Oxjam, by Oxfam!

Thursday at 7 30 there was a rockin’ concert at the Troubador. The Troubador is a pretty nice bar in London, where Jimi Hendrix and some other famous people performed. It looked fittingly grotty for the off-beat, indy mood of the concert. The musicians were also perfect, being so late as to hold up the show for an hour. That’s impressively stereotypical musician behavior, I’d say! I felt as if I were a cool Indy character in a movie about cool Indy people going to a cool Indy show in a cool Indy part of town.

Well, Oxfam is a really big charity organization over here which works to end poverty and injustice. They work on long-term programs to end poverty, provide assistance after natural disasters and conflicts, raise public awareness of poverty, and that sort of thing. The six pounds we paid for tickets went straight to Oxfam. If we would have bought merchandise that money would have also gone to Oxfam. As one funny member of Animal Kingdom said, “if you buy the singles, the money goes to charity. It always seems to go to charity.” Ah, the life of the starving musician.

The first performer was Catherine Tram. Catherine Tram consisted of three people, only one of which was named Catherine. In fact, two were males. It was nice, calm music, but nothing to make the listener say “wow”. There were wonderful vocals, though the males generally only sang “ahhh.” If you like Rilo Kiley you might like Catherine Tram, though her lyrics are a bit more angsty. I wrote while listening “this would be good music to have in the background while writing poetry or reading Perks of Being a Wallflower.” In other words, it was lovely, but wasn’t really my cup of tea.

The second performer was Tom Milson. He was alone, and played the electric Ukulele, sometimes supplemented by the dulcet tones of his kazoo. I will have to misquote a nice poem to say that malt does more than Milson can to justify God’s ways to man. Milson didn’t have the deepest lyrics--his first song focused on the plight of lobsters. It was lovely, however, to hear a young adult who was not dramatic. He had good songs for teens today. One of his songs, for example, is titled Internet Love Song and has the following lyrics:

Please, please please don't go
Circumflex underscore circumflex
I love you so.[...]

brb, omg, lawl.
roflmao.

Ha-ha! It’s pretty funny, I’d say. Quite witty, anyways. It was also the best kazoo act I’ve seen all year. The third act, Animal Kingdom, was also very good. Sadly, though, they were doing acoustic for the first time in a while( they just got back from touring with Snow Patrol) and so did slow, depressing songs. This happens, I guess.

Tomorrow I’m leaving for the road-trip around Europe. Cool! I should be visiting internet cafes every other day or so, and so will hopefully be able to tell of amazing adventures in foreign lands.

London, Again!

The Entrance to St. Paul's Cathedral.

Well, I went to London for the third time (not including Heathrow) yesterday. It still hasn’t lost its charm for me, and I haven’t seen everything I want to. I went with Jaime and Maddie, so we got group day-passes. This is such a good idea! All transportation, including the Underground and the trains to and from Colchester, totaled 16 pounds. Amazing! Consider, as an example of transportation costs, that to get to Heathrow and back one must spend 48 pounds.

So, when we got to London we first went to the Thames river, where we saw the Eye, got pancakes, and walked to Big Ben and Westminster Abbey. Then we went to Trafalgar Square and the National Gallery. If you like Botticelli, Da Vinci, Raphael, Rembrandt, Rubens, Van Gogh, Seurat, Monet, and the famous Van Dyck, you’ll love the National Gallery. And, importantly for college students, it’s free!

Afterwards we got McDonalds, which seems to be quickly becoming an embarrassing tradition and which I should probably not admit in a public blog. We then went to St. Paul’s Cathedral, where we saw that Evensong would be sung at 5:00. We decided to come back later. We then went shopping on Oxford Street. Well, we tried shopping, but failed miserably. We went to Primark, possibly the cheapest store in the world, but couldn’t stand the crowds and so left with our heads hanging in shame. We went to St. Paul’s again, and had a coffee to wake ourselves up before heading to the Evensong Service.

