Fun, food, and new friends

I’m happy to be back in Cambridge, relaxing and not having to walk so far every day. It’s been back to business as usual, with writing papers and reading for class. We have access to the computer lab in the library, which I’ve been going to a lot because the computers are bigger. I had a paper due this week, so Sarah and I went to the computer lab just about every night. We could have spent about half the time we did in there had we actually been doing work, but instead we gave each other tours of our respective universities on Google maps street view, calculated the number of days we’ve spent watching TV shows, and talked about how the shade that Taylor Swift threw at Katy Perry at her Boston concert wasn’t even subtle and was totally uncalled for. The paper got done eventually, and I guess that’s all that matters.

I got a really yummy crepe the other day at the crepe food truck, and the people there were so nice. They were college students and asked me all about my summer program. Two of them “go to uni in London,” but are home in Cambridge for the summer. The other said that he wants to study abroad in America, and when I asked him where he said either New York or California. Typical.

The other night at dinner, I had the first dessert I didn’t finish since the beginning of the program. It was quite the tragedy. The dessert was called sherry trifle and it was some sort of gelatin with fruit in it, which sounds good hypothetically, but the gelatin had a weird spongy texture and instead of normally jello fruit, like strawberries or blackberries, I found a whole grape in mine and was very confused. In other adventures of not amazing food, I finally went to this Italian panini place in the market everyone has been raving about. However, when I got there, there were only two choices for a panini, and the only one with meat in it has salami when I was hoping for ham or turkey. I got the vegetarian one, which wasn’t very good because it had lemon squeezed onto it, which made the whole panini much too cirtusy.

In other news, another small world moment happened to me. Yesterday morning, I woke up and put on my running clothes in anticipation of going for a run after breakfast, but instead I took a nap (whoops). Sarah came in and asked me if I wanted to go to lunch, and since I still wanted to go running later, I kept on my over sized Loyola powderpuff shirt and running shorts. When we were out and about in the town, I felt like a slovenly American because everyone else looked so cute and I complained that I should have changed. BUT, then we went back into Caius and a girl stopped me and asked me if I go to Loyola. I said no, but I graduated from there a few years ago. Well, it turns out she’s going to be a junior there in the fall and is doing a three week study abroad program at Gonville and Caius. Of course I was so excited; I get excited to meet and chat with literally anyone I have something in common with, even if that thing is simply being from the same country. What a small world we live in!

July 29, 2015August 23, 2015 by rosemcbride Leave a comment

Spain

Spain was stunning. The cultural was beautiful, and it was a wonderful trip.

This was not how I felt towards the beginning, when I was tired and lost, but everything turned around later in the day. My flight was at 6:35 in the morning, which meant waking up at 4 (yay) and taking a train to the airport. I arrived in Spain and was able to tell the border agent what I was doing there and for how long all in Spanish (Rose: 1, language barrier: 0).  I went to buy a metro ticket, and the officer spoke to me in English. I was so excited to speak Spanish on this trip, and they were already profiling me as American? What could have given it away? The porcelain, freckled skin? White sneakers? Awful Spanish accent? The world may never know.

The first thing I did was go to the stadium where Real Madrid plays. I didn’t know what to expect from this, because even though I played soccer for a good portion of my life, I’ve never really watched European soccer. I’m glad I went though, because the tour was amazing. First, I saw a panoramic view of this HUGE stadium. Then, there was a room with trophies and game highlights and a history of the club. There were videos playing and mood lighting and it gave me the chills. I’m not even a real fan of Real Madrid and I was excited to be there. It reminded me of the feeling when they play the pregame Blackhawks video and then all the players skate out onto the ice. Later in the tour, I walked across the field. Very cool.

Then the day took a turn for the worse. I went to the metro stop where I got off, and accidentally dropped my ticket into a slot on the ticket machine, and it disappeared. I couldn’t get it back, and there were no workers on duty, so I had to use a help call box.  The worker didn’t speak any English, and this situation was very difficult to describe in Spanish (Rose: 1, language barrier: 1). She came to where I was, and after a long time where she called someone else on the phone and brought me to some sort of office, I was issued a new ticket. Since I still had the receipt proving that I bought the original, I didn’t think it should have been so difficult but whatever.

