When in England...soften the consonants and elongate the vowels!

So, a lot of things have happened since I last posted, and rather than putting a million posts up for each of the main events, I'll just give a condensed version in this one post. Who wants to hear me blabbing about all the little details anyways? So, starting now...

1. St. Patrick's Day--like for Chinese New Year, there was a big festival in Trafalgar Square and a parade, where I think every Irish blooded Londoner turned out to walk it. From river dancing to bagpipers to militia, a lot of people walked by.

Gothic pirates!

The funniest part was when gothic pirates came by followed by high school cheerleaders.

Oddly, Obama on the St. Patrick's Day parade float...

Another odd part was Obama’s face on one of the floats, considering this was a celebration of Irish culture? The music was good, though there was a scare in the middle, when some really drunk guy got extremely antagonistic and security had to pin him to the ground and then bring him away. It was really surreal, because the singer kept singing, and the crowd on the other half was still listening to Irish folk songs, and this guy was being restrained not two meters from me. To end on a lighter note, they tried to do a ceileidh, and while the steps failed miserably, it was a lot of fun, and made me wish I were doing some folk dancing.

2. After that, the next big thing was Easter break for the entire month of April! I went to Prague to visit a friend and see what was in the Czech Republic, and I was quite impressed! The entire city of Prague is just so old, and it was fascinating, seeing how little of the city’s architecture is modern, while still seeing the flashes of modernity in various places. It’s also very hilly, and if you go to there’s some amazing views of the city from up top there.

View from Prague Castle of Prague

They were gearing for Easter there, which is a huge celebration, so Old Town Square was covered in little stalls (selling decorated eggs, witches, and wooden toys) and tons of people. Prague castle was more of another town on top of a hill, rather than a castle. I got to see some of Moravia as well, when we headed to Telc, a little town with a beautiful main square, built in the Renaissance style and surrounded on three sides by lakes. The main square of Telc

We ended up stuck there overnight, due to an inability to read bus schedules, and we proceeded to discover how wonderful and kind Czech people can be, getting an amazing discount at a fancier hotel because no hostels were open. I stayed for five days in the Czech Republic, and it was wonderful—I highly advise visiting!

3. About a week after I returned to London, I went off to Spain, for one of my courses: Field Course in Ecological Genetics. We lived in Zahara de los Atunes, a small town on the Atlantic coast, and for the week, we did field experiments on the beach, mountains, and forests with beetles, snails, water striders, and wasps.

Across the sea is Africa--Morocco in particular. This is the first real site I saw.

Windmills dotted the landscape in s. Spain, and the multitude and massiveness of them were impressive.

We lived in a hotel right on the beach, and it was wonderful, seeing the ocean every day, taking walks along the shore after dinner, watching a beautiful sunset. The experiments we did were fun, too, using nets to capture water striders that went hiding in shadows, forcing you to edge into frigid water, gasping in cold but determined to catch as many striders as possible, tediously digging in sand to set traps for beetles but returning and finding that you succeeded, and searching through tall grass, like on a treasure hunt, looking for endless amounts of snails to do a population genetics study. We went all along the southern coast, from Malaga where we flew in, to Cadiz, near where we counted number of cells in wasp nests hidden in the midst of prickly cacti.

The pond where I went fishing for water striders--it's in a valley in the middle of mountains that took 1.5 hours on an extremely bumpy road to reach.

The water striders we were catching in the pond. Most we found we couples, with the male on top of the female, guarding her from single males.

We had a break in the middle, where we almost went Morocco, since there was a half hour boat ride in Tarifa, an hour’s drive away, but it turned out to be expensive, so I went with people to Bolonia, where we had delicious seafood (over the week, I discovered that whole squid is delicious!), had more gorgeous views of the sea,

The beach in Bolonia--isn't it gorgeous?

and peeked in at some roman ruins. We explored a sculpture garden not far away, with exhibits hidden within a wooded area, and a few shelters with intriguing art exhibits—a bath house, a dark room that was supposed to play a video, but it was broken, but it still felt like art because you went in, with one dingy flashlight, and it was pitch black as you tried to see what was around you, and it felt like coming across a shipwreck in the middle of the night, with the dark pressing around and no certainty about what was even a foot away from you.

Our final project was coming up with independent experiments, and my friends and I decided to study ants, so we spent three days setting baits for ants in a beautiful national park on the cliffs, testing how they found their way back to the nest.

The ant shelter we made, used to block out the sun and control where the light was coming from, to see if the ant species we studied told direction by the sun.

We left Zahara, all darker, quite cheery, ready to eat some vegetables again, and cringing at the thought of exams, which occupied my life these last two weeks.

Now, my exams are over, and in about a week, I will be returning home for two weeks to celebrate my brother’s graduation, before returning to work in London.

When in England...nowhere else is really quite like London.

It's been a very long time, forgive me. I'm going to post about my trip to Dover, way back when at the end of February. I went with Geoffrey out of London Central to Dover, to see the English Channel and the White Cliffs. Unconventionally though, we decided we wanted something of a hike, so we got ourselves dropped off at Folkestone, where we preceded to follow a trail along the cliffs to Dover.

We began a little lost at Folkstone hoping to find a tourist center with a trail map, but we couldn't find one, so we decided to walk in the direction of the cliffs because we were told the trail was just at the top. After a bit of following the highway, we found two other travelers who pointed out the correct turn. Eventually, we got to the top, and followed along the edge, and it was beautiful! The day was a little hazy, so we couldn't see France on the other side, unfortunately, but the Channel was a beautiful blue, and the cliffs were white! The trail ran through the edge of a little town, past a field of cows, a memorial, a sound wall?, some abandoned looking creepy stone shelters, and near farms. Towards the end, while still gorgeous to the right along the endless drop, the left led down to a highway, so that was not so scenic.


Anyways, the above picture is one of the nice ones, showing some of the white cliffs, a faint hint of the train tracks that ran along the Channel, and maybe a good perspective of how high we were?
This was the name of the trail we were following, North Downs Way, if you ever wanted to follow it. It is a nice hike--starts in Edgbury?, but we started in Folkestone because there was a convenient rail in that town, and it took us about 4 hours, at a pretty slow pace, taking lots of pictures.
At this point, we had more or less reached Dover, and at the bottom of the trail was a beach. The white rocks from the cliffs were smoothed over by the water, along the ground, and it looked really neat--stark white rocks against the green algae and scattered black rocks.
We meant to go to Dover Castle, but we arrived at about 3:30 pm, and the castle closed at 4 pm, and involved an uphill walk, and we were tired, so we decided to just look from afar. We ended walking along the cliffs on the other side of Dover, and by that time, it was evening, so this is a picture of the outline of Dover Castle.

Unfortunately, we thought we could find an alternate route back down from these cliffs, but that trail led from a fairly wide easy trail, into a windy passage through branches along the edge of the cliff, to a dead end that some people might have been able to climb back up to the trails at the top of the cliff. We didn't because it was REALLY SCARY, and returned the way we came, and found where that incline led to on the way back. This picture shows the drop to were we were on that dead-end. The pipe and where I took the picture from was where the trail returned to, but as you can see, we were way below that at that bottom.

All in all, we walked at least 8 hrs, left our dorms at 7 am, and we returned around 11 pm, so it was a full day. It was great to walk near water, and the white cliffs really were magnificent.

I'll end here with a reference to Arnold's magnificent poem about Dover's white cliffs. I loved this poem when I first read it in high school, and I'm really glad I finally got to see its subject.

"...the cliffs of England stand,

Glimmering and vast, out in the tranquil bay.

Come to the window, sweet is the night-air!

Only, from the long line of spray

Where the sea meets the moon-blanch'd land,

Listen! you hear the grating roar

Of pebbles which the waves draw back, and fling,

At their return, up the high strand,

Begin, and cease, and then again begin,

With tremulous cadence slow, and bring

The eternal note of sadness in."

-Matthew Arnold, excerpt from "Dover Beach"

When in England...It's PAH-sty, not PAY-sty.

So, this post will mainly be about Canterbury, where I went about a week and a half ago, and the reason I haven't posted sooner is because I wanted to stick in pictures, and I was too lazy to move them from my camera to my computer before today. Anyways:

I went to Canterbury as part of UCL's Give it a Go events--pay 13 pounds, and they took a bus of us UCL associated people to Canterbury, dropped us off, and picked us up in the early evening to bring us back to London. I couldn't find anyone who was interested/not busy, so I decided I'd just play tourist by myself, but on the bus, I found three other people sitting next to me, all of them playing tourists by themselves, so we banded together to explore Canterbury and ended up having a fabulous time. They were all big picture takers, so we each took a lot (~200 was my final count), so I figured I'd share a few.



This was Canterbury castle, or the ruins of it anyways. I'd tell you a whole bunch of information, but I realized I was wikipedia-ing it anyways, so if you're really interested, you can go wiki it yourself. :D I am curious if anybody might have any ideas what the little string of rocks on the grounds of the castle is--see the little squiggly? We thought maybe the remains of a wall, but it ends very suddenly at the wall of the castle.
This is Dane John mound--thought to be a Roman burial mound. It's about a five minute walk from the castle, and there's a long castle wall starting here and going around the boundary of the city of Canterybury. When we were on the wall, it was sort of funny and sad, because you looked beyond it, and it was a bunch of ugly buildings--mainly large warehouse-style buildings, and within the castle walls, it looked largely like a little quaint town, with great architecture and a style like in the 17th-19th centuries.

The Canterbury cathedral, which was absolutely magnificent. It was HUGE, spectacularly so, and beautiful and just very, very grand. Henry IV is buried here, with his wife, Joan of Navarre. The most exciting story about this cathedral is the death of Archbishop Thomas Becket. Apparently, in 1172, King Henry II was upset at Becket and asked, "Who will rid me of this turbulent priest?!" His knights took that literally and rushed to the cathedral where they murdered him in the cathedral.

I included this photo to show how massive it looks from the inside--isn't the architecture gorgeous?

A photo of one of the many stained glass windows in the cathedral.


My first glimpse of the cathedral as we began our walk towards it.

Here's an example of the buildings within the city of Canterbury. None of the others are so sideways, but they are all of this type of architecture (I'm not sure what to call it exactly--colonial keeps popping in my head, since colonial American buildings were derived from these buildings, but obviously, colonial is not the right word), which I quite love and far too many of my many photos are of random houses and shops.

We also went to an exhibit about The Canterbury Tales, by Chaucer. It was one of those, you walk into the set, with 'authentic smells' (it really did smell like a stable in one room), and lifesize figurines and a realistic setting. Basically, we heard five of the tales, though it took us about half the tour to finally settle down and really listen to the stories.

We ate lunch at a cute little restaurant, where I had a beef and potato pasty and chocolate milkshake, and it was delicious. Also, since we had little bit more time before we needed to return to the bus, I had a half pint (yes, it was a very small glass and really, I only had a quarter pint because I split it with a friend) of 'Spitfire Premium Kentish ale.' As I thought, I didn't really like the taste, but now, I can finally say I've tasted ale.

On another note, last Thursday evening, I went to a gig to hear Portland Rise play. Portland Rise is a band that's just starting out, and the lead singer was in my Biology class, and he had told me about them. I liked what I had heard online, and I was curious whether they sounded good live, and I was itching to listen to a live band, so I went. Again, I went by myself, but I met another girl who was supporting another band who had gone by herself, so I made another new friend, and I really enjoyed the music a lot. Portland Rise is really good-sounding (they sound a little like Ben Folds Five), and they and two other bands were starting for the band Teitur, which was awesome. Teitur was sort of a part folk-part rock band, and the lead singer was really really good.

It was really cool because about half way through, he brought in a strings quartet to play with the band, and I love hearing strings in rock music. On other musical notes, the keyboardist had this contraption set up--basically a metal rod? They really hiked up the amp (I think that's the term I'm looking for?) and basically adjusted the electronics so as to make the metal rod vibrate, and then as he placed something nearer or farther from the rod, the sound changed drastically, and it made for a really cool effect during the show. And, here's one last parting picture--this guy was on the bass guitar (I thought he was sort of cute!), and he was using a bow on the strings of the electric guitar. That had a really cool musical effect as well.