We were stunned and excited to find that we got to sit with the choir. We even got to sing with them for a hymn! In the picture above, you can see lamps. We sat in the seats which those lamps are in front of. Yeah, we’re about the coolest people ever. The preacher did a lesson about Pharisees and their expensive looking houses. I found it a bit funny, to be honest, to be sitting in such a beautifully adorned church hearing about how bad it is to have beautifully adorned places.

Speaking of the beautiful adornment, here’s some great information I gleaned from the always-helpful Wikipedia. Its architecture is “a late Renaissance style that is England's sober Baroque. Its impressive dome was inspired by St Peter's Basilica in Rome. It rises 365 feet (108 m) to the cross at its summit, making it a famous London landmark.” Also, the organ which we got to sing with “is the third-biggest in Britain with 7,189 pipes and 108 stops”! We could feel the reverberation from the lowest notes. We even got Goosebumps.

When that finished we ate some awful, yet awesomely filling, peanut butter sandwiches which we brought from home, and headed to a concert Maddie heard about which was located in the basement of a bar far far away from touristy areas. But I’ll tell you about that next time!

End of Term Escapades

Well, term is over and there are two months until exams with no classes that are necessary to attend. Neat! In fewer than 24 hours Jaime will be here. Because of her arrival, I cleaned my room quite nicely. This entailed hoovering. Yes, I hoovered. People don’t vacuum over here. They also use plasters instead of band-aids. Interesting!

I also had an English Fry-Up again. If you try one, go for the fried bread. Hokey pete. It’s bread that’s fried in oil. Brilliant! I asked for deep-fried bread and was laughed at. The fried eggs are good as well, and the sausage is to die for.

Here’s a funny story about English cuisine: I asked Jaime what she wanted for dinner- a British meal (beans on toast) or a tasty meal(fresh tortellini). She chose tasty over British. Go figure. She’ll just have to try the fry-up.

Today I walked to Tesco by myself in the lovely, warm sunshine to get ingredients for the tasty meal. The walk was grand. There are daffodils and other bulb flowers all along the walkway. There were puffy white clouds in the deep blue sky. It wasn’t freezing. I didn’t even wear a jacket! I felt the sun on my arms! I was in heaven. No offense to humans in general, but it was also nice to be alone with my thoughts. People who passed me probably thought I was a bit odd as I burst into smiles randomly throughout the walk. Oh well.

Tomorrow I have to leave for Heathrow at 9 35 to pick up Jaime. It’ll be awesome! I will be spending a lot of time reading on a bus. This also sounds relaxing, no? I’ll probably read some Gogol and lose some faith in humanity. That sounds like a good way to spend a Monday.

Tasty, Tempting Treats (Nearly) Tantamount to Toccatas

Well, yesterday was the last day of term, which makes this the first day of Spring Break in my eyes. Some of my friends left for London already, some are off to France, some are off to various parts of England, and I’m gleefully awaiting the arrival of Jaime! In recent news, I got a medal for Derby Day.

How exciting is that? I also competed in an epee competition, where I tied for fourth place! This was out of about 15 people. Fortunately, the coach brought chocolate and beer for everyone, and people chose the chocolate in the order in which they won. (It could have been worse! Who needs to aim for the stars when even the lowliest fencer is guaranteed chocolate?)

I thus left the final fencing meeting laden with a lovely medal inscribed with “Derby Day Fencing V’s U.E.A. 2009” and 400 grams of Toblerone. If that isn’t nice, I don’t know what is! Speaking of nice, today I’m taking a rest-day which entails eating the Toblerone and listening to different versions of Symphony 7 Allegretto (Beethoven) and Toccata and Fugue in D Minor (Bach). I would strongly, strongly recommend that you watch this:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ipzR9bhei_o

It’s so cool! It’s the Toccata and Fugue, and it shows all the different pitches and when they’re played! I’m obviously a bit excited by it! I realize that it might not be the most beautiful version of the song, but it's so neat to watch the notes. Visual and Aural unite for an unparalleled sense experience! (That's what I would have said if I posted this.)

On a different note (no pun intended) I’ve also been doing cooking experiments. Many involve tasty drinks. Here’s one:

This is a Chinese summer drink, or so I’ve heard from my Chinese flatmates. It's pronounced "tsah-gwah-p/ban-dzee." This drink took about 1/4 of a can of fruit cocktail, some cut up jelly, (this is probably not going to be found in the states, so one could substitute gummy bears or other gummy candy) blackcurrant squash, and fizzy orange drink. Of course, one could add any fruit and juice. There should, however, carbonation. It should also be chilled, and ingested with a spoon. Yum!

Here’s another. It’s an experiment, and is not quite as recommended as the previous drink.

It was made with mashed up cantaloupe, crushed ice, ice-cream, and milk! I hope everyone has a grand weekend. It was pretty good, but a bit tasteless. Also, if one is looking for new taste-experiences, I recommend Battenberg Cake. It’s heavenly! It’s blaringly British!

Stunning St. Patrick’s Day!

I would like to begin by wishing everyone a merry St. Patrick’s Day! There doesn’t seem to be much enthusiasm for the day over here, which is a bit sad. I remember the days of driving about in Laguna with friends dancing(and clapping!) to Flogging Molly and scaring other drivers. Tonight I’ll celebrate by swashbuckling about and drinking a Guinness.

Let me tell you a bit I’ve heard about Guinness while I’ve been here, which has been (sort of) proven by Wikipedia.

1. Guinness is good for you! “Studies claim that Guinness can be beneficial to the heart. Researchers found that antioxidant compounds in Guinness, similar to those found in certain fruits and vegetables, are responsible for health benefits because they slow down the deposit of harmful cholesterol on the artery walls.”

2. Guinness is high in iron! “Guinness is also said to help the body replenish lost blood. When people used to donate blood in Ireland, it is said they were given a pint of Guinness afterward. This is supposedly due to its iron content.”

Now, it says it only supposedly has high iron content, so I’m not sure about its veracity. Still, isn’t that interesting? Even more interesting is this tidbit I found while “researching”: “Guinness stout is made from water, malt, barley, hops, brewer's yeast and is treated with isinglass made from fishes' air bladders.” Well! There you have it.

Last weekend I went to London again. I went to see the changing of the guards at Buckingham palace, but didn’t see too much. These things happen, I guess. I also got to see a musical at West End! That musical was... Grease! Yes, the American classic. One of the actors slipped into a British accent for about half a sentence. How funny is that?

Derby Day

I don't even have to come up with an anagram for this one, which is nice. Yesterday I participated in Derby Day (pronounced Dahbee Day of course.) I was on the women's fencing team, which consisted of three members. We all had to participate in all three events- epee, foil, and sabre. We won every event! It was lovely! Here's the epee. None of the action shots worked because we were moving too quickly!

Here's how a fencing team competition works: we have three people who fence. The first bout is over when one of the people reaches 5 points. So, for the first weapon we started down 0-5 as the first person to go was worried. The next bout goes until one of the scores totals 10. Lily, the second person to go, reached 10 first for a total score of 10-7. Then I went and it ended something like 15-11. The game ends after all three people have gone three times. Theoretically the last fencer could win the game even if the team were losing by 30 points, so the last person normally is the best fencer.

We did sabre last because Lily, one of our teammates, is a french national fencer and does not know sabre, so it was our weakest weapon. I was the last fencer for sabre, and the score ended up being 44 all. It was so scary, but wonderful when I got the point. It was like those fun sports movies, but I was actually in it! Hoorah!
The Girl's Team after we won. Look at the joy! And, of course, the tiredness. We each had to fence nine times!

The male's team also won, but they only won by three points while we won by over 35 points. Their final game was also really exciting. Since it was Derby Day, there were over 30 sports and University of Essex was whomped, as they say. But we won! We celebrated on the bus back, though we were the only ones really celebrating as we were the only team on the bus to have won. I'll end this post the way we ended the night last night. Wooooo! High fives!

