Well folks, we made it safe and sound into Stuttgart. The Burts are all as cool as their mom, and we sat around last night drinking orange juice and drinking pistachios and talking and laughing until it was time for bed. It feels really nice to be in a home again. Theirs is a gorgeous one with beautiful design that mixes a modern feel with traditional deutsch elements in a tiny village on the outskirts of the Stuttgart metropolitan area.
Oh man, it was a cool day. We didn't actually end up going to the Schwarzwald, though we drove past the edge of it. Instead we left Ramstein Air Force Base, one of the largest US bases in Germany (there is a mall there called BXPX), and headed for France. This border region along the Rhine river is really beautiful and famous, lots of picturesque landscapes and little town. Our first stop was at the top of a densely wooded hill, a castle called Haut-Konigsbourg, restored in the early 20th century by Kaiser Wilhelm as a symbol of German imperial power (and lost to the French after World War I). That was really cool, but the coolest part was this other castle, further along the ridge of the hill, which had NOT been restored, it was just these overgrown medieval ruins. We climbed around a bit, trying to avoid the stinging nettles, and felt like Aragorn and Gimli and Eowyn. It was so awesome, guys, it was this foggy, misty day, but when the mist cleared out we could see down into the valley. Highly, highly rad.
There must be something about that hill, because it also is the home of a park called Monkey Mountain, where there are like 300 monkeys walking around that you feed. It sounded really cool, but it was kind of rainy so we didn't take the time for it. I'm really happy such a place exists, though. Le Montagne des Signes.
We also went to a little town called Riquewihr, which Debbie recommended as the home of the best macaroons in the world, and they didn't disappoint. We got some crepes there. Awesome. Have you ever had salty crepes? I mean this girl just made them like an omelette, she spread out the batter on the plate, flipped it over, then cooked an egg right on top of the pancake, then put some grated cheese on top and let it melt, then put a layer of ham on, and folded it all up. It was so yummy. We also got one with membrille jam and gingerbread ice cream. And one with chestnut spread. And one with nutella. All delicious.
Around Riquewihr there are a ton of storks; we'd see them nesting on houses and in trees.
Last stop was Colmar, where we ate some quiche (AHHHH!) and took a gondola ride through the canals they call Petite Venise. Our boat driver was this dude from Mauritius named Olivier, but he only spoke French. The other group was from Zurich, but the mom was from Spain, so between all of us we could kind of communicate. The best was me and Nate just sitting in the back with Olivier trying to say things in pidgin span-frenglish. Votre familia vivre France? Ah, Mauritius? Tres chouette. Vous Jouer futbol? Ah, Basketball! Tony Parker, frances! Oui, oui. When we told him we were from California, he said with a big smile, "Oh, sexygirls? I love sexygirls." That conversation pretty much took us the whole half hour of the boat ride. Oh, and when he found out we were from California he pointed out to us a sequoyah growing along the banks. Way cool.
Charles, the GPS system, has been indispensable. Sometimes he even seemed to respond to us. There was one point when he said, "In 200 yards, keep to the right." Debbie, surprised, exclaimed, "Keep to the right?!" and Charles said again, reassuringly, "Keep to the right."
Baguettes and cheese. Debbie's favorite cheese is called Franche-Comte.
-W.
-- Okay, Carmen Sandiegers: We'll just be here in Stuttgart for the next couple days, so instead of a city I'll clue the name of the holiday being celebrated in the village today. It's a holiday celebrating the workers.
Saturday, May 1, 2010
Thursday, April 29, 2010
Meet me at the Schloss... it's goin' down.
Whaddup in the homes!!! Hi guys, it's Nate. So I'm bloggin' bout the last two days. I'm sitting on a couch in our room at the Ramstein Airforce base. Wayne is sitting on the floor next to me, chewing a Fiber One bar while brooding over a huge map of Germany that he bought today. No surprise there. Annie is reading a book by the lamp in her pajamas; she was all ready for bed within minutes of arrival here. Germany hasn't changed us much I guess.
