Happy holidays to all of my readers! Since I couldn’t afford to get you all something, this blog entry is my belated Christmas present to you. I hope it fits because I lost the receipt.
What an eventful two weeks it’s been! I spent my break in London and Bristol, thanks to the generosity of my friends and their families who took me in, fed me, gave me a place to sleep and magnanimously shared their holidays with me. I owe them my deepest gratitude for taking me in, as my only other option was to stay in a dirty little lair run by this guy named Fagin. He seemed a little iffy, although one of the other lodgers-- called himself Arty Dodger or something like that-- seemed like a nice enough fellow. Took my wallet though.
Getting to London was a bit of a mess. I arrived at Gare du Nord in Paris at 6am for my 6:45am train, and nothing could have prepared me for the line that stretched from one length of the station to the other, around corners, and then outside to an unused train platform. Because of all the “snow chaos” (and I use quotation marks because there was not a hint of snow in either Paris or London, actually), all of the Eurostar trains had been delayed and reservations meant nothing anymore. Signs all over the train station read in English, “Traffic highly disturbed,” which made it sound like the traffic had snapped and gone off the deep end and it was best to keep our distance. I was told to get in line and I would get put onto the next train available. By the time I got to the front of the line, it was three hours later and I was finally assigned a train for 9:30am. But when I finally arrived I was met by Calder and Colleen, friends from college that I hadn’t seen since the summer. It was so good to see them again!
My two weeks were chock full of new sights and fun adventures, and as I don’t have the energy to write thousands of words, and as pictures speak at least that many, I've been told, here are some photo-highlights from my trip:
The Tower of London
Tower Bridge, with some jerk who wouldn't get out of the way for my picture.
The actual Tower of London. Ravens have always been present at the Tower, although no one knows why they came there in the first place. However, it is believed that if the Ravens ever left the grounds, both the Tower and the monarchy would fall. Naturally, this freaked everyone out a little bit, so now the Ravens who live there actually have had their wings clipped so they can't leave. I find that this seems a little like tempting fate. But who asked me?
An ad for the amazing "Evolving English" exhibit at the British Library.
The British Library! I spent a good four hours here, which turned out to be the highlight of my trip. Get this-- Shakespeare's First Folio, the first and definitive collection of his works from 1623, was a mere ten feet away from handwritten first drafts of Beatles' lyrics by John, Paul and George. After the lyrics to "I Want to Hold Your Hand," John had scribbled underneath, mocking himself: "3/10. See me." I was in heaven! Unfortunately, no pictures were allowed. Neither was breaking the glass and stealing the manuscripts. Psh.
The flat I stayed in was in Covent Garden, a very famous and touristy area. Just a few blocks away was the Covent Garden market.
Christmas Eve at Trafalgar Square. We went to Midnight Mass at St. Martin-in-the-Field church, which is known for its exceptional academy of music.
Christmas Day in our flat! We decked the halls and hooked up the iPad to the TV since we couldn't have a real fire in the fireplace. Every time the fireplace video ended someone had to run over and restart it.
The view from the roof of the flat.
And then I went to Bristol to visit Amelia, my lovely friend from Bar-le-Duc! This is a picture of the cathedral there. Being in Bristol with Amelia was a blessing and a curse. A blessing because watching TV, drinking tea and eating beans on cheese on toast was exactly what I needed; but a curse because we spent a lot of time honing our demeaning impressions of the French and complaining about them. A lot. I began to dread my imminent return to France.
We spent a day in Bath, home of the Bath Abbey, Roman Baths and the Jane Austen Centre.
The Pump Room, a very chic restaurant that centered heavily in Jane Austen's scathing commentary on the wealthy in "Northanger Abbey."
The Abbey
A view of the Abbey from inside the Roman Baths. The Baths were constructed around 40 A.D.
The Jane Austen Centre in Bath was worth the visit simply because of our tour guide. She was this stout, awkward woman, and when she opened her mouth to give the introductory speech, she closed her eyes and started bellowing out her memorized speech in a stilted, forced manner. She opened her eyes every once in awhile, but then would close them again as if she was reading the speech off the insides of her eyelids. There had clearly been pauses written into the speech which she performed in an even more forced manner. For example, she held up a picture of Jane Austen’s house and said, “THE HOUSE THAT JANE AUSTEN GREW UP IN IS NOW: [long pause for dramatic tension] THE JANE AUSTEN MUSEUM.” She tried to build up suspense, but it completely backfired because she never changed the tone of her voice, she just suddenly stopped talking and then resumed two seconds later, like the sound had cut out for a moment then popped back on. And neither was there any need for suspense to begin with. She also did this with, “JANE AUSTEN NEVER SAW HER NAME IN PRINT, ONLY ‘WRITTEN BY’-------- 'A LADY'.” She was too much. I focused my eyes somewhere to the left of her head to keep from having to look at her, in case I burst out laughing.
I rang in the New Year in a pub back in London, surrounded by friends from Kalamazoo. At midnight, we hugged, kissed, and made up the words to Auld Lang Syne with brio; and then "Don't Stop Believin'" came on and we out-sang everyone in the pub. Funnily enough, "Don't Stop Believin'" was the curtain call song for the pantomime I saw in Bristol which I thought was an odd choice for the traditional Christmastime show. The point I'm trying to make, and ultimately the moral of this story, is that Journey is timeless and transcends all boundaries. Happy New Year.
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