I performed with Orchestra Vitae on Tuesday (2 weeks ago today). It's an amateur orchestra of mostly grad students and professionals just getting started. I had a fantastic time working with them and learning all the strange lingo that they use here: eighth notes are called "quavers," sixteenths, are "semi-quavers," then demiquavers, demi-semi-quavers, and I can't remember any others. Stands are called desks, and we got a tea break :) Yay English people! We performed in St. James Smith's Square, a beautiful venue, here's a picture of it.
Halloween in London was tons of fun- it was so adorable watching the children come out of the woodwork to get candy. There were gangs of witches, ghosts, skeletons, princesses, and zombies on the buses, on the streets, everywhere. It was too cute! Immediately after Halloween, up went the dreaded Christmas decorations. Seriously? Bit early...just like in the US, but even earlier! London's starting to feel a lot more like a second home to me; when I went to Ireland with Mom I found myself missing London after the first 2 days (even though I loved Ireland)! I feel very comfortable here, but I still have to remind myself that as used as I am to Kensington and Chelsea, I am still very new to the rest of the city. I only have 4 more weeks in London. I CAN'T BELIEVE IT! I NEED TO GET EXPLORING RIGHT NOW! I have this ginormous checklist of things that I need to see that I have to get through before I leave...
I decided to take a day trip into Oxford because a) Kind of have to see Oxford when in England, b) It has Harry Potter stuff in it, c) I didn't want to just sit in London (jiggling my leg with impatience) and wait for Mom to get here, and d) I wanted to visit Sam, who goes to Oxford as a grad student. We had a great time wandering about; for the first hour or so we got completely soaked because it was raining so hard, but then the weather cleared up nicely. I saw several of the different colleges at Oxford and saw the entrance hall of Hogwarts :) I also visited Blackwell's book store, super famous, which has supposedly the biggest room devoted to books in the world! I was pretty much in heaven.
This is only half of the room, it continues behind this for, well, quite a ways. Also, ELEPHANT WEATHER VANE! Schola musicae, Richard's Camera, a random school's room with gorgeous ivy, and an old door with more gorgeous ivy.
On the spur of the moment, after Sam had left to continue his day, I took a ghost tour of Oxford which was a lot of fun. Apparently, for centuries the townspeople HATED the students at Oxford; hated them enough to kill them in droves, so there were lots of ugly deaths (including a mob where 63 students were torn apart!). I went to a really old pub for dinner (it was down a creepy alleyway and the ghost tour guide's wife apparently tastes blood whenever she goes there because it was the centre for animal sports like bear-baiting), spilled my cidar, got rained on, then left Oxford with a biting wind blowing in my face. The weather was so bipolar, but I still had a wonderful time. Especially at the bookstore.
Mom came a day late because airlines are dumb, so we only had 2 days in London before going to Dublin. We covered the Tower of London, which was cool, and the Tower Bridge before I was really tired. Then, to Ireland!
IRELAND. I got to go to IRELAND! I was so lucky to get to return to the place where part of my family came from. I was equally lucky that I got to share that trip with my wonderful mother. There were a couple of ups and downs (like the tube deciding not to work when we were trying to get to Heathrow, and not having a phone to call the person who was supposed to let us in to our apartment in Dublin) but we got to Dublin in the end. With the help of a friendly Irish judge and a cheap internet cafe. But whatever.
Always good to know which country you're in.
Our first day in Dublin, we checked out Trinity College (the tour guide was insanely attractive) and the Book of Kells. For those of you who do not know what the Book of Kells is, it's one of the oldest known manuscript currently existing. It's from the 9th century, no big deal. I was so moved that I was seeing something from so long ago, I actually cried a little. I also got to see some very old musical manuscripts, which blew my mind (cried then too) because I was seeing what I had studied in music history in person. It was incredible. All of my favorite things in one place: music, books, old stuff, and religion.
Trinity College, est. 1200s
The Long Book Room
After that emotional experience, we visited the No. 29 Georgian House Museum, which was basically a beautifully preserved Georgian house from when Dublin was a hugely prosperous centre for high society from England. The next day, we went on a bus tour to Bru-na-boinne, an ancient burial site. We stopped first at the Hill of Tara, which is what's left of the centre of Irish Celtic culture. All that was left were mounds, a phallic statue, and some trees, but it was still pretty cool. The thing that touched me was these two trees on the edge of the field: people had covered them in offerings, ribbons, cloth, plastic, keychains, and other things. It was really moving to see all these people showing their respect for all the history that went on in Tara.
Mom on the way to Bru-na-boinne, and us crossing the River Boyne
Next on our bus tour was Bru-na-boinne (means "Bend in the Boyne," the Boyne being the neighboring river). Let me emphasize just how OLD this place is. It was built several hundred years before the pyramids at Giza. Let that sink in for a bit. It's still standing, and the roof of the tomb under the mound is STILL WATERPROOF. This place is astounding, and on the morning of December 21st it lets in a single beam of light to grace the inner tomb; this is the only light to come into the tomb all year. We got to go in, and I was rather surprised at how small it was- I was expecting something much bigger, but it was only maybe 8 ft square? There were carvings from the 1800s (before it was protected) right next to abstract spirals from 32nd century BCE. I just couldn't wrap my head around it!
The next day, I had convinced Mom to pay for a bus trip to Giant's Causeway in Northern Ireland with several stops along the way. Our hilarious and knowledgable tour guide/bus driver was named Gavin and he called us "m'troops" and had the most fantastic Irish accent EVER! We went up the coast of Ireland to a place called Carrick-a-Rede, where fishermen built a rope bridge to catch salmon. It was stunning; Mom had to keep nagging me to keep walking because I was taking pictures like there was no tomorra :)
I was speechless. I was so awed that I wasn't even really scared of the shaky rope bridge that I crossed. I was just all like "oh, i'm 300 feet above the ocean but IT'S SO PRETTY!"
Next stop: Giant's Causeway. It's a natural rock formation on the Northern Ireland shore, made by lava millions of years ago. OR, if you're Irish, it's the bridge that the legendary giant Finn McCool created to reach Scotland so he could fight another giant who had been mocking him across the ocean. Finn's wife Una tricked the Scottish giant when he came over to kick Finn's ass (he was much bigger than her Finn). She had Finn dress like a baby, and once the other giant saw how huge Finn's "child" was (it was actually Finn in a baby bonnet), he turned tail and ran back to Scotland, breaking up the bridge Finn had made along the way.
I actually found it quite hilarious how many people were just chilling out on their phones. Never mind we're at one of the most beautiful places in the world, never mind we can see Scotland in the distance, we've got good service here! Guys...really?
Got some truly spectacular wave pictures :)
Finn McCool's pipe organ can be seen in the hillside behind the Causeway- love to my favorite organist Marika Straw.
If you want to know how these awesome rock columns were formed by lava, don't ask me or Mom because we could not for the life of us figure out what the guides were trying to tell us on that subject. That concluded our bus trip as we trundled our way back across the border and into Dublin. Mom and I packed up and took a taxi to the air port because Dublin doesn't have an awesome tube system that almost always works.
Whew. Finally, you are all reasonably caught up! This has taken me 4 days to write, no joke. Partially because I'm lazy, but whatever. I visited Kew Gardens yesterday, which were beautiful, and I'm heading to Cardiff this Saturday to be a Doctor Who geek. I also got to see DAVID TENNANT IN RICHARD II!!!!!!!!!!!! Poor Christopher (one of my classmates) had to put up with me fangirling a little as he was sitting next to me.
So...until next time!
Yours truly,
The Management
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