Home

I feel like I have been here before... That's because I have! I am writing this entry from the computer lab of Metrogate. No joke!

I woke up and finished packing this morning. I got my backpacks on (pretty much for the last time I guess) and walked to the train station. I took the train to the airport and checked in. I went to the gate and waited for them to announce the specific gate number. They announced and then I waited some more to board. I listened to music. We boarded and departed. The flight was only 50 minutes long. We barely got in the air and flying when it was time to descend back down. I had to wait in line for the passport check because a flight from the US just unloaded in front of me. Bummer. Oh well. I got checked and then grabbed my backpack and hopped on a train. I took the Tube to the storage place. I forgot about how much stuff I left in random plastic bags. It will be a squeeze to fit it all in tomorrow but I will get it done. I took the Tube again to my hostel, Hyde Park Inn. It is on the other side of the park from Metrogate. My mom stayed in a place right by it when she was here. My room is on the third floor. Ugh, too many stairs. Oh well. It seems ok and I am going to be there only one night so who really cares anyway?

I got settled and then started walking. I walked across the park and then over to Our Lady of Victories. It was good to be back there. I grabbed some lunch from Tesco and ate it in the courtyard thing by the library. I walked over to Metrogate where I am now. I don't think I will be able to write in the blog again until I get home.

I wish there was some succinct way for me to sum up all the experiences and fun and sights and sounds and just everything that has happened to me since I left back in January. That's not possible though. I know I don't need to do this but thank you to everyone who read this blog even once (but especially to the people who read it everyday). That means more to me than I could write and I will always cherish this blog and this trip. So yeah, I guess this is it. I might write again tomorrow when I get home. Only because I wrote in it just before I left so I think it would be good to write again when just after I get back. I will also be updating the posts, adding pictures, and stuff so feel free to check back if you want in the next week or so. Um, that's it. I can't wait to get home!

I thought of this song while I was writing this post. It's called "Home" by Micheal Buble. Here are the lyrics. (These lyrics coincide with how I feel.)

Another summer day
Has come and gone away
In Paris and Rome
But I wanna go home
Mmmmmmmm

May be surrounded by
A million people I
Still feel all alone
I just wanna go home
Oh, I miss you, you know

And I’ve been keeping all the letters that I wrote to you
Each one a line or two
“I’m fine baby, how are you?”
Well I would send them but I know that it’s just not enough
My words were cold and flat
And you deserve more than that

Another aeroplane
Another sunny place
I’m lucky, I know
But I wanna go home
Mmmm, I’ve got to go home

Let me go home
I’m just too far from where you are
I wanna come home

And I feel just like I’m living someone else’s life
It’s like I just stepped outside
When everything was going right
And I know just why you could not
Come along with me
'Cause this was not your dream
But you always believed in me

Another winter day has come
And gone away
In even Paris and Rome
And I wanna go home
Let me go home

And I’m surrounded by
A million people I
Still feel all alone
Oh, let me go home
Oh, I miss you, you know

Let me go home
I’ve had my run
Baby, I’m done
I gotta go home
Let me go home
It will all be all right
I’ll be home tonight
I’m coming back home

Last Time Again

I couldn't think of a better title than that because I am feeling a lot of the same feelings right now as I did almost four months ago when I was getting ready to go to London. The fear and anxiety combined with the excitement and happiness was in both. Also, what I wrote about doing things for the last time definitely applies to today. Like when I was showering this morning. "I am showering for the last time here." was a thought that went through my head. Or when I walked to Our Lady of Victories for the last time today. Or when...

I decided to go to mass one last time because I really liked the church and just because I felt like it. The woman who has always sat in the pew in front of me and to the left was there again. The priest talked soooo sssllloooww. I didn't really mind but it was noticeable. The mass was fine although I missed the singing. After the mass, that woman came up to me and said how nice it was to see me at mass all the time. I broke the bad news to her that it was my last time. She said that it might not be and that I should come back sometime. It turns out her name is Susan. Haha, I saw her basically every Sunday for 4 months and I did not know her name until today. That's the life goes sometimes. She said, "All joy and happiness to you," as we parted ways. I said "Likewise". I am so poetic sometimes. I walked over to Kensington Library (not the last time, I am going to have to go there before I come back to drop off a book). I dropped off a bunch of books and just looked to see if they had any books that I wanted to take with me (library picture 1). Nope. I left and walked over to Foundation House where my classes were held. I took a picture of the classroom where I had Sociology and Senior Sem (picture 2). Fancy, no? . I bought a couple snacks/breakfast for the plane ride tomorrow morning. I also bought some sunscreen (I'm optimistic about my travels being sunny) and a little bottle to hold some laundry detergent. I made lunch. My last PBJ here in London. Pretty depressing (who am I kidding? SWEET!)

I came back to the flat and packed. It didn't take that long because I knew what I wanted to bring and what I wanted to leave. I did the post about yesterday and then walked over to Safe Storage to put my bags in. That was a little bit of an adventure because I walked with the little roller suitcase and a bag full of stuff. The bag ripped and a lady walking by gave me a new one. I like people sometimes. I dropped my stuff off and then walked back. Since then, I have been looking up and booking a couple hostels. I am only booking ones that look really good and are what I want, I am still without a place to stay for most of the trip. I plan to find stuff as I go. I've got some travel books so I will be fine. I also looked up ferry schedules and checked to make sure they were all hunky doory. I made dinner. I had tortellini and sauce. Yum. I took some pictures of Metrogate so I can remember it. That includes the laundry "room" (it's smaller than a closet), my bedroom (picture 3), my bathroom, and the kitchen (picture 4). I don't care what anyone else says, I didn't mind it here at all. In fact, I kind of liked it. It was centrally located and it fit my needs just fine.

I forgot to mention that yesterday I talked to my boss at Champlin Public Works. He "interviewed" me. By that I mean, he asked when I wanted to start. Haha, so that's really, really good news. I have a job this summer. Yay!

