Lancaster University

Hello! So I know it's been a while since I've posted anything. Sorry about that. It's been crazy here, trying to get settled in, and since I'm currently avoiding a 15 page paper for my London seminar that I should be writing, now seems like a good time to get you all caught up on my life for the past couple of weeks. Let's see...where did I leave off?


So I had just arrived at Lancaster and found my room with the help of the porter, who is kinda like a security guard that is specific to my college. The university system at Lancaster and England in general is definitely different than back home. Here, the University is the whole of campus, but residences are divided up into colleges. It's like how there are different buildings on the whole of campus at home, except each college is responsible for it's own mail, is made of many different buildings and has it's own bar/pub. The colleges are the centers for all of the Fresher's (freshmen) week orientation stuff. I'm living in Grizedale College, which is one of the newly renovated colleges on campus. They're actually still in the process of renovating and the bar, laundry facility, porter's office, and restaurant are currently a pile of rubble. the building I'm in has probably only in it's second year, and still smells kinda new. I'm on the second floor of the building in a flat with 5 other people, but some of our neighbors come over to hang out. Anyway, as I was unpacking, I heard a knock at my door. A couple of my flatmates, Katherine, Vinny, and Kerrin just wanted to introduce themselves and say hi. It was pretty cool. They seemed really nice and told me that if I needed anything that I could find them all in the kitchen. They left so I could continue with my unpacking. I had some difficulty with the sheet/bedding pack I ordered from the school. The bottom sheet was a little too small for the mattress they had given me, so I had to fight with it for a good ten minutes before it would actually go on the bed. I'm too afraid to take it off, for fear that I won't be able to get it back on. I got unpacked and got everything all set up. I went over to the kitchen to see if I could meet any more of my flatmates. There I was introduced to Tom, Amy and Victoria. They all seemed really friendly and helpful. They were going out later that night for one of the orientation activities the college had planned. The major difference between Lancaster and Gettysburg is that the drinking age here is 18, so pretty much all of the evening activities planned for the colleges involve drinking. I didn't really feel up to it. I still had some things to unpack, plus I was still trying to get over the cold I woke up with on our last day in Copenhagen. I wound up calling Zoe around 7 pm and we went and found the Indian restaurant on campus, Spicy Hut. We went back to her room and ate there. About that time we got a call from James, telling us we needed to come to his college's bar because that's where everyone was. James, Ryan, Alice and a bunch of other people from seminar all live in Pendle, which is where the party was that night. We did that and met some of the English people that they had met, which was pretty cool. They all seemed really happy to meet us.


The next day, all of the International students were kidnapped into a huge lecture hall for most of the day for our own, special, orientation session. It was kinda long, but sometimes helpful. We ate lunch at the Chinese restaurant on campus, which was pretty good. That night I was having problems figuring out what I was going to do. It was my college's turn to have our "big night out" which is where they bus us all into Lancaster, the town, and take us around to some of the different night clubs, pubs, and bars that are there. I still wasn't feeling the best, but I didn't want to miss it. Also, because we were in different colleges, I would be the only one going. As I was heading back to my room, I ran into my flatmates, on their way out the door and decided I was going to go for it. I wound up having a really great time. My flatmates are pretty cool people and the different places we went were a lot of fun. A lot of them have special night's for University students, which is pretty cool, but we have yet to take advantage of any of them. I was out probably until around 1 am, but we had a blast.


Not too much happened for the rest of the week. We pretty much had a lot of time to ourselves, which was nice. It gave me a chance to catch up on what I'd missed while we were off, gallivanting across Europe. Wednesday was our first experience shopping for groceries. We decided that James, Ryan, Alice and I would be cooking together. My college is right beside there's so it's not far of a walk for me to get there. However, Zoe lives on the other side of campus, so she wasn't sure how often she would be coming over to eat with us. We decided that it would be cheaper for us to eat together, and it really has been. We can get enough food for dinner's for a week for about 10 pounds, which is really good. It's a little tricky going shopping here, because we have to take the bus to get to town. It took us a little while to figure out how exactly the buses worked, but we're doing a lot better with it now. Thursday and Friday of that week were the Fresher's Fair, which is where all of the different clubs and organizations or societies on campus come and try to recruit new members. I saw a couple that looked interesting, but I'll talk about that later. The fun part was that a bunch of different places, like Subway, Domino's, and the pubs and bars were handing out free stuff. I walked out of there with a couple of bags full of pamphlets and fliers, plus like candy and bottle openers and coupons for different things. all in all, it was pretty cool.


Monday, October 6th, brought my first experience with classes. The previous week I had signed up for the classes I wanted to take. I'm allowed to take 3 classes, which has been a pretty easy course load. I'm taking all 200-level history classes, which will be fun at the end of the term when I have three essays to write, all due on approx. the same day. But I'm taking American History from 1789-1989 (but I'll only be taking it up to just after the Civil War), Introduction to Islamic and Middle Eastern History, and History of the Crusades. It somehow worked out that both my Islamic History and Crusades classes count for my Religion and my History majors, so between those 2 classes I'm getting 4 credits for my majors. It's making completing both my majors by the time I graduate a lot easier, although I would have been fine, regardless. Anyway, as my schedule is set up, I have one lecture on Monday afternoon, a seminar every-other Tuesday afternoon, nothing on Wednesday, anywhere from 2-4 hours of class or seminar on Thursday, depending on the week, and 2-3 hours of lecture on Friday, also depending on the week. It gets a little confusing sometimes with the way the seminars are only on certain weeks, so you really have to keep an eye on which week it is and which week is coming up. In some ways it makes me miss the way Gettysburg does classes, where you know exactly what you have every week because it doesn't change. That first week, I did not have seminar on Tuesday, so I had all of Tuesday and Wednesday free, which was find of fun. I didn't do a whole lot, but it was still enjoyable. I really like all of my classes. They're not too bad, as far as course load right now.


