The 11-Year-Old in Me is SO Happy

Went to London with Alex this weekend. Had so much fun! Don't have time to give many details at the moment (coursework, flat dinner, putzing around, etc.), but here's my favorite picture from the day.

Memories of Freshers Week

Yay, someone's finally updated the DramaSoc website! There are pictures from our play now! That's very exciting to me, because it's the only physical record of the production I've got, seeing as the attempt to film it was a complete and utter failure. (No, I'm not bitter. Honest. In truth, I was bummed for a while, but now I'm over it. We all have our own memories of the event, and we all get together regularly now anyway, so that's good enough for me.)

Anyway, I snagged a bunch of pictures from the website, which, if you're interested, can be viewed here. Also, below are a couple of my favorites. : )

Some girls backstage on opening night. L to R: Sarah, me, Anni, Caroline, Katie, Marine and Libby.

Rehearsal: awkward flat meeting. L to R: Caroline (Lavinia), Meghan (RT Smith), Katie (Emily), Ez (Connie), Ben (Marcus), Anni (Flora), and me (Heidi).

English Thanksgiving

Last night I went to a great belated Thanksgiving party in Anna's flat. Everyone was asked to either give £3 or bring a dish, so I decided to put my non-existent cooking skillz to the test and make baked apples. Happily, they turned out to be really delicious! I didn't know how many people would be there so I only made 8, and it turned out there were about 25 of us, so we ended up slicing them up and putting them in ice cream. They were a real hit. The rest of the dinner was great too: there was cranberry sauce, mashed potatoes, sweet potatoes, salad, green beans, corn, and of course turkey -- plus a lot of other stuff that I'm sure I'm leaving out.

Moments before the 15 other people arrived with a turkey in tow.

And with so many of us crammed into the tiny flat kitchen it felt very family-like. Out of everyone I think only 8 or so of us were American, so it was fun to bring that tradition to the English peeps. They all kept saying, "This feels just like Christmas dinner!" It was really nice.

Yummers!

Feedback, Finally

Halfway through week 10 and I finally got back a piece of assessed work. Today I was able to pick up my creative writing coursework, which it looks like my professor really liked! I'm pleased about that, obviously; her feedback was really positive. The grading scale is really different here, though, so the mark that I got would actually be really terrible back home. In theory they use a 100-point scale like we do, but in practice teachers rarely give above a 70%. One person explained it to me by saying that above a 70 is like post-graduate level work; undergrads basically could never write a good enough essay to merit a mark that high. So anyway, I got a 67% on my short story, which is actually the equivalent of an A-!

Here is a little UK-to-US grade conversion chart I found, for reference.

Weekend in Bath

Lena and I went to Bath this past weekend! Really good times all around. We left Norwich at 2:30, so we got to London around 4:45. We then had some time till our connecting train to Bath so we visited St. Paul's Cathedral. We arrived just moments before Evensong started so we listened to the choir boys sing for a few minutes, which was very nice. Then we blagged our way back onto the subway ("You mean we were only supposed to use these tickets to get from Liverpool Street to Paddington Stations? OOPS!"), grabbed some delicious bagels for dinner, and then caught the train for Bath. When we got there we found our way to our hostel, St. Christopher's Inn, which was right about a bar called Belushi's. They checked us in, the Australian guy behind the bar gave us each a free coke, and then we hung out in the Chill Out Room upstairs with two New Zealanders, an Australian and a Canadian for a while. It was cool to hear about their travels -- what they'd done, where they'd been, how long they'd been away from home. One of our roommates, also from Australia, had been in Bath for two months, working two jobs to save up enough money to start traveling again.

Next day we saw lots of cool Bath stuff, starting with the Roman Baths. It's really pretty there, and they've set up an excellent museum in the old buildings so you walk around and learn about the history of the place before going out and seeing the big bath. They tell you not to touch the water because it's untreated, but of course we did; it was slimy and smelly (and green) but nice and warm. The weird thing is that at the end of the tour they let you take a sip of the spring water as it comes out of a pretty fish fountain, so I don't know why we can drink it but not touch it. Maybe the fountain water is treated? Couldn't tell you. Anyway, Lena took some pictures of us in front of the bath so I'll share those when I get them, but for now here's one of the smelly green water and some people.

The big bath.

"The King's Spring," from whence we drank.

