Haley + London

Day 112: Goodbye, London

2008-12-18T04:09:00.000Z

4:09 AM. Time to finish any last-minute packing and cleaning and get ready to board the buses in an hour or so. I'll be back to Minneapolis at around 5:30 PM (Central time) tonight, which is just something I can't wrap my mind around right now, though perhaps that is because of the time and my apparent lack of sleep.

Thanks for reading the blog or even just pretending to. I hope it's been interesting or even humorous at times... I hope to post more pictures in the upcoming days, so keep an eye out if you'd like.

And again, thanks for reading. It's been an amazing semester, and I'm glad I could share it.

Cheers!

Day 111: Last day in London

2008-12-17T10:13:00.000Z

And now it's Wednesday, December 17. The last day in London.

We leave the flats tomorrow morning at 5-something a.m., so today is the last bit of time we have in London. I got up early this morning and went outside to take some pictures and get a cup of coffee at this place I've been meaning to go to for a while, and now it's time to finish packing. It is a beautiful, sunny day out, though... absolutely amazing.

The plan is to finish packing soon so I can go outside and walk around, but we'll see how it goes.

I'm still in denial that we're actually leaving, and I'm usually pretty good with this kind of thing.

Anyway, I'll try to get another post in sometime soon with pictures, but I should probably just wait to do an overall recap when I'm home tomorrow (yikes!) so I don't take up time in my last day here.

I'll leave with a short quote from one of my favorite songs to listen to on the morning walk to school since I listened to it this morning while taking pictures, and the last line rang quite true - Elbow's "One Day Like This" (definitely listen to the song and you'll see why it's such a great morning song):

So throw those curtains wide
One day like this a year'd see me right

Day 110: Done with finals!

2008-12-17T10:08:00.000Z

(This is for Tuesday 16 December)

Done with finals! Had Theology and Economics finals yesterday... then headed out with a friend to celebrate our birthdays and do a little shopping. We ended up getting food at a pub right near the flats which we'd heard was really good; it ended up being the best pub food I've had here, although I haven't really eaten much pub food. A much better birthday meal than the Subway sandwich I picked up on the way home on my actual birthday!

Day 109: History, done.

2008-12-15T17:01:00.000Z

Had my history final today at noon; one down, two to go. I've got my theology and economics finals tomorrow, and then I'm done! I'm actually only one of two people I know of who don't have Wednesday finals.

Oh, and I should mention: We all leave Thursday morning from the flats at something like 5:55 am, and I think my flight to Chicago from London Heathrow is at 10 am. I'm not really sure. I'll check on that soon... but I'll be back to the MSP at around 5:30 pm Thursday night, so only a few more days before I see you all again!

I'm definitely content with everything I've done in London, but I still can't believe that everything this semester has comprised is coming to a close. It's still strange that classes are over, and I'll be done with finals 24 hours from now. Wow. What a semester.

Day 108: Studying and packing

2008-12-15T16:55:00.000Z

(This is for Sunday 14 December)

Spent all of Sunday studying and packing... nothing too exciting. It's so hard to believe the semester is coming to an end, and kind of sad that what lies between now and being home is finals and packing.

I did watch Love Actually yesterday while I packed for the first time since being in London - very fun. I actually recognized the places and things they were referring to, and the airplane scenes at the beginning and end also made me excited to come home (which, don't get me wrong, I'm incredibly excited to see you all, but I also don't want to leave London yet)!

Day 107: Mass with the Cardinal

2008-12-15T16:40:00.000Z

(This is for Saturday 13 December)

Saturday after studying I headed off to the London Centre to practice guitar for the closing Mass. The Cardinal Archbishop of Westminster was coming to celebrate Mass with us, which was really special.

The Mass was really nice, and thankfully the music went well too. It was the last official London Program event of the semester, and it finally feels like things are officially wrapping up here.

After Mass some students were invited to a reception with the Cardinal, and I was asked to take some photos. Here are a couple:

A great close to an amazing semester.

Day 106: Dover + Christmas Party

2008-12-15T16:26:00.000Z

(This is for Friday 12 December)

Friday I finally made it out to the white cliffs of Dover! Sadly, the castle and war tunnels (which I really wanted to go to) closed super early, so even though we were there at 3 pm we couldn't go. Very sad.

It was a cute town, though, and the cliffs were gorgeous (even though it was cloudy and freezing and windy). Made it feel more historical than just like a beach city... you could almost see the Nazis flying over.

After getting home one of the flats decorated everything all cute for Christmas, so I stopped by for the Christmas party. Very fun and festive, and it almost felt like we were a big London family.

Click here for the Dover + Christmas album.

Day 105: Presentation + The Globe

2008-12-15T16:06:00.000Z

(This is for Thursday 11 December)

Had my final day at BBDO Thursday! I gave my presentation around 11:30, and it was great to finish with it and show my work to my coworkers. It was really an amazing experience, and I've learned so much in different ways. I can't really imagine what my experience in London would have been like without the internship. Let me clarify: I know that it would have been just as incredible, but in different ways. I think the internship has given me a kind of British construct to define my British experience here, and I don't know how I would have defined it otherwise.

Here are some photos of the outside of the building:

From BBDO, Oxford, The Globe

After work, I shopped around Marylebone High Street and then Oxford Street for a bit, which was a little overwhelming but also very Christmasy feeling.

Some photos on the way to the Globe:

There was a Shakespeare class here that's been working on scenes from A Midsummer Night's Dream the whole semester, and they performed them at Shakespeare's Globe Theatre Thursday night, which was just awesome. I can't imagine what it would be like to act on that stage, though watching friends was pretty exciting. We had a nice reception afterward, and then it was back to the flats to finish up some work!

Day 104: Brick Lane

2008-12-15T15:54:00.000Z

(This is for Wednesday 10 December)

Final day of class! Wow.

After class, I worked on my final project for BBDO at the London Centre and then we had our final gathering for the Honours Seminar as a dinner at Brick Lane. It was great to head there while our professor pointed out various historical things and told us about Jack the Ripper. We had just about every appetizer, and then somehow I had enough room for my main course, which was amazing... I can't quite remember what it was - I got chicken and prawn d____. It had onions, tomatoes, and I think green peppers... milder tasting, and not so saucy.

It was a great end to a semester of an amazing class, and we've already tentatively planned a reunion next semester.

Still, even now I can't believe this semester is over!

Day 103: Happy birthday to me

2008-12-15T15:47:00.000Z

(This is for Tuesday 9 December)

So, Tuesday was my birthday! We sang happy birthday the night before at midnight at a pub after the show, so that was nice... saw a lot of people on Tuesday and headed to the Cecil Sharp Folk Club after a day full of class - very cool. So amazing to be spending a birthday in London! Can't believe it.

Day 102: The Woman in Black

2008-12-15T15:32:00.000Z

(This is for Monday 8 December)

Monday I went to the play The Woman in Black just off of Covent Garden at the Fortune Theatre for Honours Seminar. It's a classic ghost story and was incredibly well done. I definitely almost screamed a few times. I really enjoyed the play and love to scare myself, and it was the perfect play for that. If you didn't want to be scared, you probably wouldn't be. There was a large group of middle school or high school aged kids behind us (scary how I can't tell how old kids are anymore), which was hilarious... gasps and screaming all over the place.

I'd definitely recommend it at Christmastime to anyone in London!

Day 101: Homework at Southbank

2008-12-14T11:47:00.000Z

(This is for Sunday 7 December)

Sunday I had to do work the whole day, but I decided to head to the Southbank Centre since they have free wi-fi instead of staying inside in the flats or going to the London Centre.

I sat outside for a while reading and watched people at the Christmas market. I still can't believe that I did homework just watching the Thames and a Christmas market in London...

I headed inside after it got darker and watched some children's choirs perform, which was adorable. A great way to do homework, even though I'm sure I could have been more productive.

Day 100: Union Chapel

2008-12-14T11:38:00.000Z

(This is for Saturday 6 December)

Saturday I went to a free concert at Union Chapel in Islington because one of the groups from Friday, Rún, mentioned they were doing a show. It was really nice, and I liked the variety of wintery-Christmas songs and more trad-sounding ones. I hadn't been to the Union Chapel yet and had wanted to go, so this was the perfect opportunity.

Day 99: Young Folk Awards

2008-12-14T11:10:00.000Z

(This is for Friday 5 December)

Friday after our final English Composers class I stayed at the London Centre for a while to finish up some work and then was planning on heading over to the Southbank Centre for a quick free performance organized by The Magpie's Nest , a folk club I've fallen in love with here. They had organized a few sets before and after the BBC Radio 2 Folk Awards, so since the awards were sold out I figured I'd stop at the first free set on my way home from the London Centre.

While I was there, I saw Sam Lee, one of the people in charge of The Magpie's Nest, who conducted our workshop at the Cecil Sharp House for English Composers. I mentioned that I'd decided to stop by on my way home even though I wasn't going to the awards, and after the performances he found me and mentioned he had asked about getting more tickets - what a nice guy! He ended up finding out that there were actually a lot of tickets that had been returned, but still, I wouldn't have found that out if he hadn't checked on them. I ended up going to the awards show, which was great. There were so many talented young people, some of whom just exuded amazing potential, and others who were more seasoned already. I think my favorite performance was from the winners of last year's award, Jeana Leslie and Siobhan Miller.

You can listen to their performance from last year's awards here. Or I'd highly recommend watching the following two YouTube videos:
Saints and Sinners
Bedlam Boys

This year's contestants and winners were great as well, but I left wanting to find more of last year's winners' music.

Oh, and here are some photos from the walk over there:

From London and Thames at Night

Day 98: Lighting of the Tree

2008-12-14T11:00:00.000Z

(This is for Thursday 4 December)

Thursday I was at my internship all day working on my final project, so afterwards I met up with a friend in Trafalgar Square for the lighting of the tree. Every year for about 62 years now, I believe, Oslo has donated a tree from their forest to London as a sign of thankfulness for Britain's help in the war. There were a choir and a band there for carols before the ceremony, and then numerous people including the Lord Mayor of Westminster, the mayor of London (Boris Johnson), and the mayor of Oslo gave speeches.

Boris Johnson lived up to his reputation, saying something about "all those hedge fund managers who have made millions in shorting to get us in this crisis are wondering when it will be okay to go out and start flashing all their money as they walk down Oxford and Regent Street... well, the lighting of this tree is a signal that it's okay to go." What a guy...

The mayor of Oslo made a very sweet speech in English, including a few jokes that I'm sure made sense before the translation, and then pressed the button to light the tree.

It was a cute ceremony, and there were a surprising number of Oslonians (?) there as well, including two very tall ones in front of my friend and me. Here's an example of me just holding up my camera and hoping for the best:

And here, the Christmas tree after the ceremony:

Day 97: Queens, giant spiders, and socks.

2008-12-14T09:52:00.000Z

(This is for Wednesday 3 December)

Behind again... sorry! I'll catch up though because I should be studying for finals, so we all know I'll be needing some study breaks.

Wednesday after class I heard from someone it was the opening of Parliament, so I headed over towards Parliament to see if I could see the Queen. Thankfully I had my camera with me that day, so I was able to get some shots. It was pretty cool to see all of the guards lined up and all of the horsemen coming through - something special you don't really get to see too often.

From Queens, giant spiders, and socks

I stayed long enough to see the Queen go into Parliament and come back out, then headed over to the Tate Modern , my original plan for the day. I walked through the Southbank Christmas market on the way, which was cute.

Though I wouldn't say I'm necessarily a modern art-lover, I really do enjoy a good amount of it. Even if you don't like Jackson Pollock (though I do), there's something different about standing two feet away from those paint streaks and splatters than looking at a slide of it.

One of the main exhibitions a lot of the ND kids have been talking about is Dominique Gonzalez-Foerster's "TH.2058". There's a large, warehouse-type room with empty metal bunk beds, a giant spider, a giant apple core, a dinosaur skeleton, and other random things.

Can't really say whether I really liked or didn't like the exhibition, but it was pretty neat to walk through it since it was just a giant room. After going through pretty much all of the free rooms, I went to this little quiz/game thing where there were about six adults playing a touch screen game. Apparently, I dominated the game, and at the end all of the arrows pointed towards my screen, and this sweet old Irish couple were just absolutely amazed and thought I must be a genius for winning the Tate Modern quiz game. I chatted with them for a bit, and the husband had been involved in the integration of education in Northern Ireland, meeting and working with Bill Clinton in the 1980s. Pretty cool to randomly meet someone involved with something like that.