I was hungry and so thirsty at this point, as it was close to 100 degrees. I stopped for lunch and ordered some kind of panini with cheese and spinach, because I saw the word queso and everything else had ham in it. The waitress and I had some miscommunication with language, leaving me frustrated because I thought I knew more Spanish than I did (Rose: 1, language barrier: 2, ugh). After, I continued my journey to the Temple of Debod, an Egyptian temple of sorts that the Egyptians gave to Spain as a gift. It wasn’t as cool as I thought it would be, but it was an Egyptian temple without having to go to Egypt nonetheless.

I went back to the metro and tried to find the Catedral de la Almudena, but could not. Instead, I accidentally happened upon the Palacio Real, and since I was tired and hot, I figured a tour of a palace with AC couldn’t hurt. The palace was absolutely stunning; everything was so ornate and beautiful with paintings and golden statues. I’m glad I accidentally wandered inside, though there was no AC so that was a bummer. I wish I could have taken photos, but there was no photography allowed to my dismay. I took one photo, and a guard came up to me and told me to delete it. Internally I was like

But I really just said, oh I’m sorry and deleted it. When I finished touring the palace, I realized I was literally a block from the cathedral but was like eh whatever and continued on to the Mercado de San Miguel which was like my favorite thing ever. It was this bustling market with all sorts of food available. I got some amazing frozen yogurt, and continued walking towards the city center, and as I did, everything began to look more like I thought Spain would. Hilly streets made of brick, colorful street decor, open shops with Spanish food, and plazas.

I came back to the center later, but at this point I went to the Parque del Buen Retiro. It was an adorable park, kind of like Central Park in New York but better. There was a pond, and people were rowing boats which reminded me of the boat scene in the Little Mermaid. I walked through the park towards the Crystal Palace. It was a glass building, and there was an exhibit inside with patterned scarf-like material covering the glass so that when the sun came through everything lit up.

I had a little bit of time to kill before I went to the Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofía, which was free from 7-9 and I’m all about that free entertainment life. I sat on a bench after walking around the rest of the park for a while. There was a family having a water balloon fight (including parents), and another where tiny kids were running around squealing with joy while their dad chased after them. It was just such a cute, happy moment, both were #familygoals.

At 7, I got to the museum which was quite large. There was so much to see, I didn’t make it to all of the rooms. It was a nice museum, but the art wasn’t exactly my favorite. I’m a big fan of Monet and Degas and impressionism (and of course Vermeer). The Reina Sofia had a lot of surrealism (Dalí) which kind of freaks me out to be honest. Before looking at the artist name, I guessed that about 30 paintings were by Joan Miró and approximately one of them actually was. The most famous painting in the museum is Guernica by Picasso, which I didn’t realize would cover an entire wall of the museum. It was enormous, and had two security guards guarding it. Everyone had to stand quite a few feet back and no pictures were allowed. I’m not sure if this was because it was in the section of art about the Spanish Civil War and it was a sensitive topic, or because it is super famous. Either way, I wanted a picture and was a little disappointed I couldn’t take one.

I realized I didn’t eat dinner, so I went back to the Puerta de Sol (plaza in the center of the city) and wandered into a shop that, again, had a lot of ham products. I saw something that looked good called a croqueta, so I asked if I could have that and the man asked how many I wanted. I didn’t even know what it was so I was like, I don’t know and he said okay I’ll give you two. It was only two euro so I was like yeah okay, dope. He was very nice, and I really liked whatever the croquetas were. I think they were like fried ham and mashed potatoes, but honestly I can’t say for sure.

I’m proud of myself for getting traditional Spanish food, because normally I am not an adventurous food eater. But I’ve been in the mood for trying new things (not just food) and wanted to experience the traditional food and I’m glad I did. There were McDonald’s and Burger Kings and other fast food that I recognized everywhere, but I think my body would turn on itself in ways I don’t want to imagine if I ate there for the first time in a while. Later I got a chocolate churro because why not. More culture.

