It's 11 pm here in London and I leave in the morning back to the US of A. I have extremely mixed feelings about this, but all in all I'm excited to see my friends and family again. I can't even express the quality of the experience I've had in England and beyond, I feel so lucky and so blessed to have had the opportunity to come here to see the amazing things I've seen and to have met all the wonderful people that I have. Speaking of meeting wonderful people, it just wouldn't have been Kyra's luck if she hadn't met a boy she had to say goodbye to forever, now would it? These things are true, I met a lovely English bloke and he helped make the last few weeks I had here all the more wonderful. I'll never forget him and his interesting friends so I'd like to thank them for taking the American girls under their wing for a few weeks and showing Paula and I how wonderful and hilarious English people can be! It wouldn't have been quite the experience it has been without them. So while I saying thanks I mind as well thank everyone that got me here too. If you're reading this, I guarantee you helped me take this step to go on this adventure. I'd like to thank everyone that encouraged me and supported me, your blessing means the world to me. And I'd also like to thank the other lot. The one's that broke my heart or did me wrong and made me want to get away and surround myself with some new people for a while. So in a weird way thank you for taking me down to my knees, because the journey to being able to stand on my feet again has been the highlight of my life so far.
I'd also like to thank my host family. Wow. How a group of such wonderful people got stuck with a kid like me is beyond me! All I can say is I hope they've enjoyed having me as much as I've enjoyed sharing a home with them. My host mum Jan is a complete angel and made me feel so comfortable and safe the whole time I was here. Truly like a second mum she took Paula and I to go do things, she always made sure we had full tummies, and she genuinely enjoyed talking with us and learning about us. It really couldn't have been any better. And Jan's family... what a beautiful one it is. To her daughter Kate and her son Michael, daughter in law Michelle and their children Bethan and Nathan- thank you all for being hilarious, for laughing at my jokes, and for wanting to get to know me. Spending the last of our time tonight quizzing on Cockney rhyme words and making music videos was the best going away night I could've asked for. Bethan (age 12) and Nathan (age 7) are going to grow up to be FANTASTIC people, I wish I could follow them through that journey. I've gotten really close to the kids in the last few weeks and I'm truly sad to have to leave them. I just hope I've made a small lasting effect on these people, my goal was to never let them forget me!! And if all else fails, I created a personalized Mii on Jan's Wii... so I'll always kinda be around and they shan't EVER forget me even if they want to! muaha!
And I'd definitely like to thank my European roomie/travel companion Paula McFadden! We have been through SO much these last few months and the least I can say is... we survived :) Paula you are such a kind, wonderful person with a heart the size of Texas! I'm really sorry the whole trip hadn't quite worked out the way it could have, but I think we can both say we learned small lessons and became better people out of the tough situations. I can't even begin to recall all the adventures we've had and all the places we've been together, too many good stories!! But I can't wait to be able to look back on this trip again with you someday and laugh about the good times. Oh, and thanks for mapping out my every footstep both in and out of London. If it weren't for you I'd be in Guam right now without any shoes going door to door asking for raisins and a plane back to the Kingdom of Eastcote! I cheese you to the MAX my dear Polla, thanks for everything.
I've had so many awesome adventures and seen things I never even DREAMED of seeing. It's amazing what you can do in life if you just set your mind to it. I recommend traveling to anyone who has ever thought about it. It'll change you, for the better.
I hope you have enjoyed reading my blogs. I'm sad to say I didn't get to post everything I wanted before my leave, simply because finals week was, let's be real here, a b****. So I will end on a note saying that this might be my last post. Jeez it seems like just yesterday I was in SeaTac mapping out all the people to avoid on the plane, and now here I am hours away from heading to the airport and continuing my life in the states. But hey, if you're interested let me know! I definitely have more to write about and if I think people might be wanting to read more then I would take pleasure in recounting some of my other adventures. Thanks again for reading, I'm so glad I did this blog. I'll be in the homeland soon and I can't wait to see each and every one of you.
<3KYRA:)
Friday, May 13, 2011
Sunday, May 8, 2011
Royal Weddings, Shakespeare, and more!
Greetings all! As promised I’m writing this to fill you all in on the adventures I’ve been so behind on lately! I’ll also have you know that I should be writing a paper right now… but I figured updating you all is a little bit higher on my priority list at the moment. Don’t worry, I’ll get it done because I always do! I last left you all off with snippets of my visits to Windsor Castle, Buckingham Palace and so on. Well as you all know, on Friday April 29 Prince William of Wales and Kate Middleton tied the knot here in London! Now what kind of tourist would I be if I hadn’t been a part of the festivities of that day in history? I won’t try to sugar coat anything and make it sound cooler than it was, because I basically sat in a park and watched the wedding on a humongous screen. BUT, it was a little cooler than it sounds. A bunch of the students from my school program stayed the night at our school facilities for the night (since it’s located in downtown London and transport is a pain) and woke up EXTRA early in order to get a good seat at the park. We probably would’ve tried to line up along the procession streets (where the royal cars drove down to get to Westminster) but people had been camping out for DAYS so if we wanted to see anything at all that really wasn’t an option. There were huge screens set up in Hyde Park which is just blocks from Buckingham Palace, and there were literally thousands of people there for the celebrations. Paula and I didn’t get to the park as early as we had hoped but we got there with about 20 minutes to spare and found a seat with a view of the large screens. Something like the picture below.
It was at that spot in Hyde Park, just blocks from the action that I watched history go down. I watched the cars driving the Queen and various other royalties from different countries approach Westminster and evacuate guests into the fabulous Westminster Abbey, and I also watched William and Kate arrive. The cheers that arose from the crowds when the Queen was on the screen were phenomenal. Not everyone is a royalist, but on that day most everyone was. Kate and William got equally as much cheering as the Queen and everyone was enjoying the excuse to dress up and drink wine on a blanket in the park with their friends. So there I sat with Paula and a couple other fellow students and friends and watched the ceremony take place. It was overwhelmingly powerful to know that I was watching history take place, history that would go down in the books of the British, right there in the very same city, an event that people all over the world were watching, and less than a mile from where it was happening.
I wish I had been feeling better, unfortunately, because after the official ceremony I had to part with the celebrating brits and everyone waiting for the very first kiss on the Buckingham Palace balcony. As you know Kate and William, from then on known as the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge, kissed TWICE on the balcony! Which was significant and really fun for the crowds who wanted more but weren’t expecting it. I wish I had been there but the truth of the matter is that a grumpy, not feeling well Kyra does not mix well with pushy anxious people that care about nothing more than trying to get a picture of the tiny figures of the new married couple millions of miles in the distance, so I just skipped that whole experience all together. I figured less people would get hurt that way.
So I told you all that it wasn’t that exciting, but I find the mere fact that I was there exciting all in itself. And what’s equally exciting was visiting Westminster Abbey less than a week after the wedding took place! Of course I couldn’t take pictures inside, but everything you all saw in pictures and on TV I saw in person and it was BEAUTIFUL. I updated my Facebook status that same day stating “ I’ve decided to begin a full-fledged pursuit of prince Harry so I can have MY wedding at Westminster as well. You shall all be invited”!!!! The most wonderful thing about Westminster, a part from the fact that the wedding was held there, is all the amazing people buried within the Abbey. I stood on the grave of Charles Dickens, walked around the tomb of Elizabeth I, as well as many other kings and queens, and studied the grave of the “Unknown Soldier” who is an unidentified British soldier from one of the World Wars who was brought back to Westminster to be buried near the entrance in remembrance of all the British soldiers who have given their service and sacrifice. And on the tomb of the Unknown Soldier was the bouquet that Kate held throughout her wedding ceremony starting to wilt and fade but still amazing none the less.
It cost me 13 GB pounds, which is about 20 US dollars… but I would have to say that it was worth paying the money to experience the history, especially at a time so close to a national history event. I’ll have you all know that I’ve been unable to catch Harry’s attention thus far, but I still have a few days so keep your fingers crossed! Below is me outside of the Abbey where Kate walked in!
Among some other adventures lies my experience with England’s national sport, Cricket! I’d like to start this spiel informing those who don’t know that Cricket is THE MOST CONFUSING GAME ON THE FACE OF THE EARTH. That might be the softball player in me (since my mind only works in such a fashion which gets confusing because the two games have some of the same core values) but I gave up after someone tried to explain wickets to me… So I’m sorry for not enlightening you further on the subject, all I can really do is show you some pictures and leave it up to you to research more if you so wish.
