Guten Tag!

Hello from Berlin! My computer is being temperamental about the wireless in my hostel, so I'm using one of the hostel's computers, with its freaky German keyboard. Y and Z are switched around, I have no idea where the at symbol is, and I have to press the shift key to get to an apostrophe. It's even weirder than the British keyboard, which I thought disconcerting enough.

The semester is now over. I finished and turned in my last paper and we had our end-of-term tea party. I had my last dinner with my host mum, and my last day out in London, where I finally saw the Changing of the Guard (though not from a very good spot, as I'm guessing most of the action took place behind the gates of Buckingham Palace, and I wasn't close enough), and ate my lunch in a park near the Victoria Embankment, took some more people to the Doctor Who shop and small museum, then finished my paper and wandered around a bit before seeing Legally Blonde, my last show in London. It was a lot of fun, especially seeing how things get adapted from movie to musical. I very much enjoyed it.

Saturday was when I left for Cardiff with some friends, fellow Doctor Who fans. Getting to Paddington, however, was a public transportation fiasco. The bus that goes right past my homestay either came too early (meaning more than five minutes early, which I really don't think buses should do) or just didn't come at all, so instead of taking ten minutes to get to the station from which trains run frequently, I had to walk twenty minutes to get to the station from which they do not run as frequently. One was leaving just as I was walking up, so I had to wait ten minutes for the next one. Then when I got on that, there was a defective train at the next station, so we had to wait for that to leave. When I got to Baker Street, the next line I'd intended to take wasn't going to Paddington at the moment, so I had to take the longer route. I left the house at 7:15 for an 8:45 train in what should have been plenty of time because Paddington is fairly close, but I ended up getting to the station just as the train left. Then I had to buy a new ticket all together, because the one I had was for that particular train only. At least my friends waited for me and we got to Cardiff together.

Our hostel was not very far from the station (though that's not really saying much, since Cardiff is small enough that we could walk from the north end to the south in just over half an hour), but it was an awesome place. Best hostel I've been in. I'd originally booked us three beds in an eight-bed dorm for twenty pounds a night, but somehow we got a three-bed private room without a difference in price. Really nice place.

From the hostel we walked down to the Doctor Who Museum, near the Millennium Centre and Cardiff Bay. The museum was very cool, having original props and costumes and just some really neat stuff. Then we hung around Roald Dahl Plass for awhile, looked out on the bay, got a lot of pictures. But Cardiff is small and there is really not all that much to do, so we went back to the hostel for dinner, and for watching the newest episode of Doctor Who as it aired. That was pretty awesome, to watch the show in the place where it's filmed.

Our hostel had a pretty nice bar, so we stayed there for a bit, then went to an O'Neill's (chain Irish pub). Around midnight I was feeling tired and wanted to go to bed, but my friends are more into partying and they stayed out later.

Sunday was a pretty lazy day. We slept in (them more than me), then walked around Cardiff on a Doctor Who tour of the places where it was filmed. It was pretty cool to walk around a place and recognize it from the show. Then we went back to the bay and took a boat ride around the bay. Hah. 'Boat ride' sounds so tame. The boat basically sped us around the bay at roughly 85mph, including taking us in tight circles and riding the waves so hard we got jostled. I was not expecting that, but it was very fun.

We went back to the hostel and watched a movie in our room until dark, when we went back to look at the Millennium Centre and Roald Dahl Plass all lit up at night, which was quite cool. But again, not much else to do, so we went back to the hostel for an early night.

Monday we took the train back to London, then I went back to AHA to pick up the stuff I stored there, and we met again at Victoria station for the train to Gatwick, since my friends were going to Amsterdam from there. I got on my flight to Berlin, which was thankfully a very easy flight, and got here and made it through customs (easiest customs ever--they didn't even ask me how long I was going to be here), then caught the train into the city center and made my way to my hostel.

Berlin is smaller than I'd thought, because today I walked across what looks like about half of it. My hostel is near Alexanderplatz, and I walked from here to the Brandenburg Gate and Potsdamer Platz without difficulty. The Brandenburg gate is very cool, and I got some pictures of bits of the Berlin Wall at Potsdamer Platz, and saw the Memorial for Murdered Jews in Europe. Right above the memorial is the Field of Stelae, tall rectungular concrete blocks set out in rows and columns. I walked into them, and they got gradually taller, and I felt like I was walking amongst rows of sarcophagi. Very appropriate, but also very creepy.

Tomorrow I intend to go Schloss Charlottenburg (a palace), the Reichstag (Parliament building), possibly up the TV Tower for a view of the city, and maybe for a boat and/or bus tour around the city. I'll figure out the rest from there.

It's been very interesting being here, alone in a big city when I don't speak the language. Everyone I came across in Oslo spoke English, and I was with someone then, but not everyone speaks English here and I've been having to get around and figure things out completely by myself. I've been fine so far, but it's definitely an experience. At least English is a Germanic language so there are some things I can figure out, Austria also speaks German, and Italy and France are Italic languages which I have some familiarity with. It may take a bit of time, but I can figure things out!

Busy Week

This has honestly been my first chance to update since Monday.  Wow, my week has been full.

Saturday was Brighton, which was lovely.  Weather reports warned that it was supposed to rain, and it did...for the first half hour.  After that it was sunny for the rest of the time we were there.

The train ride on the way down might have been the best, and also the geekiest, train ride I've ever had.  It's only an hour to Brighton from London, but my friends and I passed the time playing Shakespeare and Fantasy Twenty Questions.  And for Fantasy Twenty Questions the sources we focused on were Harry Potter, Star Wars, Lord of the Rings, and Narnia, so I kicked serious ass.  On the way home we added Disney to the mix, and I kicked ass at that too.

My Novels teacher lives in Brighton, and she said she'd show us around, so we met her and her excitable Dalmatian puppy (she couldn't get a dog-sitter) at the train station and she gave us a tour.  We followed the May Day Parade for a bit, and then she showed us the Royal Pavilion, the sumptious Indian/Oriental-style palace where George the Prince Regent kept his unofficial wife, apparently.

From there we hit the beach.  It had been raining, but seriously, once we got to the beach, the rain stopped.  It was awesome.  The beach was very rocky and not sandy, so it was not as comfortable to lie on, but we still spent quite a bit of time there.  There was also a carousel on the beach, which four of the five of us decided we had to go on -- we were the only adults there unaccompanied by children. :p  I enjoyed it, though.

We went to lunch at Brighton Pier, and I had fish and chips.  The very first time I've had fish and chips since coming to England, too -- and also the last.  It wasn't...bad, but it didn't have much taste, even when I added vinegar.  But at least I've finally had it, and it was by the seaside, too, so I'm satisfied.

After lunch we went shopping.  Well, I window-shopped.  Some of the others bought stuff, but there was nothing I wanted that would fit me, so I didn't get anything.  We also just walked around and listened to the street performers, but I think the main attractions of Brighton are the beach/seaside and the shopping.  We were done with the shopping, so we went back to the beach for awhile.