I was out when Mo left so I didn't get to say goodbye. That's too bad. It's weird being one of the only people left. The computer lab has been empty all day.

I am about to go to lay down for a few hours. I might sleep, I might not, but I need to do it so I can be alert when I land in Istanbul in about 12 hours (woah). I will probably add a little bit more before I leave.

I didn't sleep at all. I ended up watching some tv. I will update as much and as often as I can on the blog so check back often! Love everyone and um, see you all soon!

So Much Work

I walked into my flat at exactly 7 am after taking the bus from Victoria Coach Station. I debated in my head about sleeping for a while (I was exhausted from the overnight coach ride) or stay up and work on one of my papers and catch up online. I decided to go sleeping route. I laid down and pretty much immediately fell asleep. It felt wonderful to lay in my bed. I set an alarm to wake me up at 9:30 so I could get dressed and go to church. The alarm did not wake me up. I ended up waking up at 10:30 which was a major bummer. For a split second I thought about not going but that immediately went out of my mind. I threw on a nice shirt and almost ran over to church. I caught the tail end of it and was able to get communion. It was still worth it. I stood over to the side of the pew I always sit in. Rachelle, Katherine, and Phil were there as were all the regular people I always sit by. It was interesting to take a sort of back seat view and watch it all unfold. I was really sad to leave. The four of us stood outside for a while and chatted. Then Rachelle and I walked back to Metrogate.

I ate some lunch and then went to the grocery store to buy a little bit more food to get me through to Saturday. After procrastinating long enough I started working on my Sociology paper. I wrote about the Diversity in London. I talked about how London has been a city of immigrants and locals since it was founded by the Romans. I also talked about how the best evidence of the diversity is simply walking around any neighborhood and seeing the restaurants and people. Then I threw in some stats to back up my claim of it being a multi-ethnic city. I worked on and off all afternoon and evening. One object of my procrastination was calling my mom, dad and brother. I finished the paper at around 10 I think. Then I started working on the post about my first day in Paris. I finished it up pretty late and then went to bed.

See ya!

Square Eyes

I woke up and went to church today. It's hard to believe but I am only going to be able to go one more Sunday. Then I am off on my trip and then back home. That is really sad. I have already chronicled how much I like the place and feel comfortable there. Oh well, to go to new places, you have to leave some behind. Church this week was more like I am used to. There were a ton of kids making a racket the whole time. Last week's quietness was unsettling. It was partly cloudy when I walked to church and down pouring when I left. Pretty typical weather nowadays. I think that if it is sunny in the morning, then it will rain in the afternoon. If it is cloudy or raining in the morning, it will be sunny in the afternoon. That is a totally weird weather pattern but it's pretty much the case.

I came back from church and ate lunch. I had PBJ and fruit cocktail (Dad). I procrastinated and stumbled upon some recordings of Rick Steves (a travel guru) and his radio show. I listened to the shows about Paris and Greece. He has some on Turkey too which I will have to check out sometime. They are pretty interesting and fun to listen to. Then I starting writing the paper for Senior Sem. It's about a "universal moral theory". It's as exciting as it sounds, trust me. That was pretty much my day. I spent most of it on the computer, just like yesterday. Thus the post title, square eyes. I feel like my eyes are going to start being square soon. I hate it. Yesterday and today it thunderstormed. That's different for London. Usually it's just rainy and windy.

A couple things that I didn't mention about yesterday. I finished reading Band of Brothers. It's by Stephen Ambrose and chronicles the formation and adventures of Easy Company of the 101st Paratroopers Division. The mini-series by the same name is based off the book. It is really well written and taught me a lot about WWII. It is amazing how much I don't know about it. There are so many things that I want to read about when I get back home. I can't wait. The other thing (also not very exciting) is that I watched parts of My Big, Fat, Greek Wedding. I hadn't seen any of that movie pretty much since it came out and I went and saw it with Mom, Greg, Amy and I think Claire. We went to a movie theater faraway if I remember correctly. It was so funny. Anyway, that's all I have to say for today. Tomorrow is back to class. The bright spot on the horizon is that Paris is only 72 hours away. Yippee!!

Toodle Loo!

Snow Day

I woke up kind of late so I didn't eat breakfast before church today. I also didn't really look outside before I walked out the front door. Something felt different about the street from when we got back last night. The difference was that there was snow on the cars and falling from the sky! Yes. SNOW. I ran back in and got my camera and took a couple pictures while I walked to church (picture 1 and 2). It is insane that just three days ago I wore shorts. Weather just doesn't make sense. So I went to church which wasn't all that exciting. Church was really empty today. I don't know what the deal was but it was weird. There were very few kids screaming or talking. The same little boy from Easter was there but he sat a couple row in front of me and to the right so I couldn't see him very well. :-(

I got back from church and ate breakfast/ lunch. Then I read from a book for our Islam class that we have to do a review on. I was reading while laying in my bed because there really isn't anywhere else to do it here. That was a bad idea. I eventually fell asleep for a good hour or two. I was really tired from only getting about six hours of sleep last night but I would have rather not napped. Oh well. Then I went on the computer and typed up all of my journal entries for Art History. We were supposed to do them as we went but I didn't so I had to catch up now. It isn't due for two weeks though. That was about my whole night. I did ten entries. I made dinner in the middle of typing them up. I bought the cheap pasta but some nice spaghetti sauce for once. It was a carbonara sauce with pieces of panchetta in it. So good. It was nice having a sauce that wasn't tomato based for once. So yeah, that's about it. I just did homework for most of the day.

It's crazy looking back at the last few days and all the stuff I have done. I think it was good to just sit around and not go out. The Olympic torch passed through London today as some of you might be aware of. I didn't go out and see it because it was cold and snowing. I also didn't see it because it passed by Notting Hill Gate (the closest it came to where I live) while I was in church plus I just wasn't that interested in the spectacle. It sort of was a once in a lifetime experience but I just didn't want to go through the trouble today. Also, Mom e-mailed me a picture of her in her hostel room that I mentioned before (the really tiny one). I thought it would be nice to share with people (picture 3). I hope everyone had nice Sunday!

