Of Adventure and Naples

So we come to the last leg of the Grand Tour and at this point, I'm running out of clean clothes, my hair is a mess, and all the art has been incredibly overwhelming. Yet, there was still strength for one more and we saved the most questionable Italian city for last. Like all countries, there is the one place that has a bad reputation and you're never sure if it's warranted until you go there. Of course, due to the reputation, you probably do not want to in the first place but for the adventurous, I present:

Naples, for the daring.


Naples, or Napoli

Reading this, you might be wondering what is there to do in Naples, besides getting potentially pick-pocketed or stepping on dog droppings (since no one here picks up after their dogs).

Well, the less I say about Naples the better, only because to the unaware traveler who has never been to Italy before, you might get a negative impression of the country if Naples is the first place you visit. I haven’t experienced this kind of traffic and heart-propelling jay walking since Vietnam back in 2000. And in some ways, Naples is the same as Saigon, mainly in the traffic, the mopeds running on streets and sidewalks, the scarcity of street lights, and the trash (in piles which kind of remind me of Manhattan but bereft of any of the nightlife and convenience of wide sidewalks to bypass it). There was also the complete absence of lanes, made apparent to me when our taxi driver drove in the dead middle of the road. You need to be daring to effectively manipulate the road and traffic here and it somehow made me glad that I didn't have a car (the rare instance where I'm actually happy about that fact).

Some will say this environment is an indication of character and the real atmosphere of non-tourist filled Italy, a place where very few spoke English and when you go out to eat, it's better to just mime writing for "bill" or pointing to the cuisine you want. Yet for me, I wish I was back in Florence, if only to not have to fear crossing the road. But the pizza ended up tasting amazing (the first time I actually had a "Pizza Margherita" that I actually liked) and the hostel was clean.

Though we stayed in an 8-bed room, we ended up making friends with quite a number of people, including two students from Wisconsin, a German, a Scot, and the friendly hostel owners. We all bonded over a shared love of “The Simpsons” and Nepalese pizza.



The reason we went to Naples in the first place was Pompeii (and from what I could gather at the train station, it's the primary reason why anyone would go to Naples). The ancient city (apparently considered a real life Sodom) was a lot less preserved that I had actually envisioned. What I had thought were going to be completely intact houses were only ruins, long roads worth of destroyed walls, broken columns, and empty archways (though the houses that were completely intact gave you almost a haunted feeling when stepping within them, almost as if the ghosts were still looking). My guidebook considerately described Pompeii as "an archaeologist's dream" and somehow, the title seems fitting.



We also had a small excursion to Sorrento, or what I like to call, land of lemons since there were no only lemon and orange trees growing on the sidewalks, but shops which sold lemon kitchen ware, clothes, merchandise, alcohol, and chocolate. Try the lemoncello (lemon alcohol) if you are there, if nothing more than to see what all the fuss is about (what with all the lemon trees). It's both a really tart and a really bitter experience, which was actually strangely appealing though not something you can drink all of the time. We also sampled some chocolates within a lemon-flavored shell. Who knew lemons and chocolates actually went well together? Though definitely not something I would want all the time (I'll stick with Galaxy).

So, despite the unsavory reputation that Naples has, the wonderful pizza and trip to Pompeii was well worth the excursion. Not to mention that Naples airport boasted a spectacular view of the surrounding mountainsides (and you were actually driven out to the plane like in so many old movies).


Arrivederci Italia!

Tips:

• Watch out for dog droppings
• Beware the mopeds when you are crossing the street, they never look like they are going to slow down for you
• Be prepared to jay-walk a lot since there are rarely any pedestrian street lights
• When walking in Naples at night, walk with a friend since it does give off a seedy vibe come dark
• Eat lots and lots of pizza to warrant actually going to Naples (they did invent pizza after all)
• Pizza "Salami piccante" = pepperoni pizza, I never realized that pepperoni was not really an Italian word until I got to Italy, go figure.

Naples, the photo album

Of Religion and Rome

What do you know about Rome? Let's list some things that we do know: Julius Caesar, Marc Anthony, "Roman Holiday" with Audrey Hepburn, gladiators, togas, the Pope, and many other one-worded cliches. And this is the part where I prove all of these things wrong. When I pictured visiting Rome, I always pictured walking down Roman ruins with hills of green surrounding, peaceful and serene, taking in the history. I did that, but within a large, bustling city that not only housed ruins, but an amazing amount of churches.

