Back in the Swing of Things

The stress of working full time and work for two courses finally got to all of us this week. It has been a very busy, crazy week, but now that it is over it hasn’t been that bad. Last Monday, we took a mandatory journalism field trip to the new offices of the Guardian—a very well respected, liberal newspaper in London. The offices were quite nice and we got to talk to the former editor-in-chief of the paper who showed us around. It was an interesting evening. We also had our second big journalism paper due on Friday, so that took up much of my free time this week.

On Wednesday, my British Life and Culture class took another and final journey out of London to Warwick (pronounced without the second W) Castle and Stratford-Upon-Avon. We weren’t particularly looking forward to this trip, since our last one to Canterbury wasn’t all I’d hoped for, and Oxford wasn’t that great either. However, I had a great time.

Warwick Castle was actually an interesting, friendlier castle than Dover Castle. It’s surrounded by gorgeous neighborhoods and even prettier scenery. I even climbed 500 stairs to the top of one tower. It was kind of scary because going up and down was all tiny, circular staircases with not a whole lot of light, so it was kind of creepy, but I made it both up and down.

We then headed to Stratford-Upon-Avon (Avon means river) where we didn’t have much time to explore due to all our previous engagements. We first explored Shakespeare’s birthplace and where he grew up. The outside surrounding his house was interesting, but the actual house itself, I didn’t find very interesting or informative. The town of Stratford, the one little street I had time to stroll up and down of, was very cute. All of its shops were called something having to do with Shakespeare and I’ve never seen so many teahouses in my life. There was the Much Ado About Toys store and others named after Shakespeare plays.

Craving fish and chips ever since we got back to London, we went to a restaurant promising traditional English food and that’s just what we got. We didn’t have much time, but our tour guide told us about a very good sweet shop right next to Shakespeare’s house, so of course the entire group went to it. It was traditional English sweets like I’d never seen them before. I asked our tour guide what a Turkish delight was, because I kept seeing them everywhere and not knowing what they were. The owner opened a bag and let me try one and they were delicious. I bought some Turkish delights and fudge for our long journey back.

Our tour guide was named Trudy, and she was a character to say the least. We had her take us to the British Museum too. She’s kind of crazy. We think it’s an act that she tells us really strange stories and talks in really high, or really low-pitched voices that she changes mid-sentence. She also looks like a slightly younger version of Endora from Bewitched. She’s really cool and always makes our field trips interesting. Tour guides here are hard-core. You have a pass a very official and difficult examination on all things English to get certified as a tour guide. They are incredibly well respected. All of our tour guides have been characters in their own right.

After Stratford, we made a brief stop at Anne Hathaway’s (Shakespeare’s wife, not the actress) childhood house. It was in a pretty area very close to Stratford, but old, preserved houses don’t really make a huge impression to me. Half of the people of the trip, myself included, were going to a football (soccer) game that evening, so we got on the football coach that took us to the Fulham vs. Blackburn match.

Despite all the planning ahead our program did, we got there very early despite rushing through the day to make sure we made it on time. Maddy, Lauren and I immediately went to go and find the stadium and by the time we got there, 2 hours early, hardly anyone was there. We waited around for a while until the doors opened and slowly watched the stands fill full of people. It was a much smaller stadium than I expected, but packed with people. We ate hot dogs—to our delight, as we were afraid sports food would be different in England. It is interesting that in England no alcohol is allowed in the stadium itself, so the outside of the stadium was much more lively than the inside. Going to a football match was a lot of fun, despite the fact that I didn’t know what was going on through much of it. It was very hard-core. The clock never stopped and even if someone got injured, they just played around them. The atmosphere was great. Everyone was enthusiastic and loved being there. We got home around 10:30 and immediately went to more work on our papers, but it was a fun day.

Friday was Red Nose Day. Yeah, it sounded weird to me at first too, but it is nothing of the sort here. Red Nose Day is a huge charity fundraiser that goes on every year with the entire country getting involved. It’s been in the works publicly for months and all the major stars donate their time to get people to donate money at this huge, all night TV Telethon. It’s a huge deal that raises millions of dollars every year for things like AIDS in Africa, education, women in Africa, cancer research, and stuff like that. We’ve been covering it on MSN a lot, and it’s just something that many celebrities get involved in a good thing to know about. It’s one of those things that you don’t know what it is but quickly find out because it is such a massive event here.

Another massive event here is apparently St. Patrick’s Day. On Sunday, the City of London held a massive St. Patty’s Day festival in Trafalgar Square. In the morning, we got up early and went to the National Gallery for a special exhibit they had on Picasso. It was a really great exhibit. There were so many famous Picasso’s that I recognized, and I learned a lot about Picasso’s life in general, so it was very interesting.

We then camped out of the street where the parade was taking place. It was similar to parades in America, but I enjoyed it. There were at least three marching bagpipe bands in kilts, which was cool to get our Irish music in. Besides that, there were a few amateur Irish dancers and many families and Irish foundations that marched. Afterwards, it was basically a huge concert with a ton of bands performing. We went and got traditional Irish food (Guinness hot dogs) and listened amongst the massive crowd that got drunker by the song. The whole festival was really a huge advertisement for Guinness beer, as most people were getting drunk off of it. Trafalgar Square, a place I’ve come to know and love, was completely trashed like a frat house by the time we left half way through the bands—beer, beer cans and bottles everywhere.

Anyway, we left and walked around Leicester Square, right next door, and were on my quest to see a movie. I had not seen a movie since I was here—probably my longest stretch ever since I’ve seen a film. I was going to go alone and see Revolutionary Road, but when we saw He’s Just Not That Into You playing, we couldn’t pass it up. Besides the fact that there were no previews before the movie (much to my deep dismay), the theatre was incredibly behind (not nearly as punctual as US theatres), there were different warning signs before the films, the seats were much cushier, there was a price different between sitting up in the stalls and the balcony and the seats were assigned (although no one followed the rule) there was no difference whatsoever. Okay, so there were many major differences, but it was still fun and we enjoyed the movie and had a good time.

Anyway, just another normal Monday today. This past week has really been a whirlwind of activity, but it has been a lot of fun. Hope everyone has a good week!