Whirlwind Europe here we come!

I am currently in Interlaken, Switzerland in the middle of beautiful mountains and lakes, cows and chataeus. It's so scenic and just how I imagined Switzerland to be. On Thursday I met up with Alissa in Geneva; she was coming from Nice, France since she had been traveling while I took my exams. While in Geneva we saw (in addition to hundreds of banks and clock stores!) the UN and the Red Cross Museum, both of which were very interesting to tour. We explored the cathedral there and went to the impressive archeology musuem underneath. We played lifesize chess and made ourselves dizzy on seesaws and sit and spins in the park. We also managed to rent bikes and take a boat cruise of Lake Geneva for free. Since the Euro Cup 2008 is being held in Geneva right now, there were "football" fans from all over the world decked out in the colors of their home team so it was fun to share in the spirit of all the festivities. The city has even suspended a giant soccer ball above their famous fountain in the middle of the lake. So after two nights there, we headed to Interlaken in the central part of the country where we had to swap from our incredibly basic French vocabulary to an almost unpronouncable set of German words.
Tomorrow we head on to Munich. Here's the rest of our itinerary with basically 2 nights in each place:
*Munich, Germany (with day trips to Dachau and Fussen)
*Salzburg, Austria
*Vienna, Austria
*Prague, Czech Republic
*Berlin, Germany
*Amsterdam, The Netherlands (with a day trip to The Hague)
*Then back to England for all of 6 hours before I return HOME on June 23rd.

Finished!

I can't believe the semester is over! I came back from Italy last Thursday (Italy needs a dozen blog posts of its own because it was amazing!) and then had an exam on Friday and another on Monday. Now I'm finished! I'm not so sure how the exams went as I didn't really know how to prepare for them and so spent far more time traveling than studying, but they are OVER! It's such a relief to be done with school, but so sad to know I'm leaving. It has been a great semester and I really love England and all of the wonderful people I've met here. Despite not being crazy about my courses, I've learned so much, mostly outside class, about everything- history, politics, culture, traditions and just people and life in general. I'm so glad I had the opportunity to live here in Norwich because I feel like I was really able to experience and enjoy England in a way you can't when you are simply visiting on vacation. It was great seeing so much of the country as well as just taking part in the day to day things like grocery shopping and riding the double decker buses to and from town. I am definitely going to miss it here.

Tuesday was my birthday and it was a wonderful day. I went out for breakfast in the morning with some friends and finally had a "traditional English breakfast" because I knew I had to do it before I left. It was complete with eggs, toast, baked beans, mushrooms, tomatoes, sausage, bacon, and of course tea. And since it was my birthday, my friends insisted that i top it off with chocolate cake : ) Throughout the day I received so many birthday greetings and cards from people both here and at home. I even has the pleasant surprise of getting several phone calls from family and friends back home whose voices I haven't heard since I left in January. In addition to the more mundane like laundry and packing, I met up with friends through out the day and that night had a barbecue by the lake which was a lot of fun. I even learned (well, was taught) how to play cricket. Later that night we went to a cowboy and indian themed party that the university was hosting and I was obligated to keep my "birthday girl" hat on in addition to the cowgirl hat. It was a great day and thank you to all of you who made it special.
Now I am preparing to leave on the second half of my Europe adventure...

Oxford

After arriving back in Norwich at 1:00 am after the Stonehenge tour, I headed out 24 hours later for a "day trip" to Oxford. My friend Silvia was determined to go before we left England and it was a place I had been interested to visit, so realizing how little time we had left we decided, what the heck, lets just do it. We caught the National Express coach from Norwich at 1:50 am and after changing buses at Stansted airport (a place where I have passed far too many hours in the middle of the night) we arrived in London where we had to catch another coach. We were in Oxford before 8:00 am and it was so strange seeing the city as quiet and empty as it was. We were able to see aspects most tourists wouldn't though, such as the Oxford crew teams practicing on the river and the punters preparing their boats for the day. It was fun wandering the city and watching it slowly come to life. We visited the botanical gardens there and several museums. We went to the famous Christ Church College where John Locke, Lewis Carroll and so many others have graduated from, but is now so frequently visited since the Harry Potter movies were filmed there. Though we were limited to specific areas, it was pretty walking through the courtyard, the cathedral, and the dining hall. Too bad the dining commons at UMass do not even slightly resemble those at Oxford with their long, fancily set tables, stained glass windows, and massive portraits of past deans, graduates, and benefactors. We also walked through some of the other campus like Trinity College and Magdelen College. It was fun just wandering around in and out of stores and past renowned sights like the Bodleian Library which holds a copy of every book ever published in the UK, the unusually shaped Sheldonian Theatre, and the knockoff Venice style Bridge of Sighs. Exhausted, we left around 7:00 and arrived back in Norwich at midnight. Although we spent just as much time traveling as we did exploring Oxford, it was a fun day and I'm glad I was able to go before leaving England.

Big old rocks

The tour that a friend and I did last week was great! It was the same company we saw Scotland with and was an excellent way to visit major sites that we wanted to see but may not have had an opportunity to, as well as to see other things that were really interesting that we wouldn't have known about otherwise. 18 of us boarded the big yellow bus in London at the crack of dawn and headed to our first stop: Stonehenge. It was amazing seeing something so old and so famous that I had only read about and seen pictures of. Though it was roped off, we were still able to walk around the monument and with the admission, we were given an audioguide which provided interesting information on the arrangement of the stones and speculations on how and why they were laid. Our next stop was Devon, where we did a short walk up the "tor" (aka hill) and had a nice view of the surrounding area. We spent that night in Cornwall in Newquay, which is said to be the surfing capital of England. It was neat a town and our hostel was right by the water.