Heading back to the flats, I took Millenium Bridge over the Thames and headed past St. Paul's Cathedral, which now has a Christmas tree up in front of it!

I'm not sure if it's because I'm a December baby, but Christmastime is one of the best times of year.

Later that night I headed out to the Borderline in Soho to see the band Department of Eagles. The show was just great, and we managed to get up to the front and centre, right in front of the stage. It was a small venue anyway, but it was great being right there. I only took a few pictures, but I'm glad with how they turned out. The concert made me appreciate the band's music a lot more, and it doesn't hurt that they were really down-to-earth guys. I got my ticket signed afterwards, and when I was talking with one of the guys, I said I'd seen his sock during the show and it looked like he had guitar socks that matched his sweater -- turns out they were actually squirrel socks. And that he was wearing two different socks. I'm not awkward when I talk to people in bands at all...

Day 96: British humour

2008-12-02T22:58:00.000Z

In an optional extra Honours Seminar class today we watched our professor's favorite comedy, which was very British but also hilarious. Made me realize there aren't too many good comedies from the US, though. I actually cannot think off the top of my head what my favorite comedy is... but I guess I'm not too much of a movie person anyway.

Day 95: The Holly and the Ivy

2008-12-01T23:18:00.000Z

Wow. What a concert... we went to St. John's in Smith Square today for a Christmas concert - "The Glory of Christmas" - which was a benefit for the Head & Neck Cancer Research Trust. It was spectacular.

Here's the program:

Christmas Oratorio | JS Bach

Jauchzet, frohlocket | BWV 248

Winter from "The Seasons" | A Vivaldi

Fantasia on Christmas Carols | Ralph Vaughan Williams

Messiah | Worthy is the Lamb | GF Handel

____

Messiah | Hallelujah Chorus | GF Handel

Choir and audience | The First Nowell

Choir

In Dulci Jubilo | arr Pearsall (Carols for choirs)

The Holly and the Ivy | arr Jacques (Carols for choirs)

Lully Lulla | Kenneth Leighton

Choir and audience | O Little Town of Bethlehem

Choir and audience | See Amid the Winter's Snow

Choir and orchestra

Il est né le divin enfant

Myn Lyking

Masters in this Hall

Choir and audience | Hark the Herald Angels Sing

Organ Voluntary

In Dulce Jubilo | JS Bach

There were readings in between most pieces done by (I think) those who have been treated for neck or head cancer or are somehow involved with the organization. It was really nice and helped to break everything up.

It was performed by the Thames Chamber Orchestra under director Keith Marshall with the Choir of Christ's College, Cambridge under director David Rowland.

Oh, and did I mention that [HRH] Princess Alexandra was there, too? We did the whole stand until she sat down thing, although I never saw her.

The performance was beautiful, and the lead violinist was stunning. I don't know if this is normal at all, but for the Vivaldi piece he stood up and led the orchestra instead of the conductor directing everyone. It was incredible to hear and see it performed from the second row in a beautiful old church; we could even hear the violinist (David Juritz) breathe.

Anyway, time to study some more for an econ test. I can't believe it's December and that I've been to a Christmas concert already! This makes me wish I could go to the Christmas concert at Wooddale this month, but I'm missing it by I think four days, sadly.

Day 94: Blog updating

2008-12-01T00:55:00.000Z

(This is for today!!)

Wow, finally caught up!

For something fun, watch this video. It will make you happy – or at least, that's my wish.

Day 93: Barn Dance

2008-12-01T00:45:00.000Z

(This is for Saturday 29 November)

Saturday night I headed to a barn dance up the road as part of my recent folk endeavors. I wasn't really sure what the dance would entail, but I was able to get my name and my friends' names on the concessionary ticket list since we are local, so why not check it out?

It was at the Finsbury Town Hall in a large ball room that was beautiful.

When we arrived, the band hadn't started yet and people were kind of just standing around. I immediately felt underdressed, but soon realized we were also the youngest people there. There were a lot of late 20-somethings, but there was a strong representation of 30-somethings and 50+ people as well.

The first dance, we initially decided to wait it out and just see what things were like, but a friend and I decided we might as well just go for it. There was a lady up front announcing the moves and teaching everyone what the dance was like. We missed the first bit though, so we ended up not really having any idea what was going on. This dance required switching partners each time, which was so much fun. You'd end up with someone else who had no idea what was going on, and you'd both just give each other a shrug saying, "I have no idea what to do, but oh well!" and attempt to follow along with the dance.

This is basically what happened for the rest of the dances... so much fun. Some of them my friends and I actually understood, so we'd spend the dance trying to help other people figure out what was going on while not stepping on anyone's feet. I was definitely laughing most of the time. I love folk music. It really was quite the experience and is one of my favorite things I've done in London that I definitely would not have been able to do on campus.

Day 92: Cambridge

2008-12-01T00:26:00.000Z

(This is for Friday 28 November)

Friday after class most of the Honours Seminar headed out to Cambridge for class. Our professor went to Cambridge, so he was the perfect tour guide for our day there. We stopped for a pub lunch overlooking the river and then walked around a lot of the colleges. It was absolutely beautiful, and I'm glad we were able to see Cambridge at night. One word that really comes to mind is 'romantic'.

I'll hopefully get some pictures up soon, but I'm trying to find my card reader right now... it's got to be around the flat somewhere.

I think I liked Cambridge better than Oxford, but that's probably mainly because I learned so much about the University I wouldn't have learned if I'd gone on my own. I also feel like I have a much better understanding of what students are like there and what college life means. I think I would really like that style of learning, where intellectual and personal are so much more intertwined. The learning process isn't something confined as much to the classroom as it is in America.

After walking around, we headed to a historical pub where there were (I think) 12th century vernacular paintings on some of the walls. Also, the US Air Force was stationed near there during WWII, and before going out on their flight missions, they would stand on the tables and use candles to write on the ceiling messages to loved ones, their names, or short notes. You could still see the messages on the ceiling, though they were fading. Our professor said that as a student, it wasn't unusual for him to be sitting reading in the pub and then to see older men come in and just weep.

This was probably the best day trip I've made since being here, and it was a great experience to go as a class. It definitely helped me to learn more about the history of Cambridge and about my own intellectual pursuits and growth.

Day 91: Thanksgiving

2008-12-01T00:02:00.000Z

(This is for Thursday 27 November, obviously!)

Thursday at work the departments where there are interns decided to have a potluck-style Thanksgiving lunch for the interns since Thanksgiving isn't celebrated here in the UK. It was so cute; no one really knew what was Thanksgiving-y, so we had everything from empanadas to quiche, and a great selection of desserts. It was really sweet of them to do this for us in an attempt to help us feel more at home. I was already stuffed by 2:00 on Thanksgiving day, so I guess you could say this was pretty normal.

Thursday night the rectors had organized buying food for flats that wanted to participate in floor dinners, so we went next door for Thanksgiving dinner, complete with a turkey, gravy, mashed potatoes, stuffing, cranberry sauce, and pumpkin pie. It was really fun, and we even went around the table saying what we were thankful for.

After pie we watched some football (soccer) since there wasn't American football on, but other than that it felt like your regular American Thanksgiving.

A very thanking-filled Thanksgiving spent in London, even though I missed being with family. Sounds like you all had a great time :)

Day 90: British Museum and The Jayhawks

2008-11-30T23:49:00.001Z

(This is for Wednesday 26 November)

On Wednesday I went to the British Museum, which was just incredible. I'd really like to go back because there is so much to see. Here are a few highlights:

The Rosetta Stone

A mummified fish (Grandpa, do you think you'd do this sometime?)

Some watches for Adam

Also, Adam's favorite

Amazing museum with so many important pieces. And it's free! And probably only a 15 minute walk from the flats. For more photos, click here.

When I arrived home, I was welcomed to my flat by a very large box with my name on it with this inside:

Thanks so much again for the fruit basket, you guys!

Later on Wednesday night, I headed over to Brick Lane for a free in-store performance by Gary Louris and Mark Olson of The Jayhawks, a classic alt-country band from Minneapolis.

There weren't too many people there, which worked well for a quick 20 minute set before the two headed off to the real (read: expensive) show afterwards.

Louris and Olson:

Olson:

Louris:

It was a bummer how short the set was, but so nice that the guys came out to do a free gig. I talked to both of them afterward and mentioned how it was funny that I live in Minneapolis, but am finally seeing them in London. They were really nice guys, and it was a bummer they had to run off so quickly to their show.

After getting home, I watched the new bridge episode of 24, "Redemption." And wow. I didn't think I'd be so excited for the next season, but I'm going to be on the edge of my seat for a while now.

Day 89: Cosmopolitanism, Internationalization, Globalization

2008-11-30T23:39:00.000Z

(This is for Tuesday 25 November)

For our final official Tuesday night Honours Seminar class we read some articles from The Economist for class and then discussed cosmopolitanism, internationalization, and globalization.

It's crazy to think how different our world has become with technology and the world economy changing. Will this lead to good things? What aspects of globalization are good? Is there some initial philosophy behind globalization, or is it purely economical?

Also, what is the role of the international experience in the London Program?

These are all some questions we discussed, and I will spare you the discussion here... but it was an interesting one for sure, and I'm really bummed that it was our final H Sem class.

Day 88: Monday again?

2008-11-30T23:37:00.000Z

(This is for Monday 24 November)

Monday again? Already?

Every time it's a new Monday, I feel like it was Tuesday only a day ago. Confusing.

Day 87: Catching Up

2008-11-30T23:15:00.000Z

(This is for Sunday 23 November)

Caught up with work Sunday and actually showed my face again in Sainsbury's.

Spent a lot of the day at the London Centre working on a theology paper about incarnation. You know, I could have been a theology major; I actually enjoy writing these papers.

Day 86: Winter Wonderland

2008-11-30T22:51:00.000Z

(This is for Saturday 22 November)

Headed to Hyde Park's Winter Wonderland on Saturday... this goes on from November to January in a part of the park. There are food booths, rides, gift booths, an ice rink, and a giant Ferris wheel.

There were so many cute gift shops, and it was a great way to get into the Christmasy mood, even without snow on the ground.

Also, I almost laughed out loud when I saw this:

A dad was carrying his daughter on his shoulders, and he had a pained expression (though still with a smile) as her hands were pulling all over his face as she tried to get a good grip, including his eyeballs. Did I do this as a child?

Day 85: With a buzz in our ears we play endlessly

2008-11-30T22:34:00.000Z

(This is for Friday 21 November)

So, the band that I'd listened to a lot on the fjord trip, Sigur Rós, came to London on Friday and I was able to go to the show.

I hate making statements like this, but it was definitely one of the best concerts I've ever been to, if not the best. It's definitely in the top three, but I cannot think of two that were better.

It was at Alexandra Palace which was a really cool buildling, but the actual location of the concert was just in what seemed to be a very large room.

The energy of the band was amazing, and a lot of their songs have great builds, the culminations of which were just infinitely better live than recorded. The lights and effects were amazing, too, including a wall of water:

(from John Gleeson on Flickr)

I didn't bring my camera with to the show because I'd decided it would distract me from the music, but sadly two teenage girls in front of me were able to distract me by holding up their cameras to film basically every song.

Two of the songs ended with confetti falling, which was just an absolute joy. So exciting and surreal; it sounds cheesy, but the effect worked perfectly with the music.

(from jrom on Flickr)

When the show was over, walking out the palace we saw London all lit up at night, which was just beautiful. I already have a thing for Minneapolis's skyline, but seeing the whole of London was so different. Somehow it was a clear enough night out too that we could pick out the Big Dipper and Orion's Belt.

What a show.

Day 84: T minus four weeks

2008-11-30T22:31:00.000Z

(This is for Thursday 20 November)

Wow. Four weeks from Thursday 20 November till we leave! Students have been freaking out about this, but four weeks really is a long time. I feel like it's a great opportunity to really make a list of things to do before leaving, and it's helped to put my time here so far in perspective.

Day 83: Long way home

2008-11-30T22:28:00.000Z

(This is for Wednesday 19 November)

I decided to take my time on Wednesday after class to do more homework, but then I took a new way home from school. I think this is one of my favorite ways to see more of the city while I need to walk anyway. There is so much in this city, and I know that even if I were studying here for a year instead of just one semester I would never really "know" the city, which is great in many ways.

Day 82: More homework!

2008-11-30T22:25:00.000Z

(This is for Tuesday 18 November)

Another marathon class day and paper-working afterward.

It's ridiculous; sunset in London is around 4:00 pm now, so the sun starts setting at 3-something and is down by the time I even start my last class on Tuesdays.

Day 81: Back to class

2008-11-30T22:24:00.000Z

(This is for Monday 17 November)

Another Monday, back to class... worked on a paper Monday and have been spending time at my internship working on my final project. Nothing too exciting here (or I guess that I remember, sorry!)...

Day 80: Canterbury

2008-11-30T21:54:00.000Z

(This is for Sunday 16 November)

Slept in a bit on Sunday, but decided to head into Canterbury to explore the city there. It was a much smaller city than Oxford but also less touristy.

I arrived at the East Canterbury Station which was about a 3 minute walk from the city walls and Canterbury Castle (built in 1066):

The city itself was an interesting combination of old and new, and I headed next to Canterbury Cathedral, which was absolutely beautiful.

It's so amazing seeing the history in so many cities around London and in London itself. I really enjoyed my time in Canterbury, and I'm glad that I made the trip out to a smaller city.

Click here for more pictures!

Day 79: Oxford

2008-11-30T21:04:00.001Z

(This is for Saturday 15 November)

Saturday I headed to Oxford for an alumni dinner I had that night. The alum actually worked in Oxford University's law department, so she said that if any of us was interested in law we could go to the Oxford law fair. A group of about seven or eight of us got in around noon, and three of us made our way over to the fair at around 1:00.

The entrance to the fair:

The fair was great, even though we were the only Americans and probably the only non-Oxford kids there. It was interesting to talk to the people at the booths because most of them were probably about 22-25 years old and were willing to just chat about why they went into law. The UK's system of becoming a lawyer is different than the US's, too, so that made the fair a little less practical for us, but it was okay since we were still a step behind most of the students there in the process. I really think I'd love law school and having a career that requires thinking critically like that, but I'm just not sure what specifically I'd like to do.

Once we'd made our rounds at the law fair, we met up with the rest of the group at Christchurch. The way Oxford (and Cambridge) work is that there is one university which is comprised of numerous colleges (I think Cambridge has 31). The colleges are not for different departments, but are rather communities of living and learning. That's a pretty brief description, but it should do as far as understanding that Oxford is not just one campus but is made up of many colleges.

We walked around Christchurch, which was just gorgeous. Also, the dining hall there was used as the great hall in Harry Potter, so we made sure to get pictures there.

After Christchurch, we headed to a market to get coffee before heading to the alum's house. It was so nice to be in a neighborhood again and to go inside a home. The alum and her family had made a variety of about six or so different Indian dishes; the food was absolutely amazing. It was a great dinner and we had very enjoyable conversation. It was really nice to meet an American who had decided to marry a Brit and settle in the UK (don't worry though, Mom and Dad, I don't think that's my plan right now).

It's great that the London Program works with alumni in the area to give students the opportunity to have dinner with alumni, and I'm really glad I've been able to do two of these dinners. It's definitely given me a perspective of London that I wouldn't have had otherwise (and also better food than I would have gotten otherwise).

(Click here for more Oxford pictures)

Day 78: Best. Class. Ever.

2008-11-30T19:10:00.000Z

(This is for Friday 14 November)

Friday our English Composers class met up at the Cecil Sharp House English Folk Dance & Song Society to learn about English folk and Vaughan Williams' involvement with it.

We started off with a mini-tour, looking into the library and then learning a bit about the history of the EFDSS in the great hall. We headed upstairs to a smaller room where we then had a workshop. The director of the library there talked to us about Vaughan Williams' involvement with folk music and about collecting folk songs and how that works. I also hadn't realized this before, but most of the songs in Appalachia stem from English folk and have also mixed with African traditional music and gospel.

When he'd finished his short talk to us (he wasn't feeling well), the guy who was going to lead our workshop came in the room. I thought he looked somewhat familiar but couldn't place it for about a minute... then I realized that he was probably (90%) the guy who led the open mic session at the Bruce Molsky show I'd been to in October. As he talked more about his involvement with promoting folk music in London, I became more sure that this was the guy. He'd sung an absolutely beautiful song that was one of the high points of the open mic.

He told us we were going to sing some songs and led us in warmups and soon had us singing a round:

John, John, where have you been all night?

Down in the valley, kissing Sally

Picking up cinders, breaking windows

Riding donkeys, shooting monkeys

I'm a boy who's kicking up a row, row, row

It was fun because everyone actually got into the song, and there was even some foot-stomping and clapping.

After this song, Sam Lee played us different versions of the same song ("The Trees They Do Grow High" - this YouTube video is a good version) to show how the melody and words can change as it's passed along in different places, and then we learned a version of it and sung it as a class. Very pretty song.

After we learned it, Sam Lee brought out the suitcase box instrument thing that he'd played at the Bruce Molsky show that's like an accordion. He sang us an incredibly beautiful song that even kids in the class who don't like folk music were completely enraptured.

After the class, I mentioned that I'd been to the Molsky show and a few of us chatted with Sam before heading downstairs to check out the library. The director of the library showed us some really interesting things and told us a bit about what he was working on currently. He was such a nice guy and was so excited to see students interested in folk music.

I'm not doing this day justice at all, but this was one of the most exciting classes I've ever had. I'm slowly becoming more and more involved with folk music and into the folk community, and I love it. The raw expression of folk music and the tradition just really appeals to me, and as much as I love my current indie type music, it just isn't even in the same field as folk.

Anyone want to get me a fiddle or banjo for Christmas? (Kidding. Sort of.)

Day 77: Bubble wrap!

2008-11-30T18:58:00.001Z

(This is for Thursday 13 November)

At work on Thursday, the other intern and I had to wrap up some display boards to send to an agency in France, so we got to use the giant bubble wrap roll. I may or may not have taken a small bit of the leftovers for personal use...

Day 76: Climbing again

2008-11-30T18:41:00.000Z

(This is for Wednesday 12 November)

Happy (belated) birthday, Aunt Jeanne :)

On Wednesday I caught up with work and laundry and then went climbing again at the Climbing Castle.

I'm thinking that when I have the time/money I'd really like to get into climbing more. There are great gyms in the Twin Cities, and I really enjoy the climbing culture and how people are willing to help out others. It's also such a great physical activity that requires mental planning. And the gear and equipment is fun (yes, I am a bit of a gearhead).

Day 75: Marathon class day shortened

2008-11-30T18:21:00.000Z

(This is for Tuesday 11 November)

On Tuesday I usually have two double classes and then Honours Seminar, which means:
10:45 - 12:00 First half of theology
12:00 - 12:45 Lunch
12:45 - 2:00 Second half of theology
2:15 - 5:00 Economics (with a fifteen minute break somewhere in there)
5:15 - 6:30 Honours Seminar

Kind of a marathon day of classes.

Anyway, this specific Tuesday we got an email during the day from the Honours Seminar professor saying that class would be cancelled that night. Though somewhat relieved to go home earlier, I was actually pretty bummed that we wouldn't have class.

There's something about that class and the way that it's taught that really works well with my learning style, and I think that I definitely have learned more too about what is intellectually stimulating to me. Even with other classes I enjoy, this isn't something you really get the opportunity to have in your life very often.

Day 74: Internship

2008-11-30T18:18:00.000Z

(This is for Monday 10 November)

I can't believe how fortunate I am to have an internship in London... it's easy to forget how amazing that is; I'm here living in London this semester taking classes next to Trafalgar Square and working at a worldwide agency near Regent Park. Incredible.

Day 74: Sainsbury's Shenanigan

2008-11-30T17:34:00.000Z

(This is for Sunday 9 November)

Another rainy day on Sunday, I decided to mainly stay in to get work done that I hadn't had time for between getting completely soaked in the rain and the concert the day before.

However, I did go out to the Sainsbury's grocery store down the road with one of my roommates. I finished checking out before my roommate, so I decided to look at some of the sale items at the front of the store. I was really just killing time, but decided to pick up a large jar of instant coffee just to read the label.

When I picked up the jar (carefully, mind you) this somehow set into motion the whole of the jar pile on the shelf, causing me to react quickly to save them by throwing my body and arms in front of the shelf.

However, this then caused my bags of groceries around my wrists to slam into the shelf below, which contained... wine.

Somehow only one or two bottles fell off and broke on the floor between the checkout area and myself. At this point everyone was just staring, watching this bizarre incident unfold on what should be an uneventful Sunday trip for groceries.

I'm standing there in shock, still pressed up against the shelves with all of my limbs, when finally someone who worked at Sainsbury's comes over to try to save anything else from falling. We try to figure out how I can leave the shelf without anything else falling, but a container of coffee falls off and crashes to the floor, thousands of instant coffee speckles immersed in the wine.

I quickly said some kind of half apology/half defense something like, "I'm so sorry - all I did was touch one container of coffee and everything fell!! I'm sorry!" and as soon as someone told me it was okay, that it wasn't my fault, I bolted out in sheer shock and embarrassment.

I hid behind a large pillar to wait for my roommate and so no one could see me from inside.

Perhaps this is some kind of indicator for my true moral sense (should I have stayed inside to help clean?) or perhaps Sainsbury's just needs someone new to stack the sale items in a less idiotic way.

Either way, I tried something new at Sainsbury's that day.

Day 73: Lord Mayor's Show

2008-11-30T17:15:00.000Z

(This is for Saturday 8 November)

Saturday my friend Kelly and I decided to head to the Lord Mayor's Show procession/parade. It's an incredibly long parade that has all sorts of participants representing different groups.

So because we're so set on going, of course it starts to rain on our way down to Blackfriar's Bridge. The rain got heavier and heavier until it was the worst rain I'd been in since we got to London. Thankfully I'd brought my umbrella, but it really didn't do too much since my feet and legs were soon soaking.

The parade was cute and watching it either really made me feel like a part of London or it made me realize we were probably the only American students dumb enough to stand in the freezing rain for a parade.

It was sweet to see people there who were looking for specific floats. There was a couple across the street from us who waved like crazy when the Polish group came through, and an older man behind us waved at one of the bagpipe groups and sung along with the tune.

What topped off the parade was when the sun started coming out toward the end of the procession and then the rain stopped and we were finally able to take down our umbrellas as the last group went through. Perfect timing.

On the way back, there were some men doing some kind of traditional dancing in front of a pub, so we stopped to watch them for a bit:

But since we were still freezing, we stopped by Starbucks on the way home. I don't think I've ever been so cold in my life; I literally could not stop my hands from shaking. Even with clenched fists the shaking wouldn't stop. The worst part of this was that my chai latte was spilling all over the place until there was only about a fourth of the cup left.

I took one of the longest showers of my life before heading back out into the rain to see Ned Collette perform at The Spice of Life, a small pub show at a pretty nice venue. The show was great, and I got to chat with him a bit at the end - always exciting/awkward.

Day 72: Hendrix, Handel, Hyde

2008-11-30T16:34:00.000Z

(This is for Friday 7 November)

Friday during English Composers class we went for a walk around some sites that had significance to English music. We went to Green Park where a concert had been composed for a fireworks show and event and then to the home of George Frideric Handel. In London there are little blue plaques up at points of historical significance, and there were two plaques about 4 windows apart on Handel's home: one for Handel ("Composer lived in this house from 1723 and died here") and one for Jimi Hendrix ("Guitarist and Songwriter lived here 1968-1969"). Funny juxtaposition.

After class I was able to finally get to Buckingham Palace and Hyde Park, something long overdue. I took a book and sat on a bench for a while to read, which was a great way to wind down at the end of a week.

Here are some highlights of pictures I took, but check out the full album here for more.

A duck for Grandpa:

After returning to the flats from Hyde Park, I met up with a friend who is studying abroad in Rome but was visiting for the weekend. Another friend in London and I took her on a brief sightseeing walk and somehow managed to pack a lot into it. I brought my camera along for this too, and it was nice to get to some places I hadn't even been yet.

Some photos from that:

Day 71: It's beginning to look a lot like…

2008-11-29T18:41:00.000Z

(This is for Thursday 6 November)

…Christmas? Already?

Okay, so I guess that's not a very far-fetched idea now that it's actually almost December, but on November 6 this seemed pretty early. I was heading back towards school after work on the bus and thankfully was reading a good book because the bus took about twice as long as usual because they were putting up Christmas lights on Regent Street (or lighting them or something). When I have a good book and good music, I actually rather enjoy getting held up on the bus or tube. It gives you a chance to just slow down for a bit and not worry about things since there isn't really anything you can do to speed yourself up. This is probably opposite of how most people feel about traffic jams, but I much prefer this outlook.

Since I didn't have as much time as I'd planned when I got back to the London Centre, I headed straight out from there with a friend to walk to the Southbank Centre 's Royal Festival Hall for a concert of pieces by Ralph Vaughan Williams. The concert was quite good, though probably more because I really enjoy Vaughan Williams than anything specific about the performance itself. Actually, it's kind of a shame because the conductor, Richard Hickox, died on November 23, and the concert we saw was the last he conducted. Perhaps his health was already in decline at that point, though.

During the intermission, we walked out on the balcony area and looked out over the Thames. The view was beautiful, and I couldn't help but think how amazing it is that I was here in London at intermission for a concert for class looking out at a city with so much history and so many people. I have honestly continued to be stunned every so often when I think about this.

Speaking of Vaughan Williams, go and listen to The Lark Ascending , one of his most well-known pieces, and definitely an English favorite.

Day 70: Museums!

2008-11-23T13:01:00.000Z

(This is for Wednesday 5 November)

Since I only have one class on Wednesdays from 9.15-10.30, I have basically an entire day open afterwards. On this specific Wednesday, I decided to be especially daring and take on three museums: the National History Museum, the V&A, and the Science Museum.

I started off with the V&A since I'd been looking forward to going to the Cold War Modern exhibit for a while. It was quite the extensive exhibit and definitely was worth the money. I liked how they had a structured organization to the exhibit since it was in chronological order. I learned a lot about the history of not just art and design but also more about the events of the time around the world. Very interesting.

Also managed to get this shot before a guard told me you couldn't take pictures. (Honestly, I saw no sign anywhere saying not to take pictures...)

After browsing through more of the V&A, I headed over to the Natural History Museum. This was aimed more towards kids, which made me even more giddy on the inside when I got to stuff about fossils and dinosaurs:

I'm a big fan of fossils for someone who's never considered being an anthropology major, so I had a field day at this museum.

There was also another exhibit about either just volcanoes or natural disasters in general that I found kind of fun; they had a videotape from a supermarket during a volcano they played in a room set up to look like the supermarket that shook along with the video. Fun. Especially when I saw one poor kid run out on it when the floor started shaking.

Last, but not least, was the Science Museum. I was a bit museum-ed out at this point, so I mostly just walked through the exhibits without reading too much. My problem is that I either like to read absolutely

everything or pretty much nothing at all. Hm.

Well, I did find the exhibit on plastics interesting:

And there was this very cool special exhibit called the Listening Post.

It's this area set up with small screens, and it takes random chatter from the internet and speaks it out loud. Sounds kind of boring when I put it like that, but trust me, it was pretty interesting. I think there was some kind of music, too, and the set up made it feel like you really were listening to the internet. There were different ways the chatter was read, too, and since the displays lit up when there was text there were different patterns throughout.

It was quite a productive day, and I have just a few more museums I would like to go to before I leave now. Also, have I mentioned how sad it is that the sun sets so early here?

Here's a picture taken before 5 pm:

Yep, pretty soon sunset will be before 4 pm even.

Day 69: Mosque Visit

2008-11-23T12:49:00.000Z

(This is for Tuesday 4 November)

For our Christianity and Islam class, we went to visit on mosque near Regent's Park. It's the first time I'd ever been to a mosque, which was especially interesting. There was a man who acted as our tour guide for our time there who answered any questions we had and brought us in during one of the five salat (prayers) of the day, which was definitely an interesting experience.

He told us a fairly brief story about how he became a Muslim and a bit about what he does, but I was disappointed in how impersonal he seemed. He was a nice man and seemed to be really interested in what we knew about Islam, but he wasn't very willing to truly answer our questions any further than on the surface, and he never really told us with any real personal element about his own beliefs. Our professor was telling us about the other guides they'd had when he'd brought other classes and how varied they were as far as being willing to answer difficult questions about Islam.

Nonetheless, it was a very worthwhile visit and I left with a better understanding of Islam and of Muslims.

Day 68: Econ Paper

2008-11-23T12:44:00.000Z

(This is for Monday 3 November)

With reference to post-war UK economic policy, explain the shift from Keynesianism to Thatcherism.

First econ paper I've ever had to write... finished this up on Monday. An interesting topic, although I'm sure my paper could have been more interesting.

Day 67: I thought the Sabbath was for rest…

2008-11-22T16:10:00.000Z

(This is for Sunday 2 November)

…so why do I always end up doing so much homework on Sundays?

Day 66: Castle Climbing

2008-11-22T15:48:00.000Z

(This is for Saturday 1 November)

(Photo from castle-climbing.co.uk)

One of my friends from ND here has a membership at a castle – er, a climbing gym, so we headed there on Saturday. It's called Castle Climbing, and it's predictably a two (or three?) story climbing gym in a castle. Quite awesome.

After stretching, we did some bouldering (climbing shorter walls without harness or rope but very large pads on the floor) for a while. I was pretty surprised how much my out-of-shape body was able to do. I think the adrenaline from the excitement of climbing was enough to keep me going. There is a nice little café there, so we headed there for a break after bouldering.

We watched some people climb for a bit, and when we'd finished our food we headed out to rope climb. My friend showed me how to belay, and we did a bit of a test run with that, too. Quite exciting.

I've always loved climbing and have been meaning to go to a gym in Minneapolis called Vertical Endeavors for a while but haven't gotten to it. I must admit, it's a bit intimidating to go try to climb in front of a bunch of experienced climbers at first, but pretty much everyone is willing to help you out and encourage you.

There's a climbing club at ND, too, so I might check that out when I'm back on campus.

When we were done climbing (and absolutely exhausted) we stopped at a place called Tortilla on the way home – it's the British version of Chipotle, basically. And this is no small thing, since good Mexican food is nearly impossible to come by here. I'm incredibly glad I went... and I might even venture to say it was better than Chipotle!

Day 65: British Composers

2008-11-20T00:32:00.000Z

(This is for Friday 31 October)

Halloween!!

Since it was our first week back from break, we had our first day in the next unit of the required Images of Britain Through the Arts class on Friday. While my previous unit had been Alternative Theatre, my new one is British Composers.

I wasn't really sure what to expect from this class, but I'm now incredibly excited about it. For the first class, we went over what concerts we are going to and then learned about Ralph Vaughan Williams, who drew a lot of his influence from traditional English folk music. For those who may not know, I am a huge fan of folk music. Probably more than I will admit. We learned about the history of how Vaughan Williams was involved in collecting folk songs in England and then examined the use of the modal scale in his works and analyzed them in general too. This is basically my dream class.

So after a nice first day to a new class, I decided to take the long way home after playing some piano at the London Centre (I was feeling a little musically inspired) and finally made it out to the Millenium Bridge. While wandering back to the flats, I also stumbled across a Braveheart memorial type thing.

St. Paul's Cathedral:

Cathedral from Millenium Bridge:

Later that night, almost everyone in the London Program went on a cruise on the Thames that some students had organized for Halloween. It was absolutely gorgeous, though I didn't bring my camera. I wish I had pictures from it though! We went under Tower Bridge and also down past Parliament and the London Eye. It's definitely different seeing the city from the river, and I'm glad I finally made it on a boat, especially at night.

Day 64: Bubble wrap, a walking trash can, and war.

2008-11-19T20:01:00.000Z

(This is for Thursday 30 October)

Another nice day, and as I was walking to school listening to my new morning song (Elbow - "Ribcage" - the percussion makes this song) a piece of bubble wrap floated in front of me and landed right in my path. While stepping on that bubble wrap and savoring the 'popop pop!', I knew that Thursday would be a good day.

Not too much after this, I was in Picadilly Circus and saw a trash can kind of out in the open... and then I saw it look around and take a few steps. I slowed down my pace to see what would happen. It's not every day you see someone dressed up as a fake trash can. I'm not sure if this was part of it, but there was a somewhat eccentrically dressed woman who seemed to be what the trash can was creeping toward, and there was a man walking up behind the woman who also seemed to be following her. I'm pretty sure they were all in on this together, but sadly I had to run to the tube to get to work on time.

After work I headed to the London Centre to meet with the professor who oversees the internships for a midsemester debriefing, which was really nice. It was helpful to be forced to take time to put things into perspective.

As if I hadn't done enough on Thursday, I headed to the Barbican Centre for Late Night at the Barbican, where they stayed open later than usual and had live music. The main reason I went was to see the Robert Capa / Gerda Taro exhibit, "This is War!" The exhibit was nice, and it was pretty neat to see some of the early prints of well-known photos. However, I think that it was kind of missing some extra element. It was obviously captivating because of the subject matter and the importance of Capa's work in the public's view of the war and as flagship work in the development of photojournalism, but it just wasn't the most impactful presentation of his work.

Anyway, enough on that. I think I might try to go to the Barbican sometime again to see more exhibits and to study since they had some nice spaces and a library (and free Wi-fi). Very cool space.

Oh, and here's a photo I took on the way back from the Barbican. This is just a tunnel nearby the Centre.

Day 63: Vote is in.

2008-11-19T19:51:00.000Z

(This is for Wednesday 29 October)

Okay, so it took me a while but I sent in my absentee ballott 6 days before the election. And I really feel like my vote counts... er, is going to be recounted.

It was a beautiful fall day though; I really think we've been lucky this fall and haven't gotten too much of the "London weather". Since I was running errands in the area, I figured I'd head over to the Waterloo bridge and take some pictures:

Later that night, our Honours Seminar headed to the British Library for a debate about the US Election with representatives from Republicans Abroad and Democrats Abroad. It was pretty disappointing, as neither representative really talked about any issues and both their arguments were quite weak. Still, it was good to discuss it afterwards with the seminar group, especially since our professor is British.

Day 62: Snow!

2008-11-09T21:41:00.000Z

(This is for Tuesday 28 October)

So on Tuesday, which is my marathon class day, I actually ended up paying attention for all my classes, even the day after finishing a paper. It was interesting, because in Theology we ended up talking about the ontology of the Trinity (we had an organized class debate about Trinity from Christian and Muslim perspectives that day), and for the first time I finally understood what this meant. We'd covered ontological v. teleological reasoning in a class I had last year, but I never quite got the meanings.

Riding off that excitement (yes, I'm a dork), in Honours Seminar that night we had our final discussion about

where the subject of ontology came up. In essence, our professor had spent all the time leading up to this discussion supporting Dawkins' arguments within the book, and then showed us how the arguments broke down because of their initial ontological assumptions, which is basically what I thought as well, but with a lesser vocabulary.

It was quite an interesting read because of this; I found myself seeing the arguments as not incorrect, but as fundamentally wrong as they attempted to use the natural to argue against existence of the supernatural.

Anyway, this is probably not that exciting to read, but if anyone feels like discussing this book or anything related to it, please let me know!

When I finally got home from class, I ate and decided to take a nap at 8 pm and was awoken by screaming and shouts of "Snow!!!" I thought I was dreaming at first, but then when I realized it was real, I thought it was already morning. Probably not a good sign concerning my sleeping patterns. Anyway though, there was snow in London in October! I found out the next day in class that this was the first time it had snowed in central London since the 1930s.

Day 61: Muhammad's message

2008-11-09T21:37:00.000Z

(This is for Monday 27 October)

Sorry all these posts are boring, catching up to now... I will make up for them once I get caught up, though! Really.

Monday was back to class (9.15 am, ugh) and work, and then back to finish my paper for Christianity and Islam. Everyone in the class was frustrated that we'd have a paper due the Tuesday after fall break and midterm papers from the week before it, but hey, at least I actually enjoyed writing this paper.

Day 60: Hello again, London

2008-11-09T21:25:00.000Z

(This is for Sunday 26 October)

Although there was some schoolwork to catch up on, I spent much of Sunday editing photos. Final count: 1806. Gotta love digital...

Other than seeing other friends who'd gotten back from break, the highlight of my day was probably purchasing groceries with the weak pound. Amazing.

Day 59: Goodbye, fall break.

2008-11-09T21:10:00.001Z

(This is for Saturday 25 October)

From Fall Break - Barcelona

This is the view from our hostel room. Well, actually the view through our little balcony/sun room area. Amazing. What a sight to wake up to.

We walked toward the beach again as a group and spent a lot of time just relaxing and soaking in the sun and sea before having to head back to foggy London.

Two of the guys felt the need to buy bathing suits since it was actually hot (not just warm) out again, and they ended up with matching neon green swim trunks from the local Spar. Classy.

Anyway, after an obligatory group jumping photo (thanks to a tripod I am borrowing - lifesaver!), we all decided to head to lunch.

While walking back to Las Ramblas, Kelly and I told everyone about the restaurant we'd eaten at the other night, but that we weren't really sure where it was. Eventually though, we found it. It really was a miracle we stumbled upon it again, and it was the perfect farewell meal. The sandwiches were amazing and cheap, and everyone got sangria, a milkshake, or a smoothie. I really felt like I was able to 'splurge' a little bit here, and Barcelona felt more like a vacation in certain ways because of that.

When lunch was over, Kelly and I parted ways from the group to go see some of the Olympics things while everyone else covered some of what we'd done the day before.

We ended up going past the National Gallery to get to it, and ended up with an amazing view of the city. If we'd had more time/money in Barcelona I would have loved to go up in some of the surrounding mountain area; it was absolutely beautiful.

After seeing one of the main stadiums taken over by some children's TV show/concert (which seemed like some kind of Olympics blasphemy), we headed back down past the Venetian towers to meet up with everyone at the hostel.

We all reluctantly headed to the metro to take us to our bus for the airport and said goodbye to Barcelona and to the most amazing fall break.

Day 58: Gaudí's Barcelona

2008-11-09T20:36:00.000Z

(This is for Friday 24 October)

Friday we slept in a bit more than I would have liked to, but that's the consequence of basically missing a night of sleep. As soon as I was up though, I was up, and Kelly and I decided to hit every touristy thing we could on our maps. We saw a lot of Antoni Gaudí's architecture, which was really impressive to see, though I am not personally the biggest fan of the style, though you can't argue against the genius and creativity behind it.

From Fall Break - Barcelona

Anyway, it was a perfect day out, and I was actually hot in a t-shirt, which is amazing. We lucked out with weather again. Walking around the streets of Barcelona reminded me of Santa Barbara, Mexico, and Italy all at the same time. Mom and Dad, other than the whole Spanish thing, I think you'd love it here. And I haven't even gotten to the bit about "the water" yet.

We stopped inside a small church in between the touristy things.

There were only a couple of people here, but I witnessed one of the most personal moments I've seen, and it was so inspiring and touching that I just have to share it here. There was an older man who was praying at a large crucifix statue toward the back of the church, and after he finished praying, he kissed the feet of Jesus. So powerful, no matter what your own beliefs are.

After more of our walk through the city, we decided to stop in a small produce market for apples. We each took two apples and when we went inside, there was a large line to purchase them. We weren't really sure how it worked, and kind of stood around looking confused for a bit. Some of the people who worked there started talking to us, but we had absolutely no idea what they were saying. We thought maybe they were telling us we could just take the apples, but we weren't completely sure and besides, we wanted to pay for them anyway. Eventually one of the men working there just pointed at the apples and then gave us a thumbs up. Somehow, this made the final connection that yes, we could leave with our apples without paying, that it was a gift from them to us. We waved and said "gracias" and "thank you" probably more times than however many cents our apples were worth, and left with two apples and a large smile each. You can't put a price on that.

One of the highlights of the Gaudí architecture for me was the most famous, as well, the Sagrada Familia, which has been under construction for over 125 years. We purchased tickets to go inside the church and the Gaudí museum, both of which were just astonishing. Definitely check out my Barcelona album for more pictures.

Eventually, we made our way through the Olympic Village to the sea! We walked along the beach for a while and then sat down at a nice spot where we wouldn't leave with sand in our back pockets.

By the way, I might mention that my trail of clumsiness continues. While walking in the water, I'd always end up too far out and would get my rolled up jeans wet and sand on my legs. One time when I was trying to brush off the sand from my legs and out of my jeans, an even larger wave came up and soaked me up to my belt. Yep, imagine that, me being a klutz.

We headed back to the hostel right before the rain really started coming down and headed out with the group to a tapas restaurant. Tapas is seriously ingenious and the way that I would always like to dine; basically, you order different appetizer-type dishes in a group, so you get a variety of foods. I can never decide what I want to eat anyway, and appetizers always sound better to me than main courses. Perfect. So tasty.

When dinner was finished, we got some wine and cheese and headed down to Port Vell to sit up on the docks and look out at the sea at night. It was a perfect last night to an amazing fall break.

Day 57: Barcelona

2008-11-09T20:14:00.001Z

(This is for Thursday 23 October)

Thursday we arrived in Barcelona by mid-afternoon, I think. We were all pretty exhausted from only getting sleep on the plane and buses, so we took our first siesta before getting ready to head out for dinner. Kelly and I were the first ones up and ready and headed to Catalunya Square, about a two minute walk from the hostel (which, by the way, was nice enough that I'd almost recommended it for our family, Mom included). The fountains were lit up, and there were so many people around. I soon felt like Barcelona was a city I could live in because of the more emphasized community feel and, of course, siesta time. London is so fast-paced and materialistic that you've got to go against the grain in order to slow down, and Barcelona felt like quite the opposite.

From Fall Break - Barcelona

Kelly and I walked down the main road there, Las Ramblas, and decided to head off to the back roads a bit to find some good, cheap food. We ended up with quite a find - Cafe Mirinda. It was still pretty close to a larger road but was in this back open area and had a great atmosphere. It seemed like the kind of place where I'd go to eat if I lived in Barcelona and was also probably the first time I'd been to a restaurant where most of the people eating there seemed to be 20-somethings. We ended up getting I think 1.60 Euro sandwiches (I got brie and ham), which were amazing, tortilla espanya (Spanish omelette), and a sangria-lemonade mix. Quite the deal, and so tasty. I'd definitely recommend the place to anyone heading to Barcelona.

Still exhausted from traveling, we headed back to the hostel and slept quite well, actually using the sheets they provided.

Day 56: Frankfurt

2008-11-09T19:51:00.001Z

(This is for Wednesday 22 October)

After waking up, we found out the pound and the Euro dropped immensely, of course one day after I withdrew what I hoped to be all the money I'd need for Frankfurt and Barcelona. Kind of funny timing though, since the European Central Bank is located in Frankfurt.

Anyway, we decided to head to Römerberg, the old central square of Frankfurt. On the way we passed by the aforementioned ECB, where the Euro was proudly displayed.

From Fall Break - Frankfurt

Römerberg was so pretty and had the feel of your classic old German city.

I forgot to mention earlier, but I had some fun over break attempting to pronounce words in different languages... this was especially great in Norway, where I had no idea how to even begin saying most of the words. In Germany I tried to hone my harsh German accent to no avail. I am pretty hopeless when it comes to any kind of accent, and when you add the factor of doing it in another language, I sound like a distorted guitar in human form.

After a bit of time exploring around the square, I met up with my friend Linda, who I'd worked with back home in Minneapolis a while ago. She's been living in Germany for I believe almost a year now, so it was great to see someone who could translate for me and who knew more about the area. We walked around for a while and ended up at the history museum, which was much more interesting with a translator because there was very little English anywhere.

I'll admit, I wasn't especially looking forward to Frankfurt but ended up having a great time with my expectations greatly exceeded. The Main River was actually pretty to walk along, and the skyline of Frankfurt seemed more familiar and American than other European cities. There's something about having a body of water or main natural feature in a city that I like... I guess that would explain the places I've lived so far: Minneapolis - Mississippi, Notre Dame - the lakes, Denver - mountains, London - Thames. Oh, and though I haven't lived there, Chicago has Lake Michigan, which I love. I think it might be partially a navigational thing (I always orient myself in relation to these features), but also partially a water/nature thing. Bodies of water just have this clearing effect on the mind, where your thoughts can just catch the breeze and head out with the current or among the clouds. I think most people who've experienced living in a city like that would agree, and I personally can only imagine the somewhat cluttered feeling a city without a river or anything might be like. Heck, even South Bend has a river.

Anyway, after the history museum we headed toward some of the apple wine area. Linda explained how apple wine is pretty big in certain regions, so we found a cute restaurant for an authentic German meal. I had bratwurst and sauerkraut and tried some of the apple wine as well. I'm pretty sure German food is my least favorite of the places we've been so far, but the apple fritter type dessert was still amazing.

Linda left soon after dinner, and I met up with the group again and later headed back to the hostel again. Our flight to Barcelona was actually in the middle of the night, so we hung out in the common space/bar of the hostel. It was pretty fun, too; they had a guitar hanging on the wall and a piano off to the side, so one of the guys in the group and I ended up jamming, him on guitar and myself on piano. I've definitely become a lot more comfortable with piano than I used to be, perhaps even more than guitar. After the jam session, we exchanged travel stories with other people in the hostel long enough for us to kill time before heading out to our bus for the airport.

Day 55: Oslo to Frankfurt

2008-11-09T19:38:00.000Z

(This is for Tuesday 21 October)

We decided to get up fairly early on Tuesday so we could walk around before catching the train to the airport for our flight into Frankfurt. I ended up heading with four other people to a hill we'd heard had a good view of the city. We brought all our stuff with us and headed through a lot of the city and finally found the trail the lady at the hostel had told us about.

From Fall Break - Norway

The clouds were looking to be a bit stormy but held out for us to get up to a lookout point where there was a restaurant. The view was just beautiful and made me wish I could live in a city like Oslo and go on runs like that. The air was so clean (especially compared with London's pollution) and crisp that when you breathed in, it felt like the equivalent of a fresh glass of ice water for your lungs.

Oh, just to point out something fun, the train station in Oslo had these things called "travelators". They're like moving walkways on an incline and for some reason really intrigued everyone in our group. Fun stuff.

After a train to the Oslo airport, a plane to the Frankfurt airport, and then a bus into Frankfurt am Main (Frankfurt on Main, the river running through), we finally arrived at the main train station in Frankfurt.

From Fall Break - Frankfurt

We soon found that our hostel was even closer than we thought - basically across the road from where that picture was taken and down about two buildings.

Another great hostel - we had another room to ourselves. I learned this was probably the best perk of having such a large group (ten, much larger than I'd hoped to have). It really worked out well, though, because with ten people we were able to split off into smaller groups based on what each person wanted to do. In the more ideal size of about 2-4 people, it's tougher to compromise because you're mostly forced to do everything with everyone.

After using the Norwegian Kroner (~15 Kroner = 1 USD when we were there... apparently it is now about 6 Kroner to the dollar, yikes) for a few days, it was refreshing to know we'd be using the Euro the rest of our journey. Also, Oslo is known according to some lists to be the most expensive city in the world. Yes, even more so than London. Also, in addition to a more favorable exchange rate Frankfurt had cheaper prices for things in general. We found the cheapest gelato I've ever seen - 80¢ Euro for one scoop.

Day 54: Bergen to Oslo

2008-11-09T19:22:00.001Z

(This is for Monday 20 October)

Sadly, as soon as we woke up on Monday we had to turn around and head right back to Oslo. We got up early enough to be packed by the time we headed to the 7.00 am breakfast, which consisted of fish and some odd Norwegian things. We had to leave quickly though to make our bus back to central Bergen. It was too bad that it was mostly dark still, so we really didn't get to see much of Bergen. I think that's the one thing I would have changed about break, but we did book the fjord tour after arranging flights so we didn't have as much time to stay in Bergen.

We got on the train back to Oslo at 7.58 and arrived around 2.30 pm or so. We walked around the city a bit and settled back into the hostel for a while and then headed out in search of an authentic (but cheap) Norwegian meal. One of the booklets at the hostel mentioned a smaller place that "most tourist guides would never dream of listing", or something to that extent, and so we figured it would be the perfect place to go to. It was actually on one of the main roads in the city but was upstairs from a more touristy looking restaurant. We headed upstairs and found a sweet place where I don't think a single person was under about 60 years old. Our waiter even described one of the dishes as "for old people". The first thing we saw walking in was this cute coat check:

From Fall Break - Norway

Love the handwritten numbers. Kelly and I split the "Beef Snack" which was beef, potatoes, and veggies. Such good, homey food... I also tried some fish someone else got and actually liked it! Cute place, good food.

After dinner we ended up going to this small bar/club/café called Mir that has live music on the weekends and airplane seats along with normal chairs. It was pretty cool and "hip" without any snobby hipster feel to it. There was a great selection of local beers I did not drink because (I'm not sure I've mentioned this yet, actually) I was on antibiotics throughout most of the trip, and the bartender was happy to recommend the cheapest one to us.

There weren't many people there, it being a Monday night, and we ended up playing some foosball even.

Anyway, it was a nice relaxing night to top off a travel day, and I was looking forward even more to the rest of break at this point.

Day 53: Oslo to Bergen

2008-11-09T13:11:00.000Z

(This is for Sunday 19 Oct. I know, I'm horrible!)

Okay, so I am finally going to update you all on Fall Break! I'm sorry it's been so long... I just really wanted to get the details of break instead of just saying "Oh, we went from point A to point B and it was pretty."

So on Sunday we got up to head to the train station for our "Norway in a Nutshell tour" at 8.05 and got onto our train for the next however many hours. I had a nice little bag of snacks from the grocery store at the train station, my camera, lenses, spare battery, tripod, and iPod, so I was ready to go.

From Fall Break - Norway

Heading out from the station we went past the outskirts of Oslo, and it being earlier in the day we got to see a lot of towns in the mist.

It was absolutely gorgeous, and as our train moved ahead, we were able to see mountains, towns, farms, sheep, horses, lakes, rivers, waterfalls, tundra, snow, and frost (a list I made wall on the train). Also, as soon as we headed out from the station, I began to make a fjord playlist. For anyone who's curious, here are some of the albums I went through (I was in a full-album mood, not a shuffling one):
• Sigur Rós - með suð í eyrum við spilum endalaust (Icelandic translation: with a buzz in our ears we play endlessly.) Will be seeing them here in London soon for a concert grand finale! Almost all their music is in Icelandic and is very... different. Very pretty and emotional with a lot of build-ups into kind of fjordy atmospheric jams. Actually, I really have no idea how to describe their music.
• Bon Iver - For Emma, Forever Ago. Justin Vernon is from Wisconsin and made this while living there by himself. Saw him and the band play before leaving Minneapolis at First Ave, and it was amazing. Great acoustic music with interesting percussion oftentimes. A lot of emotion.
• Califone - Roots & Crowns. Experimental indie folk type stuff, I guess. Good earthy stuff.
• Jeremy Messersmith - The Alcatraz Kid. Cute acoustic music from a guy based out of Minneapolis. Studied music at North Central.
• Phantom Planet - Raise the Dead. Something more upbeat for when I started to fall asleep. I (re)discovered this album, which I'd had since about May, right before break and realised how upbeat and happy it was for strolling along the way to class or just around London.
• Sigur Rós on shuffle

Enough about music, though...

In the bag of food I'd gotten, I had Müsli, raisins, Smarties (like M&Ms), and peanuts... a.k.a. the makings of trail mix! Being the ever so cost-efficient student I am, I mixed them in a plastic zip baggie I'd gotten at airport security. Very tasty and lasted me a good amount of time through the day.

As we passed by Finse, the highest station in Norway at 1222 metres, I realized not just how fortunate we were to be on this fjord trip, but also how it was the absolute perfect time of year for the tour. With the fall colors, we left weather probably in the high 50s in Oslo and were able to still see tundra and snowmen up higher (I think the snowman was at Finse, actually).

It's really crazy to think about how there are people who live in these remote towns where it seems that the only way to get in or out is by train. It even looked like people had to snowshoe or hike to get from their house to the train. Still, these quiet towns were so beautiful and serene. I could definitely see Adam living somewhere like this... he'd have all the land he wanted and small ski hills in his backyard.

In the afternoon, we switched trains at a station to get onto one specifically for the fjord tour. On the new train, the conductor would announce where we were and what we were passing. We slowed down for especially scenic bits and even stopped for about five or so minutes so that we could get out and take pictures at a magnificent waterfall.

This train ride was much shorter than the one to get to it, and we stopped at Flam for about an hour and a half before getting on the boat. Alex, Kelly and I decided to try to walk around more and explore while the rest of the group got lunch, and we found the perfect little point to take pictures at – there was even a little canoe in the water.

As if it couldn't be any more incredible, on the way back to the town we found an old turret type thing from WWII. We were walking up this grassy hill and saw this little doorway framed with concrete slabs that led into a small room inside of a hill. There were little openings overlooking the fjord that had raised parts in front for people to kneel at with their guns. After we left that we found another smaller one with no openings (probably to store ammo?) with a trench running between them. There were no markings showing that there was this little piece of history here even. Very cool.

We headed back and grabbed food before getting on the boat, where we found a bunch of open chairs on the back deck for our group of eight. I can't even describe how beautiful the boat cruise was; we went through the fjords (even the narrowest fjord in Norway at one point) and passed by the most picturesque towns with little sheep running around in the hills.

The highlight of the fjord tour (and probably all of Norway or even break) was when we saw dolphins jumping behind the boat. They were following us for a little while, and I sadly wasn't able to get any good shots, but the picture will stay in my memory forever. This was actually one of the main things that encouraged me to choose Norway for break (I don't think anyone else had even considered it before I basically forced everyone to get on board with the idea) - I'd read that a photographer whose work I like went on a fjord tour and saw dolphins and basically thought that would be amazing. I'm going to Oslo.

There were fjord tours in Oslo we could have also done for much cheaper, but I'm so glad we did the tour we did since we were at much more impressive fjords for a longer time and saw so much of the rest of Norway on the trains.

After the boat ride (which was finally freezing after the sun went down), we stopped in Gudvangen and got on a buss to Voss where we walked around for a bit before getting on a train to Bergen. Voss seemed like a cute little ski town, so it was nice to be able to walk around a place with a much different feel than Oslo or Flam.

When we finally arrived in Bergen it was sadly quite dark outside so we weren't able to see too much of the city. We made our way to a bus that took us up to our hostel, and on the way we were able to see the football (soccer) stadium there and the city lit up for the night.

This hostel was one of the nicest ones, especially since the four girls and the four guys each got rooms to ourselves (without any people outside our group). The people working there were so nice and happy to help.

I'm so glad we did the trip to Bergen, even though it was probably in place of a day of hiking (for me, at least). The weather also held up quite beautifully for us since the weather forecast had said it would be rainy/snowy. Actually, before leaving for break, all of the weather forecasts for each of the cities looked like rain while we were there and nice the days we weren't.

I'd definitely love to go back to Norway and other parts of Scandinavia sometime, but even if I don't get the chance this was quite the amazing tour.

[Fall Break Photos]

2008-10-27T16:38:00.001Z

Hey! So, I'll catch up on all of the days of break after I get caught up again back at school this week, but I wanted to say that I am back safely from Norway, Germany, and Spain and am in the process of putting up pictures.

Click here for pictures from Norway, and I should be getting the rest of break up in the near future as well.

Day 52: Oslo

2008-10-19T21:13:00.000+01:00

(this is for Saturday)

We ended up getting into Oslo around noon and while we were waiting for the other flight with people in our group to get in, we went to the opera house. The architecture was amazing, but more importantly, fun. We took some great pictures which I'll post when we get back to London. We walked around at night too and went up to the palace. So amazing. got to bed fairly early to prepare for the early start to Bergen...

Day 51: And we're off!

2008-10-17T22:17:00.000+01:00

We are heading out tomorrow (early)... I'm incredibly excited.

Oh, and today I made it to the tail end of a conference at the London Centre where Tariq Ramadan was the keynote speaker during dinner. Very cool. I think I heard he was voted the #8 intellectual right now or something like that... He's currently in the theology faculty at Oxford University.

Anyway, I don't think I'll be able to update the blog during the week, but I'm bringing my iPhone so hopefully I can use wireless at hostels or internet cafes to check email. I'll have a bunch of pictures next weekend, though, so have a great week everyone!

Day 50: Fall break itinerary

2008-10-17T10:04:00.000+01:00

(This is for Thursday)

So, we leave Saturday for fall break and get back the following Saturday night. I can't believe it's here!

Here's the plan:

Saturday-Tuesday: Oslo with a one-night overnight trip to Bergen Sunday/Monday. We'll be on one of the top-ranked train rides in the world heading to the fjords at Bergen... Click here to check out the trip. I'm definitely hoping to hike in Norway at some point. Actually if I could, I might only do that.

Tuesday-Thursday: Frankfurt, hopefully getting to see a friend I used to work with at home at Starbucks who now lives in Germany. I think we'll take it a bit easier here. Actually, a bunch of people might go to Luxembourg depending on the price, but I think I'll stay back to save money.

Thursday-Saturday: Barcelona! Hopefully we can relax at the beaches here and explore the city and the architecture. I'm looking forward to it.

More details to come in tomorrow's (today's) post...

Day 49: Done with class!

2008-10-17T10:01:00.000+01:00

(This is for Wednesday)

Last class before break was Wednesday from 9.15-10.30! I can't believe it's break already.

Day 48: Royal Philharmonic Orchestra

2008-10-15T16:41:00.000+01:00

(This is for Tuesday)

Went with the Honours Seminar to Cadogan Hall to see a performance by the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra on Tuesday. It was quite nice, and they did some familiar pieces, including the one in Fantasia. Reminded me of the conversion van and driving through blizzards on the way to Big Sky...

Day 47: BBDO Dinner

2008-10-15T16:26:00.000+01:00

(This is for Monday)

After work on Monday, the BBDO interns met up with our CFO (an ND alum) and an Assistant Director of the London Program for drinks at the bar at work and then dinner at a nice Italian place nearby. It was the first time in a while I'd had Italian, and I also had some of the best tiramisu I've ever tried (including Italy!). Yum.

Day 46: Paper.

2008-10-15T16:25:00.000+01:00

(This is for Sunday)

Finished up the paper on Sunday. Nothing too exciting happened... but I'll use this empty post as a chance to put up a few photos from Regent's Park on Thursday.

From Regent's Park and Hampton Court (10/9 and 10/11)

Day 45: Hampton Court Palace

2008-10-15T16:13:00.000+01:00

(This is for Saturday)

Sorry I'm so behind! I had a paper due Monday and I guess just got off track since then.

From Regent's Park and Hampton Court (10/9 and 10/11)

Saturday morning I headed out with one of our rectors and some students for a trip to Hampton Court Palace. It was a gorgeous day out, and we beat the main rush for the tour. The palace itself was beautiful, and thinking about the history there was actually more amazing. I walked on the spot where one of Henry VIII's wives was caught by guards after she tried to run away when they'd caught her cheating on Henry VIII.

My favorite part of the palace was the garden, though. It was such a nice day, and the gardens were beautiful. Check out the album here to see more pictures. We also got to go through the maze, which made me think of corn mazes back home... it's been too long since I've done one of those, I think.

After getting back to the flats I ate dinner and then attempted to work on my paper while keeping updated on the ND football game score online. About a quarter through, the Irish were winning and I realized I just wasn't going to be productive that night and headed out for Sports Cafe, an American-style sports bar that plays the games.

I had gone to an Alumni Dinner on Thursday (the London Program sets up contacts with alumni who would like to take out students to dinner) and had a great time and met up with my alumni at Sports Cafe. It's really nice for the program to set this up, and I was very thankful for the alumni who had volunteered to do it. I was with a couple who were each '06 graduates, so it was nice to be with younger alumni.

It's just too bad we didn't win!

Day 44: Gaby's Restaurant

2008-10-12T09:12:00.000+01:00

(This is for Friday)

Sadly, Friday was the last day of the Alternative Theatre unit for the Images of Britain Through the Arts class. Our professor took us afterward to Gaby's Restaurant, which is right near many West End theatres and is known for its falafels, friendly service, and the actors that come there. Our table was in front of a signed pictures of Matt Damon with Gaby himself. It's so amazing that this little cafe was about a five minute walk from the classroom building... quite the location for classes.

Day 43: Football

2008-10-10T22:01:00.000+01:00

(This is for Thursday)

I took a walk around Regent's Park Thursday after work and saw a little boy around 5 years old with, presumably, his dad playing football (soccer). I entertained the fleeting thought of running up to them and seeing if I could play with them, of course knowing this would be ridiculous. I just really wanted to kick the ball around, though. As soon as the thought left my head, the boy accidentally kicked the ball my way. I passed it back to the dad and we exchanged a smile and a nod before he thanked me. Funny thing is, I think I enjoyed that more than he did.

Day 42: The Old Queen's Head

2008-10-08T23:45:00.000+01:00

From Bruce Molsky - 10/7

Here's Bruce Molsky at the Old Queen's Head from last night. Didn't get many shots because of the intimacy of the venue.

Oh, and yesterday my economics class went to Lloyd's (insurance)... very cool. Guys weren't allowed in unless they were wearing jackets, so I ended up going with my power suit since it's too tough to try to find the equivalent in women's dress. I wish I had brought my camera, though, since our guide brought us up on the glass elevator with a view of the city. Also, the architecture was quite interesting... will have to look into that more.

Anyway, today my alternative theatre class went back to the Arcola Theatre and saw a play about Israeli-Palestinian relations. I thought it was quite well done, and it was nice that it seemed to mainly want to bring to light the issues people are facing there instead of attempting to make a political statement. In other words, it didn't "take a side" but rather explored personal relations and how people are dealing with what has gone on.

Tomorrow after my internship I'm heading to an alumni dinner; the London Program has set up a bunch of dinners with alumni throughout the semester, and you can email to enter your name in the lottery. I'm heading with one other student to dinner in the Borough Market area with an '06 couple. Should be fun!

Thanks so much, everyone, for bearing with my (sometimes not too interesting) daily posts and comments and everything else! Miss you all at home!

Day 41: High lonesome sound

2008-10-08T00:05:00.000+01:00

Wow, what a treat... saw Bruce Molsky live tonight at The Old Queen's Head, a pub in Islington (fairly close to the flats). Absolutely amazing.

I saw him open for Nickel Creek around last Christmas at the State Theatre in Minneapolis with my parents, and I became an instant fan. His talent is amazing, and his passion for bluegrass is evident.

There was an 'open mic' before the show, which was on the 1st floor (well, the 1st floor is the ground floor here in the UK... so this was the American 2nd floor) of a nice little pub. There was a list of who was going to perform, and each person/group did one song each, with only two exceptions I can think of. It varied from a woman who very recently picked up guitar to two guys on guitar and fiddle to solo singers to a guy with a ___box. Can't quite remember the name, but it's somewhat similar to an accordion, but looks like a little suitcase or backgammon box.

Though Bruce isn't one to smile through a whole set, he definitely got into the music and cracked a few smiles now and then. Don't let the face fool you though; he was definitely enjoying himself at this small venue. In fact, this is the first time this venue has had someone back for another show. They have an unwritten rule to not have the same performer more than once.

Bruce also had (along with his guitar, fiddle, and banjo) a hardingfele (pictured above) with him, which is like a violin but with nine strings. Four of the strings are strung and the rest kind of just ring along with them. I think Wikipedia puts this more eloquently (and probably accurately) than I do. Anyway, he had it with him since he'd just headed here (for his only London show!) from a tour with some other people; he usually wouldn't have this instrument with him for solo shows. It was absolutely gorgeous though. He described this Norwegian instrument quite well when he said that the first time he heard it, he thought he was hearing a violin in the snow.

I could keep rambling about this amazing show... the venue was so intimate and perfect (except that I had to stand the whole time), and Bruce was just incredible and was very much feeding off the energy of the audience, which must have had an average age of around 38.

I'll hopefully have some pictures up tomorrow, though I only got a few shots and am not really sure of how they turned out.

Day 40: Excel

2008-10-06T21:56:00.000+01:00

Currently studying for a quiz in Christianity & Islam for tomorrow...

However, just wanted to say that as much as I hate Microsoft Excel, I also love figuring out how to make things work in it.

I inputted the feedback forms from the conference at work today and created a summary report for it with some stats. Nothing too difficult, especially compared to accounting things from this summer, but still enough for a small challenge. Dorky, I know, but hey, can't complain about actually liking this kind of thing (to an extent).

Day 39: Lazy Sundays

2008-10-06T21:49:00.000+01:00

(This is for Sunday)

Sunday was pretty much a homework and housekeeping day. The weather is so unpredictable here; I thought Minneapolis was bad with its extremes, but at least the weather forecasts tend to be somewhat accurate.

Day 38: Borough Market

2008-10-05T19:40:00.000+01:00

(This is for Saturday)

From Borough Market - 10/05

Went to Borough Market on the South Bank. It's just a gigantic farmer's market with all kinds of food imaginable in a very cool space. I'm quite sure we didn't make it through the entire thing, but we did find a great Mediterranean food stand to get lunch. Amazing.

Day 37: Friday again?

2008-10-04T00:49:00.000+01:00

Wow, has it really been over five weeks since I first stepped foot in London? And is it really Friday again?

The weeks go by so quickly here, but the days do not, which is good in a way. I can't believe it's been well over a month already, though.

I might end up in Windsor tomorrow, but it's been a long week and I may end up just catching up on sleep. The conference was a great success again today, and I had a great time. This weekend should be pretty relaxing, involving a lot of sitting around outside and catching up on debates (and perhaps going to Windsor).

Day 36: Conference

2008-10-02T22:32:00.001+01:00

First day of the BBDO Hub Conference today... was great! Great speakers, interesting presentations, and everything seemed to run quite smoothly. It's so exciting to be able to take even a small part in putting on this conference.

Also, it's a global conference, so it's so interesting meeting people from different places. For example, one person I talked to today is from Montreal but just moved out to Qatar for a new job.

Can't complain about the food, either... the dessert tonight was creme brulee with passion fruit and shortbread. Amazing.

I'm quite exhausted though... will have more news after tomorrow!

P.S. Just added a picture (from my phone, excuse the quality) from outside the office. I just love looking out at London.

Day 35: Antibiotics!

2008-10-01T21:18:00.000+01:00

Got antibiotics today, so hopefully will fully recover soon...

Also got my schedule for the BBDO Hub Conference tomorrow and Friday. I'm very excited but will be exhausted afterward and am planning on a relaxing weekend here in London. Hopefully I'll get the camera out again around here, too.

Day 34: Bones

2008-09-30T20:36:00.002+01:00

Went to the Wellcome Collection last Thursday with the Honours Seminar to check out the Skeletons exhibit, which has just ended. Very interesting... had 26 different skeletons from London laid out in a single large room with black walls, with the skeletons laid in display cases end to end how a graveyard might be. There were descriptions on the cases about where the bones were found, to what time period they have been dated, and what might be inferred from various markings and damages to the bones about the life of the person.

We had discussion today in the seminar itself about the exhibition. I felt that since some of the descriptions of the people were too detailed to be anything but at least somewhat contrived, one of the main intentions of the exhibit was to convey information about the average person from different time periods in London and to connect with the average person in the present concerning history and the continuous nature of locations. Our seminar professor thought it was a larger statement about human mortality.

Interesting, to say the least. Take from it what you will; it was an interesting and thought-provoking exhibition, perhaps more just "amusing" in some sense to the average person than deeply intellectual and perhaps existential, as my professor suggests. But that's just my take.

Actually, the point of this post was to mention that before we discussed the Skeletons exhibit, we talked a bit about the current financial crisis, specifically focusing on the [possibility of an actual passing] bailout bill and what it might mean.

I am going to try to withhold from any specific political or fiscal statements since this is actually a lighthearted London study abroad blog, so I just want to mention how I find it interesting being over here in the UK during such a huge time for the US. UK papers and people are definitely talking about the financial crisis, as it affects them greatly as well (e.g., Bradford & Bingley), but I feel like it's not in the same way people at home are talking about it.

Same general feelings go for the election.

It's just strange that I can't even pinpoint what is different about being here versus being at home during this time for the election and the financial crisis... any thoughts (especially from any Brits here)?

Day 33: Home sick and a bit homesick

2008-09-30T20:32:00.002+01:00

(This is for Monday)

Stayed home sick on Monday, and boy, do I wish I could have been in my actually-comfortable bed at home. It wasn't that I was feeling too horribly, though; I really just needed to force myself to do absolutely nothing for a day to give my body a chance to really recuperate.

I headed to the nearby Exmouth Market for my adventure of the day (really, I just wanted to get lunch and re-stock up on orange juice) and got a burrito, as close to Chipotle as I will probably have for months. Quite exciting. Vegetarian fajita burrito, no beans, mild salsa, cheese, a bit of sour cream, salad (lettuce), and guacamole. Yum.

Day 32: Back in London

2008-09-29T16:57:00.000+01:00

(This is for Sunday)

Headed back and was in my room by noon on Sunday. So nice to be back to my bed, as uncomfortable as it is. And though Dublin was great, I was looking forward to being back in London, partially because of the comfort in being somewhere you know, but also because of the size - I just love that there is so much of London I still don't know and haven't been to.

Day 31: Rhymes with "both"

2008-09-29T16:32:00.000+01:00

(This is for Saturday)

Saturday morning we headed to the Guinness Brewery, as every good college student must do when in Dublin. Personally, I could have skipped it and spent more time in the city instead, but it ended up being pretty interesting and had a great view at the top. Sadly, I was sick and chose not to redeem my free pint at the bar, but I'm sure I'll make up for it later at some point. The "Gravity Bar" in the storehouse is the highest point in central Dublin, though, so that was nice to make it to. And the history of Guinness was pretty cool as well.

After Guinness, we headed out to Howth, which was a fairly short train ride from central Dublin. In fact, I think we spent more time trying to find the train station than we did on the train. Howth is considered a suburb of Dublin and is a beautiful fishing town on the coast. It's amazing to see a beautiful place so close to a fairly large city that hasn't yet been completely commercialized. Up on the hillside was plenty of land and smaller homes (along with larger ones, too), but no resorts or anything of the sort. Refreshing.

When we arrived, I saw a few things that reminded me of some people at home:

Grandma - because of the script writing and pretty light blue color:

Grandpa - Howth Angling Center, what more needs to be said?

Mom - the pretty hanging baskets and that one brighter pink color you like:

Dad - fresh fish!

Adam - just look at the resemblance:

Howth was gorgeous and relaxing, exactly what I needed. We ended up sitting at this one place for a long time, dangling our feet out over the water. Here are a few pictures from near the harbor (harbour?), but take a look at the album for more with descriptions.

We decided to try to walk over to the cliffs and just explore for a while, finding this rope along the way:

We soon made our way up to some hills for some even more beautiful views. Here are our shadows:

Hm, well if I keep going at this rate, I'll end up posting all of the pictures in the album.

Anyway, it was a great day to relax before heading back early Sunday morning for London. I'd love to get back to the Irish countryside sometime, but I think Dublin was even more expensive than London.

Howth was quite the highlight, though, and I just wish you could all be here to enjoy it too!

Day 30: Off to Dublin

2008-09-29T16:24:00.000+01:00

(This is for Friday)

Headed off to Dublin on Friday from London's Stansted airport, which is actually over an hour away from central London. After running through Stansted to make our flight, we arrived in Dublin around 6.30pm and took a bus in to central Dublin. After checking into our hostel, we headed out in search of food.

From Dublin - 9/28

Our hostel was right on the River Liffey and just at the edge of the Temple Bar area, so we found a place to eat in no time. I had a nice pasta bolognese while Derek and Kelly got the roast of the day - lamb. I figured Irish food is not quite my thing.

After dinner we kind of walked around the area for a bit and saw some interesting things on the streets, including a guy doing limbo under fire and these two fellows:

We eventually ended up at a pub that a friend of mine who studied in Dublin last spring recommended, the Porter House (thanks, Kelly!). It was quite the place, with three floors of Irish pub goodness and a live musician who is probably the fastest strummer I've ever seen or heard.

We ended up going back to the hostel fairly early since we were pretty exhausted, but it was a great first day in Dublin.

Check out the album here for more pictures, by the way.

Day 29: Working life

2008-09-29T16:13:00.000+01:00

(This is for Thursday)

Had my internship all day Thursday again... and I'd like to point out that I am now able to stand on the Tube without holding on to anything while reading the paper the London Lite. This is quite a point of pride, and I feel like I am one tiny step closer to actually living in London instead of just visiting.

Day 28: Finally caught up!

2008-09-24T22:03:00.002+01:00

(This is for today - go figure.)

So, I'm finally caught up to today!

Anyway, one quick thought before I head off to bed early:

The director of the London Program emailed us the other day announcing a photo essay contest, and the first deadline has to do with UK culture and experiences. I think I might do one on Brick Lane and have already made an album of 26 photos ready to be looked at and narrowed down more. The essay calls for 3-5 photos. Hmm... 750-1000 words will be fun, too, though. Not sure where I'd like to go with this, but I'm thinking of making it as much of a standard photo essay as possible (as opposed to just playing into the program's grading system) so that I might be able to use it for some kind of media portfolio or something in the future. But honestly, more importantly than that is just making it what I want it to be (which I guess would also probably not quite be what the London Program is necessarily looking for). I could be wrong, though.

Due date is Oct 17 or something like that, so I guess we'll see where this goes between now and then.

From Brick Lane - 9/21

P.S. Thought I'd be in Dublin during the debates this weekend, but perhaps not? (Debates, not Dublin) An interesting turn... Oh, and anyone with any Ireland suggestions, please let me know! I think I will be in Howth on Saturday for much of the daytime, but this isn't concrete yet.