As a class, we visited “Lords Cricket Grounds” (pictured above) which is usually shortened to just “Lords” to get a tour of the facility and watch a bit of a match. I don’t remember a lot of the history but I do know that Lords is one of the oldest Cricket fields in London (maybe England?) and is certainly one of the most extravagant. Though England is more known for its love of “football” or SOCCER, a word derived from “association” of football back in the day, Cricket really is the national sport and heavily competitive. So my class watched some of a Cricket game then made our way out after the tour. It was really fun to watch and to attempt to learn about. All I can really tell you about the game is that the equivalent to a pitcher in baseball, called a bowler, “bowls” the ball to the batter which usually ricochets off the ground before being hit by the batter, being hit in hopes of getting it past the fielders and scoring points. The fielders do not use gloves, the only person with gloves is the catcher equivalent player, which I do not understand at all because a Cricket ball is somewhere between the size and hardness of a softball and baseball. Crazy!
Well after my Cricket and royal wedding experiences, I made a visit to Oxford, home of the prestigious Oxford University of England. But not only has this town hosted geniuses, it has also been used to film…. Harry Potter! Three of my lovely classmates/friends and I took our own little mosey around this town, which I would essentially describe as a town within a college instead of a college within a town, in search of anything interesting… especially Harry Potter interesting. It’s a nice quaint town of which includes, according to my trusty classmate Tessa, about 30 different Oxford University buildings which is why I described it as a town within a college because the buildings are so spread out and everywhere. The picture below is Pj, myself, and Tessa with a random part of Oxford University behind us.
One of my favorite parts of Oxford was visiting Christ Church (I know, ANOTHER church.) Christ church is extremely significant in Harry Potter because it holds the room of which the Great Dining Hall scenes in the first two movies were filmed!!
It looks a lot different than in the movie, it’s actually a very small room with only three rows of tables but the movie also has lots of special effects that make it a little different, but in all the same exact room! Fascinating and very beautiful building. There were lots of other little buildings where Harry Potter scenes were filmed, of course I come across that sort of thing nearly every day in London but it’s still fun to see anyway. Most of our time in Oxford was spent browsing and shopping, it was a very nice day to do so as well.
Now please excuse me for going out of chronological order in all these adventures but I recently went to a very special place and I promised in my last blog to share my Shakespeare experiences! Just a couple days ago I had a class trip to Stratford upon Avon, where Mr. William Shakespeare was born and where he died. To fit the significance, I visited the house, the room, the very bed Shakespeare was born as well as visited his grave, colorfully decorated with flowers and reeves leftover from his birthday on April 23.
Birthplace:
Chapel and grave:
As this being the last weekend before I leave England, I couldn’t have asked for a better note to leave on. So the first day we visited Shakespeare’s grave in the chapel where he worshiped and his birthplace, as well as a residence he held during his lifetime. There’s really no way to describe what I saw other than as amazing. I feel so blessed to have been able to visit, in spirit, the best writer in the world.
After we explored Stratford and saw all the neat historical things, we went to a production of Macbeth at a refurbished theater in Stratford. Macbeth is one of my favorite Shakespeare tragedies so I really enjoyed the play. And speaking of plays, a couple weeks ago I attended two other plays both being Hamlet! I saw a modern version on the National Theater in London and then a traditional version at Shakespeare’s Globe Theater itself. The kicker about the watching Hamlet at the Globe was that we got “yard” seats which are… not seats at all. I had to stand in the yard for about three hours and watch Hamlet. By the way, standing for a long amount of time is VERY distracting when you’re trying to focus on a play. I’m really sad that my London Shakespeare play experiences are over but the ones I had were amazing and I will never forget!! Everyone in my class got to stay in a cute little Bed&Breakfast in Stratford, so after the play we all headed back and got some rest for the next day! Paula and I had a purple room and and a "full English breakfast" in the morning!
Our Bed and Breakfast!:
The next day of which consisted of visiting Anne Hathaway’s Cottage. Who is Anne Hathaway you might be wondering? For some it may be obvious, but she was indeed Shakespeare’s wife. So I got to tour the house she lived in in her youth and that was very neat too. It had acres of beautiful Gardens!! All the houses we visited on this trip are hundreds of years old and a wonder to look at and think that people actually lived there. The floors were stone, the mattresses made of straw and so on.
So, there is more after departing from Stratford on that day but I shall save that for my next post!! I hope to write at least one more juicy blog for you and then one right before I leave (which is at this point in six days, SAD!!) I miss you all and I shall return soon and be able to recollect all my adventures in the flesh!! Thanks for reading; hopefully I’ll get my next post up soon. And until then, paper writing here I come…. Ugh finals week!
-KYRA:)
It was at that spot in Hyde Park, just blocks from the action that I watched history go down. I watched the cars driving the Queen and various other royalties from different countries approach Westminster and evacuate guests into the fabulous Westminster Abbey, and I also watched William and Kate arrive. The cheers that arose from the crowds when the Queen was on the screen were phenomenal. Not everyone is a royalist, but on that day most everyone was. Kate and William got equally as much cheering as the Queen and everyone was enjoying the excuse to dress up and drink wine on a blanket in the park with their friends. So there I sat with Paula and a couple other fellow students and friends and watched the ceremony take place. It was overwhelmingly powerful to know that I was watching history take place, history that would go down in the books of the British, right there in the very same city, an event that people all over the world were watching, and less than a mile from where it was happening.
I wish I had been feeling better, unfortunately, because after the official ceremony I had to part with the celebrating brits and everyone waiting for the very first kiss on the Buckingham Palace balcony. As you know Kate and William, from then on known as the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge, kissed TWICE on the balcony! Which was significant and really fun for the crowds who wanted more but weren’t expecting it. I wish I had been there but the truth of the matter is that a grumpy, not feeling well Kyra does not mix well with pushy anxious people that care about nothing more than trying to get a picture of the tiny figures of the new married couple millions of miles in the distance, so I just skipped that whole experience all together. I figured less people would get hurt that way.
So I told you all that it wasn’t that exciting, but I find the mere fact that I was there exciting all in itself. And what’s equally exciting was visiting Westminster Abbey less than a week after the wedding took place! Of course I couldn’t take pictures inside, but everything you all saw in pictures and on TV I saw in person and it was BEAUTIFUL. I updated my Facebook status that same day stating “ I’ve decided to begin a full-fledged pursuit of prince Harry so I can have MY wedding at Westminster as well. You shall all be invited”!!!! The most wonderful thing about Westminster, a part from the fact that the wedding was held there, is all the amazing people buried within the Abbey. I stood on the grave of Charles Dickens, walked around the tomb of Elizabeth I, as well as many other kings and queens, and studied the grave of the “Unknown Soldier” who is an unidentified British soldier from one of the World Wars who was brought back to Westminster to be buried near the entrance in remembrance of all the British soldiers who have given their service and sacrifice. And on the tomb of the Unknown Soldier was the bouquet that Kate held throughout her wedding ceremony starting to wilt and fade but still amazing none the less.
It cost me 13 GB pounds, which is about 20 US dollars… but I would have to say that it was worth paying the money to experience the history, especially at a time so close to a national history event. I’ll have you all know that I’ve been unable to catch Harry’s attention thus far, but I still have a few days so keep your fingers crossed! Below is me outside of the Abbey where Kate walked in!
Among some other adventures lies my experience with England’s national sport, Cricket! I’d like to start this spiel informing those who don’t know that Cricket is THE MOST CONFUSING GAME ON THE FACE OF THE EARTH. That might be the softball player in me (since my mind only works in such a fashion which gets confusing because the two games have some of the same core values) but I gave up after someone tried to explain wickets to me… So I’m sorry for not enlightening you further on the subject, all I can really do is show you some pictures and leave it up to you to research more if you so wish.
As a class, we visited “Lords Cricket Grounds” (pictured above) which is usually shortened to just “Lords” to get a tour of the facility and watch a bit of a match. I don’t remember a lot of the history but I do know that Lords is one of the oldest Cricket fields in London (maybe England?) and is certainly one of the most extravagant. Though England is more known for its love of “football” or SOCCER, a word derived from “association” of football back in the day, Cricket really is the national sport and heavily competitive. So my class watched some of a Cricket game then made our way out after the tour. It was really fun to watch and to attempt to learn about. All I can really tell you about the game is that the equivalent to a pitcher in baseball, called a bowler, “bowls” the ball to the batter which usually ricochets off the ground before being hit by the batter, being hit in hopes of getting it past the fielders and scoring points. The fielders do not use gloves, the only person with gloves is the catcher equivalent player, which I do not understand at all because a Cricket ball is somewhere between the size and hardness of a softball and baseball. Crazy!
