Oct 2006

I was worried a little bit about the Christmas holidays here, as everyone else is going home over the 4 week break and I was not looking forward to the prospect of being alone all that time.

So guess what I've decided to do for 2 out of those 4 weeks?? Well what else should I be doing while I'm here but travelling? I had thought about a Christmas tour of Scotland, but then I remembered there is this whole other continent not so far away and shouldn't I be going to see it!!

So I'm booking a contiki tour. (I've just sent off the first email and not sure how long the process takes so I hope it all goes to plan & I actually can go.)

And have a look at this itinerary!

Day 1: London to Amsterdam
Day 2: Amsterdam To Rhine Valley
Day 3: Rhine Valley to Munich
Day 4: Munich to Innsbruck:
Day 5: Innsbruck to Venice:
Day 6: Venice to Rome:
Day 7: Rome Sightseeing:
Day 8: Rome to Florence:
Day 9: Florence to Lucerne:
Day 10: Lucerne to Paris:
Day 11: Paris Sightseeing:
Day 12: Paris to London:

Aagh, somebody fan me I think i'm going to pass out with excitement!

And now I'm stressing, thinking about actually going on this trip. So much to organise... but it will be worth it!!!

And the money, oh the money. But again, worth it!

And now back down to earth... I'm off to the library to start writing an essay.

It was my first Halloween Party last night. Since it wasn't actually halloween and there was no trick or treating or pumpkins it didn't feel particularly halloweenish. Just a fancy dress party, really, with some freaky costumes. But still fun. I went as a witch, complete with hat, broomstick and some fake eyelashes and liquid eyeliner. I decided to got the gothic witch route rather than the haggard old one. Vain I know :p

As I was getting ready for the party, half dressed in a witches costume, there was fire alarm in my building so I had to throw on a jacket and ugg boots over my black dress and fishnet tights to go stand outside for about 20 minutes with everyone else. (I might also mention that is getting really cold here lately and I think it couldn't have been more than 8 degrees.) There was no fire - apparently the alarms can get set off by cooking, spraying deo or harispray or, get this, taking a shower! On the upside, it was the most socialising I've done with people from my residence since i got here, and I met the people from the flat across the hall from me.

Here's a few photos, but I've reached my upload limit for the month so not many. I'll put more on Facebook and my google/picassa web album.

Left to Right: Blandine and her visiting boyfriend (not in costume, tut tut), Barbel the pirate, Me the witch, Mat the cowboy and Laurence the devil. (Though you may have noticed that by this stage the witch, cowboy and devil have switched hats.)

And the freakiest costume goes to...Bjorn in his butchers costume and some poor unfortunate he came across at the party.

Fortunately I got away only mildly butchered and lived to tell the tale.

I just saw my English flatmate for the first time in what I swear has been about 2 weeks! I never seem to really see anyone in this flat very often.

Anyway, I haven't got any exciting things to write about - I'm just bored and waiting for my laundry to finish. Its cost me 6 pounds to do all my laundry today - thats about $15!!

Coming up in the near future is Halloween, which will be the first time I've ever celebrated it. Maisie, my american friend will be celbrating Thanksgiving, so that will be a first too. There is also Guy Fawkes day - which will be exciting since they seem to sell fireworks to anyone here and they're always going off every night here and there.

I'm also going on a weekend trip to Edinburgh in november - and everyone keeps telling me how great it is there so I can't wait!

So anyway, the point of all that is to let you know that my blogs will be more exciting soon.

Today I have to go return some shoes I bought yesterday, then got home and found out they had given me the right shoe in size 6 (which is the right size for me in whatever sizing they use here) and the left in size 5. (When I got home and tried them on I thought one of my feet must have been bigger than the other or something.)

Then I'm going to the life drawing class again at 6 tonight. I plan to remember tonight, since I've forgotten the last 2 weeks in a row.

Anyway, thats the end of my bored ramblings. Got to go get my last load of washing out of the drier now.

Bubbye.

In answer to the question about where I found my quotes:

the quotes by particular people are from a great website - thinkexist.com - hundreds of quotes on everything.

The movie quotes are mostly from movies I've seen recently and you can find movie quotes on imdb.com

Oh my God, I'm getting pulled over. Everyone, just... pretend to be normal. ~ It is often said that before you die your life passes before your eyes. It is in fact true. It's called living. ~ The future's uncertain and the end is always near. ~ Sometimes the questions are complicated and the answers are simple. ~ If my answers frighten you then you should cease asking scary questions. ~ Have you ever been in love? Horrible isn't it? It makes you so vulnerable. It opens your chest and it opens up your heart and it means that someone can get inside you and mess you up. You build up all these defenses, you build up a whole suit of armor, so that nothing can hurt you, then one stupid person, no different from any other stupid person, wanders into your stupid life...You give them a piece of you. They didn't ask for it. They did something dumb one day, like kiss you or smile at you, and then your life isn't your own anymore. Love takes hostages. It gets inside you. It eats you out and leaves you crying in the darkness, so simple a phrase like 'maybe we should be just friends' turns into a glass splinter working its way into your heart. It hurts. Not just in the imagination. Not just in the mind. It's a soul-hurt, a real gets-inside-you-and-rips-you-apart pain. I hate love. ~ I wanna be with her more, I wanna be with her all the time, and I wanna tell her things I don't even tell you or mum. And I don't want her to have another boyfriend. I suppose if I could have all those things, I wouldn't really mind if I touched her or not. ~ I love you not only for what you are, but for what I am when I am with you. I love you not only for what you have made of yourself, but for what you are making of me. I love you for the part of me that you bring out. ~ For it was not into my ear you whispered, but into my heart. It was not my lips you kissed, but my soul. ~ You know that when I hate you, it is because I love you to a point of passion that unhinges my soul. ~ Oh, please, just shut up. You're wounding my soul. ~ The reason people find it so hard to be happy is that they always see the past better than it was, the present worse than it is, and the future less resolved than it will be. ~ One of the hardest things in life is having words in your heart that you can't utter. ~ Maybe, maybe not. Maybe f**k yourself.

Quotes in order of appearance:

(Little Miss Sunshine)(Terry Pratchett) (Jim Morrison) ( Dr. Seuss) (Pulp Fiction) (Neil Gaiman) (About a Boy) (Roy Croft) (Judy Garland) (Julie de Lespinasse) (About a Boy) (Marcel Pagnol) (James Earl Jones) (The Departed)

Finally remembered to get a copy of this off a friend (thanks Mat) because didn't get one taken with my camera at the time.

This is a picture of most of my international group of friends on the beach at Scarborough.

From Left to Right: Jessie (Australia :P), Bjorn (Holland), Lydia (France), Mat (France), CJ (Canada), Blandine (France), Sara (Morocco/France), Mai (France)

Just a quick note - don't know if this will work anyway since there seems to be an error and I can't see my blogs. Hope that sorts itself out. I think I should keep a back-up of all my blogs in Word or something in case something goes wrong here.

Anyway, it was Bjorn's birthday yesterday. We went and saw the History Boys at the cinema, which was set in Sheffield I think and also had shots of Oxford (which I recognised from being there!) That was good. Then we had the international meal which worked really well, and everyone brought really nice food. There are some good cooks around! (and everyone seems to like Tim Tams). I realised too late that I should have taken a photo of all the food.

Bjorn's housemate made his birthday cake, which was a chocolate cake with brandy poured over the top. It looked really good, and apparently tasted good too but I was too busy running around getting people organised to sign Bjorn's birthday card and I missed out! Oh well.

This is Tom, one of Bjorn's housemates, who made the birthday cake:

And here's the birthday cake:

I bought Bjorn a poster of the movie Little Miss Sunshine which we both really loved (and I got myself one too). (It's a great movie - go see it!!)


And then we all (the international people) went in together to buy him a pass for the Leeds International Film Festival coming up in November which he really wants to go to, but couldn't afford the pass. I'm pleased to say he loved it and I'm quite proud of my idea :p

Anyway thats a short recap of the night, but now I have to go and write a 350 word history post that is due today but I've been too disorganised this week and haven't started yet :s (It took me a few days to recover from London, then for the rest of the week I kept having this feeling that there was something I was forgetting to do...

Ok so I ended with Saturday night at the globe....

Sunday was the second day trip. This one went to Oxford, Stratford-Upon-Avon and Warwick Castle.

This was a bigger, and somewhat friendlier group of people on this tour. (The people on Saturday's tour seemed to want to keep to themselves). There was another australian girl on this tour, from Brisbane and she was also a teacher (in London since May working) so we had several things to bond over.

Oxford was great! The town and the university are really one - there is no campus as such, the uni is spread over the town, so the town is the university (if you know what I mean. :P) With different colleges that the students stay in depending on their subjects and interests. The uni system is different to other unis. you don't have lectures here, you just have a personal tutor who you give your assignments to and go to some tutorials, but much of it is self directed learning. And you don't do a general arts degree or different electives etc. If you are studying history you just do history and nothing else for the whole 3 years. This means that when Oxford students graduate they automatically receive a Masters 3 years later without having to do anymore study since their Degree was so specific.

It's all very pretty sandstone buildings and cobbled streets. And not many cars - bicycles everywhere.

A peek into a college:

This trip wasn't so rushed so had a little while to walk around here (and buy an Oxford University jumper) before heading towards Stratford-Upon-Avon. On the way we drove throught the cotswolds which is an area of cottages - many of them still with thatched roofs. These are protected, meaning if you have a thatched roof you can't tile it, and if you have a tiled roof and decide to change to thatch you can't change it back. And people pay a lot of money for these cottages, even though you will eventually need to rethatch at a cost of 40,000 pounds ($100,000), and insurance is expensive due to fire risk. But they are pretty! :p The one in the photo below, we were told, was worth about 500,000 pounds (thats over 1 million dollars!!!)

Then we drove on to Stratford and Shakespeare's birthplace. Tourist infested, but well preserved and interesting to see for a Shakespeare buff like me (though this conversion is probably a new development - I always admired the plays but the more I learn and study the plays, the more I have come to think they are brilliant!!).

Then we went on to Warwick castle, which is a really well preserved medieval castle (one of the castle's built by William the Conqueror after he invaded in 1066 - never used and pretty much obsolete from the time it was built like all the fortifications William built, but perhaps his fortifications were the reason England wasn't invaded again and taken over so easily like William himself did.) It had a dungeon and everything! This was great to see. They had waxwork displays depicted both medieval life, and the life of the Earl of Warwick and his family who lived in the castle later. These were freakily realistic looking, and if you put your face up close to the fugures face you were sure at any moment they would move and you would realise you had been staring at a real person. We decided that we would have to go back one day dressed in medieval costume and sit in the display until some unsuspecting tourist came along and then spook them.

This photo was taken from the top of the tower (seen below). The walk up there was up a narrow winding and claustrophobic set of stairs, that for someone afraid of heights generated nightmares of a never ending spiral!) And there were grates at the top which looked straight down to the ground. However, not that long ago heights like this would have induced a sweaty, heart pounding panic but what I felt here was very mild, just a slight and entirely bearable discomfort. I've noticed my fear of heights since arriving here (in recent years escalating to a real irrational phobia) has abated. Which makes me think that it probably is a psychological, self-confidence related thing. Anyway, back to the photos:

That night I went back to the hostel, and even though I was invited out by two Italian guys in my dorm, I decided I couldn't do anything but go to sleep. I had thought about walking to see westminster abbey and trafalgar square at night, but apart from the fact that i didn't really want to walk at night alone, I was too exhausted and decided I would go in the morning before my bus back to Leeds.

So I went to Westminster Abbey on Monday morning. (Photos of the outside below, not of the inside since that wasn't allowed and it would have felt a little irreverant to be snapping pictures of the tombs of all these kings and queens and great people anyway.) I never knew how many people there were buried in that place!! It was beautiful and at the same time a little creepy to know that every few steps, there was someone buried under your feet. Or more than one - one of the graves was something like 20 monks who died from the Black Death.

I also saw Big Ben and heard it chime, walked past Downing Street - heavily gated and guarded - and then walked to Trafalgar square. The fountains weren't running, but the very tall Nelson's column and the Lion statues were fairly impressive.

Big Ben and the London Eye (which I have still to go on) in the background.):

Then it was time to go back and get my bags and catch the bus. I was in a panicked rush and one point as I thought I was going to be late for my bus. I ended up getting there on time but the bus was delayed for 35 minutes anyway. By the time I got back to Leeds I was so exhausted I felt like I would either snap or cry if anyone so much as looked at me funny. Total culture and history overload.

But I'm still glad I went. And there's still more of London to see, so I'm definitely going to go back. Hopefully with others next time though.

I;ve been buying, as souvenirs, charms for my charm bracelet. In Amsterdam airport I bought a little clog (even though I guess technically I haven't really visited Holland yet - but it reminds me of Bjorn now too). From bath I got a little bath, a crown from windsor, a bus from London, and a little shakespeare's house from Stratford-Upon-Avon. Soon my bracelet will be full if I keep up at this rate.

And thanks everyone for all your Aussie food suggestions. I found an online Australian product shop based in the UK. I haven't got the time to do anything involved before Saturday so I jsut bought some Tim-Tams and some Coopers Beer (which has the added personal touch of being from SA, not just Aus.) But I've bought other stuff too, and a Kath and Kim DVD, so I think I'll have an Australian party and do more meals and stuff later on when I have the time to do things properly.

Thats all from me for now.

Hope you aren't all melting over there in the heat. I'm not freezing yet but looks like it won't be long before I do :P

Also, the limit of photos I can upload here means that I can only put a few photos up, so if you want to see more go to http://picasaweb.google.com/a1120631/LondonTrip.

I'm back from London!

It was an amazing trip, but I'm still on culture and history overload! Everything I crammed into about 2 and a half days could easily have filled a week.

On Friday night, I arrived about 3pm, checked into my hostel and then went for a walk. I found my way to Buckingham Palace and wandered around a bit there. I tried taking a photo of myself in front of it (feeling like a complete idiot as I did so), and then another tourist offered to take it for me. (Unfortunately random offers like this rarely ensure the greatest photography but I'm still grateful.)

That night I went on a Thames Pub Walk - it was led by an American wierdly enough, but he knew a lot about the history of London and it was an interesting walk.

I met two Canadian Girls travelling in their gap year, and we hung around together. Then after the walk we all went together to a turkish restaurant for tea (which was really great food.) The woman they were staying with was with us and at the end of tea she generously offered to pay for all our meals as she said she wanted to do this for us a young travellers to pay back for the same being given to her when she was a young traveller.

It was about 1am by the time I got to bed I think, and I had to get up at about 6am for my tour the next day. So needless to say I was really tired (and I'd only, stupidly, had 4 hours sleep the night before!). Every time I got on the bus during the tour this day i fell asleep almost instantly. The tour was to Stonehnge, Bath and Windsor Castle. It was great to see all these places but a bit rushed all day with only a short amount of time in each place.

But I still really enjoyed it - it was a history lover's dream. Though each place was overpopulated with tourists, it still felt a little surreal when I imagined the people who had put these stones here and stonehenge, and walked in these courtyards at Bath so many years ago. I just wanted to reach out and touch everything and imagine who had touched the same stones before. I don't know what I was expecting, an electric shock or something, but I did get little chills every now and again. Just my over active imagination I know, but I still loved it.

This is a view of Bath from a hill coming down into the town:

And the Baths (another fellow tourist offering to take my picture):

Windsor Castle: (no photos of the inside, sorry - that wasn't allowed.)

A Chapel: (St George's Cathedral was like this inside but even grander. While I was there, the boys choral group was practicing and it sounded beautiful inside the cathedral.)

Saturday night I went an saw The Comedy of Errors at the Globe, which was fun, and appropriate since I'm just studying the same play at uni.

Here's pic of the outside of the Globe:

Okay, I'm going to have to leave it there for now, since I'm tired (Ik ben moe) and lacking motivation to keep going. So there will be a second instalment of my London trip coming soon.

Stay tuned.

Tot ziens. Ik spreek je gauw weer. (Which means, if you hadn't worked it out, 'Bye, I'll talk to you soon.')

Just a quick note - I just arrived in London and am at my hostel now. Using the internet for maps of where I'm going to go but I think I'm going to have to buy a proper one or I'll get lost.

It was absolutely pouring with rain all the way here but as soon as I arrived and got off the bus it stopped which is a blessing!

Tonight I'm going to go on a Thames pub Walk - it takes in more than pubs though, and I think we go past the Globe theatre which will be good so I know how to find it tomorrow night when I go to see The Comedy of Errors. (Which coincidentally is the play I'm studying this week at uni!)

Right now I'm going to just go for a walk and look around I think, and find some food. And if I come across and souvenir shop I'll probably be a tourist and buy some :P I might even walk to have a look at Buckingham palace as I don't think its very far from here. And at some point i need to work out how to use the tube - which I'm actually excited about doing, and not scared which is somewhat of a first for me! If I get lost I'll just go on my own little tour of London finding myself again.

By the way, the only person who has successfully told me what my dutch phrase at the end of a previous post meant it Bjorn, and I told him I'm not giving him a prize since he has an unfair advantage. (Sorry Grandpa, the literal translation doesn't really give you a good idea of what it means.)

Here's another one that might be easier.

Hoi! Hoe gaat het? Ik ben blij!

Tot ziens!

I told myself a while ago to do something every day that scares me. I haven't always kept it up (though 'luckily' there is a lot that scares me so I just naturally do it quite often!) but today I did it purposely.

Everyone else here as been joining societies in the last few weeks, but I hadn't decided what I wanted to do. I'm not particularly good at sports and they cost a lot to join anyway. I'm not much of a dancer, cheerleader, musician or political activist so I was feeling a bit lost.

It got me down a little bit that all my friends seem to know so clearly and confidently what they are passionate about, and are good at it too, where-as I don't seem to know what I like, what I'm good at or the person I want to be. Or at least I'm afraid to let that person show.

Then I saw the Art Society. I like art. And they have life drawing classes every week. The email said it would be relaxed with no expectation of people having particular drawing skills.

Even with that assurance, I was still vacillating all week about whether I would actually go. Today I bought a sketch pad and a pencil and went home and practiced. I told myself if I could draw something half-decent I might go.

So my practicing wasn't awful, and I told myself not to be a chicken, and just to go this once and if I hated it I never had to go again. But even as I was getting on the bus, thinking there's no turning back now, I was having mental pictures of walking into a room full of serious art students who would frown down their noses at this girl who'd not drawn in years and who didn't even know which type of paper or pencils to bring.

I found a seat in the room full of people with sketch pads, who to my initial horror did look very artsy. I sat next to two girls, and one of them turned to me and asked "Have you done this before?"
"No," I replied grimacing nervously.
"Oh, neither have I. I'm a bit scared," She said.
Oh, I can breath again!! I relaxed instantly finding I wasn't going to be the only one who didn't know what they were doing.

The next surprise was that it was nude life drawing class - which I guess is what life drawing is, I just hadn't really thought about it - or if I had I just thought of still life.

I should remember that things are never as bad as I worry they are going to be, and that I'm not the only one who feels scared about things, and people aren't going to judge me for it.

I am so glad I went now. I really enjoyed it and I think my pictures, though rough and unfinished, were ok for a first attempt. (Though the longer I sit and look at them the more critical I become.) Occassionally I would, after thinking 'ok, that doesn't look too bad', look around the room and see the real artists drawings and feel a bit discouraged, but I'm happy with my attempts.

Here's some photos of two of the six or so poses we sketched (actually on white paper but comes out brown in the photo) - the first was done in 10 minutes, and the last one was the 40 minute pose (both still unfinished and sketchy though.)

This trip to England has been the best thing I've ever done. I've already started to find the things I was missing before and getting to know who I really am - and getting the confidence to let that show. I know that I love art (even if I'll never be an artist), that I love to write and I know I have something to say in me somewhere waiting to come out, and that I really do love books and literature.

In the past few years I'd become a bit jaded and indifferent I think, just getting bogged down in the mundane side of university and forgetting about how much more there is to life, and how much enjoyment there is to be had out of it. And I really have to remember to thank the great people I've met here who have changed me this way, especially Bjorn. He inspires me.

Well, that was my little introspective session. I'm sure I'll be learning a lot more about myself in the weeks to come and probably write about that here too, so thanks for reading and coming on this journey with me

Almost a week since I last blogged already! Time is going too fast. In some ways it feels like I've been here for months already, but in other ways like no time at all.

The crepes party was fun and yummy - even though due to the french (and I'm told, correct) pronunciation of 'crepe' there was running joke about the 'crap' party.

I bought some posters to decorate my room, since I wasn't feeling very at home in it before but now its personalised its a lot better. I bought 4 posters: 2 of Escher drawings, one of a Dali painting and also 'The Great Wave' by Katsushika Hokusai.

Escher - "Drawing Hands"

Escher - "High and Low"

Dali - "the Elephants"

I also bought a little pot of Gerberas that sits in the window now. (I'll keep you updated as to whether I manage to keep them alive the whole time I'm here or not!)

Here are some pictures of my room:

What else have I been doing? Nothing in particular travel-wise. (I'll have more of that next week after I've been to London and on my day trips.

I've been to the movies and seen Little Miss Sunshine - which by the way is an amazing movie and I recommend you go see it!

I also went to the Fresher's ball on Saturday which is a big party at the university union with about 4000 people. Most of the girls dress up sort of formally but I didn't have anything like that with me so I think I was the only girl in the whole place wearing pants. Oh well. It still had fun. The sugababes were performing - even though I'm not particularly in love with them I had a look anyway and took a few videos (or Bjorn did for me) just to prove that I've seen them.

Ok, so for those of you who don't know, there someone who merits an introduction here I think - that's Bjorn. I told myself I wouldn't meet anyone over here but here I am just 3 weeks in and I already have! He was too good to pass up just for the sake of avoiding any complications an international relationship might have. He is Dutch, but has been living in China for the past 4 years. So I'm trying to learn some Dutch. Hoi! Hoe gaat het? ('hi, how are you' is about as far as my skills go so far!) He is studying Communication Studies and doing his whole 3 yr degree in Leeds, and wants to be a film maker. So thats Bjorn in a nut shell, and now you know who I'm talking about when I mention him, since I'm sure I will :p

Anyway, not much else to mention right now - I finally bought an oven tray and some containers today, and did a thorough food shop, so I can now start to cook properly for myself. I shudder to think at the lack of fruit and vegetables in my diet these past few weeks but don't worry mum, I'm changing that!

I'm going to see Babyshambles tonight at the Union (who I don't know much about but have been told they're good.)

I'll write again and put up some pictures after next weekends trip.

tot ziens, ik spreek je gauw weer! (anyone tell me what that means & I'll give you a prize )