Dulce Día Dos de Barcelona

The next day in Barcelona may have been my favorite. Madeline and I woke up somewhat early. (Nine in the morning is pretty darn early for a college student, wouldn’t you agree?) We went to an outdoor market(which you can see in the picture) to buy loads of fresh strawberries and an orange. We ended up getting a kilo of strawberries and an orange for one and a half euros! Some call us the bargain masters. We took our fresh and fantastic breakfast to the port and ate it with the sun on our faces and ships lazily drifting by. If that’s not nice, I don’t know what is.

Speaking of nice, we stopped by a place to get Churros con Chocolate after enjoying the port. The churros were cooked enough to get a crispy shell, and were covered with sugar. We dipped the churros into melted chocolate and enjoyed!

At around noon we made our way back to the apartments to meet up with some people who had been around Barcelona before and could thus help us navigate the utterly confusing metro. We ended up going to Park Guell(as seen above), which Antoni Gaudí designed. Gaudí was a famous Catalan architect who made fantastical buildings. I can’t describe the architecture as well with words as with a picture, so here is one part of the park. Later, people played futbol on the sandy area. When we went down the stairs to the columns we heard a man playing a beautiful Spanish melody on his guitar and saw the interesting mosaic work on the ceiling.

We then got a bit lost (isn’t that part of the fun, though?) and ended up, quite a few metro tickets later, at the Temple Expiatori de la Sagrada Família.
The Sagrada Família was started in 1882 and isn’t expected to be finished until 2026! Hokey Pete. It’s a Roman Catholic Church, and again, is somewhat different than normal architecture. If you’re curious at all, I strongly advise you to look it up. Here’s a link to wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sagrada_Familia
And here's a picture of some of the statues on the building. They aren't as realistic as some statues, but show emotion quite well.

The people we went with let us know that this is such a renowned church because, while it might not be as cleanly beautiful as other churches, appears to have grown from the ocean floor. Isn’t that lovely?

We went to the metro to get back, where someone stole my wallet. I was, of course, freaking out a bit considering all the identification, keys, cards, and cash that I would never see again. Fortunately, one of the people we went with spoke Spanish so he talked to the security for me. We got lost on our way to a police station, but when we went back to the metro the lovely, kind, perfect security person informed us that my wallet had been found. The person took my cash but left everything else! I was incredibly happy, needless to say. (Then why, I’m sure you ask, did I have to explicate that?)

We went back, had amazingly good kebab (which is not meat on a stick, but meat shaved off a big meat block in a wrap and tasty stuff) and went to a club. We went out at 2:00, knowing that people go out much later in Spain. No one had arrived yet! We had to come back at 3:00. When we left, exhausted, at 4:00, there was a line to get in.

Beautiful Barcelona!

Hello, I hope everyone is having a lovely day! I went to Barcelona last weekend, and have quite a few exciting stories to relate. I also took masses of pictures, so will probably take a few entries to explicate my trip fully. (By the way, isn’t explicate such a neat word? Why just explain when you can elucidate by explicating?)

So, we left for Barcelona on Friday at 9:50 in the morning. We took RyanAir, a budget European airline. It wasn’t bad at all! My favorite part of the flight happened as we went over the Pyrenees. They’re pretty darn immense. Everything went swimmingly, and we ended up in lovely apartments around dinner time. Here’s a picture of the bedroom and the view we had from the balcony.

Dinner was pretty good, but also pretty expensive. I got a Spanish Tortilla. That’s actually just like an omelet, if you were wondering. I also tried some seafood Paella which is another typical Spanish dish. We got Sangria with the meal, trying again to be as Spanish as possible. It worked! I felt a bit embarrassed while trying to use my Spanish, but of course everyone spoke English and would switch over after a “pues...” or two.

After dinner we walked around the area by our apartments, which was filled with happy people, street vendors and creepy street performers. Here’s an example of a tree lady. She was making weird-tree-movements (note that I’m not saying tree movements that were weird. If there are weird, socially awkward trees they look like her.)

I’ll save the rest of the story for another day as it’s dinner time!