A free minute!!

Ok!! I have 15 mins to write about the past week. here I go. (excuse the typos, please)

Berlin is amazing, overwhelming, tiring, and exhilirating. So many new things to try...Balkan dancing last night, after a booking at this posh club at the top of a skyscraper. Sadly, I´m miserable at dancing, as I´m sure most of you already know. Today we also started filming our documentary on multiculturalism in Berlin. The group of 25 students split in half, one doing a written publication focusing on multiculturalism in the business world, and the other (my half) working on a video documentary. Two German students and myself spent this afternoon walking around a Turkish sector of Berlin, interviewing families and shooting interesting cultural clashes. How often does one get to do that?? A Russian film producer from Eastern Germany is helping us by reviewing our footage throughout the week and making suggestions. And I´ll have a lovely copy to post on here when it´s finished!! V. exciting.

Breif summary of the previous week:
-Tour of the Bundestag, basically parliament
-Tour and conference at Axel Springer--Europe´s largest publishing company--focusing on Die Welt, one of it´s paper companies
-Berlin Wall
-Modern Art Museum
-National Gallery currently housing french impressionism exhibit from NY--lots of Degas--v. exciting, as he is my current favorite.
-Beer Gardens
-Karaoke Bars
-bike tour through Potsdam---probably my favorite excursion--riding bikes by rivers, over bridges, through old dutch quarters on beautiful old cobblestone streets and stopping for the best hot chocolate i´ve ever had...
-German food!!
-lectures from journalists from all around eastern Europe. international journalism is starting to sound quite enticing...

but above all, the other students are my favorite part. 25 of us--from germany, macedonia, belgium, serbia, czeck republic, bulgaria, poland, romania, panama--and just three of us from the states. and everyone gets along SO incredibley well. we have so much fun together and have the most dynamic discussions. and everyone is very patient with my embarrassing german skills....or complete lack thereof.
anyway, i have to go catch yet another train. I've never ridden so many trains...
I´ll try to write soon!!
take care*

I am here!

There is very limited internet here in Berlin, so my updates for the next two weeks will be very scarce. Just a quick note to say that i made it safe and sound to berlin at 1am after a flight delay, and am managing just fine despite my complete lack of knowledge of the german language. Embarrassing, but not paralyzing! The lectures and discussion tables are fascinating; there are 25 students involved--all from different eastern european countries. Thank goodness the rest of the world commits to bilingualism!! we have bonded quickly though, and all get along really well. the berlin program is much more relaxed than my time at oxford; we have ample time for sightseeing and i rely on my german speaking friends to direct me through the maze of underground transportation! (so actually, most of them are trilingual.) we spend the mornings in round table discussion, the afternoons sightseeing, and the evening discovering berlin's nightlife (which never sleeps, I'm told)
Anyway, i will write more complete entries when i have the time, and when I'm not so overwhelmed by this culture shock! I'm loving every second of it though, rest assured. :)

has it really been three weeks??

First of all, an ENORMOUS thank you for all of the birthday wishes on facebook, on my blog, and in emails.
Fortunately I DID manage to scrounge up a couple random people to drag out to the bars for some birthday drinks... kidding of course.
I've made some insanely awesome friends here, and they made sure it was a successful celebration of the last 21 years.
I know some of you have to be quite curious as to what when down, so here you go!
We all started out in the Merton College Bar--Jessica officially bought me my first drink--I think it was called a Beau-Job. (Trina--a couple of those are in order for you, I think) The whole crew came out to kind of send us off at the bar--professors and everything--so that was really nice. Then Brent, Kortni, Steve, Sam, Jess, Gwyn, Darrell and I headed out to a pub called Old Tom's where I reluctantly experienced a DJodka--not something I'll ever try again. it's exactly what it sounds like--Jack Daniels and Vodka. absolutely horrible.Then we hopped across the street to another pub called St. Aldgates, then onto a really nice bar called Copa, then to a couple nightclubs--the Purple Turtle and The Bridge. And it's crazy because it was a wednesday night, and the clubs were still packed. Oxford is actually a decently sized city--I don't know if I mentioned that already--over 100,000. To be quite brief and cryptic, it was a very interesting evening--very pleasant and enjoyable--and I definitly felt well taken care of.
Ok! so enough of that.