While walking around, I saw of lot of people wearing t shirts with English writing on them, which is confusing because most people there speak Spanish. These people could have just been tourists, but what I’ve found out since coming abroad is that people love wearing clothes with places they aren’t from on them and words from languages they don’t speak. Tons of stores in Cambridge alone sell hats and t shirts that say New York or L.A. I guess America is cool and edgy to them? In Spain there were tons of people wearing angsty shirts with phrases like: “stay beautiful” and “be yourself.” My personal favorite was, “Catch a wave, be a legend.” Aight.

I found my way to the hostel, which was a lot nicer than any of the other ones I’ve stayed in, and much cheaper! I guess different cities have different prices. I was in a room with three other people, and it was very chill; we were all asleep by midnight.

In the morning, I checked out and went to a mass. It was an incredibly beautiful church, with statues of saints and ornate decoration everywhere. However, I didn’t get much out of the mass because I didn’t understand what was being said. Although, mass is universal, so I still knew what the priest was saying, minus the homily and readings. Interestingly enough, I was the youngest person there by about 30 years, no exaggeration. It was so strange. Also, the mass had no music. When the mass ended, the priest just walked away and people left. I was like uhhhh, is this over? I just walked out confused.

Down the street from the church was the weekly Sunday market, El Rastro, which I thought would be a food market like the Mercado de San Miguel, but it was mostly clothing and other knick knacks that were sold. I didn’t think I would buy anything, but I got a pair of patterned pants for five euro that I’m obsessed with. I also got one of the traditional Spanish fans that I believe are used in flamenco dancing. All over Madrid, women used these fans. In the church, most women had these fans and were fanning themselves. I’m not sure if it’s a cultural thing or just because it was so darn hot and there was no AC anywhere. Probably both.

Another thing of note: many people there spoke English. Some didn’t, but a good amount did. It made me upset that my broken Spanish wasn’t better than it is, and upset that America doesn’t force bilingualism on kids at an early age. In Amsterdam I had no trouble finding people who spoke English. I’m under the impression that in most countries, most people speak multiple languages. It’s America that’s lagging behind and it’s almost embarrassing for us. My future kids WILL learn two languages. However, in all of the shops in Madrid the music was in English. I heard a varied mix of genres, from old Taylor Swift to Kenny Loggins and everything in between, and it made me wonder why they were listening to English songs if they didn’t speak English. Weird.

Before I headed to the airport, I had breakfast at a cute little shop that sold mostly sweets, but still advertised itself as a breakfast place. The Spanish sure love their sugar! I some chocolate dough things that were good, but way too sweet. It’s okay though, because I had room for sugar, considering I walked a near half marathon the day before (12.5 miles…I’m feeling it today).

It was definitely a worthwhile trip and I’m so glad I went. I was also proud of myself for traveling alone. I wasn’t scared at all when I was traveling, to my surprise. However, it’s all about looking like you know what you’re doing, I’ve found. Also, since I’ve gotten to Europe I have this strange delusion that since I’m from Chicago I’m some sort of tough guy and no one can mess with me. This is probably due to the fact that the perception everyone here has about Chicago is that it’s some dangerous city where people get shot (I guess that’s not untrue?) So I have street cred now. Even though EP is probably safer than most suburbs. Anyways. When I got back to England, I started having some back spasms due to the fact that I walked 12.5 miles with a backpack, which I will never do again. Until the next adventure…peace.

July 28, 2015July 28, 2015 by rosemcbride Leave a comment

Royal Armouries

Yesterday I went on the greatest run ever. Somewhere during the run I decided to just keep on going, and I ended up running for an hour. I haven’t run that much since high school, and it felt great. I went on my normal route, and just kept going and going through the pasture, and then I hit a small outdoor tea cafe, so I went around that and ended up on a farm that just kept going into the distance so I turned around. There were some horse stables, so I think it was private property and probably a good thing I didn’t go any further.

