Munich

Our next stop after Berlin was Munich. It is a beautiful city with a remarkable history, which is preserved through the massive rebuilding project following the war. Interestingly, most of the buildings in the city are no more than 60 years old, though they look to be hundreds of years old. This is a major contrast to Berlin, which rebuilt its entire city with new buildings, which given the Brutalist architectural period was a mistake in some cases, but exciting in others. In Munich we had an amazing walking tour with Ozzy, the self-proclaimed only black man in Munich. He may have been right. As you can imagine you have to be exuberant to be the only anything in a city, and exuberant Ozzy was. Interesting to not that our tour guide in Berlin was an Aussie, and in Munich we got an Ozzy. Laugh, it’s hilarious. Some highlights from Munich:

• The Augustiner Brau, where our waiter insisted on calling us his “brothers from another mother” and gave us all “American Hi-Fives” for attempting to pronounce the names of German food. It was delicious.
• The delicious sausages “mit Brochen,” which are basically meat, bread, and mustard. What else is there?
• The Olympic park and BMW museum, where Brandon, Becky, Eddie and I acted like kids again – chasing swans, jumping on trampolines and running in the grass.

Salzburg

We might have picked the most beautiful day ever to visit Salzburg, which was lucky since we were only going to be there for that one day. We (or at least Becky and I) took full advantage of our time, stopping for lunch at a lovely sandwich stop (The Sandwich Corner), seeing the Residenzplatz and its famed fountain, hitting the seriously high-fashion shopping streets, seeing Mozart’s birthplace, getting ice cream, and taking the fast fortress funicular full force to the top of a hill where we could see all of Salzburg and the beautiful Austrian mountains in the distance. At this point we met up with Brandon and Eddie to have an Italian dinner… I guess to prepare for Italy the next day? Anyway the local Salzburgian cuisine did not look all that appetizing. After dinner Becky and I stopped in for crepes at cute shop on the way back to the hostel. We (Becky, me and another American couple that had the same crepes idea) stayed until close, or perhaps past close as we watched the owner come out and start counting the day’s earnings on the table perhaps trying to give us a hint. I think the entire day in Austria was a highlight of the whole trip, so I will leave out the bullet list this time.

Venice

In London shortly after our trip around Europe, I was watching the British comedian Al Murray talking about Venice. He said, only in Italy would they take a flooded city that smells like crap and call it beautiful. I found it even funnier after having been to Venice. Granted, it is beautiful, the architecture is as it was hundreds of years ago, and the canals and complete lack of motor vehicles is charming, but overall I found it to be overrated. Most of our days were spent shoulder to shoulder with other tourists, completely lost in a maze of unmarked streets. To be honest, though, it wasn’t being lost that got to me. I think that often the best way to see a city is to get lost in it, but there seemed to be literally nowhere we could go that wasn’t packed full of people. Regardless of the crowds and tourist trap feel, there were definitely highlights:

• Making sandwiches in the Piazza San Marco and listening to free live music provided by a restaurant close by.
• Seeing the architecture I had been reading about for around a year in all its Italian Gothic glory.
• The campground we stayed in, Alba d’Oro (Golden Sunset), was awesome. The people were so much more relaxed than in the city, and they had their own bar and grocery store, neither of which featured the ridiculous markup we found on “The Island.”

Florence

Florence, on the other hand, was beautiful. I could not have been happier. It was the Italy I had expected to see. Rolling hills, relaxed attitude, and delicious food. We saw the Duomo, Ponte Vecchio, Boboli Gardens, and the most delicious kebabs of our lives. One good story is that when we arrived at our hostel, we stood in front of the door labeled “95″ for several minutes wondering if we had the address completely wrong, because the building looked more like an office building than any hostel we had seen. Finally we rang the doorbell and the door buzzed open. We entered into a giant marble room with a huge staircase and hear from above, “Hello?” “Is this the “Hostel Santa Croce?” “Yes, up here.” We proceeded up the stairs and entered into what appeared to be this man’s apartment. His computer was all set up in the corner, where he was clearly webcam-chatting with hot Italian babes. We realized that what was billed as a hostel was in reality this guy’s guest apartment. But it was also probably the nicest place we stayed. It had three beds downstairs, two in a loft upstairs, a balcony, a TV, a refrigerator, and board games! Highlights:

• Sunset from the Piazza Michelangelo, which has amazing views of the city.
• Sunset the next day on the river, lighting up the Ponte Vecchio from behind (and at the same time listening to an unwitting Italian get accosted by three very Southern women… “Do ya’ll have MySpace?”)
• Florence’s best Pub Crawl, which visited 4 pubs and then dropped us off at a club to dance the night away. These pub crawls are really made by the people who are on them, and we had a great group so it was a fun time.
• The best kebab ever made. After a long walk back from the club we stopped in for a kebab (kebab shops are everywhere all across Europe, by the way). It was delicious, and I think the key were the french fries added in with the usual meat, yogurt sauce, tomatoes and lettuce. Amazing.