The rest of the week was splendid as well.

I did however, manage to develop strep throat last weekend, so I spent the better part of friday and saturday napping...luckily dad foresaw this though, and sent along a round of antibiotics! So I feel completely fine, thank goodness.

Our term papers were also due on Monday, so the weekend was definitely a struggle. I ended up doing mine on why the romanization of Britain was such a smooth success culturally, and what some of the crucial factors were. Prior to coming here, I had never really been much for history, but I've definitely discovered a new fascination in British history.

We've had a little more free time (not much more) now that lectures have ended and our papers and presentations have been completed, so we've been trying to shop and see everything we haven't seen yet....instead of writing a book, I think a brief, hodge-podged list of highlights will work best:
-Harry Potter movie on Tuesday night!!! (if it wasn't already obvious, i'm slightly obsessed)
-church service at St. Aloysius on Sunday
-high table on thursday...penny wars have an entirely different connotation here than in the US...
-finished lectures on wednesday
-out dancing last night
-visited the Old Bodelian Library
-Divinity School
-Blackwells Bookstore--enormous and built around this ancient pub called the White Horse that refused to move
-Chang Mai--this AMAZING Thai restaurant...Thai is probably my favorite food
-punting again yesterday--much more successful this time
-movie being filmed here at Merton with Emma Thompson--one of my fave actresses
it's called the Brideshead Revisited...based on a novel I believe...
-beautiful beautiful weather...aside from the downpour this morning.

Overall, I cannot believe it's already time to leave, I'm--not hoping, but PLANNING--on coming back, and can easily say that these past three weeks have been some of the best in my life thus far. I firmly believe that everyone needs to have an overseas adventure, and that you haven't experienced life until you throw yourself into a completely foreign one and live amongst a different people. How can you discover your true person surrounded by people with extremely simlilar backgrounds? Living in SD, it's so easy to become insular, and lose the desire to pursue something scary or uncomfortable. It's easy to be happy--SD is a wonderful place to live. But there's this incredible amount of amazing people out there--waiting to make an impact on your life, ready to introduce you to new ideas, passions and experiences. Deep down, we're all people, yes, but the core of humanity is not what you experience on an everyday basis. People here are Very different from people in SD, and I'm sure Germany will hold a whole new set of differences as well.
And there's so much to see in this world. Our lives are so incredibly short, and we only get one chance to do as much as possible. ....hmmm. I'm digressing. Point is, I think I've been bitten by the travel bug. Actually, I was bitten many years ago, over and over, and now I think I'm just permanently infected. I am One with the travel bug. Ha. that was lame, Alison.
I just can't imagine not wanting to have experiences like this one. And I'm also a firm believer that you need to decide what you want, and make it happen. If you want it badly enough, and are willing to devote the required energy, you can have it. None of that "expect the worst and settle for pleasant surprises" mentality. I actually had a great conversation with Dr. Kershaw over some Tetley's at the college bar last night about living mentalities.
Anyway. Enough! Time to head to Blackwells and see if I can sell some roman books to lighten my load a little. I am not sure if I'll have internet at the conference hotel in Berlin. I may have to wander the streets for an internet cafe.
Thank you once again to all of you who have been writing and keeping me updated with your lifes. I know I've been horrible at writing back--please don't take it as an insult--free time is just incredibly scarce. I haven't forgotten, I plan on replying, and I just ask for your patience!!
I love reading your emails--keep 'em coming!! I appreciate them so much.
I hope this finds you happy--and let me know if any of you have any specific gift requests!!
Love, Al

PICTURES!!!

a view from the top of St. Mary's cathedral looking at (i think) All Souls College of Oxford

PUNTING!! That's Ryan from Louisiana in the back, by far the most successful at punting, steve from missouri in the middle, and me looking a little...worried?