I give you Rome, the city for the pious.

Rome, or Roma

A visit to Italy (and for that matter, a travel blog) would not be complete without a trip to Rome, where it (and by that I mean Western Civilization) began. To my surprise, it was not as small and intimate as Florence or Venice. Instead, what I saw were wide lane streets, moped drivers, a metro system, and car horns everywhere. Be prepared to jay walk quite a bit in Rome (and for that matter, any modern, non-tourist-filled town in Italy) since more often than not, there will not be any street lights for pedestrians. In the words of my friend Lana, "Just close your eyes and cross."

And the trip to Rome would not have been completely entertaining if not for our hostel. Actually, it was not a hostel experience but more of a coach-surfing experience with a host who tried to get us to watch “Two Girls One Cup” (wiki it if you don’t know what this because there are no words). Though the place was listed as a hostel on hostelworld.com, we were pleasantly surprised (and I use this term lightly) to find that it was actually an apartment with extra rooms. Suffice to say, interesting. At least the beds were clean (I think) and there was free internet.

Piazza San Pietro, the jewel of the Vatican City and site of a very long line

Another thing I did not count on encountering in Rome was large amounts of tourists, only because it was still late winter and as such, absolutely frigid in Rome. The days we were there was rainy, windy, and cloudy (though there was sun, it was very cold sun) which made the fact that there were actually still people standing in line outside of the Vatican Museum and the Saint Peter's Basilica in the Vatican city that much more amazing. Or maybe not....

No photos I can take will even come close to how breath-taking the Basilica was.



Allison almost cried and I almost felt pious and small standing under the immense, vaulted ceiling. Walking around, seeing the statues of Saint Peter, the past Popes, Bernini's altarpiece (hell, he designed the whole church) and Michelangelo's Pieta (protected by bullet-proof glass after some idiot tried to smash it), the splendor of it all made you almost speechless. The only thing I could say as I was inside the church was, "Oh my God," there was just no words. It was almost too big, too magnificent, too overwhelming. The sense of being eclipsed by a higher power (and I'm not usually the religious type) was almost tangible. You can only be there to feel it.

Saint Peter sitting on his throne (he's life-sized)

Rome is also known, informally by art historians, as Bernini (Baroque sculptor, his work is all over Rome) town, even if I did not see all of the Bernini’s that I wanted to see (it's my only regret while I was in Rome). Yet, the most wonderful thing about Rome was just walking down the street and seeing a random sculpture, fountain, obelisk, fresco, or chapel with a Classical façade in an obscure square or street corner. I was always pleasantly surprised upon strolling down the street and seeing a beautiful sculpture on an otherwise nondescript street corner. It was as if the entire city was constructed to be one large, complete work of art. Everything was so elegantly laid out and it was easy to see the love of art and beauty within Rome, so much so that it covered every road, piazza, and street corner. Bernini town indeed and all the more beautiful for it.


Bernini's "Fontana dei Quattro Fiumi" (we found it completely by accident while wondering the city looking for dinner)

Along with the religious imagery, there were other images that made you aware of just how insignificant you are to the grand scheme of the universe. I found this while walking around the Roman Forum and the Colosseum. You never realize the extent of the damage done to these historic monuments until you walk through them and you realize, "This used to one of the greatest empires in the world," and all you see around you is a lonely column, a stone block on a bed of grass. Even the Colosseum, known for its iconic gladiator battles (and for other methods of entertainment that usually involved feeding people to animals), is just a skeleton of what it once was. A beautiful marble structure reduced to just wooden beams and moss. Walking through it (and even thinking about it now), you realize your own mortality. If something so grand and influential can be reduced to a feeding ground for the birds, what does that say about our civilization, our life? I'll leave the question at that, at the risk of sounding morbid.

Let's just say, being in Rome, in all of its hustling and bustling glory, with its grand churches and romantic ruins, I could not help feeling small and, dare I say, a bit pious. After all, the point of building the high ceiling of Saint Peter's Basilica was to make you feel small within the grand scheme of the universe (or rather, within the eyes of God but let's try to be politically correct). In that case, for Rome: mission accomplished.

Ashes to ashes...