After the baths we looked around at some of the pretty buildings of Bath, including the Royal Crescent, Bath's prime real estate; and the Royal Circus, where, our guide was pleased to inform us, Nicolas Cage just bought an apartment for £4 million. Bully for him, I say. Later that night we went on a ghost tour around the city, which was really fun and creepy. All the ghosts the guy talked about were from Victorian times and stuff, and they had died in duels and hunting accidents and the like, so you know it's legit.

We also visited the Jane Austen Centre, where we had tea in Jane Austen's Tea Room. I don't even particularly like tea or Jane Austen, but even I had to admit that it was very classy and fun. We also met up for a while with Jenny and Carol, who both go to UCSD (and UEA, for the semester) and who were just passing through Bath on their way back from London.

Carol, me, a Victorian man, and Jenny outside the Jane Austen Centre.

My conclusion: Bath is a lovely city, and Lena is a lovely friend and travel companion. So that made for a lovely weekend.

Happy Evacuation Day!

I love Gawker, because it makes history fun! (Well, that's one reason among many.) Here is a great "article" about Evacuation Day, the anniversary of the day (November 25!) in 1783 when British troops finally left the newly independent US of A.

Also, regular visitors (Dad...) will know that one of the best parts about the site is the hilarious comments people leave. My favorite this time is, "What's great about this post is the conclusion, unspoken but obvious, that we all lived happily ever after."

Happy Evacuation Day!

Dad's Visit!

Dad was here last week! Woo! We had fun and got a little lost, but mostly had a lot of fun. Here's photo documentation of the fun stuff we did. (Minus go to the pub, that is. We never took pictures there, and we were in a few good ones! Especially the Dirty Duck.)

Failed attempts at MySpace-style photos.

Luckily we ran into Alison, who took our picture for us!

Driving on the left!

This route was the source of some agony on the trip back to Norwich.

I hear they really know how to have a good time there.

At William Shakespeare's childhood home.

Acting Shakespearean, I guess.

Hey, that's me, walking awkwardly out of a red phone booth!

At the BBC Radio office in Norwich.

Norwich City Hall and market stalls in the foreground, seen from the top of Norwich Castle.

And that was his visit! Yay, good times. : )

The Bag Ladies and the Tramp

Last night some friends and I went to the weekly Pub Quiz, and our team (we were the Bag Ladies and the Tramp) came in third place out of 22 teams! So between the six of us we won £5 at the bar, which we promptly spent on coffees and hot chocolates for all of us. It was so fun, and I'm very proud of us. : )

Proud team: Sarah, Esme, me, Anni's hand (and our prize), Alison and Nicky.

On an unrelated note, going to this website here is guaranteed to cause you inordinate amounts of happiness.

Special Election Night

Oh, oh, see what I did there? With the title? Yeeeeeeah.

Tuesday night really was extraordinary. Historical, of course; a major victory, yes; and also a really good time. The turnout at the Union Pub was unbelievable -- at its peak close to 300 people. Interestingly, I'd guess that only slightly more than half were American, and the non-Americans were just as pumped up and enthusiastic as the Yanks. Actually they were really funny, because they (understandably) didn't have a concept of what states were guaranteed to go to either candidate, so they booed every time McCain won any state, including shoo-ins like Kentucky and Tennessee. But it was really interesting to see how involved and invested in the election everyone was, regardless of nationality, and to see the outpouring of absolutely overwhelming relief and joy that came with the announcement of Obama's win. It was really wonderful.

Fans of staying up late in pubs. Oh, and the election.

Speaking of which, here is a video I took that has since become a Facebook sensation among my friends here. It was just sheer luck that I decided to record at this moment. It was 4 AM, and there were still at least 200 people in the Union Pub. On CNN they were doing a countdown till the west coast polls closed (we're 8 hours ahead), and everyone in the pub was counting along, so I whipped out my camera. As the countdown ended, suddenly the "CNN Breaking News" graphic popped up, followed by the words, "BARACK OBAMA ELECTED PRESIDENT." And this is what happened.

I really could not be any more pleased. It's going to be really hard to leave England at the end of the semester, but I now have one more great thing to look forward to!