(I started this post forever ago but never finished it and now I'm in ITALY with a million more things I could write about so I'll quickly sum up the rest of the tour.)
We spent all of the next day in Cornwall, the south western part of England, stopping at various places along the way including St. Ive's- a quaint seaside town where we walked around and stocked up on the famous Cornish pasties, a light house with Caribbean-like views of the ocean, Sennen Cove from which we walked to Land's End- the most westerly point in England, Minack Theatre- an amazing outdoor stone theater built into a cliff overlooking the water, as well as other stops (including my first official cream tea- a delicious English specialty consisting of a pot of tea, a fresh scone, jam, and mounds of clotted cream). The third day we went to Tintagel-- where the ruins of what was supposedly King Arthur's castle remain, Glastonbury--a hippie town that also made Arthur claims and had an abbey and another fun hill to climb, Cheddar Gorge-- where cheddar cheese originated, and ended in Bath where we spent the night. We were free to do as we pleased until 12:00 the next day, so friends and I spent time just wandering around and gazing at all of the Georgian architecture and gardens and other things we came across. Of course we also went to the Roman Baths and it was so interesting to see what remains from when they were built 2000 years ago and how the area has changed. That was our final day of the tour so on our way back to London, we made several stops including Avebury- a giant though not as well preserved version of Stonehenge, and Lacock, an old fashioned village that hasn't really changed since the 16th century. It was a great trip!

Classes are finished! It is a relief to have all of the course work in and only have to deal with exams now. Last weekend I participated in a program called HOST that is organized for International students to do a home stay with an English family. I had signed up for it in January, but unfortunately wasn't placed until now. However, it was fun to get off campus and stay in a house. I was placed with an nice older single woman and her two dogs which were like her children. We went on several walks, including one with the Rambler's Association that she is a part of, visited a National Trust estate, went swimming, played a few games, and ate lots of food. It was an interesting change of pace from university life.

The week was primarily dedicated to finishing up my massive history project, but some friends and I managed to squeeze in a day trip to the Norfolk broads--a series of lakes and streams. We didn't do the typical thing and hire a boat, but we did rent bikes and wander all around which was fun. It was so pretty seeing all of the flowers in bloom and the little lambs out in the field. However, despite the appearance of Spring and in typical English style, the weather decided to change and we were caught in a hail storm and then were soaked in the rain. Fish and chips helped warm us up though and make a nice ending to our day.

On Saturday night we went to the circus as it came to UEA as part of the two week long Norfolk Festival. It was weird and unlike anything I've seen before, but it was good. Basically it was standing room only inside of this big silver tent where we were continuously herded from one side to to another as the position of the act changed. You'd be watching the tightrope walker and all of a sudden you'd have to move because a trapeze artist would be dangling above your head.

Now I'm off on a four day tour to Stonehenge, Bath, and Cornwall with the same company that we saw Scotland with. I'm excited! (except for the fact that I have to leave at 1:50 am on a 4 hour bus ride to London...)

back to work...

So it's back to the grind here at UEA, but I can't really complain seeing as though I only have two more classes before the semester is up; then it's a month long period of exams... I don't know why they spread it out so much here, but I hope to do lots of traveling during it and squeeze in studying where possible. It's terrible that I've been so unmotivated with school this semester, both because I don't really like my classes and because it feels like a 5 month vacation here! I do still have a fair amount of work to get in by next week, but after that it's just studying. I say "just" as if my exams aren't worth 50% of my entire grade... Oh well. I'm thoroughly disenchanted with the world of academia in general and over the past few weeks I have decided that I'm not ready to go straight on to do post-grad work and my Masters after next year. What I'll do, I haven't decided yet, but I'd love to teach abroad (teaching English as a second language, or working in a school in a developing country, or teaching at a missionary school, etc), join the Peace Corps, apply for Teach for America, or do something similar for a year or two in "the real world" before going back to school. I have too many other decisions to make right now though so that one is going to have to wait awhile.

That all being said, I'm not failing out of university or anything, though one might think I was considering that I got a 67 on the essay I just got back. However, while this would be pretty close to failing back home, the marking is quite different here. Failing is a 35 and a 67 is considered "upper second class honors" and is equivalent to an A- back home. So don't worry, I will at least pass this semester and secure myself a place at UMass for my senior year.

I'm gong away this weekend as part of the HOST program where you apply to stay with a British family for the weekend. I'll post an update on how it goes when I get back. As for pictures, they're coming. Good news= I received the cable from Hong Kong; Bad news= despite its description, it's not compatible with my computer...

Back at UEA after the Isle of Wight

So Easter Break is officially over and now it's back to work... As much as I loved traveling and was dreading coming back to UEA, it's actually been really nice to be back. It's great seeing everyone again and catching up. It's also strangely nice to just have more of a regular schedule again. However, I still want to travel everywhere at every spare moment (which causes a problem when I have so much work that I need to get done in the next couple of weeks)!

The Isle of Wight was really nice. It was pretty walking along the ocean and exploring some of the quaint little villages on the island (which is about 23 miles x 13 miles). Rachel and I bought bus rover tickets and so were able to go all over and see things like the castle, different shops, an old military battery, unique rock formations called "The Needles," a monument to Tennyson, and more. I also just really enjoyed relaxing and visiting with Rachel's grandmother. It was so nice to eat delicious homecooked food around a normal table, sleep in a real bed, chill out on a couch, and just do all of those little things you start to miss after living in a dorm away from home for awhile.

As for pictures, I never did find my cord (though I just ordered a new one on good ol' Ebay), but I was able to back up my memory card on to a CD and so I will try to put up a sampling of photos from my travels. I just wish there was some way of labeling them.



By the way, this is what England looks like: