Today 34 Americans Died Attempting to Climb a Small Hill

My Dear Readers,

I must warn you that the following Blog post is going to be a novella, if not a full length novel. Please read the following responsibly.

Lots of Love,

Jacquelyn

Our Tour Guide, Richard

The past four days have been the best of the trip so far. I know every time I write I keep saying “this has been the best so far” and literally every time, it gets does get better.

We left for Scotland in the wee morning hours on Thursday, trudging from tube station to tube station to get to King’s Cross train station before rush hour. When we finally got to our train and got settled in, it was a six hour ride to Edinburgh. This being my first train ride, I was thrilled. And let’s not even mention the gorgeous English and Scottish country sides that we got to see from the windows. We got to Edinburgh around two in the afternoon and were promptly picked up by our tour guide, Richard, who generously reinforced the Scottish “men-in-kilts” stereotype. He was great fun, so he was. He talked a wee bit fast and in his slightly thick accent, his stories were hilarious but occasionally hard to understand. By the end of the weekend, though, we had acclimated enough to have me writing this in a proper Scottish accent twenty four hours after hearing Richard last speak (if you couldn’t already tell). He took us around the city sharing its history and interesting stories of famous Scottish people that I had never heard. It’s a bit sad how little Americans know about Scotland. But then again, it’s been so closely connected to Britain both geographically and politically, most people just assume the history isn’t that big of a deal but it’s actually quite fascinating. After our walking tour, we were taken to our hotel which was possibly my favorite thing about the trip. IT WAS SO NICE. The bed was like a cloud, something I’ve missed sleeping here in London on my rock of a mattress. It was seriously heaven to get the luxury of that hotel. Laugh all you want. I challenge you to come try out my bed here and see how it feels.

ANYWAYS, our wakeup call had us up early Friday morning as well and getting ready for a long day. We headed out to the Scottish highlands after breakfast, a normally three or four hour drive except that we stopped at several little “photo stops” along the way. The first was the memorial to a Scottish war hero (of course I’ve forgotten his name already…he’s the guy from Braveheart but I never saw that movie…). The memorial was set on top of a “hill” but in Scotland when they say “hill” they mean mountain. Granted it was a small mountain but it was definitely not a “hill.” We got our blood pumping and calves aching marching our way up to the top but it was worth it. But of course, we’re Americans so we had to complain the entire way up which led our CAPA representative Ollie to give the headline that became my blog title and Facebook photo album. After some war stories and history of the monument, we made our way back to the bus, happy to give our legs a rest. From there it was back on the road, passing AMAZING things that I wish we would have had time to stop and see including but not limited to Dune Castle which they used for the Frenchman’s castle in Monty Python and the Holy Grail (“Your mother was a hamster and your father smelled of elderberries!”), Hagrid’s house and the Forbidden Forest, and the station that housed the Hogwart’s Express.  You can take a regular train for the same ride for six pounds or you can actually ride the Hogwart’s Express for thirty pounds. I would have paid the extra twenty four pounds for that experience. SO COOL. But alas, we kept moving. (Unfortunately, the bus was moving quickly and I was on the other side so I don’t have pictures of any of those things but I do have memories so lucky me!, sorry guys). Our last stop before the live museum (which was really cool, by the way) was a “photo stop” in the middle of the highlands. We got off, took pictures and expected to get back on the bus but instead we were lead out into the middle of the fields and up and over the hills (which were actually small hills compared to the mountains surrounding us. None of us had expected this and we were all in the wrong shoes, most girls were in flats and I was in my black boots that I had been fighting to keep in pristine condition. We were basically trudging through swampy ground, completely ruining our shoes. It was disgusting….but I got great pictures. With wet socks, shoes, feet, and jeans, we made our way back to the bus, shivering and mourning the destruction of our shoes. Eventually we got to the live museum where a man dressed in head to toe Tartan plaid showed us how ancient highlanders lived and told the stories of traditional kilts. It was incredibly fun and a few people got to get dressed up to boot. It was great fun, so it was. Afterwards we checked into the REALLY nice hostel and slept the night away.

Saturday came with another early morning as we headed out to Loch Ness just after sunrise. It was absolutely gorgeous, complete with a rainbow. Sadly, we didn’t find Nessie but we really did try! We headed out to Blair Castle (my home away from home) and got a tour. It was lovely and I would definitely live there if it weren’t for the excessive use of antlers in their decorating. But it was definitely fun. Afterwards we hopped on the bus and had a few more photo stops around the country, one included the Hamish forest. It was absolutely stunning. It was awesome to see the beauty of God’s creation in an entirely different atmosphere.

Loch Ness

Blair Castle

Forest

The rest of the trip was relaxing and wonderful and a complete joy to be there. Seriously, it was incredible and I’d love to go back to Scotland, particularly to ride the Hogwart’s Express. Maybe someday.

