Papers ahhhhh

Well here I am again, turning a paper in right before the deadline. To be fair my topic was really hard to find supporting material on. I'm sure my sister can corroborate this since she is proofreading it and is probably thinking I don't have enough examples to support my claims. At least it is only a 100 level class so it won't be graded as hard. It is now 1 AM and I am waiting to hear from my older sister to see if she is feeling generous enough to check my second draft. Hopefully that happens soon so I can go to bed and still be able to get up in time for my Italian lecture tomorrow. We will see.

I am also getting ready to go on vacation for a month! I am going to Italy with my parents for two weeks! I can't wait to see them, I haven't for 3 months! After that I am meeting up with Matt and Philip to go to France!!! Paris on New Years should be fun! Then Matt is going back to the States and Philip and I are gong to the South of France. Around the 7th I am flying to Holland to meet up with one of my new friends over here. Claire is letting me stay at her house for a couple of days before heading home again. This is going to be one of the most memorable winter breaks of my life!

I have Christmas cards for my grandparents I just have to get myself to the post office, it is at least 45 mins away. I'm going to do it tomorrow. This time it is for real. I also have to print off all of my confirmation emails for flights and hotels and hostels (just 1 don't worry mom). I will not have my computer so I will have to blog about it when I get home. If you facebook me that is why I am not responding.
Laters,
Regina

Avenbury, Stonehenge and Bath!

Guess where we went last weekend? We took a hired coach to Avenbury, Stonehenge, and Bath! Avenbury is a town that has a ton of stone circles similar to Stonehenge, except they do not have the stones on top and you can go right up to these stones and touch them. And you can do all of this while enjoying a game of dodge the poop. The stones are in sheep grazing fields, so there is poop everywhere! I stepped in a landmine right before we left. While eating our lunch, we found a shop that sold ice cream, so naturally quite a few of us got some even though it was freezing outside and it hurt our hands to hold it. Still worth it.

Next we drove to Stonehenge in Salisbury, we got the audio-guided tour but I didn't listen to very much of it. I think it is better to just go and look at the stones. They are very beautiful and there is a lot less poop surrounding them!

Then we went to to Cathedral where we ran into Joe Ballandby. After that we got some time to shop in Salisbury and Philip and I picked out a new scarf for him. After an hour we were off to Bath, by this time it was getting close to 5 so it was getting dark. Our days are really short up here, usually it becomes pitch black by 4:45-5 pm. A couple of us went to this little Italian restaurant, I got mint ravioli with a tomato lamb sauce which was delicious!!

On our last day we got to tour the Roman Bath house and at the end of the tour you got to drink some of the water, it tasted like salt water, in case you were wondering.  We also got a tour of the city from a very energetic and enthusiastic guide of the city of Bath. This tour included the Royal Crescent, best known from Jane Austen's Persuasion.  We also saw the Circus, which is a beautiful area of houses. Marin and I ate lunch at this tiny pub on some side street. I think it was the best fish and chips I have ever eaten. On our ride home we couldn't figure out how to work the heater  until the last hour of a four hour car ride. Bob, our driver, picked out a restaurant by a loch for us to eat at for dinner. He then proceeded to explain how a loch worked even though we all said we knew what it was when he originally asked.

Overall a great trip, great weather, (it was cold but no rain). I went to Scotland for thanksgiving weekend with my friend Claire! She is looking at the University of Edinburgh and asked if I wanted to come along. Hmm do I want to go to Scotland? YES. I missed being with my family for Thanksgiving, and I heard they all meet in Afton this year instead of my house. I am currently in the process of procuring my Nottingham ultimate frisbee swag. I'm going to have a new warm up suit when I come home that I am planning on never taking off. Get ready family. It's green yellow and black.
Laters,
Genie

I Went A Walking

The last couple weekes have been full of travel. Two weekends ago our flat took a house trip to London for the weekend where we got a tour of Parliment, which was much better than expected. And we went to evensong at Westminster, where we saw Camilla!!! When we stood up for her to walk by she said thank you to our group! That's right, addressed by royalty! We got to do whatever we wanted that night. Some of us meet up with our friend Sachin who often frequents London, he took us to an Indian restraunt to eat and then we went to a bar where everyone was dressed up for the weekend before Halloween. We have all become very good at navigating the tube system even though I got stuck on a different car once.  The next day we got to do whatever we wanted as well, which involved a lot of indicision and walking but was very fun all the same.