Since coming here, I have also gotten involved in a couple of different societies. Wednesday night's I participate in Dance society. I go and learn a dance that I won't have to preform again, but it's exercise and I just, generally enjoy dancing. Tuesday and Thursday night's I'm also involved in Ballroom Dance Society. Although I wasn't expecting it, James is my partner for this as well. A bunch of people we know through our seminar in London are involved too, and we all have a good time. So far we've learned some basic moves to the Quickstep, Jive, Waltz, Salsa, Rumba, and Rock 'n' Roll. By far, the Quickstep and the Jive are my favorites, with the Waltz a close second. The Jive is very similar to swing, which James and I are very familiar with, which is part of what makes it so fun. The society competes, so, at the moment, James and I are throwing around the idea of maybe trying to compete in the Jive at one of the competitions before we leave, but we'll see on that one. They've also said at some point this semester they might teach a couple of swing classes, which could be fun if they teach us something we don't already know. Either way, we're very much considering doing a swing dance when we get back to Gettysburg next semester.

Now, for one of the coolest things that has happened since I got here, Mom and Dad came to visit me a couple of weekends ago. They got here in the afternoon on the 11th of October. I went down to the train station to meet them and then we went to find their hotel. They stayed at this really cool looking place that had one of those really old elevators (or lifts as they're called here) where you have to open and shut the doors manually. It was kinda small and a little scary the first couple of times we used it, but it was still cool. After they got settled in, we went out to dinner at a place called Wetherspoons. It's a good chain of pubs that isn't very expensive, but the food is great. We sat there and caught up for a while. As it was their first day in the country, they were both really tired, which I remember all too clearly. The next morning, they took a bus up to campus and I met them here and showed them around. They came and saw my flat and room and I took them on as best of a campus tour that I could come up with. We had lunch at Pizzetta Republic, which is a pizza restaurant on campus and then headed back into town. Zoe came with us and we went to explore the Lancaster Castle and Priory. The Castle is still a working prison, although the tour did not include those parts. We got to see the Civil and Criminal court rooms, both of which are pretty cool. We also saw some of the older parts of the castle, including the old cells. In one of the rooms there were two, tall backed wooden chairs that Mom and Zoe sat in. We found out that those were the chairs that they used to use to restrain crazy people....which was just funny. We walked around the Priory, which was more difficult than it would seem. This is mostly because the monks were practicing the bells... entirety of the 2-3 hours we were there. It was still pretty and we got a really good view of the city and the neighboring Lake District. Mom and Dad got lucky in that they visited Lancaster on a very rare string of days were it is not raining or too overcast. That night we met up with James and Ryan and went back to Wetherspoons for dinner. Mom and Dad wanted to hear all about our trip to Europe and we wound up talking for a couple of hours. Monday was their last day here. I went down into town and met up with them for a couple of hours. We walked around town and got lunch at Subway before they had to go and catch their train back to London. It was really good to see them and I'm glad they came to visit. It was a lot of fun for me because I got to do the tourist thing in Lancaster and got to hang out with them for a while. They spent the next couple of days in London and got to explore all of the cool things that were there. I gave them one of my travel books which I marked with the things I thought they would enjoy. They had a really good time and flew back to the States on Thursday.


Nothing all that eventful has happened since then. James' parents came up on Wednesday of this week and took all of us out to dinner. Ryan's parents got here on Friday. Both of them are off exploring with their parents all weekend.


We're working on making plans to go to Edinburgh, Scotland and Dublin, Ireland. We're also going to York with other Gettysburg students in two weeks. We would also like to go see the Lake District, I hear it's beautiful.


The rest of this weekend will be spent doing as much of my seminar paper as I possibly can and trying not to get too distracted. It's difficult though, because the weather is so dreary here with the rain and the wind and the clouds, it makes me want to sleep or just not leave my room. Apparently this is one of the most overcasts areas of England, and I would definitely believe that. But life's good, I'm doing well, and I'm definitely having a fantastic time.

Pictures??

Ok, so, the reason there haven't been any pictures up yet is because I'm looking into getting another site, something along the lines of Flikr, to post my pictures. I've been having a lot of trouble trying to get pictures up here at all, so for now I'm accepting that Blogger is smarter than I am, and trying to work around it. I'll keep you posted on the status of my struggle.

Copenhagen!!!!!

So I last left off with our last full day in Berlin. The next morning, we slept in and headed out to catch our flight to Copenhagen. We got there a couple of hours early and sat by the terminal and played cards until it was time to board the plane. It was only about a 40 minute plane ride. Basically, we reached cruising altitude and 5 minutes later we were descending. I had the window seat, so I sat and watched the whole time. It was cool because I got to watch the landscape and the ocean. One of our friends from Gettysburg, Angela, is studying at Copenhagen for the semester, and we met up with her at the airport. It was a lot easier getting out of the airport with Angela there to guide us. We got on the Metro and found our way to the closest stop to our hostel. We also needed to get money to use while we were there. The Kroner is the Danish currency. About 500 kroner is the equivalent of $100, but everything is extremely expensive. We walked to the hostel. If any of the hostels we stayed in were going to be the set for the horror movie by the same name, it would be this one. As soon as I walked it, I realized it smelled almost exactly like a barn. The walls were covered in graffiti and it was overall, not a very nice place. We had to pay extra for blankets, which was sort of a pain. After we dropped off some of our stuff, Angela took us on a walking tour of the city that she put together herself. We saw the times square of Copenhagen, as well as the longest pedestrian street in Europe. We walked out to the Little Mermaid statue by the water. It was put up there because Hans Christian Anderson, who wrote the story, is a native of Copenhagen. We took the bus back from there and had dinner from a place along the pedestrian street. We walked around for a little bit more and wound up at a cute little place called BarBar Bar. Angela recommended a really tastey apple cider that is a lot like sparkling apple juice. We sat outside the bar, talking and catching up for a couple hours before James, Zoe, Ryan and I headed back to our hostel and Angela headed back to her host family.
The next morning, Angela had class, so we had to amuse ourselves for a few hours. We walked down the pedestrian street and found a really awesome pastry shop. I also discovered that Danish danish’s are amazing. I had an apple one that was, quite possibly, the best I’ve ever had. We wandered around for a while and just took in the sights of the city. We had lunch in the main town hall square. They’re really big on their hot dogs, so I enjoyed the cultural exchange and had a hot dog for lunch. We went to the national museum of Denmark and had a lot of fun in the children’s toy exhibit. After a month of museums in London and a week of museums while we were traveling, we were tired of looking at exhibit after exhibit, so when we found one that let you play with the things in it, we let loose. There were stilts, hop scotch, helmets and costumes from the medieval time, and a Viking boat that came with swords and shields. At the end we got to color, which was fun too. Around 3, we headed back to Town Hall Square to meet up with Angela. From there, we got on a bus and went to Christiania, which is a hippie commune in Copenhagen. It was its 37th birthday, so there were people all over the place, music, and really pretty murals on the buildings. It was a lot of fun, for a while. I found a really cute bag that I love. We also had dinner, which was the cheapest meal we found the entire time we were in Copenhagen. We were there for a couple of hours before we left. We walked back into Copenhagen and headed to a Scottish Pub that had live music. It was pretty cool. After that, we wanted to hang out again, so we went back to BarBar Bar. Around 12:30 we wanted to head home, but we had to run back to Angela’s school to get some of her stuff. We all really needed to use the bathroom and the only one that was open was Burger King and they literally had bouncers guarding the stairs that went to the bathroom to make sure that people who were using the bathrooms had actually purchased something, so we stood in line and bought the cheapest things we could find on the menu before holding it like a bathroom pass to get past the bouncers. After that we said goodbye to Angela and walked back to the hostel.
The next morning we got up and headed back to the air port and got on the plane back to London. First we had some issues with security, but lucky for us, our plane was delayed and we made it in time. It was about an hour and a half flight back into the air port and from there we had another hour and a half bus ride to get back to the city. We checked in at the Globetrotter hostel that was being paid for by Gettysburg. We had dinner that night with some of our friends from the seminar who had stayed in London for the week off. After that we went back to the hostel and crashed. The next morning we got up and got on the 6 hour bus ride that brought us to Lancaster. There was some confusion about where we were supposed to go, but once that got figured out, I found my room and started unpacking.
I’ll leave off here for now. Not too much has happened in Lancaster, but then again, classes have just started. I’ll tell you all about it soon!