Election Night Special

Seeing as this year's presidential election is pretty important for a lot of reasons, both good and bad, I have to admit that I'm a little disappointed I'm not at home in the US to experience the bizarre political climate first-hand. Being abroad means I have to be a lot more proactive to keep up-to-date, and I imagine that I'm missing out on some interesting talk on campus amongst the students and professors. Plus, this is the first (presidential) election where I'm old enough to vote, and I don't even get to go into a voting booth. Boo.

All that being said, though, it has been really interesting to follow the election from this side of the Atlantic. Every aspect of the election is covered by every major British media outlet. Literally everyone I've spoken to, British and otherwise, is well-informed about America's political situation, and has been following the election rather closely. Not only are people very familiar with Obama and McCain and their respective platforms, but Sarah Palin is an extremely hot item. Concrete, "UEA's only independent newspaper," a few weeks ago ran an article about her stance on environmental protection, and my flatmates love to bring up ridiculous things they've heard about her: She believes the world is 5000 years old! She thinks you can "cure" gays!! She HATES polar bears!!! All I can say is, "I know, right?!"

Everyone I've spoken to, British and otherwise, is hoping Obama's victorious. During my first week here I met a couple British guys who overheard me talking to some of my new friends about I don't remember what, and one of them interrupted me to say, "I'm sorry, but are you American? Please vote for Obama!" It wasn't until I promised that I would that they even introduced themselves.

Anyway, I sent in my ballot in the beginning of October, so here's hoping that it went through. All I can do now is sit back with my fingers crossed. As I mentioned earlier, they're keeping the pub open all night tonight, and I have a feeling it'll be the social event of the week, so I'm very excited about that. To get you in the election coverage spirit, take a look at the way the British do elections with this classic Monty Python sketch, "Election Night Special."

Guy Fawkes Day

Tomorrow may be a big day in the U.S., but here in England the real cause for celebration comes this Wednesday. The 5th of November is Guy Fawkes Night, a.k.a Bonfire Night, or The Night Guy Fawkes Failed to Blow Up the Houses of Parliament.

In 1605, a man named Guy Fawkes and a bunch of his fellow Catholics devised to detonate the Houses of Parliament, thereby killing the Protestant King James. He came really close to pulling it off -- he managed to set up the gunpowder under the building and everything -- but someone caught wind of his plan at the last minute and put a stop to it. Fawkes and the other conspirators were tried, tortured and executed.

So now, to celebrate the fact that Fawkes and friends weren't able to eliminate the royal family, every November 5 people set off fireworks and burn effigies of the Catholic traitor. Awesome holiday if I ever heard of one!

Post-Show Withdrawal

Well, the play is done, and has been for exactly a week. Needless to say, I'm very very sad it's done, and so is everyone else. BUT the plus side is that I've made all these wonderful friends! Luckily we can all reminisce and console each other as we withdraw, and now that we're not forced to hang out with each other at rehearsals for 6 hours a day I see that we really are all friends outside of drama too, which makes me indescribably happy.


DramaSoc has updated their website a little bit in the past few days, but only to put up the poster and program (which I of course promptly snagged onto my computer). I'm told the photos are on the way, though, so I'll share those as soon as I can.

Also, on Tuesday they're keeping the pub open all night so we can watch the coverage of the US election! I'm so excited! All my American friends are going, and loads of non-Americans as well. I mean who can pass up an opportunity to stay up late with friends in the pub watching political commentary on television? I'll definitely be there, despite the fact that I have a seminar at noon on Wednesday...

Full Calendar

This play has kept me really busy this past week. Yes, it's exhausting, and it's pretty frustrating how it often interferes with plans to hang out with my other friends, but at the same time I couldn't be happier that I'm doing it. First of all, I've met so many awesome people that I wouldn't have met otherwise because we're not all on the same course and we live in different accommodation on campus. Also, all the hard work we've put in has clearly paid off, because the play's looking great and we don't open until tomorrow. If tonight were opening night I'd be confident that we could do it really well. Plus, it's just really really fun to be on stage and doing this silly play that another student wrote! It's just a cool atmosphere, a cool project, and I'm really happy to be involved.

And this happened in my Writing Prose Fiction class today, which I found funny.

Emily: But plenty of people have written masterpieces while they're unhappy and poor! Just look at J. K. Rowling.
Professor: Emily, I told you not to swear in my classroom.

Speaking of Language Differences...