And, since Linda wanted a shout-out, here you go! Now, you better comment lots and lots so I feel like I did not just waste my hour writing up this blog. :D

When in England...There's Always A Chinatown to Be Found!

I've been holding off on talking about Chinatown, until Chinese New Year passed, and I had some substantial things to write. Of course, as you guys well know me, despite being in a completely new continent with tons of exciting new museums and buildings and foods to taste, one of the most exciting things was exploring a new Chinatown. I love comparing different Chinatowns I've been to on their similarities and differences.

Now, London's Chinatown, I quite like. It's a fifteen minute walk from me, which is very exciting, but unfortunately, prices are not as consistently cheaper at these Chinese restaurants like they are in American Chinatowns. Or maybe it's just me griping about the pound. It is a little commercialized, but overall, I still feel very Chinese whenever I go there, so the authenticity still holds. Some people have said it's small, and maybe I've never been to the biggest ones, but I think it's quite large. In terms of official closed-off (no cars) areas, there's only a block and a half, but I find Chinese restaurants and stores (and some Korean and Japanese ones as well!) extending over several streets outside of that main area.

This last Sunday, they had the official Chinese New Year celebration in Chinatown, and a huge area was set aside for the festival--all of Chinatown and its nearby streets and Trafalgar Sq for the main stage event and Leicester Sq. for the fireworks. The hosts of the show said about 20k people were in the area, and I'm not surprised, given how packed the place was.

The event at Trafalgar Sq, and a glimpse of the crowds.

This was the main area of Chinatown, well-decorated for the Year of the Ox!

It was freezing, but I stayed the entire day, froze my joints in place and lost feeling in my toes. In exchange, I got to see an amazing lion dance--it's taped and you can see the link here:
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-8917214490266021952&hl=en Lion Dance pt 1
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-8723039517392716780&hl=en Lion Dance pt 2

as well as Qinghai and Yunnan dance troupes perform

the Qinghai dance troupe giving their final bows...

one of the Qinghai singers jumped off stage to sing with the crowd (about half way through, I had managed to edge my way through the crowd to the front row so I had a really good view)
Another Lion Dance occurring on the streets instead on stage--the lion was going door to door, getting fed by the people in the stores.

Fireworks in Leicester Sq. at the end of the festival


One of the many stalls along the street selling random Chinese stuff.

Another glimpse of the massive amount of people there were--these were all waiting for the fireworks.


One of the dances performed by the Yunnan dance troupe.

So, that was my Sunday, and I'm glad I went. The dances were extremely well done, the food was great (esp. the dumplings and steamed pork buns I bought from an outside stall in Chinatown!) and the crowd cheer and atmosphere was everywhere!

When in England...Pound=Quid=Dollar and Pence=Cent

It's high time I mentioned something about the money system, though I think I'm finally getting used to it, after nearly a month in this country. Two things drive me the most crazy: there's no such thing as a 25 pence coin and a pound comes in coin, not bill form. I didn't realize how much I relied on counting coins using 25p as the number to fall back on when figuring out change--52 p? Oh yes, that would be two quarters and two pennies in the U.S. Here, it's two 20p coins, a 10 coin, and then a 2p coin--they have, for your info, coins valuing 1p, 2p, 5p, 10p, 20p, 50p, 1 pound, and 2 pound. That's 8 coins! And goodness, the pound coin...somehow, changed from paper to coin form, the value of the pound feels far less than the value of one dollar in the States. I always feel like change is never worth that much, so I don't take them into consideration for how much money is on me. I still feel the same, but I shouldn't, because I can have no bills, and only pocket full of change, but depending on the number of 1 or 2 pounders in there, I could have quite a decent amount of money. That blows my simple mind.


