sisters are cool...

I don't have a great deal of time, but I think it is necessary to say that these past few days in Paris with Kim (and Stephen and David and some of David's friends) were some of the best days I have spent in Paris. Instead of doing the traditional touristy-business in Paris, these few days were spent eating wonderful food... in the appt, it was wine, bread, cheese, and litchis... when we went out, David shared his wonderful knowledge of the best hidden places to eat in Paris. I enjoyed the conversation, the cooking, shopping at the cheese shop, the wine shop, the fresh fruit places, and of course the patisseries. The chunnel was fine, nothing too special, only twenty mintues in the tunnel itself, but I was glad to check that off my list of to do's. More to follow and pictures as well.

Paris, pour le cinquième temps

Tomorrow morning I'm off to Paris via the Chunnel! I can't wait to see Kim :) I will be sure to take more pictures of the two of us than the last time I saw her. Have a wonderful week and I will update when I get back from France.

P.S. My Islamic Tradition final went well enough and everyone in the flat is doing well with finals as well. I also got to talk to my dad's mom (Nano) tonight and she is planning to visit in the middle of May with Arthur, Joanie and my cousin Cynthia... how fun!

another week gone...

First of all, if you didn't get the chance to peruse my entry about break, look below this one to see a few pics and read a bit about each city if you want. And of course, all of the other pictures from break are still on my Picasa page (link on the left as usual).

What is there to say? This week has flown by... much like the first four months of this trip have flown by. I was able to organize some things, get second semester classes figured out and started (very briefly) to look over my notes for Islamic Tradition as I have a final on Tuesday. Next semester I will be taking an Introduction to Human and Animal Nutrition, Social Psychology of Exercise and Sport, and the continuation of my Cognitive Psychology course. I am excited for all of the courses as they should be very interesting, but a little scared as well... all three will prove to be very study, reading, work intensive classes.

Second semester doesn't actually start until 29 January because finals are still taking place. Lucky for me, I only have one final exam this semester because my sociology course grade was based entirely upon a final paper and the psych course is year long (we turned in a paper in December and have a cumulative exam in June). After my final on Tuesday night, I am going to come home, pack and head off early the next morning for London, hop onto a train to Paris (I am excited for the Chunnel) and then I will get to see Kim!! I really do feel luck that I get to see so much family while I am over here for the year. I got to see Kim for a day in September while she was in London, my mom for a long weekend in November, two of my cousins over break, Kim in Paris (and I get to meet Stephen - her bf that has already met my parents, my grandparents, and some of my aunts and cousins - this is a big deal and about time I met him), and then my dad is coming in late February. I will also hopefully get to see my cousin when I go to Norway in the spring and my dad's mom hopes to visit in May sometime. I am really lucky!

As for now, I think I will study a bit of Islamic tradition and then have another relaxed night in the flatmates. I hope all is well, whether you are in the US, Chile, New Zealand, France, Spain, Norway, Malta, Ireland... or anywhere else you may be traveling, living or studying abroad. Much love!

let's start at the very beginning...

...a very good place to start.

No matter how hard I try, every time I think of break and Salzburg comes to mind, the music from The Sound of Music becomes ingrained in my brain for a solid three days. Needless to say I am rather bored with the music.

I will attempt to recap a few of the more memorable moments from each city and a few in between. So, here goes nothing...

Dec 13 - Kate and I got all of our things together and were ready to walk out the door when we picked up our packs for the first time fully packed. A sense of dread filled me as I envisioned hauling it all across the Continent. I hurriedly removed several things and slung the not much lighter pack on my back. An easy ride from the Nott'm bus station to Stansted, just outside London, gave us an easy start to the trip. We caught our first Ryan air flight without a hitch and safely arrived in Bratislava a few hours later. After trying to remember the ridiculous conversion rate and taking out money, we decided on a taxi instead of navigating a non existent bus system to our hostel. Our driver spoke about as much English as we did Slovakian, but he was very friendly and took us right to our hostel. We made our way into the hostel and were greeted by a quadrilingual receptionist who gave us all the info we needed about Bratislava. An early night in (after calling and emailing) was relatively uneventful.