Well after my Cricket and royal wedding experiences, I made a visit to Oxford, home of the prestigious Oxford University of England. But not only has this town hosted geniuses, it has also been used to film…. Harry Potter! Three of my lovely classmates/friends and I took our own little mosey around this town, which I would essentially describe as a town within a college instead of a college within a town, in search of anything interesting… especially Harry Potter interesting. It’s a nice quaint town of which includes, according to my trusty classmate Tessa, about 30 different Oxford University buildings which is why I described it as a town within a college because the buildings are so spread out and everywhere. The picture below is Pj, myself, and Tessa with a random part of Oxford University behind us.
One of my favorite parts of Oxford was visiting Christ Church (I know, ANOTHER church.) Christ church is extremely significant in Harry Potter because it holds the room of which the Great Dining Hall scenes in the first two movies were filmed!!
It looks a lot different than in the movie, it’s actually a very small room with only three rows of tables but the movie also has lots of special effects that make it a little different, but in all the same exact room! Fascinating and very beautiful building. There were lots of other little buildings where Harry Potter scenes were filmed, of course I come across that sort of thing nearly every day in London but it’s still fun to see anyway. Most of our time in Oxford was spent browsing and shopping, it was a very nice day to do so as well.
Now please excuse me for going out of chronological order in all these adventures but I recently went to a very special place and I promised in my last blog to share my Shakespeare experiences! Just a couple days ago I had a class trip to Stratford upon Avon, where Mr. William Shakespeare was born and where he died. To fit the significance, I visited the house, the room, the very bed Shakespeare was born as well as visited his grave, colorfully decorated with flowers and reeves leftover from his birthday on April 23.
Birthplace:
Chapel and grave:
As this being the last weekend before I leave England, I couldn’t have asked for a better note to leave on. So the first day we visited Shakespeare’s grave in the chapel where he worshiped and his birthplace, as well as a residence he held during his lifetime. There’s really no way to describe what I saw other than as amazing. I feel so blessed to have been able to visit, in spirit, the best writer in the world.
After we explored Stratford and saw all the neat historical things, we went to a production of Macbeth at a refurbished theater in Stratford. Macbeth is one of my favorite Shakespeare tragedies so I really enjoyed the play. And speaking of plays, a couple weeks ago I attended two other plays both being Hamlet! I saw a modern version on the National Theater in London and then a traditional version at Shakespeare’s Globe Theater itself. The kicker about the watching Hamlet at the Globe was that we got “yard” seats which are… not seats at all. I had to stand in the yard for about three hours and watch Hamlet. By the way, standing for a long amount of time is VERY distracting when you’re trying to focus on a play. I’m really sad that my London Shakespeare play experiences are over but the ones I had were amazing and I will never forget!! Everyone in my class got to stay in a cute little Bed&Breakfast in Stratford, so after the play we all headed back and got some rest for the next day! Paula and I had a purple room and and a "full English breakfast" in the morning!
Our Bed and Breakfast!:
The next day of which consisted of visiting Anne Hathaway’s Cottage. Who is Anne Hathaway you might be wondering? For some it may be obvious, but she was indeed Shakespeare’s wife. So I got to tour the house she lived in in her youth and that was very neat too. It had acres of beautiful Gardens!! All the houses we visited on this trip are hundreds of years old and a wonder to look at and think that people actually lived there. The floors were stone, the mattresses made of straw and so on.
So, there is more after departing from Stratford on that day but I shall save that for my next post!! I hope to write at least one more juicy blog for you and then one right before I leave (which is at this point in six days, SAD!!) I miss you all and I shall return soon and be able to recollect all my adventures in the flesh!! Thanks for reading; hopefully I’ll get my next post up soon. And until then, paper writing here I come…. Ugh finals week!
-KYRA:)
Friday, April 29, 2011
Castles, Cathedrals and Palaces Oh My! (haha)
Howdy Ya'll!! I thought I'd bring a little home to this post because I MISS YOU ALL SO MUCH!! I've got about two weeks left and time is flying! I've been doing so much and I apologize for not keeping up on the blog after I finished my big travels. I've still been doing super cool stuff so NO FEAR, KYRA'S STORIES ARE HERE! The order of my recollections may be a little scewed because it has indeed been a while since I've shared and a lot has happened, but I will attempt to do my best.
I'm going to take you back to the beginning of April when a PLU friend came to visit for the weekend who is studying abroad in Spain. This gave Paula and I the opportunity to go out and do a lot of the touristy London stuff that we had been wanting to do but hadn't quite had the time... or ambition to be perfectly frank. One of the first things on the list was to watch the changing of the guard ceremony at Buckingham Palace. This ceremony takes place depending on the time of year but at the moment every other day at 11:00 a.m. I think. I'll admit, it wasn't a life altering experience, but I'm really glad I went none the less. It was a very nice day so it was very crowded and a very long ceremony I was surprised to find out.
There are gates in front of the Palace, of course, so you can only get so close and get so good of pictures on account of EVERYONE else trying to take pictures and video record. But the ceremony basically consists of one group of guards (like in the above picture) marching into the Palace and replacing the previous guard. This process is much more than just switching out the the famous guards that can't smile and just stand outside of the Palace. The "guard" from what I understand it is a huge group of soldiers that take on responsibility of guarding the Palace for two days.
The above picture is the previous guard marching out of the Palace grounds back to wherever they came from. The ceremony includes a lot of marching and even a marching band that plays lots of music. There's a lot of standing around and not a lot that happens, but you gotta love watching the cute men in red jackets and big furry hats march around anyway.
While our friend, Natalie, was visiting we took her on a walk on the Thames (pronounced tems) which is the famous river that runs right through London. There's not much to say about that other than it was fun because there was a whole group of us and we crossed the Millennium Bridge (the bridge that gets destroyed at the beginning of the sixth Harry Potter movie!!!) and then later we crossed the Tower Bridge (the famous one that everyone thinks is the London Bridge) Below is a picture of the wandering crew with the Tower Bridge in the background!
My next topic of interest is visiting yet another..... Cathedral!! But not just any Cathedral, more specifically the Canterbury Cathedral! This probably doesn't mean a whole lot to you but it is the oldest church still in use in England so it was a very sobering experience to visit this place so old and full of history, dating back to even before Henry VIII. This Cathedral is famous for the death of Saint Thomas Becket, murdered by knights of King Henry II after a row about the amount of power the church has over the King. If I could make this more significant for you I would but the history is overwhelming and I'm afraid I don't have a grasp on it all so I wouldn't want to mislead you. But it is my understanding that the Arch Bishop of Canterbury is the highest power in all of the Church of England. I saw tombs of Kings, Queens, and knights. It was amazing. Below is a picture of the outside of Canterbury Cathedral!
Now moving on from Cathedrals and Palaces I'm also going to briefly tell you about attending the London Coffee Festival! It has been out of my control to hinder my love for coffee so this was really fun for me. I only had to pay 6 pounds (about $10) for admission to a Festival dedicated to free coffee!! Coffee places from all around, both locally and foreign, came and set up camp in this facility and I had the pleasure of trying all the coffee I wanted because I had a pretty pink wrist band on! I tried all different sorts of coffee, most of which I can't recall anymore, but it was just one big comfortable chair short of Kyra-heaven.
Here's Paula and I taking a break from the coffee craziness!! We even tried little espresso shots (which are very popular in Europe) and as much as I love coffee.... WOW. I hate to say it but it was kinda disgusting... I'll take my shots with milk and sugar from now on, thanks. As lame as this might sound, one of our favorite parts of this festival was getting free Starbucks coffee and treats. The whole idea of unlimited free coffee is brilliant and by the time we left, Paula and I felt sick but it was worth it!! (Coffee shot below :D )
So I have spoken about visiting a Palace and a Cathedral, so it's only appropriate that I visit yet ANOTHER famous Castle right?! My host Mum Jan was so nice to take my roommate and I to Windsor Castle, residence of the Queen of England when she's not at Buckingham. Quiz time. Do you know what the Last name of Queen Elizabeth is? I realized a while ago that I literally had no idea so I found out that it is... Windsor! Makes sense huh? But here's the catch- This Castle existed before Windsor rule of England, that's because King George V changed his family name from the German Saxe-Coburg and Gotha to Windsor because of anti-German feelings of the British people during World War I. I was very interested to find this out, and now you know! The picture below is me on Windsor grounds in front of the tower where the flag flies when the Queen is in London.
