Time to Catch Up

I have tons to catch up on in this blog so I’ll do my best to key in on some of the highlights. Monday we had our British Life and Culture class pretty much all day. We started at 9 am and the class ended at 3:00 with an hour and a half lunch break in the middle of the day. During the morning session we learned the geography of the United Kingdom based on football teams we were required to research as part of our homework. It was quite an interesting way to learn geography. After that part of class we did a webbing activity to start connecting the things we had been learning so far. To end the morning session we were divided up into groups and required to write down five questions we wanted answered while we were here.

We had an hour and a half lunch break after that. During the break we ate our lunch and then Jeana and I headed to the market that is nearby to get our fruits and vegetables for the week. Then we headed back to class for our afternoon session. In the afternoon we discussed how Parliament works and the roles of people within Parliament. Then we did a mock session of Parliament and had to pass a bill. It was again a really neat way to learn about the UK and how the things they do vary from the way we do things. When class was over we got our tasks for the week and I am quite excited about it. I know its crazy I’m looking forward to doing homework but this is homework London style. We have been given a shopping task. Basically we all have been given different grocery stores in various parts of town that we have to shop at and then compare our findings at our next class session where we will also be taste testing the food. It should be quite fun to do! I’ll explain more about the rest of the assignment as we complete those things!

When class was over it was time to go on one of our walks for walking class. We walked through Soho and Chinatown so that was pretty interesting to get to see those parts of London. We only walked for 50 minutes but we were all dead tired by the time we got back to our flats. Not so much from the walking but the entire day in general was sort of exhausting. When we got back Jeana and I had a snack and then headed out to do some grocery shopping. We had looked up a few recipes that we could make and were quite happy with our shopping. We made some yummy Mexican dip when we got home. Even though I was totally exhausted at this point some of us decided to go listen to some live music that was playing down the street and I’m quite glad I went because it was really good.

Tuesday was a much more relaxing day than Monday. I did not have class until 1:00 so I slept in until 11:00 to catch up on some much needed sleep. At 1:00 was our British Pop Music class. This class is absolutely fantastic…mostly because my professor is just excellent! On Tuesday we learned all about the Beatles, The Rolling Stones, and a little about The Animals and The Who. We got to listen to music from all the groups and I just absolutely loved it. We all left there wanting to go play some Beatles when we got back to our flats. I just wish there were more classes like this one because it really is an experience.

After class I came back and worked on some homework a little bit. Later in the evening Denise and her family invited us over for some tea and treats. We started heading over there a little after 7:00 and had a great time telling stories and talking about trips we had in the works for the rest of the semester. Currently we are working on planning our fall break trip to Italy and I am quite excited about it!

Lyndon had told us to try to catch some of the football match that was on last night: Tottenham Hotspurs (which is one of my football teams) versus Arsenal at one of the pubs. He said it would be fun to see what the atmosphere of the pub was like and he was right. We decided to catch the end of the game before heading home at the pub on the corner of Denise’s street. It really was a neat thing to be a part of. Everyone cheered when something good happened or booed when they were upset. It was just a fun environment to be in to watch the game. We did have to ask a few people some questions about the match but that only made it all the more fun. Now when we go to a football match as a group next week we’ll sort of know what we are talking about! And apparently we got there at an exciting time because the match had just gone into extra time (same as over time). It was lucky for us because if it hadn’t we would have missed the match completely. When the match ended the pub we were in actually started doing Karaoke. We stayed to listen to a few songs. The people were actually really good. We are thinking we might do some rehearsing and go back and give it a try sometime (I only plan to lip sing but the girls don’t know that yet!).

