Updates And Such...

I must begin by apologizing for the lack of posts recently. I didn't have time to post much two weeks ago and then my sister, Lauren, came to visit last week and we spent four days backpacking through Scotland. I just got home on Saturday and I have had a cold ever since. I just got a laptop from the library for a week so there should be many more updates coming soon. The highlights should include, sheep and Stonehenge, Glasgow, Fort William, Aberdeen, Inverness, and getting stranded at Loch Ness. Also, hopefully there will be more pictures and posts about life in Swansea which is always an exciting thing. Tonight I have a friend's 21st birthday party to attend and then tomorrow, finally, sailing! Other than me all is well in Wales and I hope that it is the same for you. Cheers.

Avebury, Stonehenge, And A Lot Of Sheep!

I finally did it, I went to Stonehenge. I've been hearing about it since elementary school and its nice to finally join the thousands of other people that can say, "Stonehenge? Yea, I've been there."

As the title might suggest I also went to Avebury. For anyone who may not know, Stonehenge is just one of at least one hundred such stone circles and henges located throughout England. Avebury is another such place. As with Stonehenge, no one knows exactly who built it or why but archeologists have managed to piece together a significant amount of its history. Since Avebury was the first stop on my trip, which was planned by the American Studies Office, we'll begin there. I don't have many pictures from Avebury but I'll give you what I do have and I'll make a pathetic attempt to be as informative as our guide was.

I suppose that I should begin by explaining what a henge is. Henge is basically a term for the man made ditches that surround the stone circles. At Avebury there are three circles, each with their own henge. I don't have any pictures of the biggest henge but in the middle of the town (the town built up around the henge) there are two more stone circles and henges both of which are in a sheep pasture. Exciting stuff isn't it? Above is a picture of one of the interior circles and yes all of those little white things are sheep! We had to exercise a lot of caution to prevent our shoes from picking up what the sheep left behind and there was a lot of that stuff too.

This would be Marta, Nicole, me, Rachel, and Megan in front of the, "Mamma Rock," at Avebury. Okay, so supposedly the more round the rock the more feminine it is thought to be. This is the most round one in the interior circle. There is a very tall, rectangular rock straight behind the camera and at certain times of the year, particularly during the solstice, the masculine rock's shadow, "pierces," the Mamma Rock. Is anyone else thinking Freud yet? Moving on...




Look what I did. I built Avebury! And to think that archeologists spent all those years wondering how they moved the stones, it was me.


























Here is a view of one of the interior circles. It is the most complete one that can be found at Avebury. I can't remember the specific date, I want to say the 1300's but I'm not certain, anyways a priest ordered that the circle, "disappear." Well what do you do with over a hundred half ton stones? You bury them of course. That's right, the townspeople wanted to keep the henge and the circle so they just dug holes in the ground next to each stone and pushed them over into the hole. Ingenious, I thought. Fast forward to the 1930's when an archaeologist discovered one stone and decided to erect the rest of them. Unfortunately, World War II began and the project was never finished. What you see above is the product of an unfinished job, but as they say here, "good effort mate!."

Above is a picture of Nicole and I on a wall beside the street to Avebury.

Avebury Chapel. That right there is the difference between Britain and the States. At home a, "chapel," is a charming word for a one room church from the late 1800's, not a sanctuary and cemetery from the 1500's or earlier.

One last view of Avebury for you, please don't remember it this way. Now on to Stonehenge (and better pictures)!

For any of you who like to entertain yourselves with the thought that Stonehenge is a bunch of rocks in the middle of no where, you would be correct, but do not make the mistake of thinking that it is vacant and that you can just walk up and touch the stones like the Travel Channel shows you, its not true. They say that the camera adds a couple of pounds well reality adds a couple of hundred people. That would be the awing mass that greeted us upon our arrival. If you've ever wandered what it was like to be famous, here's your chance, just place a picture of you where the rocks are.

Me and Stonehenge (and a million other people).

Marat, me, and Stoney. See she does look normal when she's not being a facial contortionist.