Tips:

• To avoid the long line at Saint Peter's Basilica (and believe me, there will be a long line), visit the thing in the afternoon after all of the tour groups have gone through it.
  
• As for the Vatican Museum, you are always going to have to wait in line, suck it up and do it. But once you do that, then head straight for the Sistine Chapel since that is usually the last stop for museum visitors. Unless you feel like elbowing a lot of people on the way to the chapel, bypass the first parts of the museum and head towards the chapel first (admire it for as long as your neck doesn't hurt since they don't allow photographs in there).
• The metro system is absolutely rubbish since there are only two lines which only covers the center of the city. They are also crowded so be prepared to push your way in during rush hour. Also, keep your hand on your purse/wallet while on the metro, I now realize why people were always warning me about that after seeing the Roman metro.
• A way to have a cheap and filling dinner at a restaurant is to order pizza. Since Italians tend to have two main courses at dinner (consisting of pasta for one and meat for the other), a pizza fulfills both criterias (and won't get you dirty looks from the waiters who usually expect people to order two courses) and will usually only set you back 8 euros. Not to mention that the pizza you get is huge.
• If you love Bernini as I do and want to see more of his amazing work in one place (instead of doing a scavenger hunt around the city), check out the Galleria Borghese (the park around it is also beautiful for a picnic or stroll). The only thing I regret is not being able to go in since you have to buy a ticket and reserve a time in advance.

Rome, the photo album

Of Art and Florence

It is official, I have become one of those people who you stare at when you go to museums. You know those types: the art students, or wannabe artists, who stand in front of the statues in the Greco-Roman galleries, pensively studying the works of art, lost in their own little world. You walk past them and try to sneak a glance into their sketchbook. Sometimes you admire what they are doing and wish you had that kind of skill…and other times you just shake your head and walk away. I hope I was the former, though from what I heard of the people around me while in Florence, the reception was not that bad, even quite positive in some cases (including the lady who gave me a thumbs up when she saw my sketch of "Perseus").

Which leads me to Part II of my Grande Tour, Florence, the city for the artist.

Florence, or Firenze

To my surprise, Florence ended up being the city where I felt the most connection to in Italy, mostly in terms of the art. After all, the city that gave birth to the Renaissance, to Michelangelo, Giotto, Raphael, Donatello, Leonardo Da Vinci is bound to be filled to the brim with art. And I was not disappointed. I had not thought that I would love it as much as I did, maybe because I had always been partial to Venice when studying art history (it's the gondolas). Yet, Florence exceeded my expectations and I attribute it mostly to the art, so excuse me while I gush about it.

The Piazza della Signatora - "On a central square, in a city made of statues and stories..."

My favorite place in the city ended up being the Loggia dei Lanzi, with its multitudes of original Baroque sculptures, all looking out at the Piazza della Signatora, the Palazzo Vechio (city hall and the original site of Michelangelo's "David"), and the Uffizi Gallery (the mecca of Italian Renaissance art and the site of Botticelli's "Birth of Venus"), I found myself screaming in excitement at seeing the Loggia for the first time. There was so much beauty and art to entertain in such a small area, it was almost overwhelming. There was nothing I wanted to do more than to take out my sketchbook, to pretend that I was an art student of the 19th century, going to Italy to learn about art, to live in it and breathe it.

My rendition of Michelangelo's "David," located in the Academia, and standing at 16 ft tall (in actuality, for the most perfect human being, his head and hands are too big for his body and his arms too long).

Being able to draw in the Loggia, standing in the Florentine sunlight, feeling the wind rustle against my skin and the sounds of the Piazza, there was nowhere else I wanted to be at that moment. As I was standing there, drawing my version of the "David," (ironically located at the Academia, in an obscure sidestreet) not caring about the people walking past me and what they thought, I realized that I had never felt at one with myself and centered in my element. It was a peaceful feeling, almost as if nothing existed except me and the paper. You know you’re an artist when you are looking at a person and instead of seeing them as they appear to be (or even hearing them), you see the shadows on their face and the color gradations in their skin. I think I may finally be getting to that point…and I like it.

Not to mention that as I was drawing in the Loggia ("Perseus"), the woman next to me looked at the statue, my sketch, and gave me a curt nod. How is that for validation?

