Move on down the road

Today is departure day from London. It is quite bittersweet - London has been a great city and we have all loved it as we lived, toured around, and gained so much knowledge. But, after living in a “tourist class” hotel for 39 nights and sightseeing every single day I think I am ready for a change of scenery. It is hard leaving the now familiar behind as we pack our bags to travel in Italy for the next week and leave half the group behind to study in Stratford while we continue on to the continent.

Last week we took a tour of Cambridge and got to go punting on the river. You can see that and my other final pictures from London now on my Picasa site. Also, on the next to last day I got to see the Queen as she and King Abdullah from Saudi Arabia made their way down the royal mile for a meeting – which was greeted by loud protesters yelling behind me, mainly about the poor horses that were being used in the ceremony. You may also notice in the photos I finally got a haircut. After two of the guys on the trip (Andrew and Keith) got their hair messed up by local salons, I was nervous, but luckily my barber lived in Florida for a few years so he knew what I was looking for.

Keith, Rachel, and I rode the London Eye and saw the city from a new perspective on our last night in town. It was tough thinking that was the last time I’ll see many of those places for a while, but life goes on as must I.

London is getting cold

The other day I checked my inbox for my youtube account, which I rarely use. I found I had a message from a reporter at the Asheville Citizen-Times. It was regarding the “Appalachian is HOT HOT HOT” video which I uploaded onto youtube a couple years back. I knew it had a great deal of hits but I had no idea I was the first one to put it on the site. Unbeknownst to me, the video I uploaded had been featured on VH1, NPR, and was the debate at some Appalachian State faculty meetings. I called the reporter from London and we did an interview from which she based some of her article.

I originally posted the video I downloaded from the school’s website before we played them in the National Semi-Finals in 2005. I hoped it would boost our morale going into the game and lower their school spirit and reputation. I’m not sure which is worse for Appalachian State – this video or the fact that Miss Teen South Carolina now attends there.

Here is the link to the article:
http://www.citizen-times.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=200771020048

Here is the link to the video (if you’re one of the few that hasn’t seen it):
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pVENWl8uBeg

England loses

On our way back from seeing a Poe’s “The Mask of the Read Death” we saw a store called ASDA. Right below that it said it was part of the Wal-Mart family. Now at home, Wal-Mart is usually so crowded I tend to avoid it but over here you would’ve thought we found water in the desert. We all ran inside and finally got to do some one stop shopping where socks, candy, electronics, and coathangers could all be gotten. It was very refreshing after having to search for all the little nuanced stores scattered throughout London to buy goods previously.

Yesterday, I went with a couple people on a boat tour of the Thames and we got to see a lot of the old docklands that are now being redeveloped into nice housing units along with all of the other riverside sites.

After that we went to a club to watch the Rugby World Cup where England lost to South Africa. I’ll be honest, I was hoping for riots in the streets and people looting stores so I could have nice pictures and good stories to tell, but instead everyone just moped off back home.

There is also an arts/neighborhood festival in the Bloomsbury area which I walked around today. They had free-trade organic underwear for sale in one of the booths. I didn’t have any cash on me so I couldn’t make a purchase but people over here are wild about the environment. I’m impressed with the huge amounts that are recycled and all of the resources that they conserve, it has really shown me how wasteful I am. However, I have read about how in some communities if you have more than one bag of trash for pickup you must pay five pounds for each additional one. Also, officials there can search your garbage and if they find any recyclable materials you can be fined. That’s an exciting job to have.

Lastly, we booked our flight to Rome for our independent travel time. Keith, Rachel, Bridget, Martin, and I will be in Italy for a week, so if you have traveled there and have recommendations please email me. I love random email updates from people and if you are reading my blog I’d love for you to post a comment so I can see who all is reading it.

Family

First, thank you to my Nana who sent some grits over. Hopefully, I will be able to find a kitchen somewhere and cook a large breakfast and serve these to everyone. A lot has happened in the last few weeks since my last post. We have all become very settled in London and are making friends at church and learning to navigate the city with ease.

