Garden Party Anyone?

Back from the U.S., an amazing trip (to say the least). The fast-paced life in New York definitely made my return to the quiet, nothingness of Filton a reverse-shock, but a pleasant shock. I can breathe again :) I can drink tea in the middle of the day, and now I can do so in my garden! PAB and I moved flats last weekend, disassembled the furniture (pulling 100 nails out of a delicate cardboard wardrobe backing is no easy feat!), though not as trying as it sounds--we moved approximately 25 feet, down. We have moved from 77B Wallscourt Road to 77A :) A pain in the butt to move everything, carrying arm load after arm load of books, clothing and airplane models, but well worth the hassle! Last weekend was perhaps the most brilliant of the summer, weatherwise, and we made the absolute most of our new garden--dinners and tea outside, burgers on our new grill! We still haven't quite arranged the garage for the car--I tried to go inside last weekend with a broom and was chased out by spiders larger than any roaches we have in Houston--but we do have a little shed for the bikes! The flat downstairs is much bigger (still relative to English living spaces), so visitors are welcome (and now we won't have to put the table in the kitchen when we pull out the futon)! Garden parties will abound!

Last week PAB and I also had a visit from his high school friend Mathieu (not to be confused with Matthew) and his girlfriend, Audrey. I acted as official guide of Bristol and London, in French! See parents, you didn't entirely waste your money in sending me to Paris :) Our trip to London was one for the record books, we did a river tour of the Thames, walked the bridges, took an inside tour of the Queen's palace (otherwise you can only go to Buckingham by invitation!), and did the National Gallery! I felt I did Mathieu and Audrey well and London justice, they fell asleep as soon as we got back on the bus for Bristol ;)

Last week I also had my Induction ceremony for my Masters programme (busy week eh?) There are 15 students in the programme, and I am the only one not graduated from U.W.E. A little unnerving, but apparently normal in England (most students who continue their studies stay at their school). The professors all seemed nice and approachable (not always the case at Rice, as Natalie can confirm with Skura), they had wine and cheese with us after the ceremony. Free food/drink is definitely a benefit of being a student :) My first class is Monday, and I am trying to get in all of the pre-reading while desperately searching employment; already a lot more work than undergrad!

New York State of Mind

The Great Return to the U.S. of A., and after three months of various shades of grey--SUNSHINE! And heat, albeit unbearable at times in the New York metro and crowded streets. I had forgotten how LOUD and dirty New York is, even getting off the plane at Newark airport I knew I had entered a completely different world. Certainly not one of polite cricket matches and afternoon tea. I got onto the elevator for baggage claim smushed in between the scratchy beards of a Hasidic Jewish family and the golden chains of Harlem's finest. The doors closed to revel a giant bullet hole in the metal elevator door--it was in this moment that I felt truly back in America :) Home Sweet Home!

The streets of New York are impossible to negotiate with luggage (I seriously prefer narrow cobblestone streets in Paris to vicious, suitclad New Yorkers on their way to work). Thank god for taxis. It amuses me how the airports change their taxi rates from day-to-day (or maybe tourist-to-tourist), but once you're in the line and they give you a number, there's no haggling. The taxi brought me to the apartment in Battery Park, a "quiet" area of New York. Battery Park consists of the financial district and the ridiculously long lines for the Statue of Liberty--thankfully both tourists and businessmen tend to go home at a decent hour. The apartment has windows covering the entire Southern wall, giving us a spectacular view of the New York harbor, Statue of Liberty, Ellis Island and Govenor's Island; definitely a benefit of 32 story buildings ;)

New York is incredible dirty. Trash and rats are commonplace. The only thing missing is the dog poop you find in Paris and other European cities; whoever made the ridiculously high fines for picking up your dog's excrement in N.Y.--THANK YOU, from the bottom of my heart (and my soles). Somehow New York's dirt just adds to the charm, a city where people are literally too busy to worry about trash and the likes. It makes the city more alive, more REAL. You see gorgeous models doing photoshoots along the harbor while trash and dead fish float in the water beneath them. I can't quite express it, but I LOVE the dirt and the chaos and even the chance encounters with the rats. It gives New York a certain vitality that Paris lacks.