Now just going back a week to Easter Sunday, I went on a short little day trip with my host Mum and her family (daughter, son, son's wife, grandchildren) to a Saint George Day Festival. Saint George is celebrated on April 23 as the Saint who saved England by slaying a dragon hundreds of years ago. This festival was a blast!! Basically it had Roman soldiers and English soldiers and a few other side shows and you could go around to different tents and area's to see the way the people used to live; the way they cooked food, made clothes, made weapons etc. Below are Roman soldier re-en actors.
I also got to see a jousting match!! That was probably my favorite part of the day. And it can get surprisingly heated watching two guys on horses charge eachother with big sticks... very fun to watch! I was rooting for the guy with the red sheild below! Aaaaand he won :)
And finally.... the man of the day, Saint George! The following is him defeating the ugly terribly horrifying dragon!!
Okay... so the dragon was not terrifying at all and actually walked slower than a snail. The re enactment was hilarious actually, all a part of the fun!! My host family is most enjoyable to be around and spend time with, and it's so fun mixing our cultures and learning new things from one another. After we got back from the festival we sat around for a couple hours just talking about the differences in speech in American and in English, SO very interesting!!! I'll have to write more about that when I'm done getting you all up to date on my recent adventures. Brief and to the point, I hope you enjoyed reading about all this. I have much more to share with you including my experience with the royal wedding between Kate Middleton and Prince William that took place today! Tune in next time for more of that and also for some more of my Shakespeare experience. My next blog will be posted soon so I hope you look forward to it!
To end this jam packed blog the picture below is of Paula, me, and our host Mum Jan!
I miss you all and like I've said, I'll be posting again soon! All my love to you!
Cheers!
-KYRA:)
I'm going to take you back to the beginning of April when a PLU friend came to visit for the weekend who is studying abroad in Spain. This gave Paula and I the opportunity to go out and do a lot of the touristy London stuff that we had been wanting to do but hadn't quite had the time... or ambition to be perfectly frank. One of the first things on the list was to watch the changing of the guard ceremony at Buckingham Palace. This ceremony takes place depending on the time of year but at the moment every other day at 11:00 a.m. I think. I'll admit, it wasn't a life altering experience, but I'm really glad I went none the less. It was a very nice day so it was very crowded and a very long ceremony I was surprised to find out.
There are gates in front of the Palace, of course, so you can only get so close and get so good of pictures on account of EVERYONE else trying to take pictures and video record. But the ceremony basically consists of one group of guards (like in the above picture) marching into the Palace and replacing the previous guard. This process is much more than just switching out the the famous guards that can't smile and just stand outside of the Palace. The "guard" from what I understand it is a huge group of soldiers that take on responsibility of guarding the Palace for two days.
The above picture is the previous guard marching out of the Palace grounds back to wherever they came from. The ceremony includes a lot of marching and even a marching band that plays lots of music. There's a lot of standing around and not a lot that happens, but you gotta love watching the cute men in red jackets and big furry hats march around anyway.
While our friend, Natalie, was visiting we took her on a walk on the Thames (pronounced tems) which is the famous river that runs right through London. There's not much to say about that other than it was fun because there was a whole group of us and we crossed the Millennium Bridge (the bridge that gets destroyed at the beginning of the sixth Harry Potter movie!!!) and then later we crossed the Tower Bridge (the famous one that everyone thinks is the London Bridge) Below is a picture of the wandering crew with the Tower Bridge in the background!
My next topic of interest is visiting yet another..... Cathedral!! But not just any Cathedral, more specifically the Canterbury Cathedral! This probably doesn't mean a whole lot to you but it is the oldest church still in use in England so it was a very sobering experience to visit this place so old and full of history, dating back to even before Henry VIII. This Cathedral is famous for the death of Saint Thomas Becket, murdered by knights of King Henry II after a row about the amount of power the church has over the King. If I could make this more significant for you I would but the history is overwhelming and I'm afraid I don't have a grasp on it all so I wouldn't want to mislead you. But it is my understanding that the Arch Bishop of Canterbury is the highest power in all of the Church of England. I saw tombs of Kings, Queens, and knights. It was amazing. Below is a picture of the outside of Canterbury Cathedral!
Now moving on from Cathedrals and Palaces I'm also going to briefly tell you about attending the London Coffee Festival! It has been out of my control to hinder my love for coffee so this was really fun for me. I only had to pay 6 pounds (about $10) for admission to a Festival dedicated to free coffee!! Coffee places from all around, both locally and foreign, came and set up camp in this facility and I had the pleasure of trying all the coffee I wanted because I had a pretty pink wrist band on! I tried all different sorts of coffee, most of which I can't recall anymore, but it was just one big comfortable chair short of Kyra-heaven.
Here's Paula and I taking a break from the coffee craziness!! We even tried little espresso shots (which are very popular in Europe) and as much as I love coffee.... WOW. I hate to say it but it was kinda disgusting... I'll take my shots with milk and sugar from now on, thanks. As lame as this might sound, one of our favorite parts of this festival was getting free Starbucks coffee and treats. The whole idea of unlimited free coffee is brilliant and by the time we left, Paula and I felt sick but it was worth it!! (Coffee shot below :D )
So I have spoken about visiting a Palace and a Cathedral, so it's only appropriate that I visit yet ANOTHER famous Castle right?! My host Mum Jan was so nice to take my roommate and I to Windsor Castle, residence of the Queen of England when she's not at Buckingham. Quiz time. Do you know what the Last name of Queen Elizabeth is? I realized a while ago that I literally had no idea so I found out that it is... Windsor! Makes sense huh? But here's the catch- This Castle existed before Windsor rule of England, that's because King George V changed his family name from the German Saxe-Coburg and Gotha to Windsor because of anti-German feelings of the British people during World War I. I was very interested to find this out, and now you know! The picture below is me on Windsor grounds in front of the tower where the flag flies when the Queen is in London.
Now just going back a week to Easter Sunday, I went on a short little day trip with my host Mum and her family (daughter, son, son's wife, grandchildren) to a Saint George Day Festival. Saint George is celebrated on April 23 as the Saint who saved England by slaying a dragon hundreds of years ago. This festival was a blast!! Basically it had Roman soldiers and English soldiers and a few other side shows and you could go around to different tents and area's to see the way the people used to live; the way they cooked food, made clothes, made weapons etc. Below are Roman soldier re-en actors.
I also got to see a jousting match!! That was probably my favorite part of the day. And it can get surprisingly heated watching two guys on horses charge eachother with big sticks... very fun to watch! I was rooting for the guy with the red sheild below! Aaaaand he won :)
And finally.... the man of the day, Saint George! The following is him defeating the ugly terribly horrifying dragon!!
Okay... so the dragon was not terrifying at all and actually walked slower than a snail. The re enactment was hilarious actually, all a part of the fun!! My host family is most enjoyable to be around and spend time with, and it's so fun mixing our cultures and learning new things from one another. After we got back from the festival we sat around for a couple hours just talking about the differences in speech in American and in English, SO very interesting!!! I'll have to write more about that when I'm done getting you all up to date on my recent adventures. Brief and to the point, I hope you enjoyed reading about all this. I have much more to share with you including my experience with the royal wedding between Kate Middleton and Prince William that took place today! Tune in next time for more of that and also for some more of my Shakespeare experience. My next blog will be posted soon so I hope you look forward to it!
To end this jam packed blog the picture below is of Paula, me, and our host Mum Jan!
I miss you all and like I've said, I'll be posting again soon! All my love to you!
Cheers!
-KYRA:)
Sunday, April 10, 2011
Mid Semester Shenanigans!
Wow. That’s all I can really say when I reflect on the places that I’ve been and the things that I’ve seen here in Europe. This week of March 24-April 1st was my mid semester break so I decided to take advantage of this opportunity and do some traveling. Fortunately my lovely roommate Paula and I decided on the same plans and travelled together the whole time. Our adventure began in Berlin, Germany and ended in Prague, Czech Republic. It was an absolutely wonderful experience and I can’t wait to share it with you, so read on!