The view of the Uffizi Gallery from across the river

The artistic mood was also helped since the days in Florence were the most beautiful in terms of the time spent in Italy. The sun shone clear and warm, amidst a light breeze, and for one brief moment, I felt as if I was back home in California, basking in the winter light. The first day we climbed to the Piazza Michelangelo (which functions as a car park on the way out of Florence, with a copy of David in the middle) and treated with a breathtaking view of the sunset over the city, along with a panoramic sight of Tuscany's rolling hills.

The view from the Palazzo Michelangelo..."Like a beacon coming out of the dark"

If you want to save money at the Duomo (aka, the Basilica di Santa Maria del Fiore, which also offers a wonderful view of the city) but still want a delightful view of Florence, the Piazza Michelangelo is the place to go (though the Duomo is still a beautiful cathedral to visit). It is no wonder that so much inspiration for art, culture, and philosophy came from such a city. Looking at Firenze at dusk, bathed in golden light underneath an overhang of lavender and orange clouds, the air was full of poetry and possibilities.

The ceiling of the Santa Maria del Fiore, which is commonly known as the Duomo

The time spent in Florence seemed to be filled to the brim with looking at art, admiring art, or walking along to find more art to admire. For the art historian in me, Florence equaled Paris in its artistic splendor with the main difference being the lack of large car-filled boulevards and crepes. No matter, I had gelato and the Masters to keep me company. Not to mention that I also had sticker shock since Florence seemed inexpensive in comparison to non-budget friendly Venice. I now have another favorite city in the world, one where I cannot wait to someday return and fully study and fully render on paper.

"Now I see it...the light in the piazza"

Tips:

• Florence is the place for cheap souvenirs, especially leather goods, silk and cashmere scarves, and ties (all for under 20 euros, you can easily find silk scarves here for 5 euros). Look for the open stands near the Medici chapel.
  
• A number of museums and churches, such as the Uffizi Gallery, Academia, and the Medici tombs, do not let you take photographs. The solution, just enjoy what you are looking at and make a note to look it up on Wiki later.
• To save money on lunches, go to a snack bar (they have them all around Italy though Florence tended to be the cheapest in my opinion) and get a slice of pizza to go. For 5 euros at the most, you get a gargantuan, wonderfully oily piece of pizza that you can carry with you as you stoll along the piazza.
• Unless you want to wait an hour or two for the Uffizi Gallery (which houses the most impressive collection of Italian Renaissance art in Europe), reserve a ticket in advance. It's only 4 euros more and you save a large amount of time, which can later be spent exploring the city.
• "prego" is a multipurpose word, used for "you welcome," "please," "thanks" and many other fun options. When in doubt as to how to respond to an Italian statement, just say "Prego!"
  

Florence: the photo album

Of Romance and Venice

I am back at Warwick after 12 emotional yet wonderful days in Italy. Though I had come back at 3:30AM, I didn't go to sleep until 4:30, fearing that I might wake up and find the past days to be a dream. Next to France, Italy has been the second place that I had always dreamed of visiting. To take the Grande Tour like so many master artists and philosophers of old and to walk among Roman ruins and statues...that's amore, as they say.

And the verdict for Italy: it's a quilt. Each city we visited was its own separate entity, with different auras, flavors, and beauty.

Let us begin in Venice, the city for the dreamers at heart.


Venice, or Venezia

It began like any other day in which I had essays due: I only had four hours of sleep and was running around like a madwoman in the morning trying to edit my essay, print it out, and turn it in on time, MLA format and all. To add to that stress, I had no access to my bank account at all since my bank canceled my debit card (thus, I was penniless, literally).

It was times such as that which made you appreciate the little things in life, such as:

• Complimentary sandwiches and drinks (including alcohol) on a 1.5 hour flight
• A really nice hotel room for 16 per person per night with 4 beds, two TV's, clean towels, a hairdryer, and a toilet which shoots water up your butt.
• A gelato cone for only 1.20 for a scoop (the cheapest it was ever going to be in Italy).
• Comfortable shoes because due to the fact that there is no public transportation along the small streets of Venice, you are walking A LOT. Sadly for me, I decided to test out my tennis shoes at the wrong time.
• Wonderful friends who will not bash an eyelash at paying for your dinner, bus ticket, and toothbrush at a time when you are completely destitute and kind of pathetic due to the fact that your bank (damn you Bank of America) decides to cancel your ATM card (on issues of identity theft, they said, and not even e-mailing you to tell you they did that) and thus, you are left in Italy with absolutely no money and need to have your parents send your new ATM card to you, which will take a week and a half. But, in short, I love you guys!