We went to a pub for dinner, and I have chicken tikki masala with naan.  It is a mark of how good Indian food is in Britain that I could order it at a pub, of all places, and still have it be very good.  One of the others ordered a whiskey and coke, and we got onto the subject of whiskey, and I somehow managed to be the expert on the subject there.  (Well, maybe it's not too surprising, since I was the only one there over 21.)  This made me want whiskey, so I ordered some, and I actually prefer my whiskey neat rather than mixed with something.  But the others were curious about the taste of plain whiskey, so I let them have small sips.  One made a rather hilarious face, but another actually spat it out.  What a waste of good whiskey! :p

After dinner we went home.  I went to bed, and actually slept very well.  I'd been getting an ear infection, which, after the horrible one of last year, made me very nervous.  I was going to try and see a doctor just in case, but then it just started going away on its own, which was a big relief.

Sunday and Monday I just spent on classes and homework.  Three papers due next week, and three finals.  Gah.  I really prefer having either a final paper or a final exam, not both, especially when the final exam is essay questions.  Oh well, though, since I think I'm pretty well prepared for the tests at least.  I still have two essays to finish.

On Tuesday the entire program went to see Macbeth at the Globe.  The Globe!  Macbeth!  I hadn't been looking forward to standing for three hours, but it wasn't as bad as I'd been anticipating.  I enjoyed the performance.  Some of the others didn't like some of the choices the director made, but I hadn't minded.  I was right in the front, almost in the center, and I just really enjoyed the experience.

Wednesday was spent on classes, figuring out some stuff for Europe (oh, Mom and Dad -- I got the Eurail pass), and writing one of the essays.  I finished the essay Thursday morning, so I didn't really have time for the changing of the guard or the national history museum, so I'm going to try for those next week.  The changing of the guard I especially want to see.  Anyway, I think I've got my exact dates for Europe figured out, for when I'll be in each city and when I'd be better off taking sleeper trains and so on, so that's a relief.  I think on Monday I'll try to make hostel reservations.

Thursday I spent on finishing the essay and doing research for another, then class, and then a show.  Sarah and I were going to spend the night in the airport before our flight to Oslo this morning, because trying to get there in the morning would have been such a hassle.  But we had to leave pretty late, because Sarah had to see Midsummer Night's Dream for the Shakespeare class, and I decided that since she had to see a show, I might as well use the time to see one as well.  I did Billy Elliot again, just because I love it.  Wow, do I love it.  I'm definitely going to try and see the movie when I get home.

Yesterday was also election day in Britain (it looks like the Tories got the most seats but there's a hung parliament, which means they only got a plurality, not an outright majority).  Martin had told us that there'd be broadcasting of election results in Trafalgar Square and against Big Ben, so after my show was over I went to Parliament Square, but there was no broadcasting.  I met Sarah there, and we decided to check out Trafalgar Square, but there was likewise no broadcasting.  It made me very sad, because I'd wanted to watch it, and thought it would have been so cool to see it in Trafalgar Square or against Big Ben.

We had to take an hour-long bus ride to get to Stansted Airport, and Sarah made reservations for one in the morning, because she wanted to make sure we had enough time to get to the coach stop.  I understand that, but I wish she'd gone for the midnight time slot, because we found the bus stop by then, and then had nothing to do.  Things close so early in London -- there were no pubs or bars open or anything.  We basically had to wait outside in the cold for an hour, and I was tired by that point, so I was trying to sleep on a hard wood bench, but it wasn't working out too well because I was so cold.

We made it to Stansted by two, but check-in and security weren't open then, so we passed the night on a hard cold floor in the lobby area.  I drowsed for three hours, but that was about it.

I woke up by about five-thirty and we checked in and went through security, but we still had another couple hours to kill before we even found out what gate we were, so I went on my computer, but not on the internet because I would have had to pay.  We finally made it to the airplane and I dozed some more on the flight.  It was thankfully only about two hours.  That was the first time I've flown since coming over here, and I don't like it any more than I ever have.  I'm really not looking forward to the flight home from Paris.

We had to take another hour-long bus to get from the airport in Rygge to Oslo, but we got to our hostel at about one.  I'd brought some food for my lunches for both days (definitely a good idea, now that I've seen how expensive food is here), so I ate lunch and went on the computer for a bit while we waited for check-in to open.  Then we checked in, dropped our bags off in our room, and went out to explore Oslo.

We'd decided on an easy day today, because both of us were exhausted (honestly, I'm surprised I've managed this long).  We wandered around the shopping area nearby, and I got a European plug adaptor.  From there we went up one of the main streets towards the royal palace, seeing sights such as the Domkirk (church), the University of Oslo, the National Theatre, the Hard Rock Cafe Oslo, the parliament building, and just some great pedestrian areas.  We took some pictures of the palace when we got there, but there wasn't really much else we could do, so we stopped in for a drink at the Hard Rock Cafe and then moved on to look at the fjord.

Right by the fjord, at least the part we went to, was an old fortress and castle, so we explored that a bit.  The castle was closed by then, so we didn't go in, but we actually saw rather a lot of the fortress grounds, and got some great pictures, and saw some guards in funny uniforms standing and marching around, so that was cool.

Sarah had brought food for her dinners, but I really only had room in my backpack for lunches, so I went to find dinner.  Wow, things are expensive here.  Much more so than England and even Ireland.  I really hope that the rest of my visit to Europe has prices more similar to England than to Norway, where a medium pizza cost almost thirty dollars and a glass of pepsi almost six.  But the good thing about getting pizza is that I now have leftovers, so I can have leftover pizza for lunch tomorrow, eat the food I'd brought for dinner, and then not have to pay more.

We came back to the hostel after dinner, since both of us are quite tired, though Sarah more than me.  So now I'm online, have finally had time to properly update this thing, and will probably go to bed in a few hours.  It's nine-thirty here, but it's still light out!  Considering how far north we are, I would have figured it would have gotten dark already, but apparently not.

Anyway.  Tomorrow we're going to take a ferry across the fjord to the Norwegian Folk Museum, meet one of Sarah's Norwegian friends who will show us around more, and then go back to the airport in the evening to spend the night there for a six-fifty flight Sunday morning.  Hopefully I'll be able to sleep better at Rygge airport than Stansted.

I love living in London and I think the tube is marvelously convenient most of the time, but gah it's awful on weekends.  Weekends are when they do engineering work, and of course I understand why they do weekends -- it'd be even more disruptive during the work week -- but doing anything on weekends can be a real hassle.  There was my Easter adventure, and this weekend is another Bank Holiday (for May Day), and there are closures on almost all the lines in my area.  I'm going to Brighton tomorrow and figuring out rail replacement buses and what exactly are the lines I can use is being a bit of a headache.

Anyway!  The semester is winding down, and all of my assignments but the final papers/final exams are done.  I have two weeks left in London.  Two weeks!  How did that happen?  I can't believe how quickly this semester has gone by.

So I'm trying to finish up the touristy stuff I want to do.  Yesterday morning we went to the Imperial War Museum for a class, and after that I had about four hours of free time before my next class so I went to the National Gallery and National Portrait Gallery.  I went to art museums of my own free will!  Honestly, it was mostly because I thought I should, but I did see some Leonardo da Vinci, Michaelangelo, Monet, Rembrandt, and Van Gogh (for people I've actually heard of), and some of those famous paintings of Queen Elizabeth I and Henry VIII and Queen Victoria and so on, so that was pretty cool.  Next week, probably Tuesday, I'm going to watch the changing of the guard, and I think Thursday will be the Natural History Museum.