We left London straight away after my last history final on Thursday, March 24th. We flew out of Heathrow and into Tegel Airport in Berlin, Germany. I’m happy to say that we did indeed make it to our hotel (Holiday Inn) without any major complications, BUT for your entertainment I will admit that when we got to the general area of our hotel we wandered around in circles for at least 30 minutes until we discovered the yellow brick road to our destination. It’s pretty much unavoidable for us. We took the Bahn (which is like the London Underground service) to Potsdamer Platz in order to get to our hotel and it happens to be that Potsdamer Platz is the city center of Berlin. It’s almost surprising when you first take in the scene of Berlin’s city center because it is very new and very much a city consisting of big, new, modern buildings. But it only takes a quick history recap to remind yourself that much of Berlin had to be rebuilt after WW2. It was pretty late by the time we actually got to our hotel and settled in, but that didn’t stop us from treating ourselves after our long journey to….. ice cream! Haagen Dazs to be exact… which we were thouroughly excited to be eating in Germany. After that we rested up for the next day.
We decided to spend our first full day in Berlin exploring and getting to know the city. We made our way back to the city center, Potsdamer Platz, and had a look around. In the midst of the huge buildings there was the Sony Center. This place was a collection of restuarants, business buildings, a cinema, and more. Now before I tell you what we did next, I feel the need to justify my actions. Paula and are taking a Shakespeare class and decided long ago that we wanted to see the new film “Gnomio & Juliet.” Now since I mentioned there was a cinema in the Sony Center I will now mention that “Gnomio & Juliet” was playing in English AND in 3D… and since the Sony Center is such a big part of Berlin’s city center… We bought tickets for 5:00 that night. Now, I don’t want to catch crap for seeing a movie while in a foreign country, I’m glad we did it :) But in the meanwhile, before the movie, we had time to kill so we set out to explore more of Berlin. We stumbled upon, and yes I mean by accident, a part of the Berlin Wall that is still standing. There’s pieces of the wall on display in Potsdamer Platz by the road with information about it (and graffiti’ed all over as the much of the wall was) but we saw a part of it that didn’t get knocked down probably because it didn’t necessarily need to be. Below is part of the Berlin wall that is on display in Potsdamer Platz.
Without insulting your wealth of knowledge I’ll attempt to explain briefly what the Berlin Wall was for. After WW2 the Cold War began and Berlin was divided in two; East and West Berlin. The West side was the side supported by the U.S. troops and the East side had support of the Soviet Union and their troops and the wall was built to keep East Berliners from escaping to West Berlin during the Cold War. Among discovering the wall (back to my story ) we also discovered a small food stand where I bought a bratwurst and Paula bought a currywurst, both very yummy indeed! We then made our way back to the cinema and enjoyed Gnomio & Juliet at the Sony Center!
Now before you start scanning for stories about me reeking havoc on the Berlin night life, I’m sorry to inform you that Paula and I indulged in no such thing. Yes, sort of sad but in the end we were just looking for a nice relaxed vacation so we didn’t stress bout going out and all that overrated stuff. We had enough fun exploring the city and experiencing what it had to offer without alchoholic beverages and prowling men that we really had no interest in talking to. That being said, we slept in Saturday morning and then set off to Starbucks to have get some coffee to get us goin, and plan out our second day in Berlin. We noticed something a bit unusual in Potsdamer Platz that day- booths, green balloons, and people carrying signs, mostly. After spending some quality time in the good old Bucks we headed outside to investigate the growth of booths, green balloons and people carrying signs. Mostly. At this point there were hundreds of people walking around Potsdamer Platz and the main streets in this city center were closed and filled with people… in booths, with green balloons, and people carrying signs. Mostly. To our unfortunate disadvantage, everything was in German so Paula and I hadn’t the slightest clue what was going on. On the chance that a young man in an interesting jumpsuit and face paint handed me a flyer, I asked him if he spoke English, and with a returned “Yes, a little” I asked him to explain what was going on. Apparently, Paula and I were in the midst of one of the biggest protests Germany has ever seen; a protest against nuclear power.
After his explanation, the Simpson posters began to make much more sense. According to this guy, Germany’s people has been protesting nuclear power for a while but Japan’s devestations concerning nuclear power had set off the opposition even more. This protest was a day before political elections in Germany and, to my knowledge, has contributed to the great shift of power from the party that has been power over Germany for many years now to the Green Party. I’d also like to mention at this point my embaressment because at one point in the conversation the young German gentleman stopped and asked if we could speak Spanish, since that’d be easier for him to speak in. Yes, he could speak (that I know of) three different languages fluently, and I can only speak one. It’s times like these when I wish I had ACTUALLY listened to Wilson all those semesters in Spanish class! Paula and I walked with the protesters until there came a breaking point to the march and then we headed back to our hotel to collect ourselves once again. (Picture of part of the protest below)
Our second excursion of the day was going to the famous Brandenburg Gate (pictured below) and the German Parliament building Reichstag (second picture below)
The Brandenburg Gate is a one of the famous symbols of Berlin located just blocks away from Reichstag.
If you recall earlier that I talked about the Berlin Wall, now I’m going to tell you something that was a large part of the whole it's functionality. There had to be a place where people could legally get through the wall right? Well there was, and it was called “Checkpoint Charlie.” Checkpoint Charlie was manned by armed soldiers and came equipt with a fair warning on the American side going East. The warning began “You are now leaving the American sector…” and goes on to warn those who are leaving basically that once they pass the threshold they are no longer under the protection of the Americans on the West side of the wall.
Sunday, our last full day in Berlin, was an eventful one as well. We started the day (after sleeping in of course) in search of a very specific thing in Berlin. The Holocaust Memorial. Stone slabs cover over 4 acres of land in downtown Berlin arranged in a grid pattern on a sloping field of land. The stone slabs range in height from just a rectangle on the ground to over 10 feet tall. There are debates of any symbolism involved in the construction of the memorial.
Walking through the blocks of stone was a really powerful and provoking experience. Among the people laughing and playing hide and seek throughout the blocks you really had to force yourself to stop and think about why this memorial is there and what it represents. But as long as you can do that much, what’s in front of you will do the rest. I even ask you to take a second to remember the Jewish lives that were lost in Europe during those unfortunate times.
On a happier note, our next stop was the Charlottenburg Palace. Paula and I made the venture to this palace but alas, did not go inside. We didn’t really want to spend 12 Euro to look at something we’ve more than likely already seen since we’ve been to Europe. But… here’s a picture! This place was freaking HUGE! Not even all of it was open to the public either.
The next day (Monday) we set off for Prague in the Czech Republic! An AWESOME four hour train! (Sarcasm anyone?) Luckily Czech is beautiful so I was able to enjoy the window seat fully the whole ride. As soon as we got there we met another fellow PLU-mate who is also on the London program with us, none other than Mr. Pj Edds! He’d been there by himself the whole weekend so he was really excited to get to spend the rest of his break with the two best travel buddies anyone could ask for. And yes, those were his EXACT words. Duh. So, since he’d already been there for a while, Pj already knew about a lot of cool stuff so we didn’t waste any time when we got there. He took us to Old Town Square first where stands the famous Astrological clock (pictured below).
This clock is amazing, especially for the time it was created in. It was installed in 1410 making it the third oldest astrological clock in the world and the only one today that still works! It’s extremely complex and has many different components including the time, the position of the moon and sun at that specific time, and a calendar dial that represents the months and the astrological signs. Every hour the clock strikes and the famous ceremony takes place where the little windows above the clock open and “The Walk of the Apostles” takes place (the apostles walk by the windows, obviously). It’s a bit of an overrated ceremony but neat to experience none the less.
Pj also took us to visit the John Lennon wall. Yes, that John Lennon. This is basically a graffiti wall dedicated to John Lennon where hundreds (maybe thousands?) of people have left their mark on it. We did not write on the wall at all, but we did take time to enjoy what others had written, and even took a couple pictures!
We also went on the famous Charles bridge which was built by… no one other than… King Charles!
This bridge was really cool because it was a walk only bridge and had people selling neat things and a BUNCH of artists sketching characters (which I totally would have done if it wasn’t 900 Kronor.) So you know, about 20 Kronor equals one Euro, which is a good thing to keep in mind otherwise you might have a heart attack reading how much I spent haha. For some reason Pj thought it would be a life changing experience to drink Czech beer on the bridge at sunset… So I did!
I was the only one doing it out of us three though, the other two wanted to save their brew for a better sunset but we actually never went back to do it again so I’m glad I had my drink on the bridge when I had the chance! After that we went to an Italian restaurant for dinner, walked around more until we were all worn out, and then called it a night. What a great first day, I know!