We arrived into the city at night and thus, were treated to sights such as this:



"This is way better than the version at Vegas" - me after seeing real Venetian canals

Built upon 118 islands and known for its iconic canals, Venice has always been associated with romance and Italian music (usually sung by the men rowing the gondolas). The reality of it was not too far from the fantasy. The city itself oozed mystery, exemplified by the fact that the street was impossible to navigate.

The main reason to go to Venice is to just walking along the small street and see what new treasures await you on every corner. There are the main sights such as the Doge's (the mayor of Venice) palace, St. Mark's Basilica, and the Rialto, but more importantly is walking on the street, having a gelato, and enjoying the aura of the city. You do not (and cannot) rush in Venice, the streets themselves make it impossible to do so. They say even the natives of Venice get lost (exemplified when I was trying to find a Western Union office and the man giving me directions had to pull out a map and directory - that had yellowing pages signifying that it was probably at a couple of years old - to see himself).

"Let's get lost..."

I had always dreamed of going to Venice, something that spawned from when I first visited the Venetian hotel in Las Vegas when I was 14. Though it was a disturbingly commercial way to be introduced to such an iconic and usual city, it inspired me to want to visit the place someday, something that grew when I learned that Venice was home of artists such as Titian and Bellini.

Even though I was awe-inspired upon glimpsing the main city for the first time with its extravagant bridges and the stairways and doors leading straight into water, the feeling quickly dissipated after I realized that even though the city was beautiful, it also suffered from commercialization and excess of tourism. Fish-smelling canals and over-priced gondola rides (80 euros! So much for that dream) aside, there did not seem to be anything real and authentically Italian about the city. Not once there did I see any Italian going home or from work, or carrying briefcases even.

St. Mark's Basilica, a primary and awe-inspiring example of vibrant and colorful Byzantine architecture.

Even when we wandered away from Saint Mark’s square, away from what we thought were touristy areas and into the more secluded piazzas, side streets, back alleys, the postcard stands with their knick-knacks of mask-shaped jewelry boxes and lace fans were still prevalent. There were still the same mask stores, murano glass jewelry, leather purses that repeated themselves. It was as if the whole city was a tourist zone, I did not see anyone looking as if they were going to work or going home. There was only hotels and the calls of “gondola!”

The front of a mask shop, they were everywhere!

Though I must say, the gelato was fantastic and definitely one of the cheapest I have seen yet in Italy (though it was the only thing cheap, the food was exorbitantly expensive). The rule of thumb for good gelato, go to the place that sells it exclusively. There are “snack bars” which sells the tasty treat along with calzone and pizzas but they are not as good. Though in comparison to American gelato, even the snack bar gelato tastes like heaven (as exemplified by Allison's very enthusiastic "MMMMmmmm!" upon tasting her first bite). There was an amazing gelato shop we consistently went to while we were there which only sold 10 flavors but who were very generous in their portions, creamy in the gelato consistency, and located relatively near Saint Mark’s Square.

Though Brendan might just kill me for writing negatively about one of his favorite cities in the world, when you are looking for authenticity and all you get is commercialization, then the point of traveling is lost. Suddenly, the Venetian Hotel in Vegas no longer seems as inaccurate. Despite that, there is still something about walking along the Rialto bridge and looking at the gondolas on the water that just causes you to sigh in romance.

Come in, the water's fine...

Tips:

• Beware of Venice during high tourist season, the streets are very narrow which render it unfavorable to crowds. Just walking down the streets near Saint Mark's square, which were only half filled with people due to the winter cold was still a slow experience. I shudder to imagine it during the summer.
• For cheap hotels, stay in Lido, which is the next largest island in Venice and right next to the main island. There are less people, it's quieter, and you are a short walk away from the beach leading to the waters of the Adriatic. The hotel we stayed at was right on the waterfront and only 16 euros a night per person.
  
• Beware of the pigeons in Saint Marc's square, they fly in droves.
  
