Super Amy

Mmm, Ireland. I felt adventurous just leaving Winchester last Monday evening — my heart was pounding, to be completely honest, because it was my first out-of-the-country trip by myself, and it was a touch scary. The travelling went off without a hitch, though — a couple of trains to Gatwick, typical airport nonsense of customs and security and whatnot, and then a charming little economy flight from London Gatwick to Dublin. Easy. Landed without any problems, and found a coach to the city.

I have an annoying tendency when I arrive somewhere unfamiliar just to start walking until I “happen upon” my destination. This obviously doesn’t always work so well, so I saw a good bit of Dublin’s city center before I ever saw my hostel. I’ll admit it — I knew nothing about Dublin prior to arriving, except that it was the most popular city in Ireland, and therefore somewhere I could easily fly to. When I saw the river, and by way of signs identified it as the “Liffey,” I had a moment. “aha,” I said to myself. “Thom Yorke has been here.” I always feel so stupid when I make these sorts of connections.

Anyway, I walked for a mile or so down the Liffey, and then decided it was the wrong way, and backtracked until I found my hostel (surprisingly close to the coach station). The people there were quite friendly, and the price was very good, so that almost made up for the 17 beds that shared a room with my bed. Here, I have a very interesting complaint, which all hostel managers should note. If you have an ensuite bathroom, which is within the room, it is a good idea to put the light switch for said bathroom inside the bathroom itself. Putting it right next to the bedroom light switch means that, when someone is in the shower, and someone else decides to leave the room and switch off the lights, bad things happen, and the first someone (me, in this case) has to shower in pitch black. The rest of the hostel, of course, was lovely, and my courtesy morning french bread came with blackcurrant jam and instant nescafe. What more could one ask for?

Dublin is a city. It’s a very charming city, and full of friendly people and not-so-friendly city people, and souvenier shops and Starbucks and vast shopping centers and whatnot — basically, just like every other city in the world. It has its differences — the Liffey is my favorite UK river (take that, Thames!) yet, and the people were definitely more laid back and approachable than Paris. I felt much more at home in Dublin, but that might be because of my hair. Three times, I got stopped by cars and asked for directions. How dearly I wish I could have donned a perfect Irish accent and pointed them in the right direction. But instead, I shrugged, and in well-articulated Americanese, told them that unfortunately, I was a tourist.

My first morning, I woke up late, with a stiff hostel-induced backache, dry eyes, and a dim awareness of how stale my pillow smelt. I started walking, not really sure where I was headed. I followed the river downstream, hoping to find the beach, but ended up crossing a bridge and headed towards no-man’s land. I found myself in a housing village, obviously of poorer population than the city, and helped a charming old lady to step up a four-inch curb. (”Let me just hold you, dear. I always fall here… oh, thank you, love. God bless you!” … Irish ladies are charming.) Several hours later, I found myself walking along ocean strands, headed for Bootersville. Yep. Bootersville. Wherever that is. It was a charming town, in its own way, but just took too much walking to get there. By the time I got back into Dublin, I had been walking nonstop for seven hours, and almost fell over from starvation. I don’t even remember what I bought to eat, or how much I paid for it, but it was probably the best meal of my life.*

The night was spent wandering the city. I hate nights spent wandering the city, unless I have company, because they are cold, and you get tired, and you can’t really eat anywhere except fast food unless you are one of those people who doesn’t get self-conscious eating all by your lonesome, which I am not. So I spent a couple hours hanging out at the hostel, and went to bed. The next day, I woke up late again, this time with a pulled muscle in my knee (thanks, Bootersville…) and hostel back ache and rank pillow. Ahh, budget accomodation. I was pretty annoyed with Dublin at this point, so I went into lots of little touristy gift shops, where they play ridiculous Irish music on the stereo and try to sell you leprechaun statues, green hats, and Guinness-brand socks. I can’t imagine working in a place like that. I would go insane. Anyway, in one such building, while purchasing aforementioned cheesy souveneirs, I asked the fellow running the place where I might find something green. Turns out he was Australian, so probably not the guy to ask, but nonetheless, he traced a path to one of the rail stations on my map, and wrote in big letters: “HOWTH”. So, obedient tourist that I am, I followed the line to the Connolly rail station, and bought a return for the next train to Howth.

Howth is a coastal town, with more charm than should be consumed in one afternoon, and has footpaths across the cliffs of the eastern coast of Ireland. I don’t know what else to say about Howth, except that I am convinced it’s the prettiest town in the world. I know I speak from limited exposure, but gosh. If you have to live somewhere. Pick Howth. And go see the photos. I never thought I would owe so much to a Dublin souvenier salesman from Australia.