Yesterday, April 29th, we woke up and hit the road to Heidelburg. That has been my favorite place of our trip so far. We walked through the old university and then took the freidnshnelken (sorry, that's not actually the real name, but the word started with an 'f' and was quite long), which is just a tram that gets pulled up the hillside, up to . . . The Schloss! Isn't that a great name? A schloss is a castle. This schloss was quite awesome. Unfortunately you couldn't just go wild and explore the whole thing. Most of it was closed off. But we explored as much as we could, and we had a blast doing it. Plus it had many incredible views overlooking Heidelburg and the Mosel river.
The quote of the day, (for yesterday) came when I was buying a t-shirt at the university gift shop. I asked the woman in charge where the t-shirts were, and she pointed at a rack and said, "These are the models". I proceeded over to the indicated rack and started perusing through the t-shirts. She quickly approached me and again proclaimed, "THESE are the models." I wanted to say, "I know, you already told me," but I simply said, "yes, thank you,:" and continued looking through the shirts. I did not understand that she was upset that I was browsing and pulling off the folded t-shirts on the shelves, rather than the shirts that were on hangers right beneath the shelves. Finally, nearly shouting this time, she grabbed hold of the hanging t-shirts and said, "THESE ARE THE MODELS!" This time I understood. "Oh, sorry." Well, I ended up buying one of the shirts, and I made sure to show her the "model" that I wanted, and she did the honors of taking it off the shelf for me.
Anyway, 'These are the models'. Quote of the day. Don't you forget it baby.
After our Heidelburg excursion we drove to Burg Eltz. A Burg is also like a castle. I really don't know the what the technical differences are between the burg, the schloss, and the castle---i just know that they are all awesome. Burg Eltz was beyond picturesque. It was built on massive hunk of rock that jutted upward out of a valley. So this castle just erupts out of this rock with beautiful medieval turrets and windows and stone architecture surrounded by lush green hills. It is breathtaking. Plus, our guide of the berg was this girl named Ellie, and she was super cute. It was the first time she had given a tour in english and she did great, but she had lot of misprononunciations which just made her even cuter.
Okay on to today, April 30th. We hit the road quick this morning, ate breakfast in the car, which consisted of tasty european yogurt purchased from the Shoppette on the base and some smashed muffins. We got to Trier about an hour later. Here we saw some amazing old roman structures, the Basilica and the Porta Nigra. There is tons of history behind each one, because they've each been around for well over a thousand years. Look em' up on wikipedia though because I'm not gonna tell you much about them, other than that they are huge, old, and incredible. In Trier we got the mother of all french fries: Belgium fries. Belgium fries are nice and thick, and they are served with a big old glob of mayonaisse on top and some ketchup and onions. An excellent way to clog your arteries...mmmmm!
Next we went to Metz, which is in France, where we saw an amazing old cathedral. I thought up on the coolness level with Westmister Abbey, and that's really saying something. It has excellent stain-glass windows everywhere, and three of the big ones were done by Mark Chagall. You can really tell that they are his; they stand out from the others with fervor. That doesn't make much sense but oh well. . . it's late. Oh, there was also this guy playing the organ, and Annie went over to him and started talking with him and he was super nice and charming, especially after he learned about her musical talents. She asked him to play some Bach, and he did. It was like a live Cathedral Jukebox!
This post is getting long. The last adventure I will mention happened on the autobahn. A lady got out of control and crashed right in front of us on the autobahn. We slowed down and stayed out of the way luckily. And she was not hurt nor were we or anybody else, which we're very grateful for. It was kinda crazy though.
Okay, thus ends the day. Big day. 3 countries: Germany, France, and Luxemborg. Plus a U.S. Airforce base. Bonjour! Auf Wiedersehen! Bye bye! And Go Jazz!!!
-N.