Dec 14 - We woke early enough and checked out of our hostel. We began walking around the city, with our packs (we had yet to figure out that luggage storage was our friend) and did a bit of sight seeing. The castle was impressive, even in the mist, but was mysteriously closed... or so we thought until we trekked all the way to the other side and by that time we were too tired to check it out... we stopped by the Christmas market and looked a some interesting food and admired the craftsmanship on all of the goods being sold. After some churches and traversing the old city streets, we hopped on a tram to the train station. A bit of a queue and we caught an hourly train to Vienna... using our Eurail passes even though they aren't technically valid in Slovakia. Thankfully the language barrier played to our advantage. We arrived in Vienna and eventually figured out which station was that we wanted and got off, much refreshed from a nap on the train which was induced by the gently lolling rock of the train. Immediately, the city felt less foreign to me, even though I still didn't understand the language, and somehow I felt safer. Perhaps it was the fact I had heard German before or perhaps because there was no prominent evidence of semi-recent wars. Either way, I was excited for the city. Our hostel proved to be fantastic (it was called the Wombat... and ended up being the best hostel of the whole trip) so Kate and I set out for the night to see what there was to see. After an hour or so of night wandering through Christmas markets and whatnot, we stumbled upon the magnificent Vienna Opera House. We popped in and discovered that the opera Don Carlos was on that evening and we managed to finagle tickets for 3.50 Euro. The inside of the Opera house was exquisite and the performance was beyond worthy of its venue. A walk back through the city to our hostel in the chilly night was interesting as everything had shut down while we were in the performance. Although the streets were a bit darker and the shops were all closed, countless couples and groups still walked through the streets, enjoying the Christmas lights.

Dec 15... who am I kidding... if anyone is still reading I am amazed... I will do this by city now to speed things up a bit. Vienna became one of my new favorite cities. After Don Carlos the next night Kate and I went to see Der Nusscraker aka the Nutcracker which was only 2Euro this time and possibly the best ballet I have ever seen... excluding Barishnikov of course. We visited at least four museums (only two of which were actually worth our time and money) and basically had a great time. Oh yeah, we also visited on of the largest palaces in Europe casually known as Sisi's palace. Another simple train connection to Budapest and we were in Hungary.

After wandering the streets, useless map in hand, we got to our hostel. It was more like a big flat than a hostel... different, but very friendly. Kate and I wandered the city that night for hours. The palaces and cathedrals and parliament buildings along the Danube were beautiful...
... the next day we explore the city more in depth, went back to the famed Gerbaud patisserie and reveled in the goodness of real hot chocolate and fine pastries.

That evening we spent time in the amazing baths. The indoor pools and steam rooms were filled with older people and the water was... cloudy green at best. Needless to say Kate and I spent little time there and were grateful when we discovered the inner courtyard. The pools were immense and elaborate. Fountains, waterfalls, currents and jets in the steamy water shimmered in the steam rising from the pools into the cold night air. Thankfully this water was lightly chlorinated and the company was much younger. We met several nice Americans and Canadians and before we knew it, it had been over two hours and our fingers were rather shriveled. After the baths, we treated ourselves to a nice meal out in a cute French Cafe. Back in our hostel I stayed up late chatting with some Aussies while we watched a movie while Kate slept to ward off illness. Early the next day we caught a train to somewhere, changed again, and made it to Salzburg. Salzburg was great because we met up with Mary and Kevin (and later Emily and Anna who got separated bc of tickets). It was wonderful to have the group somewhat back together. We visited Festung Hohensalzburg, the Christmas market several times (I had the best Austrian butter Crescent cookies of my life there) and had a meal of pretzels (ham and cheese, cheese, chocolate, cinnamon and sugar, you name it, they had it...) It was strange to be back in Salzburg after seven years, but I really enjoyed recognizing all of the old places... the Wolf Hotel... the H&M... the castle... meeting cousin George there... Anyway, it was a good city. Many trains and hours later, Kevin, Mary, Anna, Emily and I arrived in Prague. Again, the Eastern European atmosphere was slightly unnerving (especially when seen from the train track view) but we safely arrived, luckily met Aaron at the train station, and made our way to the hostel. We searched for a restaurant reccommended to us, but never found it. We ended up at this restaurant that served excellent food, the only slightly odd thing about the place was the waitress walking around with black pants, nice shoes, a nice shrug shoulder sweater... and nothing else. Incase you aren't getting my drift, she was pretty exposed... no one paid her any extra attention and everyone acted as if everything was normal...everyone except the six sheltered American students who were incredibly awkward and uncomfortable everytime she walked by our table. We never figured out any reason for her manner of dress as the restaurant seemed to be a respectable place... The next day we explored the city (churches, cathedrals, castles, christmas markets, cool clocks... same old, same old) and celebrated Emily's 21st birthday by going out to a great restaurant in downtown Prague. Thank goodness for the week Czech koruna, everything was expensive by their standards, but pretty affordable for us. An early night in, due to early departures and that was all we had of Prague.