On Tuesday my history class went to do a tour of Lord's Cricket Grounds and to see part of a cricket match.  So now I know a bit of the history of the game, and I got to see the Ashes, and I watched some cricket, but I still don't understand it very well.  Pretty much the entire time we were watching the game, we had to ask our teacher what was going on.  Now there are a few things I can get by myself, but for the most part I still need an interpreter.

My plans for this weekend had originally been Dover and Canterbury today, Brighton tomorrow, and Oxford again on Sunday.  But then the friend I'd been going to Oxford with couldn't go anymore, and other people said they were going to Oxford today, so I decided to skip Dover and Canterbury and do Oxford today and have Sunday free.  Though it's just as well, because Sunday will be not so much free as spent getting some final essays out of the way so I don't have to worry about them during the week or when I'm in Norway.

I very much enjoyed Oxford, especially because I got to do what I wanted to do, rather than what had been scheduled as a school trip.  I caved in and bought an Oxford sweatshirt, and we went back to lunch at the Eagle and Child, and we went to Blackwell's Bookshop, which sold a lot of rare books I could not afford no matter how much I wanted some of them (1851 Emma for two hundred pounds!).

Part of my reason for going back to Oxford was because I really wanted to take a boat on the river, and happily the friends I was with also wanted it.  Originally we got a punt, because it seems like punting in Oxford is rather traditional, but, um, we failed.  Well, mostly I failed.  I volunteered to actually punt the boat, but wow is it harder than it seemed.  I just couldn't figure out how to get the boat to move forward.  And then we couldn't really try to change punters because we thought all that moving around would make at least one of us fall out.  I did get a picture of me attempting to punt, though.

We ended up using the paddle to get back to the dock, after only twenty minutes of our allotted hour.  We didn't want to waste our money, though (since we paid for the hour), and we still wanted to go on the river, so we used a paddle boat instead.  Much easier.  One friend steered while the other friend and I paddled, and I think we got our money's worth there.  Great scenery, a boat we were actually able to handle, and a good time all around.  And when we got back to the dock, the boat handler told us we hadn't failed with the punt as badly as some other people have -- we at least managed to get ourselves back to dock, rather than him having to go rescue us.  So despite the blip at the beginning, I had a good time in a boat on the Cherwell, and I am pleased.

After that we went to see Magdalen College, which is where C.S. Lewis taught, and we were supposed to pay three pound fifty but we actually only paid one pound because it was a rainy day and the porter gave us a discount for weather, which was really nice of him.  Then we went to Merton College, which is one of the colleges where Tolkien taught, and we were supposed to pay two pounds but the porter there said we could just go in.  Right after lunch I'd gone to see St. John's College, because it was free to visitors, so I got to see three of Oxford's colleges for only a pound, which was awesome.

There were no specifically Tolkien-related things for us to see at Merton, but it was still pretty awesome to walk the same ground he walked, and though it was very rainy, it was also very pretty.  We also saw some students playing croquet, so that was pretty cool.  I don't think I've ever seen people actually playing croquet before.

My friends had to get back for dinner with their host family, so we left after Merton.  I loved Oxford, though.  Beautiful sights, and such history -- it would have been so cool to have gone to school at Oxford.  Maybe if I decide to continue my education later I'll try for a doctorate or something at Oxford.  Heh.  We'll see how that goes. :p

Brighton tomorrow!  It's supposed to rain even worse than it did today, but there's going to be a festival and parade for May Day, so I'm still really looking forward to it!

Happy St. George's Day!

The past week or so has not been excessively interesting, except for weekends and the volcano in Iceland.  

The Iceland volcano, which I'm not even going to try to spell or pronounce, has been more applicable than just reading about it in the papers.  Martin, our program director and teacher of one of our classes, had to go to Portland, OR two weeks ago for some AHA conference.  He was supposed to be back this past week, but...volcano.  So he got stuck in Portland, we had no class on Monday, and had to get a substitute in on Wednesday to talk to us about Britain's political parties and the leaders' debate from last week.  We're not sure when Martin will be back, but it should be by Tuesday, at least.

Last Thursday I saw Wicked!  That was one of the shows I'd really been wanting to see, and it was really good.  I did like Billy Elliot better, but I'm definitely glad I got the chance to see Wicked as well.  It also made me want to watch The Wizard of Oz again, and maybe read the book at some point.

Last weekend I met two friends from the internet, one for dinner on Friday, and one, a closer friend, I met in London on Saturday and then went to Southampton, where she lives, on Sunday.  She'd warned me that Southampton wasn't very interesting, and it really wasn't, but I saw bits of Southampton castle scattered around (it's in ruins and the town grew up around it), and she showed me her university, and it was just really nice to get out of London and visit a friend in a nice, non-touristy English seaside town.  I found it very enjoyable, even if we did spend a lot of time sprawled on grass talking.

On Thursday I watched the second leaders' debate with my host mum.  These debates are between the leaders of the three main political parties, Labour, Conservative, and Liberal Democrats, the men who would be Prime Minister if their party gets the majority.  Gordon Brown of Labour is PM now, but what's sort of funny is that his main rival, David Cameron of the Conservatives, pushed for televised debates because he's young, photogenic, and speaks well; he thought he'd do especially well compared to Gordon Brown.  Well, he did -- but I reckon he didn't account for Nick Clegg of the Liberal Democrats, who have been a minority party for the past century and are unexpectedly being a force in this election.  Nick Clegg is also young and photogenic, and he speaks even better than David Cameron, so the general consensus is that he's won the past two debates (there's one more), giving his party a big boost.  I guess that one backfired in David Cameron's face. :p  I'm really loving being here for the British election.  It's so interesting!

Anyway, this weekend was, of course, Stratford-upon-Avon, for Shakespeare's birthday weekend and also St. George's Day (St. George is England's patron saint, so it's a bit of a holiday).  We got into Stratford yesterday, which was Shakespeare's actual birthday, and checked into our B&Bs, which were so much better than hostels.  Too bad I can't afford to do B&Bs for the rest of my time in Europe, but oh well, hostels are fine.

First we went to Holy Trinity Church to see Shakespeare's grave, and then we went to see Shakespeare's Birthplace.  Normally people are not allowed to take pictures inside the house, but because it was his birthday, we were allowed to, so I got some pictures of the house.  They were also giving out free samples of mead in the garden, and that was pretty good.  I'd never had mead before.

Stratford was, by the way, particularly gorgeous.  Friday was warm and completely cloudless, and all the Shakespeare houses we visited had big gardens, and wow the flowers were beautiful.  Tulips and daffodils and lavender and sweet pea and more flowers I couldn't even begin to name.  Spring in England is gorgeous, and Stratford is particularly picturesque.  Absolutely wonderful.

After Shakespeare's birthdplace, we went to New Place, which is the last house he bought and the one in which he died, so we went from his birth to his death in about half an hour.  But apparently the original house he bought was demolished around a century later and another house built very close to it, so when we were there they'd actually dug up half the garden as an archeological site.