Okay, the best part of today was hands down the Metz Cathedral. Gothic style, buttresses flying, loads of stained glass windows including some by Chagall. And that's not even the best part. After we had walked down the Nave, the white-bearded man at the organ began playing. He was playing this really modern but really beautiful organ piece. I was dying to know who it was by, and I think he noticed me loitering around the organ and listening. When he got to a pause that seemed like it could be the end - you never know with modern music - I asked him who composed it. He let me cross the barrier and go talk with him, not a bit condescending that I only spoke English. He had heard of Salt Lake City ("big organ there!"), and he has a student (he's an organ teacher here) from Utah. The piece he had been playing was by Messiaen, and he had been improvising based on that piece. It was totally awesome, even though I dislike the other work I have heard by Messiaen. I asked him if he would play some Bach, and he obliged. He was so nice.
-A
P.S. Wayne is getting good at German by now. He already knows basic conjugations and stuff. And Nate bought a pocket knife perfect for slicing European cheeses. In a nutshell, we're having a blast.
P.P.S. The name of the tram to the schloss was "funicular". (see nate's post above)
I just can't resist adding a few notes:
Annie had to specify that the guy at the organ was not condescending because everyone else in France is. Nate walked into a Pastelerie, or whatever it's called, and asked the lady behind the counter, "English?" She frowned and said "non" and WALKED OFF. She only had a tiny bit of space so it was quite a trick for her to pout and stomp off to show her utter disdain, but she did it. I said in audible English, "they really are brats about it, aren't they?" Does that mean Americans really are brats, too? No, just me.
The accident was crazy. It was this tall black van, sincerely it was the car right in front of us, we just saw it start swerving, hitting the barriers on both sides before swiveling around to a halt. Really scary. Debbie was really calm, just stopped with plenty of room and plenty gradually so we didn't get hit, but all the traffic behind us was lined up. The police arrived, no joke, within two minutes, and we were probably there for ten minutes before the cops swept off the dirt and glass from the road. And you know what? No one honked. Yay European drivers.
Do you guys even know who Debbie is? She's mom's friend from college (they met on an anthropology field study) and her family lives here in Germany now. She's getting us in to all the US Military bases. Without her, this part of our trip would be impossible. She is helping us out so much, and making it just really fun. So be glad your parents are so incredible that people love them enough to do stuff like this for you just because you're their kids. :)
K, I know this is already Mammoth Blog Post. Zwei (two) more things: US Military bases are their own country. They're unreal. They're like this ideal articulation of an America that doesn't actually even exist in America. I actually have a lot to say and think about that, but for now let me just say it's been really fascinating to see, and it's made me love America even more.
Highlight of yesterday: we were walking down to Burg Eltz, and Nate picks up a rock and says, "Let's play a game." Annie and I know him well enough to expect something good after that sentence, and he didn't disappoint. The game is this: Whoever has the rock has to sing, and when to pass it off to someone else, they have to pick up where you left off. Like Round Robin stories, but with music improvised on the spot. It was so funny that by the time we got to the castle Annie couldn't even catch the rock she was laughing so hard.
Love y'all madly. Sorry we didn't have time for photos today. I'll at least put captions on the ones from yesterday, so go back and look.
-W.
--tomorrow we're going to a lot of towns, so you'll have to try and figure out the german name of the forest we'll be driving through, puzzlemasters. it's in southwest germany and it's famous for cuckoo clocks. I think its biggest city is Freiburg. it's also the name of a kind of ham.
Yesterday, April 29th, we woke up and hit the road to Heidelburg. That has been my favorite place of our trip so far. We walked through the old university and then took the freidnshnelken (sorry, that's not actually the real name, but the word started with an 'f' and was quite long), which is just a tram that gets pulled up the hillside, up to . . . The Schloss! Isn't that a great name? A schloss is a castle. This schloss was quite awesome. Unfortunately you couldn't just go wild and explore the whole thing. Most of it was closed off. But we explored as much as we could, and we had a blast doing it. Plus it had many incredible views overlooking Heidelburg and the Mosel river.