Day 27: Christianity & Islam

2008-09-24T21:58:00.001+01:00

(This is for Tuesday)

From Sept 19-22

Have I said how much I like this class before?

Okay, so the reading is really interesting (not that this means I am always interested while reading, if that makes sense), and the professor is very knowledgeable. A very interesting class I wish I'd had years earlier; I'm learning a lot about Islam (and Christianity) and some of the intentions and thoughts behind much of it (at least I hope). I'd go into more detail, but this head cold has really got hold of the brain part of the head.

Day 26: Food.

2008-09-23T20:30:00.000+01:00

(This is for Monday)

From Brick Lane - 9/21

Can I just say I had an amazing weekend of food?

Went to an amazing vegetarian restaurant Friday, Michelle cooked on Saturday, and then I had Indian food on Brick Lane on Sunday.

It's funny, one of my flatmates told me yesterday that she's heard Brick Lane has the best curry in the world.

Of course, I made some smart comment along the lines of, "Wow, it's even better than in India?"

Now it's the week and I'm back to bolognese shells from a can (but I add some mixed herbs so it's not as boring). Or "homemade pizza" on naan with bolognese sauce (see a pattern here?) and shredded cheddar (again, with mixed herbs so it's not as boring). What will happen when I get bored of the same herbs?

Day 25: Brick Lane

2008-09-23T00:18:00.001+01:00

(This is for Sunday)

Headed to Brick Lane on Sunday with a friend, Michelle, for our Images in Britain Through the Arts class. It wasn't really necessary to do the homework, but we wanted to check out the Bangladeshi area of London anyway and get some good food while at it.

Very lively place with all sorts of people. We ended up getting Indian food at a place where they offered us 20% menu prices, no service charge, and a free first round of drinks. I guess this is pretty common, and we got lucky because we were looking around a bit before most people ate too. A little wary that there was no one else in the restaurant when we entered, our fears vanished by the time we left as the restaurant had a full house. Great food! I'll put up the pictures soon. In the meantime, feel free to check out the Brick Lane album so far:

From Brick Lane - 9/21

Sadly, I may finally be getting sick and am going to get some rest for now.

Day 24: Life with a camera

2008-09-22T19:26:00.003+01:00

(This is for Saturday)

Went back to Russell Square, but with a camera this time!

From Sept 19-22

So peaceful again... was nice to people-watch for a bit again. Also took way too many pictures of doors on the way there.

Also did a group dinner again Saturday night! The group was our fall break group, minus 2 people. Very fun, especially since there were a few people I didn't know as well.

Check out some more of the pictures from the album - I hope you like them!

Day 23: Life without a camera

2008-09-21T10:47:00.002+01:00

Well, it was actually only a few hours. And I did have my camera, but the battery died and I didn't have my backup battery.

I took a different way home Friday from the London Centre because I had seen some guitar shops on the way from the bus and have been dying to play. Played some nice guitars, but I didn't find anything that had as good of a sound as the Ovation or Martin at home.

Headed to Russell Square after this because I spotted it on my map and figured I should take a new way back to see new things. My camera battery had died earlier while taking a walk around Leicester Square for class, but it was actually kind of nice going to the square without being able to use a camera. For a bit I kept spotting shots I wish I could take, but after a while just resigned to the fact I couldn't use my camera and stopped focusing on pictures I wished I could have taken. I ended up just sitting down in the grass where the sun was hitting (finally, it's been sunny this week!) and watched people.

I realized after a bit of this that listening to my iPod was as much of a preoccupation as having my camera and then took out my headphones. It's so nice to get rid of all of the things, the electronics or any kind of preoccupations. I'd like to think that when I'm holding a camera in my hand I'm much more observant, but is that really something you want to be all the time? Sitting in that square without my camera made me feel like I could just be. I wasn't some temporary observer trying to see what I wanted to capture of the place; I was living in this space at this point in time just like the other people around me.

What a beautiful Friday.

Day 22: Cooking

2008-09-19T17:04:00.000+01:00

(This is for Thursday - a bit behind, I know)

Attempted to make a pasta with a white whine cheese cream sauce. Did not work. Ended up not cooking off the wine enough and then overcompensating with cheese. I then tried to boil off more of the alcohol, thus making my sauce into a nice, cheesy paste. Interesting-tasting, to put it nicely. I of course seasoned my bell peppers and broccoli well, thus making up for a small fraction of the horrible taste, but it still came nowhere close to making up for the paste.

Hopefully will have more luck in the future... got a Tikki Masala sauce on sale from Sainsbury's, so we'll see if this is any good at all.

Day 21: Alternative Theatre

2008-09-17T22:48:00.002+01:00

I love this class. Went to "Painting by Numbers" today at a local pub theatre, and it was amazing. I love small-scale theatre. So much more realistic with less of that production feeling. Really provokes emotions because you feel a connection with the characters, as opposed to thinking you have to feel something because dramatic things are happening onstage.

Anyway, that's all for today! Just a few thoughts...

Day 20: BOE, Honours Seminar, Dodos.

2008-09-17T00:23:00.002+01:00

BOE: Went to the Bank of England for my econ class today. Was a nice visit - went to the museum and saw a short film. The best part of the trip was just the fact that we were at the Bank of England... amazing. Oh, and I held ~$300,000 today. Gold bar. Probably the last time I'll be close to touching that much money.

Honours Seminar: I had the privilege of being invited to the London Program Honours Seminar, and tonight was the first class meeting. There are ten of us, and we basically chatted about why we chose Notre Dame and then various other things. It seems like it will be a great class, and the assistant director "teaches" it and is great. Very interesting guy.

Dodos: Went to a concert tonight at University of London Union (ULU) to see a band called The Dodos perform. Absolutely amazing... they're so upbeat and energetic on the recorded songs, and live was just incredible.

Here's the trash can one of the guys bangs on with drum sticks during the show:

And here's the frontman rocking out:

A security guard came over and told me I couldn't take pictures with a "professional camera" unless I had a pass, but I had the perfect way to get around it. I was in the front and center, but in between the guard and me was a monitor. I was able to put my camera in my purse behind the monitor from the guard and shoot blindly. Kind of fun, and plus, I was able to pay more attention to the music.

Oh, did I mention they were filming the show for a DVD? I'll have to watch out for that - funny having Americans at the front of a show in London. I met a girl from the Netherlands there too who was also in the front.

Day 19: So, how do you really pronounce "Thames"?

2008-09-15T23:34:00.003+01:00

Went to the Thames Festival last night! It was going on the entire weekend, but I didn't make it till the end for the fireworks. Absolutely amazing. We had a perfect view of the fireworks and people. Just beautiful watching the fireworks and reflections in the river. The grand finale was not one to disappoint, too; the fireworks looked as if they were coming out toward you to grab you.

Oh, and amazing people-watching. They were expecting a million people to be at the festival, though I'm not sure what the actual number was.

P.S. I've been slowly but surely taking a few shots every now and then with the Fed, my old film rangefinder camera. I might have found a place nearby that develops for [relatively] cheap, so I'll keep everyone updated on the status of my Ilford FP5 ISO 400 roll of film. :)

P.P.S. Oh, and it's pronounced "temz". Or "tem".

Day 18: 1312 photos later...

2008-09-14T23:33:00.005+01:00

Just saw I've taken 1312 photos here so far. Wow.

Well, I promised more details on Stonehenge and Bath (and yesterday in general).

Stonehenge was amazing, thinking about how we still are not certain about what it was used for. The feat of building it is mysteriously formidable, and seeing it in person just adds to the amazement. The weather was beautiful, and the dynamic clouds definitely made for some better pictures than most midday ones.

At one point a man on a dirtbike holding a sheepdog in his lap road near us and started moving posts while the dog herded sheep. So cute.

We headed to Bath from Stonehenge. I wish we'd had more time in the town, but our bus came late in the morning, sadly. The drive over was beautiful, and the hills and countryside reminded me of Tuscany. The Romans must have felt somewhat at home here.

The history of the Roman Baths is something I was somewhat familiar with because of taking Latin courses in high school, but we all go the audio tour devices, which greatly added to my appreciation and enjoyment of the baths. I definitely would like to head back to Bath to explore the town more at some point, though.

Oh, and quick side story: When we were waiting to head into the baths, a cute old man rolled out a contraption and brought out a guitar and a violin. The device alone was enough to draw crowds initially, and by the time he had started gaining a larger crowd, we headed in. I got a few pictures of this, which are some of my favorite from Bath.

After arriving back at the flats around 8, a friend and I headed to the area of Shoreditch (about a 20 minute walk east of the flats) for the Homeless Gallery. The gallery is a one weekend-only event where anyone can hang up their photography. Though the concept is great, the best part of the gallery was the space it was held in. The Shoreditch Town Hall basement is so full of nooks and crannies with walls falling apart and bits of floor missing. This has definitely been a highlight of my time here in London so far.

We headed to the game, which was being showed at Sports Cafe, after the gallery to see the Irish become 2-0. So awesome!

All in all, an absolutely amazing day.

Went to the Thames Festival tonight for the fireworks. So fun! I'll have more on this later.

Pictures of Stonehenge and Bath are up , by the way.

Find them here: picasaweb.google.com/haleybeaupre/StonehengeAndBath

Day 17: Stonehenge + Bath

2008-09-14T02:59:00.003+01:00

Quite a Saturday... will have more details later (and pictures).

Basically, we went to Stonehenge and then Bath today with the Notre Dame program. Then after this, I headed to Shoreditch (an area of London a bit east of us) with a friend to see the "Homeless Gallery" -- a photography gallery where anyone can hang their work. It was in the Shoreditch Town Hall basement, which was definitely the coolest place to have a gallery. Right when we were done with this, we found out that ND was actually winning the football game and headed to Sports Cafe near Trafalgar Square for the second half and, ultimately, the victory.

Again, what a Saturday.

Day 16: Night on the Thames

2008-09-13T01:52:00.004+01:00

Okay, so for today's official post...

Went in to work today to help edit a yearly book thing they do for clients... really cool. Was there for quite a while. They brought in delicious bagel sandwiches, little cakes and pastries, and fresh fruit. Then later on, there was champagne and chocolate cake to celebrate a birthday and an engagement. Awesome perks. And fun work.

Hm, just remembered something, though... headed to the Tate Britain with a friend on Wednesday to look at some things for class. Ended up making it only for about 15 minutes, but then decided to wander around for a bit. We found a cute little cafe and then ran into Westminster Abbey right as the sun began to go down. So beautiful. Saw Big Ben (well, Clock Tower) too.

We decided to keep walking and get on the tube if we got tired, so we headed up the Thames toward the flats. Absolutely stunning. We ran into this pub that looked pretty unique from the outside and went in to be treated to a gorgeous interior. (There are pictures in the album.) Got my favorite beer, Leffe, which I just recently found out actually is a Belgian abbey beer from Notre Dame de Leffe. What a coincidence.

And what a Wednesday night.

Here's a link to the latest photos: picasaweb.google.com/haleybeaupre/WeekOfSept8.

On the schedule for tomorrow are Stonehenge and Bath! The ND Program organized this trip, so there are about 50 students going. I'm really looking forward to it. Still can't believe I'm actually going to Stonehenge... I read an article in National Geographic about it in August at the dentist or something, and the whole idea of actually going still amazes me. Afterwards, I'm planning on heading to Shoreditch for this thing called the Homeless Gallery where anyone can hang their art. Seems like a nice enough idea; could be really interesting.

Day 15: Fall break, decided.

2008-09-12T23:52:00.003+01:00

(It's actually Day 16 while I am writing this, but I figured I'd still give an update from yesterday.)

Here's the plan:

Oslo -> Frankfurt -> Barcelona

SO excited. Oslo is the main thing I am looking forward to at this point, but I know I will have an amazing time everywhere. There is a group of about 7 or so of us who booked the flights together, and I know that the 4-ish of us who are closer might end up spending more of the day trips together as well.

(By the way, Katie, I am going to Dublin at the end of this month! Can't wait!)

Will have more details on break in the upcoming weeks.

Thursday night after work, I headed to Regent's Park, which is only about a 5 minute walk from BBDO. It was so relaxing to just stroll around the lake and gardens.

I love people:

This one very elderly woman seemed to be on her way home from buying groceries and was carrying one small plastic bag in her hand, hunched over, making very slow, yet deliberate, steps. Her routine seemed to not mind about what path was the quickest through the park; even though she struggled with each meter of walking, she took the long way through the curve to walk directly next to the lake. I admire this woman.