Okay, truth time. Things have started getting a little sad. A little sad? No. Quite a bit sad. I’m not ready to leave this place. The friends that I have made, and the places that have become comfortable, have made this a second home. Part of me wants to stay here forever, because part of me belongs here forever. Don’t get me wrong — I miss being home like crazy, especially at Christmastime. If I actually thought I would be stuck here forever, I would go insane trying to get back to Greenwood. But. It’s just bittersweet, I guess. We had a very special dinner last Friday, myself and some of the friends I’ve made from all over the world. It was such a nice evening, and ever since, I’ve been feeling a little down at the thought of leaving. Tonight, I went to the County Arms pub, to tell yet another lot of wonderful friends goodbye. I don’t like thinking that I won’t see them again, especially when right now, it feels like I’ll see them tomorrow on my way to class, or some time this weekend at the pub. It’s completely odd, this saying goodbye stuff.

That having been said, I called British Airways, and had them change my flight. I’ll be coming home this Sunday, instead of Thursday, as previously thought. This is partly based on missing home, I guess, but more than anything, it’s based on the fact that my wallet was happier with ticket-changing fees than it was with trains and hostels across the UK for four extra days. Scotland was going to end up costing more than I’d budgeted, not to mention the fact that I don’t want to feel too tired and rushed to actually enjoy Glasgow, Iona, or Lochness. Some other time, I want to see all three, but not in five days in December.

I submitted all of my essays yesterday, or at least, the ones I didn’t get concessions on. I also received a package in the mail yesterday. All of you, of course, deserve very special and individual thanks, but just know that, no matter how late it was or how complicated it was to get it here, I was so happy to see it, and felt so special. I am warmer now, thanks to Mandy, Brian, Jessi, and Wendy, well fed thanks to my Aunt Shirley (and also Jessi), decorated thanks to Liz, and genuinely entertained, thanks to Troy and Corey. I’m almost glad I got it after fini
shing my work, shortly before going home — otherwise, I would have been terribly homesick. You guys are awesome, and I love you so much.

It’s late. Bedtime, even. I just booked a hotel for London, and I plan on getting up early for one last countryside “ramble” before I leave. Then that leaves laundry, packing (!!), possibly another trip to the cathedral and Christmas market, and then last goodbyes. London on Saturday, a flight on Sunday morning, and then thanks to the magic of the sun, I will be home four hours later, after a nine hour flight.

I miss all of you. I’m ready to go home. I can’t wait…

listening to: Coco Rosie. Whichever song Troy, with his brilliant mix-cd-abilities, selected.

(Ireland photos and My Christmas Tree! courtesy of Mandy!)

*That’s not true. I do remember what I ate — turkey and swiss on delightful homemade Irish soda bread, with salad and a latte.

1. The Winchester Christmas Market opened near the cathedral today. Logically, we could compare this to that time Bright Eyes played in Atlanta, the night before two final exams — wonderful things tend to happen at the most inopportune moments. Nonetheless, I went first thing this morning to check it out, and it was indeed nifty. I’ll buy Christmas decorations in practically any circumstance, anyway, but something about having them in wooden chalets with an ice-skating rink in the middle, and Bratworst and hot cocoa and mulled wine stands all around, makes it much harder to resist.

2. To celebrate the vanishing of my mp3 player last week, I went out Tuesday and bought this state-of-the-art technological masterpiece to add to my collection. I get laughed at on campus, but aside from that, it was well worth the price. I burned a mix, and have been listening to those used cds I found in Oxford. I knew there was a reason behind those.

3. Inspired by the purchase of #2, and also by my recent longing for the Paste subscription I forgot to have forwarded here before I left, I bought an issue of Word magazine today. I’d been eyeing it ever since my trip to Oxford, and having a cd player, I could completely justify the purchase. And if I am to be completely honest, I bought it because the sampler cd has “Heart it Races” by Architecture in Helsinki on it. That’s 99% of the value, right there.

4. I only packed one suitcase for my trip to England, but because I’ve accumulated so many things while here (Belgian chocolate… *ahem*), it’s become increasingly apparent that the return journey will require more luggage. I’d been keeping my eye out for a while, but today, realizing the sudden desperateness of the situation, I poked my nose into every charity shop I could find, looking for anything that would hold a lot of junk and be accepted as checked luggage at Gatwick. Well, I came across a gem — a beautiful, resilient, £2.50 seventies masterpiece on wheels. You will agree. Sometimes good things just happen, and the satisfaction I got just rolling that beauty up the big hill to St. Lizzie’s paid the cost in full.