Bon soir!

Tower of Easter

One of the things I do when I can't think of a title for a blog entry is replace one word with another which allows for more coverage of what happened that day, kind of like the Before and After puzzles on Wheel of Fortune but not really. This title is no exception. My mom and I went to the Tower of London on Easter. Thus the Tower of Easter. It doesn't really make sense but that's something you all will just have to deal with.

Since it was Sunday and I just about always go to church on Sunday, that's what I did in the morning. My Mom was maybe going to meet me and go with but we decided the night before that if she wasn't there before 9:30, I should just go on my own. She didn't show up so that's what I did. The walk to church was FREEZING. It was soooo windy and it was snowing! Snowing, on Easter! Crazy. The service was not that different from any other one (no special things, like the play on Palm Sunday). The pastor did his homily with the children sitting up front which was nice. There were so many kids there! Even more than usual I mean.

The best part of the mass by far was the little boy who sat in front of me. He reminded me SO MUCH of Sam. Not as cute but pretty darn close. He would stand up on his dad's lap and his dad would mak the biggest grin. While he leaned over their shoulder, I we sounds and he would break out intoould do peek-a-boo with my song book. It made my heart hurt a little to think of how long it had and has been since I saw Sam and Josh and Emily. At the same time, it seemed a little like an Easter gift from the Big Guy Upstairs that I got to see this child who was so much like Sam throughout the mass. That's why I don't really remember much else about what happened, I was too busy paying attention to the boy. After the mass, I told them how cute their baby was and about Sam. They said their son was 11 months old so a little older but still close.

The snow stopped while I walked back. I met up with my mom who apparently had an adventure of her own. She took the bus from her hotel to the Tate Britain but got a little off track along the way. That is totally understandable. London can be really confusing sometimes. Anyway, we met up and went to the Tower of London (picture 1). We took the Tube but had to wait in line to buy tickets unfortunately. It was cold but we survived. The Tower of London is a big tourist attraction (or trap, depending on your point of view). It all started with the White Tower which was a Norman tower built in 1097 and is 90 ft. tall. From there the complex get expanded more and more throughout the centuries until its current size. The Tower is known best of all as a place where lots of famous people have died. Most people were publicly executed on Tower Hill, outside the Tower walls in front of enormous crowds. The Tower is also known for holding the Crown Jewels.

So we walked in and went on a "Beefeater" tour. The "Beefeaters" are actually called Yeoman Warders and no one really knows why they are called that. They have lived and protect the Tower of London for many centuries. Now, instead of protecting the complex, they give very entertaining tours of it (picture 2). We started the tour talking about one of the 20 towers in the complex. We walked along and passed my the Traitor's Gate which was a gate that leads to the River Thames. Accused people would pass through the gate and into the Tower of London on their way to be executed or held there. We walked by and listened to the Beefeater talk about the White Tower. Just outside the tower are the Ravens of the Tower (picture 3). Legend has it that if the Ravens ever leave the Tower, the White Tower, the monarchy and all of the UK will fall. Needless to say, there is a cage. There were so many people following along on the tour that it was hard to hear him sometimes and kind of uncomfortable. It was only that busy because it was Easter and everyone was on holiday. Our next stop was the Tower Green which was the private execution area (picture 4). Only seven people were killed here, including Lady Jane Grey and Anne Boleyn, two of the wives of Henry VIII. Then we went into the Chapel of St. John which has quite a few famous people buried in it. That's where the tour ended.

After the tour we walked around and found the end of the line for viewing the Crown Jewels. It was so long. We had to wait for about 20 minutes or more, I can't remember. Then once inside, we had to shuffle around people to actually see anything. The Crown Jewels were really amazing though. The Imperial State Crown has over 2,800 diamonds and 273 pearls among other precious gems on it. The State Sword is one of if not the most expensive sword in the world. There are many other jewels and things like the Orb (symbolizing the power of Christ the Redeemer) and the Sceptre with the Cross which has the largest cut diamond in the world, 530-carat, in the middle of it. All the opulence and wealth kind of made me feel bad and that it was kind of a waste but what do I know. At least it looks cool I guess. I should mention that all of the jewels are super important in the coronation ceremony of a new monarch and are worn when the Queen opens Parliament each year. Lots of tradition and history involved in them.

After the Jewel House, we walked through the White Tower which has a bunch of exhibitions on armor and weaponry. This is because the White Tower served as an armory for about 700 years or more. The highlight of the whole collection of pikes, shotguns, muskets, swords, and armor (for horses and people) is the armor for Henry VIII. The armor is very nice looking but there might have been a little bit of exaggeration on a certain part of the armor (picture 5). From there we walked around part of the walls and into a room where they kept some of the old crowns (they make new ones when the stones start to fall out of the old ones). There was a kid in there that kept whistling the same tune over and over and over and over again. I seriously wanted to punch him in the throat. I hate people sometimes. We left there and walked around the inside some more. Finally the sun made an appearance. The White Tower looked awesome with the blue sky and white clouds (picture 7). We took some pictures of us with the Tower Bridge in the background (picture 8 and 9). We walked through one of the buildings that is actually inside the walls and it had windows over looking Tower Bridge (picture 10). After that we decided to leave.

We walked along the River Thames so that Mom could see some the South Bank sites from across the river. Plus it was still sunny and I wanted to savor it while we could. We walked until we got to St. Paul's Cathedral which we walked in a little bit (there was a service going on so it was free to go in but we couldn't walk in very far). Still just as spectacular as before. From there, we took the bus back and stopped at Tesco on the way. We got a ham sandwich, some pasta salad, and carrots sticks for our Easter Dinner. We ate it in the basement while we called people back home to wish them a Happy Easter (picture 11). It was a very different kind of Easter Dinner than I am used to but I still liked it. Better than spending it alone anyway. I had a very memorable Easter and couldn't wait to get ready to leave for Spain. That's all for today!