Rome

Rome continued to restore my faith in Italy as a beautiful country. It still felt relaxed and had the beauty of Florence, but also felt a bit more like a “big city,” which I liked. There was obviously a LOT to see in Rome, and I think we did everything we wanted to do. I think this story is better told through highlights, because there are a lot:

• The Colosseum: We saw it first the night we arrived, when it was already dark, and then again when we went back for a tour, which leads me to the…
• Crazy Italian tour guide, who along with being overtly racist (“don’t be like the Japanese and just follow in a line”), and sexist (“in ancient Rome, men could sit down and women had to stand! High five!”), was also extremely loud screamed into his microphone as though we didn’t all have the little earpieces to hear what he was saying, effectively overloading the speaker and making it more effective to just turn the earpiece off and listen to him directly. Which leads me to…
• Mike the reserved British tour guide, who took our group to the gardens and ruins across from the Colosseum and continued to enforce stereotypes just as well as his ridiculous Italian counterpart, telling dry jokes that I felt I was the only one laughing at.
• The Trevi Fountain, whose beauty was probably signaled by the fact that there must have been 400 people just sitting in front of it in awe.
• The roof garden our hostel had, where we drank Italian wine and played Trivial Pursuit (English Family Edition, which proved impossible for the usual reason: too many questions about Cricket!)
• Tour of the Vatican, which we did with Mike (the British tour guide), because he did such a great job the day before. Arranging a tour of the Vatican meant we not only got the guide but we also got to jump the queue and go straight in, which despite requiring us to be there at 8:15 am was a lifesaver. Which brings me to the…
• Sistine Chapel, which really is all it is rumored to be, making it all the more disheartening when people wouldn’t abide by the constant requests for silence.
• The coffee chop around the corner where we could get a cappuccino and a pastry for 1.50 and where the beautiful Italian waitresses didn’t speak a word of English (which became the gauge for authenticity).
• The Zoo, where Brandon and I once more relived our childhood
• The Pantheon… what more can I say? It’s The Pantheon.
• The Spanish Steps, which were beautiful by any standard and overlooked all of Rome.
• The random protest/parade that Eddie, Brandon and I encountered and decided to follow along its route, disobeying all warnings that Americans studying abroad shouldn’t take part in demonstrations political or otherwise. This one appeared to be police-sanctioned and non-violent though, and anyway we couldn’t resist the giant Papier Mache whale blasting techno music and encouraging hundreds of Italians to dance ridiculously in the streets.
• The most amazing meal ever, which involved one question: “Red or White?” The rest was left up to the kitchen. We were brought courses of lentils, crisps, mozzarella, olives, salad, roast pork, cured ham, pasta, mandarin orange juice, endless bread, cheesecake, and of course pasta. All for 20 Euro. Highly recommended, and easily the best meal of the trip.

Barcelona

The final stop on our trip was Barcelona, on the coast of Spain. I had been there twice before and so was content to relax a little and see some parts of it that I hadn’t seen before. For the most part Eddie and Brandon seemed like they wanted to relax as well, so it worked out. To recap, we saw the Gaudi cathedral (La Sagrada Familia), and Parc Güell, where Gaudi lived and designed much of the ornamental architecture in the park around his house. We also went to the Barcelona Aquarium, the largest in all of Europe, and as usual relived our childhoods. Highlights:

• The Hello BCN hostel and the crazy Canadians and Australians we met there.
• Drinking Sangria in Parc Güell and looking out over the city.
• Laying out on the beach drinking Fanta on chairs you are supposed to rent, and leaving before the attendant could collect our money.
• Tapas with Amanda and her Dad, who ended up being in Barcelona at the same time as us.
• Paella Mixta near the beach with Eddie and Brandon.
• Watching a pickpocketing duo unsuccessfully try to rob Brandon on the Metro while he spun around in circles, causing them to do the same.
• Completing the circle of childhood-reliving at the Aquarium watching sharks swim overhead, taking pictures of each other on giant frogs, and generally getting more excited about sea life than any of the 3rd graders that were there with us.