There is always something going on in New York. Every night, every day, a street performance, a show, a movie premier. In less than one week I have been to a latin jazz performance, flamenco dancing, an Indie movie festival...And I am sure that I missed a 100 other things in my down time. The quality of the free entertainment (all of those aforementioned were FREE by the way!) in New York is incredible. The flamenco dancing in particular is something I would have gladly paid to see in Houston. The dancers (7 luscious Latin boys) had been performing together since childhood. There dancing infused flamenco, hiphop, acrobatics and ballet. The flamenco gives it drama (like watching a Spanish soap opera to music), the ballet gives it grace and the hiphop gives it a little edge and spunk. As if it wasn't enough to be multi-genre talented dancers, each of the 7 boys played an instrument. After finishing their pirouettes and back flips they would pick up their flute/cello/violin/drum/keyboard and show us all what pure, raw talent is. One even played the flute while doing flamenco. It's almost as if impressing New Yorkers requires multiple talents--Ah, we've seen a celloist before, but not one that can do flamenco!

I still have 5 days left. I am trying to squeeze in as many performances (hopefully a musical) as I can, reap the benefits of a big city. But, ridiculous as it may sound, I will be happy to go back to Bristol, to my little love nest in Filton where it is quiet and peaceful, where I can think and I don't feel compelled to go out every night and sacrifice my precious sleep. New York is more of a novelty for me; I will definitely be back, but certainly never for good.

"I'm leaving London because the weather is too good. I hate London when it's not raining." --Groucho Marx

After almost two months of being culturally stifled in Bristol (not that I had much more opportunity in Houston, Texas, one would just expect more from a country with royalty) I was ecstatic when PAB's sister arrived and provided a much needed excuse to escape the city limits into the big city. Little did I know that half the European and Asian world were at that very moment planning their own "escapes"...I had never been to London in August, when most of Europe is on summer holiday. And now I know why. Somehow crowded streets and metros add to the charm of nouveau cities like New York, but in Paris and London there is nothing so charming about squeezing your way down tiny cobblestone streets while half a million other tourists are bumping you with their fanny packs and asking you to take pictures of them and their extended families.

We parked in a London suburb, the first secret of a London tourist who doesn't want to pay the Emission fee for the city nor the ridiculous parking rates inside city limits. The London suburbs definitely have their charms (though I have avoided the dodgy ones), and PAB safely wedged himself between a BMW and an Audi, reassured that if someone's car were to be stolen it wouldn't be his :)

We made our way first to Picadilly Circus, stuffed into a metro between three Italian friends who kept whacking us during their conversation with their zealous gesturing and a Russian couple who said nothing but looked very cross (either at each other or at the loud Italians). Picadilly Circus and its animated advertisements doesn't have quite the umph of Time Square (maybe it's because they are posted on 18th century buildings instead of skyscrapers) and I would guess the Japanese tourists fill the same. The circus does, however, lead to two brilliant streets of shopping, Regent and Oxford. Regent street was as crowded as the rest of London, it seemed only the stores were empty. It's funny how you hardly ever see anyone go into a Burberry or a Gucci, almost makes you wonder how they stay in business. H&M and Next, on the otherhand, were fit to burst. But PAB and I had one objective--PRIMARK.

The Irish may have done many things wrong, they may be raging alcoholics and be at a loss when the potatoes aren't blooming as they should, but the one thing they have done amazingly and inexplicably right is Primark. Please, if you go to London, avoid the overpriced British retailers, Next, Dorothy Perkins and Topshop (which seems more of an overpriced store for teeny boppers), and head straight for Primark. I don't know how they do it, but Primark has managed to combine fashionable clothes with an incredibly cheap price (they put H&M to shame). Imagine, Primark is the equivalent of the designer for WalMart obtaining an actual sense of new and trendy fashions. It is BRILLIANT! I don't know whether it's that Ireland has no child labor laws or they're just going for broke to please the British, but however they do it I LOVE it, along with thousands of other London shoppers without the funds for Regent street. The lines for the dressing rooms are always crazy (I've tried early in the morning, late at night, nothing seems to shorten them in the least), but it is well worth it. The clothes fit well, they are of good quality and the most you'll pay for a shirt is £8. Absolutely LOVELY.