Happy Easter!

Explore the Great Indoors

It was a cold and rainy day today so I didn't really go outside unless I needed to. This lead to me not doing much of anything exciting yet again. Sorry but its the way it is. I could look it up but I think that it has rained at least a little bit every single day for a week. We are getting paid back for all the just incredibly beautiful days we had earlier on. I hate pay back.

I did go outside to go to church day. It was Palm Sunday which I remember as a kid always being a little excited for. I was excited because it was when they would have a bunch of different people come up and read the parts of the Passion. They would stand at different places all over the middle of the church. It was different which was nice. Well, instead of having a bunch of adults come up, my church here had the school children (the church has a primary school) act out the Passion. It was really well done and just great to see. The kids were about 4 grade I would say, maybe a little older. I got a palm and hung it up over the mirror in my bedroom.

Actually, there was one exciting thing I did today. I am going to Paris!!! Wahoo!! I bought a return coach ticket for the night of April 16 and April 19. Just like Scotland, overnight coach there, two nights in a hostel, overnight coach back so three full days. I was kind of hedging about going to Paris and/or doing some other things but now that I bought the coach tickets, I am just super pumped. I can't wait. I did a project with Matt McLaughlin in 10th grade for Mrs. Toman's French Class where we had to write a journal about a fake 5 day trip to Paris and write it all in French. I wonder what ever happened to it. Anyway, one of the days we said we went to Pigalle at night and ended up sleeping on a park bench instead of a hotel. Hahaha. I can't remember what the circumstances were where we ended up on the bench but that doesn't really matter. That was an awesome project. Looking at all the attractions in Paris, I think of that journal. Plus, it will be the middle of April so more flowers should be in bloom which would be phenomenal. (On a side note, who would have thought that I would EVER be excited about flowers??? Certainly not me.)

The other excitement in my life is this book Beginner's Greek by James Collins. It's a romantic comedy book but written by a guy so it's not exactly like that. It reads just like a movie. I actually found myself laughing out loud at times and I shed a tear or two at the end. The premise is two people meet and fall in love but don't end up together at first. It's not ruining the story to say that the two main characters get together because that is evident the entire time. It's how they end up together and all the stuff they go through that makes the story. Some reviews online say that it was too wordy but I thought that was one of the strengths of it. I loved the descriptions of the places and people. By the end of the book, I was rooting for the guy, Peter, like he was my best friend. I suppose I am building it up too much for anybody who ends up reading it later in life but I don't care. Like yesterday, when I was doing the mental recap of my day in my head before I started typing my blog, the only thing that really stood out was this book, not the cathedral or castle. I actually had to look up the name of the cathedral again, haha. This was truly one of my favorite books to read ever.

So that's all that's new. I have a test in Senior Sem tomorrow. Should be fun. Also, tomorrow night, Vanessa, Peter, and I are going over to Phil's (my director) place to have dinner. Everyone in the program goes over there eventually in our time here. I am excited to eat the really good food.

Bon Soir!

Future Math Teachers Unite!

I am sitting at the computer writing this blog entry with Maggie Donahue sitting next to me on a computer as well. She was in Scotland this weekend and spent the today in London. Amazing!!!

That paragraph was written, like it says, with Maggie sitting next to me. Sadly, she has left me here all alone again so the rest was not written with her here.

I started the day by going to church. It was really good. The pastor, Father Perry, did the service. He hasn't been at the 10 am mass for a while so it was nice to have him again. The other priests have bad accents and are hard to hear. Plus Fr. Perry is just very calm and he smiles a lot. I like his style. Not to get too evangelical but I just liked his homily. He had a baby (not the Fr. Grile Christmas Special Homily) and talked about how babies can't see when they are first born just like people can't "see" until they baptized. It was more complicated than that but it was really good. He did a good job. It was refreshing to be able to completely understand the whole Homily. Anyway, I didn't go to Whole Foods like usual after mass because Maggie had told me that she would be in London today so I went back to the flat and tried to call her. It was no good. Her phone wasn't working. I was depressed but couldn't do anything about it. I started to put more pictures on Facebook and then all of a sudden I got an e-mail that said. "Call me you fool!" I replied calmly, "I can't!!" and then gave her my phone number. Soon after I got a call.

We met up at Trafalgar Square (picture 1). Kristina came with me because she knew some of the people Maggie was traveling with. We walked around the square looking for them. I turned to Kristina and said, "I bet Maggie is going to either scream my name or jump on me when she sees me." Sure enough, like 1 minute after saying that, Maggie jumped on my back. It was so cool to see her. The first thing we noticed was that we have the exact same coat!! Haha, the rain coat thing that I always wear and bought from REI. Crazy. Reminds me of the first time I saw John's winter coat (we have the exact same one of those too). I guess the old saying, "great minds think alike" is true. Maybe the other old saying applies better, I think it goes "Jeremy has excellent fashion sense" :-)

Anyway, it was just unspeakably cool to be able to see Maggie here (picture 2). It was like having a little bit of home come and visit. That sounds weird maybe to people who are still in MN. The same kind of feeling comes over me when I buy fruit cocktail (Dad) or read a depressing young adult book (Amy) or see a little boy walking hand in hand with his dad (Josh and Sam) or see an amazing sunset (Mom). In each one of those instances, its sort of like each of you are there with me. I have stuff like that for everyone from back home. With Maggie being here, it was like all my SJU friends and memories were here, even though it was only Maggie actually sitting with me. I hope that that makes some sense. As soon as Maggie and I started talking, it was game over with the rest of her friends. I felt sort of bad because we were walking way faster than everyone else but I was just so excited to talk and see her that it translated into a faster walking pace. Plus, I always walk kind of fast now. Its just a by product of all the walking I do.