And that was the trip that was Europe Trip 2007. In retrospect I think it is the kind of trip you can only do once, but you also need to do it once. When I go back to any of those places I definitely want to dedicate more time and see some off-the-beaten-path sorts of things, but for a first impression I think we hit each city for a good amount of time.  All in all I was surprised how well I dealt with living out of a backpack for three weeks and moving every few days to a totally new city sometimes with a totally new language. It, much like the entire experience of studying in London, has given me a new confidence that I can step out of my comfort zone and take on new places, which literally opens up a world of possibilities for after I graduate, which is getting closer and closer!

Exeunt. 

We arrive at the airport and catch a bus to the train station where we book our overnight train for Munich. Then we take the U-Bahn to our hostel, St. Christopher’s Inn. It’s really nice! Cool furniture and a nice restaurant in the lobby. It is getting late so we head out to wander around the city. We hit the Museumsplein or Museum Island and see the Berliner Dom and Altes Museum. Then we get dinner and meet up with friend-of-a-friend Tom for drinks. He gives us a beer tour of Berlin (he is studying there this semester) including a bar that sells beers on a sort of stock market, where prices vary based on popularity (but probably they just vary randomly and it is all just for fun).

Day 2

We wake up early for breakfast in the hostel and then head out to get a free walking tour of the city. Our tour guide, Andrew, is awesome and has an awesome name. The tour lasts about 3 and a half hours and hits pretty much all of the major sights. It was nice to get a good overview so we could choose what spots we want to go back to. We see the Brandenburg Gates, the Holocaust Memorial, which is very interesting, the Berlin wall, Checkpoint Charlie, the opera house, a memorial to the Night of Broken Glass (a giant underground space with empty bookshelves representing all the books burnt that night), and we end on the Museumsplein, where our tour guide tells the story of how West and East Berlin were finally unified (which basically happened by accident). For dinner we go to a restaurant recommended by our tour guide that serves traditional German food. It is delicious and our waiter was quite funny. Even though he warned us if we sat outside he wouldn’t be that quick he was actually quite attentive. At night we head to the Reichstag (the German parliament building) and go up to the giant glass dome on top to look out over the city. The view is very impressive, and the beautiful glass dome was designed by the same person who designed London City Hall and the building in the City of London affectionately known as The Gherkin, Sir Norman Foster. An interesting connection.

Day 3

Now somewhat familiar with the city, Brandon, Becky and I hit some of the sights we are interested in seeing more in depth. In the morning we visit the Friedrichswerdersche Kirche, which is now a museum housing sculptures by the architect K.F. Schinkel who designed the church and many other buildings in Berlin. Next we head to the Pergammon Museum and see the Ishtar Gates, which are impressive to say the least. The whole museum houses antiquities that seem almost too large to be real. Determined to sample the local specialty in each city we visit, we get Currywurst for lunch, which is a sausage with ketchup and curry powder. It is actually quite good and needless to say we continue to eat it throughout the day as it is cheap and they probably won’t have it anywhere but Berlin. After lunch we head out of the city a ways to try and go to the Zoo. It starts to rain, though, so we opt for the aquarium instead and see the Kaiser-Wilhelm-Gedächtnis-Kirche on the way. The aquarium turns out to be excellent and we have a lot of fun looking at various fish including a tank full of Garibaldi all the way from Southern California! Next we walk down the street to KaDeWe, Germany’s answer to Harrod’s. It is a huge department store, but obviously we focus on the toy department. I take a look at the train layout and we all take pictures with a giant stuffed bear. After the department store we all meet up again at the train station to get our overnight train to the next stop on our tour, Munich.

After my parents left I had a solid week of serious paper-writing, because I had three papers due in the same week. This may not seem like that great of a schedule, but I think it was nice to get into writing mode and just knock them all down. All in all I wrote about 9,800 words in the span of 6 days. Now, though, three of my classes are over completely and my last class, Marketing, just has an exam on the 17th and then I am done completely.

These days I have mostly been hanging out with my friends on campus, and making occasional trips into Central London. It’s nice to have this time to live like a college student again after having done such intense traveling. Most of my friends are back from going home for break or traveling so we are just trying to make the most of the end of our time here. It is strange and sad that I only have two weeks left here! But as I’ve already said, I don’t foresee this being the last time I am in London. At least I hope it isn’t. All the same I have made a list of things I want to do and see before I head back to the states. Hopefully I can get to everything.

