiing was over much too quickly.


We spent the night back in Luzern enjoying more of Fasnacht (which hadn't calmed down a bit since we left), but turned in early so we could get up in time for our early train to Geneva. We only spent one day there, but the goal was to cut up our train travel to Paris, where our flight was leaving from. With our Eurail passes, it was much cheaper to take a train and fly out of Paris than it was to fly out of Switzerland. At least, it was initally. As luck would have it, when we showed up at the train station ticket window the day before we were to leave Geneva, we found that they were all out of Eurail spots to Paris. Instead, we would have to Eurail to Lyon and then pay for a ticket to Paris. Forced with remaining in Geneva for the forseeable future or returning to England, we forked over the cash.

Geneva was still a good time. We would have visited the UN, but found a protest of considerable size going on outside, which both shut down the UN to visitors and ruined our photo opportunities. Not to worry, as instead we went to CERN (European Center for Nuclear Research) where they keep a giant supercollider. While most of it went over my head, there were enough engineering majors in the group that it was a must-see spot.

After another night of wandering another city, looking at hotels named for Woodrow Wilson and Swiss Banks, we turned in early again, as Saturday included getting up at 5 AM to be sure to be at the train station for our 7 AM train (no mean feat when traveling in a large group). A whirlwind day of running from train platform to trainplatform, figuring out Paris's underground train (luckily everyone besides me spoke at least some French), landing in London Luton Airport, Taking a train to St. Pancras, a tube to Mile End, and the ordeal of lugging my suitcase up four flights of stairs, and I was able to collapse on my bed. Whew!

Thus ends my tale of my week on the Continent. I'm sure I've left out dozens of stories, but I can tell you all about them when I return to the States!

For now, here are my albums:

Fasnacht!
Luzern--the historic side
Out in the Cold...in Switzerland
Skiing!
Winding Down in Geneva

Enjoy!

Venizia: Days 1 and 2 and 3

Sunday morning Hilary and I boarded a train from Rome to Venice and met up with the rest of our gang: Kevin, Emily, Haider and Vanessa. The train ride lasted several hours and put us into Venice around 3 PM. Let me note now that train travel is now possibly my favorite way to get about. Beautiful scenery, plenty of space, no pressure problems on the ears, just plenty of time to relax and get some reading done. I think we need more trains in the U.S. Or at least more trains that work.

But I digress. Having met up with the crew and depositing our luggage at the hostel (located 20 minutes by bus outside of Venice) we came back to town. We found a nice cheap gelato shop and indulged in the first of many, many scoops of gelato that we were to eat in Venice. With so many flavors to try and so little time, stopping 5 or 6 times in one day to eat gelato seemed like quite an amazing idea. With gelato in hand, we literally wandered the streets. Although we had a map, the streets were utterly maze-like, due to the height of the buildings and the narrowness of the walkways:


Short story: Any time somebody says "Amazing!" I have this habit of bursting into a song from the stage musical Little Women which goes like this:

"Amazing, there we were in Venice,
In a gondola, in Venice,
When he suddenly stood up and shouted,
"Will you marry me?""

So when someone in our group uttered the fateful word, I immediately began singing without a second thought. Until it clicked in my head that I was actually in Venice singing that song. I literally stopped in my tracks in disbelief.

And of course, what wandering would be complete without stumbling across a stunning building? No idea what it is beyond a church, but it reinforced just how wonderful life was at the moment.


While we were wandering, we also discovered that quite by chance we had arrived in Venice during Carnaval!



The masks they had to sell were simply stunning in their beauty....and ranged from 8 to nearly 200 euros! That's close to 300 dollars these days.



The next day we made breakfast in the kitchen of our hostel rooms, then took the bus to Venice. Our day started out with a gondola ride that started out along the Great Canal, then diverted into one of the many side channels. It was quite a bit of fun and I got some really great pictures which you can see at the links at the bottom of the post. As a side note, Hilary and Vanessa both reside just outside of Las Vegas, and couldn't help uttering "Woah...the Venetian Hotel did a really good job!" Apparently there were multiple spots where they both had a sensation of being back at home in the hotel's recreated Venice.





After the Gondola trip, it was time for mask shopping! Everyone in our group bought one, with the rule being once you bought a mask, you had to wear it for the rest of the day. Below is my selection, and the selection of everyone else (click to enlarge):



Somehow, everything is better in masks!

We made our windy twisty way through the streets, stopping every now and then for gelato, until we reached San Marco's Plaza, where the big festivities were. One of the most beautiful sights was that of the dozens of people who dressed up in elaborate costumes and did nothing but stand in the plaza and take pictures with people. I can imagine this easily be an annual tradition of the locals, and the results were quite stunning. Below is just one of many I took pictures of:


We also toured St. Mark's Basilica, which is amazing to go into solely to look at the mosaic pictures that cover the entire ceiling. However, there is no photography allowed inside the building, so I have no pictures to share.