Later in the day I just hung out in my room and watched Netflix; I started Brooklyn Nine-Nine and I am a huge fan. Andy Samberg is everything. So funny. Then, in an effort to do work, Sarah and I went to Caffe Nero. However, the coffee we got was super strong. Since I’m very new to this coffee thing, I just got super tired and my head was spinning a little. For dinner we had a nice pizza party in the JCR, though the pizza was pretty bad and essentially just cheese on some dough.

Sarah and I watched some of The Office before we went out to the Bathhouse for a nice casual night. This morning, the history class I’m in took a trip to Leeds to visit the Royal Armouries. We had a little class with some of the historians there and got to try on chain mail and use the swords. We loved it.

    

 

Then, we toured the museum a bit before getting on the bus to come back. There was one particularly interesting exhibit, which showed a timeline of all of the wars that England fought in since the Battle of Hastings in 1066. However, two wars were interestingly left out…the War of 1812 and of course, the American Revolutionary War. Hmmm…

Tonight, some of us are going to the club and I want to go because I’m like..

but alas, my taxi comes at 4:30 AM to take me to the train station so I can catch my flight to Madrid. Hasta luego!

July 24, 2015 by rosemcbride Leave a comment

Stratford upon Avon

Yesterday we went to Warwick Castle and Stratford upon Avon which was an all day affair. We were all still a bit tired from the weekend in London, so not much was accomplished at these places. When we first got to Warwick, it looked like a castle, but when we went inside the grounds, it was more like an amusement park. There were “archery lessons” for 5 pounds, and wooden swords for children’s parents to buy for them. I’ve never been to Medieval Times, but I assume it was something like that. All of the tourist traps aside, it did happen to be a real castle. We climbed to the top and there were beautiful views, albeit we had to climb very steep, narrow staircases. It was an extreme fire hazard to say the least.

After climbing the castle, we walked around the grounds and saw the birds of prey exhibit, which was a collection of eagles and vultures. I’ve never seen birds like that, but it was so sad to see them in captivity. One of the vultures seemed like it wanted to get away and was flapping it’s wings to no avail. We also saw a free roaming peacock approaching a group of people, so that was different than what I’m used to.

We hopped back on the bus to go to Stratford upon Avon, best known as the birthplace of Shakespeare. This is where the exhaustion kicked in and the desire to spend money kicked out. All of the Shakespeare exhibits cost like 15 pounds and we weren’t super interested in paying money to see where he was born. We did walk to see his grave though, and it cost us 50p to get in, which is questionable. It was in a church along with Ann Hathaway and some other graves. Next we went to a field and just sat there for an hour before we had to meet up for a pre-show talk.

Prior to the show, the assistant director talked to us about the production of The Merchant of Venice. We had a dinner break where I got some good pizza. The show was at the Royal Shakespeare Company, which I guess is really famous. The show was actually really good. It was an abstract interpretation; the lines were the same as in the original play, but the outfits and set were incredibly modern. Like modern to the point where the characters were wearing Nike sneaks with skinny jeans (Lorenzo I’m looking at you).

We got back to Cambridge around 12:15, so I was exhausted. I had 9 AM class this morning, and of course I need to wake up for breakfast beforehand, so I did not get much sleep. After class, I took a 5 hour nap. I think this is my longest nap to date. LIKE HOW DID THAT EVEN HAPPEN? Just when I thought I was getting better at not napping… I woke up just in time for tea, then I did some laundry and went to buy nail polish.

Some people already know this about me, but I have been trying to grow my nails out for approximately, um, years, and it never works. I always end up fidgeting with them and either cut them, bit them, or they’ll break. I haven’t touched them since I got here, and it has been my goal to not touch them for the 6 weeks that I’m here. I’ve been painting a clear hardening coat on them, and today I got a nail polish to distract me from touching them.

Also, I FINALLY ordered the dress I’ve been eyeing for weeks. I have been looking for a striped shift dress that isn’t totally fitted, but still kind of fitted (yeah, that makes no sense I know) and I found one at this store called Joules. They didn’t have my size in the color I wanted, so I had to order online to pick up in store. I went back to Caius to do so, but when I tried entering my payment info, they didn’t have the USA as a country code. Like what? Ugh, they had every other country. So I had to email a service rep who never got back to me, and today I went in the store and ordered over the phone. And of course, when I got back, there was an email in my inbox telling me that there is a separate US site. Grr.

Tonight I went to the computer lab with my pal Sarah, and I planned my Madrid trip. I’m very excited to speak Spanish and explore the city. I also did some reading for my Graphic Narratives class, which I LOVE. We read Watchmen, which is kind of an anti-hero story. So much symbolism. We just finished Burma Chronicles and I would highly recommend it. It’s about a Canadian man, Guy, whose wife works for Doctors Without Borders and they move to Burma with their infant son Louis. The story follows Guy as he learns about life in Burma. I never read graphic narratives before, but I’m starting to really enjoy them.

July 23, 2015July 23, 2015 by rosemcbride Leave a comment

It’s a small world after all

It’s been three days since I’ve taken a nap, and I consider this a complete win. The tiredness is going away, at least I hope so. I was going to take a nap today, but instead I watched live streaming of the Blackhawks Convention for an hour. Little kids were asking Shaw, Rundblad, van Riemsdyk, and Bickell questions and it was the funniest thing. A little girl asked them who their favorite princess was and Shaw said Merida from Brave. None of the other answered; I was disappointed because I wanted to know.

Anyways, after getting back from London yesterday, the few of us who weren’t still in London or in Paris went to the pub we’ve been frequenting called the Bathhouse. It’s such a casual and laid back environment, we love it there.

This morning, I went to a Catholic church down the road. Having gone to Catholic school my whole life, I was expecting some other people here to be Catholic too. Even at NU, there are a good number of Catholics. But I was like “I’m going to church tomorrow where my Catholics at” and they were like “not here” so I went by myself. It was a beautiful church, but it was almost too touristy to be a church. There were ladies selling church merchandise, or church merch (look how clever I am), and I thought that was odd. The mass was pretty similar to the ones I normally go to, but the choir was too far away so I couldn’t hear what they were saying. Also, some people with backpacks got up in the middle and left, and I was like, did people really come to a mass as a tourist attraction? I don’t know how I feel about that.

However, my walk to the church is the reason for this post title. I was walking along the street with my headphones in, and a girl stopped me on the street and asked me if I was with Factor in Chicago. I said yes, and I recognized her from a shoot I did for Sheridan Road about two years back. Her name is Sarah, and she is working in London for a few months. I never would have recognized her on the street, so I’m so glad she stopped me. Small world moments like that are the best. Here is a photo from the editorial we shot together, she’s on the far right.

Other than church, today I mostly just wrote my paper for class tomorrow. I also got a waffle in the afternoon, which was once again super yummy. After dinner, Lauren, Sarah, Sean, and Sam (I told them about my blog and they were somewhat dismayed I didn’t write about them, so shoutout) went to the computer room in the library to do some homework because the wifi in the college is down. It has been one big struggle because I realized just how much I use my computer. Well, instead of doing what we should have, we just sat around talking about life and watching videos of Amy Schumer. Then, a boy who wasn’t in our program asked us if we were American and if we were in summer classes. Turns out, he goes to school at Caius, but is from Connecticut. I couldn’t believe it; I thought he was from the UK with his accent. We talked all about his time at Cambridge and I was so enthralled with hearing about what it’s like to go to school there on a regular basis. It sounds so cool, but I would surely miss home.