A long train ride into Germany and we were safely in Munich. We decided to spend only one night in Munich so that we wouldn't have to travel on Christmas Eve. We checked into our hostel, walked to the Christmas market for dinner (brats and crepes... yum!) and then headed on to the Haufbrauhaus. We all enjoyed the beer and pretzels there and met some intersting people. Although this was considered the most 'touristy' brew house of them all, we met a group of older men who have been going to that place, once a week, for twenty years. It was neat to talk to some of them, those that spoke English and especially the Bavarian that we (and his doctor friend who was trying to translate) had absolutely no idea what he was saying... we had a fun walk back to the hostel and an early night in. The next morning we left for Geneva.

In Geneva, we spent quite a few happy hours in Starbucks, just chatting, reading, and journaling. On Christmas Eve, Kate and Brandon arrived and we enjoyed all being together. On a long night walk through a beautiful park with cool statues and the old part of town, some of us stumbled upon a church that was having a late service. We attended the eleven o'clock service in the beautiful cathedral and sang carols in French. After midnight we walked back to our hotel and went to sleep, dreaming of the snowy midwest. The next morning we awoke late and had a nice breakfast to send Kate off to meet her mother. We entertained ourselves all day and at night attended an orchestral and choral concert in the same cathedral we attended the night before. After excellent music, we went to a great Italian restaurant and had a relaxed dinner. Good food, excellent wine and friends made for a different, but good Christmas abroad. The day after Christmas, Mary, Kev, Brandon and I headed to Cologne.

Cologne (aka Koln) was an interesting city, but by the time we got there, we were all a bit tired of traveling. We spent two days there and the boys enjoyed the brew houses (sampling the house brew at several establishments) and Mary and I went off for some girl time. We met up with the boys back at the hostel and went out to dinner... at another brew house. Unfortunately, the restaurant was out of soup, so Mary and I ordered something that we had no idea what it was...

...needless to say, we ended up sharing with the boys. That night, night wanderings provided good conversation and bonding. It was a beautiful night and I thoroughly enjoyed it... From Koln, I was to leave a day early to meet my cousin (my dad's nephew) in Paris. The rest of the group decided to come as well, so I had some travel buddies on the incredibly full train ride there. I still had a hotel room to myself for the night, so I waded into the crowd in the metro and sent the other three off to their hotel. I checked into my hotel and took a nap and grabbed some dinner before meeting Mary, Kev and Brandon. It was WONDERFUL to have a hotel room all to myself... that night we walked around the city. It was great to be back in Paris and to be a semi-knowledgeable tour guide. {side note, if anyone is still reading, you are truly amazing, this is the post to end all posts... good job}The next day, we met for breakfast and I headed off to meet my cousin George. We had a good day together: a great lunch out, going up to the Eiffle Tower for George's first time, and later, a phenomenal dance performance at La Theatre de la Champs Elysees. It was good to see George again (he lives and works in Norway and I hadn't seen him in years). The next day was fun with Friends. We walked all over and did the Eiffle Tower again. Somewhere in there, we went to the Louvre which was more crowded than I have ever seen it before and a good dinner of bread, cheese, wine and chocolate in the hotel. Kevin's friend Alex was there and so was Emily's friend Keri. New Year's Eve was fun... we had a dinner of Mona Lisa pizza and Hagen Daz icecream. We stayed in Kev and Alex's hotel room until around ten and then headed down to the Seine. It was a fun night with friends... New Years in Paris... what could be better?... entirely too early the next morning, I got onto a high speed train to Spain. I got safely into Barcelona and checked into my hostel. I had a relaxed evening and waited for Kate to arrive. After sharing stories from the previous week, we went to bed. Barcelona was a beautiful city with amazing weather... blue skies, sun, and balmy breezes. I especially enjoyed visiting the Olympic grounds. It was quite surreal to be there... fifteen years after the even. Anyway, Kate and I enjoyed our time there and headed to Madrid after two nights in Barcelona.

Madrid was also enjoyable. We stayed in a nice hotel right across from the Atocha train station... I later learned that my friend who studied in Madrid for the fall semester stayed near there and his parents actually stayed in that same hotel... small world. While in Madrid, we visited three wonderful museums, had great tapas and met up with Ryan a couple times. On the last night in Madrid, I met up with and went out with my cousin Brent (my mom's nephew who is living in Madrid for the year teaching English), his girlfriend, and his friend from home. It was a really fun night and great to see Brent and Ginger again.