On our daytrip to London last weekend--on the Westminster bridge with Ryan (LSU, obviously) and Sam from Oxford. You can kind of see Parliament in the background!

this is what I see when I leave my room every morning!!

that's me, obviously, standing in the same garden, with a part of Merton in the background

this is a view from one of the many gardens at Merton--you can see a black gate towards the centre that leads to another quad....just an example of the incredible beauty everywhere you look here!!

so this one is a little blurry, but it was one of our first (rainy) days here, standing in front quad at Merton with Jessica from Missouri.

not enough hours in the day!!

So first off, I feel the need to apologise for my obvious lack of commitment to this blog. And for the absense of promised pictures (although I AM working on that--camera charging as I write this!)

I'm never going to be able to recount everything I'd like, but here's an attempt at some of the highlights!

Friday night was my first chance to breathe, I think. Everything is so beautiful and captivating and distracting here that one is constantly craving solitude in which to just soak everything in. So Friday night I grabbed my journal and some reading material and found a courtyard to enjoy. I don't think there's a single place here that I couldn't just sit and revel in all day. The old stone and beautiful viney flowering plants everywhere create a different kind of peace than the shores of Lake Madison. Equal, maybe, just an entirely different feeling.

Anyway, Saturday was exciting; several of us hopped on a bus and headed to London to watch the start of the Tour de France. We also walked around the bridges by Parliament and Westminster as well. Beautiful sunshine, loads of people, and huge screens everywhere so that you could see the racers up close--with sometimes hilarious expressions on their faces. :) Afterwards we all met up at a pub, had some drinks, and headed back to London...very very tired.

Sunday was probably one of the best days I've had here so far. Four of us started the day off punting in the Thames, where we had a bit of an accident resulting in Jessica hanging from a bridge and consequently falling into the river. The art of punting is much harder than it looks! (It's done in a flat-bottomed canoe, with one person standing on a ledge in the back, steering and propelling the canoe with a 20-foot metal pole. ) I'll try and get pictures up of that....I think one of the guys even got an action shot of Jess falling in....I'll have to get those from him.
After punting, we visited the Natural History and Pitt Rivers Museums with a huge variety of artifacts, including shrunken heads! So fascinating!!!
After the museums, we climbed St. Mary's Cathedral tower and got the perfect view of all of Oxford. Upon descending, we took tea in this beautiful tea/desserts room that used to be Oxford's University Chest, where all of the money to pay tutors was kept.

Skipping ahead a bit, Tuesday was our trip to Stratford Upon Avon to see MacBeth at Shakespeare's Royal Theatre. I seriously cannot begin to equate the performance to anything I've seen before. We were second row in a theatre built to resemble the Globe, so we literally had swords right in front of our faces and sweat flinging past us. (probably on as well) :) I have never seen acting like this, or an interpretation so interesting. Or brutal. I was barely able to stomach parts of it; at one point, when Lady MacDuff and her children were murdered, they actually made it look like they were ripping the baby from her womb--blood, baby and all--and it was RIGHT in front us, looking way too real....ok I hope I haven't grossed you out too much...oversimplified, the production was in a realm of its own; impossible to classify as the type of theater I've seen before, beacause it was SO REAL.

Anyway, :) ... Wednesday my Roman Britain class took a trip to Fishbourne to see the Roman Palace recently excavated. Apparently in the 1960's, someone was digging to put in water pipes, and dug into the remains of a roman palace that had burned down in its day and had pastures grow to hide it. The floors remained relatively untouched, however, and the mosaic work was amazing--especially considering it was all cut, dyed and laid by hand. Every room in the palace had different mosaic floor patterns. We also got a tour of the archived artifacts by the director of the museum himself, and even got to hold some pieces! ...not something you get to do every day...
...time is going so incredibly fast here...always doing something, seeing something, getting ready for something, etc...I know I'm not finding the time to record as much as I'd like. And I'm already half done! And there's so much more to see and do!

