UK Days

My study abroad program held an early Thanksgiving dinner in London for all the UC students attending universities in the UK and Ireland. This meant I got a free trip to London and a proper American Thanksgiving feast. London was a lot of fun. I got an authentic experience because I stayed with Shai’s friend Olivia, who is a student and local resident of London, instead of in a hostel. We flew out of Cork on Thursday night and landed in London just in time to put our bags down in the apartment and go to a pub down the street. I was surprised because London initially reminded me of LA with better public transportation, a big, busy city, but with British accents.

The next day I went to the Harry Potter Studio Tour! I navigated public transit all alone to get there, this gave me a nice taste of the London life but I would have much rather used apparition or the floo network, oh well. At the studio I saw the original sets, costumes, props, and effects used in all the Harry Potter films. It was magical: I walked through the Great Hall, rode a broomstick, drove my friends around in a flying car (with the aid of a green screen), entered Dumbledore’s office, hung out in the Gryffindor common room, saw my reflection in the Mirror of Erised, drank butterbeer, and so much more. We were there for over 5 hours and never got bored once. It was surreal to live in a world I have only seen on screen. I went crazy with my camera and now have more than 200 Harry Potter related pictures- here’s a small selection.

I spent the next day playing tourist on the streets of London with Shai and Olivia. We started our day at the Borough Food market, a local outdoor market that is open every weekend and is full of delicious food from all over. As is our food market tradition, we bought homemade fudge, among other things. Next we saw the Globe Theatre, which was amazing to see in person after reading Shakespeare's plays and learning the history of the theatre in school. Then we crossed one of several bridges and made our way over to St. Paul’s Cathedral. It was pretty, but St Finbarre’s in Cork maintains its status as the most interesting Cathedral I have seen so far. We continued on to Trafalgar Square, named for a famous Napoleonic Battle.  This square used to be infested with pigeons. It was popular for tourists to feed them, and this lead to an uncontrollable, disgusting amount of birds in the square. Legislation was passed to stop this, now the square is clean and almost pigeon free which I liked very much. From here we took a bus to Buckingham Palace, then walked over to see Westminster Abbey and Big Ben. It was a whirlwind day of sight seeing, but having a local show me around made it feel like I was also experiencing the 'real' London at the same time.

After that long day, we were off to our EAP Thanksgiving dinner at Gibson Hall. Gibson Hall proved to be extremely difficult to find, and Shai and I arrived a little late, right as everyone was being let into the dining room. We were ready to eat, and after about 30 minutes of speeches from alumni and coordinators, dinner was served! They had it all: turkey, stuffing, green beans, sweet potatoes, corn on the cob, cranberry sauce, and pumpkin pie- Shai and I might have been the first people to go for seconds...It obviously was not as good as my usual Thanksgiving meal with Aunt Laura’s mashed potatoes, my mom’s delicious sides and homemade stuffing and grandma’s jello mold and cool whip- but it was delicious, festive, and perfectly American. After dinner they announced the winners of the photo, video, and blog competitions -guess what- you are currently reading an award winning blog! I entered my post about my visit to the Blarney Stone and won third place. My prize was an ill fitting t-shirt, which I ended up giving away, but it was great to be recognized for simply recounting my adventures.

After dinner we went to a karaoke bar down the street from Olivia’s apartment. It was filled with locals and had a carefree, fun vibe. We sang, or rather rapped, Ignition by R.Kelley and then Bills Bills Bills by Destiny’s Child. It obviously sounded perfect and we acquired some loyal fans and back up singers! I have been meaning to go to a karaoke bar in Cork, so this was a perfect spot to spend our final night in London.

After a week back in Cork I was missing the royal family already, so I headed to Scotland. On this trip I learned to never trust budget airlines. Our plan was to go to Glasgow and Edinburgh, but it turned out that our flight landed in Glasgow Prestwick, which is a 40 minutes bus ride outside of Glasgow-thanks RyanAir. Even though we arrived in Scotland to and unpleasant surprise, the rest of the trip was incredibly enjoyable. Apparently the Scotish are not short on holiday spirit, because even though November has not even ended yet, there was a Christmas Market in both Glasgow and Edinburgh. There was over the top decorations and great food-what more can you want? After exploring the Christmas Market in Glawgow we set out to see the rest of the city. It is very Urban and the main street reminded me of 3^rd street in Santa Monica. There was an H&M, a Forever 21, and a Hard Rock Cafe, so we decided to go off the beaten path and find some real culture. We saw the City Chambers, the local University, St. Mungo’s Cathedral, and the Glasgow Necropolis. Everything was stunning. The leaves were changing and the sun was shining; this set the stage for some beautiful photographs, and a fair amount of photo-shoots.