Well, hopefully this entry will let you all know that I am still alive and well in the UK. After this I am hoping to post some entries summarizing my trip around Europe. Obviously there is a lot to say, but I am just going to try and hit the highlights. Wish me luck!

Also, pictures will be going up on Flickr. Berlin photos are already up!

Friday we arrived in Dublin in the early evening via ferry and checked into our hostel, which was very nice. We got free t-shirts from the company we booked through as well as visitor guides, restaurant recommendations, etc. No sooner had we turned around from checking in when a couple of Canadian guys invited us into the kitchen to hang out and gather a group before hitting the town. Once we had all been introduced we headed into the Temple Bar area, which is where many of the pubs, bars, and clubs are. We decided to hit The Temple Bar, which is really three bars that have been joined together. It was a lot of fun and of course there were tons of people. To complete the night when we walked out of the bar there were street musicians playing and lots of people dancing outside. Of course we couldn’t resist and danced a bit before heading back to the hostel.

Saturday morning we woke up early, surprisingly, and got outside to grab a spot on the road for watching the St. Patrick’s Day parade. We stood around for quite a while but the parade was well worth it! It was very long and there were lots of different cities and groups represented. There were even a couple of marching bands from the US, which was admittedly a bit strange. Tons of people were out for the parade despite somewhat gloomy weather. Our cab driver the night before estimated there would be 200 to 300 thousand people watching it! After the parade we got lunch at Apache pizza, the only Native American themed, Chinese-owned pizza restaurant in all of Dublin. Who knew the Native Americans enjoyed pizza so? We then headed appropriately to St. Patrick’s Cathedral, which was very nice. I bought a number of postcards that maybe one day will get sent off if I get around to it.

Saturday night we had dinner at Acapulco, a surprisingly good Mexican restaurant. At least, it was much better than anything we have in London. We then headed to Mulligan’s, a very authentic Irish pub that supposedly pours the best pint of Guinness in Dublin. Of course this is what we got, and it was good. Perhaps it helped that there were drunken Irishmen singing IRA fight songs to get everyone in the mood. The crowd was a bit older, but it was definitely nice to take a break from the tourists for a bit. After finishing our pints we left back to Temple Bar and celebrated St. Patrick’s day in style, wearing our green of course.

Sunday morning we woke up VERY early for our tour of the Wicklow Mountains and the Irish countryside. This tour was definitely the highlight of the trip. The countryside was beautiful, and it was nice as usual to get out of a major city for a bit and breathe some fresh air. We hiked up into the Wicklow Mountains past two lakes and into some monastic ruins. Despite the intermittent hale storms, it was great, as the bad weather was always broken into by bright sunshine. I think our favourite part of the trip was definitely the Rock of Dunamaise, the site of the first English castle in Ireland. Eddie, Natalie and I all laid down in the grass on the side of the hill and let the incredibly high winds blow over us. It was a moment I will certainly never forget.  After the tour we got some fish and chips from supposedly the best fish and chips place in Ireland and ate them back at the hostel. We met a girl who was also in Ireland from London and hung out with her for the rest of the night. We went out but it was a bit lower key as we knew we had to be up early to catch a ferry in the morning.

The trip home on Monday was quite interesting. First of all, our fast ferry was canceled due to high winds, so we had to take a slower one that left earlier. This turned out alright because the slow ferry was much nicer and much larger. However, because of the high winds we couldn’t dock in Wales for about 3 hours once we arrived. It was the ferry equivalent of circling the airport before getting to land. We kept approaching and then turning around, all while the wind blew outside at upwards of 100 mph. Finally we did make it into port, however, and managed to get back to London only about 2 hours later than we would have otherwise.

Whenever I return from a trip I am always struck by how much I missed London while I was gone. Of course the trips are great but London has definitely become a home away from home, and a place where I feel comfortable. I got a bit emotional when I booked my flight home but I cheered up when I reassured myself that this isn’t the last time I will live in London, as it I can definitely see it being a part of my future. I imagine after my two and a half week exodus through Europe that starts on Sunday I will be missing London quite a bit, so it will be great to be here in May when we don’t have class and are just supposed to be working on essays and studying for exams. I am excited for my trip, though! It is so soon, and there are lots of preparations to be made.

Today I went on a bit of shopping spree with my friend Becky to get some new clothes and most importantly shoes for the trip. Tonight a bunch of us are celebrating the end of the term but tomorrow is all about packing and getting ready to leave very early Sunday morning. Wish me luck! I will be trying to update my blog in a bit of a different style just to chronicle my trip since there is no way I could summarize it all when I return. Look out for that! Pictures will come at the end of April, but be sure to check out the ones I posted recently from Ireland if you haven’t already.