The following Wednesday Philip and I went to Leicester for our assignment to travel to a town for a day trip. We went there and saw the towns Cathedral, it seems that every town has one. We also went to the Jewry Wall Museum which is full of Roman artifacts, and got into the site where they think they may have found Richard the III. We were not technically supposed to get so close to that site but the gate was open and there was no sighn. We got a couple of good shots of the site before being shooed away by some type of guard.  We also walked through the castle gardens and saw the mound where the castle had been built.  Eventually it started raining and Philip and I took cover in the mall, so we ended up shopping a lot and I bough a new scarf.

This past weekend I went up to Norwich which is about 2.5 hours away by train for the women's Frisbee regional tournament. I got bumped down to second team, but got appointed captain and it was really fun getting to know some different girls better! Our first team qualified for nationals and our second won the plate (got 9th) out of 11 haha.

This week is a reading week for two out of three of my classes, so I am done with class tomorrow. I think I might be coming down with something again as I cannot stay awake once I get home. Hopefully I can get a lot of my Greek reading done this week so I don't have to bring my book with me on break. Speaking of break, I cannot wait to see my parents!!!! Our plans are to go to Italy for two weeks then to meet Philip and Matt in Paris for a week, and then I will be staying at my friend Clair's house in Holland. Get pumped! Today is bonfire day so there have been tons of fireworks going off for the past couple of days. We are going down to the fair grounds to see some of them tonight.

Sorry for the brief sum up of what has been going on I promise Ill do better on our trip to bath this weeked.
Laters
Genie

I have recently developed a social life

Sorry I have been neglecting my blog a little! I have recently developed a social life, which is a nice change. As I mentioned before I joined the Frisbee team here at Uni, and it is great! I made the women's first team, which is their 2nd best team. The best one is boys and girls (mostly boys). I also went to my first ultimate tournament this weekend in Loughborough University. About an hour away by bus and train. Our team (Fling) entered 2 beginners teams. I was on Fling 2. My team placed 16th out of 24th and our other team placed 21st. Not too bad if I do say so myself.

 I got to know a lot of the members better and made some friends.  I almost got the nickname Aladin, since my name is Genie, but it got vetoed by some of the other girls. They decided Genie was novel enough for a nickname. One of my other teammates got the name Ballen. Ben plus Allen, he wasn't allowed to have the name Ben since one of the older players is named Ben. We slept on a floor of a church hall with about 4 other teams, which was interesting to say the least. Loughborough threw a Frisbee party and a lot of us ended up in the church drunk, trying to find our sleeping bags in the dark. Someone used my feet as their pillow during the night as well. I didn't have a sleeping bag so I grabbed one out of our flat closet that looked like it was from the 50's. I tried not to think about the last time it had been washed. I'm going to invest in one that condenses down really small. I have been referred to Blacks, an outdoors store, kind of like Scheels or Active Endeavors.

  This weekend there is a women's only  tournament in Nottingham which means there is no entry or travel fees, plus I can make lunch at my flat instead of packing it.We have practice every weekday but Tuesday.  Monday and Wednesdays are at the Jubilee campus, only a 20 minute bike ride away from the flat. I don't want to walk because then I have to walk through Aspley (my suburb) which is slightly sketch at night and there are no buses between Jubilee and our flat since it is "close". Unfortunately all the bikes at the flat are in slight disarray. I think I have found one that will just need; new brakes (the right brake does not work at all), re-grease the chain, and some lights so I don't get hit by other bikers. You can bike on the pavement or the road but I'm not confident enough on the road so I'm sticking to the pavement. Also I'd love it if someone would mail me my helmet so I don't die! hint hint wink wink.

Other than that classes are going pretty well, loving Italian.  I have once again forgotten what time my first lecture is, and arrived on campus 2.5 hours early.  I finally got some of my books for Greek so I can start to catch up on my reading for that class. Philip, Aimee and I are going to take a day trip to Lenton where they think they have found one of the English kings. We are trying to work out a day that we can all go. I can hardly believe that it is already halfway through October! I'm finally taking Kenza's advice and growing out my bangs like I should have done this summer. They are once again at that horribly awkward length where they are always in the way and look weird with headbands. My piercing is finally starting to heal so my refusal to take it out even though it has gotten infected twice has worked out, since I still have two ears. I need to go get a new earring because I am allergic to most metals other than silver and gold so then it can finally heal all the way. It is going to be extra expensive since I am in England. 

Laters

Genie

What can I say? I'm a fast learner.

I am concluding my first week of classes here at Nottingham Uni and it has been great despite getting lost before almost every class. Luckily, I've made it on time to all of them.

 I'm finding reading lists slightly confusing: four pages of books that you might find helpful or interesting in relation to the class you are taking. I'll just ask my profs about it in more detail. I guess I should say lecturer, not prof, though. Also, the library is confusing. There is a short term part where you're supposed to be able to go and read something for like 2 hours and then return it. But you can also apparently put those books on hold so others can't read them even though no one else is using them. Dumb. I'm also finally starting to get some of the lingo down after three weeks of being in England. What can I say? I'm a fast learner.

Yesterday was the social for the triathlon team which I was planning on joining. It was being held in Mooch, the bar in the basement of Portland building (like the Union of most campuses). To get there I have to take two buses and walk a couple of streets over. Unfortunately, the buses do not run as often at night as they do during the day, so I was running late. As I reached my second bus stop I saw my bus (the 34) leaving and it wouldn't be back for 20 mins. I took the 36 instead of waiting, got of at the wrong stop and ended up having to walk by myself through (what I assume must be the poorest lit part of campus). And when I say walk I mean all out sprint. And when I say all out sprint I mean run to the nearest tree hide behind it while I scope out the surroundings to look for rapists and continue in the same fashion all the way to Portland.

 Finally I got to mooch 45 mins late and could not find anyone from the triathlon team anywhere. I followed some people into the back room of Mooch and ended up in the middle of the Frisbee social! It was just like being back home with the Freya and Pound except they all have awesome British accents so they are more interesting to listen to (sorry Luther). They even have weird nicknames for the boys. I started talking with some people there and now I'm on the team! I have seen a couple of them around campus today. I'm going on a beginners tourney next weekend which I can't wait for! This will also be amazingly less expensive than the triathlon team which is brilliant!

This weekend is a trip to York, which I need to do a small report on (due tonight). We have had a couple of guest speakers whom I find horribly boring (sorry D Ran but it's true). None of them are very charismatic and they come right after dinner, so I'm sleepy. One spoke about the education system in England and the other was just a get to know the area speech.

Right now I'm trying to kill time till my next lecture which is at 16:00 and its only 13:13 blurg. But what I'm really doing is glaring at a girl who has a seat that looks really comfortable that I want. Hopefully she leaves soon so I can have it. Maybe if I make it more obvious that I want that spot she will feel awkward en

Everything is more interesting in a British accent

Hello again,
I am currently on campus for my first day of class. Picture me with my Northface backpack on, in the usual "first day of school" photo op that parents always make you take. We have to take two buses to get on to Uni Park campus, first one of the turquoise line then the 34 orange line.  Of course I was running late today and didn't even get onto the bus until 10:18 when my class is at 11, and it takes at the very least 35 mins to get to campus. Then I took a wrong turn on the Canning Circus stop and had to backtrack, thankfully just in time to catch the 34 to campus. Once there I walked in the complete wrong direction, until I suddenly realized the bus had dropped us off right next to Sir Clive Granger (the building that I was supposed to be in).

 Finally at 10:58 I arrived in my lecture hall just in time for the lecture to begin, only half covered in sweat from nerves and walk/running everywhere. The beginning lecture was excellent, and the class promises to be awesome, but who would have thought differently with a title like Introduction to the Archaeology of the Roman Empire. It doesn't hurt that the professor is British which makes everything he says immensely more interesting to listen to.

Next I went off to buy my Italian text book. £23 in case you were wondering. Hopefully the library will have most of my reading list, as I am planning on spending most of my money on clothes. To say I stand out would be an understatement. The English here dress at once much better and much worse than me. Even my semi dress clothes appear shabby around the other students.

I have narrowed the style of dress down to two main ideas: posh and ghetto. The posh clothes are AMAZING, I want them. (Lauren Russett would understand my need to shop right now.) They all seem to have a million scarves that work effortlessly with their outfits, cropped skinny jeans, pretty sweaters and purses/bags.

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       The ghetto kids remind me of the tv show Skins. They wear leggings with pacsun-esk t shirts or baggy sweaters and either throwback nikes or white vans. Backcombed hair seems to be a big fad with them as well. Oh, also a lot of girls wear super short cut-off jean shorts over leggings or tights...and sometimes no tights. I have only seen a couple girls on campus who have backpacks and they seem to be the foreign exchange students. I'm going to need a bigger purse (wink wink nudge nudge mom). Even the boys are dressed better than me but I have not been paying attention to their trends as much. Oh and I already bought some new shoes. They. Are. Awesome! So cool I had to write it in Shatner style. Also, thinking of buying a leather jacket. A cute one, not a biker one if that makes any sense. A lot of girls have them here.

Presently I'm sitting in the Cafe in Trent building, which is where my Italian class is at three (currently 2:13 or 14:13). Hopefully it goes well. I haven't taken a conversational language in a while, wish me luck! Planning on hitting up the library after class before I go home. Apparently I'm not allowed to join the skydiving club according to my mom. Even though it is a great opportunity to get out of my comfort zone and try new things! Oh well, I still have the triathlon club, hopefully. I'm not sure if I will be able to join due to our flat dinners not coordinating with when everyone in England eats dinner. Hopefully we can just move dinner back so we can adjust to the culture.

I'm Looking for a road bike with 600/700c wheels in case anyone reads this and has any suggestions as to where in Nottingham I could buy one cheap or rent one for a year.  Philip and Aimee are making dinner tonight so it will probably be great.

Untill next time ciao!

A Series of Unfortunate Events

Sorry for the delay in my updates! Things have been a bit hectic. We made it to England! Our awesome group waited for four hours at the train station for us, thank God. Otherwise Phillip and I would have had to buy train tickets to get to our flat.

Before I forget, we have already traveled a bit before orientation. Sorry about the disrupted timeline, I am sick and don't feel like trying too hard on this. Lo siento! As soon as we got to England, David Ranum (or D Ran as we call him) had us walking everywhere! We had a tour of Nottigham, we ran out to Lincoln for a day, and to London for a day as well. All of these were brief visits without much time to spend in the beautiful buildings that towns had to offer. They were more of an overview in case we wanted to visit on our own. I did take lot of pictures and put them up on facebook.

Now back to the flat, it is fairly big, with 5 bedrooms, a kitchen, living room, dinning room, entry way, and library. It is a little janky, as we expected. The bunkbed I share with Marin shakes like an earthquake every time one of us moves in the slightest. If you want to have a shower that is not rotating between boiling hot and freezing cold, then no one else can be running water. But we all realized how good we have it after attending orientation this week and staying in a dorm called Crips. I still maintain that I had a ghost in my room that shuffled around while I tried to sleep- an activity which proved more difficult than I ever before. In true form to my unlucky life, I got sick while staying in the dorm, and so have half my flatmates (possibly due to me but who really knows). We are all sitting around our living room in two or three sweatshirts trying to fight off the shivers and aches we are having.

This last paragraph is just really a jumble of last thoughts, sorry. I've really gotten to know the neighborhood by going running most mornings, just a mile or two. And I usually stop by the local fruit shop that we have an account with. Next week we sign up for classes which don't start officially until October 1st (I believe).  We walked to the city center today which is downtown Nottingham.  We got our bus passes today which I view as a Godsend. If you know me well you know I hate walking places. Alli Wright my summer roommate can attest to this. But we have all been whipped in to marching shape as D Ran's walk is like a normal person's light jog. The Ranums ( D Ran, Brenda his wife, and Rylea their 13-year-old daughter) have been great helping us get settled. Brenda has been cooking for us and it had been delicious!!! Rylea is an energetic girl with a great sense of humor who we would all love to spend more time with, I think maybe to the chagrin of the Ranums. Oh and needless to say Brenda makes us all miss our moms (shout out to Teresa Preston). T-t-thats it for now folks

Genie

Goodbye 'Merica

Goodbye America! I was ready for this plane ride! I had not been on a plane since our last family vacation to Florida, which was circa 6^th grade. 8 hours would be no problem for someone who did a road trip to Alabama. That is if it was indeed 8 hours. Our flight first got delayed for 45 mins in Chicago, and as I watched the flight attendents congregate together and whisper, I knew we would not be boarding soon. This was confirmed by the unfriendly blonde attendent who announced we wouldn't be departing untill 2 a.m,. and there were no hotels available near by. As if I was willing to pay for a hotel for 4 hours.

Now, as I sit 3 hours into our 5 hour delay with my 12 dollar dinner voucher, I am pondering the idea of Dunkin Donuts or Starbuck hot chocolate. Our new friend, who is unfortunately nameless because I don’t remember his name (he is going to graduate school at Kingston next year) and Philip have gone off to get their dinner/breakfast. Only the wailing baby near me seems able to express what all of us on American Airlines flight 98 are feeling at this moment: fatigue, hunger and impatience for this part of our journey to be over.

Hopefully we will find some cheap train tickets to Nottingham since we will most likely no longer have a driver to pick us up at the airport. But this mode of transportation may be a little more scenic.

I'm not what you would call a creative type

Hello,

First off left me apologize for my blog title. I'm not what you would call a creative type. You may now be wondering,"why are you writing a blog if you are not creative?" The answer is and will always be, because I'm lazy. There will never be time to write personalized letters to each of my friends and family back home telling them about what it is like for me to watch t.v. in a different country instead of on my futon. So if you get an email or letter you should feel special and write back! I hope I meet my reader's standards of what a travel blog should be with my witty and cynical observations on life that you can chortle along with. I am not writing this to pass on my traveling wisdom or promote any political statements. I just tend to have awkwardly funny encounters that I know my friends will appreciate. Hopefully that will not include painfully detailed recollections of food that I have eaten along with photos of said food.  But I make no promises.

Right now I am in the midst of packing/putting off packing. It doesn't feel as if I am really going to go to England for 9 months. It feels like I am just telling everyone that I am leaving while instead I am really living in my parents' basement. Yeah, all those photos you are going to see... they are fake. I totally photoshopped myself in them while in my new basement home. All of this is leading up to why I do not feel like packing my bags. I don't think I can fit my pillow pet into my bags, which just makes me sad. Goodbye Montague the giraffe. 

Phillip, my friend and classmate, is currently getting our seats. He has assured me that if we dress nicely that we will have a greater chance of  being bumped up a class as he is still grumpy that we are in economy seating. Oh, he also reminded me that dress clothes are just more comfortable anyway. I must have forgotten that fun fact the last time I wore heels. I hope that a nice sweater, jeans, and chacos count, because that is as dressy as I am willing to get for our 8 hour plane ride (I don't really know how long it is but that is my best guess).

Monday has never seemed so far away!