Apparently in England the word "aviary" is pronounced "avery." So all this time my flatmates have thought my name is Aviary Finch. That is so embarrassing.

British as a Second Language

Everyone knows that English people talk funny. They have fancy accents and use nonsense words and go on and on about sports that most of us have never even heard of. So I was prepared to hear some language that isn't used in the US, but to which I've been exposed by watching British movies and reading Harry Potter; things like lift instead of elevator, football instead of soccer, favourite instead of favorite.

But when I finally arrived, I was really surprised at how little British English I actually knew. For example, did you know that a zucchini is called a courgette over here? And an eggplant is an aubergine. Also, aluminum is aluminium -- note the tricky second "i" (which makes for a fifth syllable).

There are also some really important distinctions that I wish I had known about before coming to the UK. I knew that English people use the word trousers far more frequently than we do, but I figured it was interchangeable with the word "pants." Oh, how wrong I was. Turns out pants actually means underwear; only underwear, never anything else. And everyone knows what it means to smoke a fag, but I didn't realize that the word also refers to a type of English sausage until I saw faggots and mash (mash is, of course, mashed potatoes) on a restaurant menu.

Slang, too, is really funny, but I'll save that for another time, because most of the slang I've learned is kind of...inappropriate.

Of course my British friends like to laugh at the weird stuff I say, too. (Actually they really like to hear me swear, but I think that's just because it's surprising.) They had never heard "sketchy" before, but they all got it immediately (dodgy). For some reason one of my flatmates took great pleasure in the fact that I said faucet instead of tap yesterday, but maybe she's just easily amused. Oh, and the other day I was making a quesadilla for dinner (which really impressed my flatmates, by the way!) and I asked the two guys who were in the kitchen at the time if they had a spatula I could borrow. When I was met with blank looks I said, "Oh, I'm sorry, I don't know what else to call it," and I was starting to try to explain myself when one of them said, "No, we call it a spatula too; we're just trying to remember what that is."

Days Like This

I've got to say, I love love love busy days like the last few I've had. Saturday was, of course, the trip to Cambridge, and then yesterday was the most international day I've had in a while. Well first was play rehearsal for a few hours in the afternoon, which was mostly English. Then that evening my flatmate Adam took me to his Japanese friends' flat, where we all made and then ate some delicious sushi. It was, hands down, the best meal I've had since coming here. (Granted, I haven't yet tried bangers or faggots [wow to both of those...], so the best might actually be still to come! Or not.) After that we went to a salsa lesson hosted by the International Students Society, followed by the salsa dance party, where we tried -- and mostly failed awkwardly -- to put our new salsa skillz to the test. We were far from experts, but it was fun nonetheless.

Yup, and then today I did some reading for my film class during the day. After dinner I went to a film society meeting, and one of the members agreed to film our play next week. She even wants to do a kind of behind-the-scenes story about us, which they'll broadcast on the university station! It's a win-win situation really: we get the free publicity, and she gets clips to put on her video reel (she's studying film and television). Then was rehearsal, of course (we've got it every day now until the show goes up in less than two weeks), which was really fun as usual. And finally, it's JP's (one of the assistant directors) birthday today, so we hung out at the pub for a long while after rehearsal. And now I have to read a bit more and then rest up for class tomorrow! Ohhhhh uni, how I love thee. : )

Happy Punters

Yesterday we took a bus 90 minutes southwest to Cambridge, and we had such a fun day! First of all, for lunch I had a beef and potato pasty, which is so English and, surprisingly, so good. Probably less surprising is that our main destination while we were in town was the university. We visited quite a few of its separate colleges, including likely the most famous, Trinity College:

I think it's really nice the way the university buildings are spread out all across Cambridge. Enormous old residence halls and cathedrals and libraries are interspersed among the shops and restaurants and museums, which makes for a really busy and beautiful downtown area. Plus there's nature everywhere: loads of green fields and willow trees, and the River Cam, a branch of the Great Ouse (pronounced ooze!), runs throughout the city.

Speaking of the River Cam, one of my flatmates told me that a trip to Cambridge isn't complete if you don't take a ride on the river, so naturally we did it. We rented a punt (basically a gondola with square ends) and pushed around on the water for an hour. It was absolutely hilarious. For comparison:

Here are some legitimate punters...

...and here's us.

Boat skillz.