Thursday I went to see La Boheme performed by English National Opera. Of course it was great because it is an amazing story and the music is beautiful, but since I had seen the show before in New York, I had something to compare to. The ENO version was sung in English, which took a bit of getting used to, and I think overall it is much better in Italian. I don’t know why they feel obligated to translate all their operas into English. National pride? In this production I liked the woman playing Mimi better than in New York but for the most part I felt the cast was stronger in New York. The stage set was most definitely better in New York. Regardless, the music and story prevailed and I think the opera house made a killing on tissues that night. After the opera I went to a hip little bar called Freud with Becky, Natalie (from Brown) and some others. It was a very cool place and we had fun talking and drinking mildly expensive but delicious cocktails.

Saturday I went on a trip that my university organized to Stonehenge, Salisbury and The New Forest. The weather was beautiful and we boarded a minibus early in the morning. There were about 15 of us and one guide and we managed to arrive at Stonehenge before many crowds had gathered. It was extremely windy, which I think made the landscape that much more interesting. Some people had advised me not to expect too much from Stonehenge, and I guess in reality it is just a bunch of rocks but it is interesting to think of the history and all the mystery that surrounds it. Also, to think of how long it has stood there. It has meant a lot of things to a lot of different people over its long history.

After Stonehenge, we drove a short distance to Salisbury. The town is very cool and reminded me a lot of Canterbury. Of course Salisbury is also a Cathedral Town, and their cathedral is quite impressive (though not as nice as Canterbury I must say). After the cathedral I got lunch with some friends who were on the trip coincidentally and then we boarded the bus once more. We headed to The New Forest, a protected wildlife preserve. There are all sorts of wild ponies wandering around and we stopped to hang out with them for a while. They are obviously used to people being around and were very happy to see us. There are pictures on Flickr of them.

After playing with the ponies we went deeper into the forest to see its oldest oak tree. The forest was very beautiful and it was just great to get so much fresh air. I got to talking with the guide about whether you can camp in the forest, and then about forest fires, and eventually about Los Angeles. Apparently he stayed in Manhattan Beach on his way back from a trip to South America!

After walking around in the forest for a bit, we headed to Lyndhurst, the “Capital of the New Forest.” I didn’t know anything about this town, but it was very nice and quaint. I got some delicious ice cream and then found out that Alice Liddel, the inspiration for Alice in Wonderland lived and died in Lyndhurst! This was exciting, since it is one of my favorite books. Apparently many other authors wrote in Lyndhurst including J.R.R. Tolkien.

Sunday was another beautiful day and shortly after committing myself to doing work all day my friend Brandon called and asked if I wanted to go play football with John and Oli. How could I resist? We kicked the ball around and then played around in the park. They have a sort of playground but I think the equipment is more geared towards adults because it has instructions on how to use it sort of like a gym would. After getting back to our flats Brandon, John and I grabbed our guitars and headed out on the grass to play for a little while and generally laze about in the sun. After this we continued our well executed work avoidance plan by taking a walk around our campus trying to find places we had never been.

Our walk ended at the grocery store, where I bought fixings for tacos and came home to make them for myself. They turned out to be delicious, so I was quite proud. After the tacos, a bunch of us headed out to the local pub for their pub quiz. There were 6 or 7 teams and we achieved our goal of not coming in last despite our general lack of knowledge on the subject of Cricket (which came up far more than it should have).

Monday night I went to see Cabaret with Debbie. It was very good, despite being far raunchier than I had expected (originally I saw it done in regional theatre, so I guess they were going for more family-friendly there, but this production was particularly extreme). The title song – …life is a cabaret, old chum… – is always great.

Tonight my week at the theatre continues as I am off in a few minutes to see The Tempest with Patrick Stewart of Star Trek fame. He’ll be playing Prospero. It is also now really only one more day until I leave for Ireland! I can’t believe it is so soon, I am very excited. I will take plenty of pictures! For now I hope everyone is doing well, and I’ll be sure to write again when I return from the Emerald Isle.

After returning to school I took a quick shower and grabbed dinner on my way out to a date to see the Sir John Soane Museum. On the first Tuesday of each month the museum opens at night and is lit entirely by candle light. It was a perfect setting for a date and we both really enjoyed ourselves. The museum is inside of John Soane’s house, and it was really fun to get an idea of what it must have been like when he had to light his house with candles. We kept imagining if his nieces and nephews came to visit Uncle John and had to wander the house with all it’s hundreds of mirrors and busts and other artifacts – creepy! We kept circling back to our favourite rooms to avoid leaving but eventually we had to brave the cold and after the museum we got coffee at Starbucks, which was tremendously overpriced but tasted more delicious than usual.

I headed back to my room just in time to catch the Liverpool v. Barcelona football match in my friend Sian’s room. She is from Essex and a huge Liverpool fan, so we were all very excited when Liverpool won! This means they move on to the quarter finals. After the game a bunch of us headed over to the pub to celebrate with cheap drinks because Tuesday is student night.

All in all, it was an excellent, excellent day! Hopefully there will be more to come as this term comes to a close.

In other news, my travel plans for the next two months are shaping up. This weekend I am going to Stonehenge and then next weekend Eddie, Natalie and I are going to Ireland for St. Patrick’s day! We finally got our transportation booked so we are officially going, and we are getting there by ferry so that should be exciting.

The big news in the travel arena is that we’ve finally gotten the April vacation figured out. For about 3 weeks five of my friends and I are going to be traveling around Europe by train. I’ve already received my Eurail pass in the mail, and we just booked our flight to Berlin this morning. The schedule looks like this:

1 – 3 April: Berlin
4 – 6 April: Munich
6 – 7 April: Salzburg
7 – 9 April: Venice
9 – 11 April: Florence
11 – 14 April: Rome
14 – 18 April: Barcelona

It is going to be a whirlwind but I am very excited to see so many new cities (and a couple favourites that I will be revisiting – Barcelona and Munich). If you or anyone you know will be in any of these places be sure and let me know!

Saturday I got together with my roommate from Brown, Eddie, and some of his friends from King’s College and we planned a trip around Europe in April. We are flying into Berlin and then taking the train all around. I will post more details later about that.

Sunday my friend Abby and I went to Brick Lane, a quirky street near my school with lots of food and an open-air market that happens on Sundays. We had some delicious bagels (or beigals, as they called them) and then went to Spitalfields market, which is a giant farmer’s market-type place with all sorts of food, clothing, and various trinkets. I want to go back as the first time around it was pretty overwhelming but amazing nonetheless.

Tuesday my friends Brandon, John, and I went to this funky pub called the Betsy Trotwood to see an acoustic act from London called the Blue Rose Code. The venue was really cool, and at maximum capacity probably could have held 20 to 25 people standing. The music was great and reminded me of John Mayer, if he were British and showed off his guitar-playing ability more often. After we saw them, I left to meet a bunch of friends at a club in central London for their student night. A bunch of students from Queen Mary were there, and we had a lot of fun dancing well into the morning.

Wednesday I went on an awesome walking tour of London. You might be thinking it’s a little late for a guided tour of the city, but it wasn’t a touristy tour at all and barely hit any of London’s more famous attractions. The tour was lead by a great guide named Joel, who had a penchant for singing randomly and reciting Shakespeare and a theory that Americans wash far too much (probably true). He showed us all around some of London’s forgotten jewels, dark alleys, and historical districts most people probably don’t realize they are in. On the tour we saw and sat in the oldest church in London, saw  the William Wallace memorial, and walked around Postman’s Park. For those that have seen the movie Closer, this is the park with the wall dedicated to various people who have lost their lives helping others. I had no idea this park actually existed so I was incredibly excited to see it. The guide didn’t even know it was in Closer, and just liked the idea of memorializing people who died doing good deeds, so that made it even more special. The tour was scheduled to last about two hours but our guide loved to talk and we ended up meandering around for about 3 and half hours!

After running back to my flat and grabbing a quick dinner, I got my theatre ticket and left once more to see Ibsen’s John Gabriel Borkman at the Donmar Warehouse. I had no idea what to expect as I had never heard of the play and only knew that Ian McDiarmid (Emperor Palpatine from Star Wars) was in it. Of course it would have been a great experience just to see him, but the play was amazing. It was really well acted and the direction and set were spot on. For the entire play snow was falling outside the windows of the house it was set in and for the final scene the walls pulled up and a white rug was rolled out that covered the whole stage so the characters could walk out into the snow. Very cool.

Yesterday I spent most of my day working so that I could feel alright about going out at night for my friend Brandon’s birthday. To celebrate my friend Katie baked him a cake and we all ate it and talked in his kitchen and then ventured off into Leicester Square. The initial plan was to go bowling but it was extremely expensive so we all went to a club called Verve instead and danced the night away. It was a lot of fun, and the music was very good.

Today I finished off and handed in my Impressionism paper and then went down to the “guitar district” of London with John and Brandon to ogle some vintage guitars and search for a harmonica. We succeeded on both counts and also managed to get some good Chinese takeout from Chopstix (who incidentally had run out of Chopsticks!)

Tonight there is supposedly a very large flat party that is rumoured to involve a late night “sail” in the canal by our school on inflatable boats. We shall see! The water looks anything but clean so hopefully we will manage to stay dry. Now if we can just figure out how to operate the locks we can sail into central London.

Time seems to be moving very quickly here now and this term ends at the end of this month! I am starting to get a bit nostalgic even though there seems to be so much time left. I have been thinking lately how interesting it is to live in a new place and get to know it so well. I definitely no longer feel like a tourist, and I would love to come back here to work – maybe Virgin Records is hiring? In any case I feel lucky to be familiar with so many completely different places – Los Angeles, New England, and now London. It will be sad to leave, but it is too early I think for nostalgia like this and you are probably well cream crackered of reading so I’ll just shut my north and south before I get in any more barney. Did I mention our guide taught us rhyming slang?

Day 1 – The journey begins…

My friends (Brandon, Jerry, Jo, Katie, and Noel) and I met at 9:30 to begin the journey to Amsterdam. This involved taking the tube to King’s Cross, the train to Luton airport, a plane to Amsterdam, a train to Amsterdam Centraal, and then a tram to the city centre. The journey was mostly uneventful except for when the EasyJet representative told me my bag was small enough to carry on and then when I got all the way through security the officer told me it was “massive,” and made me go all the way back and check it in and then come through security again. I maintain that it isn’t that large, but whatever, I made it in time for my flight and that is what matters.

We arrived at our hostel, The Flying Pig, at about five and got checked in with no problem. The six of us were in a 12-person room, and we got a whole side of it, which was convenient. After settling in we went out to walk around the city a bit and find dinner. After deciding on an Italian restaurant (Dutch food, apparently, is terrible, but they do all sorts of ethnic food wonderfully). The dinner was great, and afterwards we continued to explore the city but went back to the hostel early because it had been a long day.

Day 2 – Polar opposites

We woke up early to take advantage of the free breakfast at the hostel, and then headed out for a walk along the canals to the Anne Frank House and Museum. The whole experience was very well done and especially meaningful for those of us who had read the book. Of course if you have read it, you know the story does not end well, but I thought that despite the depressing topic the museum did a good job of being hopeful at the end. After the museum we stopped lunch, where I ordered a hamburger that arrived sans bun, but was yummy all the same.

For the afternoon we decided to head over to the Heineken Experience, which used to be the Heineken brewery but is now a museum and attraction dedicated to the second-most imported beer (can you guess the first?) Let me tell you, it was quite an experience. I guess we didn’t know quite what to expect. Personally I figured we’d get a brief introduction to the beer-making process, then a sample, then we’d be done. In reality we did get a couple of rooms about beer-making, but we also got the history of the company, a virtual reality ride following the path of a Heineken bottle being filled, capped, and distributed, three free glasses of Heineken (which tastes much better out of an official Heineken glass), a promotional video, a foosball table, a DJ booth, a drum kit made out of kegs, and a free gift! To commemorate the experience we bought a six-pack of Heineken glasses (one for each of us).

Day 3 – Art appreciating, canal cruising, jazz jamming

Even early on a rainy Wednesday the Van Gogh museum was packed with people. There we saw around 200 of Van Gogh’s paintings, including a majority of his most recognizable (except, alas, for Starry Night). I never knew much about Van Gogh but seeing all of his work really made me want to learn more. My impressionism class might have contributed to my newfound appreciation, as he seems to experiment a lot with motion, light, and atmosphere. One particular painting, Olive grove, was really beautiful.

In the afternoon we took a canal boat cruise to see the city from the water. The tour was 75 minutes, and although it was warm inside it was impossible to take pictures so I went outside to the back of the boat. It was good that I did because there was a very nice Dutch man giving his own version of the pre-recorded tour happening inside, which was much more interesting. One of the highlights was when the boat left the canals and headed out onto open water. It was totally unexpected and very pretty. We got to see the train station from the water and a pirate ship!

After two nights of exploring and eating delicious waffles from a store called Australia, we decided to take advantage of some of the Amsterdam nightlife. At my urging we went to a jazz club called Cafe Alto, which turned out to be delightful. The bar served Amstel exclusively – apparently there is a rivalry between Heineken and Amstel despite the fact that they are distributed by the same company – so we all had some while we waited for the band to come on. There were four musicians – a drummer, saxophonist, pianist, and bassist – and I wasn’t sure what to expect, music-wise. It was a pleasant surprise when they broke into some straight jazz standards (as opposed to some wacky jazz fusion or something). They were all top players and their personalities were almost as entertaining as their music. The saxophonist even sang a song (in English, which was surprising since he had said everything else in Dutch)!

Day 4 – Tripping in Amsterdam… bike tripping!

We checked out of the hostel early and said farewell to all the “piggies” (this was the staff’s affectionate name for their guests) we had stayed with at The Flying Pig. After dropping our bags off in lockers at the train station we got lunch at the Q lunchroom back in the city centre, which was really good. Since we didn’t have to be back at the station until after dinner we decided to rent some bikes and ride out into the countryside. We got our bikes and some maps and got on our way. Initially we thought we were searching for a tunnel under the water, but we actually needed to catch a free ferry. Our search for the tunnel brought us to an empty skate park, though, so all was not lost as we had a chance to do some jumps on our bikes, which were lacking in the shock absorption department.

Once we got across the water on the ferry, we started our tour of the countryside. It was beautiful! After being in cities for so long it was refreshing to see some farmland. This was definitely the highlight of the trip for me. It turned out to be the nicest weather that day – still cloudy but a bit warmer – so it was a great day for a ride. We passed by an old windmill and then rode out along the river past plenty of sheep and cute farmhouses before turning back home. When we got back across on the ferry, we had about an hour left on our rental so we rode through the city, which was at times scary, but since the city has bike paths leading all over it was relatively safe. It is definitely a bike-friendly city – there are bike parking lots and over 25,000 bikes end up in the canals each year!

After returning our bikes, we did some souvenir shopping, got dinner, and headed to the train station. We realized that our day involved all manner of transportation – our feet, a bike, a ferry, a tram, a train, a plane, a bus, and finally a subway! The trip home was uneventful, and we managed to catch the last tube back to our school in London which was fortunate because the alternative was to take night busses, which could have added a couple hours to our journey.

All in all I would call the trip a great success, especially given the fact that 6 people who had only known one another for about a month spent 4 days together, 24 hours a day, and managed to avoid any explosive arguments and/or fisticuffs.

Now, maybe I should get to work on all the things I was supposed to be doing this past week!

P.S.: 10 points if you can identify the artist of the song whose lyric is featured in the title of this entry… and you get negative 10 points if you just type it into Google! Maybe this would be a good time to mention that all my entry titles have been lyrics. Did you notice?

Wednesday was Valentine’s Day. My friends had a party in their flat, which turned out to be really fun. There were cookies and brownies and hearts all over the flat. A couple of friends from King’s College and a friend from high school came out, which was nice.

Apparently this was the week of the flat party, because Thursday night my flatmates and I threw a party here. It went well, even though it was planned at the last minute.

Friday I worked at the Brown office and then went to the library to start work on a paper for my architecture class. After a failed attempt to find the books I needed at one library downtown I went to the King’s College library and found what I needed. It turned out to be fortunate because my friend Becky was there so we got to study together.

Saturday Amanda, Courtney and I went to Canterbury! What a beautiful city. We started off seeing the cathedral, which of course was beautiful. The sun was out and shining through the stained glass; it was a beautiful day to be there. After the cathedral we walked around the city a bit and marveled at the quaint medieval streets. I took a bunch of pictures that will hopefully be on Flickr soon. When I got back to campus, everyone back at my school was pretty tired so we just made milk shakes and watched Caddy Shack.

Today I woke up early (again… lot’s of early mornings this past week) and headed out with my friend Jerry to the Chinese New Year celebration in central London. I have never seen so many people! Leicester Square and Trafalgar Square are always busy but this was insane. They shut down all the streets and the day started with a big parade. There were lots of dancers and dragons and drums, to be alliterative. In Trafalgar Square they had a stage set up where we watched the Dragon Dance and the Lion Dance, which were both impressive although I preferred the Lion Dance more to be honest. After the show we decided to take a trip to see MI6 (where James Bond works… allegedly). There isn’t a museum there or anything but the building is cool and it’s right on the Thames. We took some pictures and then walked around. Later that day I went back to the New Year celebration with my friend Brandon and we met some friends from King’s college for Chinese dinner. It was very delicious.

Well, I should finalize my packing and then get to bed. We are meeting to leave at 9:30 tomorrow morning! I hope everyone has a great week. Wish me luck with my first trip outside of the UK!