Days 30-34

Day 30:

We checked out of our Hostel early in the morning and were met by some blue badge guides to lead us around the Royal Mile and the Edinburgh Castle. Our tour guide happened to be LDS and went to Ricks College. She was so excited to give our group a tour. We got to see the changing of the guard, the Scottish War Memorial, the King and Queen’s apartments and the crown jewels. The crown jewels were sort of a disappointment after the Tower of London. After the Castle we went to the Sir Walter Scott memorial which was huge! It was the largest memorial I have seen. We then walked up to the Scottish Parthenon.  We only spent a few more hours there and then the rest of the day was spent driving to York. I feel like I need to go back to Scotland. I wasn’t totally satisfied with all I saw. I feel like I would have loved to go out and see the countryside more, too!

Day 31:

York was a really fun little town. The cathedral was so impressive. It is the largest in Britain. Apparently, York and Canterbury were always fighting to be the religious center of Britain. Unfortunately for York, Canterbury got the archbishop, so York decided to build an even larger Cathedral. I thought it was even more amazing than Notre Dame inside and out. The cathedral was made of a light stone almost yellow. It was a lot brighter on the inside than most cathedrals. The most unique thing about this cathedral was the amount of detail that they put into it. We went to this part of the cathedral called the Chapter House. It was dome shaped with stained glass windows. Beneath the windows there were carvings of individual faces. Every single one was different and there were at least a hundred in the room. Throughout the cathedral the carving was incredible. Everything was so unique. The stained glass was some of the best I had seen. One of the tour guides talked to us about stained glass restoration for nearly an hour. The work they are doing on just one window costs 40,000 dollars a panel and there are at least 30 panels. It is not a safe job either. People who do the restoration have to get their blood checked every two weeks because of the chemicals they use and most of them have back problems. The cathedral was my favorite so far; it was stunning. Then the rest of the day was spent driving back to London.

Day 32:

Yea for Valerie and Brad getting married! I was so sad to miss it! But congrats and I love you guys!

This was one of the only days of the trip that we didn’t have scheduled out. Amanda, Lauren, Tiffany, and I went to Kew Gardens. It was 300 acres of gardens and greenhouses. We were there for about three and a half hours and only saw a sliver of all they had there. I loved it! It was, for once, the most perfect weather in London! It was sunny and not too hot. And it didn’t rain! We started out going to one of the greenhouses that has African plants. It was so neat to see so many I had never seen before, and so many of them were huge! We then went to a green house that was just a large pond full of lilies. They were gigantic! A few were four or five feet across. We accidently stumbled into this rock garden that had a section dedicated to each continent. It was neat to step from North America into Asia and see the different plants. We went to a rhododendron garden that was full of bushes with flowers in all different colors. After that we climbed up a ton of stairs to walk along this path that led through the treetops. When we climbed down we ended walking through a forest of bamboo. One of my favorite things was all of the willows with hanging branches we could walk underneath.

That night we went to this Dutch Pancake restaurant for Kayley’s birthday. We had no idea what a Dutch pancake even was. Some of us got savory ones that had pepperoni or bacon with apples and syrup. They were gigantic! They were about a foot across and they weren’t what we were expecting. They were like crepes. It was so delicious.

Day 33:

Went to church! This week in primary I played the piano and sat in on the CTR class. Last week there were about 15 kids, this week there was only three for the first hour and then two more came. I am so impressed with how much these kids know. They remembered everything from the lesson the week before, and I have never seen kids more eager to answer questions. This ward is so nice to us also. I almost wish we were here longer so that we could help more and feel more like a part of the ward and less like visitors. By the time we are done here we will only have gone 5 or 6 times.

That night we had a fireside from a former stake president in the Wandsworth Stake. He talked all about what it was like to live during the Blitz in World War II. Most of the things I had already learned about in my history classes in high school, but it was really neat to hear it from someone who had actually experienced. He had to be taken to Wales to live with some people he didn’t even know part way through the Blitz. Being here and seeing things and hearing from people who lived here and visiting people’s homes makes the history so much more amazing to me.

Day 34:

Midterm. Wicked tonight! More tomorrow!

Day 29:

We started the day by hiking to Rydel Estate, one of the cottages on the estate was one of Wordsworth’s homes later in his life. The estate had beautiful grounds. We walked to a little building that was six feet by six feet with only a window. Through the window was a beautiful waterfall with a stone bridge over the top of it. Before the days of photography people would go out with a mirror an empty frame and find the most beautiful piece of scenery they could find and hold their frame there. The little cabin with the window was built with soul purpose of framing that waterfall.

The next three hours were spent in the coach driving to Edinburgh. We finished watching North and South for “homework.” I loved it! We watched it to help introduce our discussion of the industrial era in our history class and Victorian writers in our English class.

We arrived in Edinburgh at four in the afternoon. We stayed at a five star hostel, and if that hostel was five stars I don’t even want to know what a two, three, or four hostel is like. There was eight of us in one room. The shower was in its own room, kind of like a closet with a shower head and nothing else which was weird.

We ate dinner at the Elephant House Café, the birthplace of Harry Potter! JK Rowling wrote her first two books in that café. More time was spent taking pictures outside the café then spent eating in the café. The walls of the women’s bathroom were covered with notes to JK Rowling. On the hand dryer somebody had written, “JK Rowling dries her hands here.” There were lots of pictures of her in the restaurant. During dinner a few of us wrote on our napkins random Harry Potter sayings. After we got dinner though we were very surprised that she would have even written past page one in that café. The food was terrible! I ate there only because JK Rowling did, and I don’t think any of us would go back.

We walked around the streets of Edinburgh. Most of the buildings were black. Apparently they tried cleaning the buildings in Edinburgh a few years ago. They started with the Walter Scott Monument (the largest monument in the world commemorating a writer), but when they did ears started flying off, noses got broken, and fingers started to fall off. They found that all the coal and soot now acts as a sealant, so they can’t clean any of the buildings. We started up at the Edinburgh Castle and walked down the Royal Mile. We passed John Knox’s home, Scottish Parliament, the Cathedral, the Adam Smith Monument, and the Royal Family’s Palace.

At eight we began to climb Arthur’s Seat which is the highest point in Edinburgh. It is the place where Orson Hyde dedicated Great Britain for the coming forth of the gospel. It was a steep climb and it took about an hour to climb to the top.  The view was fantastic. You could see the ocean, Edinburgh Castle, and city that stretched on for miles. We spent nearly an hour up there looking around and taking pictures. Just for fun we read The Tables Turned by Wordsworth when we were up there. We got to see the sunset from the top and it was spectacular!  

Day 28

Today was a great day! I woke up first at 5:30 because the sun was up. I thought I had slept in! The sun sets at about 10:30 and rises at about 5:30 everyday. I can’t imagine what it would be like to live here in the wintertime. We are staying in this cute little bed and breakfast and we got served a full English breakfast. Complete with blood pudding… I have tried pretty much all the food this trip, but I couldn’t try that one…

After breakfast we hiked a fell or a mountain. I don’t think you can actually call it a mountain. I would call it a large hill… The view was beautiful! We could see lakes and farms. We were so hot by the time we got to the top. We figured because we were going to be in Northern England and Scotland it would be cold. We were very wrong. It has been in the 70’s the past two days and all I brought were long sleeves and jeans. It was totally worth it though! I have pictures at the top on facebook.

For lunch we went to the Apple Pie Café in Ambleside. I have never had better Apple Pie. It was to die for. I couldn’t even get a picture of it I ate it so quickly. I also got a Cornish Pasty which is like a beef stew pastry. It was really good. For someone reason I always feel like I have to blog about food even if it something as plain as apple pie…

The rest of the day was spent at Dove Cottage. The poet laureate, William Wordsworth lived there for eight years of his life. In my English class we have been reading some of his poems and I love them all. Some of them are really well known such as “I wandered lonely as a cloud” or “Ode: Intimations of  Immortality” which is read in General Conference often.  My favorite is “We Are Seven.” I bought a book of his poetry while at Dove Cottage. It was fun to read it where he could have written it. After touring Dove Cottage we went to workshop where we got to see the first editions of his Lyrical Ballades, Frankenstein, a few books by Samuel Coleridge, and letters between various people in the Wordsworth family. Most were love letters between Wordsworth and his wife that have just been found recently. They were really beautifully written. They asked us to try and transcribe them before we got to read transcription they had done. It was so hard! It felt like indexing without spiritual gratification… After that we at dinner in Dove Cottage with recipes from Dorothy and Mary Wordsworth’s cookbook. The food was pretty bland, but it was neat to have something they actually ate. It was like a beef stew with rice. There was also boiled potatoes and carrots. For dessert we had a crème with lemons, eggs, and sugar. Not my favorite dessert I’ve had so far…

Tomorrow we head for Edinburgh! More then!

Day 27

Today we drove and drove. Our first stop was the England MTC in Chorley. We knew the church was true when we saw that there were trash cans and drinking fountains as soon as we walked in. We were met by the first counselor in the mission presidency. His wife is President Hinckley's daughter, and they were the nicest couple. They told us all about the MTC. The MTC is for all english speaking missionaries in Europe and for all German speaking missionaries. It is near Preston because of all the people who were baptized there when the missionaries first came. In 1850 there were more members in England than in the United States. The members who came over were a great strength to the church. The River Ribble is about a 15 minute drive from the MTC where the first members were baptized and the Preston temple is about a 5 minute walk. We got to tour the MTC which was really neat because I have definitely never seen the inside of the Provo MTC. We ran into a few missionaries who I think were overwhelmed to see 30 girls all at once. There are missionaries from 18 different countries at the MTC. Right now there are 7 couples and 61 missionaries. After the MTC we walked up to the temple and then drove to the River Ribble. At the River Ribble I ran into the first people I knew from the States. I ran into the Harknesses from our home ward in Mapleton. I really wanted to run into somebody I knew while I was in Europe, but I didn't actually think I would! It was so fun! I told them to say Hi to my family and we took a picture together.

Later we drove to Ambleside. Ambleside is beautiful! It is so green. It is in the Lake district and has mountains. I missed mountains so much! They have building codes here so that everything looks uniform. They all remind me of beautiful little cottages, and most are in the tudor style. I even saw a movie theater today that looks like it might have once been an old church. It was kind of crazy to see a movie theater as a three or four hundred year old building. We went on a hike today around some waterfalls in Ambleside. Here a waterfall is still called a force. We hiked and walked around Ambleside for five or six hours and had a wonderful time. It was a nice to take a day to explore and see old churches and gardens and waterfalls. I am so excited for all of the hikes we will be doing this week. I know I said Paris was my favorite, but I think Northern England and Scotland are going to definitely beat it. More things to come! Tomorrow we are eating in Wordworth's cottage. So excited!

"There is no easter bunny, there is no tooth fairy, and there is no queen of England."

Day 25

I haven't been blogging as much because we have been doing a whole lot each day this week. It has mostly been homework and class and eating gelato…

On Thursday for our London Walks class we went on the Olympics Walk. An old police officer for east London was our tour guide and he was hilarious. Our walk was two hours long. I honestly wasn't very impressed with what London had done to get ready for the Olympics...maybe they will do more as it gets closer, but I couldn't help but think they were cutting it kind of close. East London has typically been known as the slums of London. They thought that having the Olympics there would give them a chance to fix it up. Total they are spending 12 billion dollars on the Olympics. There were a few interesting things that we learned. London was not planning on doing the Olympics and seemed pretty obvious that France would win the vote. However one of the French representatives voting on where they Olympics were said that nobody would want to have the Olympics in Britain. They said that other than Britain the only other place with worse food was Finland. The Finnish voters were standing behind him and ended up voting for London. Also, during the last five years everyone has been issued new Visas. The last number on the Visa card is a number indicating how "attractive" you are. Those with the highest number will be in the honeyshots for the Olympics. The stadium was ok and I honestly didn't see anything that particularly impressed me during the walk. The swimming pool was amazing. It had this crazy dome shaped roof. However, after they made it they realized it didn't have enough seats so they extended the building and added risers. Now you can't see the roof... I am sure London will pull it together more by the time we get to the Olympics. 

On Friday we went to this church called St. Martin in the Fields. We went to a baroque concert put on by the Festival Orchestra in London. It was all by candlelight and the building was beautiful. They played Vivaldi’s four seasons, Mozart, Bach, and Pachelbel. I wish I could have gotten a program. The best part about it was that they had a harpsichord instead of a piano and it was so neat to hear it played in that building. It was a really neat experience.

This morning we toured Parliament. It was a beautiful building. It was really interesting to learn how their government works. Most of the things they talked about I had learned in my history class. I love all the things I am learning!

Not much happening right now! More tomorrow and then we leave for Northern England and Scotland!

Day 22:

Today was so awesome for all the girls in our group... One of the boys in our group said he was going to bring earplugs to protect his ears from all the excited squeals at the Jane Austen house, Bath, and Stourhead.

We left early this morning to see Jane Austen's house and the church where she lived. I wasn't especially excited about her house or the church. They weren't very impressive compared to a lot of the other things that we had seen, but knowing that I was standing in the room where she wrote some of my favorite books was a pretty neat experience! They also had one exhibit in her house where they had all of the original illustrations from Pride and Prejudice. It was really fun to see that! I bought Persuasion from the gift shop at her house to read on the way home.

Next we went to Stourhead. It is this beautiful estate with miles of gardens. There is a lake and some neat little buildings. Really I can't describe it and my photos don't do it justice. All I can say is it was so breathtaking. I wish everybody else could see it too, so they know what it was like it. Some of you could see it because the proposal scene in the rain in the Keira Knightly Pride and Prejudice was filmed there. While I was there I tried Apple Strudel ice cream. It was divine, definitely a new favorite.

Next we went to Bath. I had no idea how old the structures surrounding those hotsprings were! The Romans built the temples surrounding them only a few decades after Christ's death. They eventually were covered over and in the 1800's restoration began on them. It was a very large spring. After touring the hot spring we had the chance to drink some of the water! Don't worry they assured us it was very safe. It was hot and the orthodontist/dentist appointment aftertaste. Something I will probably only try once...

For dinner went to an Irish pub. It ended up being somewhat of a disappointment, they pretty much only had hamburgers and chicken wings on the menu! I should have found a gelato place for dinner...

More tomorrow!

Day 20-21

This week is a week for school and homework! We were in Paris half of last week and will be in Scotland all next week, so I guess we should probably go to class a little bit... :)

So I guess just a bunch of random thoughts for today!

I feel like I am starting to get the hang of London. I can pretty much figure out the tube and get anywhere I want to and I know where to shop and get stuff to eat. I still feel like there is so much more to explore though! I feel like I have only gotten to see a small piece of London. We have a London Walks class where we have to do eight specific walks around London. We walk through the parks and around the city. It's fun to see the people who live here and see what they do everyday. The parks here are so beautiful! They are so green, my camera does not do them justice. It makes me really want to go home and walk around and see the neat things by where I live! I love running into little shops and finding great food or books or other things! I feel like there is a lot more things I can explore at home, too.

I love being able to study British Literature and History while I am here. I noticed while I was in Paris that it was just not as exciting to see things because I didn't know their importance or their story at all. Just something I've noticed... Today in class we talked all about Art History and Jane Austen. I loved it! We talked about the progression of art and watched this really great clip! It was so funny, it was the credits on Wall-e, but as you watch it the background goes through all these different forms of art. It starts with cave drawings to hieroglyphics to mosaics and goes through all different art forms like impressionism, etc, etc. It was kind of fun! Then we seriously went through and talked about art :). Talking about Jane Austen was great, too. We talked about how well she does character development, about her life, and about how she was someone who really saved the novel and was the great novelist of her time. Then we had a great discussion of the relationships in Sense and Sensibility and the characters. I have really missed being in English and having great discussions like that!

Last night we went to this play called Written on the Heart. It was about William Tyndale and the translation of the bible into english. It was a little long, but it had some very moving scenes. It really made me realize how hard it was to translate the bible into english and all of the sacrifice that was made by people to do it. It was really neat to hear how important it was to Tyndale for common people to be able to read the bible. I think that as Latter-day Saints we sometimes take the bible for granted and don't realize how important it is and how many things had to happen for it to get to us. I have gained a much better appreciation for those who have given us the opportunity to read the bible.

So I've tried this new thing called Digestives. It sounds like a horrible medicine that you take like tums or something right? Well, that's not what it is and I am so addicted to them! They are these graham cracker like cookie with chocolate on one side. A whole package is like a pound and I can't stop buying them!

Something I never thought would be hard: crossing the street. I didn't know I always looked a certain way first! And these people don't slow down or stop when they go around the corner. I don't even know if they know that people are crossing the street. Or maybe they don't care... I am more afraid of dying crossing the street than anything else...

I guess I should talk about how my church experience has been, too. It is interesting to be in a ward that is mostly converts and that has so many different ethnic groups, mostly not european. It is a very large ward, but most of them are inactive. Even so, it is quite large for a ward in London. It is interesting how they go through and spend a really long time on some basic principles. The other day in Sunday School we talked about the difference between a seer and a prophet for a long time. Most meetings are really wonderful. There has been one meeting where there has been some contention and where it almost felt like the teacher had an argument for every comment made. For the most part though, this ward is really sweet. I have noticed that this ward really loves each other so much! They are so kind to each other and are always willing to talk to everybody and make them feel comfortable. I have met a lot of really great missionaries in my ward, too. I found out that one of my friends from high school Michael White is AP in the mission my stake here is in. That was pretty neat!

I really want to run into a celebrity while I am here... Just for fun. Some girl in our group ran into a famous artist today. I was a little jealous.

Tomorrow we are going to Bath and Stourhead and I am so excited! I'll blog about it tomorrow. I still haven't figured out how to respond to people's comments! I am not ignoring them just trying to figure it out. I'll get it down soon though!

Days 14-18

So much to catch up on! I didn’t have my computer while I was in Paris, so we will see what I can remember of all the things we did!

Day 14:

Our last day in London before Paris was so much fun! We went to the British Library which I honestly didn’t have very high expectations for, and it was amazing! I saw so many amazing things. I read Jane Eyre in Charlotte Bronte’s handwriting. I saw Jane Austin’s writing desk, Oscar Wilde’s diary, Shakespeare’s first folio, the Beatle’s manuscripts for Help and Yesterday, William Tyndale’s New Testament, the Magna Carta, and manuscripts for a Beethoven Violin Sonata, Ravel’s Bolero, Handel’s Messiah, a Haydn Sonata, and some Schubert Lieder. And that was only a few of the things I saw! I loved it! It was neat to be able to see the composer’s handwriting or read Oscar Wilde’s thoughts or read out of the first folio! It was so neat! Later that night every single person went to Phantom of the Opera except for me. I was the only one who didn’t buy a ticket, but it was so nice to have the center to myself!

Day 15:

Best day of London Study Abroad=First Day in Paris

The first day in Paris was magical! We took the Eurostar over at 6:15 in the morning and I slept the whole way there! We saw the Louvre for just a few minutes and then were rushed away to the Arc d’Triomphe. We walked down the Champs Elysees which had amazing store after store. We stopped at a little bakery and got paninis. The waiter would tease us about being American and talk to us a lot. I think all of the waiters and waitresses liked to tease us because we were American, sometimes they’d lean around the corner and stick their tongue out at us on the way to another table or they wouldn’t hand us our menus or they’d make jokes with us. They were so funny!

The best part of the day was seeing the Eiffel Tower! I don’t know why I didn’t have great expectations for it (probably because it is talked about so much), but it was the most amazing sight! We took at least 50 pictures in front of it. We climbed it all the way to the top and the view was spectacular! It is such a beautiful structure.

Later we got crepes, something we made sure we did every day we were there. Our group met for a riverboat cruise down the Seine. I think it was my very favorite part of the whole trip to Paris. We saw Notre Dame and museum after museum. I didn’t know the names of most of the buildings I saw, but they were incredible. One drawback to the Paris trip was that I didn’t know a lot of the history because we haven’t been studying it like we have London. I had to write down a lot of things to look up when I got back to the center. People on other boats and sitting on the side of the Seine waved to us and blew us kisses. My friend Lauren’s reaction to the cruise, “this is the most romantic thing I have ever done and I am all by myself!”

Towards the end of the cruise we ended back at the Eiffel Tower and it started sparkling! I didn’t even know it sparkled!

Day 16:

We tried to fit in everything we possibly could our next day in Paris. We were running around Paris for 14 hours straight. My feet have never hurt that bad. We wanted to make sure we hit all of the things that we could, and so that’s what we did! We woke up bright and early and went to Notre Dame. It was a beautiful building on the outside, but I wasn’t as impressed when I walked inside. I thought Westminster Abbey and St. Paul’s Cathedral had more impressive decorations, stained glass windows, and more light was let in. Then we went to the Concierge where Marie Antoinette was held prisoner. We also went to Saint-Chapelle which is a chapel that is basically all stained glass. It was so beautiful. It was the most amazing stained glass I have seen. Better yet, I got to take pictures while I was there!

Next we went to Versailles. Our directors told us it was kind of a let down, but I thought it was incredible! The palace was so ornate. They had a hall that was all mirrors and chandeliers. The ceilings were all painted, and the rococo style made the rooms even more impressive. We walked around the grounds even longer than we did the palace. We walked through a maze, laid on the grass while eating ice cream, and went for a boat ride on the lake. We also Marie Antoinette’s home. The weather was amazing! It was 80 degrees and sunny! I hadn’t experienced that in a while… That night we went to the Musee d’Orsay an impressionist art museum. I think we were a little tired to appreciate it as much as we could. I loved the sculptures more than most of the art. The Roudin was my favorite. We got out of the Orsay at 9:45, and then ran as fast as we could so we could see the Eiffel Tower sparkle one last time.

Day 17:

By Friday, we were so burnt out from Thursday it was hard to do hardly anything. We went to a bakery first, and got some sandwiches that are ham and cheese, but all the cheese is on the outside and they broil it. It was the best cheese I have ever had, and I think one of my favorite things that I got in Paris. Then, we went to the Louvre, but didn’t appreciate very much because we were so worn out! I would love to go again and just spend a whole day there because it was so huge! There were some really incredible paintings. I wasn’t too impressed with the Mona Lisa; it was tiny! But there were so many other things that were just incredible!

Next we went to the Orangerie which has Monet’s water lilies. It was way better than I expected. They wee larger paintings that stretched along each wall in one nearly oval shaped room. The walls were white so they wouldn’t detract from the paintings. It was so beautiful. It was almost relaxing to look at those paintings, and I loved how they were set up.

With our last couple hours in London we ran to the Pere Lachaise Cemetery, so that we could at least see a few famous people. The biggest ones we wanted to see were Chopin, Rossini, and Oscar Wilde. We didn’t have much time to look for anyone else. There were security guards driving around in vans telling us it was closing soon and that we should get out of there. We had already seen Rossini and Wilde, but I really wanted to see Chopin so we literally ran all around the cemetery looking for him! Another van came up to us telling it was closing and we pretended like we were walking towards the exit, but we were really just looking in more and more lots in the cemetery. Finally we found him! We snapped a few pictures and then ran out of there just as it was closing.

By this last day I was pretty satisfied with all I had done in Paris, but I was really excited to go back to London. I really like being in London! I like that I speak the language, I think it is cleaner, and I like the tube way better than Paris’ metro. I like both places a lot, but I really just enjoy London, and I think I am getting the hang of where things are and what I like here.

Day 18:

Yesterday was my day to recharge. I spent the whole day doing homework, grocery shopping, and eating. The only thing I did was go to the BYU Singer’s concert in St. John’s last night. Yesterday, I bought a lot of fruit and it is so expensive here! I paid five dollars for four apples! It was crazy! We passed a little stand that had all kinds of different breads, olives, and desserts. I bought some Turkish delight, and fizzy licorice with crème in the middle, and a huge loaf of focaccia bread. I love going around and discovering little stands or going to markets and finding new foods. It has been really fun! Next week is mostly classes and homework it looks like. I am going to try and go see 39 steps and maybe Singin’ in the Rain next week. Should be fun!

Day 12-13

Day 12:

On Sunday I went to my official ward for the first time. Getting there was an adventure. With all of the strikes and tube closures it took us two and a half hours church. We took four tubes and went to two different train stations before we got there.  In the end traveling two and from church it took about 3 to 3 and a half hours round trip. We were an hour late, but about a third of the ward was also because of all of the tube closures. Our ward was very small. It was mostly Africans, there was one Irish family, one Tongan family, and two English couples. Only two of the families there even had children. The ward was really excited to have us there. The bishop asked all of the kids from BYU to come up and bear their testimonies. It was a really neat experience.

Day 13:

Monday was such a great day! We had English in the morning, which is a great class. We talked about Twelfth Night and Shakespeare the entire time, and had some really great discussions. After that discussion I like twelfth night a lot less than I did before after going more into detail. We talked a lot about how the plot isn’t well developed, the crudeness of the play, and the bisexual references. Before I just thought it was a fun lighthearted play, but after discussing it I don’t think so any more.

After English we had a free day! That doesn’t happen very often, so we made the most of it! Jaden, Amanda, Kayley, and I did some things on our list that we aren’t doing as a group. First, we went to Buckingham palace. It was a beautiful building. We were sad that we couldn’t go inside, but the grounds nearby, St. James Park, were beautiful. I can’t believe how green it is here! I think the parks and the green space here in London is amazing.

After that we walked down a street called the Mall which leads to Trafalgar Square. We got a picture with the lions and the best part was trying to climb up them and a get a picture. It was raining so we were all slipping on the pillar we were trying to climb. It was so funny.

We went to the National Gallery of Art next which I had already been to, but it was even better this time! The National Gallery is huge!! We all loved it! We spent two and a half hours there and it was not enough! We saw Rembrandt, Van Gogh, Monet, Manet, Da Vinci, Michelangelo, and many people we didn’t know. I wrote down all my favorite paintings, but the list got far too long. There were so many neat paintings that I had never heard of before that were just incredible. I think it was the highlight of the day.

We found Jeremy Bentham, a man who died in 1830 who asked for his body to be preserved. He is still dressed and his body is still there. Some students stole his head a while ago and then it started to look funny, so they put a wax head in. We found the case that he is displayed in, but it was closed because it was a bank holiday! Literally all of the exhibit was open except the body. We were a little sad about that.

Yesterday we ate a lot of great food also :). I tried some Salt and Vinegar and Cider chips (they call them crisps here). They were amazing! I can never have regular Salt and Vinegar chips. I think I am going to have to bring a lot home! We also went to Scoops! Great gelato. I had cookies and cream, hazelnut, and pistachio gelato. Surprisingly their cookies and cream was incredible! It was seriously the best ice cream I have ever had!

I’ll write for today later!

Day 10-11

Day 10:

Nothing happened. One word. Homework.

Day 11:

Today was a lot of riding in the coach! But we saw a lot of really neat things! We rode a little over an hour or so to Brighton and went to George the IV’s Pavilion. Most of the time when I hear the world pavilion I think of picnic tables under a roof behind a stake center. A pavilion is more like a palace! It was incredible.

It was built during a time when there were a lot of English were going to India. They didn’t necessarily want to live there, but they wanted to bring back part of that culture with them. So on the outside the pavilion looks like a piece of India. It was kind of funny to see it in the middle of England. It had all kinds of Chinese and Indian decorations inside. My favorite was a chandelier that was held in the jaws of a giant dragon. They said that some of the guests to the pavilion were too afraid to sit under the chandelier. In King George’s time it was one of the first places that actually had plumbing in England. He had one room just for himself that had four different kinds of baths. It was a beautiful palace and had the most amazing decorations and furniture. One piece of furniture that I thought was really fun was a beeswax shield. A beeswax shield is this oval shaped piece of metal on top of pole that women would stand in front of when checking themselves out in the mirror over the fire so that the beeswax makeup wouldn’t melt off their face.

            There were many very famous people that came to the palace to visit. Rossini performed there once. (I love Rossini!)

            Later we went to the beach. It is the only time I have gone to the beach wearing two jackets, long pants, and rain boots. I was still freezing! I stood in the ocean with my rain boots for about five seconds before I got tired of it and went inside.

            After Brighton we went to Canterbury about two hours away. We went to the Canterbury Cathedral where the Archbishop Thomas Becket was murdered. We could take pictures!! I was so excited we could actually take them and then…my camera died! It was very sad. We also got to go to Evensong at Canterbury which was wonderful! My favorite part was the boys choir. They were really quite good and they sang so high!

            For dinner tonight I went to Nando’s. It is a restaurant that has lots of meals with chicken in them. I got a Mediterranean salad that was seriously the best salad I have ever had! It had olives, cucumbers, tomatoes, cheese, paprika dressing, grilled chicken, and corn. And then I had hazelnut gelato. A perfect ending to the day! 

More London Pictures

https://picasaweb.google.com/106275476571793953979/LondonPictures?authkey=Gv1sRgCNjzkc-0vYKEvQE

Day 2 pictures!

https://picasaweb.google.com/106275476571793953979/Day2OfLondon#5738442797971086354

End of Day 9:

End of Day 9:

Today Amanda, Jaden, and I walked around Kensington Gardens. We saw Kensington Palace where Kate and Will live. They live so close to us that if they were LDS they'd be in our ward ;). It was so green! The trees were so beautiful! They have a Princess Diana memorial, a Peter Pan statue surrounded by beautiful flowers, and a few other statues. And it is only a 10 minute walk from the Center! We are going to rent bikes and go biking through it soon!

Matilda! I saw Matilda the musical tonight. When I went in I had very low expectations. I mostly went because I had never heard of the musical before, and it has been around very long. It totally exceeded my expectations! I thought it was one of the most entertaining musicals I had ever seen!! It was my favorite one I've seen so far (excepting Les Miserables). The cast was mostly little kids and they were incredibly talented! The dancing was so clean and clear. Things popped out of the set everywhere and they had really amazing special affects with lasers and shadow puppets and confetti! Miss Trunchbull was hilarious! Her part was played by a man to make her extra tall and large. All of the actors were spectacular. I was so, so impressed. I was blown away! It kept me laughing the whole time! I wish my family had been there to see it I know they would have loved it, too!! I am definitely seeing it again while I am here!

Day 7-9

Day 7:

Tuesday was so great! We went to Hampton Court all day and looked at the amazing palace and gardens. The palace was incredible. The most interesting part to learn about was how they prepared the food for so many people. There was a whole courtyard for bringing food through, a hallway that acted as a refrigerator, and numerous for cooking. They often made meat in a dish like a shepherds pie, but what was interesting was that they didn’t eat any of the bread that went around the meat. It was used simply as a way for cooking meat. There were people in charge of keeping track of silverware and leftovers and the amount of food eaten. I learned that many times people had to move from a place like Hampton Court because they had exhausted all of the resources around them, by how much they had eaten.

The palace had amazing artwork, most of them beautiful women in amazing clothes. My favorite part of the palace was the grounds. The gardens were incredible! There were trees that were cut to look dome shaped. There were French gardens that were very detailed. They had overgrown gardens with wildflowers and varieties of trees. A whole day didn’t even give me enough time to look at all of the gardens there.

That night we went to Lion King! I was wondering how they would do the costumes and the set, and I was so impressed with how they did it! Sometimes I forgot they were people performing. I thought the part where they had the wildebeest stampede was so amazing. The set was just so neat. My favorite characters were Rafiki and Mufasa. Their voices were like butter; they were so smooth and clear. I loved the extra African songs they added into the musical. It was funny when some of the actors tried to speak with an American accent. It would sound southern, then east coast, then west coast, then British, and then I had no idea what accent they were trying to do!

Day 8:

Yesterday we went to Westminster and had class for three hours. I am not super fond of three hour history classes no matter how interesting they are…

Even though I had been to Westminster  before, I loved going back and seeing new things or things I had forgotten. This time when we went we had a tour guide. I learned so much on the tour! Westminster was crowded! I could hardly walk, it was very different than the last time I had gone.

We saw the coronation chair while we were there which is the oldest piece of furniture still used for its original purpose in the UK. It was built in the 1300’s. It had been through a lot. Westminster choir boys had written their names on it many times. Suffragetes tried bombing it and succeeded without totally destroying it.

It was really neat to learn about some people I didn’t know were buried in Westminster. Thomas Tompian a famous clockmaker was buried there. It was interesting to learn how important clock making was to the English. It helped them with so many different trades and was really important. Michael Faraday who contributed a lot to the study electromagnetism was also buried there which was neat because I am taking that class in the fall. I saw Newton and Darwin’s graves as well as many other important scientists. The Herschels were buried there, one of which discovered Uranus. Flemming the man who discovered Penicilin was also there.

This time going through it was neat to see how many musicians are buried there that I didn’t know were. I saw Elgar, Britten, Handel, Purcell, Clementi,  and Vaughn Williams. I went home and read a lot about Britten since I hadn’t heard much of his music. I am kind of excited to listen to their music again. We are also going to see some of Handel’s original manuscripts later in the program, which I am so excited for!

I also saw the grave of Queen Elizabeth and Bloody Mary. It was even cooler to see that now knowing their family history, their religions, and that they hated each other. Honestly though, I think the British were a lot more excited about the Queens and Kings and I was more excited about the musicians, writers, and scientists.

I saw Chaucer and Dickens grave as well! I’ve been reading their works while I have been here, so I really enjoyed that.

Then came the highlight of the week! I saw Les Miersables last night! The story is so great. It is by far my favorite musical. Jean Valjean and Javert were so incredible. Eponine was African and she had a great voice. Gavroche was so wonderful. He had a good voice and he was such a great actor. I think the only time I cried in the whole play was when he died. It was so powerful. Cosette was awful! I mean she was terrible. She sang everything super rushed and she had a really obnoxious voice. The set was so cool. They did a lot with different pieces of the stage moving. They also did a lot of great effects with the lighting.

Greatest discovery of the day: Waffle Palace! I got a waffle with Belgian chocolate and vanilla ice cream. It was divine.

Day 9 Mostly…:

Today we had English for 3 hours. We talked about the history theater for the first two hours, and I really enjoyed it.

Today we also went to the British Museum. We only had two hours! Not enough time, I am so going back. Jaden and I did all the Egyptian, Greek, Roman, and early European history as fast as we could. Yep, we are definitely going back.

We saw the Parthenon, about 20 or so mummies, some telescopes, the Rosetta stone, and so many other things! Just a few neat things I saw… I saw the Lindow Man which is a man that they found who had been preserved since 60 AD. His skin was all leathery and his face looked like it was melted. There was also one of these men in the Egyptian section, but what was neat about him is that he still had hair! It was crazy. I learned a few things in the Egyptian exhibit. I learned that the Egyptians believed that when you died you had two spirits, the ba and the ka. The ba is the spirit that can go into the spirit world and wander around or the traveler. The ka stays in the tomb. For that reason they burry the deceased with things to do. I saw one mummy where they wrapped all his fingers and toes separately. I also saw eel, baboon, snake, and alligator mummies. It cracked me up all the things they wrapped up! It was really neat to see some of the Parthenon and read more about it. I was amazed by all the pieces they put together. I really just need to go back and read more though! It was just not enough time to go through!

Tonight is Matilda the Musical and then more tomorrow!

Days 5-6

Day 5:

So we didn’t do a whole lot today…

·      I went to the only single’s ward in Europe, The Brittannia Ward, which was mostly Americans, Brazilians, and Asians.

·      I did dishes for 50 people for the last time!

·      I chatted with all of my cute siblings and my parents and figured out why everyone can see me when I chat and why I can see no one! Not a whole lot.

Jaden’s been making fun of me because I always start sentences like this, “Do you know what I’ve noticed?”

So here are some things I have noticed about London…

·      People do not talk on their cell phones when they are walking around here.

·      People try and stay out of your way. They don’t talk to you or look at you. It’s understandable when you are around people all the time and never get a moment to be alone.

·      If you don’t watch for cars you are a goner. People zoom around corners and cars definitely have the right of way.

·       

Day 6:

Shakespeare Day!

Today was all Shakespeare! We went to Anne Hathaway’s cottage where she grew up. The gardens were so beautiful, and it was a cute little Tudor house. We also learned some neat things about Tudors. Wives had to be in the house at a certain time each night to put the fire down so that the house wouldn’t burn down at night. They would put something over it literally called “cover the fire” in French. Over the years they shortened it into curfew, and that is why the time we have to come home each night is called curfew. Fire was a very important thing in Tudor culture. It kept the family warm, cooked their meals, and it was the wife’s responsibility to keep track of it. Husbands were allowed to beat their wives if they let the fire go out as long as they used a stick thinner than the width of their thumb and only if it was at night so they wouldn’t wake the neighbors. That is where we get the phrase “rule of thumb.”

The house had very low ceilings and small rooms. During Anne’s life it had only two rooms. The floor in the kitchen was the original floor which dates back to King Henry the VIII’s time. The grounds had hundreds of tulips and beautiful trees. They had little vegetable gardens as well.

Next, we went to Shakespeare’s birthplace. We walked around his home and I actually got to stand in AND take pictures of where Shakespeare was born! They were a pretty well off family, and their home was much larger and more spacious than Anne’s. I think it was also built more recently than Anne’s. When we left his home we got to see someone perform an excerpt from Romeo and Juliet through the window of his home. It was fun to Shakespeare performed in his home.

Shakespeare’s church was our next destination, and it has been the only church so far that I have been able to take pictures in so I went crazy! I took tons of pictures! I took pictures of their graves and the stained glass windows. I think I was more excited that I could finally take pictures in there than that I was actually seeing Shakespeare and Anne’s graves. The grounds of the church were beautiful! I love how green it is here!

That night we went and got Italian food before we saw our performance of Twelfth Night. We saw Twelfth Night in Stratford just a couple blocks down from Shakespeare’s birthplace. Our professors warned us that would probably be pretty risqué knowing the other shows that they had seen there, but that it was important for us to see some Shakespeare while we were in Stratford. The set was incredible! They had water under the stage, so that when Viola and Sebastian got shipwrecked they came on the stage out of the water. The floor bent upward and made the floor seem to go even farther near the back of the stage. They had an elevator also. It was so neat. The setting was England in the 40’s or 50’s. It was a pretty risqué in some parts, but from things we heard we were really happy that it was as clean as it was… The acting was phenomenal!

Little from Today:

It’s been really fun to get to know people in my group here! There are so many cute girls. They are all so fun! A couple of them are trying to plan my wedding for me while I am here, asking me my colors all the time and asking to see my dress and asking about the food. They’ve all been giving me ideas and telling me about how they want their wedding. One even made a pinterest board on her pinterest for me. It’s been way fun! I love having Jaden here. It’s so great to be her roommate again!

Steven sent flowers to the center for me today which was so sweet. We all came in at the same time, and everybody clapped and waited around to see them.

More about today later! We went to Hampton Court and we are seeing Lion King in a few so I want to get that all in there!