• The best way to travel around Venice from island to island (or even from one end of the island to another) is via waterbus (called a vaporetto). If you want a cheap ride down the Grand Canal and do not want to pay for a gondola, the waterbus is the best bargain and you get to meet some interesting people along the way.
• "Ciao" = the Italian version of "aloha" in that it means both hello and goodbye

Venice: the photo album

Of Essay Writing

It is the eve of my trip to Italy and what am I doing? Well, besides updating this blog I am putting the finishing touches on my 3,000 research essay for "Crime Fiction" and packing. Here in the UK, they assign essays by word count instead of page count. So unlike the way students do it in America with increasing the period sizes, increasing margins, and other fun ways of increasing page count, the way students here increase word count? Cite, cite, cite. And you know that you've become a real British student when you have written 1,500 words which did not seem like a lot when it got assigned but then, you realize, "Damn, that's 5 pages double-spaced." Here, that's a practice essay.

And according to a number of American exchange students I have run into here: writing essays in the UK is more difficult. Having written 3 papers so far, one 1,500 words (5 pages) and two 3,000 words (10 pages), I have figured out a fun, almost non-painful way to go about writing research papers in the UK. Please remember that this is coming from a student who has never written a research paper for English but is now learning how to use MLA citation all over again, woot!

1) Get your "essay titles." Which are really just your essay prompts but the difference between these and prompts are that they are really the title of your essay. Unlike the US, they do not make you come up with a witty and suggestive title. And the prompts are usually about a sentence or two long. Case in point: "Discuss images of the female body in Victorian poetry" (I turned that paper in Monday).

2) Think of author/title of literature/subject that you will be discussing in your essay. Jot down some ideas on how you might go about answering the question. When in doubt, jot down ideas for all the prompts you think you might be able to answer, the one with the most notes next to them wins!

3) Go to the library ASAP and check out the relevant books, if there are any. Most of the time, towards the deadline, all of the books you need will probably be checked out. What to do? Article databases online, make friends with JSTOR and Web of Science. Look for articles that have some semblance to what you may be writing about. Sometimes, this may be just background information or they'll use a word that you may want to use in your essay, like "feminism" or "fruit." Take as many kind of relevant sources as you can, you can figure it out later whether or not you'll need them.

4) Skim, DO NOT READ THE WHOLE BOOK. One, it's a waste of time because you probably won't remember all of it. And two, you're going to have to cite around 10 sources within your paper so unless you start two weeks before (which will not happen if you're a college student), you will not have time to read all 10 articles and books. Writing down points that are interesting or the page numbers they are on helps as well, you can stick that into the essay later.

5) Now think of a thesis since you're supposed to think of a point to your essay after you've read everything. I know, it's backwards. I don't like it, I feel like I'm being influenced by someone else's reading of the text. But when in Rome...

6) Try to write and whenever relevant, add an official quote in. Towards the end, you'll probably be quoting arbitrarly since in my experience writing and talking to fellow British students, you're just writing what you know then sticking the quotes in there. Of course, you can always write your essay before you start reading and just read as you write, it really depends when you've formulated a thesis.

7) You know you've written a British essay when your paper is filled with more citation than original content. Learn to love the MLA format.

8) When you're done, run to the library and beat other students down for a computer to print (I suggest staring down the ones who are on Facebook in the library).

9) Print out two copies and run to the Departmental Office by 3PM the day it's due.

10) Take yourself out for a beer since you've just completed a British research paper. Now just hope that both of the people reading your paper will kind of understand what you're talking about.

But it's fine, at this point in my college career, I'm pretty much used to writing longer papers anyway (case in point, 5 pages is more complicated than a 10 page paper since I have so much to say now, which probably means I've been writing papers for way too long at this point).

Britishisms I learned:

• "full stop" = a period
• "marked blindly" = the two people that will be marking your essays will not know whose it is. It's more fair that way as well as kind of scary.
• You don't indent the very first paragraph
• Being an American is no excuse for not using British English in your paper
• 8 sources and up is common for a 3000 word essay, as exemplified by the fact that after finishing my first Warwick Uni essay for English, I had a grand total of 11 sources. Of course, a majority of people will also agree with me that half of those sources were arbitrary at best.

Of [Old] York and Tea Time

So I finally went to an English tearoom this past weekend when we visited the city of York with the International Office. And now I am wishing that I had chosen to go to university at York instead of Warwick. The town was just so charmingly old-fashioned with cobblestone streets, small mom and pop bakeries, hat shops, and even a barbershop with the old red and white sign. A different feeling from Coventry. Yet, no need to fret over something like that now.