July 20, 2015July 20, 2015 by rosemcbride Leave a comment

My love affair with Pret and other London tales

So I went to London this weekend, but more important things first: croissants have become my driving force in life. I find myself waking up excited for 8 AM breakfast, because they have chocolate croissants. They’re heavenly and I’m confused how I never had croissants for breakfast before coming to England. However, as the title of this post insinuates, Pret a Manger has THE BEST croissants I’ve had yet. When we were looking for a place to eat in London, everyone was like “let’s go somewhere else besides Pret, we can get that a anywhere,” but I said, “bye I’m going to Pret.” It has revolutionized my abroad experience. And to think, we had one in Evanston for a year and a half since I got there freshman year, then it closed and I didn’t even care. Didn’t know what I had until it was gone.

Food aside, London was fun but so tiring. We took a bus there on Friday morning from Cambridge. When we got to the river, our bus drove onto a ferry and the ferry carried our bus along with other cars and semi-trucks to the other side. I was like wut how is this possible. Also, why didn’t we just take a bridge? But either way, you go engineers. Mad respect from the journalism major (except for those people who say that all other majors are soooo easy compared to engineering, you still suck).

When we got off the bus, a group of us went to the Tower of London, after getting lunch. This was a monumental lunch because I bought my first ever cup of coffee here. It was a mocha, and I bought it from this hole in the wall (but not in a good way) shop, and it was pretty good. I thought I needed some caffeine because I took a motion sickness pill on the bus, and since I didn’t get the non-drowsy kind, knocked out on the bus and struggled to stay awake throughout the day. In addition to the coffee, I also got what was advertised as “the best hotdog in the world” which it was not. They gave it to me on a baguette and it looked a little funky, but tasted okay.

We toured the Tower of London and saw the Crown Jewels as well as the Royal Armories and the torture chambers (ew also sad). Afterwards, we went to the Globe to hear the director of Richard II talk about the play we were going to see that night. We had a dinner break, and then went into the theatre to see the play. It was outdoors, and we were sitting on backless bleachers, so the comfort aspect of this three hour production was a little bit rough. Also, I had a hard time understanding what was going on at points, but overall I had a nice time. Being in the Globe was an experience I have heard about from many English teachers, but I never thought I would have the chance to experience it myself. Check that off the bucket list.

After the Globe, most of us stayed in a hostel in the city for the night. London after dark was beautiful, and seeing the Tower Bridge all lit up was magical. The hostel we stayed at was SO MUCH NICER than the one I stayed at with Liz on day 1, and this one restored my faith in the hostel experience. It was a comfy bed with clean facilities, and that’s all I could have asked for.

When I laid down at night to go to bed, I finally got on the wifi and checked all of my apps as I normally do, and ohmygosh I had so much FOMO from twitter, snapchat, and Instagram over not being at the Blackhawks convention. I watched some of the life stream and videos from the convention when I got back from London today, and I wanted to be there so bad. The convention and the Taylor Swift concert were two of the only reasons I didn’t want to come to England. I mean, LOOK AT THAT FACE.

I digress. In the morning, we walked to St. Paul’s Cathedral (after breakfast at Pret, of course) and pretty much just looked around. It would have been cool to go in for a tour, but that costs cash money, which we were all low on at the time. We also went to King’s Cross and took photos at Platform 9 and ¾, which was so necessary, since the Harry Potter studio tour had no tickets left and we needed to get our literary nerd on (well, Sarah and I did at least).

Next, the group split and Hallett, Sarah, and I went to see Buckingham Palace and the surrounding area. We also went to Hyde Park and the Kensington Gardens, which were probably my favorite part of London. The park was beautiful and there were swans swimming in the pond.

Our final stop of the day was Harrods, which was a miracle because I thought my feet were going to fall off. When I went before with Liz, we only looked around the first floor. This time we went up to the first floor (granted, it was only to find the bathrooms) and everything up there looked like it was hot off a runway. It makes me wonder who would buy any of that. I’ve never known anyone who is glittering Dolce and Gabbana dresses and studded Valentino heels wealthy. But, as Hallett pointed out, these companies seem to be doing really well, so someone must be buying it. However, if seeing all of this designer stuff did one thing for me, it made me miss Factor and modeling back in Chicago. That will probably be the only time that I get to wear lavish and elegant clothing I can never afford, and get paid to do it. Fall season will be here soon enough.