You’ll notice a pattern throughout most of my Prague experience, that Pj heard about doing it or planned it already. That being said, Pj had already planned us taking a guided tour the Prague Castle on Tuesday. Tours sound pretty typical and touristy but honestly, I would suggest taking one anywhere you go especially in Europe. Paula and I learned by not taking any tours in Berlin, that we saw a bunch of awesome stuff but didn’t know barely any of the significance. This was not the case in Prague, luckily! For this tour we had a great Scottish guide named Colin who was absolutely wonderful! He had a way with keeping us interested in everything he was telling us, which is a pretty great talent if I do say so myself. So we made our way up to the castle which is on top of a hill (of course) listening to tid bits of interesting Prague history on the way. On top of the hill was an absolutely beautiful view of pretty much all of Prague, definitely a sight to see. Unfortunately my camera broke for good in Berlin, so I wasn’t able to take any pictures but on the bright side I have a great roommate, who has a better camera than me anyway, who has allowed me to steal all of the great pictures she took throughout the trip.
The only part of the castle we were actually able to go in (since this is a still-functioning castle) was the cathedral but I don’t feel short changed because the cathedral is definitely the most beautiful aspect of the castle anyway. From this castle and cathedral stems the story of the famous St. John of Nepomuk. The story goes that the King at the time suspected his wife of having an affair, and since she confessed every week to St. John the King figured he could get the information from him. Well, St. John took his vow to God seriously and refused to tell the King of anything the Queen had told him so St. John was tortured to try and get the information out of him. But none of it worked and in a final attempt to get the information out of him the King ordered St. John to be dipped into the river off of the Charles Bridge in which act St. John died. Today he is a national saint of Czech Republic.
Among seeing the castle we also got a little tour up and around the grounds where we saw various places where famous movies were filmed such as Mission Impossible, James Bond, Eurotrip etc. which I thought was pretty neat. Even more interesting than that though was seeing the Communist headquarters where many terrible secrets are still held today. Our tour guide told us that people were tortured and killed in this building. Of course it’s used as something else now, but since communism only ended in 1989 some people are still convinced that communism still exists and indeed fear its return. But no fear, that’s not likely to happen. The picture below is of a plaque posted outside of the old communist house gates commemorating lives lost to the corrupt government.
To end the tour our guide to us to a Monk brewery known for world winning beer and of course I had a pint and would like to say that Monks definitely know how to make beer! It was probably the most delicious brew that I had the whole trip (possibly since I’ve been in Europe.)
We wrapped up the night by having a “traditional Czech meal” at a place suggested by our tour guide. The place was really hole-in-the-wall and not touristy, which was exactly what we wanted. Now the Czech’s aren’t necessarily known for their food but we ordered the best we could to experience the cuisine. Paula ordered Goulash (which is not even CLOSE to the way my mom makes it) with dumplings, which is the course Czech’s are most known for, and I got “Czech potato soup” with a Czech garlic potato pancake called “Bramboraky.” Pj got some sort of omelet. After dinner though, we had one more stop- something that Pj had discovered and wanted to show us.
Intense right? A bunch of locks on a bridge. I bet you’re wondering where all the keys are. The answer is, since this is a bridge, the keys are at the bottom of the water bank. Now just because I had never heard of this tradition before I got to Europe doesn’t mean none of you have. But I’ll share it anyway. The tradition is for two lovers to go to a bridge, lock the lock onto some part of the bridge, then throw the key into the water to represent everlasting love. We stood at this spot for a good amount of time studying all the different locks, big and small, wide and skinny most with names and dates carved or written on them. It’s such a romantic tradition and I hope to be able to do it someday with someone I love! I’ve seen locks on other bridges; it doesn’t have to be any specific one. This city just happens to have hosted a lot of lovers!
Wednesday we decided to take it easy because we had been doing a LOT of walking and sightseeing. We did explore a little of course, we sure didn’t go there to sit in our hostel. We ended up at what we thought was the Prague market… but it ended up being a very sketchy experience so we left just about as quickly as we came. At one point we went into a candy store that sold mostly chocolate and rock candy, and we got to watch the rock candy being made!! If you’re interested look it up, it’s super cool. And then I bought some of it. Variety pack!
We relaxed then set out for dinner to a place called BarBar that Pj found online that had pancakes (which were really basically just crepes) for dinner! That was a fun walk. We ended up find these statues-
Don’t ask… I don’t really know, but it was funny!
Thursday was our last full day in Prague (sad face) but I think we spent it well. We set out in the morning to get some coffee and find the REAL Prague market, which was a success, and I bought all my Prague souvenirs. One of the things that area of Europe is known for is Bohemian crystal so I got some of that, of course. So after we finished our shopping we hung out in Old Town Square (where the astrological clock is) until our tour started. We decided to take the free tour of Prague since Pj did it (twice) and recommended it. Honestly, I learned so much that recollecting it all is nearly impossible, but I’ll tell you that we learned about a famous protester against communism who burnt himself alive to make a statement just 20 years ago. He now has a place in the city named after him. We also saw one of the buildings Mozart performed in, learning that he actually loved Prague because he felt like his music was really appreciated and understood there. A really random interesting fact is, speaking of music, that when the Americans landed on the moon for the very first time they were in fact listening to music by a famous Czech composer. So the Czech’s do actually have the claim to fame for the first music on the moon! At one point we also visited a small church that hosted something very interesting. A human arm. Ew, right? This arm is actually over 600 years old! The story is that a thief had attempted to steal jewels off of a statue inside the church and got stuck. The people of the church had to cut his arm off to free it, and decided to keep it and hang it in the church to warn other thieves. And here it hangs... in all it's shriveled glory
My favorite part of the tour was going through the Jewish District. This is where history starts getting really interesting. Apparently Hitler wanted to retire to Prague “after he won the war” which ultimately explains why Prague was nearly untouched during World War II. That being said, he created something called the “Jewish District” in Prague which was an area of confinement for all the Jews in Prague. To much surprise there is a standing Synagogue in the Jewish District of which is apparently partly compromised of stones from the original Synagogue in Jerusalem. The story goes that when the Messiah finally came the Jews would remove the stones from the Synagogue in Prague and take them back to Jerusalem to rebuild the original. So why would Hitler leave it standing? Our tour guide informed us that Hitler planned to make a museum of this particular Synagogue after he exterminated all the Jews in the world. One of the most disturbing parts of the tour was seeing the graveyard in the Jewish District. The people only had a tiny part of land to bury their dead so… the only way to keep burying was to finish one layer then begin another by burying bodies on top of the ones already buried. The walls to this graveyard are higher than any other ground surface in the area and it’s said there are up to 11 bodies buried on top of each other. Below is a picture, and the brick wall you see is one of the sides of the graveyard.
We ended the day by wasting time on the Charles Bridge, which was the perfect ending to an amazing adventure. We sat on the bridge and took fun pictures and just talked. Paula and Pj were amazing to travel with and I’m so glad I got to spend this trip with those two, I couldn’t have asked for more.
Friday morning Paula and I woke up early and set off to the train station. We took a four hour train from Prague back to Berlin (since that’s where we were flying out of), then a 30 minute bus from the Berlin train station to Tegel airport, waited four hours for our flight, flew for two plus hours, arrived in London and took the tube to our homestay which took an hour. It was a solid day of traveling! But we made it back safe and sound and I only forgot one thing in Prague! No worries though, it was just a cord and my hostel is mailing it to me fortunately. And that ends my mid semester adventure. Below is a picture of us and our GREAT tour guide Colin!
If you’ve made it this far, props for being able to read all the way through! I know it’s a lot to take it and it certainly took me forever to write it all and attempt to recreate it for you. I appreciate your support and I hope you’ve enjoyed all I had to say. I’m pretty much done travelling for the most part, well to other big countries at least. I know I make it look it easy but it’s not and it’s really expensive!! I’ve had so much fun though and I still can’t believe all the places I’m able to say I’ve been. Now, even though I’m not going anywhere super major in my last remaining month, please keep up with my blogs! I’ll try to keep it interesting, I promise. I hope that you’ve learned something from my adventures and if you have any questions definitely let me know!
Thanks again, and I hope you all are doing very well. I miss you so much and it’s about a month until I get home! Mark your calendars! Much love to you all!!
-KYRA:)
We left London straight away after my last history final on Thursday, March 24th. We flew out of Heathrow and into Tegel Airport in Berlin, Germany. I’m happy to say that we did indeed make it to our hotel (Holiday Inn) without any major complications, BUT for your entertainment I will admit that when we got to the general area of our hotel we wandered around in circles for at least 30 minutes until we discovered the yellow brick road to our destination. It’s pretty much unavoidable for us. We took the Bahn (which is like the London Underground service) to Potsdamer Platz in order to get to our hotel and it happens to be that Potsdamer Platz is the city center of Berlin. It’s almost surprising when you first take in the scene of Berlin’s city center because it is very new and very much a city consisting of big, new, modern buildings. But it only takes a quick history recap to remind yourself that much of Berlin had to be rebuilt after WW2. It was pretty late by the time we actually got to our hotel and settled in, but that didn’t stop us from treating ourselves after our long journey to….. ice cream! Haagen Dazs to be exact… which we were thouroughly excited to be eating in Germany. After that we rested up for the next day.
We decided to spend our first full day in Berlin exploring and getting to know the city. We made our way back to the city center, Potsdamer Platz, and had a look around. In the midst of the huge buildings there was the Sony Center. This place was a collection of restuarants, business buildings, a cinema, and more. Now before I tell you what we did next, I feel the need to justify my actions. Paula and are taking a Shakespeare class and decided long ago that we wanted to see the new film “Gnomio & Juliet.” Now since I mentioned there was a cinema in the Sony Center I will now mention that “Gnomio & Juliet” was playing in English AND in 3D… and since the Sony Center is such a big part of Berlin’s city center… We bought tickets for 5:00 that night. Now, I don’t want to catch crap for seeing a movie while in a foreign country, I’m glad we did it :) But in the meanwhile, before the movie, we had time to kill so we set out to explore more of Berlin. We stumbled upon, and yes I mean by accident, a part of the Berlin Wall that is still standing. There’s pieces of the wall on display in Potsdamer Platz by the road with information about it (and graffiti’ed all over as the much of the wall was) but we saw a part of it that didn’t get knocked down probably because it didn’t necessarily need to be. Below is part of the Berlin wall that is on display in Potsdamer Platz.
Without insulting your wealth of knowledge I’ll attempt to explain briefly what the Berlin Wall was for. After WW2 the Cold War began and Berlin was divided in two; East and West Berlin. The West side was the side supported by the U.S. troops and the East side had support of the Soviet Union and their troops and the wall was built to keep East Berliners from escaping to West Berlin during the Cold War. Among discovering the wall (back to my story ) we also discovered a small food stand where I bought a bratwurst and Paula bought a currywurst, both very yummy indeed! We then made our way back to the cinema and enjoyed Gnomio & Juliet at the Sony Center!
Now before you start scanning for stories about me reeking havoc on the Berlin night life, I’m sorry to inform you that Paula and I indulged in no such thing. Yes, sort of sad but in the end we were just looking for a nice relaxed vacation so we didn’t stress bout going out and all that overrated stuff. We had enough fun exploring the city and experiencing what it had to offer without alchoholic beverages and prowling men that we really had no interest in talking to. That being said, we slept in Saturday morning and then set off to Starbucks to have get some coffee to get us goin, and plan out our second day in Berlin. We noticed something a bit unusual in Potsdamer Platz that day- booths, green balloons, and people carrying signs, mostly. After spending some quality time in the good old Bucks we headed outside to investigate the growth of booths, green balloons and people carrying signs. Mostly. At this point there were hundreds of people walking around Potsdamer Platz and the main streets in this city center were closed and filled with people… in booths, with green balloons, and people carrying signs. Mostly. To our unfortunate disadvantage, everything was in German so Paula and I hadn’t the slightest clue what was going on. On the chance that a young man in an interesting jumpsuit and face paint handed me a flyer, I asked him if he spoke English, and with a returned “Yes, a little” I asked him to explain what was going on. Apparently, Paula and I were in the midst of one of the biggest protests Germany has ever seen; a protest against nuclear power.
After his explanation, the Simpson posters began to make much more sense. According to this guy, Germany’s people has been protesting nuclear power for a while but Japan’s devestations concerning nuclear power had set off the opposition even more. This protest was a day before political elections in Germany and, to my knowledge, has contributed to the great shift of power from the party that has been power over Germany for many years now to the Green Party. I’d also like to mention at this point my embaressment because at one point in the conversation the young German gentleman stopped and asked if we could speak Spanish, since that’d be easier for him to speak in. Yes, he could speak (that I know of) three different languages fluently, and I can only speak one. It’s times like these when I wish I had ACTUALLY listened to Wilson all those semesters in Spanish class! Paula and I walked with the protesters until there came a breaking point to the march and then we headed back to our hotel to collect ourselves once again. (Picture of part of the protest below)
Our second excursion of the day was going to the famous Brandenburg Gate (pictured below) and the German Parliament building Reichstag (second picture below)
The Brandenburg Gate is a one of the famous symbols of Berlin located just blocks away from Reichstag.
If you recall earlier that I talked about the Berlin Wall, now I’m going to tell you something that was a large part of the whole it's functionality. There had to be a place where people could legally get through the wall right? Well there was, and it was called “Checkpoint Charlie.” Checkpoint Charlie was manned by armed soldiers and came equipt with a fair warning on the American side going East. The warning began “You are now leaving the American sector…” and goes on to warn those who are leaving basically that once they pass the threshold they are no longer under the protection of the Americans on the West side of the wall.
Sunday, our last full day in Berlin, was an eventful one as well. We started the day (after sleeping in of course) in search of a very specific thing in Berlin. The Holocaust Memorial. Stone slabs cover over 4 acres of land in downtown Berlin arranged in a grid pattern on a sloping field of land. The stone slabs range in height from just a rectangle on the ground to over 10 feet tall. There are debates of any symbolism involved in the construction of the memorial.
Walking through the blocks of stone was a really powerful and provoking experience. Among the people laughing and playing hide and seek throughout the blocks you really had to force yourself to stop and think about why this memorial is there and what it represents. But as long as you can do that much, what’s in front of you will do the rest. I even ask you to take a second to remember the Jewish lives that were lost in Europe during those unfortunate times.
On a happier note, our next stop was the Charlottenburg Palace. Paula and I made the venture to this palace but alas, did not go inside. We didn’t really want to spend 12 Euro to look at something we’ve more than likely already seen since we’ve been to Europe. But… here’s a picture! This place was freaking HUGE! Not even all of it was open to the public either.
The next day (Monday) we set off for Prague in the Czech Republic! An AWESOME four hour train! (Sarcasm anyone?) Luckily Czech is beautiful so I was able to enjoy the window seat fully the whole ride. As soon as we got there we met another fellow PLU-mate who is also on the London program with us, none other than Mr. Pj Edds! He’d been there by himself the whole weekend so he was really excited to get to spend the rest of his break with the two best travel buddies anyone could ask for. And yes, those were his EXACT words. Duh. So, since he’d already been there for a while, Pj already knew about a lot of cool stuff so we didn’t waste any time when we got there. He took us to Old Town Square first where stands the famous Astrological clock (pictured below).
This clock is amazing, especially for the time it was created in. It was installed in 1410 making it the third oldest astrological clock in the world and the only one today that still works! It’s extremely complex and has many different components including the time, the position of the moon and sun at that specific time, and a calendar dial that represents the months and the astrological signs. Every hour the clock strikes and the famous ceremony takes place where the little windows above the clock open and “The Walk of the Apostles” takes place (the apostles walk by the windows, obviously). It’s a bit of an overrated ceremony but neat to experience none the less.
Pj also took us to visit the John Lennon wall. Yes, that John Lennon. This is basically a graffiti wall dedicated to John Lennon where hundreds (maybe thousands?) of people have left their mark on it. We did not write on the wall at all, but we did take time to enjoy what others had written, and even took a couple pictures!
We also went on the famous Charles bridge which was built by… no one other than… King Charles!
This bridge was really cool because it was a walk only bridge and had people selling neat things and a BUNCH of artists sketching characters (which I totally would have done if it wasn’t 900 Kronor.) So you know, about 20 Kronor equals one Euro, which is a good thing to keep in mind otherwise you might have a heart attack reading how much I spent haha. For some reason Pj thought it would be a life changing experience to drink Czech beer on the bridge at sunset… So I did!