That was it... after three and half weeks, it was time to go back to England. At 4:20 the next morning, Kate and I caught a taxi to the airport and flew directly into Nottingham. A short bus and tram ride later, we were back in the flat. It was silent, Anna and Kevin were still asleep, so we napped a bit. Over the next 48 hours, the rest of our flatmates arrived home, excited to sleep in their own beds. It was a whirlwind tour and a lifechanging experience with countless memories created. I can't wait to do it all over again in the spring.

What now?

On Thursday, I printed out my paper, ripped it to shreds and reworked it. At 4:35 I was out the door with the final copy safely tucked into my coat, protected from the wind and rain. As I biked to campus I noticed the bike I was riding was a little wobbly, but I pushed on. My I made it to the Social Sciences building at 4:53 or something... the traffic was worse around rush hour than I remembered... I filled out a cover sheet and turned in my paper just in time. On my much less hurried ride home I was making my way up the hill just a little under a mile away from the flat and the pedals suddenly flew... the chain had slid off ... and much to my dismay... as the bike is a hardy, three speed, bum-around-bike... there was a cover on the chain so I couldn't put it back on. I was fine with that and made my way home, thankful that the rain held off until I made my way safely back.

After a leisurely dinner with the flatmates (which included a Bailey's hot chocolate) I read some and reveled in the need to do nothing and watched a movie with Mary. It was wonderful to join my flatmates in the don't-have-anything-to-do trend that is this week/month. I have turned in all of my final papers and only have one final exam left which isn't for two weeks. Although I have a little work to do for Mark and Carol and a bit of studying for my final, the present relaxation is much appreciated. Friday was relaxed and after sleeping in and reading for several hours, I started cooking dinner. No one else had signed up to cook so I threw together a potato and leek soup with garlic cheese toast on the side... both of which actually turned out quite well. Another relaxed dinner and a good chat with my mom proved for a beginning to a good night. A few of us headed out later and visited two new pubs. It was surprising to see some of the oldest pubs in England filled with younger adults (wait, do I count as a younger adult? what is going on...) and still very busy places. On the way home we avoided the rain just barely and headed to bed after a few wasted hours.

Today proved to be another lazy day. Fortunately, Mark and Carol finagled money out of Luther to buy us a new washing machine. Now, we can finally wash all of our laundry from break (we had done a few loads at their place earlier, but only the essentials) so that provided our morning excitement. I finally finished the book Eragon (I suppose it only took me four days to finish, but still...) and I am excited to read something else. Although the book was very entertaining, it was much like other fantasy books that I have read. It is filled with elaborate descriptions, but lacks depth and development of characters which does nothing to entice the reader's emotional attachment. However, the book was a nice change from what I read over break {Bill Bryson's Notes from a Small Island which M&C had asked us to read... it was good and proved to be quite diverting on the long train rides... and John Updike's Pigeon Feathers which was really good, but very intellectually engaging as each short story was entirely different and sparked analytical thought for hours after one finished the story}

I am excited to be figuring out travel plans for the next few months. Kim will be in Paris and then Berlin over the next few weeks, so I am quite excited to visit her and finally meet Stephen! My dad is coming over sometime in February or March - but figuring out that date has proved challenging as M&C have yet to provide us with an accurate itinerary - either way I am excited to go back to Wales and explore with my Dad. Also, Molly (my roommate from last year) is now in Ireland so I have to arrange a visit to her as well as her visit here. Whew...

As for now, I'm headed to bed and maybe tomorrow I will start the reliving of the month of travel... along that train of thought, we have now been here over four months. One of those months was spent traveling across Europe. One quarter of our time here has been spent traveling ... not to mention our time traveling in England. In the end, it will be nearly three months of travel with six months spent here in Nott. No complaints, whatsoever, I love it... but...Who knew?

in the spirit of procrastination, i uploaded all of my pictures. from the hundreds that i took, i narrowed it down to under 300... they are all on my picasa page and if you have a little time to look...
enjoy!

safely back in the flat...

first of all, thank you SOOO much for all of the mail that awaited me in the flat when i arrived. it was wonderful to walk in and see a pile of mail just for me from friends and family.
right.
so:
after a three and a half week long whirlwind tour, i am safely back in the flat. yesterday at around 9:45am kate and i got home from our 6:25am flight from madrid. everyone (except for ryan who is delayed in madrid) is home safely and it is great to see them all. we had a relaxed night in the flat last night ... reading, movies, and catching up :) spain was wonderful, but not as amazing as paris. i will blog more later, but as for now, i have a final paper due on thursday and so i will be spending most of my time working on that...
i will eventually get pictures posted as well, but bear with me.
christmas and new years were great over here... i hope you all had wonderful holidays as well :)
more soon xoxo