5. I had an embarrassing moment today. Having used up the week’s worth of money on my catering card by lunchtime yesterday (I am a hungry girl), I stopped at Starbucks this morning to get my first-of-the-day coffee (eggnog lattes are great). I am not using a wallet these days — it turns out that banknotes are wider than dollar bills, and poked out the top of my duck tape wallet. Instead, I just keep money and credit cards and id cards and insurance cards and all of those wallety things loose in a zip-up pocket in my bag. When the barista gave me my order total, I felt around for cash, found a 10, handed it to her, and resumed admiring the funny-looking mince pies in the window. After a minute, I realized she was trying to get my attention. “Maam,” she says, glancing at the note. “… this is a euro.”

Whoops.

6. I have a lot of essays to write over the next couple of weeks — six, to be precise, and all due two weeks from today. I am a little stressed about the whole thing, to be honest with you — time-management and being proactive with schoolwork are unfortunately not my forte. I am learning some new tricks, quite honestly, and this is very, very challenging for me. But your prayers would be appreciated — if ever I’ve needed some peace and the ability to focus, now is probably that time.

song of the moment: Architecture in Helsinki — Heart it Races

I’ve had a sort of a bittersweet morning. After getting some breakfast, I slipped upstairs for my usual cup of coffee and email-break before my lunchtime lecture. And for the very first time, the coffee shop girl remembered my morning coffee (quite a feat, as it differs from my afternoon coffee), and started making it before I said a word.

I only have two weeks of school left, but already I live here.

listening to: Tom Waits – Ol’ 55

New template — nifty, yes? It seemed well overdue, and nothing I’d been playing with seemed to be working. It isn’t much, but Christmas is coming, and Belgium was beautiful, and here you have it.

It’s true that I’ve only been to Belgium for the one weekend, and my knowledge of the country is quite limited, but I think I’m safe in saying that Christmastime is the best time to visit Belgium. The shop windows were decorated, and lights were everywhere, and there were lots of little Christmas markets. It was beautiful. Brugge was my favorite — we spent our first night there. The town was very quaint, and had an early-twentieth-century German feel to it. The people are so friendly, and most of them speak English, which was such a relief. Our first hour in town found us being rained upon, hailed upon, and somewhat snowed upon, before the clouds cleared up and the sun came out. The next morning, we took a horse-drawn carriage around the town — touristy and expensive, yes, but the quickest way to see the buildings and canals when you only have a few hours.

Brussels was nice, too, in its own little way. It’s the capital of the European Union, although we didn’t make it south to see the headquarters. Our hotel was well-located, and we got to see the plaza, the peeing statue that everybody raves about, and even more chocolate and candy shops, of course.

The food in Belgium is the best I’ve had yet. Other than the obvious chocolate and waffles (which were better than I expected, even), many of the market stands sold German food, and for really good prices. We had bratworst and some sort of German potato dish. After living in England for two months, I have become very attached to any food that has seasoning and flavor, so this was a treat.

I imagine I will have more to say later — after I work on this much-neglected history. Notice to your left the nifty Belgium photo-stream — yet another fancy feature of superamy.com … 23.0 or whatever version we’re on these days. I also have a handful of promised Oxford photos up, and you can also now get to my photos from the “Photos” link on the navigation bar.

Another note worth mentioning: I updated links as best as I could. I took out any non-blog links — later, I’ll add a section for bands and music and websites and links and such — and realized something very sad: there aren’t as many of us as there used to be. So please, if I have somehow left you out of the list, or you have a blog I’ve forgotten about, let me know.

Last Thursday was one of the most hectic days of my life. In my mad dash around campus to take care of classes and essays and presentations and paperwork and packing and whatnot, my mp3 player vanished (was stolen?) in the computer/coffee lab. With a laptop down, and no time to myself in this lab, that means NO MUSIC until I go into town this afternoon and buy a portable walkman. But for what it’s worth, The Weepies – “Painting by Chegall”, Ben Folds – “Jesusland”, and The Format – “Dog Problems” are the songs that have been in my head.

It has been raining a good bit here lately, which is surprisingly a contrast to most of my stay so far. Having for most of my life been unconvinced that an umbrella has any sort of real functional purpose, I am proud to say that up until now, I have not owned one. Unfortunately, I have since been forced to concede my position.

I walked into town this morning in the pouring rain, starkly aware of the puddles that were climbing up my jeans (osmosis, is it?), past even my knees, and the drops of water raining from my bangs.* So while picking up various bits of shopping in Boots, I grabbed a little purse-sized umbrella I had been eyeing for a while, convinced that I would feel much better on the walk back up the hill to campus. Of course, I stepped out into a most beautiful blue sky, and have not yet had an opportunity to open up my new umbrella.