I was the only one doing it out of us three though, the other two wanted to save their brew for a better sunset but we actually never went back to do it again so I’m glad I had my drink on the bridge when I had the chance! After that we went to an Italian restaurant for dinner, walked around more until we were all worn out, and then called it a night. What a great first day, I know!
You’ll notice a pattern throughout most of my Prague experience, that Pj heard about doing it or planned it already. That being said, Pj had already planned us taking a guided tour the Prague Castle on Tuesday. Tours sound pretty typical and touristy but honestly, I would suggest taking one anywhere you go especially in Europe. Paula and I learned by not taking any tours in Berlin, that we saw a bunch of awesome stuff but didn’t know barely any of the significance. This was not the case in Prague, luckily! For this tour we had a great Scottish guide named Colin who was absolutely wonderful! He had a way with keeping us interested in everything he was telling us, which is a pretty great talent if I do say so myself. So we made our way up to the castle which is on top of a hill (of course) listening to tid bits of interesting Prague history on the way. On top of the hill was an absolutely beautiful view of pretty much all of Prague, definitely a sight to see. Unfortunately my camera broke for good in Berlin, so I wasn’t able to take any pictures but on the bright side I have a great roommate, who has a better camera than me anyway, who has allowed me to steal all of the great pictures she took throughout the trip.
The only part of the castle we were actually able to go in (since this is a still-functioning castle) was the cathedral but I don’t feel short changed because the cathedral is definitely the most beautiful aspect of the castle anyway. From this castle and cathedral stems the story of the famous St. John of Nepomuk. The story goes that the King at the time suspected his wife of having an affair, and since she confessed every week to St. John the King figured he could get the information from him. Well, St. John took his vow to God seriously and refused to tell the King of anything the Queen had told him so St. John was tortured to try and get the information out of him. But none of it worked and in a final attempt to get the information out of him the King ordered St. John to be dipped into the river off of the Charles Bridge in which act St. John died. Today he is a national saint of Czech Republic.
Among seeing the castle we also got a little tour up and around the grounds where we saw various places where famous movies were filmed such as Mission Impossible, James Bond, Eurotrip etc. which I thought was pretty neat. Even more interesting than that though was seeing the Communist headquarters where many terrible secrets are still held today. Our tour guide told us that people were tortured and killed in this building. Of course it’s used as something else now, but since communism only ended in 1989 some people are still convinced that communism still exists and indeed fear its return. But no fear, that’s not likely to happen. The picture below is of a plaque posted outside of the old communist house gates commemorating lives lost to the corrupt government.
To end the tour our guide to us to a Monk brewery known for world winning beer and of course I had a pint and would like to say that Monks definitely know how to make beer! It was probably the most delicious brew that I had the whole trip (possibly since I’ve been in Europe.)
We wrapped up the night by having a “traditional Czech meal” at a place suggested by our tour guide. The place was really hole-in-the-wall and not touristy, which was exactly what we wanted. Now the Czech’s aren’t necessarily known for their food but we ordered the best we could to experience the cuisine. Paula ordered Goulash (which is not even CLOSE to the way my mom makes it) with dumplings, which is the course Czech’s are most known for, and I got “Czech potato soup” with a Czech garlic potato pancake called “Bramboraky.” Pj got some sort of omelet. After dinner though, we had one more stop- something that Pj had discovered and wanted to show us.
Intense right? A bunch of locks on a bridge. I bet you’re wondering where all the keys are. The answer is, since this is a bridge, the keys are at the bottom of the water bank. Now just because I had never heard of this tradition before I got to Europe doesn’t mean none of you have. But I’ll share it anyway. The tradition is for two lovers to go to a bridge, lock the lock onto some part of the bridge, then throw the key into the water to represent everlasting love. We stood at this spot for a good amount of time studying all the different locks, big and small, wide and skinny most with names and dates carved or written on them. It’s such a romantic tradition and I hope to be able to do it someday with someone I love! I’ve seen locks on other bridges; it doesn’t have to be any specific one. This city just happens to have hosted a lot of lovers!
Wednesday we decided to take it easy because we had been doing a LOT of walking and sightseeing. We did explore a little of course, we sure didn’t go there to sit in our hostel. We ended up at what we thought was the Prague market… but it ended up being a very sketchy experience so we left just about as quickly as we came. At one point we went into a candy store that sold mostly chocolate and rock candy, and we got to watch the rock candy being made!! If you’re interested look it up, it’s super cool. And then I bought some of it. Variety pack!
We relaxed then set out for dinner to a place called BarBar that Pj found online that had pancakes (which were really basically just crepes) for dinner! That was a fun walk. We ended up find these statues-
Don’t ask… I don’t really know, but it was funny!
Thursday was our last full day in Prague (sad face) but I think we spent it well. We set out in the morning to get some coffee and find the REAL Prague market, which was a success, and I bought all my Prague souvenirs. One of the things that area of Europe is known for is Bohemian crystal so I got some of that, of course. So after we finished our shopping we hung out in Old Town Square (where the astrological clock is) until our tour started. We decided to take the free tour of Prague since Pj did it (twice) and recommended it. Honestly, I learned so much that recollecting it all is nearly impossible, but I’ll tell you that we learned about a famous protester against communism who burnt himself alive to make a statement just 20 years ago. He now has a place in the city named after him. We also saw one of the buildings Mozart performed in, learning that he actually loved Prague because he felt like his music was really appreciated and understood there. A really random interesting fact is, speaking of music, that when the Americans landed on the moon for the very first time they were in fact listening to music by a famous Czech composer. So the Czech’s do actually have the claim to fame for the first music on the moon! At one point we also visited a small church that hosted something very interesting. A human arm. Ew, right? This arm is actually over 600 years old! The story is that a thief had attempted to steal jewels off of a statue inside the church and got stuck. The people of the church had to cut his arm off to free it, and decided to keep it and hang it in the church to warn other thieves. And here it hangs... in all it's shriveled glory
My favorite part of the tour was going through the Jewish District. This is where history starts getting really interesting. Apparently Hitler wanted to retire to Prague “after he won the war” which ultimately explains why Prague was nearly untouched during World War II. That being said, he created something called the “Jewish District” in Prague which was an area of confinement for all the Jews in Prague. To much surprise there is a standing Synagogue in the Jewish District of which is apparently partly compromised of stones from the original Synagogue in Jerusalem. The story goes that when the Messiah finally came the Jews would remove the stones from the Synagogue in Prague and take them back to Jerusalem to rebuild the original. So why would Hitler leave it standing? Our tour guide informed us that Hitler planned to make a museum of this particular Synagogue after he exterminated all the Jews in the world. One of the most disturbing parts of the tour was seeing the graveyard in the Jewish District. The people only had a tiny part of land to bury their dead so… the only way to keep burying was to finish one layer then begin another by burying bodies on top of the ones already buried. The walls to this graveyard are higher than any other ground surface in the area and it’s said there are up to 11 bodies buried on top of each other. Below is a picture, and the brick wall you see is one of the sides of the graveyard.
We ended the day by wasting time on the Charles Bridge, which was the perfect ending to an amazing adventure. We sat on the bridge and took fun pictures and just talked. Paula and Pj were amazing to travel with and I’m so glad I got to spend this trip with those two, I couldn’t have asked for more.
Friday morning Paula and I woke up early and set off to the train station. We took a four hour train from Prague back to Berlin (since that’s where we were flying out of), then a 30 minute bus from the Berlin train station to Tegel airport, waited four hours for our flight, flew for two plus hours, arrived in London and took the tube to our homestay which took an hour. It was a solid day of traveling! But we made it back safe and sound and I only forgot one thing in Prague! No worries though, it was just a cord and my hostel is mailing it to me fortunately. And that ends my mid semester adventure. Below is a picture of us and our GREAT tour guide Colin!
If you’ve made it this far, props for being able to read all the way through! I know it’s a lot to take it and it certainly took me forever to write it all and attempt to recreate it for you. I appreciate your support and I hope you’ve enjoyed all I had to say. I’m pretty much done travelling for the most part, well to other big countries at least. I know I make it look it easy but it’s not and it’s really expensive!! I’ve had so much fun though and I still can’t believe all the places I’m able to say I’ve been. Now, even though I’m not going anywhere super major in my last remaining month, please keep up with my blogs! I’ll try to keep it interesting, I promise. I hope that you’ve learned something from my adventures and if you have any questions definitely let me know!
Thanks again, and I hope you all are doing very well. I miss you so much and it’s about a month until I get home! Mark your calendars! Much love to you all!!
-KYRA:)
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