Maggie and her pals wanted to see the Tower Bridge so we crossed the Thames on the Jubilee Bridge and walked along the South Bank. We passed the National Theatre, Globe Theatre, Tate Modern, Vinopolis, the Clink, and London Bridge. Maggie and I stopped on the Tower Bridge (Maggie said picture 3 looks like an elephant, I agree) and sat and talked while we waited for the rest of the group to catch up (where we sat picture 4). I don't even know what we talked about. Just a million things. We were sitting there and some people walked by and one was wearing a St. Cloud State sweatshirt. Turns out Maggie swam with that girl for 11 years when they were little. Go figure... The group caught up and Maggie and I zoomed off to go back to our flats. The rest of the group went another way back.

I took Maggie back by way of The Strand, the major roadway through The City. We passed by St. Paul's Cathedral, the Royal Courts of Justice, and Fleet Street. St. Mary-Le-Strand (picture 5), the church in the middle of the road, was looking especially good in the late light and budding trees. We got back to Trafalgar Square and continued on my well worn path back to the flats (I have walked from Trafalgar to Metrogate about 10-15 times. The usual sights went by: St. James's Park, Green Park, Buckingham Palace, Hyde Park Corner, and Hyde Park (the Serpentine and daffodils picture 6). It was fun to go on it with someone that wasn't jaded by it all like I think me and Vanessa are sometimes. This whole time we were talking and walking by the way. We took a little different way back by passing by Harrod's (picture 7), the V&A, and the Natural History Museum.

Back at the flats, Maggie and I had a cup of tea while we waited for the others. When they got there, we made the noodles and sauce that they had bought. They bought 2 kilos worth of noodles (!). That's a lot of noodles. There were 7 of us though and, come hell or high water, we finished all of them. Like I said, Maggie and her friends had just been in Scotland and they took an over night bus to London so they were all really tired. Plus, I felt like they were visiting me in my "home" so I was sort of the host. I did all of the cooking and cleaning. They offered numerous times to help but there wasn't much to help with and they were all tired. This made me think of one of the big themes of The Odyssey which is hospitality. All the people in the book offer lots of hospitality to everyone else who visits because they know that some day they will need the hospitality when they are out adventuring. I feel that way now too. Sort of a "Pay It Forward" type of thing. Plus I really enjoyed cooking for all those people. A welcome change to always only making stuff for myself which can be depressing and boring. It was really funny trying to finish the noodles (everyone was so full). Maggie told me that she sometimes cuts up garlic or spinach and adds it to the crappy sauce she buys which makes it taste way better. Great idea. I will remember that. Also, one of the people in her group made coffee chocolate. That being melted chocolate mixed with instant coffee and sugar, then reformed. DELICIOUS!!!!! It was so good and it was instant energy.

After dinner, we all just hung out in the dining room and computer room. They finally got ready to leave. I was really sad to see them go. It was all over so quickly! I was really sad to see Maggie and all her friends go. They had to catch a bus to Stansted for their flight in the morning. I was so glad to have Maggie come here while I was in London. I was/am amazed that the same person that I worked on Foundations homework with 18 months ago, is the same person I was walking across the Tower Bridge with. Crazy!! I had an awesome day of walking and talking. Tomorrow: class :-/

Thanks for coming Maggie and friends!

TTFN: Ta Ta For Now!

Back to School, Back to School

Well I didn't write an update of what I did yesterday because I didn't do anything. I went to church which was really nice. As I have said before, and the Pope agreed (haha), going back to Our Lady of Victories Church is kind of like going home here. It was weird to be gone for a week. After church, I went on the computer and promptly sat there for most of the rest of the day. I put a whole crap load of pictures on Facebook. If you don't have Facebook, try and find someone who does because I can only put 8-10 pictures on my blog per day but I put 60 per day on Facebook. Plus I took the pictures so they have to be good :-) I had tortellini for dinner and started reading The Odyssey.

Today we all had to go to back to school which was weird. In Sociology in the City, we watched From Hell which is a movie from 2001 about Jack the Ripper. It was pleasant way to spend a class period. Haha, so easy. The movie was good though and it was interesting comparing what they did in the movie to what happened in real life. In Senior Sem, we talked about all the stuff we have coming up this week:

Tuesday - The Vertical Hour, a play at 7:30 pm
Wednesday - Globe Theater Tour at 10 am; Pirates of Penzance at 2:30 pm
Saturday - Cambridge Visit with Evensong at King's College

That's a lot of stuff. We talked about Anglican Music more and about the plays we are going to see. After class, I went to the library and got a new card. I picked up a bunch of new books that I am excited about. I also stopped at a store and bought some new ear phones because my old ones broke. Then I came back and worked on my blog more. That's about it. Kind of boring but its nice feeling like I am getting stuff accomplished and almost caught up with the blog. I had some pre-made lasagna and a bread stick thing for dinner. The lasagna was no where near as good as my mom's and made me a little sad. I miss everyone back home and I hope you all are enjoying the stories of my trip!

*Waves goodbye*

Je suis fatigué

I was really tired just about all day so I never got around to doing my posts about Scotland. I will get them up tomorrow. It was a really fun trip. My two favorite parts were the East Sands and Arthur's Seat, those will be explained.

Um, what else? I was going to go over to my cousin Sonya's house today but one of her son's was not feeling well so that is going to happen another time. I hope he gets feeling better. I really wanted to go but in a way I was kind of glad that I didn't. I ended up napping from 2-6. I only had 40 pages left of Gods and Generals so I started to read and immediately fell asleep. Haha, oops. Its ok though. I needed it. I only got 3 hours of sleep on the bus last night.

I went to church today too. Rachelle had not gotten back from Ireland so I went alone. It was kind of weird to not have her there. Most of the other cast of characters were at church though. All the kids were there too (unlike Ash Wednesday). I think I saw with my own eyes about 10-12 kids crying. That doesn't include all the ones I heard crying. Crazy. I kept up our tradition of going into Whole Foods after church and just browsing for a few minutes and then leaving. Weird thing to do I know but it's fun to see all the weird food they have there. Then I came back, ate some lunch and went to pick up my pictures from Sainsbury's. Tomorrow I will start scanning some of them in and add them to my previous posts. More details when I actually do it. I also dropped off my cameras from Scotland. They will be done on Tuesday so pictures will come then or if I can get Vanessa's earlier.