Classes and meetings with different agencies/businesses around London have been very interesting and we have had the opportunity to see many plays. My favorite so far has been “Rafta Rafta”, an updated version of the play “All in Good Time”. One evening Keith and I went and saw the the musical “Blood Brothers” together and we told the couple next to us we were watching it because it was loosely based on our lives. We explained how we were separated at birth but met again by chance at Furman and now we were reunited as brothers. The couple then asked us if that was why we were dressed in the same outfit, but we hadn’t even realized we had done this. Brown shoes, khakis, and a micro-plad button down apparently are not as common here as in the states. At the end, I’m not sure if the couple believed us or not, but we had fun with it.

I have finally uploaded pictures from London and some of our side trips so you can view them. Keith, Rachel, and I traveled to Dover to see the castle and famous chalk cliffs. They weren’t as magnificent as the ones in Eastborune, but they were still beautiful.

The most exciting news has been that my parents were here for almost a week to visit me! We spent the first few days in the Cotswolds, the countryside heart of England. We stayed near the little town of Broadway and traveled around to many of the smaller cities nearby. This area is so rich with culture and history it is unbelievable. I rank it the second prettiest area of England, behind the Lake District. On the country roads, I got to test my driving skills with the rental car and I actually did quite well. The last event we attended in the area was called a balloon glow. Five hot air balloons blew fire into their bright balloons in rhythm with a music compilation that was playing over a loud speaker – quite interesting and entertaining.

Once in London I toured St. Paul’s with my parents and I must say it is my favorite of the many churches we have toured thus far. We also spent some time in Harrod’s and I got to view the Princess Diana memorial in the store. And yes, it was weird. There were tourists all around it taking pictures of themselves with a ring, chalice, and picture of she and Dodi Al fayed that were on display.

Having my parents come and visit me was such a treat. We caught up on everything that has been going on here and at home lately and my mom brought starbursts, airheads, and sour patch kids for me. If any of you know my dad, you realize he likes to research and carefully choose where we eat each meal and it was very much worth his efforts. I am so thankful they were able to come and they left me with a tripod so expect some better night time pictures soon.

No grits here

I have received dozens of emails asking me to write a post about the foods I’ve been eating while here. Actually, that is a lie, but I’m going to write about it anyway.

Each day we have breakfast provided for us in the hotel. It consists of cereal, toast, assorted jellies, water, and orange juice. This suits me just fine, but it is incomparable to the full English breakfast we received while on our coach tour everyday. Every morning I had fried eggs, English bacon (what we call country ham), tomatoes, baked beans, toast, and sometimes mushrooms. I miss biscuits, grits, and sausage gravy but all of those will make my homecoming trip to Waffle House in Conyers all the better (and yes Waffle House does now serve biscuits – but they don’t have ovens in any of their restaurants…).

Now that I’m living in a hotel I have sandwiches for lunch a lot otherwise I just grab a sandwich out, a Cornish pastry, or a hot dog/sausage from a cart by the tube station. Saturday I was at the Portobello Road market and I had some Ghanaian food – my best lunch so far. I noticed on the sign that the food had been featured on the BBC and when I looked at the guy serving me I grabbed my camera and started snapping. Just the night before I had seen this guy and his wife on a reality TV show called “The Restaurant” where teams try to have the best restaurant. If they don’t, they get kicked off Donald Trump style. The night before he had gotten kicked off, but the food was great and he was excited that I had seen the show.

Each night we usually go out to dinner and pretty much choose a different ethnicity of food each night. Italian, Chinese, Mexican (no free chips and salsa), Kebab shops, American, Pubs, or just wherever we find that looks good. I haven’t had any restaurant blow me away with their food yet, but I’m waiting on my parents to arrive next Wednesday and then I’ll begin to really start eating good in the neighborhood. My favorite appetizer was the authentic garlic bread we had at an Italian restaurant. If it didn’t cost the equivalent of $6 a slice I would’ve ordered more. My favorite food I’ve had that was unique was at and American diner here that had a sign that read “Hi Y’all Come on in”. I had the breakfast burger which was a hash brown, burger patty, bacon, fried egg, and brown sauce. It was very good and I intend to bring this recipe back to the States. Yes, I have had fish and chips. I don’t have dessert often but I do love getting Haribo sugar covered gummy treats at the corner stores and trying the chocolate bar assortments, of which Cadbury Flake is my favorite so far.

When I travel to Italy I anticipate better food stories but this is all I have for now. I’m going to China town soon to try fried Pigeon which I read in the local paper is quickly becoming a popular dish as chefs are encouraging restaurant goers to try wild game meats. Finally, if you’ve read this far you either really love me or you are getting hungry so here is the recipe to my newest favorite dessert that I learned to make this summer. Courtesy of church members in Section, Alabama:

Krispy Kreme Bread Pudding
2 dozen Krispy Kreme Donuts
Can of Sweetened condensed milk
2 cans fruit cocktail drained
2 beaten eggs
9 oz raisins
2 teaspoons cinnamon
Icing
Box of confectioner’s sugar
Stick of butter
¼ cup of water

Start by mixing all of the ingredients besides the donuts and icing items into a mixing bowl. Then chop up the donuts and put them with all of the other ingredients and let soak a few minutes. Bake on 350 degrees for one hour. While it is cooking bring the mix of confectioner’s sugar, butter, and milk to a boil and pour it over the product when it comes out of the oven.

It won’t kill you, I’ve tested it on many people.

Settled

First, I must apologize for not posting for over a week. We are now completely settled in London and we have been busy attending lectures, visiting sites around the city, discovering the nightlife, and mastering The Tube.

I’ve seen many things so far:
St. Joan at the National Theater
The Merchant of Venice at The Globe
John Wesley’s House and museum of Methodist History
Buckingham Palace
Parliament
The Cabinet War Rooms and Churchill Museum
The National Gallery

Basically each day we have lectures for a couple hours in the morning and then we are off to explore the city for the rest of the day. It is a pretty good arrangement. The weather was great the first few days but lately it has been rainy London as expected. The weather held out for our weekend trip to Eastbourne where we saw the chalk cliffs on the coast, quite beautiful. I have noticed lately after browsing through art galleries and taking photos on my own that I love landscape photography. Luckily for me there was an exhibit at the National Theater of the UK’s best landscape photos. If you want to be inspired go here (http://www.take-a-view.co.uk/2007_winners.htm).

One of the main highlights of the week was finding a church community to become involved in. A few us have been going to the College Ministry and worship at Holy Trinity Brompton, an evangelical Anglican Church right down from Harrod’s. Holy Trinity created the Alpha Course which I know many of you have done or heard about it. All of the students there have been very accepting of us and we have met a lot of great people. It is a very international group and it is amazing to worship with people from all over the globe.

I had the exciting opportunity to photograph some monks from Burma the other day protesting in front of the foreign affairs office (pictures will be up soon) and while I was doing so a local man asked me if I knew who was responsible for the current conflict in Burma. I knew what he was going to say before he opened his mouth and I proved correct - it was George Bush’s fault. I asked him how so and he went into a diatribe about Iraq, the Chinese Olympics, Sudan, and brought all of these points together and ultimately told me that the only way the conflict would be solved is by the USA intervening and putting troops over there. I stood there perplexed by his logic and arguments as he quickly moved on. I really was happy he stopped and talked to me. It was a nice change from people avoiding eye contact at all costs while walking on the street or on the train. Sometimes I try to make eye contact with people just so they don’t forget what it is like.

The latest observation Keith and I have had is that bread molds a lot faster over here. After about 4 days (sealed) mold begins to form and we can’t figure out why. All of the loaves were labeled no preservatives but I think we need them in our bread. Is this normal?