A closer view of Stonehenge. I bet you didn't know that the rocks are blue stones and they can only be found in Wales. Perhaps a big red dragon built Stonehenge instead of druids or wizards.

Nicole and I with the entire henge in the background. Kudos to Marta, great picture, thanks!

This is the less seen side of it. Look at the sky, its blue, I almost forgot that I was in England that afternoon.

Group shot. Nicole, me, and Marta. My, "us shots" are improving, see I actually got the henge in the picture.

Ah yes, a familiar sight. See how disgusted we were with all the people.

One last view of Stonehenge for you. That ditch to the left is the actual henge.

I know, I promised that the posts would be shorter and this one wasn't. To be honest I began working on this post about a month ago but then I got sick and I never had the chance to finish it. Well that's one down with about four more to go. To tell you the truth, Stonehenge itself isn't really all that exciting. Its the mystery behind it, I think, that attracts people. It is worth a visit though should you ever be lucky enough to find yourself on this side of the globe. I hope that my pictures and pathetic commentary did it justice.

Swansea Living

I've gotten a few requests for pictures and details about life in Swansea so I will try to answer some of your questions in this post. This blog will probably be short because I haven't had the opportunity to take many pictures yet. I'll try to take some pictures of my new room in Hendrefoelan Student Village soon. Here is what I do have so far, I hope that its enough for now.

This is the beach that's across the street from my uni. The sea was in a bit of an uproar due to the remnants of a hurricane. You have to walk through the sea oats and over a sand dune to get to the beach and the day I took this picture sand was blowing off the dunes and stinging my face the entire time, it doesn't get much better than that. I come here at night a lot of times and watch the lights of the freighters on the horizon pass in the night. We tried to make a fire on the beach one night but it didn't go as planned. It took us two lighters and fifteen minutes to get the fire to light and then the embers blew into my friend's hair and burned him. We eventually gave up and settled for a beer and the sunset. It was an experience to say the least.

Yes, that's what you think it is...a boob cake. It was our friend Brianna's 21st birthday and my friend Erin, pictured above, picked up this cake at Tesco (Walmart). It wasn't specially made or anything, we just found it on a shelf next to a Bart Simpson cake. Does this picture remind anyone else of Betty Crocker?

Brianna (birthday girl), Nicole, and I at the Village Inn pub on the Mumbles Mile. I am sad to report (sorry Lauren) that several of the pubs on the Mumbles Mile have closed and that its reputation for well rounded drinking seems to be rapidly declining. It is a sad time in Mumbles history indeed.

This is the same group as before only after a couple of drinks. Its amazing what alcohol can do.

All of my American friends who did the Swansea pre-course in British culture and politics. We'd been together three weeks by this point and for any of you who have traveled to a foreign country with someone before you can understand the camaraderie and, on some level dependency, that is formed. This was one of those, "nights you'll never remember with friends you'll never forget." From front left: Caite, Kelly, Amy, Erin, Rachel, Sher, Brianna, Nicole, me, Marta, and Andrea.

Rachel, Erin, Strongbow, and the owner's dog...the best of Swansea.

Me after the university hosted, "porn star party." That's right, the party was thrown by the school. Experiencing culture shock yet? Its mostly a fresher's (freshman) thing so I didn't go but I did inherit a pair of bunny ears from my flat mate Rich. Aren't I cute? These same ears were later sheared off by a flying flapjack but that story will be saved for the next picture.