It could be argued that ulterior motives led to the purchase. The umbrella is emblazoned with an adorable kite-flying miffy. But semantics, I say.

Something has been happening to me lately that has been somewhat troubling, to say the least. I have been reading this book, Britain and European Unity 1945-1999 by John W. Young, for my (vile, frustrating, loathsome) history class this semester. The book is very factual, extremely chronological, opinionated but not to excess, and (gasp!) actually made sense. I found myself thinking extremely pompous historian things like “well, we didn’t see that coming from you, mister French president man,” and “come on, Britain, get ahold of yourself… this is Benelux** we’re talking about, not 1930’s Germany!” I even found myself laughing once or twice, and caught myself, but I’m afraid my worst fear may have come true. I enjoyed a history text. Times are indeed hard. I do not have a guitar, and I do not have time for much knitting or leisure reading. And you must not infer from this that I’m enjoying my history presentation whatsoever. The reading is finished, and it’s all downhill from here.

Listening to: The Lemonheads – Drug Buddy (I love my drug buddy….)

*This is one of many, many inherent issues I did not consider in my impulsive decision to cut my hair one morning.

**I’m not good at history, and have come across lots of terms I do not understand. After seeing this one about a half dozen times, however, I had to look it up. Turns out, Benelux is not a chocolate-flavored antacid or a nineteen-fifties-produced child nutrition juice, as I’d imagined — it’s a union formed by Belgium, the Netherlands, and Luxembourg. Go figure.

Well, I was prepared for much worse. I think Oxford is a very nice city. Bill Bryson would have me to believe that it is the ugliest place in the UK, but what I saw of it definitely wasn’t ugly. Perhaps I am biased, having been given a beautiful, clear, sunny autumn day to judge from, but I thought the buildings and schools were quite pretty. It’s a big enough city to have proper shopping (Primark!) and numerous coffee shops, but small enough so that I didn’t feel smothered walking around. Beyond that, since the population must be like 90% student, there are tons of music venues and clubs, and I imagine that if I lived there, there would be no shortage of culture and entertainment. I even considered for a bit what it would be like if I were a student in Oxford, instead of Winchester. The town is spread out a little, and the general layout was pretty confusing; sheer luck got me place to place and hour to hour with no problems.

I got there around lunchtime, having paid an extra couple of pounds for an open return ticket — I didn’t want to end up in another Brighton situation, and this way I could stay the night if I missed the last train, and not have to buy another ticket. I walked around the city for a couple of hours, ducking in the occasional shopping centre (Primark!). There was a travelling street market in town on Broad Street, so I pottered around, and bought some turkish delights and other treats for Corey (surprise?) at a candy stand. The rail station is a good mile and a half from the venue, and I wasn’t entirely sure how to get there, so I headed in that direction fairly early. (Note: Oxford has more Indian and Asian cuisine restaurants and groceries than seems entirely necessary.) I found the venue by around three, but they would not let me pick up my ticket until the doors opened at seven, so I wandered back down High Street in search of food. Eventually, I came across a little cafe called “Tick Tock.” The name attracted me, and the walls inside were covered in close to one hundred different kitschy clocks, set to different times across the world. I ordered a latte and a tomato and mozarella panini — good prices, too! — and pulled out my book and notes about Britain and European integration between 1945 and the present.

Something I’ve found very interesting about hunting for a coffee shop is that you can never tell its personality until you’re already inside. Some cafes don’t really like for you to sit down any longer than it takes for you to finish your food and drink. Some cater to groups of people who are there to socialize, and they are very noisy. The hardest to find, I believe, are cafes where you can sit down all by yourself and read a book without feeling either bothered or imposing. This was one of those cafes, and there were two other students there, also studying alone. Very nice, I thought.

An hour or so later, anyway, some guy came in with a mobile phone and two friends, and interrupted everything. I picked up my things and went to Oxfam for a few, and then down the street to Costa Coffee for the remainder of my studying. They have a cinnamon latte which in general is pretty awesome.