The quote of the day, (for yesterday) came when I was buying a t-shirt at the university gift shop. I asked the woman in charge where the t-shirts were, and she pointed at a rack and said, "These are the models". I proceeded over to the indicated rack and started perusing through the t-shirts. She quickly approached me and again proclaimed, "THESE are the models." I wanted to say, "I know, you already told me," but I simply said, "yes, thank you,:" and continued looking through the shirts. I did not understand that she was upset that I was browsing and pulling off the folded t-shirts on the shelves, rather than the shirts that were on hangers right beneath the shelves. Finally, nearly shouting this time, she grabbed hold of the hanging t-shirts and said, "THESE ARE THE MODELS!" This time I understood. "Oh, sorry." Well, I ended up buying one of the shirts, and I made sure to show her the "model" that I wanted, and she did the honors of taking it off the shelf for me.
Anyway, 'These are the models'. Quote of the day. Don't you forget it baby.
After our Heidelburg excursion we drove to Burg Eltz. A Burg is also like a castle. I really don't know the what the technical differences are between the burg, the schloss, and the castle---i just know that they are all awesome. Burg Eltz was beyond picturesque. It was built on massive hunk of rock that jutted upward out of a valley. So this castle just erupts out of this rock with beautiful medieval turrets and windows and stone architecture surrounded by lush green hills. It is breathtaking. Plus, our guide of the berg was this girl named Ellie, and she was super cute. It was the first time she had given a tour in english and she did great, but she had lot of misprononunciations which just made her even cuter.
Okay on to today, April 30th. We hit the road quick this morning, ate breakfast in the car, which consisted of tasty european yogurt purchased from the Shoppette on the base and some smashed muffins. We got to Trier about an hour later. Here we saw some amazing old roman structures, the Basilica and the Porta Nigra. There is tons of history behind each one, because they've each been around for well over a thousand years. Look em' up on wikipedia though because I'm not gonna tell you much about them, other than that they are huge, old, and incredible. In Trier we got the mother of all french fries: Belgium fries. Belgium fries are nice and thick, and they are served with a big old glob of mayonaisse on top and some ketchup and onions. An excellent way to clog your arteries...mmmmm!
Next we went to Metz, which is in France, where we saw an amazing old cathedral. I thought up on the coolness level with Westmister Abbey, and that's really saying something. It has excellent stain-glass windows everywhere, and three of the big ones were done by Mark Chagall. You can really tell that they are his; they stand out from the others with fervor. That doesn't make much sense but oh well. . . it's late. Oh, there was also this guy playing the organ, and Annie went over to him and started talking with him and he was super nice and charming, especially after he learned about her musical talents. She asked him to play some Bach, and he did. It was like a live Cathedral Jukebox!
This post is getting long. The last adventure I will mention happened on the autobahn. A lady got out of control and crashed right in front of us on the autobahn. We slowed down and stayed out of the way luckily. And she was not hurt nor were we or anybody else, which we're very grateful for. It was kinda crazy though.
Okay, thus ends the day. Big day. 3 countries: Germany, France, and Luxemborg. Plus a U.S. Airforce base. Bonjour! Auf Wiedersehen! Bye bye! And Go Jazz!!!
-N.
Okay, the best part of today was hands down the Metz Cathedral. Gothic style, buttresses flying, loads of stained glass windows including some by Chagall. And that's not even the best part. After we had walked down the Nave, the white-bearded man at the organ began playing. He was playing this really modern but really beautiful organ piece. I was dying to know who it was by, and I think he noticed me loitering around the organ and listening. When he got to a pause that seemed like it could be the end - you never know with modern music - I asked him who composed it. He let me cross the barrier and go talk with him, not a bit condescending that I only spoke English. He had heard of Salt Lake City ("big organ there!"), and he has a student (he's an organ teacher here) from Utah. The piece he had been playing was by Messiaen, and he had been improvising based on that piece. It was totally awesome, even though I dislike the other work I have heard by Messiaen. I asked him if he would play some Bach, and he obliged. He was so nice.
-A
P.S. Wayne is getting good at German by now. He already knows basic conjugations and stuff. And Nate bought a pocket knife perfect for slicing European cheeses. In a nutshell, we're having a blast.