Yay! Anyway, it was an awesome trip; can't wait for the next one. And as usual I've put some more pictures here.

Another Pleasant Surprise!

This is completely unrelated to my being in England, but I just have to share this because a friend told me about it and it's super exciting: Connecticut has legalized same-sex marriage. Wow! I wasn't really following the case but I know my friend was involved in campaigning for support to end the ban on gay marriage in Connecticut, so a big congratulations to her and everyone who worked so hard to get it passed. : )

Fish and Chips on the Pier

Yesterday a bunch of my friends and I spent the day in Cromer, a little city in northern Norfolk, on the coast of the North Sea. It was a really easy trip, just a 15-minute bus to the Norwich train station and 40 minutes by train to the Cromer city center.


View Larger Map

Obviously it was freezing -- it's an English beach town in October -- but we had a great time regardless. We saw surfers (!), played frisbee on the beach, walked around the city center with ice cream cones (dumb idea but delicious), and, to top it all off, ate fish and chips on the pier. It was a really fun day.


I also put some more pictures from the trip here, plus some miscellaneous ones from recent fun nights here at UEA.

Uni Life

Mom wrote me in an email, and I quote, "I love your blog! BUT -- you need more pictures of you and less of old buildings! Pleez?" (Yes, she is a lolcat.) So these are for you, Mom.

The first night of international students' orientation, in the Union Pub. Clockwise from the guy in the tan jacket: Assaf (Israel/Switzerland), Philip (China/England), Christina (Jamaica), Alison (CA), Jaimie (NY), Yan (NY), me, Tom (CA), Surya (Mauritius), Arturo (Venezuela), Claire (Italy), Shannon (India/England), Tri (PA), Pierre (France).

On the bus back from a club in Norwich. Clockwise from left: me, Lena (Germany), Tom, Surya, Philip.

The winning International Quiz team. Clockwise from bottom left: Lena, Sonja (Finland), me, Shannon, Claire, Arturo, Ryan (US), Surya, Joanna (US), Tri, Assaf, Pierre.

Some of my flatmates learn that you can't beat English weather with one umbrella. From left: Surya, Rich, Ollie, Mark.

Aaaaand this is how you dry your clothes when the US dollar is weak.

More to come. : )

A Pleasant Surprise

So...wow! Guess what! Over the course of the past two nights I auditioned (kind of on a whim, but encouraged/dragged along by two of my flatmates who were also auditioning) for a play that the Drama Society is putting on at the end of October. It's called "Freshers," and it's an original comedy (by a creative writing student) about Freshers' Week, the first-years' first week of university. I had always kind of wanted to try out for something, so I figured, What have I got to lose? At the very least I'll have fun playing improv games at the group audition, and if I make it through the individual audition alive I'll have proved to myself that I can do it. Plus, they told us that there were a bunch of roles to be given out -- 10 main protagonists and 14 or 15 supporting parts -- and it looked like there were only about 35 people auditioning, so my odds weren't terrible.

Anyway, at 11:30 last night, three hours after what felt to me like an awkward and extremely nerve-racking individual audition, I got a text message saying I got a part! And not just any part, one of the 10 main ones! I really could not believe it. The guy told me I got the part of Heidi, who actually, now that I think about it, is basically me: hyper. So I'm extremely excited, I think it'll be really fun. We have our first read-through tomorrow, Thursday, so I'll share the details of that later. Yay! :)

Oh, and P.S. Rabbit rabbit.

Touring the City Center

On yesterday's walking tour around Norwich I learned a lot about what turns out to be an interesting and extremely historical city. Here are some pictures and highlights of the tour. (More pictures in the slideshow at left, and in the album here.)

Norwich Cathedral: started 1096, completed 1145.

Part of the Norfolk Broads, a huge river network that runs throughout the county of Norfolk and into the North Sea.

Historically Norwich is said to have had a church for every week of the year. With three or four churches on every street in some areas, it wasn't always clear which church you should go to. The plaques on the corner of this building indicate the borders of two different parishes -- the neighborhood regions that certain churches serve.

St. Andrews Hall, in regular use since 1544.

Someone's pretty house.

What was once a medieval banquet hall is now a movie theater. In the café inside the original arched ceiling beams have been preserved.

Market stalls in the foreground; Gentlemen's Walk, the main shopping street, in the middle; and the Norwich Castle on the hill in the background.