We then went to the Rialto Bridge and took some amazing photos of the city at sunset, before heading to find a restaurant along the canal to have dinner. It was an absolutely delicious meal on outside tables literally next to the canal.

And this lasagna is just the first course!



Our day was fairly over after all that excitement, so we went back to the hostel. The next day we had all morning to see the city until our afternoon train to Luzern, so we headed back to San Marco's to the Campanile, a giant tower whose sole purpose, at the moment, is to entice tourist to pay overpriced fees to take an elevator to the top to take photos of the city. Having skipped a similar spot in Rome, I decided to fork over the cash this time, with some nice results, if slightly hampered by the annoying cloud cover that had moved in over night:


Then it was on the train to Luzern, where we ran across a surprising experience......

Albums are: Viva Venizia! Hide Your Face so the World Can Never Find You, and There are Buildings in Venice?

Snow Day Madness

Turns out I have material for one more post, dear friends. My friend Hilary finally had time to post her pictures from our Snow Day last week, so here we go!

Caitlin trying to get revenge on Haider.




Caitlin, Vanessa, and Hilary using a deflated air mattress as a toboggan.



It actually works quite well!


Using a tray is a bit riskier; this is a split second before I come to a rolling halt.


Alright, I leave for the airport in a few hours, so I'll have plenty to post about when I get back!

Caitlin

Stonehenge and Salisbury

Topic of the moment: USC's paid (but freezing cold) trip to Salisbury and Stonehenge. As usual, the complete album will be posted at the end of the post; below are some choice photos with additional commentary.

It's amazing these things are still standing after so long. The amount of energy and thought behind dragging these slabs 200 miles WITHOUT the invention of the wheel is simply amazing. The fact that they got the stones to sand upright and then peg them together is even more astonishing.

As with the Churchill museum, admission included an audio tour, given by the device seen hanging 'round my neck. I enjoyed the first few bits, but it soon became too cold for me to worry about anything than staying warm while marveling at engineering before me.

This simple boulder is called the Heel Stone (for reasons unknown to me). It accomplishes an amazing feat every year: on Midsummer's Day, the Heel Stone blocks the rays of the sun as it first rises. When the sun finally peaks the stone, the rays fall in the dead center of Stonehenge. Again, the engineering behind this place is just amazing when you consider it was done thousands of years ago, without a calculator or a computer.


And as you see, it got cold enough that I had to improvise some head gear. It wasn't this cold in London when we left! Aren't things supposed to get warmer as the day goes on?



Then onwards we went to Salisbury, about ten miles from Stonehenge. Its biggest attraction is Salisbury Cathedral, built during the thirteenth century. As you can see, it's currently undergoing some refurbishment.

It's absolutely massive inside, and every wall has stained class windows. There used to be a screen of sorts dividing the church in two so you couldn't see from one end to the other, but a architect a few hundred years ago decided to take it out, so now you have this view.


The tomb of Lady Catherine Grey is here. Her sister, Lady Jane Grey, was put on the throne of England for 9 days by her father-in-law. after the death of Edward VI, but Queen Mary Tudor raised an army and overthrew her and had her executed for treason. Lady Catherine was always viewed with suspicion, especially during the reign of Elizabeth, because she was Catholic and potentially in line for the crown upon Elizabeth's death.


Caitlin in the courtyard of the church.


The cathedral cat, "Wolfie." The cathedral sells magnets and photos of him in their gift shop. I fully expected Wolfie to be skittish, but he merely sat in the doorway of the giftshop, barely flinching when people walked by. As you can see, he has no collar, so he most likely wanders around the cathedral as he pleases.


We stopped at an Italian restaurant for a late lunch. Since I had eaten a rather large Cornish pasty at Stonehenge, I skipped right to the desert portion of the menu, and had a rather amazing chocolate pudding with vanilla ice cream. Imagine if you will a small warm cake with a hot fudge center, topped with vanilla ice cream. Simply heaven.

Full album of the trip here.

Cheers!

A Visit to the National Gallery

Saturday was bright and beautiful, if cold, as a few of us trekked down to the National Gallery (currently home to Van Gogh's "Sunflowers") and Trafalgar Square. No photography is allowed inside the building, but I did get some wonderful outside shots of the area.

A statue of George Washington. According to legend (and one of my friends) Washington swore he'd never set foot on English soil, so when this statue was installed in front of the gallery, they imported ground from America to set it on.

St. Martin-in-the-Field's Church.