I suppose that I could have taken a better picture but that's our beer can pyramid. What do you think? I think that Tennessee would be proud. For about two days it was the biggest one in the student village. So about that flapjack...my flatmate, Rob, has two friends Jon and Tom. I'm not sure how this originated, probably alcohol, but Tom thought that it would be fun to knock down the beer can pyramid with a flapjack (a granola bar type of thing) but Jon was the one who actually threw it. Regardless, being drunk, they didn't realize that I was standing between the pyramid and them so when they threw the flapjack it hit my bunny ears and down they went. I managed to escape unscathed fortunately. It upset my flatmate Rob and he proceeded to take Tom, the instigator, thinking that he had thrown the flapjack, back to his room and explain to him kindly that it is improper to go to someone else's flat and throw flapjacks at the residents. Tom apologized and the party resumed. Although Jon threw the flapjack Tom some how managed to be nicknamed, "Flapjack," and unfortunately for him the name has stuck. He has since nicknamed me, "Fish Food," though since I was eating Gold Fish Crackers during, "drinking time," (Rob's term for any time other than rubbish and sleeping time). Flapjack was drunk and having never before seen gold fish crackers thought that I was literally eating fish food. Oh the joys of alcohol.

Have you ever had one of those nights where you wake up and you don't know where you are, who you're with, or how you got there? Yea, this was definitely one of those nights. These would be the three guys that I live with, flatmates we call them, Rob, Rich (he was drunk, forgive him), and Rhys(pronounced Reese). This picture was taken after the porn star party about five minutes before the flapjack incident. Mom and Dad, are you still glad that I came here? I am.

Our adopted flatmate, Kyro (pronounced Cairo, like the city). He's friends with Rob and is over whenever we have drinking time which is just about any time after the sun goes down. For the record, Kyro is %100 Welsh he just looks Italian.

Rob and Kyro, yes that's Rich's shirt on Rob's head. Don't ask, I don't know.

Flatmates and friends. Back row beginning with the guy in yellow: Rhys, Rob, Rich, Kyro, Luke, and Carly. Front row: Jon, Flapjack (Tom). My flatmates are Rhys, Rich, Rob, Carly, Lisa, and Sara. Sara was the photographer but she can be found in the pictures below. Lisa is another American but I don't yet have a picture of her unfortunately. Now to explain the ties, the university also hosted a party called the, "Fresher's Ball." The theme was old school uniforms. I didn't go but Rich did give me a neck tie and Sara taught me how to tie a windsor knot. Now that's what I call getting cultured. Thanks guys.

Rich, Strongbow, and Kyro. This was about two hours into the pre-partying.

I'm not sure who the legs belong to but if I had to guess I'd say Flapjack. No one knows why Rob is making that face and I'm not sure that we want to.

Rob on the bus on the way to the Fresher's Ball. That would be Luke on the right laughing at him.

Kyro and the girls, Sara and Carly.

One afternoon my American friend, Nicole, and her English flatmate, Zoe, walked all the way from uni. to the maritime quarter downtown, two miles away, on the beach. Below are a couple of pictures from our little outing.

Me and Captain Cat. Just so you know copper on bare skin in 50 degree weather is really cold.

This is the caption below the statue pictured above.

Zoe and Captain Cat. So about that, "British reserve?"


That's all that I have for now but I'm sure that there will be more on the way soon. As for classes, I'm taking two. My Cosmopolitan Wales class meets twice on Tuesdays from 9:00-10:00 and then again from 2:00-3:00. Wednesday I have my Gender and Identity anthropology course from 11:00-12:00. There are eleven people in that class, nine Americans and two Welsh. All of the Americans sit facing the window that looks out over the ocean and the Welsh sit with their backs to it. Ironic I think. I don't have class on Mondays, Thursdays, or Fridays so that I can travel and party. I also have sailing on Wednesdays at 1:00 and then sailing socials Wednesday nights but that hasn't begun yet. I can't wait for it though. I hope that this blog has answered some of your questions about every day life in Swansea at UWS and if it hasn't just let me know and I'll do the best I can to fill in the rest. Don't forget I still have Stonehenge and Avebury coming soon so keep checking the blog for updates. I hope that you've enjoyed your day in Swansea, there will be many more to come.

The Other Side Of London

As I've mentioned before I went to London last weekend. This post will be fairly short seeing as I was only there for one day and being considerate of the fact that some of the places I went didn't allow photography there won't be many pictures. Please follow along anyway as Marta, Nicole, and I take you on a trip through parts of London that you may recognize and several that you may not. We aren't big into touristy things and I don't like large crowds too much so most of our day was spent wandering the streets and parks as we got more of a local feel for London.