Berlin!!!!

Now for the next installment of the details of my week of European travel. I last left off with boarding the train to Berlin. That was definitely an interesting experience. We were put in a 6 person cabin. Our room was probably about the size of a small closet and it had 6 bunks along the walls. There was barley enough room for 1 person to stand between the bunks. I was lucky enough to be on the top bunk, which actually gave me a bit more headroom than everyone else, but I had the farthest to climb up the ladder. We were bunked with two very nice older French men. They went to sleep almost as soon as we got on the train, so mostly James and I planned out what we wanted to see in Berlin. We arrived around 8:30 in the morning on the 23rd. As with Paris, we had a little bit of a hard time trying to get transportation tickets. We eventually wound up finding something similar to our Paris metro tickets and boarded the S-ban to the stop that would take us closest to our hostel. This time we were staying at the JetPack City Hostel. It was a lot smaller than St. Christopher’s, but I liked it better because it came with free internet access. Plus, the people were really nice and it was a very clean facility. We couldn’t check in until 3:30 in the afternoon, but when we got there the owners told us about a 3.5 hour free walking tour of Berlin, which we immediately set off for. They were nice enough to let us leave our luggage in the luggage room, so we didn’t have to carry everything around with us all day. The walking tour was fantastic. It covered all of the major, popular sights of the city. We saw Bradenburger Tor, which is a fairly famous gate of the city. From there we also saw the Reichstag, which is the main government building in Berlin. In the course of our walk we also saw the Holocaust memorial, spot where Hitler’s bunker was, Checkpoint Charlie, the spot where the huge book burning rally took place just before WWII, the former Royal living quarters and Museum Island, among other things. It was basically a tour of everything I wanted to see while we were in Berlin, shoved into the first 3.5 hours we were there. At the conclusion, we headed back to our hostel to check in. Later that night we headed out to the Reichstag. They have free tours that take you up on top of the building and the massive glass dome that overlooks the house of parliament. By the time we got there, it was night. So, once again, we got a pretty amazing view of our current city, light up at night. It was pretty cool how the whole idea of the glass dome on top of the building was to remind the politicians that the people are the ones who are in charge. From there we went and found dinner at an Italian restaurant in the area.
We got up in the morning and had breakfast in the café attached to our hostel. From there we headed out to Potsdamer Platz. There we saw the film museum, Lego land and a section of the Berlin wall that is still preserved from its active days. They took huge sheets of steel and put it up between two sections of the wall and they keep it set up with barbwire and both parts of the fence, almost exactly as it was during it’s use. From there we went to Tiergarten, which is a pretty massive park in the city. There is a statue called the victory column. What’s comical about the statue on top of the column is that it is made from melted down French cannon balls and was then dipped in gold. After Tiergarten we went to Alexanderplatz. We saw the memorial to Marx and Engels, as well as Karl-Marx-Allee, which is the main street that the Russians used when they invaded Berlin during WWII. After that we went to the Atles, which is the Ancient Egypt museum in Berlin. They have the bust of Nefertiti, which is one of the most well-preserved artifacts from that time period. That day was Zoë’s 21st birthday, so we had dinner in a nicer German restaurant. She tried a raspberry flavored beer, which actually tasted pretty good. Surprisingly, it seems going back to Germany, temporarily turned me into a good German and I actually found sauerkraut that I liked. I’m not sure what was different about it, but it was almost enjoyable. After that we went to find ice cream. We were having problems ordering because the man behind the counter only spoke German, and while between James, Zoe and I we spoke 3 different European languages, none of them was German. Thankfully another American who was at the counter came to our rescue and translated for us. We started talking to him and found out that he grew up in Bucks County in Pennsylvania, which isn’t too far from where Ryan or I live, and then went to college in the same county in Connecticut that James grew up in. And to top it all off, he knew someone who graduated from Gettysburg last year. This was just a further demonstration of how small a world it actually can be some time.
Overall, I really liked Berlin. The history aspect was really interesting for me, mostly because I’m interested in that area of history. I would love to go back and take some of the specialized tours that there are. Mostly they have to do with the concentration camp that is just outside the city and different museums within the city. I also liked that it was a lot cheaper than Pairs was. Something I’ve noticed during my travels is that it is a lot easier to pick up a language when you’re surrounded by it. Every language class I’ve taken has said this, but I actually believe it based on personal experience. From being in Paris and then in Berlin, I picked up little words that I learned in context of needing them to get around at all. Because they were more pertinent to my life, they’ve actually still stuck with me. So that’s it for Berlin. I’m almost caught up….sort of….but I still have Copenhagen and Lancaster to catch up to.