PAB finally dragged us out of the store and back into the crowded streets where it promptly started raining. We headed for the museums, a natural course of action in bad weather, and found ourselves squashed into the café of the National Galleries with tourists of every shape and size trying to devour their afternoon meal in a heated and dry environment. After eating our packed lunch (and getting angry stares from the café workers for taking up a table with our homemade sandwiches) we headed to the British National museum to see what the the Brits had in the way of old things.

I have never been a fan of museums of history; I like a mummy or Greek statue as much as the next person, but when it comes to row after row of broken pots and rusting swords, I'd just as soon spend a day in the sanitarium. We had to fight our way to see the Rosetta stone and the extensive collection of Greek ruins, but had almost free range of Japan and the Middle East. It reminded me of the Louvre, where everyone crowds around a 12"x12" painting of a woman with a stupid smirk while hardly anyone stops to look at the enormous canvases that showcase some of DaVinci's more interesting work. In any case, PAB and I lucked out because a great majority of the tourists were Japanese, thus giving us at least a 5 inch advantage on all the exhibits.

We ended the day with an incredible dinner at La Locanda, an Italian restaurant off Regent Street that PAB found in a guide book. Typically I am disappointed with guide book recommendations, but this one is a keeper. The restaurant is owned by an Italian man (black shirt with grey chest hair poking up over the top, gold chains, 100% Mafia) and serves the most incredible pizza and pasta at an affordable price, especially for London. Five stars in my book.

Overall, a nice trip. PAB and I will have to take advantage of our easy accessibility to London and visit during the low season (if it exists). I am open for any other visitors who would be so kind as to give me an excuse to go back :)

Hangin' Ten in GB DUUUUDE?

For my birthday (June 21st for those of you miscreants who forgot) PAB offered me, in the form of a "voucher" or coupon of the sort that children give their parents for Mother's/Father's Day, a trip to Pembrookshire, the beach in South Wales. PAB had brought an extra bodyboard from France and his wetsuit from middle school. It's always a sad day when a woman discovers that she once was (or even worse, now is) the size of her male companion, though at 5'11" I've never quite fit the dainty mold...

I waited patiently for a good weather weekend, which I am fortunate came within one month of my arrival. On Friday PAB came home from working ecstatic that BBC weather reported sunny skies and 75° for Pembrookshire on Saturday. We packed in a mass frenzy (although I was reminded of our disappointment with Air Tattoo I allowed PAB to act in the only way he knows how, anally and thoroughly). Saturday morning we packed the car to astonishingly blue skies and rolled down the windows for fresh air. We crossed the bridge (engineered by the French, best civil engineers in the world, information grace of PAB) that separates England and Wales and entered into Welsh country.

Wales is not all that different from England, though they strive to prove their independence by any means necessary. All sign were written in English and Welsh (or Cymraeg as you like). Exit Here, allanfa 'ma. No Hard Shoulder, Na 'n anawdd ysgwydda. I felt that we had entered some terrible German/Yiddish/Arabic twilight zone. I don't know how many people in Wales actually speak Welsh, but I imagine it is close to the number of Gaelic speaking Irish, meaning that the signs in Wales are all but futile attempts to conserve a dying and forgotten language. But I do admire the strong pride and the anti-Brit sentiment you find in Wales, Scotland and parts of Ireland.