We had free time after that until our play that evening, so we went for dinner at The Dirty Duck, which is the pub where the RSC likes to eat.  Which reminds me, we passed that pub on our way to Shakespeare's birthplace, and right as we were passing, actors playing Helena and Demetrius from Midsummer Night's Dream burst out the door to do their first scene in the woods together.  Random unexpected Shakespeare for the win!  We stayed until they finished their scene.

After dinner, we walked by the Avon for a bit, then went to the theatre.  It had a gift shop, so I browsed a bit, then saw the most perfect tote bag.  It's Shakespeare as a tube map.  There are different lines of, for instance, lovers, and villains, and fathers and daughters, with character names as different stops, and there are different intersections and clever services.  Like Ophelia offers riverboat services and Richard III has disabled access.  Such an awesome tote bag, and very much a souvenir of both Stratford and London, so I got it.

The play we saw was King Lear, which was really good.  We had front row seats, so we could see very well (even at some of the points I didn't necessarily want to see so well, like when Lear stripped down to almost his underwear).  Great play.  I've heard random bits of the story but had never actually seen it or read it before, so I'm glad I finally have.

This morning we really only had one thing on the schedule, visiting Anne Hathaway's cottage.  That is one play with another set of absolutely beautiful gardens.  In the garden they also had a gigantic birthday card for Shakespeare, which I both signed and got a picture of.  Inside the cottage we were sadly not allowed to take pictures, even though it was still the birthday weekend, but it was still quite interesting.  Tour guides gave us little lectures about what life would have been like for the Hathaways in Tudor England.

We had free time after Anne Hathaway's cottage, so most of us went to see the birthday parade.  That was pretty awesome.  We got a good spot near the end at the Holy Trinity Church, and saw a very long line of schoolboys carrying flowers for the grave, and a marching band, lots of random groups dressed in period clothing, and this group of middle-aged men dancing with bells strapped around their shins and waving handkerchiefs in their hands.  Really great stuff.

It was another gorgeous day, so after the parade we just sprawled on the grass in a park by the Avon and caught some sun.  Got a cheap lunch at Sainsbury's and just drowsed in the park, because Stratford is really quite small and we'd already done what there really was to do.  I stopped by the church again to get some pictures of Shakespeare's grave covered in flowers, but no one else in my group came with me.  I'm not sure why.  You can go to Stratford any day of the year and get a picture of Shakespeare's grave, but only on one weekend can you get it covered in flowers, so I'm pleased about having that.

Now I'm back in London.  I'd been going to go back to Oxford tomorrow, but the person I was going with said she can't afford it right now, and we made tentative plans for next Sunday, when we hope she can afford it.  And I don't want to go by myself, since I want to get a punt on the Isis or the Cherwell and that's not really something I can do by myself, so I hope she will be able to go or there's not much more point in me going back unless I can find someone else to go with me who wants to punt down the river.

I've made some tentative plans for next weekend.  Friday I want to do Dover and Canterbury, to see the white cliffs of Dover and Dover beach (mostly because of the poem) and I think it would be awesome to catch an Evensong in the Canterbury Cathedral.  Saturday I'm going to go to Brighton, because there's a festival starting there and also one of my teachers lives there and said she'll give us a little tour.  Sunday is either Oxford or free.

Tomorrow is unexpectedly free and my weekends from now on are going to be pretty busy, so I think tomorrow I'm going to try and get ahead on schoolwork.  With the added bonus of not spending any money!  Always a good thing.

Playing Catch-Up

Now for the rest of the past week and a half, which, though interesting, has not been quite as eventful as spring break.

Got all my midterm grades -- As and A-s on everything, which makes me feel a lot better about my unrevised papers.  Unless my teachers get ridiculously stricter for subsequent assignments, I think this semester will continue my straight-A streak.

On Wednesday one of my classmates got a care package from home that included a box of Cheez-Its.  There were only a few of us in the room at the time, and she let us have some, and oh, Cheez-Its.  God, I miss American snack food.  I found something generally cheeto-like to munch on, but I really miss goldfish.  If anyone wants to, you know, send me a care package, then I will love you forever if you send me some goldfish.

On Friday we had a group excursion to Oxford.  I enjoyed it, but I would have enjoyed it more had I been on my own and able to do the things I was most interested in doing, so a friend and I will be going back next Sunday, after Stratford-on-Avon and Warwick.  Anyway, we took the coach there, which was only about an hour (God, this is such a small country), and first we went to the University Museums, where I saw dinosaur skeletons and shrunken heads.  After that we did an audio tour of the Bodleian Library, and then we had about an hour for lunch.  About half of us went to the Eagle and Child pub, which is the pub where JRR Tolkien and CS Lewis and the rest of the Inklings would meet, so that was pretty awesome.

After lunch we went for a tour of Christ Church College and Cathedral, including the dining hall and other bits where parts of Harry Potter were filmed, then finished the trip off with the Ashmolean Museum, where I saw King Alfred's Jewel.  (Which was the only thing I was really interested in.  I've been getting rather burned out on museums, I've seen so many this semester.)

There were several things I wanted to do but didn't get a chance to, like touring Tolkien's colleges and getting a punt down the Isis or the Cherwell, but that's why I'll be coming back.  I'm also debating getting an Oxford sweatshirt.  It would be awesome to have, but I generally don't like wearing memorabilia of colleges I don't attend.  Well, I'll think about it before I go back.

I've been missing a lot of the books I had to leave at home, so on Saturday I went to the big Waterstone's on Piccadilly and spent half the day there just reading, and it was wonderful.  Then I came back to my homestay and watched Doctor Who as it aired on BBC1, for the first and possibly the only time.  I've never seen Doctor Who as it aired before (well, it's only possible in Britain), so I was very happy to be able to do that.

Sunday I went with a friend to see Alice in Wonderland in 3D IMAX.  It was more expensive than I like for a movie (though I think I've been spoiled by working at a theater and seeing movies for free), but it was so worth it because my friend actually invited me.  In the beginning of the program I always had to invite myself to things or just go alone, but now people have finally started inviting me, and it's great not being the one to have to make the first move all the time.  Definitely worth a movie ticket.

Though speaking of invitations, another friend told me last week that she was going to Norway in May because she found a ten pound round trip plane ticket.  She asked me if I might be interested, and I said I'll think about it, just send me the information.  So she did, and though the ticket prices went up a bit since she got her tickets, I found that I can go to Norway for $40.  I can't even go from Reno to Tacoma for $40 (flying or driving, considering how much gas it takes), and that's in the same country!

So I decided I'm going with her to Norway in May.  It's the week before the program ends, the 7th through the 9th, and I'm getting pretty excited about it.  I mean, I'm really looking forward to traveling after the program ends (really looking forward), but I'm just going to Western Europe.  And because I did my spring break in Ireland, I'm spending pretty much my whole time abroad in Western Europe.  Which is awesome, of course, but Scandinavia is a different region, with different history and traditions.  I really couldn't pass this chance up, so in May I'll be spending a couple days in Norway.

Today I had a history presentation on Canada in World War I, and I think it went pretty well.  My teacher said I went into a bit too much detail on the battles but that I was very thorough, and he was nodding through most of the presentation, so I think I'll get an A or A- on that.  Next week I have a paper due for that class, but I need to find some more research on my topic, so I think I'm going to do that tomorrow, because I'm going to have a busy weekend.