I was definitely having a Mary Poppins moment here.

A Panoramic video of the area:


We were a bit surprised by the heavy police activity when we came out of the Gallery, and found out that there was a big anti-Gaza protest rally planned that night; as a result, most of the streets leading to the square were shut down.

Before we took our leave of the area, we were desperately in need of some food (contemplating all those paintings is an exhausting task!) so we stopped at a restaurant called Little Frankie's, a New York American Italian food chain that has crossed the ocean to set up shop in England. There was pizza and milkshakes all around! The rally, complete with the communist party, no less, was just getting underway when we finished, so we decided that it was probably a good idea to leave.

Complete photos can be found here.

Cheers for now!

Photo Album Updates

Hello all!

It's been a slow week as I settle into things and try and recooperate from the exertion of the activities I've done the last few weeks. But a little tidbit for you readers at home is that I have finally put my recent photos on Facebook! The links are listed below.

Natural History Museum
Cabinet War Rooms

Enjoy!

A Little Touch of Home

I have a little spare time on my hands tonight (finally!), so I thought I'd post some pictures of what my flat looks like. Below are the dizzying flights of stairs I have to climb every day to get to my flat on the fourth floor (or what they call the third floor here, since they count ground, one, two, etc).



The directly across from my window at first appears to be very boring buildings, until you look to the side, and see the canal that runs along the edge of campus. That white on the grass there is what little snow we received one morning during my first week here, when all the ponds were frozen over.



Some shots of my room:



The pink door leads to the hallway that connects the rest of the rooms in the flat, including the kitchen (which is occupied at the moment, so no picture now). The white door leads to my ensuite shower and toilet (very small).



As you can see, even enrolled at a different school, I still bleed cardinal and gold.

Cheers!

Awe-Inspiring

Tuesday Night was time for a bit of silly fun with a free Ghost Tour of London, paid for by the International Student House (ISH). This tour, part of London Walks, took place in the area around St. Paul's Cathedral. While not particularly spooky, it was a fun way to see some of the area, as well as get filled in with the local lore about ghosts and poltergeists, and to top it off, some film locations were pointed out to us (one church we stopped outside of was one of the many churches in Four Weddings and a Funeral). Due to it being dark and I not wanting to use my flash and annoy other people on the tour, I only got a handful of photos, but this one is my favorite:
The above is St. Bride's Church, known as the Wedding Cake Church because it was based on this architecture that a baker got the idea for a wedding cake he was designing, an inspiration that would become the common form of wedding cakes from then on.

Wednesday was field trip day for my architecture class, where we visited the outside of Parliament and the House of Lords.




My Foreign Office photos were taken from very close up, and were more reference photos for my architecture class, so they are not included among the sampling of photos.

The Gaza conflict is a huge issue here right now, evidenced by the 24-hour protest going on outside of Parliament (these people have camping tents set up!).


But by far my favorite part of the day was the visit my friends and I paid to the Cabinet War Rooms and Churchill Museum. What was supposed to be a quick stop in the day turned into a three hour extravaganza, only ended by the fact that the museum closed at six. It is to this particular experience my blog post title refers.

Visitors to the museum take self-guided tours, aided by these handy dandy devices. Punch in the number you see on the display, hit play, and hold it to your ear like a telephone to hear your tour guide explain some of the exhibits. The commentary also gives you optional sound bits to hear, like an excerpt from a memo from one secretary to another about how to handle Churchill's dictation, and a recreated dialogue from one of the debates that took place among the commanding heads of the army and Churchill.



Below are some of the pictures of the exhibit. The quality varies as many of the displays had glass in front of them, which made them difficult to photograph.





o

The last photo at first glance is a restroom which was notorious for always being locked. Rumor had it that it was Churchill's private toilet that only he could access. But in reality, this led to a secret transatlantic telephone room where Churchill could contact the President of the United States. Only a handful of people knew the real identity of this room.

I will hopefully add the rest of my photos to Facebook soon and post the link here. Its much easier to add and caption photos there then it is here.

But before I leave you, some more videos! These were taken in the new wing, the Churchill Museum. By far the most time we spent was in that room, which contained material from his birth until his death (which included footage from his funeral). The man led an absolutely fascinating life; for instance, did you know he was a journalist during the Boer War in Africa, was captured, escaped from prison and made his own way back to friendly territory, at one point spending three days in a mine where he was being hid by some farmers? Its absolutely amazing. The first video is of a huge interactive table that ran down the middle of the room that was essentially a huge time line, with the options to read extracts from various memos or to see pictures of certain events. The second is a simple pan around to help give you an appreciation for the size of the exhibit.









That's all for now! Cheers!