A list of what I hope to see/do in the next week:
1. Explore the Bodliean
2. Explore Merton's Library
3. Visit the Eagle and Child (Tolken and Eliot's fave pub)
4. Visit Christ Church's Hall (where Harry Potter was filmed)
5. Attend a service at Christ Church
....and I'm sure there are more, but those have been nagging at the back of my mind.

Today started with breakfast, lecture, tea and another lecture--the later one by a Lord from the House of Lords on Labour Party Prime Ministers, particularily Blair and Brown and the differences between the two. One of his points that was particularily interesting was that Brown's politics will depend heavily on who we elect next year. Apparently Brown and Obama get along quite well...(that one's for you, molly!)
Tonight we have High Table and then out to enjoy another beautiful night. The weather here has actually been extremely pleasant--usually sunny and dry with cool nights.
Tomorrow after lectures and classes, some of us are tentatively planning on seeing Oxford Theatre Company's Open Air Production of A Midsummer Night's Dream, one of my favorite Shakespeare plays. Hopefully the good weather continues!

Thank you to all of you who have been emailing, sending messages with the goings-on back in SD!!!! I really appreciate all of them and will get to replying eventually. It's really hard to find a spare minute here. I miss everyone a lot; Oxford is breathtaking and exciting, but I've always believed that you're happiest surrounded by people who really know you and love you anyway. And it's nice to know I'm missed as well!
Love you all** and hope you're having a relaxing, agreable day.
Bye for now!

[correction: There are 39 colleges within Oxford, not 12.....that's a bit embarassing...thanks to Sam for pointing that out.]

New Goal: Study Old English

In about an hour I need to start getting ready for cocktails and high table (a thursday tradition) so I'll attempt a breif rundown of the last two days:

I left off last time mentioning that our evening plans were to try out some interesting pubs. The night ended up being SO pleasant. We began in Merton's Bar, which is within the college walls and has this beautifully old scholarly feel to it. It was Quiz Night, so my friends and I competed against other teams answering trivia about Merton. Needless to say, my team of new yorkers and mid-westerners didn't win. The only way we got any points was when the sweet old bartender snuck over to our table and whispered answers.

A couple welsh Oxford students--Gwyn and Sam--then took us out to try The Turf, The King's Arms, and this underground cocktail nightclub with beautiful private lounges glowing with all sorts of neat lighting. Afterwards, we walked back to Merton and found a place to sit in one of the many courtyards. (our keys let us in at any hour) We sat around a round table that was actually C.S. Lewis's inspiration for the table where King Atlan was slain. (C.S. Lewis was a Mertonian.) Every nook and cranny of this place is so insanely rich with history. Everything has a story.

Then yesterday, on the 4th, We had lectures in the morning--one of which was one of the most captivating things I've ever experienced. A professor here who is an expert on Old English discussed selected poems and talked about the uniqueness and unrivaled beauty of the langauge. The best part was when she read the poems alound in Old English. I don't know if I've ever heard anything so beautiful. The way the words are structured and compounded is amazing as well.

Then jessica and I walked around discovering Oxford in the early afternoon. The town actually is quite big--over 100,000 locals, not counting thousands of students.

The rest of the afternoon (3&1/2 hours) consisted of our class on Roman Britain. I'm definitly going to come back with a decent amout of knowledge on the subject--and our professor (as you can imagine) is awe-inspiring in his knowledge, charisma and vocabulary. He also plays double bass in a jazz band that travels world-wide, and they just happened to be preforming at this jazz club opening in North Oxford. So several of us hopped a bus last night to the jazz club. The band consisted of him, the scholarly, english double-bassist, a young, tall danish electric guitarist, and a swedish drummer, dressed in white linen with hair past his rear. They had all original pieces and were absolutely fantastic.

After the concert, several of us decided to check out this Independance Day Party at a club called the Purple Turtle. The club was amazing--a huge mass of underground tunnels, bars, lounges and dancefloors, all lit with purple lighting. Mostly americans, but what did we expect, you know? Gwyn assured us that americans aren't THAT annoying.