Tonight I'd been intending to see Wicked with some friends, but a couple said tomorrow night would be better, so I guess I'll be seeing Wicked tomorrow.  Instead, the friend I'm doing Norway with and I decided to see a movie tonight since her phone service gives her 2-for-1 movie tickets on Wednesdays and student prices made it even cheaper -- I paid about three pounds for a movie ticket, which is probably the cheapest I've ever had, not counting the free ones.  We saw Kick Ass, which I very much enjoyed, though it certainly earned its R rating (for violence).

This weekend I'll be meeting two different internet friends.  I'm meeting a more casual one for drinks on Friday, and then I'm spending the weekend with my close friend from Southampton.  On Saturday she'll be coming to London, and then on Sunday I'm going to Southampton.  I can't wait!

Murphy's Law

I'm almost all caught up from spring break.  The final leg is one big long story of Murphy's Law in action.

The initial error was definitely mine, but the consequences gave me a sharp lesson.  See, my train from London to Holyhead had been one train doing the whole trip, but on the way back from Holyhead to London I had to change trains twice, once in Chester and once in Crewe.  The train from Chester got into Crewe about half an hour before my next train was set to leave, so I found out what platform I needed and went there.  At about 8:30, still fifteen minutes before my train is supposed to leave, a train arrives at my platform.  It's Virgin Trains, which was the train I needed, and it was at the right platform -- the only issue was that it was too early, but I've seen trains arrive at a platform and just wait for twenty minutes before.

What I should have done is look at the departures board, because then I would have seen that this particular Virgin train was going to Manchester, not London.  I didn't, though.  I just assumed that the train was going to wait a bit, and got on.  I realized my mistake moments later when the train started moving, but by then it was too late.  I didn't even know where this train was supposed to be going.  I hoped it was the same general direction, so that I could just get off at the next station and still catch my proper train, but that hope was dashed when I did get to the next station, Wilmslow.

At Wilmslow, I went to the security station and told the guard I think I got on the wrong train; I needed to get to London.  He informed me that I had indeed gotten on the wrong train, because I was now halfway to Manchester.  Furthermore, by this time the train I should have been on was already gone, and it was the last train of the night going to London.  There I was, stuck overnight in a place I couldn't have pointed to on a map.

This would have been bad enough, but what was worse was that I had plans the next day.  I had my ticket for Star Wars in Concert, which I really wanted to get to.  It was at three, but getting there would have been complicated because the Jubilee line, which would have taken me right there with only one change, was down for planned engineering work over the holiday weekend.  The route I had mapped out involved different lines and replacement buses and would have taken nearly two hours, but that wouldn't have been a problem if I'd been home on Sunday and could have left early enough.

Instead, I had to spend my Sunday getting back to London, getting from the train station back to my homestay to drop off my stuff and get my ticket for the concert, and then getting there in time.  The security guard in Wilmslow said that I could stay the night in Manchester and get a train that would get in around 1:30, which would not have given me enough time, so that was out.  My other option was to go back to Crewe and get a train that would get me in around 12:30, which would be cutting it close but would still probably be all right.

I bought a train ticket for the next morning, and went back to Crewe.  Once there, I asked the station personnel for overnight options.  They did say I could stay the night in the station, but I'd have to sleep in the waiting room, and when I got back to London my host mum said that's what she would have done, just to save money, but I couldn't.  Stay the night alone in a train station in a foreign country?  I wouldn't have been able to sleep, and not just because all I had was the floor, short benches, or chairs.  And I seriously can't function when I don't get enough sleep -- I probably would have bungled getting home even worse than I already had.

Crewe, being in the middle of nowhere, didn't have any hostels, and I hadn't meant to be there so I didn't have any research on places to stay, and had to rely on the station people for recommendations.  The place they directed me to was fairly close, but one night was fifty pounds (at which I winced, but what other options did I really have? I didn't know where else to go), and they did not have any internet access.  No business computers, no wifi, and no open internet cafe anywhere nearby.

This just made things even worse, because my host mum was expecting me home that night.  I'd accidentally left my paper with her phone number in my room in London, so I thought the only thing I could do was get into my email account and fish out my roommate's number, call her, and have her explain to my host mum what happened.  Unfortunately, though, no internet.  I made it clear to the receptionist that I really needed this (all the while thinking, what kind of hotel doesn't have any internet access at all in this day and age?), so he sent me one of their employees with an iphone he was willing to let me try.  No dice, though -- couldn't get into my email.  I was basically stuck hoping my host mum would call me so I could explain, but I didn't know when.  I wasn't supposed to get home until around midnight, so it would have to be after that, but I just wanted to go to bed.

I waited for a bit, but finally decided to just take my shower and go to bed, and just answer if it woke me up.  But then I couldn't figure out how to turn the shower on.  There was a bathtub I could turn on, but I couldn't find anything for the shower.  So I had to go to bed without taking a shower, which always makes me feel uncomfortable.

My host mum did text me in the middle of the night, waking me up, but I did feel relieved at being able to explain a bit of what happened and that I'd be home the next day.  I did not sleep as well as I would have at home, but I did get enough sleep to function, and far more than I would have gotten had I stayed at the train station.

I got to the station bright and early, and this time made sure of the train's destination before boarding.  Unfortunately, the train encountered delays along the route.  It left Crewe at 9:17 and was supposed to get in to London at 12:32, but it managed to get there at about one instead, and I was almost despairing.  I could have made it to my concert on time if I'd left my house around one, but I was still at the train station and needed to get home, and had to take circuitous public transportation back.

I made it home at 1:40, where my host mum was a marvel.  After wanting to cry at finding out there was no way for me to get there by public transportation that wouldn't get me at least an hour late (and the show was only two hours, so I would have missed at least half of it), she found me a cab that could get me there in an hour.  It was more expensive than I would have liked, but I'd been looking forward to this concert for weeks, and really wanted to get there, so I paid it, and I got there only fifteen minutes late.

It was Easter, so the show wasn't full, and I got my seat upgraded so I could sit closer.  The concert was basically music from the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra set to a theme montages from the films, narrated by the actor who played C-3PO.  It was so awesome listening to the Imperial March played live, and the theme music, and so much more that I recognized and loved.  Live!  Exactly what I'd been waiting for.  I did not regret rushing to get there.

I especially did not regret it after seeing how long it took to get back home.  Had the Jubilee line been working, it would have taken me forty-five minutes.  Instead, it took two hours and fifteen minutes, which really emphasized that I could not have taken public transportation to the show without missing two-thirds of it.

But I got back, and ate dinner, and spent time online, and went to bed, peaceful in the knowledge that Monday was a bank holiday and therefore I could spend it doing absolutely nothing.

Mid-Term

On Thursday I met Maddy for lunch, the London Eye, and the Imperial War Museum.  The London Eye was fun, but not as impressive as I'd hoped.  I did get a very good view of Big Ben and the Houses of Parliament, but the sun was starting behind them so I'm not sure how well the pictures I took will turn out.

The Imperial War Museum was interesting, but I could only stay there for about an hour because I still had to get to class.  That night we had another show, The White Guard.