These are the coins in order, from left to right, 1p to 2 pounds. Hmm, are there names for these coins? It'd be so much easier than saying 10 pence coin, etc. Also, congratulate me on my first picture! Though it's not one I took myself...I just have yet to have any really impressive pictures worth extending the size of my post for.

One more thing--I knew the pound would get confusing! I bought a pound of lychee, and the seller got confused and wasn't sure if I meant a pound, weight-wise, or money-wise (I meant weight!). Hah! This is what they get for using such a confusing term for the money system. :)

On other things, I discovered shopping near me, and now I really want to be making money, so I can just buy clothes. I've met some people in my class, so it's nice, knowing some faces. On class, I'm currently writing an essay--2000 words (it's also odd basing it on amount of words rather than number of pages), so I'm procrastinating by updating. I went with Colin to Tate Modern a week and a day ago--there was one exhibit that disturbed me a lot, and I still freak a little when I think about that exhibit. No, I don't think torture and self-mutilation is an interesting art topic.

I also went to the Lates at the Science Museum, though I was a bigger fan than Colin--I went with a bunch of other Affiliate students from UCL, so I'm glad I'm hanging out with some people. It was Japan-themed, and there was taiko, a kendo demonstration, and origami! There were so many people, and when we got there, we had to wait in a 3 block long line! I'm looking forward to the next Lates!

I made sausages for supper this evening--yummy! It satisfied the craving I've had all day for them!

Wish me luck on my essay--for those curious, it's about genes and biased sex ratios! :D Go females!

When in England...To the Left! To the Left!

Most of you are already well aware of the odd state of English driving, that is, drivers drive on the left side of the road. I knew that going in, and aside from a little confusion when crossing the street--easily remedied by the helpful street signs indicating which direction I should look to cross--this matter affected me little. Or so I thought.

A rather more pressing problem, I soon realized, was that in normal pedestrian walking, I am faced with a terrible conundrum when facing an oncoming person strolling purposefully forward. Should I move to the right or left? Usually, I follow that rule of shifting to the right, and most Americans, if they give it any thought as they are walking, do the same. Here, though, I no longer know if that is standard, and each time I face that person walking towards me, a moment of panic arises, and I usually end up awkwardly performing a sudden evasive maneuver to the right (only left when I recover from panic a little sooner), and I walk away from the scene feeling horribly clumsy and bumbling.

I finally got around to being touristy, so I met up with some fellow Swatties to walk around London, and I discovered that I was really close to all the really famous places. Of course, I'm not a very good tourist, because after taking about 5 pictures, I realized my camera was out of power. To add to the folly, London Eye was closed, and Westminster Abbey wasn't open that day. However, I got to catch up with friends, and have an enjoyable day out, and eat amazing Italian food, so all in all, I had a lot of fun.

And, since my courses are finally settled, here's a little look at what's occupying my next few months, academically:
Sex, Genes, and Evolution
Molecular Evolution
Field Course in Ecological Genetics (in Spain!!)
The Emergence and Spread of Modern Humans

The best part of this is that the first two classes are each for half the term, and the field course in a week in Late April, so I am currently only taking two classes, and I have both Wednesday and Friday off! Of course, I have to figure out how often I'm going to go do research for my Biology studies...

When in England...Curry is the Food of Choice, Not Fish and Chips

First day of classes, and I'm a little overwhelmed! It's such a big school, so there are so many students! I'm too used to the small school environment, and I'm a little surprised by how disorienting it feels to no longer be in that type of environment. You need a card to get into every building, and half the places in the building, and oftentimes, you need the card to get out as well.

Oh, right--the password problem I had earlier? Turns out that I thought the first two digits were not part of the password, and that's why I couldn't access anything. I had an idiot feeling for a little while after that.

As for classes, if I take the four classes I just signed up for, I have no class on Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday for the next five weeks, and still no class on Wednesday the entire term. Because I'm the sort of person that wouldn't know what I would do with all that free time, I'm trying to take a fifth class, but it's proving difficult. If they don't let me take it, I might ask if I can audit it, because it sounds really interesting--it's called Sex, Genes, and Evolution.

Finally, on one last note--it seems a go for working with that professor to do research, so yay!