I fell on the stone sidewalks, I still got the bruise on my knees

Back to the tea room; York is full of them. And I must say, for the price of the tea (a pound fifty a pot) and the price of scones and cakes (2 pounds and up, depending if it's a scone or a cake slice), it would not normally be worth the money. Yet, the selection of tea was extremely varied, everything from your usual English Earl-Grey tea, white tea, green tea, fruit teas, and many more. Considering it is meant for one person, you get quite a substantial pot, enough for three good cups.

We got the apple and cinnamon which tasted something like mulled wine except not as sweet and without the lightheaded quality (and residual bitterness) of alcohol. Though I have never been much of a tea aficionado, I did enjoy the experience of being in the room, with it's small, family-like coziness, the old-fashion coat racks, the lace in the windowsill, flower boxes...it was something out of a Victorian novel, where ladies in big skirts and hats are talking of gossip or beaus while nursing their tea. We weren't wearing big skirts, fancy hats, or lace gloves, but the peace and tranquility of the room did have that residual influence. And it was nice.

Being a coffee-addicted American, after an afternoon of walking along the walls of the city of York, visiting York Minster, and seeing ruins such as Clifford's Tower, having a warm cup of apple tea and a scone (or a Yorkshire pudding, in Allison's case) put a very nice, relaxing English touch to the whole day.


The old walls of York, we walked along almost the entire thing, which circled the whole city.


Clifford's Tower, part of what used to be York Castle. This is also where 150 Jewish people killed themselves. It had a wonderful view of the city.


York Minster, the largest Gothic Cathedral in northern Europe apparently. There was a man sitting outside it with a piano who was playing ABBA and the Beatles. It was wonderful background music while admiring the cathedral.

Of Learning How to be Mellow

So I did something last week which I have never done in my college career (though which I'm sure that other people have done as well): I dropped a class. For college students, dropping a class is a regular endeavor. For me, who've always been known as the most studious (even when I'm trying not to be, such as right now), doing so is unheard of.

I attribute that to my personality, I don't like change, especially not when I've gotten comfortable. Being a control freak runs in my family, as exemplified by my mother who will rewash the dishes because she claims that the rest of us do not wash it properly (something that I find myself doing quite a bit here since my flatmates tend to rush a bit when they're washing dishes).

For me, control is knowing exactly what I want to do and when I want to do it, that's why I've always preferred written exams to multiple choice, I can control how well I do. It's no longer a simple A or B answer, I can place the results in my own hand...so to speak. I'm also a planner, never having been very good at wandering around aimlessly without a purpose: I get bored and just a bit antsy, the feeling of being lost makes me uncomfortable.

Which is why resolving to drop a class took a lot of thought for me; it was disrupting my schedule, it was potentially throwing 8 weeks work of class out the window.

It was also less to do and more time to work on classes that mattered.

The epiphany came to me as I was laying in bed last Friday night, wondering how I was going to finish 4 research papers in three weeks and being frustrated that I only had a workable thesis for one of them. Never one to be a procrastinator since I cannot take the stress of impending deadlines, I like to work ahead. But working on a paper two weeks before it was due seemed a bit ridiculous, even for me.

Then I got to thinking about my major requirements and realizing that because one of the courses I was taking, "Epic Tradition" did not actually fulfill any requirement for me at home that mattered, I was stressing out for a class that could potentially harm my grade rather than help it.

So what to do? I fell asleep at 7AM after laying awake and thinking about the pros and cons of each. Then I resolved to change my schedule as soon as I woke up.

The pros: Stress less, write better, more time to work on my art portfolio for my "Practical Art" class.

The most important pro: I'm learning how to better adapt to change and what's more, not to be afraid of it. It may be small as changing a class but so far, it's also been wandering aimlessly around Paris, Dublin, and so many other places without relying on a map, allowing other people to plan and navigate for me, and actually strolling these days instead of rushing from place to place. As my friend, Lana from Connecticut says, "I don't get why people are always booking it, you'll get there eventually."

In short: being a little less of a control freak. Though I still rewash dishes and carry a map in my bag for comfort. Every journey begins with a step.