It’s nice to be back in London, though. We’re all back in the routine around here and settled in for another slightly crazy week. I’m sure you’ll get another update soon. On a completely unrelated note, Happy Six Months, Steven Jones! Also, for more pictures, SEE FACEBOOK!

 All Done For Now!! That wasn’t so bad, was it?

In West Philidelphia Born and Raised...

Pretty Castle

I can’t believe it’s been almost a week since I wrote! And it hasn’t even been a particularly busy week that I remember. Sorry about that!

Yay Chivalry!

On Friday we meant to go to Spitalfields Market but didn’t feel like braving the weather to shop outside. Instead, we waited it out and caught the last Yeomen tour of the Tower of London. It was actually really amazing to be inside the Tower walls and walk the ancient cobble stone streets that so many historical figures walked. We saw the site where Elizabeth I was held captive and where Anne Boleyn (and countless others) was executed. We got to go inside the chapel where I found proof that Chivalry does in fact exist (other than in the SU chapter of Kappa Chi’s that is) and see all the crown jewels. Yes, that’s right. Crown Jewels. As in, the largest cut diamond in the world that is part of the Queen’s scepter. I want a freaking scepter!

The Globe (I actually took this on the HP tour)

Saturday and Sunday were slightly boring work and shopping days but Monday was great. Not only was it Hermione Granger’s birthday, but I got to go on a tour of Shakespeare’s Globe Theater AND a Harry Potter Walking tour. The Globe was amazing because we got to see the tail end of a rehearsal for Much Ado About Nothing. To our surprise, the guy that played Jeffery in the Fresh Prince of Bel-air, is in the cast! And we get to see the performance next week! I LOVE JEFFERY!! It was really cool. I can’t wait to see the show next week.

I wish it would have gone through...

After the Globe, we rushed to King’s Cross Station to begin our Harry Potter walking tour. We went to a lot of places where they filmed the movies, most of which we’d already been to just wandering around London but it was still pretty neat. Unfortunately, it was a night tour so all of my pictures are really dark. It’s kind of disappointing. But we definitely got great pictures at Platform 9 ¾!

Yesterday was busy and kind of dreary but there were two particularly great highlights: I got to stand up for my God in two different situations! Once was in class when we were discussing the language of scripts which naturally led to a discussion about bad words. She asked us to list the worst words we could and she would write them on the board and I passed and got to talk about why which was really cool! The second time was after we saw our Tuesday night performance of Faith Machine. Go google it because there’s really no good way that I can think of to summarize it for you. But you can tell by the title that it sparked some interesting conversations. It was definitely a great experience and I can only hope and pray that it leads to more conversations, particularly in class next week with my professor.

Tomorrow we head out to Scotland which should be really, really great! We’ve got completely packed schedules and it looks like there’ll be lots of bus time for some relaxed reading which I’m almost equally excited about! I finished reading BossyPants (Tina Fey’s book) and that was absolutely hilarious (thanks, Jessy!) and now I’m on to Water for Elephants. I think the next thing I read will be the Other Boleyn Girl since it’s based on things I’ve actually seen. And thanks to Jenn and Shawn, I can take them all with me on tubes, trains and busses on my Kindle!

I won’t be taking my computer with me this weekend so it’ll be a while before I post again. I guess that just means I’ll catch you on the flip side!

“OhMiGod You Guys!”

It’s been an extremely long week but I’m happy to say that I’m done till next Tuesday. And next week actually has a lot of really exciting things happening but more on that later. Since I haven’t written since Sunday, I figure I should fill you in on the rest of my week.

After a downhearted and slightly depressing day of listening to the names of 9/11 victims on Sunday, Monday was considerably better. I spent most of the day working but had a “brief” break to do my weekly Skype Bible study with Steven. I put brief in quotation marks because we ended up talking for two and a half hours and using up the majority of my bandwidth for the week which doesn’t get reset until Saturday. So I apologize to the friends and family who have wanted to talk this week. It might be easiest to set up times to talk to me and I can go to a pub with free wifi and actually have a conversation with you face to face. I’ll be working on it. But later Monday night I dipped into my bank account for the first time this trip and booked my ticket to Iceland for fall break. It should be a really amazing trip. We’ll get to see the Northern Lights, relax in the Blue Lagoon, and go horseback riding on solid lava. It’ll be nice to have some time to relax and not worry about school.

Tuesday my Performing Culture class went to Brick Lane for a field trip. It was mostly irrelevant and I don’t really know why we went but it was interesting to walk around. We had lunch in the last-standing Jewish bagel shop (If you don’t know the story of Brick Lane, in the late 1800’s and early 1900’s it was an entirely Jewish immigrant community but has since become almost entirely Bengali immigrants now.) It went from bagel shops and synagogues to curry restaurants and mosques, leaving only two Jewish places left, one of which was the bagel shop we stopped at. It was REALLY good. I had a crispy bacon bagel (they don’t keep kosher any more) and it was definitely one of my favorite things I’ve tried so far. Come to think of it, most of my favorites here involve bacon. Yum. But after lunch it was time to head back    We saw Top Girls and to be honest, I couldn’t tell you what it was about. It was thoroughly confusing and honestly, I left with a headache. Don’t get me wrong, the acting was amazing but it jumped around in time and was generally very vague and abstract. Kind of like this description. What’s bad is that I have to write a review on it by Tuesday and I have no idea what happened. Oh well. I guess that’s what Wikipedia is for!

Wednesday was a normal work day but it was followed up with a great girl’s night out with Bree to see Legally Blonde the Musical. We got front row tickets which were amazing except that we couldn’t see the dogs when they crossed the stage. But it was an absolutely amazing show! It was especially fun for me because I’d seen it already and I got to pick up on all the changes they made to make it funnier for the British audience. Even though it’s definitely an American show, they turned a lot of the American pop culture references into more UK friendly references and since I pretty much had the show memorized, I noticed all the little details. It was also really nice to be able to see all the actors up close. I’m already in love with the character of Emit Forest so you can imagine how happy I was to see that he was basically a brunette Steven. He even had Steven’s blue eyes and bad dancing skills. It was AWESOME.

Today was less awesome but still good. We had a painfully boring Music, Culture and Identity class in which at one point he literally said “don’t worry about the music, it’s just there.” It’s going to be an incredibly long semester. But afterwards we had British Life and Culture with Quintessential British Professor. We went on a walk of the Westminster area and learned some really interesting things not only about London’s past but about London’s future as well. I’m kind of super sad that I’m one program early for being here during the 2012 Summer Olympics. The group that does the London semester next year will not only be around the Games, they’ll get all the updated tubes. Right now all the lines close every weekend starting on Thursdays for updates and repairs, making it incredibly difficult to get anywhere on time. But good for them.

Tomorrow we’re headed out to a market and possibly the Tower of London. And I don’t think there’s much going on this weekend but Monday starts an extremely fun week. Monday is the Harry Potter walking tour around London and on Thursday we leave for Scotland till Sunday night. And apparently they’ve got a ton of really awesome things planned for us while we’re there so it should be good times.

Everyone here is sick with a horrible cough/flu epidemic and I’m hoping and praying not to catch it. Especially since the last time I had a cough, I stopped breathing. I’ve been drinking two glasses of orange juice a day and getting lots of sleep so hopefully I’ll outlast whatever this stupid bug is.

It sounds like we’re planning a short trip to Ireland after Iceland which would be really fun, I just don’t know how much I want to spend. But I definitely want to visit Ireland before I leave, even if it’s just for a weekend. We’ll see how that goes. It’s been a long day and we’re watching X-MEN: The Last Stand so I think I’ll leave you with that. Hope everyone’s doing well!

Proud to Be an American

Ten years ago today, the world changed. It’s amazing to see the impact of that fateful day as an American living abroad. The country hasn’t exactly shut down (there was a Thames festival going on all day) but there were several memorial services going on throughout London, not to mention an all day broadcasting of the events in New York, Pennsylvania, and Washington on BBC News. It’s incredibly surreal to watch from this point of view. I’ll come back to the heavy stuff later.

Bree and I headed out to the festival around lunch time today. We were a little apprehensive about taking public transportation as the U.S. Embassy has been sending us emails for about a week telling us to be careful about making our “Americanness” known during this anniversary weekend but we hopped on the tube anyway. We got off at the Westminster tube stop which dumps you off directly in front of Big Ben. Neither of us had gotten out at that stop so we were surprised to come up the stairs to a giant clock towering over us. It was incredibly gorgeous and a lovely surprise. We walked across the bridge toward the festival and under the London Eye. I haven’t gone on it yet, but when that day comes, someone here will have to convince me to get on. I know I want to go on it, I have to, but walking under it, you can see just how massive it really is. I’ll have to make sure I go with people who will push me on. We walked through the festival which was mostly a series of neat little shopping booths and food stands and I found some really great Christmas presents to take home for people. We must have walked several miles along the Thames just browsing and enjoying the beautiful day. We headed home later in the afternoon and have spent a good majority of our afternoon in front of the TV watching BBC News and trying not to cry.

I guess that because I grew up as an American in the generation that was so greatly affected by 9/11, I never had much of a grasp on how the rest of the world was impacted. I had no idea how many Brits were killed, not to mention people from other countries around the world. America tends to focus on America, even in worldwide events, and I wish I had known how massive the attacks really were. Maybe I was too young at the time to realize that 9/11 expanded beyond America’s borders. Fourth grade isn’t exactly a time of much deep understanding. But even in high school, my education of the tragic day focused purely on America’s perspective.

I’m not exactly a patriotic person. I’m not registered to vote and to be honest, I couldn’t tell you the details of what’s been happening overseas. But today is not a day to criticize or judge. Today is a day to remember the victims, the firefighters, and the policemen who lost their lives in this tragic event and to pray that their families find peace in God who gives it freely. Today is a day to find pride in your country and those who fight for its safety.

Today I’m proud to be an American.