Well the bells are tolling, which means I need to get out my umbrella and head back to my room.

Quick QUICK rcap of today then:
breakfast (fantastic breakfasts here)
lecture on Elizabethan and Jacobean poetry--really excellent)
nap...
lunch
As(h)molean Museum--world famous for roman artifacts
Oxford Museum
a bit of shopping
and here we are.

hope this wasn't too dry and sketchy!
feel free to email and post--I love to hear from you all.
Bye for now*

Is "magical" too cheesy?

Because it is honestly the only way to describe this heaven. My room is enormous with a fireplace and a spiraling staircase leading up to it. the streets in front of Merton (my college--one of the three oldest, built in 1264) are true cobblestone, and everywhere you look are huge wooden doors, stained glass windows, ornate carvings, gargoyles, statues, and crests adorning every doorway. The flower gardens everywhere are just as breathtaking. I hope to get pictures up on here soon**

Yesterday a girl named jessica and i spent most of our day walking around Oxford, just taking everything in. we also had a formal english lunch, with four courses and constant filling of our wine glasses. This caused most of us to become quite sleepy in our introductory courses a little while later...
We headed to our first English pub experience as well, at a pub called the Kings Arms. You definitly can't be shy when trying to order drinks here! There are about a dozen different pubs in Oxford, and it will be neat to compare them all as the weeks go by!

This morning, after a very different English breakfast (ever tried scottish eggs??) I attended lectures from two different Oxford professors--one on the history of the Oxford English Dictionary, and the other on trends of leading world powers. The dictionary lecture was given by a woman who is considered to be the leading authority on the OED in the world. Believe it or not, it was fascinating.

Between lectures was tea time, (there are about 5 poortunities to get tea a day) and after lectures we had our induction into the Bodliean library, which houses 8 million volumes...and is again, is one of the most beautiful things I've ever seen. (Rivaled only by Oxford's other architecture.) Harry Potter was filmed there. (and we also saw the square where Malfoy was turned into a ferret!) After the Bodliean, we had our first formal walking tour of Oxford and all its colleges. There are almost a dozen colleges here at Oxford, if you were unaware, each of them unique but equally stunning.

Tolken and TS Eliot both stayed at Merton, and Louis Carroll lived next door (not at the same time of course) near Christ Church College, and drew his characters and settings from thins right outside my window.

So much of what I'm experiencing will be better shared through my pictures, so I apologise if this is dry! I'm in a bit of a hurry, as a bunch of us are headed to The Bear tonight--the oldest pub here at Oxford--and then maybe Merton's College Bar.

I've discovered (moreso than ever) how I love English food. The food at Oxford is amazing (I know I keep using that word) and the desserts (we all agree) just keep getting better.

My professor is also (once again) amazing. Not only does he teach and write books, but he also plays in a recording jazz band (that has toured the US) which is giving a concert tomorrow night at a pub in North Oxford (quite a lengthy walk from Merton). Some other students and I are planning to attend.

We had about an hour of spare time today (with the induction and tour taking up a bit of time) so we found this beautiful old bookstore on the High Street (main street) and I'm definitly headed back. There's this quiet feeling of reverence (??) that you get when you look at writings older than your country.

There's so much more to describe--hopefully it will come out in my next couple of postings. THANK you to all who commented on my news story on KELO--it was SUCH a surprise when Matt called me here for an interview. I hope I didn't sound too uneducated...cause I didn't know much...

Anyway, night for now--enjoy your SD sunshine!!

made it!

Just a quick note to let you all know that I arrived safetly, with ALL my luggage, despite a scare; someone had taken my suitcase off the belt and set it with another pile of suitcases, but a nice man (who ironically is a student at Oxford) helped me to relocate it.
I am currently in Redding with my dad's brother's family--Graham, Jane, Oliver, Fraiser and Tom. I managed to (barely) stay awake all day yesterday, while visiting dad's sister's family and grandparents in East Grinstad, so sleep felt gooood last night. I'll write more after I get to Oxford!