Mind the Gap

Hello everyone.
What can I talk about tonight?
London, I think.

Friday was at the British Museum. The fact of the matter is that I had a hard time with the British Museum. The things there are lovely, of course, and they're displayed nicely, but its so very clear that they aren't from here, that they were, in fact, stolen from Egypt and Greece and Rome, that this totally takes away from their overall impressiveness. Our tour (given by Daphne, the ARTH prof--ARTH being Art History) was pretty excellent, and it was nice to get to see the things we've been studying about. But, I don't know. The museum just didn't give me a good feeling. It really was a very stunning museum--beautiful architecture that brought together the Greek art inside it and the more modern feel of, well, not living in ancient times.
So, worth visiting, but not as good as actually going places. Where, when you go, they will tell you that this or that particular piece of art is missing because it is in the British Museum.

In my free time on Friday I did a tour of Westminster Abbey, which was outstanding. Favorite church ever. I saw Newton's grave, and Darwin's (I love Darwin. He is on the 10L note here. Awesome. And so cool that he is buried in a church.) And Shakespeare, and Winston Churchill, and Samuel Johnson and Charles Dickens... The tour was totally worth it, too. A little long, and a little more information about the church than I really needed, but the guide pointed out some important stuff that I would have missed otherwise.

On Saturday I got to go into London AGAIN! Even though it was Yom Kippur and I was tired and hungry and sick. (I passed up the opportunity to see Merchant of Venice at the Globe. I didn't feel like that would have been quite the right way to celebrate Kol Nidre.)

London on Saturday focused on the Natural History Museum, which was phenomenal, and which I have not at all as many complaints about as I have about the British Museum. We were early for our field study, so I went to look at the dinosaurs. Now, I've seen some pretty awesome dinosaur exhibits, but this one was really outstanding. They've made the dinosaurs real. Several of the skeletons are suspended from the ceiling, and a few of the dinosaurs are anamotronic, and so move. Which is awesome.
Then was the Earth Science exhibit, which was amazing. It was astoundingly well presented, and informative and actually interesting. Sad part is, now I have to write a paper on it. Basically, the exhibits showed how the Earth had changed over time, and what this meant for the species inhabiting it. My essay is arguing primarily that the current trend of global warming isn't so much man-made, or caused by human beings, as its just another oscillation in the ever-changing pendulum of Earth's climates. Yeah, I really should get on writing that essay...

After that we took the tube to King's Cross and took some pictures at platform 9 3/4, and then went to Paddington Station, where we could just see a little bear walking around with a jar of jam. It was Yom Kippur, and I was hungry, so that was about all I was up for. It was good, though.

Then I came back to Bader and ordered Paddington books (and Harry Potter) from Amazon.co.uk. I can't wait for them to get here, as I really should be more informed about small bears and jam.

Presents

I just want everyone to know that presents are amazing.
We have pidgeon-holes (mailboxes) in Bader (residence) in the lobby. Therefore I can see right when I walk in if I have a letter or a package (we get a slip in our hole that says "you have a package!") and it is the most exciting thing EVER. Seriously. I do an "I've got a PRESENT" dance. This is by way of saying that you should send me things. I understand that it is very expensive to send me things. A letter or a postcard is fine. Just please make sure to include a note! (My father sent me a package with no note! It was very sad. Well...a little sad.)

For example, today I got a present with FIVE individually wrapped presents inside!!! I'm opening one up each day so that its like I get five whole days worth of presents (!) and each one has its own note!! This is amazing.
I'm just saying.

SO, to recap:

Lia Yanis
Rm. C140 Bader Hall
International Study Centre--Herstmonceux Castle
Hailsham, East Sussex
BN27 1RN
ENGLAND

Thanks very much.
Also, if you do send something, I promise I'll let you know when I get it, so don't worry.

Saturday at the Castle

Well, I've been here for a week and a half now, gone to all my classes, Brighton, London, shopping, and the pub. Here are some week-end conclusions and thoughts:

Classes: first off, my profs are all different nationalities, which makes things all the more interesting. Art History and Geography profs are English, History is Canadian, Politics is Greek (and speaks with such a heavy accent one can hardly understand her, but otherwise is fairly excellent) and the Econ prof is Italian.
The classes themselves are interesting. So far, I guess, they aren't as hard as I'd expected. I kind of feel like I'm dooming myself by saying that, but I was expecting an essay every other night and exams once a week. It looks a lot more like we're just going to have a lot of reading and then a midterm essay or exam. And a final, of course. It's SO much reading, though. But the classes themselves are really good, the lectures are interesting and the material seems worthwhile. I'm looking forward to starting seminars this week (each class meets twice a week and the way its supposed to work is a lecture the first day and a seminar to discuss the lecture on the second. I don't know if this is how its going to work, but we'll see. Econ seminars don't start until the week after this one, which is sad, because Econ was amazing last week. Last week instead of seminars we basically just had two lecture periods, or an intro and then a lecture.)

Brighton and London: Our official trip to Brighton was last week, and it was interesting enough. Brighton is a little shopping town right on the beach about an hour from here. Several of us went back this morning to get things like sweaters and clubbing outfits. Personally I got a lovely warm frumpy sweater for 8L and a pair of shoes for 10L. Things really aren't that expensive here. In the states I wouldn't have gotten the things I got today for less than, like, 50$, I don't think.
London was yesterday. It was a "Cultural Study" trip, meaning that the whole school went and mostly we toured London and Greenwich, rather than we would on Field Study trips (where we mostly will be at one museum or other such hot-spot related to our class, and will then have free time. We took a bus tour of London and then a cruise down the Thames from London to Greenwich, where we did have time to hang out and shop. (Don't worry--I am keeping track of my finances!)
I took a TON of photos in London, and of course I can't put them all up here, but I'll show you when I see you.

What else is going on? I annoyed the pubtender again last night (because I couldn't decide what I wanted) until he just gave up and made me a drink, which wasn't bad.
Its Saturday, though, and I feel that I've wasted a sufficient amount of time thus far this weekend. Therefore I will leave you now, and go be productive. Or take a nap. Ah, weekends.

Cheers.

(The photos are: 1. Me and Riley at Cleopatra's Needle. 2. Me and Big Ben. 3. Parliament. 4. The Globe Theatre. 5. London Bridge. 6. The Tower of London.

Week 1

My week has been...Interesting.

My room is...well, it doesn't feel like its that small, but i guess it is, compared to my room at home. My roommate is pretty cool. We aren't going to be the best-friends roommate types, I don't think, (shes tall and blonde and is clubbing right now. On the plus side, shes not 18 yet, and so hasn't been coming back drunk.) We seem to get on well enough, though. I think we're gonna go to Rome in November for bonding time or something. It'll be good. And our room is a very acceptable state of mostly-neat but not spotless.

I'm really enjoying living in res. Its a nice feeling that when I don't have class or anything to do, I can always find something. I'm on an all girls floor (there are 127 first-years here and something like 22 boys, so its no shock that none of them are on my floor) and I'm, well, not at the "friends" stage yet, but I like some of the people here a lot. We've gotten past the "hi who are you" stage of conversation now and have moved a little deeper, which is really nice.

Yesterday we spent the day on a field-trip to Brighton. Its a nice little town, I suppose. We didn't have that much time there (we also went to the University of Sussex library, which we are to use to supplement the one here and to some pretty cool cliffs which were called something that I can't remember) but some people and I are going back to Brighton on Saturday to do some shopping and hang out on the beach. (Theres a pretty nice beach there.) (Image 1: The Cliffs)

Last night (the night before classes started) we had a wine-and-cheese mixer with our profs. It was nice to get to talk to them before classes started. Most of mine are pretty awesome, actually. The history prof is going to do some archeology digs on the castle grounds, and the politics prof is Greek, and therefore is teaching us about the etymology of the politics words. Its interesting.

I can't get used to being served alcohol, though. The pubtender thinks I'm hilarious. I asked him for a free sample the first night, because I didn't want to spend money on a drink before I knew what I liked. He gave me a sample (I wasn't surprised, having spent most of the summer giving out free samples, but most of the people I was with were pretty shocked, and regretted having already ordered drinks) and so now anytime I come in he calls me sample-girl or something to that effect. As it turns out, I'm not a huge fan of drinking. I like being able to buy liquor, I'm just not a big fan of consuming it (which I'm sure will come as a relief to my parents.) A lot of people here don't drink, or don't drink much. It costs a LOT of money. (Image 2: Lia and Jamie at the pub.)

Classes started today. I had Art History, Politics, Geography and History. They seem pretty good. People keep warning us not to over-extend ourselves and whatnot, which I'm sure is a good warning (as I haven't done what I need to to prepare for tomorrow yet...) but it doesn't seem like a really outrageous amount of work. We'll see, though, I bet it is and they're just trying to lull us into a false sense of calm... (Image 3: Lia's first day of school.)

We're going to London all day Friday.

The food is terrible. Like, its so much worse than I could have imagined... Literally, there are three or four starch options at each meal (at least two kinds of potatoes, pasta and rice) and not really any edible meat. At least there is a salad bar, thank goodness.
On the other hand, the dining hall is in a castle, which is nice.
(Image 4: On the way into the Castle.)

Schedule

So I'll share (partly so that I'll remember...)

Monday:
11:30-12:50: Art History
13:00-14:00: Lunch
14:00-15:20: Geography
15:30-16:50: History
17:00-18:20: Political Studies
18:30-19:30: Dinner

Tuesday:
14:00-15:20: Politics
17:00-18:20: Art History

Wednesday:
8:30-9:50: Economics
11:30-12:50: Geography
17:00-18:20: Econ again

Thursday:
10:00-11:20: History

Friday, Saturday: Field Studies.

There you have it.

Greetings from the UK!

I am at this moment sitting in my room in Bader Hall. Actually its a great dorm space (not mine in particular, Bader in general.)
I got to Heathrow at 6:00 Wednesday morning. Jamie and I then lugged all of our luggage (and there was rather a lot of it) from the terminal where we landed to the terminal where we were to meet the ISC people. We were supposed to be on the second bus. HOWEVER, even after taking a train from one terminal to the other and going through customs, we were the first ISC-ers at the meeting area. So we sat, and waited, and slowly gathered people, and eventually (around 9) got on a Coach for the 2ish hour drive to the Castle.
Which is really not that big, but excellent anyway.
The food, however, is not so good.

So I'm jetlagged (just a little...ish) and I'm going to go to bed.
More orientating tomorrow! Much excitement.

Fare thee well.

Three, Two, One...

I guess every time you do something really exciting you kind of know its coming in the back of your mind for awhile before it really hits you. I've known I'd be leaving for England on September 4 since spring break. But it wasn't until a few hours ago that I really got that this includes moving out of Highland Park.
As it so happens, I hate moving. I like living in the new place, its just the in-between part that gets me. I don't enjoy saying goodbye. I tried to call and talk to everyone this week so that I could, I guess, avoid saying goodbye as much as possible. Because I am not a fan.

Orientation starts the day after tomorrow.
I'm already checked in to a 4:40 PM British Airways flight direct from O'Hare to Heathrow tomorrow. It gets in at 6:something Wednesday morning, local time.

This is my way of saying goodbye.
And thank you.
xoxo