P.P.S. The name of the tram to the schloss was "funicular". (see nate's post above)
I just can't resist adding a few notes:
Annie had to specify that the guy at the organ was not condescending because everyone else in France is. Nate walked into a Pastelerie, or whatever it's called, and asked the lady behind the counter, "English?" She frowned and said "non" and WALKED OFF. She only had a tiny bit of space so it was quite a trick for her to pout and stomp off to show her utter disdain, but she did it. I said in audible English, "they really are brats about it, aren't they?" Does that mean Americans really are brats, too? No, just me.
The accident was crazy. It was this tall black van, sincerely it was the car right in front of us, we just saw it start swerving, hitting the barriers on both sides before swiveling around to a halt. Really scary. Debbie was really calm, just stopped with plenty of room and plenty gradually so we didn't get hit, but all the traffic behind us was lined up. The police arrived, no joke, within two minutes, and we were probably there for ten minutes before the cops swept off the dirt and glass from the road. And you know what? No one honked. Yay European drivers.
Do you guys even know who Debbie is? She's mom's friend from college (they met on an anthropology field study) and her family lives here in Germany now. She's getting us in to all the US Military bases. Without her, this part of our trip would be impossible. She is helping us out so much, and making it just really fun. So be glad your parents are so incredible that people love them enough to do stuff like this for you just because you're their kids. :)
K, I know this is already Mammoth Blog Post. Zwei (two) more things: US Military bases are their own country. They're unreal. They're like this ideal articulation of an America that doesn't actually even exist in America. I actually have a lot to say and think about that, but for now let me just say it's been really fascinating to see, and it's made me love America even more.
Highlight of yesterday: we were walking down to Burg Eltz, and Nate picks up a rock and says, "Let's play a game." Annie and I know him well enough to expect something good after that sentence, and he didn't disappoint. The game is this: Whoever has the rock has to sing, and when to pass it off to someone else, they have to pick up where you left off. Like Round Robin stories, but with music improvised on the spot. It was so funny that by the time we got to the castle Annie couldn't even catch the rock she was laughing so hard.
Love y'all madly. Sorry we didn't have time for photos today. I'll at least put captions on the ones from yesterday, so go back and look.
-W.
--tomorrow we're going to a lot of towns, so you'll have to try and figure out the german name of the forest we'll be driving through, puzzlemasters. it's in southwest germany and it's famous for cuckoo clocks. I think its biggest city is Freiburg. it's also the name of a kind of ham.
explanations shortly.
I can't tell you how much I love that the word for Government Building in a German town is RATHAUS. This one's in Heidelberg.
View from the Schloss of Heidelberg.
The University, which Heidelberg is famous for, seemed really cool. We walked through their library. Just young people everywhere. Outside the library is the biggest collection of bikes I've ever seen. Green town, I guess. Green students.
Nate with Burg Eltz. A dude in the Eltz family still owns this place, he's like the 33rd generation Duke or Knight or whatever of the place. He had a job in the economics ministry but now he's retired and just works on fixing up the old family place on the weekend. Hence crane.
Annie with Burg Eltz. It's from the 1100's. I mean this place dates back to Barbarian times. I can't say enough about it. Oh and there is an original Lucas Cranach the Elder painting inside.
---All right, since Heidelberg was so easy, we'll try and make this hard. Oldest city in germany. founded in 16 BC. Home of Emperor Constantine. GO!
Tuesday, April 27, 2010
Hey Deutschland.
There are a lot of heroes in this story. The main one from today is Debbie. But I'll get to that.
Also forgot to mention that a Jamaican lady in Brixton explained to me that breadfruit would put hair on my chest. Apparently she thought I needed help with that.
All right. More from Deutschland tomorrow. Love.
-W.
--Gumshoes: Tomorrow we're going to one of the oldest Universities in the world, officially called the Ruprecht Karls University. Also, they discovered the jawbone of the earliest human skeleton found in Europe in this town.