Save for the multi-language signs and occasional "Museum of the History of Wales", Wales had much the same rolling hills and intense greenery of its ruling neighbor. We arrived at the beach early, and were greeted by a surprising number of...surfers? Perhaps others are aware, but I had NO idea that there was a surfing culture, of all things, in the U.K. I mean, honestly! Board shorts look much less cool when worn with a turtleneck and scarf! But here they were, bleach blond hair in their full body wetsuits. I actually saw one surfer struggling into his wetsuit while sipping tea from a travel container in his left hand. "Dude, pass me the biscuits"

PAB and I brought our bodyboards and wetsuits down to the beach and what we found there epitomizes G.B. 100s of surfers crowded into a tiny cove, all very respectful of each other, excusing themselves for the slightest infraction on someone's surf space, and waiting patiently for the tiniest of waves. Having spent most of the summers of my childhood on the beaches of Hawaii, I found the waves hysterical. PAB and I needed fins to even bodyboard and these silly Brits were going to SURF!? In addition to the sad spectacle of the waves, it was COLD. The kind of weather were Floridians and Californians are inside by the fire, NOT sunbathing on the beach. PAB and I did not have a favorable first impression.

But after 30 minutes the morning clouds disappeared, the sun came out in full force (mitigating the 65° weather) and I realized that despite their mediocre waves, all the surfers seemed to be having a gay, old time. I squeezed myself into PAB's wetsuit (making me into a flat chested blue condom) and waddled down to the water in my fins. We waited, with the other patient surfers, for a decent size wave, and suddenly, riding atop the wave on my bodyboard, I was transported back to age 10 and was overwhelmed by a giddy and immense happiness! PAB had been afraid of my reaction to the cold (not that you can feel a thing in wetsuits, they are the wonder of the cold climates), but after the first wave it was me who was pulling him back into the ocean for another and another.

The beach was eventually filled to the brim (reminding me again of how compact the U.K. truly is) with kids playing cricket and rugby on the beach, catching crabs in pools left by the tides and Brits using their disposable BBQs to cook sausage and corn. The entire day was, as the British would say, "absolutely lovely". After an entire day of beach bumming, PAB and I headed to the funfair (every British seaside resort MUST have a funfair, it is mandatory) for what we hoped would be greasy, fresh fish and chips. We found what looked like a small trailer set up outside the funfair, advertising "faggots and peas" (yes, faggots, apparently some type of sausage made of the worst bits of the pig, anus and all, I pray this is not where we got the American usage from). The fish and chips were everything I hoped for and more, the grease from the fresh caught cod literally soaking into the fries below. I was overwhelmed with the satisfaction of getting exactly what you want, when you want it.

I returned to Bristol with a sunburn, and although it hurt, it was a wonderful reminder that there is in fact SUN in England (or at least in Wales)! An amazing birthday present, one that reminded me that G.B. is what you make of it!

Master of the Universe (at least my own)

Just a quick note to let everyone know that I have been accepted into a Masters programme in Modern literature at the University of the West of England!!! I am still dumbfounded that while I was rejected from 5 teacher certification programs, I was accepted to my first choice for a M.A. Regardless, I will be studying what I love and after my year of nerdiness (the M.A. program at U.W.E. is only 12 months) I will have a two year work visa in the U.K., making it much easier to find a job :) It will be strange to be sitting in a desk again after a year at center stage...I'll have much more sympathy for the professor if he's nervous or doesn't grade papers as quick as I would like him to :) Anyway, I will start at the end of September, so until then...ABSOLUTELY NOTHING...I should enjoy being able to read whatever suits my fancy (which at the moment is Candace Bushnell's "Lipstick Jungle", I feel like I can justify it because she is an ex-Rice student), I have forgotten what the student life is like...

I have included the website for the Masters programme, in case y'all want to see what I will be studying (nerds tend to believe that others are as interested in their studies as they are) :)

http://www.uwe.ac.uk/hlss/english/maenglish.shtml

LOVE Y'ALL!

Just Another Day in Paradise...

My second event to be cancelled by "Mum" Nature! First, the infamous two hour delay in cricket. Second, Europe's largest air show "Air Tattoo" (and the event PAB was most looking forward to, perhaps even more than the baptism of his godson)! You know the weather is B-A-D when the world's large aircraft, the A380, can't take to the skies! The whole cancellation was made even more depressing because PAB had made little lists of what we needed to bring, he had printed out a map and scouted the area for the best views of landing and take-off, chairs and ice chest already in the car, he had me on lunch duty, 8 little sandwhiches all neatly wrapped in cling film...This is when I say it's better to be UNprepared! If an event is cancelled there is no cleaning or unpacking, just "Oh well, maybe next year"...