Awesome play.  It's about this family of Russians in the Ukraine at the very end of World War I and in the middle of the Russian Revolution, and it had some really amazing sets and wonderful characters and a great story and set of themes.  I loved it, so now it and Billy Elliot are my favorite things I've seen so far.

On Friday we went to Stonehenge and Bath.  We got a coach and a tour guide and stopped at Stonehenge for an hour, where it started raining.  I think it was raining the last time I was at Stonehenge as well.  It was pretty cool, but I have been there before and it hasn't really changed much.

From there we went to Bath, which I enjoyed.  It was still raining, and in fact rained the entire time, but I still enjoyed it.  Our tour guide took us on a walking tour of Bath, showing us some of the main streets, the river Avon (which I hadn't realized went through Bath at all), the Bath Circus and the Royal Crescent with their impressive architecture, and then Bath Abbey and the Roman Baths.  Bath Abbey had some absolutely gorgeous stained glass windows, and at the Roman Baths we were given audio guides that I found out today were narrated by my theatre teacher.

I enjoyed the Roman Baths, mostly for the omgRomans! factor.  After we were done there, we had about an hour of free time, so Sarah and I went to the Jane Austen Centre.  I wish we'd had more free time, because I enjoyed the mini-Jane Austen museum, but the Centre also had a tea room that advertised tea with Mr. Darcy, and I would have liked to do that.

We left Bath at about four for a three hour coach trip back to London, getting home in time for dinner.  Some people stayed in Bath an extra day, but I decided not to, because I had three papers due this week and I wanted to use the weekend to write them.  I did get two done and turned in already, and the third isn't due until Friday so I was going to do it tonight and tomorrow.

I had a bit of a weird experience (I'm not sure what to call it) with the papers, though.  When I write papers, I like to take a draft to my teachers for their feedback, which I can then use to revise the paper and turn in an improved final draft.  I'd intended to do that with these, but when I asked Martin if he'd be willing, he seemed very confused at the concept.  He said he normally looked at student summaries of what their papers were about so he could tell them if they were on the right track or not, but looking at a complete draft was too much like marking it, and he would prefer I do the summary.  I did, and he said my paper should be fine based on that, but I'm a bit eh.  We don't have a writing center here, so my only source of feedback on a rough draft is my teachers (I don't want to ask fellow students, who are busy enough, this isn't their job, and most of them are not politics students, but my teacher (who is also the program director) said he doesn't really do things like that.  I did do another read-through and make a few revisions before turning what I had in, but if I don't get as good a grade as I'd like, for the next assignment I might ask him to look at it anyway, even if it's not what he usually does.  It's really an important part of the writing process for me, and has resulted in the great improvement of many of my drafts, and is really something I sort of took for granted at UPS, since the teachers there encourage that sort of thing.  But it's not like I've never turned in a paper cold, so I suppose we'll just see how this goes.

This weekend I also finished Great Expectations!  Finally!  I "read" it in high school, which means I read the first part, did a bit of skimming of the rest with relying on SparkNotes, and read the final pages.  This is partly because I didn't like the first part and partly because that week was when I was stage crew for 42nd Street and I was busy enough, but I still did fine on the test we had on it.  This time I actually read the entire thing, and liked it somewhat better.  I still don't precisely like it, but it wasn't as bad as I'd remembered, and I enjoyed it more once Pip because less of a little snot.  I still didn't find it all that funny, though.  There were a few moments where I cracked a smile, but really, I find Dickens's style more annoying than amusing.

Moving on!  Monday night we saw Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, and I was like finally! a playwright I recognize!  Apart from the Shakespeare I've seen, I haven't heard of any of the people who have written the plays I've seen, but of course I've heard of Tennessee Williams, and have even read one of his other plays (A Streetcar Named Desire).  I was rather eh about this play, though.  There were things I really appreciated, like the character of Brick and the actor playing him, some of the really great lines, and James Earl Jones, but there were things I rather didn't appreciate, like how the first two acts had mostly two people, only one of whom did much talking.  I found it sort of hard to pay attention with more monologue than dialogue.  Still, it was all right.  Not my favorite, but not my least favorite either.

Tomorrow we're going to the Houses of Parliament!  To watch a debate!  And it's going to be Budget Day, so the different parties are totally going to be all over each other about the budget!

British politics is hilarious.  This is going to be so awesome.

Yesterday...might well have been the easiest school day I've ever had.  I only have one class on Thursdays, and it's only an hour, and the last class of the day.  I had a bunch of free time before 4:30, so I decided to go to Chinatown.

I love Chinese food.  Mmmm.  I had lunch there, and it was very good.  I also walked around Chinatown a bit, and felt somewhat out of place, though thankfully I was not the only white person there.  I haven't been to any other Chinatown (not even San Francisco's, really), so what I was most reminded of was Bangkok.  Lots of people selling things (especially food) on the streets, lots of kitschy souvenir shops along with things like Chinese Herbal Medicine, lots of people in general.  Very interesting place.  I'll definitely be gooing back there, if only for the food.  Mmm, Chinese food.

I had class at 4:30, and this is my 19th and 20th century novels class, and we'd been intending to go to the Charles Dickens museum on Doughty Street (which is just two streets over from AHA).  Unfortunately, the museum is closed this month, so my teacher wanted us to watch a documentary on Charlotte Bronte, since we just finished Jane Eyre.  However, she couldn't get the TV to work.

So instead, she...treated us to a round of drinks at a nearby pub.  We did do some literary discussion while in the pub, but mostly not.  So that was basically my day.  Chinatown, and then a pub.

Today we went on an excursion to Birmingham, which is about two hours away from London by train.  When we got there we spent about an hour at the Birmingham Art Gallery, but the main point of the excursion was to go to Bournville, and Cadbury World.

It was actually rather hilarious, how excited most of the group was about going to Cadbury World.  I was less than enthusiastic about all the chocolate everyone else was in raptures over, but I was highly amused at just how bouncy everyone was.  There were some school groups of younger kids also doing tours, but people in my group kept joking that our group was so much more excited than the little kids, which from what I observed is actually a fairly accurate statement.

I was far more interested in the history of Bournville and the factory than in the free or otherwise very cheap chocolate, and the history was really why we were even there.  The Cadbury family seems to have been pretty awesome, very much ahead of their time with their treatment of their workforce and wanting to make sure the workers are taken care of even to the extent of building a nice village for them to live in.  I could have done without all the chocolate, but I did enjoy the history lesson.

I did, however, get some chocolate, because it really was very cheap.  I'm not sure whether I should mail them soon, or wait to give them out until I get back home.  I got different kinds, and I'm not sure what people would prefer.  Well, I actually only got four bars, two of milk chocolate, one of dark, and one that is chocolate-covered Turkish Delight.  But I got them for you people at home, and I'm not sure the best way to get them to you fairly.  I'll decide later.

Tomorrow there is once again A Plan to go to the Tower of London.  We'll see how that works out this time. :p

I'd been intending to see Alice in Wonderland on Saturday, but apparently it only premiered on Thursday and doesn't actually come out in cinemas (hah, watch me use the more British term. :p) until this Friday, so we did not go see it. Instead, I spent the day reading Great Expectations. Sort of. I did a lot of staring at Great Expectations, at least, but I've been reluctant to read it because I didn't much like what I did read in high school. Well, at least I don't have to have read it until next Monday, which is plenty of time.