We left Swansea on the 7:00 am train to London. It was pretty simple, get on, fall asleep, wake up, get off in Paddington. I must take this opportunity to warn you that I had only had about four hours of sleep in the three days leading up to this trip so there may be some things that I don't remember so well, sorry. While planning this trip we made the fortunate discovery that we would be in London on the last day that the Houses of Parliament would be open to the public for the next several months. We had bought tickets online for a twelve o'clock tour. Upon our arrival in Paddington Station we bought all day passes for zones one and two and caught the tube (subway) to Westminster. Lauren told me before I came here that I had to get off at that stop and after seeing the view I must thank her profusely for her demanding suggestion.

I didn't have the opportunity to get a picture of the view but imagine Big Ben, seen above, literally right on top of you. I hope that your imagination can do it justice.

We found the ticket office pretty quickly and then walked around Westminster (a section of the city) for about an hour waiting for our tour to begin. Below are some pictures from our walk.

The Houses of Parliament as seen from across the street and a block away from Westminster Abbey.

I give you Westminster Abbey. We didn't' actually go in but it was still beautiful.

Me and Westminster Abbey. Notice the double decker bus in the background!

Marta and I with Westminster Abbey.

An unforgiving goofy picture from the Abbey. Is that Mic Jagger on the right?

Moving on now we are on our way to our tour of Parliament.
Nicole and I with Big Ben taken from the street in front of Westminster Abbey.

One of the entrances to Parliament as seen from the, "lobby."

This would be the other entrance into Parliament.

These are the only pictures that I can offer you because photography was prohibited inside the building. It was amazing though. I actually got to stand in the room where Parliament debated what to do about the U.S. during the Revolutionary War. Did you know that the Queen is only allowed into the House of Lords? That's right, she isn't granted entrance into the House of Commons. David, if you read this, question time is on Wednesdays from 12:00-12:30, come visit.

After seeing Parliament we headed over to the Orangery in Kensington Gardens. Its a restaurant that is housed in the old stables at Kensington Palace and if you eat there, technically, you can say, "I ate at Kensington Palace." Well, I'm not that cool but we did have tea at Kensington Palace. Just an ironic story for anyone interested. Marta has a friend that she grew up with in Knoxville. They live about ten minutes apart from each other but they haven't actually seen one another in four years. It turns out that her friend is studying abroad at Imperial College in London this semester as well. We met her at the Orangery for tea. It took four years and a trip around the world but Marta got to see her friend. Her name is Melissa and she was probably the friendliest face that I saw in London. I have a friend studying in Madrid this semester, anyone up for a reunion? It is true, you do meet all kinds of people over seas.

Melissa and Marta at the Orangery.

"I'm late, I'm late, for a very important date!" Sipping tea at Kensington Palace. See Daddy you were right, I am a princess, just kidding.

Nicole and I in the Orangery.

After tea in Kensington Gardens it was off to the Albert Memorial. Evidently it is a memorial to Prince Albert. Below are several pictures of all things Albert.

A view from the back of the Albert Memorial. Things can only get better.

The Prince Albert Memorial from a distance.

Nicole, Albert, and I.

I'll leave you with this goofy picture of Marta and I in front of the Prince Albert Memorial. Maybe you'll be kind and forget this image.

We went to the Albert and Victoria Museum after seeing the memorial. We spent about two hours looking at clothes from the 16th-21st centuries in the fashion exhibit. The V&A Museum is kind of like London's version of the Smithsonian, huge and never enough time. We got a nice glance though and a passing view as we headed back to the tube station. To be honest, it would take at least a couple of weeks to see all that London has to offer. I'll stick with Swansea though, a small sea side village with sailboats and wind generators. I have to turn my laptop back into the library now so you won't be hearing from me for at least a day maybe longer, sorry. Enjoy the break though and I'll be back in a few days with more from Stonehenge and a day in the life of Swansea.