"I wish those bloody bells would stop!"

I'm trying to sleep but a fire alarm somewhere across campus is going off for the fourth night in a row! It's so weird. Just like the past few nights, it's been sounding for hours. Since before dinner, in fact -- which, by the by, was so good tonight. My flatmates and I ordered 5 pizzas for the 9 of us. It was a really nice change from the ravioli and salad and turkey sandwiches I've been having for the last few days.

Anyway, I went on that walking tour of Norwich today, so I'll put up my pictures and what I learned in the morning, if I can ever get to sleep...

P.S. Points to anyone who recognizes the "bells" quote. :)

A Well Good Time

This past week has been well fun, as my flatmate Ez would say. (She would also say, "It's well sunny today," or, "This pasta I made tastes well bad." Or, if she felt like really confusing people, she might even say, "I like my steak well rare.")

Anyway! A fun week. My classes started on Tuesday, and I already have a lot of reading and writing to do, but most of it seems pretty fun. By next Friday I have to make up a synopsis of the screenplay or stage play I want to write for my final drama project, which is a little daunting. I'm really looking forward to that class a lot, though; it seems like it's going to be a real challenge. Plus we get to see our final projects performed in class by our classmates! So that'll be tight.

And I've been up to more fun than just going to classes, if you can believe it. Almost all of my nights here so far have involved sitting around the table drinking (mmm...cider...) and chatting and meeting really cool new people, either in the Union Pub on campus or in the kitchen with my flatmates and other friends. Last night my flat did a poker night, which was really fun. The drinking age in the UK is 18, so you'd think the university would be overrun with wasted first-years who are away from home and able to buy booze for the first time. But actually most people I've met have been pretty casual about drinking.

I'm guessing that's probably for a couple of reasons. First of all, American freshmen have to sneak around in order to drink, but that fun element of secrecy and stealth doesn't exist here in England. Also, the alcohol laws aren't really as simple as "legal at 18." You can't buy alcohol until you're 18, but you can have it in a restaurant with your parents when you're 16, and you can be served it in a private home as early as age 5. As far as I can tell this takes some of the excitement out of drinking: when you've been allowed to do it with your parents for a while, it's not such a huge deal when you can buy it on your own. Finally, the "normal" age of a first-year is 18, which is just barely legal, but in actuality a good number of first-years are a year or two older than that. Of the 8 first-years in my flat, I think only four are 18: two are 19, one is 20 and one is 21; and they're all starting as first-years for various reasons: a few took a gap year, and one changed his degree so he's starting university over. So these guys, having been able to buy booze for a while, are pretty mellow.

We've also had some really fun parties since I've been here. The best was the first International Students' Society party of the year, on Wednesday. The ISS rented out a club in Norwich for the night, and I had a lot of fun dancing and meeting loads of students, both international and domestic. (The ISS has a reputation for throwing great parties, so they attract people from abroad and home.) There's also a Quiz Night every week, and my friends and I went to the first one of the year. It was a special event for international students because we were the only ones on campus, and my team tied for first place, with 27 1/2 points. I won a killer tat of a flaming skull, so I put it on my hand and impressed people with it all week.

Anyway, tonight I'm hanging out with my friends in my flat again, and then tomorrow I'm going on a walking tour of Norwich, so I'll put up some pictures when I get back. And speaking of pictures, check out the photo slideshow on the left! Clicking on a picture will bring you to the gallery where you can see all of them. Night! : )

Welcome Freshers

All the British first-years have been arriving today, which has had all of us international/visiting students very excited. I'm pretty sure I've met all the new kids who have moved into our flat, and there are still 2 empty rooms which should be filled by this evening.

It's funny to see them all move in and think back to when we arrived at Middlebury for the first time, because the experiences are very different. In general these students are given a lot more independence, and also a lot more responsibility, both in terms of university life and academics. First of all, there's not really a scheduled orientation program apart from "Freshers' Week," a week of nightly dance parties and social events that takes place during the first few days of classes. There's also no meal plan on campus, meaning that many new students (myself included) are having to cook for themselves for the first time. Actually it wasn't really until I was buying food for myself at the Tesco (little budget grocery store) a few blocks off campus that it hit me that I'm really away from home, with no one to look after me, and that I have to figure out this whole "sustenance" thing on my own. Luckily I've got a nice kitchen and even nicer friends and flatmates, and we've talked about having big group dinners and stuff, so that should take away some stress and add some fun.