Paris!

Wow, it has been a crazy couple of weeks. So much has happened; this promises to be my longest email yet I think. So I left off last on the eve of my grand exploration of Europe. My main traveling companions for this adventure were James, Zoe and Ryan. We set off around 6 am on Saturday morning and headed for the train station. The week before there had been an explosion in one of the tunnels RailEurope runs through. Because of this, we got pushed back to a later train from London to Paris. It was only about 45 minutes later, but it gave us time to eat breakfast, which was good. I slept most of the way to Paris, but did wake up to see some of the French countryside on the way past. We arrived in Paris at 11 AM and I found out that Pairs is a hour head of London, which I didn’t know. We were all a little nervous when we got off the train because it was our first experience at being in a country where the primary language was not English. Luckily, James knows French from taking it at college, so we weren’t too concerned. We ran into issues trying to get metro tickets first thing off the train in Paris. They had a lot of automatic machines but we couldn’t really find a real person to talk to. Half an hour later, we were sure we weren’t going to make it out of Gare du Nord. We finally found an information desk, and luckily, not only did the woman we talked to speak English, we were able to purchase a 3 day pass for all of the public transportation in Paris. We hoped on the Metro and made our way to our hostel, St. Christopher’s. We arrived about 2 hours before check in, so we went to explore our surroundings and find lunch. Keep in mind, all of this walking and standing was done while carrying a book bag that contained everything I was going to need for the next week, and probably weighed about 25 pounds at least. We had lunch at a small place called La Princesa and then went and sat by the Crimée, which is a canal that ran right by our hostel. We checked into the hostel at 2 and went up to our room. We were in an 8 person room that had 4 bunk beds. Our roommates were 2 pairs of German natives who were traveling around Europe for a while. After dropping off the majority of our clothing, we called two of our friends from the London Seminar, Chris and Doug, who were also in Paris for the same amount of time we were. Being the good tourists we were, we met them at the base of the Eiffel Tower. The Tower became the theme of our time in Paris, seeing as we spent more time in and around it than anywhere else in the city. After meeting up with Chris and Doug, we hopped on a metro and went up to the Arc de Triomphe, which is another of the most popular landmarks of Paris. From there we walked down the Champs- Élysées, which is one of the main roads of Paris and is lined with shops for a large chunk of it before it ends at the Louvre. Along our walk we saw the spot where Marie Antoinette and Louis XIV were beheaded during the French Revolution. We followed the Champs- Élysées all the way to the Louvre. From there we got on a train to the Ile de Cité and Notre-Dame. By this point in the day, it was getting pretty late so we found dinner from a vendor near Notre-Dame and headed back to St. Christopher’s.
The next morning, we woke up and had breakfast at the hostel. We met up with Chris and Doug under the Eiffel Tower around 10:45 and got on a train out to Versailles. When we got there we saw this really cool looking clock that was made out of living plants. We walked from the train station out to the palace itself and wound up standing outside in line to get in for about an hour and 45 minutes. We started with the apartments of the Dolfín, who is the next in line to be King. We also looked through the apartments of the various mistresses of the king. The main palace was very impressive. It contained a huge number of rooms, including the Hall of Mirrors, the Hall of Battles and a hallway that contained numerous statues and busts of famous people from French history. Something that really sticks out in my mind was the presence of different statues of modern art that were on display inside the palace. There was a massive, magenta, metal balloon dog, as well as a blow-up lobster hanging from a chain where a chandelier should have been, that really stick out in my mind. I wasn’t entirely appreciative of their presence inside Versailles. I personally felt that they would have been better outside in the gardens, rather than inside the palace. The gardens were beautiful in their own respect. You could tell that a lot of work went in to their upkeep. We got lunch by the train station and went back into Paris. We walked by Les Invalides, which is where the body of Napoleon is kept. Chris and Doug needed to go back to their hostel, so we went back with them and saw the Moulin Rouge on the way. After stopping in their hostel, we walked back to the metro and found a pizza place on the way. We grabbed two pizzas and went back to the Eiffel Tower. We sat looking at the Tower, lit up at night, and ate pizza, which is a memory that will probably always stick with me. When we were finished eating we actually took a journey up the tower. It was a little scary to be up that high, but the view was stunning. We stopped for a while on the second level of the Tower and then continued our trip, up to the very top. It was windy, dark, and cold, so I was a little freaked out to be so high up, but it’s an experience I won’t forget. The lights of the city were amazing to see. It also happened that there was a harvest moon that night, which made it that more cool. While we were on it, the Tower light up and stated sparkling. It would have been cool to see from the ground, but even more amazing to see from on the Tower. While we were there, we noticed that they were selling glasses of champagne at the top, so, just to be able to say that we’ve done it, James, Ryan, Zoe and I all pitched in and bought a glass between the four of us. It didn’t taste very good, but now I can say that I’ve had champagne at the top of the Eiffel Tower at night. After coming back down off the Tower, we decided that since it was our last night in Paris, we wanted to see some of the other famous sights of the city at night. We hopped on the metro and went back out to the Arc de Triomphe and snapped a few quick pictures. Then we ran back to the metro and went down to the Louvre and got pictures of it at night as well. So, after a day of running around, we went back to the hostel and crashed.
Out last day in Paris was just as eventful as the previous two. First on our list of things we still needed to see was the inside of the Louvre. We actually wound up basically running through the museum. They brag that it would take weeks to really see everything inside the museum. What they fail to mention is that you can hit the major sights, plus some other cool things, in about 90 minutes. Among other famous paintings and sculptures, we got to see the Mona Lisa, which was amazing. From the pictures you really can’t tell exactly how small it really is. It probably didn’t help that it was hanging, by itself, on a massive free-standing wall in the gallery, but it was still amazing to see. After the Louvre, we went out and found the opera house where the Phantom of the Opera is supposed to have taken place. One of our traveling companions, Doug, wanted to see the grave of Jim Morrison, so we stopped by the cemetery where he is buried. We then went to the Pompidou center, which is really interesting, architecturally. It was designed with the stairs and heating system on the outside of the building, as opposed to the inside. There is also a really cool water fountain outside of it. From there we headed back to the Eiffel Tower and then struck out on our quest to find the miniature Statue of Liberty in Paris, the one that was featured in the second National Treasure movie. It took us a while to find it, and it was a lot farther out that I thought it would be, but it was still pretty cool to see. The statue is actually a lot smaller than the one in New York, but it was still like a little piece of home. Doug and Chris had to run off really quickly to catch their train to Italy, but we had a couple of hours to kill before our train left, so we walked back to the Eiffel Tower and sat under it for about and hour and a half. We then went to Gare du Nord and got on our night train to Berlin.