So I napped after getting my pictures and then finished the book. I really liked Gods and Generals. It is historical fiction about the first half of the civil war. I hadn't read anything about the civil war in a long time. It was funny hearing about some of the battles and officers and having my memory jogged a little. I wish I had some of my books here. For those who don't know, I was obsessed with the civil war in junior high. I was hungry after finishing the book so I made dinner, shell noodles with onion and garlic tomato sauce. I also had a little garlic bread thing which was just amazingly good. For dessert, chocolate mousse. All in all, a very delicious dinner.

It feels good to be back here after being on the bus and sleeping in the big hostel rooms. I know it was only 4 nights (after the program I am going to be doing that for 5 weeks, yikes) but it was still nice to be back to a place I am familiar with. I have a bunch of stuff to do before Wednesday: freak out about not having my camera yet, get a bunch of books to read in Italy, do the posts about Scotland, read more about Italy, do homework, miss everyone back home a ton. That's a long list. That's all for now.

Happy Chinese New Year!

We All Follow Chelsea, On to Victory

Even though I walked a lot today, it still felt like kind of a lazy day. Previously, I walked around the East of the Chelsea neighborhood. Today, not really on purpose, I walked around the Western end of it. That's how the past few days have gone. Just heading out of the flats and deciding on where I am going while I walk. I kind of like it. The title of this post is part of a chant that the spectators do in the Chelsea stadium during football (soccer) games. I saw the stadium today.

I don't think I mentioned this before but I added pictures to my post from Friday about the walk through Surrey County. They are definitely worth a look.

I went to church with Rachelle again but we had some new companions. Anna, Chelsey, and Laura decided to come along with us. Its crazy thinking that including today, I have been to Our Lady of Victories 4 times. It doesn't seem like I have been there that many times. There were not as many people there as there have been in the past, at least it didn't seem like it. Either less children came than usual or I am getting used to the noise, I don't really know which. We had a priest who spoke in an Italian accent, it was hard to understand his homily. Otherwise, it was basically normal. One family was missing though. It is a mom, a dad, an older daughter, a middle son, and the youngest daughter. Last week or the week before, Rachelle and I heard the oldest daughter say to her dad, "Oscar hit me. Can I hit him back?"The dad replied with, "Yeah just not on the head." Haha. I thought it was funny. It was funnier with the British accents too.

I got back from church and ate lunch. Then I decided to go somewhere but, as usual, I didn't have a place in mind. I made my way to the Natural History Museum because I wanted to finish it off so I wouldn't have to go back. I walked inside but there were SO many families walking around, it was almost impossible to move so I left. I just started walking around and walked all the way down Fulham Road. This is a major road through Chelsea and had lots of shops along it. I was looking at my map and saw Chelsea Harbor on it so I went there. It has recently been re-developed. Lots of new apartment buildings with funky designed buildings (picture 1). I don't really know if I liked it or not. It vaguely reminded me of Canary Wharf but it was not as good, mostly because it was almost all residential and it didn't have the same vibe. I did walk down to the Thames (picture 2). It was really windy and pretty cold (for here) so I started to head back. Along the way I ran into Stamford Bridge Stadium (picture 3), the home of the Chelsea Football Club. The tours are £15 so I did not take one but the building looked very impressive from the outside.

I took a shortcut (sort of) through Brompton Cemetery (picture 4). There were soooo many graves. I have never seen that many graves in that small of a space. Fort Snelling has more graves but they are orderly, these were not. It was kind of spooky with the wind blowing, cloudy skies and bare trees. I wouldn't go in there at night. I was pretty tired by this point so I was just kind of kept putting one foot in front of the other and got through it. The rest of the walk was uneventful. I was walked along some side streets until I got back. Lots of red brick houses and some small churches.

The rest of my day was spent napping (I told you I was tired). I was planning on reading but I just sort of fell asleep. I finished Atilla yesterday on the bus. It wasn't that great. The whole book was just Atilla as an adolescent. I thought it would be a progression of his life, I was wrong. Parts of it seemed to have no point and there was a lot of foreshadowing to stuff he did as an adult but I didn't know exactly what the foreshadowing was about, just that it happened when he was older. My next book is The Diary of Anne Frank. I was just wondering through the library and I saw it. I thought it was appropriate because I am in Europe and because its diary entries which are similar to the blog entries I do. Granted, I'm not in hiding from people who would shot me on sight so its a tiny bit different but I do feel a little bit of camaraderie with her as a writer of sorts. I like it so far. Its amazing that she wrote all of it as from age 13 to 15. Impressive.

Not a very exciting day for me but I have had 4 or 5 exciting days in a row so I think I deserved a kind of boring day. I had spaghetti with butter and salt today. It tasted really good even though it was very simple. I had cookies with my tea. Really good too. Tomorrow is back to class :( Oh well, it won't be that bad.

Auf Wiedersehen!

Walk along the Thames

Today was not a very lazy Sunday. It was yet another day of awesome weather outside so I knew I couldn't spend it all inside and so I didn't.

I went to bed last night at around 1 am after finishing my book. I was awoken by Mo coming into the room very unsteadly and hopping around trying to get his shoes off and changing pants and stuff. There was a reason for his being uncoordinated which some people might guess (it was his birthday yesterday might be a clue). Anyway, I woke up during this and he mumbled something like sorry and then left again to sleep in someone else's room apparently. I immediately fell back asleep. The whole thing wasn't a very big deal to me really, it was his birthday and he could be kind of loud if he wanted to. So after sleeping again, I woke up and went to church with Rachelle. We got into our same place with the same people sitting around us (for the most part). I definitely feel more at home there than I do in my flat which is probably bad but whatever. Rachelle was looking around and spotted Phil and Katherine behind us, we did the obligatory wave. The sermon was by a priest from Australia. I think the guy was genuinely very loud and honest and stuff but I think he was also putting on a little bit of a show for everyone today during his homily. I liked him a lot and he had a lot of good things to say.