It should be noted, a little late perhaps, that my first stop after arriving in Oxford was at Avid Records, a tiny independently-run record store. The term “record store” gets thrown around loosely, but this was indeed a record store, and had very few used cds for sale in comparison to the vast selection of very reasonably-priced vinyl albums. It’s probably for my own good that I did not have anywhere to put any records, because I have no way of playing them and did not need them. Nonetheless, I got a cd of various Tom Waits covers, which is about as mediocre as I expected, but only £1. I also got The Lemonheads – It’s a Shame about Ray, Doves – Lost Souls, and Travis – The Man Who. All used, all very cheap. I was overdue to buy some new music, and I was quite fond of this place — if you ever find yourself in Oxford, it’s worth a visit. I guess it’s worth noting that afterwards I stopped in some generic music store, marched myself to the back and picked up a guitar for a good fifteen minutes. That felt very nice. I must have looked determined, because despite signs of “please ask for assistance before playing the instruments,” I was not questioned even once. It was a £1000 Martin, too. I put it back and left the store without even pretending to be interested in buying anything.

These guys — The Thirst — opened up, and I was impressed — lots and lots of energy on stage. They started at about 7:45, and the second billed opener was not there, which was fine by me. Hot Hot Heat started around 8:45, started strong, and kept going. They were absolutely awesome. It was a good crowd, excited and energetic, but not excessively drunk or anything, and they played pretty much every song I wanted them to play. I was worried they’d just play new stuff, which I don’t know / like as much, but they played lots and lots of old stuff, too.

And, I got to stay for the entire show, encore included, buy a tshirt, and make it out by ten. I also caught a bus to the rail station, saving the long hike in below-freezing temperatures, and catch the 10:16 train back to Winchester. Luck = totally on my side. Like I said, it might just be my charming experience, but I would recommend both Oxford and Hot Hot Heat.

I will have photos of Oxford eventually, but probably not any good ones of Hot Hot Heat, since I had to check my coat and bag, and only snapped a couple of distant pictures during the encore after I picked up my stuff. Also, my memory card is completely full, and I can’t manage to get these lab computers to back anything up onto a cd for me. In order to rip these new cds, I need to back up old mp3s, and in order to take more photos, I need to back up the ones I have. What to do, what to do… Once I get it all sorted, You’ll find the photos here, as usual.

Listening to: The Black Lips – Veni Vidi Vici (Troy’s awesome recommendation, so hold him responsible)

Edinburgh is absolutely lovely. As much as I love England, I think I could see myself living in Scotland. The train ride up took Ashley and me right alongside the western coast of Northern England and parts of Southern Scotland, and the coast is absolutely breathtaking through Berwick-upon-Tweed and the surrounding areas. I didn’t get photos from the train, but I found some online later (copyright to Northumberland Cam), and you can see them here. They do not exaggerate.

The city itself was so charming. The beautiful castle sits atop a very high hill, so you can see it from most parts of the town. Ashley and I took a tour of the castle while we were there, and got to learn the history and see the Scottish Crown Jewels (a bit underwhelming). The Royal Mile had a lot of exceedingly touristy shops, but Princes street had better shopping options, and the other side of the city had some very small artsy shops with handmade jewelry or tshirts or magazines and comic books. Our hostel was interesting, to say the least — the rooms were themed; I was in the “drugs” bed of the “addictions” room. It wasn’t as bad as that might lead you to believe; it was clean, organized, safe, well-situated, and most importantly, cheap. We ended up in a room with six Australian girls (not all travelling together, incidentally), which was fun in and of itself — I now have connections and invitations to every corner of Australia, if I decide to visit.

The people of Scotland are extremely, genuinely, nice. Don’t get me wrong — the people here in Winchester are very friendly, and have been more accepting and hospitable than I expected, but for the most part (and with definite exceptions), they are not warm people. Everyone I came across in Scotland seemed genuinely, openly, warmly friendly, even when they had no need to be. Yes… I think I could live there.

That trip was, of course, two weekends ago. I went to Paris last weekend, and that was a different experience entirely. Ashley, Cameron, and I took the trip, and we travelled by Eurostar, which is a train service that runs under the English Channel from London to Paris, and London to Brussels.

My train was to leave London two hours earlier than Ashley and Cameron’s train, and it was one of the worst mornings I have ever had. I mean, the set-up was all wrong to begin with. I was up late packing and printing directions the night before, and didn’t get to bed until one. I slept on the floor, afraid that my 4:00 alarm might not wake me up otherwise. The 5:15 train is the first train of the day from Winchester to London Waterloo, with hourly trains after, and is the one I absolutely had to take in order to catch my 7:15 Eurostar (it’s much like flying, travelling with Eurostar, and you have to check in early and go through customs, etc). So I made it to the Winchester train station and went to the ticket machine to buy my ticket. It would not take my debit card, so I tried cash. All of my banknotes were Scottish, thanks to Edinburgh, and it did not like those either. After running to the nearest ATM ($5 surcharge… alas) to get more cash, I was worried I might miss my train. And then, after buying the tickets and waiting for them to print, the machine malfunctioned and started buzzing and shaking and spewing blank tickets, waking the poor soul on the bench nearby.