So I just realized how far behind I am with trying to post to this. I promise to do much better in the future. For now, here's the end to my adventures in London.

On Saturday, September 13^th, James, Zoe, Ryan and I went to Cardiff, the capitol city of Wales. We got up early in the morning, headed back out to Paddington Station and started our two hour train ride into Wales. When we got into Cardiff, around 10:30, we set off for Cardiff Bay. The weather was absolutely beautiful and it was nice to be along a large body of water. The whole Bay area was really beautiful and fun to explore. We found the Visitor’s Center by the bay, which was shaped like a torpedo or zeppelin. We picked up a better map of the area and proceeded to walk to the Millennium Center. There was a massive water fountain that was pretty cool to look at. From there we went to the Dr.Who exhibition. Dr. Who is an English science fiction show that is popular in England and the States. There were costumes from the show as well as different villains that are featured on the show, which was pretty cool. We had lunch at a Chinese buffet in Cardiff Bay and then walked up to the heart of Cardiff. We went up to Cardiff Castle, which is actually two parts. The first was the main house, which we had a guided tour of. There was literally gold foil to decorate the ceilings, which was a little crazy. The family who owned the house was incredibly wealthy. When it was no longer reasonable to have the house they gave it to the city of Cardiff, who turned it into a museum and a way to raise funds for the city. There is also a much older part of the castle that has been there for many centuries. We were allowed to go up into it and look around, which, while there wasn’t much there besides the remains of the building, it was still pretty cool. The steps were really narrow and steep in parts, but it was still a lot of fun. While we were up on top of the old chapel we noticed a nice looking park right next to the castle, so we walked over there and went through part of it, which was really pretty. There was a really creaky bridge that you could feel moving while we walked over it. From there we set off to find St. Fagan’s National History Museum, which, on the map, looked really close, but after walking for 25 minutes and not encountering it, we decided to turn back. We found out after we got home that it was about 5 miles away from where we were. We went to dinner at the Prince of Wales pub, which is a member of the Weatherspoons chain of pubs, which have a really good reputation. The food was really good and well priced, which was really good. After we were done dinner, we walked back to the train station and were back in London by 9. Overall it was a really nice day. We got to see a good bit in Cardiff and the weather was wonderful.

The next day completed the absolutely perfect weekend. We slept in for a while. When we woke up I made my first attempt at English pancakes, which are quite a bit different than pancakes from home. After that we decided to go out to Buckingham Palace for the changing of the guard. There were a lot of people there and we couldn’t really see too much, but the music was really good. After that we sat in Green Park and tried to figure out what we were going to do next. It was a really nice day outside, and after having run all over the UK the previous day, it was nice to take a few minutes to just chill out. We finally decided we would go and check out a place called Covent Garden, which is like a huge flea market. There were dancers and really awesome musicians, as well as good deals on scarves, food, and post cards. We spend a couple of hours there and then decided we wanted to go to Hyde Park, which is a fairly massive, well-known park. We found a bench by a fountain and just sat there for a while. There was an Andrew Lloyd Webber festival going on not too far from where we were, so I got to listen to “Music of the Night” from the Phantom of the Opera, while sitting in a park, by a fountain, on a bench in the sun. It was a pretty awesome experience and one that I am not going to forget any time soon, or ever. We left our bench and walked over to Speaker’s Corner, which is where anyone with anything to say can set up a foot stool and tell people what they think. It was an ….interesting….experience. There were your basic over zealous religious people, one of whom told us that only people in yellow shirts could go to heaven. He mostly said this because Zoe was wearing a yellow shirt, which meant that James, Ryan and I are just out of luck apparently. There were also a guy and a girl with signs that said “Free Hugs” which I thought was pretty cool, mostly because I’d heard of the Free Hugs campaign before. We also got to see the Marble Arch, which is one of the signature pieces of Hyde Park.

Monday wasn’t really that exciting. We had class in the morning and then didn’t do too much in the afternoon. Our seminar did get cookies from the dining hall at Gettysburg, under the oath that we would take pictures with the cookies at landmarks around the area and wherever we were traveling during our week off. That night the entire seminar went out for dinner at Kahn’s, which was a really good Indian restaurant.

Tuesday we went to Westminster Abbey. I loved it. The architecture was really beautiful and there were all kinds of people buried there; anyone from Isaac Newton to several Kings and Queens of England, including Queen Elizabeth I. We spent a good couple of hours in there just wandering around and looking at everyone who had been buried in the abbey over the years. That night, we did a pot luck dinner with our entire seminar group, where each room brought something to eat and we all shared. It was really fun and the food was excellent.

Wednesday we had class in the morning and then opted for taking the afternoon off. We have all been getting a little burnt out from running around all the time and have taken the opportunity to relax for a while in preparation for next weeks adventures, which I’ll get to shortly. That night we went on a walking pub tour of the south bank of the Thames. It was pretty cool to get another look at the history of London and of the different aspects of it.

Thursday was our last, real, day of class. After it wrapped up, we mostly concentrated on packing and getting ourselves ready for our week of travel. We did go out and see The Mousetrap, which is the longest running play in London. It’s a murder mystery and at the end, the audience is sworn to secrecy as to the ending, so I won’t go into any more detail, other than that it was pretty cool.

Friday we had class late, and only for about 45 minutes, just to wrap everything up and go over check out procedure. That night, James, Ryan, Zoe and I went out for dinner at the Hard Rock Café in London, which is the original. We had a pretty good time.

Busy, Busy, Busy

Sorry it has been so long since I've posted anything. It's been a crazy couple of weeks. I went traveling around Europe all of last week, so I didn't have too much internet access. As for this week, I've been trying to settle in to my new residence at Lancaster University in England. It's been interesting and a little odd because I'm basically a freshmen or "fresher" again, but there will be more on this later. I've picked out my classes and I'm very excited to start them next Monday. In the next few days I should be able to find the time to really update and recount all of our fun stories from our European travels.

More free time = more frequent blog posts.

With my seminar winding down I’ve had a lot more free time. I’ll pick up where I left off on Monday, September 8^th. After class we went to the Royal Society. We have been talking about this Society throughout the seminar. The Royal Society is the oldest scientific society in existence as well as producing the oldest publication in the world. Many of the people we had to research for our papers and presentation were members of the Royal Society. Because of this, the Library of the Society had different artifacts from our ingenious people. I got to see an original letter written by William Herschel, one of my ingenious people, discussing his discovery of a new comet. We also saw one of the death masks of Isaac Newton, who has played a major role in our seminar. There was also a copy of History of Fishes, which was the first publication financed by the Society, which was such huge failure that it nearly bankrupted and destroyed the Society. While we were there, a couple of us applied to be readers at the Library, which is pretty cool, considering all of the other important people who are too.

Tuesday it was my turn to give my presentation, which went very well. After class we went to explore a couple of the museums near where we are staying in Chelsea/ South Kensington. We started at the Science Museum. We actually saw a couple of the mirrors that William Herschel made, which I discussed in my presentation earlier that morning. There was a really cool part of that museum that was more designed for children, but we had a really good time in there for about an hour. There was a station where you could play with these huge bubble wands. There was also a infrared camera with a screen and a part where you could wire electrical circuits in a way that kept you from electrocuting yourself. They had another exhibit on the history of computers and math, including the difference and analytic engines, which James discussed in his presentations. They were designed by Charles Babbage, whose brain is actually in the museum. Apparently it used to be a big thing to preserve the brains of really intelligent people and dissect and compare them to see if there was a difference between them and average people. When they were done dissecting Babbage’s brain, they gave it to the museum, which still has it on display. After we browsed through that museum, we went next door to the Natural History Museum. It was your basic natural history museum, complete with fossils and massive dinosaur skeletons.

Wednesday we had a free afternoon, so Ryan, James, Zoe and I went and experienced the London Eye. It’s basically a massive ferris wheel that is right along the Thames, near Big Ben and Parliament. It took about a half an hour to go the whole way around, but it was well worth it to get such a great view of the city. When we got off the Eye we decided to go and explore Harrods, which is a massive store. It was 6 floors in total, with its own grocery store and concierge desk. Everything it was horribly overpriced, including a £136 beach towel. I did end up buying something there. There was a Waterstones bookstore, which is not owned by Harrods, and was therefore, reasonably priced. I got a Student Survival Cookbook set, which has come in pretty handy. That night we had tickets to see Shakespeare’s Midsummer Night’s Dream at the rebuilt Globe Theater. The Globe was the building that Shakespeare had all of his plays preformed during his lifetime. We were groundlings, which meant we were right up front near the stage, but we had to stand the entire time. The play was really good though, so I didn’t mind standing.

Thursday, after class we went to the Soane’s house museum. Basically, Soane was an avid collector of everything. He was also a well known architect. In his will he provided that his house and collection be turned into a public museum so that it would never cost anything to enter. It was a little unsettling for me to be there. It wasn’t very well lit and there were all kinds of masks hung on the walls. Some parts of it were very cluttered, including the part of the basement where the sarcophagus of Seti I of Egypt is kept. We also found out that the way the house was set up, with everything displayed like a museum, was how the house was set up while Soane and his family lived there, which struck me as odd.

Friday we took a day trip to Bath. We started out at Paddington Station. It took about an hour and a half to get there. After we arrived around 11 am, we walked into town and went through Bath Abbey, which is one of the oldest Abbey’s in the United Kingdom. One thing that I really remember from the Abbey was that there was a tomb for the wife of an important man in Bath. She died before he did, so he made arrangements for both of them to be buried in the Abbey. However, after his death, someone else decided to burry him somewhere else, so his wife is in the Abbey and he is not. After we went through the Abbey, we took a tour of the Roman Bath’s, which is where Bath gets its name from. The Baths are the only hot spring in England and were so warm in some parts you could see the steam rising from the water, even though it was a really beautiful day. Outside the Bath’s there were some really good violin players, so it was cool to hear the music while I was walking around the Baths. At the end of the tour, we were each given a free glass of purified water from the Baths. It smelled and tasted like fish and sulfur because the water comes from deep underground. Needless to say, I didn’t finish my glass. After taking a break for lunch we walked up to William Herschel Museum, which is located in the house that William and Caroline lived when they discovered Uranus. Our tour of the house started out with a short movie that recounted William and Caroline’s story. I actually found some of it funny because how the movie was telling the story was different than how I had learned it. They were only little details for the most part, that, and although I had already given my presentation, I’m fairly certain I was the only one who noticed. It was still really cool to be in the house that they worked, although I may have been the only one who really enjoyed it. Here was where we went separate ways from some of the group. Meghan, Cheryl, Zoe, Alice, Ryan and I, set off for the Jane Austen Center. Our tour of that museum started off with a 15 minute introduction session, which was very interesting. After that we walked through the museum, which was mostly comprised of costumes from a BBC movie about Jane’s life. After the museum, we decided to have high tea in the tea shop above the center. It was really fun and actually really good. Throughout the whole day we noticed these statures of decorated pigs that were all over the city. We learned it was a local legend about one of the first king’s of Bath, where a prince of Bath contracted leprosy, so he was sent off to live with a pig farmer. He noticed the pigs also contracted the leprosy, but then went into a mud puddle from the water from the roman Baths and were cured. Bladud, the king, noticed this, bathed in the water, and was cured of leprosy. After this he returned to the throne. Overall, the day was a lot of fun. The whole area of Bath was really pretty and overall it was a really good day. To keep this from getting too long, I’ll stop here for now and finish updating to what I’m doing currently within the next few days

Pictures from the London Eye and Bath

View of the Thames from the top of the Eye.

James, Me, Zoe and Ryan with Big Ben in the background.

View of Big Ben and Parliament from the Eye.

The Roman Bath's with Bath Abbey in the background.

Ryan, Zoe and I at tea in the Jane Austen Center.

Catching my blog up with reality.

So it’s been a while since I’ve written, but the upside to this is that I’m done with the work I have to do in London, so I’m basically on vacation for the next two and a half weeks. We only have a week and a half left in London and there is still so much that I haven’t done yet. However, a lot has happened since my last email, so let’s see what I can remember.

Last Thursday, September 4, we went to the British Museums. The whole experience was really awesome. The building was huge and completely filled with artifacts. There were a couple of huge rooms with mummies and different artifacts from Egypt. They also had the Rosetta Stone, which is what was used to decipher the hieroglyphs. I was actually surprised to find an entire room dedicated to Native North Americans. It just goes to show that you can cross the ocean, but you can’t escape where you come from. The museum had a number of artifacts from China, Japan, and India, including symbols from Hinduism, Buddhism, and different Chinese religions. They also had a number of Greek and Roman marble sculptures that were very pretty.

Friday was a fun day. We had another day trip that was part of the seminar. This time we went up to Greenwich. We started out taking a boat down the Thames. We got to Greenwich in a little less than an hour. After arriving, we went to the Queen’s House, which is a building for two of the Queen’s of England. The house itself was beautiful. In the Great Hall, the builder, Inigo Jones, built the ceiling to match the shape of the marble tiles on the floor. After the tour, we went to the National Maritime Museum. There were a bunch of really cool exhibits about different chapters in British maritime history. We also ran into our tour guide from the first day. Surprisingly, he recognized us, but thought we were part of his tour that day and didn’t seem to realize we weren’t part of his tour, even after we tried explaining it to hi. From the museum, we walked up to the Royal Greenwich Observatory. This is where the Prime Meridian is marked, so we had fun taking pictures with people in different hemispheres. We also had a tour with the person in charge of taking care of the clocks in the museum. He showed us the room that was the Observatory when it was first built. We also saw the four clocks that helped to solve the problem of determining longitude, which was the topic of one of the book we read over the summer. After that we saw a show at the planetarium. We got home by taking a tunnel that runs under the Thames, which was fun.

Saturday was a pretty easy day. We went out to a huge flea market along Portabella Road in Notting Hill. There were really great prices on fruits and vegetables, which I used when I made dinner that night.

Sunday was our main adventure day. We got on a train out to Salisbury, England. From there we got on a bus and went out to Stonehenge. The whole experience was amazing and it is definitely one of my favorite trips so far. Our bus tickets included an announcer who told us about all of the different landmarks on our way up to Stonehenge. When we got there we were given an audio tour to take with us as we walked around the site. It told us what the different stones were made of and what they were used for. It also discussed some of the different myths and legends concerning the building and builders of Stonehenge. Some of them that were discussed were Merlin, Satan and aliens. It was pretty impressive to stand there and look at the stones that have been there for so long. When we left the henge, we discovered there was an archeological dig going on in the field across from the henge that was working to discover more about the origins of the henge. That was one of the most interesting parts of the visit. I also found out that the stones themselves are one third buried underneath the ground. They were also excavating what called Stonehenge Ave, which is a pathway is leading from the river, up to the henge, which points to the henge being used in some sort of processional. We got back on the bus and drove back through Amesbury, which is a very old earth-made fortress which was the first version of Salisbury. We also saw a bunch of burial mounds that surround the henge.

I’ll stop here for now, but a lot has happened since then and I will report back on it as soon as I can.

Picture section.

This is the real Rosetta Stone, which was used to decipher the hieroglyphs, which was pretty amazing.

This is a picture of the view from the top of the Greenwich Observatory. Even though it was cloudy, you could still see a lot.


This is Stonehenge. It was amazing!


This is me with my traveling companions Zoe, Ryan and James at Stonehenge.

Pictures to go with previous post

So this is going to work a little backwards, but I've been having problems trying to put pictures right into my posts. so I'm going to have a picture section below the post, starting with the post right after this one.

Punting tour of the River Cam along the back of Cambridge University


Trying to gain entrance to Hogwarts via Platform 9 3/4 at King's Cross Station.
aka. brb going to Hogwarts


This is the memorial at the spot where people, such as Anne Boleyn, were beheaded inside the Tower of London.

Inside the Tower, enjoying the history and the fantastic weather.

More fun things in London!

So much has happened since my last post, so bear with me if this gets a little long. On Friday, the 29^th, we took a day trip to Cambridge. There was a little bit of a mix up on the way there, where half of the seminar group got on a underground train, called the Tube, and the half I was in did not make it in time. We thought we were going to all meet up at the next stop, but apparently they wandered off to look into getting discount rail passes. About 45 minutes later we all managed to meet up at King’s Cross Station. From there we got on a non-stop express train up to Cambridge. It only took about 45 minutes, which wasn’t that bad. Once we got there, we walked into town, past some of the college of Cambridge. The University system in different in England than how it is in America. Each university is composed of many different colleges. When you apply, you apply to a college, not to the university as a whole. All of the colleges have their own characters, financial support, chapel, housing, and dining hall. Classes are handled by the university though, so there could be students from many different colleges in the classes. One of the colleges on the outskirts of the Cambridge University grounds, Pembroke, was open for visitors, so we walked around and looked at the chapel and the grounds. After that we headed into the main center of the city of Cambridge. We found a market there that has been in that exact same spot since the time that the Romans occupied the city, about 2000 years ago. We got lunch at the market and then went down along the Cam, which is the name of the river. There are flat boats that they run along the river, called punts. Two groups of my classmates decided they wanted to try punting down the river themselves. I quite enjoyed watching them try to figure out how to get the boat to go in the right direction. I opted for the guided punt tour of the river along the part that runs behind and through a bunch of the colleges of Cambridge. It was really pretty and I took a lot of pictures that I now have to go back through and try to remember what all we saw. When we were all back on dry land, we went back into to town to meet our tour guide. He was an American who had been living in England for many years. We walked through the complex of the Cavendish Laboratory and passed by the spot where Watson and Crick had their lab where they discovered the structure of DNA. We also went into the display where they have some of Darwin’s collection of animals that he collected on the voyage of the Beagle which helped him develop the theory of evolution. We also got more information on some of the better-know colleges at Cambridge, including Trinity College where Isaac Newton lived, worked, and studied for most of the time he was developing his theories. After the tour we went to a local pub called The Eagle, where Watson and Crick first told people about their DNA discovery. We had traditional fish and chips, with, basically an entire fish, minus the scales, eyes, and bones. We then hopped on the train back to London and had fun playing with the sign for Platform 9 ¾ from the Harry Potter books.