After church, Rachelle and I completed our Sunday morning ritual by going into Whole Foods on the way back and drooling over all the amazing food they have there. After we wiped the drool off our faces, we made our way back. I went online for a little bit then decided to go somewhere. I didn't decide where exactly until I was on the Tube. I got off at Vauxhall which is about a mile upstream of the Thames from Westminster. I had decided to walk on the Thames Path (a footpath on the south side of the river) for a while. A while turned into me walking from Vauxhall all the way to about a half mile past Tower Bridge. It was fantastic because the sun was on me the whole time and the River was next to me. The path wasn't too crowded most of the time. The London Eye (ferris wheel thing) had started up again after being closed for about two weeks for repairs and such. There were street performers in the park right by the Eye. The people who pretend to be statues, the break dancers, the musician, they were all there. It was fun to see them do each of their respective "thing". There was a big difference in the place from the last time I was there. I had previously walked this path but both times it was night, and raining, and the Eye was closed. Needless to say, today was the next opposite of all three of those.

Like I said, I just walked for a while next to the River, letting all the attractions and people and sights pass me by. I did wish I had a camera for parts of it but Vanessa was meeting up with one of her friends who happens to live here and I don't have one at the moment (as we all know). I got back on the Tube (probably a 4 to 5 mile walk today) and came back here.

I made spaghetti with sauce for dinner, it was ok. I read for Senior Sem tomorrow and that was about it for me today. Tomorrow is a class day as well as a grocery day, very exciting...

Cheers!

Free Books

Why would I title this entry "Free Books"? Well there are a couple reasons I did that which will be revealed shortly.

I had Senior Seminar again today. We spent about forty five minutes just doing trip business, handing out information, talking about registration and volunteering and other stuff. The next forty-five minutes we talked about where we are going Saturday. We are going to Salisbury Cathedral (more on that after we visit there), Stonehenge (I am super excited about that), and David Fanshawe. I think I mentioned this before but David Fanshawe is a composer of music who rocks. He has a CD he made where he combines guitar and percussion, choir, and recorded African music. It's called African Sanctus. If anyone reading this blog has a chance to just listen to a little bit of it, you should. It is phenomenal. It is so different from anything I have ever heard. Anyway, on Saturday, we are visiting his house and having dinner with him I guess. It should pretty sweet. So we talked about Saturday and then we listened to some of the CD, African Sanctus.

After Senior Seminar, I came back and had a quesadilla for lunch (yummmmm). I bought some hot salsa but I didn't think it was that hot, at least not compared to Greg's salsa. Then I got Vanessa to come with me and we did a little walking tour of North Kensington (northwest of where I live). The main points of the tour were A) get out and walk B) see more of our neighborhood C) get a library card and visit the library. So main point C was one of the reasons I titled this post free books. Anyway, Vanessa and I walked by the church that I go to every Sunday (all 2 of them so far), Our Lady of Victories (picture 1). Throughout the walk, we passed by houses occupied by semi-famous people. People like Lord Leighton (artist, his house is picture 2), Linley Sambourne (drew cartoons for Punch), and Kenneth Grahame (wrote The Wind in the Willows). They all lived in Kensington in Victorian times. They had really cool Victorian houses along the entire walk. Lord Leighton's is now an art museum which we did not go into, but I will someday. We walked by a restaurant owned by Bill Wyman (guitarist in Rolling Stones) called Sticky Fingers (picture 3). Holland Park is in Kensington and it has manicured gardens that must be spectacular in spring (its not spring so they aren't as good as seen in picture 4). Holland Park was part of the gardens of Holland House, a mansion that was around since 1600, but was later donated and became the main part of the park. The two of us stopped by a garden shop which has peacocks as residents (picture 5). Vanessa freaked out when saw the head of it pop up above the fence line. We eventually made our way to the Kensington Central Library and got our library cards. Same policy as the US, free books for 3 weeks, then renewals. I for got to mention that on our walking tour, we passed by one of the oldest letter boxes in London. The whole walk took about 3 hours, it was very pleasant.

Another reason I titled this entry, Free Books, is because I just finished reading a book I brought with me (for free) called Final Exam. I really liked the book (except for the ending, kind of anti-climactic if you ask me, I was expecting someone to get busted but oh well). It's a murder mystery set at Kenyon College where my uncle, Barry, is a professor. Since I left I have also read Hatchet and An Abundance of Katherines. Both were very good (AAoF being one of my favorite books I think I have ever read, I basically finished it on the plane). It's crazy, I don't think I have read this much in a verrrrry long time. Those three books, plus reading for my classes, plus reading about Britain and Europe for traveling purposes. That's a lot of reading. That's part of life though, changing and adapting. Most nights I spend watching TV and reading (as opposed to last semester where I spent most nights on the computer, playing video games, or watching tv). I'm not making any judgements on myself or what I am doing, I am simply stating the difference.

Well, that's all I have to say for now I guess. More tomorrow I presume. Adios!

Lazy Sunday

'Allo every one! So as the title suggests, its been a pretty lazy day for me.

I woke up at around 9 so I could get showered and dressed to go to church again. The walk to church was much better than time around though because I wasn't a dead man walking. Rachelle and I kept up a good pace and we were there in no time. The church service was loud, again. Little kids just running all over the place. Rachelle and I walked in and she asked where we should sit, me being a creature of habit, decided to sit in the exact same spot. It was nice beacuse all the same families and other people sat around us. It reminded me a lot of St. Als and how we have sat roughly the exact same area ever since I can remember. I did notice a couple differences in the mass today (I was too out of it to notice them last time). They change just a couple words during the Apostle's Creed and they don't sing the responsorial, they just read the verses out loud and everyone replies the chorus. Its different but not bad.