We had theatre nights two days this week, Monday and Tuesday. Monday's performance was Dunsinane, which is a sequel to Shakespeare's Macbeth where Lady Macbeth survived, remained sane, and had a son. I really enjoyed the performance, especially coming as it did right after we came back from Scotland, since it was so much about Scotland. I feel like we've been inundated with Scotland lately, but I don't mind because it's really so interesting.

Last night we saw The Caretaker, which I...did not particularly enjoy. I thought it was boring and the characters unengaging, and I'm not sure what the point was, apart from that people are crazy and self-centered. It'll be interesting to hear what the rest of my theatre class thinks, though, since everyone else I've talked to seems to have enjoyed it.

Next week we have another two shows, London's Assurance and an opera of A Midsummer Night's Dream. I've seen Midsummer several times, but I've always enjoyed it, and I'm looking forward to an opera version of it, especially since I've never seen an opera before.

There are two particular extra-curricular shows I want to see soon, though, and those are Wicked and Billy Elliot. I've also been seeing posters for Star Wars In Concert, at the O2 arena, which just sounds omg so awesome. That one, however, is April 3rd and 4th only, which is the weekend ending our spring break, so I'd have to cut short traveling a bit and come back to London sooner in order to see that. I think I will, though. Star Wars in Concert! How awesome is that?

Back from Scotland

So last night we got back from Scotland.  I would have posted last night, but internet was being worse than usual (blinking out after only a few seconds rather than a few minutes) and I was tired.  But I slept a lot last night and am now waiting for a text from some people I was planning on seeing Alice in Wonderland with later today, so now I attempt to chronicle my trip to Scotland.

Well, really the first thing to talk about is Tuesday night, because I saw Twelfth Night.  I'm not in the Shakespeare class, but I got an extra ticket, and I'm so glad I did, because it was an awesome performance.  Very funny; I definitely enjoyed it.  But we got out pretty late, so it was almost midnight when we got back home.  Considering we had to be at King's Cross at 7:45 the next day, meaning getting up no later than 6:15 thanks to the commute, it wasn't much fun, but I was fine.  Martin kept telling us to just sleep for a couple hours on the train, but once I'm awake, I'm awake, and I'm not going to be able to go back to sleep until the afternoon at the earliest.  Thankfully, though, less than six hours was still enough for me to stay awake the whole day.

I like trains so much better than flying.  So much.  I still didn't want to chance reading, but I had enough to occupy me, and I had so much more leg room, and it just felt smoother...I hate flying.  Thank God I got the Eurail pass so I can take trains across Europe and not fly.

The weather was miserable the entire time we were there.  It was snowing when we got out of the station, and that sucked, because we walked from the station to the hostel, and I'd lost one of my gloves and hadn't yet had the chance to replace them, so there I was, carrying an increasingly-heavy bag (or so it seemed) with freezing wet hands for twenty minutes in an unfamiliar city with my glasses getting wet and slush sliding around under my feet.

Edinburgh is a very hilly city.  Lots of inclines, not that much level ground.  I did not enjoy that, though there were only a couple times it was bad, when we had to climb things particularly steep.  The first of those horrible climbs was right after we dropped our stuff off at the hostel, because our first stop was the Castle of Edinburgh, which happens to be at the top of a tall hill.  There was a set of stairs that was particularly brutal, and that no one liked, so it wasn't just me.  But I managed them, and all the way up the rest of the hill to the castle.

I do want to say, though, that on the way we passed a street performer who was playing bagpipes and wearing a kilt.  Disappointly, I did not see many men wearing kilts, but one of the ones I did see was also playing bagpipes.  Hah!  That was awesome.

The castle was very cool.  It was still sorta snowy and very cloudy, so we didn't have the view we would have had on a clear day, but it was still a nice view.  We could see pretty much all of Edinburgh, which is an interesting combination of very old (like the castle, part of which dates back to the 1100s), to the old-but-not-as-much (like all the Victorian buildings), to the pretending-to-be-old (like all the buildings in the style of ancient Greece), to the startlingly-modern (like the Parliament building).  Very strange juxtaposition.  London also has that juxtaposition of very old and quite modern, but it tends to have the very old things clustered together, and likewise the very modern, whereas in Edinburgh it all seemed a mish-mash.

Anyway, the castle.  I wandered all over and saw St. Margaret's chapel, which is the oldest thing there (the one built around the 1100s), and the Great Hall, and the War Veterans' Memorial (for the Scots who died in the world wars), and the Scottish Crown Jewels, and the room where King James the VI and I was born.  We had audio tour guides, but I was so busy looking at things that I was only half paying attention to mine.

When we were done at the castle, we walked to the National Gallery.  It was cool, I suppose.  I never was much of one for art museums.  There were some pretty things, but I was not sad that we only had about an hour to look around until it closed.

We had a few hours of free time until dinner (which the hostel provided for us), but most of the people in the group wanted to take a nap.  I still felt awake, but I didn't want to go out by myself after dark in an unfamiliar city in the snow, so I just stayed in my room and read for awhile.  It was not a bad room, but it had bunkbeds and I was too slow, so I had to have top bunk.  It was also an extraordinarily creaky bunk, so I couldn't get into it, out of it, or move around in it without it creaking like hell.

After dinner we had the night to ourselves.  I just went out with a group of people to a pub, but I had a good time.  I did not drink that much, and we just spent the entire time talking and trading stories in a fairly quiet pub, which is what I like best in a bar experience.  Being there to socialize, not to get drunk.  I also discovered that one of the girls is a big fan of Doctor Who, and another thinks Final Fantasy VII is the greatest video game in the world, so I had plenty to talk about.

The next day we went to the High Kirk of St. Giles, which is also known as St. Giles' Cathedral and has at a couple of points actually been a cathedral, but it isn't properly anymore, it's the high kirk.  We had a tour of that, and I found it quite impressive, but I usually do for really old churches.  The window above the entrance had only been replaced a couple decades ago (actually, the stained glass windows in the kirk were all Victorian; in the Middle Ages and Early Modern periods, the kirk had clear glass), but it's called the Robert Burns window because the scenes in it relate to Robert Burns, which I found very cool.

After St. Giles, we went to the Museum of Scotland.  On our way, we passed a place called The Elephant House, which had a big sign in the window advertising itself as the birthplace of Harry Potter -- the cafe where JK Rowling thought up Harry Potter.

The museum was interesting.  It was huge, and we didn't have a lot of time scheduled for it, so we couldn't see that much.  There were seven floors, from the basement and the pre-history of Scotland to modern Scotland on the sixth floor, and the rooftop terrace with yet another awesome view of Edinburgh.  So much to look at.

After the museum we ate lunch, and I have a new favorite sandwich with an actual story behind it.  See, the hostel packed lunches for us, which was very nice -- or would have been, had the sandwiches not been covered in butter.  Seriously.  I had two half sandwiches, one of ham and one of tuna, and I like both of those on their own, but both ham and tuna were thin layers of meat surrounded by think layers of butter.  There was maybe two or three times as much butter as meat.