Not that cooking is even that big of a deal when compared to our academic life here. As far as I understand it, students at British universities are held more or less accountable for their own education -- much moreso than at Middlebury, where it can sometimes feel like a more rigorous version of high school, what with the long class hours and borderline excessive amounts of written homework. Classes here at UEA (at least in the Faculty of Arts and Humanities) typically meet for between two and four hours a week, for an average total of 10 hours a week. The limited time spent in class in conjunction with the minimal amount of assigned homework means that students have a lot of unscheduled time, and that what they do with that time is up to them. Ideally professors would like us to be studying independently -- doing further research, reading the optional course materials, generally just keeping up with the class.

I'm really looking forward to seeing how this independent, self-responsible model of student life plays out, both for me and my British classmates. I have a feeling that, because the British students have been preparing for a British university for most of their lives, they'll be ready to live up to the responsibility. I think I can handle it too, though, and I actually think I'll also really enjoy it. Well obviously not having as much homework will be a huge plus, but I also like the idea of getting as much out of the experience as I put in. I don't really think Middlebury's system is ineffective, but it's easy to drown in seemingly insurmountable amounts of reading and writing and lose sight of the fact that I'm at school to learn, not to scrape by in my classes by doing only as much as is required of me and then collapsing from the effort. UEA and British universities in general seem to put a lot of responsibility in the hands of the students, and they erase everything that they deem unnecessary to the student's learning (the stuff that turns into busy-work at other institutions...). Anyway, I think that being given that responsibility will be a huge inspiration to work hard and get the most out of my time here.

Made It to England!

So here I am in England. These last few days have been exhausting but otherwise amazing. All of Tuesday and a good part of Wednesday were spent traveling, which was kind of a drag at the time, but it made the hard mattress in my dorm a lot more tolerable when I finally got to sleep on it. I left the house at 9 AM on Tuesday and flew from Knoxville to Houston, where I had a six-and-a-half-hour layover before my nine-and-a-half-hour flight to London Heathrow. (Thankfully the George H. W. Bush International Airport has several weird art installations to keep me occupied, like a bunch of televisions arranged in a circle flashing different colors and patterns.) From Heathrow Airport I took a four-hour bus ride to Norwich (with stops; otherwise it’s only two hours away), which dropped me off right on campus at about 4 PM, bringing my total travel time to exactly 24 hours. Booya.

Anyway, I signed in, blah blah blah, and my room is awesome. My friend Rosi (she was an exchange student from UEA at Midd last year) works in the Accommodations Office and she scored me a room on the top floor of a building that’s known as a ziggurat, which is like a stepped pyramid. My room has a wonderful view and a sink, and I pretty much have the bathroom next door to myself, seeing as I’m the only bedroom up here at the top of the pyramid. I’m in a flat with about 10 other people, one of whom has arrived so far: Surya, a really cool first-year from Mauritius.

From my window I can see a dorm that's identical to mine.

The campus itself is very strangely designed. It was built in the 1960s, and you can really tell, because there is concrete everywhere. The whole place consists of two levels, a ground level and an upper level. So you can walk around on this concrete terrace and enter some buildings on the ground level, and then some buildings are only accessible by a raised walkway that connects all the multi-story buildings. It’s really like a mini-city. But there’s also a fair amount of grass surrounding the campus center: from my bedroom windows I look out over a river (aka The Broad) and a pretty field where live at least 20 mammoth-sized bunnies.

The Square, at the center of campus.

Thursday morning I took a 10-minute bus ride into the Norwich City Centre with Surya and a bunch of other great international and exchange students that we picked up along the way. What I saw of the city was extremely charming. There are modern buildings interspersed with historic ones, including several cathedrals and an enormous castle of which you can apparently take a tour, so I’ll definitely be back there. There was also a great open-air market right in the center, with stalls selling clothes and food, both fresh and prepared (got a delicious hot dog). There were so many people there, too, which might have been partially due to the excellent weather: 63-ish degrees and sunny! Like, the sky was blue, and the sun was warm. Not what I expected at all, but people keep telling me that it won’t last long.

Some stalls at the market in the city.