Maybe I'm in a heroic mood because we went to the Cabinet War Rooms museum, underneath some government building near Parliament where Churchill set up his emergency offices in World War Two and where a lot of the war got planned. It felt like it was inside a ship, and indeed it was designed by this guy, Ismay, who had a Royal Marine background. Even though it was underground, it wasn't built like a bunker, it was this improvised space, and they reinforced it as much as they could but it was never really safe and would have caved in in the event of a direct bomb hit, although Churchill never told most of the staff that. There were these huge gorgeous map rooms. And there was a guy, this thriller novelist of the day, employed as a Deception Specialist, whose job it was to cook up ways to fake out the Germans. Great job. Also, Churchill despised paper clips and staples so he had all his documents hole-punched and then . . . tied together? I missed that word on the audio tour. But he definitely had all his documents hole-punched.Churchill liked to eat Beef Wellingtons. What is a Beef Wellington?
I didn't take a bunch of pictures today. The War Rooms were poorly lit, and Westminster Abbey didn't allow photos inside.
AH! Westminster Abbey. I can't even tell you. I can't even tell you. I can not even tell you. Poet's corner. It's this very old, very beautiful, very living place. With Browning and Tennyson and Johnson and Newton and the inventor of the pianoforte in it. And lovely gardens.
We ate fish and chips in a pub.
And there's Buckingham Palace. That's as close as we got to it.
I don't mean for this to just be a log of the places we went. I want to tell stories, hopefully interesting ones. But the days are so packed that our time is limited and this is what's easiest. I apologize for that. I'll try to be thinking more about stories and less about places or things.
Buckingham palace seemed less interesting to us than catching our train on time, which we started doing right after we bought another round of whippys (my ice cream fell off the cone and I CAUGHT IT and ate it) and a pasty. We went back to the hostel and got our luggage, got back on the tube, and rode out to the National Rail station. We barely missed the Stansted Express from Tottenham Hale tube station to the airport, so we had to wait another fifteen minutes for the next one. Then once we got there, RyanAir charged us an exorbitant fee for airport check in, and the self-service kiosks wouldn't take my card, and there were long lines, and one desk referred us to the other desk. Finally we got it all paid for (grumble) and went through security, where the lady who weighed my bag told me it was overweight and would be charged a fee. So I was putting clothes on my body and cramming stuff into my pockets, and we were all hoping our bags would fit into the overhead compartments because we were checking none, and meantime our flight is boarding . . . so we sprinted, heavy-laden, from security to the gate, which seemed so far away, and made it on time. I know you've heard that story in every romantic comedy you've ever seen involving an airport, but, well, our life is a movie.
The plane took us to GERMANY, specifically Karlsruhe-Baden airport, where Debbie met us and started driving us around, helping us learn how to pronounce German, pointing out to us the downtown of Baden-Baden which is a spa getaway for the rich and famous, introducing us to her car's GPS who we named Charles, and showing us how to drive 100 (MPH, not kph) on the Autobahn. Totally legal. We were trying to get to the US Army base nearby to stay the night, but the gate we arrived at was locked. After slogging through some unhelpful directions from Charles and some even less helpful directions from the Military Policeman on the other side of the chain link fence, we drove through some asparagus (spargel) fields around the base until the German polizei tracked us down to ask us what the heck we were doing. (In five hundred yards, turn right. Thanks Charles.) Debbie convinced them to lead us to the entrance to the base, which they did begrudgingly, and we're now in by far the poshest lodgings we've seen yet, thanks to Debbie.
Guys, I forgot to put the quote of the day yesterday, so I'll put it here.
"Your call has been accepted. The lift will be here shortly."
--Elevator in St. Pancras International Train Station, to Nate
All right. More from Deutschland tomorrow. Love.
-W.
--Gumshoes: Tomorrow we're going to one of the oldest Universities in the world, officially called the Ruprecht Karls University. Also, they discovered the jawbone of the earliest human skeleton found in Europe in this town.
Monday, April 26, 2010
The Guns of Brixton.
Today was a big day – we knocked multiple items off our London list:
1. Brixton. Supposedly London’s “little Jamaica”, although we saw more Middle Easterners and Africans than Jamaicans. It was fun to wander the streets of Brixton Market. There was raw meat everywhere, produce markets, little shops, fishmongers, etc. We ended up at a little Jerk restaurant run by two legitimate Jamaican dudes. They’ve been in England for 11 years now. Talking to them was one of the highlights of the day.