Now finally today! Today was quite the eventful day. We began our day full of sightseeing at Westminster Abbey. It was quite spectacular and I would say it is somewhere everyone must go who visits London. There really is just so much to see inside and the architecture of the building is simply incredible. It was sort of fascinating seeing the burial sites of all the people we have been studying and learning about this entire trip. Seeing them was also quite odd at the same time because you just do not expect them to really be buried there. Apparently there are 4,000 bodies buried there and it is now completely full. No one else can be buried in Westminster Abbey. A few highlights were seeing the coronation chair and Edward the Confessors burial site. The part I found the most moving was the tomb of the Unknown Soldier. The tomb of the Unknown Soldier is the only grave you cannot walk over. People are allowed to walk all over the graves of Kings and Queens but it is specifically noted that no one may walk on this grave. No one knows which solider is buried within the grave as he was randomly selected from four corpses but he represents all the lives that were lost that were unable to be identified. It was quite sad to think about thousands of men who lost their lives and were never identified so I just thought the grave was a really good commemoration of that.

When we finished touring the entire Abbey we quickly marched ourselves over to Buckingham Place to see the changing of the guard. It was a really beautiful day out today so by the time we got there it was really crowded. We stood around for a while but basically gave up on seeing it today. We were only going to see them switch out anyway so I had planned to come back because I would like to see the full ceremony. After that we had until 1:45 to just enjoy the afternoon and eat lunch. There is a beautiful park right next to Buckingham Palace so that is where we spent our afternoon. If I’m not mistaken I think it was St. James Park but I’m not sure on that. It was a beautiful park and just made it for a perfect afternoon. We have all missed seeing the grass and being able to just sit out and enjoy the sunshine on the days when it is shining so our afternoon at the park was fantastic. I absolutely loved seeing all the flowers and the wildlife that was there. The animals here are so much braver than they are in the US. Squirrels just came up to us while we were sitting in the grass. To be honest it freaked me out a little bit. I never really want to be that close to a squirrel again. There were some really pretty ducks and other birds in the water and also some great views of London from the park.

After fully enjoying the wonderful weather and time out in the sun we headed for Buckingham Palace for our tour. We just used the audio guides and got to walk through at our own pace. It was really nice being able to spend as much or as little time in each room as we liked. Though I don’t think I spent a little amount of time in any room. Some of the people didn’t seem to enjoy the tour but I thought the house was absolutely beautiful. There is no other place where you can have as beautiful of ceilings as they have in Buckingham Palace. It may seem like a weird detail to pick out but the intricacy of the ceilings was incredible. The entire place was exquisitely decorated. It really can’t even be described in words. Hearing the audio guide the entire time was a bit of information overload. It was interesting while we were walking through the rooms but honestly I was so into actually looking at the rooms that at the end of the tour I couldn’t remember much of what the audio guide said! The tour was still completely worth every minute. Apparently I took too much time enjoying the rooms though because one other girl and I were the last ones out and some people had been waiting 20 minutes for us. I really didn’t feel bad about it because they just should have looked around more!

Now it seems as if that is one full day and it should probably be over but not quite! Our final activity was actually optional but I wasn’t about to pass up on some potential fun and fun it was. We ventured over to Hyde Park to play a game of rounders. It is basically softball but its rules vary quite a bit. Instead of the goal being to just get around the bases and score when you make it back to home plate, you only score if you make it all the way around to home plate in one run. Basically you only score a point if you get what would be a home run to us or if you’re really fast and the other team can’t tag you out by the time you run around the bases. I was quite excited because I did actually score a point for the team. We played girls versus guys (Denise’s family joined us for the tour of Buckingham Palace so her three little boys got to play with us which was quite fun). The girls played hard but we didn’t end up with the victory in the end…all I ended up with was a grass stain on my pants from sliding into one of the bases to try to get one of the boys out (I actually sort of slipped…I didn’t mean to actually slide. I just hope the grass stain comes out of my jeans!). It was so much fun though and I hope we get to play it again. We are actually hoping that Phillipa will teach us how to play cricket soon.

So that has been my exciting week so far. I cannot believe it is Wednesday night already! Time sure has been flying by! One more day of class and then we have a fun filled weekend in store!