When we got back I took the rest of the afternoon to do some shopping and set up my room a little more. The campus is very conveniently outfitted with a number of stores and restaurants, including a grocery store (aka Union Food Outlet, or UFO), so I stocked up on some food and eating supplies, which I stored in my cubby in our flat’s sweet communal kitchen. Then in the evening I met up with the kids from that morning at the pub on campus, the Union Pub, where we hung out and talked and I met a bunch of other great students, most of them first-years or exchange students.

So now I’ve just come back from registration, where I found out what courses I officially got into: Writing Prose Fiction, Writing Drama, and Whiteness & Ethnicity in American Film. I’m really excited about those three courses, even though the last one wasn’t one of my top choices. I guess it’s kind of a bummer that I’ve come all the way to England to take a class on America, but it’ll probably be interesting to see our culture from a British perspective.

Anyway, all of this information is very factual and probably boring, I realize. So I have to go finish up the rest of the orientation activities for today, but I’ll be back later with some more details of university life. : )

T Minus 6 Days

Well hi! Welcome to my little blog. I'm going to use this thing to document my upcoming semester in England.

While there I'll be studying creative writing at the University of East Anglia, a university of about 15,000 undergrads whose alumni include authors Kazuo Ishiguro and Ian McEwan (my fave!), as well other prominent writers, politicians, performers, academics, and leaders. UEA is located in Norwich, which, with a population of 132,200, is the biggest city in the somewhat rural county of Norfolk. (Thanks for all that, Wikipedia.) It's located on the southeastern coast of England, right across the water from Amsterdam and an hour-and-a-half train ride (116 miles) from London. Here's a map where you can see Norwich's location within the UK:


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Since coming home from New York City a little over a week ago I've been getting ready for my trip in a number of ways. Most of it is kind of logistical preparation -- doing laundry, stocking up on toiletries, etc.

Typically students apply for a student Visa well in advance before going abroad, but as of last September that's not always necessary anymore. Last year Britain's immigration board instituted a new policy whereby students (from certain countries, the US included) intending to study in the UK for fewer than six months can get a Visitor's Visa upon arrival to the UK, right there in the airport. That's good news for me, because I'll only be there for three months. And while a regular Visa would've worked too, before I could get it I would've had to drive 175 miles to Nashville in order to get my fingerprints taken or my retinas scanned or something. This way I only have to show my passport and my UEA acceptance letter at the entrance checkpoint at Heathrow and I'm golden, baby.

One piece of documentation that I did apply for in advance is the International Student Identification Card, and I'm really glad I did. My Mexican friend Enrique (WHAT UP!) told me about it. The ISIC is kind of like a universal school ID card: it costs only a few bucks to make (I got mine at the International Studies Office here at UT), and then you're afforded all sorts of student discounts and special offers when you show it at certain places like museums, theaters, restaurants, hotels, and travel companies. Pretty sweet deal, as I definitely plan on traveling.

I've also been trying to prepare myself for the cultural differences between America and the UK. Since announcing my intention to study in Great Britain I've heard the expression "America and England are two countries divided by a common language" more times than I can count, and I don't doubt that it's true. I know that if I went across the pond expecting to see a mini-America I'd be in for the shock of a lifetime, and that even though I speak the language, there are probably plenty of things about British culture that I won't understand right away. For this reason I've watched a lot of "The Office" and Simon Pegg movies lately. (Actually, I'm serious. See "Shaun of the Dead" right now; it will blow your mind.)

I've also been reading through a couple of books that my mom found for me: Rules, Britannia: An Insider's Guide to Life in the United Kingdom by Toni Summers Hargis, a Brit living in America; and The Anglo Files: A Field Guide to the British by Sarah Lyall, an American living in Britain. They're both kind of anthropological sketches of United Kingdom, both written from the perspective of someone who is familiar with both British and American culture. So far they're very interesting; I have yet to figure out if any of what they say is true, but I'll be sure to note here whatever I find.

Anyway, that's it for my pre-departure introduction. I'm off to England in 6 days (next Tuesday), and I've still got a bit of preparation left, so I'll get back to that, and I'll be back to this blog very soon. For now, I'll leave you with this gem from the Golden Age of British Comedy (i.e. the 1970s). This is Neil Innes and Eric Idle on Rutland Weekend Television: