I See London, I See France

Much has been happening in Europe this month. My brother Stefan and I have been all over, from London to Bretagne to Paris to the Alps. To cover it all, and in the spirit of international look-back-at-everything-and-rate-it day, I feel like a superfluous countdown list is in order.

Top Five Greatest Moments of England/France Vacation 2010:

FIVE (5)

Hanging out in London/The Celtic Hotel

'Laxin' in the lobby

When we first arrived in London, my knee was still a little wary of walking around too much, so there was much hanging out. The hotel we stayed at was very cozy, and I took full advantage of its lobby and wi-fi. At one point, we managed to Skype with my dad, and bring the camera out into the street to show him just outside of the hotel.

FOUR (4)

Walking Abbey Road

It's like on the Beatles cover. The Abbey Road one. But with only two people.

It's touristy, there was a group of people waiting to do the same thing, (and one person offering to snap one with a high quality camera for a couple pounds), and Stefan's feet got cold, but it was fun. What a bizarre thing The Beatles made popular.

THREE (3)
Houses of Parliament/Big Ben

The metro stop in fabled Vestminst

Westminster Abbey, the Houses of Parliament, and Big Ben were three of our stops on one day of our London visit. Parliament was by far my favorite. As an art exhibit alone, it was amazing, (including a great, scowling statue of Winston Churchill right next to a sign saying "Do Not Touch the Statues").

Big Ben

TWO (2)

Re-Visiting Dinard

About to eat some ray with my dear old grandmother

For those of you who don't know, Dinard is an important family place in my life. It is a city in Bretagne, the Northwest region of France. Every other summer, I would visit my French family in Dinard with my Minnesota family for a month. The tradition ended for my brother and I when we were each around 18, so I hadn't been there for a while. It was great to see the place again with a different perspective and a more tolerable level of French-speaking ability. Mémé, (my grandma), has been a very kind and loving host, and a great chef.

Dinard is on the coast of the English channel and is very much a summer town. So it was interesting to see the place cold and snowy. Snow is a rarity there, so Stefan and I seized the opportunity to make snowmen. But not just ordinary snowmen, conversing snowmen.

I think, therefore I snowman.

ONE (1)

Christmas in Paris

The Ménages, Schifskys, and the Otts

Christmas in Paris involved great food (in enormous quantities), the Louvre and the beautiful cityscape, and visiting with family that I rarely see. Good stuff.

I have been staying at my aunt Aline's house, with her sons. Here they are (minus Adrien, who is not holding the camera):

(Left to right: Alban, Arnaud, Stefan, Aline, and I)

And here is a picture of us five cousins, (including Adrien) looking devilishly handsome in the Parc du Sceaux.

Adrien is actually shorter than my brother, but screw it.

I guess I have one more picture of me in front of the Louvre, as well. What a freaking fantastic place. The pieces of art there kept my skin in a permanent goosebump state.

There's art all up in this.

So that's it for now. I'm getting tired. There was a portion of my travels that included visiting the beautiful French Alps, but those pictures aren't available yet. That's for a different post, probably. It's 5:50pm here, and the plans for tonight include playing some sick games of Jungle Speed, eating a lot, and walking the streets of Paris mildly intoxicated, (it's legal, hush).

Happy New Year from Europe, everybody! Special shout-out to the gamer bros, Armstrong friends, Luther buds, my great French family (in France and the Galapagos), and Schifskys everywhere!

Study Break

It is essay crunch time at the moment, and I am pulling myself away from the tedium of catering my writing and thoughts to carefully cited scholarly articles to bring y'all an update.

This has been me all day, every day, for the last week, except for the fact that I am a man.

I am still a cripple, but can move my knee around a lot more comfortably. In fact, my knee was recently used for dancing (and even sitting!) at my favorite bar in town: Coco Tang.

Here are some choice pictures:

The fabled Absinthe/rum tea-like concoction: Mad Hatter's Tea Party

My drink of choice: The Dirty Cinderella

Me telling everyone how it's 'bout to go down.

A serious, completely candid shot of Aaron, Ben, and I's everyday life.

That was great times.

I also recently saw a pantomime, a fairly unique British show that involves audience participation, cross-dressing, and an occasionally overwhelming amount of cultural references. You can read about it more, here.

I won't be updating the blog for a while, as I will be off soon for my winter break, (in sunny France!). I will likely be writing a post or two in France, but if not, Happy Holidays, everyone!

Life on Hard Mode

Hello, again, everyone. Do not let my lack of posts fool you: much has been happening here in Nottingham. Unfortunately, one of these happenings has left me less able and willing to do things.

Three weeks ago, I dislocated my kneecap at Ultimate Frisbee practice, when my awkwardly bent leg collided with someone else's. It was unsightly and painful, but there was no major damage. I have since then been living as a cripple, with the ups and downs that brings. Just today, I started physiotherapy and am doing exercises to regain muscle and control in my left leg. The physical therapist was optimistic, and I hope to be fine by next month.

But enough about that. Before the unfortunate practice, us students made a trip to Bath, Avebury, and Stonehenge. The Roman baths in Bath were wonderful, and I have a few pictures from that.

The Roman Baths (right)

Natural hot spring water surrounded by Roman and medieval architecture is pretty cool.

The site had a sort of cellphone that you would call to hear information about the different areas and items.

Unfortunately, my camera ran out of batteries, so I don't have too many photos. This means that I didn't get any of myself in front of one of the wonders of the ancient world: Stonehenge. A friend of mine took some of me, however, and I'll post them up later.

EDIT:

Here it is, or the best one.

Stonehenge was a surreal experience, but there's not much to say other than that it looks like it what it does in all the photos. It was inspiring to stand in their presence, though, and the surrounding countryside was beautiful.

But before I'm done for now, this:

From left to right: Dr. Hugh Higgins, Veronica Horne, Clark Kitson, Zelda Kitson, Philip Rosenblum, Iliyana Romanov, Cynthia Summerbrooke, Otis Dickinson-Hill, Roxy Malone, Samantha Cyprus, Sam Shepard

The night before Halloween, all the flat (minus 2 people) were involved in a murder mystery party. It was great times. In character, we met each other at the residence of Dr. Philip Rosenblum, who, tragically died soon after our long dinner. There was suspicion, intrigue, and an awful, early conclusion, (made by Ben and I to try and wrap things up) that brought everything to an anti-climactic halt. But, we all got to talk in British accents and be jerks, and we have this fantastic photo to show for it. I call it a win.

Serious Business

It's been a while, but I've finally got to posting another entry and sprucing up the blog a bit, which took more time than it needed to.

An outsider of a peculiarly judgmental nature might not think it, but Nottingham University student life is in full swing. Instead of at least one class per day, I have three lectures and two seminars a week. Students are expected to be reading in the gaps, which is what I have been doing at a refreshingly relaxed rate, (there be change on the horizon, though). The rest of my time is spent winning the board game Settlers of Catan and wearing pillows on my head with my roommates.

I am an adult man.

But it is not all fun and games. I have joined the Ultimate Team, where I go have fun at practice several times a week, and I have also joined the University television station: NUTS, where I play around with cameras and write for and shoot for a comedy sketch show.

In all seriousness, I'm pretty excited and fortunate to be able to get experience in a field that I have often looked at as a prospective career field. The show I will be writing for is called Insert Name Here. It will be a weekly show with themed episodes featuring several one-minute-or-so sketches. I am on a team with about seven other dudes, who all contribute to the writing process, as well as the eventual production, (camerawork, sound, lighting, editing). It is far from high art, and will not be much more than one can see over at CollegeHumor, but damn it, what a cool opportunity.

This upcoming weekend will be our flat's third trip, a short one to Bath. I'll have to let you all know how it goes.

London and Other Things

Hello, all.

Class finally started yesterday and it's been promising. I'm taking two university courses: "Modern Irish Literature and Drama" and "American Literature to 1900." The latter proves to be very interesting, even beyond the fact that it's British people teaching me about American things.

The university is big, much bigger than Luther, as expected. It takes a good amount of time to get from place to place, especially from our flat to the university itself. The students here are generally very friendly.

They're friendly in the pubs and clubs, too. About a week ago, some of my friends and I went out to a club that has student-only nights. After a cold, uncomfortable, and very long queue, as well as a victorious bathroom break following it, it was some of the most fun I've had dancing in a long time. This is the club, if you want to see it and all of its amazing rooms. We danced in the New York disco room.