Small victory: one of my two tickets — the one to London; the one I needed — did indeed print, and my money was promptly refunded. I caught my 5:15 train by perhaps two minutes, and arrived at Waterloo close to seven, frazzled and decaffeinated. I searched the entire station for the Starbucks I knew existed, bought my coffee, and practically ran to the boarding gate. There, I was promptly and unfortunately informed that I was very late, I should hope that I didn’t have any issues with customs or I would miss the train, and that I must leave my coffee on the floor. Have you ever had to set a brand new cup of much-needed, untouched, and somewhat pricy cup of coffee on the floor of a train station? Oh, I was grumpy. The guy at the customs desk, knowing that I was running late, kept flipping through my passport, and asking if he could keep the extra photos I had wedged in there for id cards and such. I caught my train, again by an excess of about two minutes, and paid exorbitant amounts of money for a Paris-sized cup of coffee.* The train ride itself was mostly uneventful, except that my ticket clearly specified seat 81, which was a window seat, and an old man in a suit was already there, and I had to sit in the aisle. I almost said something, but he was French, and I decided to sleep, anyway.

Gare du Nord is not a good train station. If you ever go to Paris, and find yourself at the Gare du Nord, I would suggest that you go somewhere else immediately, unless you just really want to hate Paris. Do not pay to use the train station toilets, or you will get yelled at in French. Do not go to the coffee shops there, or you will be overcharged, given very little coffee,* and quite possibly get yelled at in French. Do not stand still for too long, or you will get approached by strange beggars, wanting money, in French. Do not leave your luggage sitting unattended, or you will be approached by security.** And most especially, do not step outside of the Gare du Nord train station, or you will decide that Paris is the ugliest, dirtiest, smelliest, and most unappealing city in the whole world.

That being said, Cameron and Ashley arrived two hours later to find a very disgruntled and unhappy Amy who was glad to have someone to speak English to.

At this point, the trip made a complete 180. We booked a hotel room instead of a hostel, partly because all the hostels were full, partly because a Parisian hostel just sounds iffy, and also partly because it was Ashley’s birthday weekend, and a hotel seemed to be in order. Our hotel room was very nice — certainly no Budget Inn or anything, but it had real beds, a clean bathroom, and a door we could lock, and thus leave our belongings strewn across the beds. Ah, what luxury.

The Eiffel tower is absolutely beautiful. It’s another one of those things that I wasn’t particularly ecstatic about seeing, as I assumed it would look just like a postcard and I’d be done. That is certainly not the case. For one thing, it’s enormous. For another, the lights are breathtaking — photos can’t do it justice. We spent our entire first night at the Eiffel tower. We did not go up to the top (it’s £11 and they can’t even guarantee there will be room to get off the elevator).

Shopping in Paris is also an experience. I’m not really much of a shopper — that is, I like getting deals, but I’ve never been impressed with huge brand names. So seeing an enormous, glitzy, double-decker Louis Vuitton store flanked with armed guards was amusing for me.

There is definitely good food to be found in Paris. It’s hard to do without getting out a little bit, since the middle of the city is full of tourists. We had crepes one afternoon at a crepe stand — cheese crepes and sugar crepes. They were fantastic, though not an every-day sort of meal, unless you’re into dying young. The pastry shops, however, were the best. As much as I hated ordering food in those places (my lack of French leaves me pointing, nodding, and flipping through a phrasebook while the bakery lady stands with a disgruntled French attitude), it was incredible. Eclairs, cookies, quiche, all of it. I will miss that.

We walked the Champs-Elysees, saw the Arc de Triomphe, and went to the Louvre. The Mona Lisa was the most depressing thing I saw in the entire building. We went first thing on Sunday, the one day a month which boasts free admission to all. It was absolutely packed, but even if you made it through the crowd in the Mona Lisa room, there are barriers as far as six feet back from the painting, which is
rather small and housed behind layers of bullet-proof glass. I suggest that you find a picture of the Mona Lisa on google, and I guarantee that you will get more detail and excitement out of that than you will if you go to the Louvre.

The rest of the Louvre was fantastic; Venus de Milo was neat to see in person, and the Italian Renaissance paintings were unbelievable. I’d always liked “Raft of the Medusa” by Gericault (though not a cheery painting), and in real life it is twice as big as I’d pictured — it was incredible.

I would recommend Paris, but not for very long. Unlike Edinburgh, Paris is somewhere I would merely want to visit, and then get out. The people are not very nice (for the most part; again, there are always exceptions), and the attractions aren’t worth staying for very long.

The past few days have seen my trying to catch up with school. This blog has proven to be yet another distraction from an existentialist essay I’m supposed to be writing. My schoolwork will get finished. It’d be misleading to say that I am not incredibly stressed about the whole ordeal, and a little upset at the lack of communication between the University and us exchange students and the unfair disadvantage we’ve been given, but the only thing I have left to do is write the essays when I can, and the best I can, and hope for passing marks.

I miss Velcro terribly, and some of you guys too, occasionally, I guess.

listening: Paul Simon – You Can Call Me Al (don’t judge me.)

* You know the tiny cups they give you at the dentists’ office with water for swishing? The small ones? The ones that really aren’t as big as a paper espresso cup? This is the type of cup that they use in Paris to give you a cup of coffee.

** This did not happen to me personally, as I would never leave anything unattended, but the loudspeaker announcements warned a person of this. “Security” at the Gare du Nord consists of uniformed men carrying large machine guns. I did not want to be approached by security.

… breathe in… breathe out. I will not die. School can not kill me. 50% is all I need to pass. I will not die.

Something I found out after arriving at the University is that the typical fall semester here runs until mid-January. What this means for students only here until Christmas is that we are given alternative assignments by our tutors, to work around our schedules. Having spoken with my tutors, most of them had a very simple solution — I would turn in the cover sheet for the assignment before I left, and email the completed essay by the January deadline. “Good good,” I thought to myself, and when I set up my tackboard-calendar and wrote in all of my assignment dates, this is how I have been planning my work.

Tonight, I get an email from the people who apparently know these things, and I am told that all alternative assignments must be completed and handed in by December 16th — no emailing. This means that I have about 10,000 words’ worth of essay-writing to turn in on the 16th, not to mention the essays and assignments due in abundance the weeks prior to that. Must.. not… hyperventilate…

Also worth noting: Ubuntu May be Killing Your Laptop’s Hard Drive.

Hmm, also.. the comments weren’t working a couple of minutes ago, though they should be. I’ll look into that tomorrow if it isn’t fixed by Blogger.

Just an update notice: I spent two hours today, no joke, cleaning out my comments log of spam comments. I’ve been doing this every few months or so, and it’s admittedly pretty ridiculous, but I can’t find the solution I want. So, for now, my old comments system has been disabled, and I’ve enabled Blogger’s comment system, with the word-picture authorization thingy. Hopefully, this will keep out spam, and I’ll keep looking for a way to solve the problem without losing those years’ worth of comments.

Now, back to that essay.

Wow. I just got back from Edinburgh, which was absolutely incredible! But it just so happens that, since I’m a little slow to update these days, I’m not going to blog about Edinburgh (not yet, anyway) — I’m going to blog about Brighton, as chronologically, that’s what happened first.

Wednesday, Ashley, Alison and I went to Brighton. It was a last-minute decision, made primarily around the fact that Fionn Regan would be playing a show in Brighton that night, and I fully intended to go, and since Brighton was on my places-I’d-like-to-visit list anyway, it made sense. We’d had pseudo-plans to visit Southampton that day, and since I was backing out of those, I had to beg and plead and convince them that they wanted to go to Brighton instead. Which, of course, they did.

My research beforehand indicated that trains run from Brighton to Winchester until close to midnight, so we got return tickets and off we were. Brighton is a funny town, and has a lot that you would expect of a beach town — strange souveneir shops and tiny cafes, all with signs competing to be the loudest. It wasn’t that the city was particularly dirty or shady, but it had a sort of grungy atmosphere about it that I can’t explain. It was also very cold.

It’s funny how your mood changes your perception of a place, though. As I’d mentioned before, my hidden agenda for this trip to Brighton was to see the Fionn Regan concert. When we arrived at the Brighton rail station, the timetable’s last listing for Winchester was seven thirty. The whole time we were wandering through the town, poking in and out of stores and walking the beach, I had a sad sort of knowledge that I would be spending the night in Brighton and catching the 5 o’clock train in the morning (Thursday means nine hours straight of lectures). Brighton did not have any cheap hostels or 24-hour diners, which leaves train station benches, or wandering for hours. It wasn’t the most appealing idea, and Brighton was cold and lonely, but I’d already bought my concert ticket, so I was in a sort of dull mood the whole day.

The coast itself had the typical hot dog stands, lots of fish-and-chips shacks, and a boardwalk, the fair included. I’ve never seen a boardwalk fair before, so I went on the roller-coaster (my first-ever upside down roller coaster, and I was a bit underwhelmed). Instead of sand, the beach is covered in rocks. This seemed very nifty, until I took my shoes off to put my feet in the water, and they got bruised.