Having been in England only three weeks and having already had two outdoor events cancelled, I am beginning to understand why museums and underground transportation are so popular...It is amazing though, that when the weather is nice (meaning "sunny intervals") EVERYONE (and their little dog too, but seriously, EVERYONE in Bristol has a dog of some sort) is outside. The park behind PAB's house can't be more than a mile in length and there were 100s of Brits walking merrily back and forth. It makes me happy to see everyone outside at the slightest hint of sun; Floridians and Californians--do NOT take your weather for granted!!!

We took the sunny opportunity to fly PAB's kite, a gift from yours truly from the Boeing store in Clear Lake. The kite is shaped like a plane (with star spangled wings, HOORAY!) and actually has a little man inside with a parachute who is released by a timer. Even people who don't like airplanes get excited :) And the plane flew spectacularly...except when the little man was inside. PAB said that only Boeing would design a "plane" that could not hold passengers. Next time I'll get him an Airbus kite...

I am still waiting to hear back from the English Masters programmes (and going a little mad in the process). The pictures at the top of the post are of the Bristol flat; the American flag and the purple Volvo are PAB's :)

Why don't they celebrate Independence Day in England? And other irrelevant questions.

This past Friday was actually not my first 4th of July spent in the country least likely to celebrate America's day of independence. The first 4th of July I spent in the land of the Redcoats was with my parents, in the year of our Lord Bushhole 2005. I remember riding the London Eye on this holiday and thinking how much more joyful the experience would have been with some American sunshine, BBQ ribs and fireworks. It is no surprise that the English do not recognize a holiday where Americans cry in one proud voice "Bugger off Brits! No more of your puddings and digestive biscuits!" There are a few restaurants in London that serve "traditional American cuisine" in honor of the holiday, but the menu seems to be modelled off McDonalds and they still offer toffee pudding as a dessert.

On this 4th of July, in a desperate attempt to make a celebration of it, I insisted that PAB invite his Italian friend (thus making our celebration of America multinational) for an all-American dinner (of frozen pizza and salad with ranch) and my specialty American flag cake. This cake epitomizes the kind of American uber-nationalism that fuels movies like Borat and Team America. That being said, I have made the cake with my mother every 4th of July since childhood and it never fails to rally up a love for my country (or at least an appreciation for its hokiness).

Funny, I have never been a huge supporter of the U.S. of A., never one to hang a flag outside or cry during the national anthem. I willingly spent a year of my American college experience abroad in Paris and even more willingly uprooted myself to the U.K. But somehow, despite my failing patriotism, the moment I hear a European badmouth America in that contemptuous, elitist, "You do know that the average American eats McDonalds 5 times a week" way some dorment nationalist pride within me fires and I find myself adamantly defending fast food, gyms with elevators, Hollywood and 6 lane highways as public transportation. There are many things I do not like about America, but nothing irks me more than hearing Europeans, who lovingly eat our fast food, drink our Coca-Cola, wear our clothing and watch our films, talk as if nothing worthwhile has come out of America post-colonialism. If you were to take all of the American TV shows off television, American films out of cinemas, American music off radio, France and other European countries would be sadly quiet, deprived of the large part of their mass entertainment. I would bet a large baguette that more French have seen C.S.I. than have visited the Louvre!

With that said, I adore Europe--30 hour work weeks and 5 weeks of paid vacation, 5 hour meals and an equal number of courses, wine with lunch, churches that have existed longer than our Independence Day, tea breaks, cobblestone streets and public transportation that does not include a light rail--and there is nowhere I would rather live. Just don't f@ck with the U.S. of A. unless you are a fully qualified American. Only we know how bad it really is.

A belated Happy 4th to my loved ones in the ol' country!