I don't even like butter as a thin layer spread on bread.  I'm sure these sandwiches could have looked less appetizing, but I really don't want to imagine how.  We had free time that afternoon and Martin was organizing an optional trip to Linlithgow Palace that I wanted to go on, so I just ate my apple and chips and figured I'd picked up something else on the way to Linlithgow.

Linlithgow Palace, the birthplace of Mary Queen of Scots, is about a fifteen minute train ride away from Edinburgh, so we went back to the train station, and there I found My Sandwich.  Ham and mozzarella on a baguette, cold.  Normally I'm not much for cheese on my sandwiches, but that's cheddar and swiss and so on, and I do like mozzarella cheese on pizza, so I thought I'd try it.

Oh my God that was so good.  Ham and mozzarella on baguette.  I am so remembering this.  I bought another one for the train back to London yesterday, and it was still so good.

Anyway.  About half the group ended up going to Linlithgow, which was amazing.  It's partly in ruins -- there are no roofs, and some of the walls are crumbling, but it's still mostly intact.  It was raining the whole time, but I had such a great time exploring.  So many awesome pictures, especially one Martin took of a bunch of us in what had been the kitchen.  The fireplace there was so huge that seven of us could stand in there without touching each other, the sides, or the ceiling, so Martin took a picture of us in the fireplace.

We explored that for about an hour, including going up to the top of the tallest tower and seeing yet another great view, but the palace isn't really that big.  We went back to Edinburgh and still had a few hours to do our own thing before dinner.  I wanted new gloves, but in particular I wanted those kind of fingerless gloves with the flaps that fit over and turn them into mittens, but I couldn't find them.  I went to two different malls and walked down several shopping streets, and could not find the kind of gloves I wanted.  It's probably because winter fashion is out and spring fashion is in, sigh.

I went back to the hostel for dinner, and afterwards one of my roommates expressed interest in the bar across the street advertising pear cider.  I love pear cider, so I agreed to go with her.  It ended up being just us, because a bunch of people were either going out for serious drinking (it was one of the girls' twenty-first birthday) or were going on the Edinburgh Ghost Tour.  I thought about going on the Ghost Tour, but it looked like it was going to be cold and wet, so I decided not to.  (The next day I was glad, because the girls who went said that they'd never been so soaked.)

The pear cider was wonderful.  Definitely the best I've ever had.  The bartender noticed our accents and asked where we were from, so we chatted a bit about that.  It was really just a nice relaxing experience, where we just talked and had a couple drinks.  After two each, we went back to the hostel and went to bed, and it was pretty early, but I still slept well.

Yesterday we climbed Carlton Hill, which was the second of the absolutely awful climbs.  Carlton Hill is where the Nelson Monument (for Admiral Nelson) is, and though a bunch of the group climbed to the top, I did not.  Carlton Hill is also where they built this thing they wanted to be a second Parthenon, because during the Enlightenment Edinburgh was called the Athens of the North, but they ran out of money partway through and so this second Parthenon is unfinished and looks sorta funny and is sometimes called the Shame of Scotland.

After Carlton Hill, we went to the Scottish Parliament.  It's an extremely modern-looking building (quite the contrast to Westminster Palace) right across from Holyrood Palace, which is where the Queen stays when she's in Scotland.  We went on a tour of the Parliament, which I thought was very cool for multiple reasons.  Scotland had had a parliament since at least 1235, but it was dissolved in 1707 when Scotland united with England to become Great Britain, and has since been governed from London.  But then in 1999 they got their own parliament back, and after learning more about Scottish history, I felt so happy for them.  They really are a people with their own distinctive history and society, and though I think the issue about them becoming a completely separate nation again is very complicated, if they do manage it I'll be very happy for them.  Scotland is now the only country in the United Kingdom to have its own parliament -- Northern Ireland, Wales, and London have assemblies, but they can't make laws and raise taxes, and parliaments can, so they've all just been governed out of Westminster.  But now Scotland has its own parliament, which is a step closer to being independent.

Our tour guide also said that the Scottish Parliament is a unicameral legislature where committees are used in effect as a second chamber, and I think I'm going to have to do some more research to figure out how that works.  I mean, Congress has committees that do what the Scottish ones seem to, from my understanding, but Congress is still bicameral.  Now I want to figure out unicameral vs bicameral and their respective advantages and disadvantages.  I also really want to see Westminster, but that's not scheduled for awhile yet.

That was pretty much it for Scotland.  Our train left at three, so we had to get back to the hostel and get our bags and get to the station.  The first part of the train ride was actually sorta funny though, because at the front of our car was a hen party, and they were very...exuberant.  They got off at Newcastle, though, so they weren't there for very long.  Otherwise the train ride was quiet.

Next week we'll be going to Birmingham for a day, and later I'm going to try and organize trips to Southampton, where I have a friend, and Cardiff, because the Doctor Who friend and I really want to see it.

I forgot to bring my flash drive today, so no pictures yet again! Wednesday is my busiest day with three classes, but those are spread out beginning at 9:30am and ending at 5:30pm. Time enough to go on the internet, but not to go home and get my flash drive.

On Sunday I actually got sick. Just a cold, which is really going around our group of students (it's easier to point out those who don't have it than those who do), but I didn't really want to do anything then either. It was a bit better on Monday and Tuesday, and I'm almost over it now, so hopefully this weekend I will be doing something. Apparently there's a Viking festival in York, so I might see about getting a student rail card (makes rail tickets a third cheaper!) and going to York. I heard some people talk about going on Saturday, so I might see about going with them.

Next week we'll be going to Scotland for three days -- Wednesday through Friday. I think we'll be the entire time in Edinburgh, and I'm warned that it's very cold, so I'm going to have to remember to bring my sweaters and dress very warmly. Here it's been alternately very cold and not as cold as I was expecting, but I'm not sure if that's the weather or just something weird my body is doing, because everyone else seems to think it's just plain cold.

Last night was our first theatre show, the play Enron, about the rise and fall of the company Enron. It was sort of strange, being there as an American -- it seemed like such an American show, but it was written by a Brit and is performed by Brits in Britain. My theatre teacher explained today that Britain's economy is so tied to America's that something like Enron would still have been very significant here, which makes sense, but it still feels a bit strange.

I did get dressed up. I knew I wouldn't have time to go back home and change between my last class and the show, so I wore tights under my jeans and brought a skirt and my nice shoes, and changed into them after class. No one else got dressed up. It was also raining, so though I did bring my umbrella, it was not so much fun wearing tights and open-toed shoes in the rain on uneven cobblestones while hurrying and often running to get to the theatre on time. Especially since I saw very few people dressed as nicely as I was. Liz explained later that people are going to theatre more casually now, especially in London, which I'm definitely going to remember because jeans would have been much more comfortable throughout the whole adventure.

I enjoyed Enron. The play actually explained financial matters so I understood them, which I felt was quite the feat. It was also something of a musical -- there were musical numbers and interludes, including songs both written by the playwright and inserted by her to appropriate places -- I especially enjoyed Guns N' Roses's Welcome to the Jungle as particularly apt for the corporation stage. There were a lot of pop culture references to things like Jurassic Park and Star Wars, which I also enjoyed.

Our next play is Dunsanine in about two weeks, which is apparently a sequel to Macbeth written last year or thereabouts. I think that'll be interesting. I'm looking forward to it!