Ashley and Alison left around six, and I went with them to the rail station, to find out what my options were to get home. A new morning ticket to Winchester would be as much as I paid for the return the first time, so that was no good. However, the very helpful man at information gave me a route I could take that night. It didn’t run direct to Winchester, and instead cut through London and made some funny changes, but it was the last reasonable way I could go. That train would leave at 10:34. It wasn’t midnight, but it wasn’t seven o’clock either; neither was it five the next morning. Armed with this more-cheerful fact, I bid Ashley and Alison farewell (Ashley loaned me her scarf and two hair pins, in case worse came to worst — thanks, Ashley!), and headed back into the cold. I wandered the beach until it got dark, then ducked into a Costa Coffee, where I tried to make a banana nut muffin last longer than was reasonable. I left when they closed at seven, and picked up my ticket at Komedia, and killed time looking at posters and wishing for coffee until the doors opened at eight thirty (thirty minutes late — already I was nervous).

Well, the opening band did not start until nine. I ended up talking to a girl named Nia, who is from Tanzania but grew up in Switzerland, and spoke with an American accent. She had come to the show alone, too, which made us both stand out.She’s studying in Brighton, and has a fondness for alt-country music. She’s a very big Ryan Adams fan, and Bob Dylan, too, and said she’d always wanted to visit Tennessee. She had not heard Fionn before, but had heard him compared with Dylan, which apparently was incentive enough.

Well, Fionn did not start playing until a quarter to ten, and I was ready to jump out of my skin. He was wonderful — great guitar work, a good sense of timing, and a good band with him. I listened to about five songs, excluding two of the three I really wanted to hear, and at 9:53 I picked up my coat, and ran — very, very fast — to the train station.

Well it is a small world indeed. After the first change in Haywards Heath, wherever that is, I was waiting on my platform along with a guy and girl who looked to be student age. I was almost positive I recognized him from the show, and asked if I’d seen them there. Indeed I had, and I felt a little better at not being the only person who had to duck out early. We talked for a few minutes until the train arrived, and I could tell that they were American, but didn’t mention it. The train showed up, and we got into an empty train car. I was studying my very-complicated list of stops and changes given to me by the information guy when the girl interrupted me to ask how tall I would guess Fionn is. I suggested 5′8″ (she had said 5′10″ and he’d said 5′6″, apparently), and then the guy asked me where I came from in the states. I told them that I am from South Carolina, and they seemed not to believe me. “Really? No way! We’re from South Carolina!” Her name is Rose, and she is from Charleston, and his name is Palmer, and he lives outside of Clemson somewhere. I can’t remember the name of the town they were studying in, but they’re living in a big mansion-school, where students from all over the world come to discuss “life’s big questions.” It sounded like a very interesting program, and it was really refreshing to get to hear accents that sounded like home.

So, even though I missed most of the show I was excited to see, be disappointed by a less-than-exemplary roller-coaster, and almost lose a few toes due to the freezing Brighton ocean, I did not miss my train, I did not have to bum around Brighton for the night, and I got to meet some very nice people.

A new blog template is absolutely necessary, I know — including new links and a more permanent photos link. For now, you can see the Brighton photos here, and the Edinburgh photos here, with captions to tell the story until I can tell it proper.

We’ve already fallen back due to daylight savings, so right now, there are only four hours’ time difference, until the US falls back, too. However, Paris (next weekend’s destination) is an hour ahead, time-wise. So where normally, we’re five hours apart, right now, we’re four hours apart, until friday. Friday and Saturday, we will again be five hours apart, but Sunday, after you guys fall back, we’ll be six hours apart, until I get back to England on Monday, where everything will be back to normal, except for my phone, which cannot find a signal and regretfully will not update for daylight savings. I know that was a terrible paragraph to put you through, but something about all of it is very, very funny for me.

Next time, I’ll bring you stories of Halloween parties, castles, provoking train cats with tunafish, Scottish scarves and mannerisms, cheap wine, the addiction room at the hostel, chocolate soup, and friendly Australians. Or at least, I’ll bring you some of those stories, perhaps. The rest of the week threatens to bring lots and lots of essay-writing and laundry, both of which are very overdue, and I don’t want to spend my trip to Paris worrying about being behind in school (it will be worrisome enough not speaking French — any fluent speakers want to meet us there?), so I must try not to let blogging and other various internet distractions keep me from staying busy this week. S
o if you have any ready-made essays on Hollywood films from the 30’s, or perhaps Deontology, I’d love to steal them.

listening to: Beirut – Nantes