Take 2wo Jamaican Jerk Chicken
2. The British Museum. We basically perused the entire first floor and didn’t even touch the second. The Rosetta Stone, marble sculptures from the Parthenon, and Ancient American stellas were some of our favorite items.
3. Whippies. These are just vanilla soft-serve ice cream cones with a mini flake stuck in ‘em. We saw the Whippy truck outside the museum and we just knew. It was time.
"Are you thsure you want juthst a cone?"
"Yeah."
4. The British Library. Here they have on display some incredible things, including the original manuscripts of the Magna Carta, Beowulf, Handel’s Messiah, and other equally important documents. We saw the actual handwriting of Shakespeare, Mozart, Charlotte Bronte, Jane Austen. One of my favorite things was an illuminated Qur’an. It was absolutely beautiful. (Jacqui – I left you a note inside a book called “London Inn Signs” in the Humanities reading room. I will post the author and call number of the book next time I have my notebook with me.)
5. Indian Food. We went to an Indian Tapas place. It was really tasty, especially after such a big day. They gave us each a little stick of incense in place of a dinner mint as we left.
-A
Oh my HECK it feels good to just wash my hands after being in so many tube stations. Railings, railings, railings. Kind of nasty. In fact I washed them twice.
Before any further ado: I forgot to mention the captain on our Atlanta-London flight was named Sparky Lurf. Just thought I’d get that out there.
Brixton, folks, is cool—it was nice to just get away from tourists from a while. Except the German potheads who came into a rasta store run by this distinguished, humble old West Indian guy. We felt like we were in Real London, though. I talked with a guy at the meat market (where they sell cow’s feet and ox tails) who had just arrived from Pakistan three months ago and was LOVING it here. Oh, and there are all these fish markets, and at one of them we saw this huge fish with its head severed. I mean the head was probably a good nine or ten inches across, and we watched this lady walk up and buy it. Just the head.
We saw this sign in Brixton and it was just too good.
The British Museum: I don’t even need to add anything. Just don’t die without going there. The Brits just took everything shamelessly from everyone, but it makes for a spectacular museum.
There's Anne hanging out at the Parthenon
Nate summoning Nacho's eagle powers in front of Rameses.
The British Library. Taking photos was prohibited, so I want you all to know I risked my life to bring you all this rare glimpse of what most scholars agree is Shakespeare’s own handwriting.
And guess who’s the proud new owner of a British Library card?
-W.
--K. Tomorrow we’re going to a new country. The city we're going to is where mom’s friend Debbie lives, who’s going to drive us all over the place. It's the capital of the state of Baden-Württemberg. I actually don't know that much about it, so we'll be learning together. I think there's a US Air Force base or something around there. There are a lot of castles around. Sorry guys. You can ask mom for a hint.--
A quick note on languages and prepositions.
I’ve heard more of other languages on the streets than English, if you want to know the truth. There are loads of French, Eastern Europeans, South Asians, East Asians, Middle Easterners, and Spaniards, Spaniards, Spaniards. I even talked to a few Latinos. I know that’s partly because we’ve been in the vacationy bits of London, but it’s also partly because London became the cultural and economic hub of this vast global empire and still maintains ties to its former colonies. Silver lining of imperialism? We’re enjoying it anyway.
The English use prepositions differently than Americans. Signs inform us that there’s no smoking permitted in the premises. And that certain train stations will be particularly busy at weekends. Reminds me of Marjorie Dawes’s question to the Fat Fighters: “What sort of things do we get cravings of?”
(“Oh man I love the cake.”)
-W.
The English use prepositions differently than Americans. Signs inform us that there’s no smoking permitted in the premises. And that certain train stations will be particularly busy at weekends. Reminds me of Marjorie Dawes’s question to the Fat Fighters: “What sort of things do we get cravings of?”
(“Oh man I love the cake.”)
-W.
Sunday, April 25, 2010
London, Day Two
Wayne’s alarm went off. Annie’s alarm went off. And . . . I didn’t hear them. Annie woke me up at 9:40 wondering if I wanted breakfast which closed at 10:00. I did. But man, we all Zonked last night. Out Cold. It was greatly needed though, and helped us get rid of the worst phases of jet lag.
