Londres and Oxford, otherwise known as Harry's backyard...

This post is dedicated to Nicole.

I just got back from London and Oxford; well, I've actually been back in Granada since Monday night, but classes have been going on, so I've been pretending to be busy with those. Just in case you're wondering, I'm taking the Political System of the European Union (riveting), Introduction to Linguistics, Varieties of Spanish, English to Spanish Translation, and an advanced Writing and Conversation class. At least that's my schedule at the moment - we'll see what actually sticks around, as I've got until Friday to make changes.

England was phenomenal. I knew that I liked London from the two nights I had spent there before about two years ago, though I was a little apprehensive to go back. The first time was after spending two weeks in Spain and France, and my mom and I were so happy to speak English that we would have been happy in Arkansas (well, OK, that's not true, but you get the point). I just wasn't sure if it would be so great the second time I went. It was. Getting there was hellish, but only because I had to take a taxi to the bus station at six in the madrugada, take a bus to Málaga two hours away, get on a city bus and then in a taxi, all to fly out in a hurricane. When I arrived in London, however, the sky was perfectly clear, the temperature around 70 degrees, and the leaves were actually changing colors! You must bear in mind that yes, in Spain the leaves do change, but they turn brown and die. England, strangely enough, is very much like New England in fall, just not quite as spectacularly colorful. My friend Steve met me at the station after my train ride into the city, and off we went to swindle my previously-booked hotel out of some money by sneaking him in for the night.

Demonstrating my amazing ability to take a picture with one hand and not look like it.

That night, we went to see a show in the West End (London's answer to Broadway). We had no idea what we wanted to see, but we didn't want to spend a lot of money. We walked by a theater advertising "39 Steps!," a comedy, apparently, based off of an old Hitchcock movie. "Why not?" we thought. We stepped into the box office and asked the man about the £10 box seats. "How are those guys?" "Great, if you want to sit behind a pole three balconies up behind a large woman in an even larger hat," came the answer. "OK, how about the £22.50s?" Then, he had a sudden idea. If we happened to be students, he told us, we could get the best seats in the house for £15. Needless to say, we did it, and sat in the third-row orchestra. The show was great: the 24 characters in the show were put on by a four-person cast which was very adept at quick changes and wonderfully ludicrous British humour, especially when they needed to play two or three characters who appeared on stage simultaneously. It also snowed on us at the end of the show (more accurately, foam fell on us from the ceiling, but it was pretty cool - I can't actually remember what that had to do with the plot).

The next day we left for Oxford. I live in a stunningly beautiful area of Spain, but Oxford had it all over Granada, at least in a different way. I think it helped that I've been yearning for fall, and also that the weather could not have been more perfect. Many, many of the buildings date back to the 12th century, and Steve took me on a great little tour around town and past some of the colleges. Oxford is very much a city, just with ancient buildings filled with brilliant, beautiful people with British accents, surrounded by a river and beautiful meadows. I miss green fields. There's a whole lot of red dirt in Spain. And the green there is amazing.

Punting along the Thames. OK, so this isn't punting, but some people were, and it was very atmospheric.



The most amazing part of the day, perhaps, was when Steve left me to go study - but not because Steve left me. I decided to entertain myself by paying £3 to walk around Christ Church, one of the "clotted cream" colleges of Oxford, according to Steve, which means it's where all the rich children of Lords go. I'm curious to see if you can tell why it was amazing from the pictures sans description (here's where you come in, Nicole!):






You guessed it! Christ Church was where they filmed many scenes for the Harry Potter movies, namely for the Great Hall and the stairs leading into it (seen above). Steve ruined the magic a bit for me by telling me that the actual hall at Christ Church (which they still use as a dining hall) was too small for the movie, so they essentially recreated it exactly (except for the magical ceiling) in a barn somewhere in the English countryside. But it didn't really matter. Amazing.

After spending the night on Steve's comfy floor, I left the next morning, falafel-and-hummus panini in hand, on the bus for London. That afternoon, I went to the British Museum (very cool, but I think the Met is better), ate at an Indian restaurant that night (Indian food!), and spent the next morning walking around aimlessly before I had to head to the airport. I walked around Regent's Park, which was originally designed as a garden for the extremely wealthy who were to build their houses around it, but which is now just beautiful. It was also the setting for 101 Dalmatians.