I got back from church and just sat around for an hour or so. I didn't really have anything that I wanted to do. I ate some lunch (mmm, PBJ) and just watched a little tv and read some articles online. Then I decided to do something with myself. I went to the Chelsea neighborhood.

In one of the books (Eyewitness London) they have walking tours of just about every neighborhood in London so today I picked Chelsea. Its a famous neighborhood for fashion. Mini-skirts started there in the 50s and 'Punk' was invented there in the 70s. It was a riverside town back in the day and Sir Thomas More, among other famous writers used to reside here. Chelsea is also just a 5 minute Tube ride away from me.

So I began the walk at Sloane Square (picture 1). Not much to say about the Square. It's actually a rectangle which is interesting I suppose. I continued on and walked for quite a ways along King's Road. This road has tons of shops and stuff along it. It's like High Street Kensington but fewer name brands. I walked by The Chelsea Town Hall and made my way by The Old Dairy (picture 2). That is a house that was built in 1796 when it was surrounded by cow pastures. I walked by Old Chelsea Church (picture 3) and just stepped inside for a minute. The old church was basically destroyed during WWII but they rebuilt it to almost the exact same dimensions. There is a sculpture of Sir Thomas More gazing across the Thames in front of the church. I walked along the Cheyne Walk (picture 4). Its nothing more than a path next a street which is next to the river but there used to be no road so the Walk was a little bit more romantic and scenic. Now, not so much. I walked by Thomas Carlyle's house. There was an admission charge to get in and I wasn't particularly interested so I didn't pay. Apparently a bunch of famous people used to visit Carlyle here. Dickens and Darwin are two. By the way, James Carlyle was a historian who wrote some famous books.

I continued on, walking by a ton of different brick row houses (picture 7). Very pretty and probably very expensive. I walked by Albert Bridge (picture 5). It is a suspension bridge over the Thames that has a huge amount of light bulbs along each suspension wire. It is very spectacular at night (I wouldn't know I suppose, but it was nice during the day). I walked around the Chelsea Physic Garden but it wasn't open during 'the winter'. Winter? It was like 50 degrees out today. Whatever. I moved on to the Royal Hospital (picture 6). Its not so much a hospital as it is a retirement home. It was built and designed by Christopher Wren (designed A TON of stuff in London). It is home of the Chelsea Pensioners (retirees, they call them pensioners here). I saw a couple of them as I was walking around. They have a very nice dining hall. I was looking out when at the end of the road I was walking on, I saw a bench with a wooden pensioner on it (like the ronald mcdonald things you see), and a little girl walked by with her mom. The little girl jumped up and stood on the bench and hugged the fake pensioner with all her might around the neck. Pretty much the cutest thing ever. It made my day.

I walked back to the Tube and headed for the flat. I stopped and bought some italian sausage and ham tortellini and tomato sauce for dinner. It was delicious. Then I talked to John on Skype and went out and bought some cookies for dessert. I also read for my classes tomorrow sometime during today, I don't really remember when. Anyway, it was a lazy day and I loved it. I hope everyone else had a lazy, relaxed day as well! Bon soir!

Sickness Sucks

So here's the deal. I'm sick. It kind of started last night and yesterday but today it was full blown sickness. Last night I had a headache and was really tired for most of the night but when I woke up today, I was super warm (sweating profusely) and my through hard a ton every time I swallowed and I was really achy. I sucked it up and went to church with Rachelle. The church we went to was called Our Lady of Victories Catholic Church. It was a really cool church. We went to the 10 am mass which was the family and children mass. It was so loud. They don't have crying rooms or anything (not that that would have helped, everyone would have had to go into the crying room anyway). After church we walked back to our flats and I immediately went to bed. I was so tired. I ended up sleeping from about noon to nine. This was after sleeping from midnight to nine last night. I feel better now but my throat still hurts. I think that the main reason for the sickness was the lack of sleep and the out put of energy I put myself through yesterday and the day before. Moral of the story: sleep and don't go overboard on seeing everything right away.
Speaking of yesterday, I will fill you in on what happened. So after I posted that blog entry, we went on a bus tour. Rochelle and I were seat buddies. We had the same guide that we did the day before on our walk around the neighborhood. She was funny and very smart. She knew stories and little facts about what seemed like every single place we drove by. We drove just about all over London. First we went to Chelsey and then we drove back around along the Thames and by Big Ben and Westminster Abbey. After that we proceeded to the area of London called The City. It is the oldest part of London. We took a break at St. Paul's Cathedral. I went into the Crypt Cafe and got the most delicious brownie ever. After St. Paul's Cathedral we went to Trafalgar Square and Piccadilly Circus and some other places that I can't really remember. We made our way back to the flats. Rachelle, Vanessa, Peter, Mallory, Kristina, Amy and I decided to take the train to Westminster and walk from there to Piccadilly Circus. It was a very beautiful walk and well worth the effort. We stopped by the horse guards and everyone got a picture taken next to them. We got to Piccadilly and decided to walk along Regent Street which was the only street in all of London that was actually planned and designed. Rachelle, Mallory, and I were really tired so we went back while the other four got some tea. All seven of us met up at the flats later and we all made PB&J together for dinner. It was a lot of fun. Mallory and Rachelle discussed travel plans for spring break and our free weekends. After eating dinner we took the tube down to the Thames again and found the Sherlock Holmes Restaurant and Pub. We got a pint (or something else) and it was fun. We walked along the Thames again and made our way back to our flats. I was really tired and went straight to bed. And then, like I said, today I went to church and slept. I felt kind of bad about sleeping that much but there's nothing that I could do about it. When you're sick, you're sick. Anyway, tomorrow we start classes (booooo) and hope I feel even better tomorrow morning. Three straight hours of class with a headache and sore throat would be terrible. I think it will be ok though. I guess that's all for now.