The free breakfast here at our hostel wasn’t the best, but hey, they had some coco pebbles type cereal and toast, which suited me okay. We headed off to walk through Kensington Gardens before church. They were lovely. All the parks are nice and big. These dudes were playing futbol and I just wanted to go hop out on the pitch and start playing with them. I kept thinking, “Here’s Totti!!!”
Kensington Gardens
Church was nice. We got some pass along cards, which we hope to quickly use up. The talks were great as well. We also ran into Ellen and her family there. Crazy huh! We sat by them and we had dinner at their flat later on in the evening.
More fascinating than our singles ward was the second service we went to. We walked over to St. Paul’s cathedral after sacrament meeting ended. Much to our chagrin, it was basically closed---they were only letting people in a small portion of the cathedral on one of the wings. But wait! We asked around and found that they were having a Eucharist service shortly, and so we waited for it. You see, this would give us the opportunity to be right underneath the central dome of the Cathedral, the most amazing part of the cathedral. It was beautiful. Spectacular. I wished we could’ve walked around to get some closer looks at things, but the Bishop (Or whatever title he carried ) was walking in with his staff and special robe, and so we had to sit tight. The service was very good, and I think that parts of it moved me, Wayne, and Annie. We even took communion. It was good for us to experience a Catholic service and see a way in which they draw nearer to Christ.
St. Paul's Cathedral
My highlight of the day was eating a picnic lunch in little park called Brunswick Square. We bought some chorizo, cheese, baguette, and some drinks at a little market called Tesco, and then walked over to this park. We sat down on a bench and leisurely ate our sandwiches as some fellows played futbol right behind us.
Lunch
Quote of the Day---
“You don’t have to kill yourselves in culture, you know, just drive yourself full of it.”
---Nate
Well, we’re surviving, and we’ve been having a pretty swell time of it.
Peace in the Family,
XOXO
-N
--BJC: Tomorrow, for part of the day we’re headed to the neighborhood which is the center of London's Caribbean immigrant community. We'll be getting there on the Underground, the awesome subway system of London with an awesome map, and it's at the very south end of the light blue Victoria line. Good luck! Email us if you find the answer!
London, Day One.
We arrived at the Queen Victoria Station slightly dumbfounded. So much happens in this place. There are people everywhere, speaking every language. We walked toward what we thought would be Belgrave Road, the location of our youth hostel, and after about thirty minutes we decided to ask someone for directions. We asked a cab driver, and ended up just taking his cab to the Astor Victoria youth hostel, which was in the opposite direction.
So we were wandering past Grosvenor Gardens (there are lots of parks and gardens in this city—so nice!) and we saw these awesome sculptures of a cougar chasing a gazelle. Nate and I thought it would make a great photo, so I mounted the gazelle and he climbed on the cougar. We were trying to hurry so no one would tell us to get off the statues. As I shifted myself forward to get higher on my steed’s neck, her mane took a toll on my pants. They caught on the metal and ripped. “Guys, I ripped my pants!!”
We must have been a very entertaining sight to Elena, from Germany, the only other person in the park. The rip wasn’t so bad that I had to change – if you were standing on my right you wouldn’t notice a thing – so I wore them for the rest of the day, even to the theater. But they are now in the rubbish bin of our tiny, perfect little room on the fifth floor of the hostel. I’ll be wearing shorts, capris, or a skirt for the rest of our trip!
We must have been a very entertaining sight to Elena, from Germany, the only other person in the park. The rip wasn’t so bad that I had to change – if you were standing on my right you wouldn’t notice a thing – so I wore them for the rest of the day, even to the theater. But they are now in the rubbish bin of our tiny, perfect little room on the fifth floor of the hostel. I’ll be wearing shorts, capris, or a skirt for the rest of our trip!
We also saw “Oliver” at the Theater Royale. It was a good show, although we had to fight our drooping eyelids. Needless to say, we slept like dead people last night.
-A
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