Last weekend was my first trip to London with all the Nottingham/Luther students and faculty. It was a cool place, but I didn't get around to see Big Ben, the Tower, or any of the big, iconic monuments. I'll definitely be visiting again.

I did, however, go out to a London dance club, (which was way too crowded) and the Globe theater.

The Millennium Bridge, on the way to the Globe theater. Harry Potter fans might know it as the one that got ripped apart by death eaters in the sixth film.

At the Globe. We had a great guide, who was a swashbuckling, Shakespearean actor himself, complete with fantastic moustache. He knew and liked who he was.

Henry IV, Part I was the play being performed at the time. For the duration of the three-hour performance, (with one intermission in the middle), I watched as a "groundling," or what was once the peasantry and lower class that stood on the ground for the entirety of the play. It was very worth it.

If you're familiar with the play, there's a character named Falstaff in it, a drunk, fat, morally reprehensible, but lovable old man. The actor who played him was hilarious. Everyone else was great, too.

Good times here, and looking forward to more!

Video: York Minster, Hadrian's Wall, and More

Flatmate and coolguy Aaron Rosell has recently posted a video compilation of some of the sights we saw on our recent trip, unfortunately including an extended look into my social behavior.

But that's at the end. You don't have to watch that.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VQBV-OORAlk&feature=player_embedded#!

The First Flat Trip

Throughout the year, us 13 students will be traveling to various historical points of interest in Britain. Our first trip was last weekend, and we visited the cities of York, Alnwick, and Durham. It was good times.

I took a good amount of photos, but they're too large to post on Blogspot, so I'm linking my Facebook album, which has the various places we visited and descriptions. I'm fairly certain non-Facebook users can't view the album, but I'll try and deal with technology at another time to post some up on the blog.

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=232512&id=506015094

Hadrian's Wall was one of my favorite stops on our trip, which is a 73 mile-long wall that goes through Northern England. It's a Roman wall, mainly built to show territories. The scenery along it is gorgeous, almost comically featuring every idyllic English countryside thing imaginable: hilly plains, Lord of the Rings-esque forest paths, lakes, grazing sheep, and giggling daughters running through fields as their proud fathers look on from the doorway of their stone house, (that last one may or may not have happened).

Durham Cathedral was another great stop. On our walk there, it began to rain, and rather than get praise from my fellow students for planning ahead and donning a rain coat, I got jokes about how I looked like death or a ring wraith. We came upon the cathedral, which is near a small graveyard, and the choice of what to do was obvious:

For the Uninformed

I feel like a short summary is in order:

I am currently living in a shared flat with twelve other students, all from my college. Our course director lives a few blocks away from us and helps to organize us and comes over for dinner nightly. We're not studying at the University of Nottingham yet, as courses do not start until October, apparently. Instead, we are familiarizing ourselves with the area and will be taking several trips across England not only for the experience, but also to satisfy the history class we are taking with our director/professor.

The city of Nottingham has been a great place these first few days. The weather is generally moody, like they said it would be, but for the most part, a good temperature. The buildings are very eclectic, I'll try to post some pictures to do them justice. We've had a great tour guide show us how to best navigate the city and have gone shopping/searching for food several times already.

Best part of the tour: a random, older man walks up to our group when we are all circled around the middle of a building, listening intently to our guide. He stays there for a good twenty seconds until he comes in during a lull in the guide's speech and asks us: "Is this a magic circle?", laughs, then walks away. The man's a hero.

Tomorrow we leave for York and Durham and several other places in between, which I can't be bothered to remember or write down.

It's been great so far, and we're all getting along famously, even with only two shared showers between 12 students.

Photo-Tour of the Flat

Right outside the flat on Homefield Dr.

The mini-library downstairs. Will most likely be a study spot of choice.

The library is next-door to the church, which shares building space with the flat. It's ours to use everyday other than Sunday.

Here's Ben, stirring some Macaroni & Cheese for the flat dinner in our tiny kitchen.

And here's some of the girls in the living room/dining room doing what the majority of us do at most times of the day: reading.

The bedroom hallway. There's five rooms and two bathrooms.

And here's my room. I share it with two Aarons, who both have blogs of their own. The room is very comfortable and is getting new add-ons almost every day.

My bed and workstation. Accomodating.