After two nights in Glasgow we caught a bus to Edinburgh (pronounced Edin-brah, we had fun with that). Edinburgh is the capital of Scotland and is an unbelievable mix of tradition and modernity. Almost every building is medieval style architecture, so what looks like a castle could easily turn out to be a KFC- and I’m speaking from experience. Our hostel was 50 meters off of the Royal Mile. This is the main street in the city center and gets its name because it is a mile long with the Queen’s Residence at one end and the Edinburgh Castle at the other.

 

On Sunday morning we hiked up to Arthur’s Seat, the highest point in Edinburgh, and got a 360-degree view of the entire city. We could see EVERYTHING-the castle, the ocean, the city- it was remarkable. After seeing the city from above, we sought out a more grounded perspective and took a 2.5-hour walking tour. We learned about the complicated history of Scotland, some infamous grave robbers and serial killers, the man who inspired Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, and the nation's obsession with the stone of destiny that England stole from them for 700 years.

I honestly did not know what to expect from this trip to Scotland. We planned it on a whim, without any particular destinations or sights to see, but it turned out to be the perfect way to really experience the country. Walking the streets, eating the food (yes I tried Haggis- we ordered it deep fried and it tasted like falafel) and simply exploring the culture with friends was amazing.

Weekend Warrior

A lot has happened since I last wrote for you! I guess I’ll go back 3 weeks and start by telling you about the Cork Jazz Festival. From October 24-27^th there was live Jazz in the City Center. Jazz Weekend is one of the liveliest in Cork all year, and I went downtown to experience all four days of it! The first day was my favorite because we headed downtown in the afternoon, and before the sun went down there were people playing on almost every street corner. We saw all different types of performers, even a band performing a jazz rendition of Get Lucky. That night, and for the next three nights after, we saw live jazz in several different pubs every night.

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The following weekend was Halloween. While the Irish do have the same traditions of dressing up, carving pumpkins, and trick-or-treating as we do in America, they also have some additional strange customs I learned about in my Aspects of Folklore module. November 1^st is a quarter day that represents the festival of Samhain and the start of the season of darkness and storytelling. The strangest Samhain tradition is the serving of Halloween Brack. Brack is a giant loaf of bread/cake with items baked into it. The item you get in your piece of Brack is an indicator of what will happen to you in the future. For example, if you get the pea it represents poverty in the year to come, the ring represents marriage, and the dreaded matchstick represent domestic abuse. We decided to avert any dangerous bakery related psychic mishaps and not try any brack. Instead, we stuck to American tradition and dressed up in costumes for a couple nights out on the town.

The next weekend, I went on a trip to Dingle with the Mountaineering Club. Dingle is a tiny, isolated town, in which our 60-person group took over an entire hostel for two nights. On the schedule for the weekend was hiking, climbing, and banter (this is not a joke, the club promised banter). So, the first day we had a choice to either go on a hike or chance the weather and attempt a day of outdoor climbing. I of course chose the latter, and the weather gamble did not pay off. As we walked to the sea cliffs we were hoping to climb, the sun was out, pictures were taken, and we were optimistic! However, once we abseiled down to the shore to climb a route back up it got FREEZING. And wet. And windy. With the Atlantic Ocean waves crashing at our backs we managed to get in one climb with frozen fingers and toes. After that we had to call off the outdoor climbing due to unsafe and intolerable conditions. I was bummed, but we had a back up plan. Despite how tiny the town of Dingle is, they have an enormous indoor climbing wall. It wall was amazing! The gym was at least triple the size of the one in the Mardyke at UCC and it had so many different routes that I did not climb the same one twice in the five hours we were there.

After an exhausting day of climbing for me and 11 others, and hiking for the rest of the group, we headed back to the hostel for dinner. Club members made us dinner both nights; we had homemade spaghetti bolognaise and then chicken curry. It was nice to be cooked for, and the group meals had a great family feel that I have been missing in my apartment. As was promised, after dinner the banter ensued! Around 2AM the giant dinner table was cleared and we began to ‘table boulder.’ What is table bouldering you ask? Just what it sounds like! We climbed under and around the table utilizing climbing skills we learned on the bouldering wall. It looked very difficult and I was reluctant to try and fail, but when people chanted my name I had to step up and give it a shot. I began laying face down on top of the table, flipped under and climbed to other side but could not manage to pull myself back up and complete the problem, but I was close. I guess anything can happen when you put a bunch of climbing enthusiasts under one roof!

(here's a picture of Hannah table bouldering because there are none of me)

The next day we explored the town of Dingle. Keep in mind that it is a tiny town and the weather was awful. We basically only went to a world famous specialty ice cream store, and I am not complaining. I split a pint of homemade baileys and chocolate chip ice cream with some friends, and enjoyed the warmth and good company in the tiny shop for a while. That night we decided to get out of the hostel and hit the town. However, to get there a couple of us had to wear headlamps because the streets were so dark. It’s a new fashion trend that I am definitely planning to bring back to Santa Cruz if they don’t put streetlamps on Bay St. soon.