That morning, I also visited St. Paul's Cathedral, but just saw it from the door because I was too cheap to pay to actually walk around it. After that, I stopped by Temple Church, a 12th century replica of the Church of the Holy Sepulcher in Jerusalem. Less interestingly, but still worthy of note, it was featured in the popular novel/Tom Hanks movie The DaVinci Code. It wasn't supposed to be open, but happened to be, and was beautiful and peaceful, the perfect respite before my fight for a turkey and cranberry sandwich at a busy deli for lunch (we don't have turkey in Spain, and it is a staple of my diet!), and the awful, awful RyanAir flight back to Granada.

Capilla Real

Yesterday was pretty cool. As you know, I started class, and as you also know, I've been going to choir rehearsals, despite the fact that I can't sing with the chorus in their concert on Sunday in the Capilla Real (the section of the cathedral in Granada built by the Catholic Kings as their burial site) because I'll be in London, visiting my friend Steve, who's also keeping a blog. That didn't stop me from going to rehearse there, in spite of the fact that I had missed the last four rehearsals for various reasons. It was absolutely unbelievable. First of all, the group met outside the Capilla after it had been closed for about two hours, and we were shown in by a security guard. Of course, no one was in there, and we were pushed through a secret door hidden behind a blood-red velvet curtain hanging next to one of the two side altars. As we walked behind the 30-foot high iron gates next to the 40-foot tall gilded altar (though not the main one), we passed through a three-foot thick wooden door, and up a huge, slippery, curvy staircase from the very beginning of the 16th century. At the top, the whole Capilla opened up to us in the choir loft, which overlooked the three major altars in the darkened, cavernous space, the majority of the light reflecting off the four huge marble sarcophagi of the royal family behind the massive gilded grille. We were greeted by a gilded, carved sign stating "Hic Est Chorus," or Here is the Chorus, in Latin. It was great up there; not only did we have a phenomenal view, but everything was dusty, they hadn't replaced the floor, so it was the original ancient tile, and there was graffiti all over the stone balcony, some of which dated from the 1800's. The acoustics were also phenomenal. Who needs a bishop as an audience? It was very, very cool. Here's a picture.

Today, I went to "Dunkin' Coffee," the name Dunkin' Donuts has given to itself in this country, and ordered a Dunkin' Original, the only way you can get a "normal" American cup of coffee in a to-go cup. I wanted it because it's pretty blustery today, and I have to say, it was the best cup of Dunkin' Donuts coffee I've ever had. In the morning, I went with some friends to a gelatto shop I don't much care for to try one of their specialties: essentially, a piece of ice cream cake in a cone. It was pretty good, but way creamier than what I'm used to here, so I'm not rushing back. Tomorrow I fly to London, and I found out that the earliest bus I can take gets in only an hour before my plane leaves if everything runs on-time, so we'll see how this works out.

Bruselas

Madrid was fun, but a lot like I left it about a month ago. We also met up with some students from another program in Toledo and had about 15 bottles of wine between the 20 of us on our program's tab (not something they were expecting), so that was nice. Also, we checked out the cathedral in Segovia, which I missed the last time I was there.

Brussels was amazing, if not very cold and wet. In fact, it rained every day we were there, and only got nice the afternoon of the last day. None of us, though, really had clothing that was appropriate for the temperature. In the hotel, I literally had to step over the toilet in the bathroom to get into the "shower area," which had only a hand-held nozzle clearly meant to hang on the wall but which lacked a piece or two of hardware, while the tub was about big enough for me if I squeezed in and held my breath. Unfortunately, I got pretty sick in Madrid with a cold, and didn't really have the luxury of being able to breathe for the majority of the trip; this is a problem in a place where the only thing to do is eat. You might think I'm kidding, but absolutely everything we did in the city revolved around eating. We had waffles covered in sugar, nutella, bananas, strawberries and ice cream on the street, we had french fries with curry ketchup and mayonnaise wrapped in newspaper, we had mussels, we had cherry beer, we had Chemais beer made by Trappist monks somewhere in Belgium, and we had lots and lots of chocolate. From the free samples alone I have gained 12 pounds, but, not to worry, I have quite a bit stored here in my closet. In fact, we tried to go to three museums, and only made it to two. The Comic Book Museum proved impossible to find, especially in the rain, so we had to settle for the Museum of Chocolate and the Museum of Beer. We went out for a really nice dinner the first night we were there to a restaurant which formerly had three Michelin Stars, but which has recently been downgraded to two. Despite the fact that I could taste almost nothing and that it had been knocked down a peg, it was one of the most memorable meals I've had. One of the girls I was with has culinary aspirations and a direct attitude, and the next thing we knew we were in the kitchen having our picture taken with the chef. Once I get copies, I'll get those up on here, assuming that I don't have bloodshot eyes, a glazed look from the amount of drugs I was on, and something dripping out of my nose.


This is a picture of the Grand Place, the main plaza in the old section of town. Unfortunately, this doesn't do it any justice: it's huge and stunningly beautiful. Each of the smaller buildings around the plaza was built by one of the guilds of the city back in the 17th century. The most impressive building, I think, was built, unsurprisingly perhaps, by the brewers.

In other news, classes started today, I have my other two classes tomorrow, and then I'm off to London and Oxford. ¡Que paséis una semana fantástica!

La Policía

This morning I had to get up at 6:15, which is practically unthinkable here in Spain. You see, for all of my efforts with the Spanish government's admirable attempt to recreate hell on earth known as the Spanish Consulate in New York, I was only able to get a three-month visa, though I will be living in Spain for a year. Students here for six months, however, receive a six-month visa. This, I am told, is standard practice. Because of this, it was necessary for me to go over to police headquarters last week to petition a visa extension and student identity card. A woman who works for my program and I tried one day, found that the line was too long and that they would let no one else in, and so we left. The next day, my program's director got into line at 7:00 AM, and we (myself and Cristina, the program's twenty-something coordinator) took over at 8, being number 130 in line out of 150. There were, of course, about 400 people in line, but no one after 150 was told that they wouldn't be entering the building, so they continued to wait. At about 12:30 we finally entered, only to wait at another window for another number, to then wait in line again at the window of the woman who could help process my paperwork. I signed everything I needed to, and was told that I had to come back the next week to have my fingerprints taken and to pay some "nominal" fee, which, being like the Consulate, I couldn't pay at the police station, which meant I would have to leave with a paper from the station, go to a bank, pay there, and get a money order to take back. This was after waiting in line to get into the building again.

Which brings us to today. This was a four day weekend for me, since I finished my exam on Friday, and I was the only student in the group who had Monday and Tuesday off, also. I thought about traveling, but no, they told me, it would be best if I went to the police station Tuesday morning to do my prints. "OK," I thought. I packed some fresh almond and lemon zest biscotti in my bag from my "mom" (there are some perks to living where I do), and set out. I thought about getting a coffee or a paper on the way, but then remembered that there is no coffee to go here, and that nothing is open before 7:15, so that was impossible. I had enough foresight to rent a movie for my iPod (Dial M for Murder, I'd never seen it) so that I could watch it in line. I got there around 6:45, and knew that they start handing out numbers at 8:30. One step in the process is to put your name on a list to get a numer to get a numer to get the final number, which I did, being 140. Remember, last time they let 150 in. The north African man behind me in line kept pressing up against me because A) there is no concept of a kinosphere here and B) he was trying to watch my movie. Also, it was about 35 degrees here this morning when everyday it has been in the 80's, which is why my sandals, my sweater and I were freezing this morning; I realized this as soon as I stepped out of my building, but I didn't have time to go back for a jacket. At 8:30, we were told that they had decided to let only 130 people in that day, so that there were no numbers left. They don't actually tell anyone, you must leave line to go ask this, which is why the rest of the people in the line wrapped around the back of the building are futilely there still waiting. I went up to ask one of the massive police officers if I could possibly get in just to do my fingerprints since I had already been to the station and missed the arbitrary cutoff by 10 people, and was told to get up at five next time. This coming from a man who doesn't get into work until 8:30, and probably can't function until he's had his steroid-laced espresso in the morning.

So, I called the program coordinator, who told me that it wasn't really necessary that I go today anyway, and that she would accompany me the next time when we get back from our break. "Oh," I thought. "I'm glad I didn't take advantage of this weekend." She also reminded me that I need to go back for a third appointment at the station, in order to pick up my ID. The DMV is a Caribbean resort compared to this place. I'd write to someone, but I don't think they'd care.

In other news, I was shaking so much as I walked home from the cold that I dropped my iPod onto one of the marble sidewalks, it broke out of its case, the case cracked, and the iPod went flying. It still works. The same might not be true of my new computer, which has started making a strange noise, and of course there are no Mac stores here where I could have it looked at. It was a lovely morning :o) We leave for Madrid tomorrow, and I must say, I'm very ready. The only thing to be seen now is whether I'll be allowed back into the country after Belgium, since my visa hasn't been extended. Ehh.