Saturday we got up early and went down to a farmer's market that they have every Saturday morning in one of the parks near our residence hall. We found a bunch of fresh stuff, for good prices and found food for the rest of the day. Later, we went to the Tower of London, which was ridiculously awesome. We stood outside and watched a demonstration of a catapult. We went into the Tower and joined a tour of the Tower and heard a bunch of really cool stories of things that happened there. We also got to see the memorial near the spot where 6 people who were killed inside the Tower, including Anne Boleyn, were beheaded. We also got to see the Crown Jewels, which was pretty amazing. After that we went through the White Tower, which is the oldest part of the Tower, which was used as a torture chamber and arms warehouse in the many years since its construction. All in all, it was pretty cool and I basically went into history major overload.

Sunday we went to this fun Chinese place that serves something called din sum, which is where they bring all kinds of food around on trolleys and you sit at a table and pick what you want as they come around. It was in the China town section of London, which was pretty cool to see. After that James, Ryan, Zoe and I went off to see the National Portrait Gallery. They had a good collection of portraits from different periods of England’s history, starting mostly with the Tudors.

Monday, after class, we went to the British Library. they had a really awesome collection of different books, including a working copy of Persuasion, by Jane Austen and her writing desk. They also had several copies of the Magna Carta and different pieces from many different religions, including Taoism and Buddhism. They also had a copy of the Gutenberg Bible, which was the first book mass produced after the invention of the printing press. After that we went up to Notting Hill and had dinner at a really cool pub. We were looking for a Jamacian Festival, but figured out that it had probably happened the week before.

Tuesday we had another seminar session in the morning, followed by a scientific walking tour of London. We got to see the homes of a couple of people we’re talking about in our seminar. When we were done with the tour, a couple of us went up to Abby Road and saw the recording studio where the Beatles worked. I also stood by and watched four of my friends from the seminar attempt (rather badly) to recreate the photo on the cover of their album.

I’ve been having a really awesome time so far. I love London. It doesn’t really have the feel of a city that I’m used to from visiting New York City. Where cities in the United States expanded up because of the restrictions for how far out they could to, London seems to have expanded outward, with some of the buildings constructed in the 1600’s being among the tallest in the skyline. I’ve really started to enjoy the Tube, now that I know how to navigate my way through it. The seminar is a little boring at the moment. The professor doesn’t really know how to teach history, seeing as he normally teaches physics. That should get better next week, when our presentations start. Although, the one really cool thing that Professor Marschall has done is ask about getting cookies from the dinning hall at Gettysburg, sent over to us. We still have a lot coming up this weekend, including a trip to Greenwich all day Friday. James, Ryan, Zoe and I are thinking about going up to check out Stonehenge on Saturday, or possibly checking out a much bigger farmers market back up in Notting Hill. Friday is also my birthday, so we’ll see what kind of craziness we can get into, which should be fun.

Sorry it's been so long since I've posted anything. I've been having difficulties trying to put pictures into my post. I'm going to try working on it some today and will hopefully have lots to update with sometime soon.

Wow.... I'm actually in London!

It has been a crazy couple of days. Our flight took off from Newark, New Jersey around the time the sun was setting on the 25^th of August. About 7 hours later, we landed at Gatwick airport, about 45 minutes outside of London at 7 am local time, after having seen the sun rise again over Ireland. We were witness to an amazing sun rise, just in time to descend below the think layer of clouds that has yet to clear. As a group, James, Zoe, Ryan and I decided the reason the sun never sets on the British Empire is because it never rises in the first place. We were met at the airport by Professor Marschall, who is our Gettysburg professor that is teaching our seminar while we are in London. We made it into our residence hall in Chelsea, London around 9 am. The next few hours were spent unpacking and at an orientation for the building. The rooms are basically tiny, but they’ll work for the month that we’ll be here, plus, I’m not planning on spending a lot of time in the hall when London is right outside my window. We’re up on the 7^th floor, so we’re got a pretty good view of the London, which is awesome. Tuesday afternoon we went for a walk along the shopping district in Chelsea which starts right up the street from where we are staying. This also brought the adventure of trying to buy a cheap cell phone to use for calling other people in England, which wasn’t too difficult once I figured out what was going on. That night we went out for dinner at Henry J. Beans, which, ironically enough serves mostly cheeseburgers and french-fries. Notice how I have yet to mention sleeping? This is because, from the time I got up on Monday morning to when I finally managed to go to bed, I had been up for a grand total of 33 hours with out more than 2 half hour naps. Needless to say, I was asleep before my head hit the pillow. I didn’t move again until 5 am when I was accidentally called by one of my friends from Gettysburg, who called me when she was trying to call someone else, and hung up quickly when she made the connection she was making an international phone call. We gathered as a group around 8:30 am on Wednesday. We had our first experience on the Tube, London’s underground metro system. Our seminar group met up with a tour guide who took us all around London and the city. We started at the Tower of London. Our tour guide took us to the spot where the public executions were. There we got on a boat up to Westminster, and walked all over the place, ending in Trafalgar Square. We got to see Big Ben, which I've taken many, many pictures of. There was also Westminster Abby and the Parliament building, as well as Buckingham Palace. The tour guide was pretty fun and had a bunch of stories to tell us, which made it a good experience.

Westminster Abbey, pretty cool, we'll be going for a tour of this later.

We got lunch from an Arabian restaurant we found new the Square and took it back to sit with the pigeons and people to eat. We then walked up to Piccadilly Circus with is comparable to Time Square, just not quite as big. We got on a bus there that took us all over London, giving me more photo opportunities of the Eye of London, the Clock Tower, and just about anything you could imagine in the city.

The Clock Tower and Big Ben through the Eye.

Thursday brought us our first seminar session and a free afternoon. We took the opportunity to get out of our tiny rooms and head out to a coffee shop just down the street and sit in an internet café for a while. Thursday night we went out and saw Spamalot, which was hilarious. Tomorrow we’re off to Cambridge for the day, which should be fun. I’ll talk to you soon!