FINALLY, we went back to Cambridge on a train leaving from King’s Cross. The train was about an hour and a half long, but I didn’t mind because it was peaceful and we got a chance to rest our feet. Also, looking out into the late afternoon sunshine as we passed fields upon fields of the English countryside made me feel peaceful and happy.

When we got back, Sarah and I went to get food and both agreed that when we went to London, we both missed Cambridge. Although we have only been here two weeks, Cambridge seems somewhat homey already. Of course I miss Chicago, and my secondary home in Evanston, but Cambridge is becoming a third home somehow. In the season finale of The Office, Creed gives what is probably his most insightful quote in the series: “No matter how you get there or where you end up, human beings have this miraculous gift to make that place home.” It’s true.

 

 

July 18, 2015July 19, 2015 by rosemcbride Leave a comment

Running n’ Shopping

I still cannot get over how cute Cambridge is. Around every corner is a new spot for afternoon tea, a coffee shop proudly serving croissants, or a boutique clothing store. I’ve been frequenting all of these, minus the afternoon tea (still have to plan a trip!)

I’ve also been going on a lot of runs lately, which is good because I need to get myself back into shape. Plus, it’s so beautiful here that running isn’t even a chore. Yesterday I ran through a neighborhood that I thought was going to be a dead end, but it led out onto a pasture next to the lake. It was a hidden slice of heaven, and there were people walking, swimming, and having picnics by the water. On my way back to Caius, I also saw some friendly (this is a brash assumption) cows just chillin on the meadow of King’s College.

Yesterday night we went to a foam party at a club. That is a statement I never thought would apply to me, but studying abroad is all about new things, right? It was interesting. Fun, I suppose, but I got sprayed in the face with foam and nearly ruined my favorite sandals. I should have worn flip flops, but the dancing was fun. I’m shocked that there are so many clubs here, I’ve never heard of college kids going out clubbing in the US.

This afternoon I went to Primark, which is similar to Forever 21, and got a bunch of cute stuff for really cheap. Granted, it might fall apart tomorrow, but I’ll wear it for however long it lasts. Tonight instead of eating in the hall, we had a picnic in a park. It was a lovely dinner, and the park was bustling with people. Later, since it was Bri’s birthday, we all went out to a pub to celebrate. Tomorrow we leave for a day in London!

July 17, 2015July 18, 2015 by rosemcbride Leave a comment

C’est la vie

Not much has been happening lately, just typical life. My schedule goes as follows: eat, class, nap, class, potentially another nap or walking around, eat, homework or fun, sleep. I don’t know why, but I’ve been SO tired this past week. I took a four hour nap yesterday for no good reason, it’s crazy. I’m almost finished being sick, though nearly everyone else in the program is sick or starting to feel sick. Hopefully that isn’t my fault.

I also went running yesterday and tried to find the trail that runs along the River Cam, but all of the trails seem to be closed off. So, instead, I just ran around for 30 minutes and somehow didn’t get too lost. I’m still finding my way around this town, I wish I knew it already.

The other night, a couple of us went to a pub called the Bathhouse. There are surprisingly a ton of bars and clubs in this tiny town, as opposed to Evanston which doesn’t have any. The Bathhouse looked kind of like a little coffee shop with a bar. There were comfy seats and even some book decor on the walls. We met some other Americans from the College of William and Mary. I want to meet more students who are also studying abroad! This is very much a college town, so I’m sure it will keep happening.

Nothing else of note has really happened. I had a waffle for lunch today (super healthy, right?) and it was fantastic. Now I know what Matt meant when he said that waffles are amazing and super popular in Europe.

July 15, 2015July 18, 2015 by rosemcbride Leave a comment

Amsterdam

We woke up bright and early (well early, it wasn’t quite bright outside yet) on Saturday morning to take a 4 AM cab ride to the London Stansted airport. It was such a strange feeling to be taking a plane ride to another European country and returning to Cambridge, or “temporary home”, because every time I have taken a flight, I’ve always returned to Chicago. The flight was incredibly short, only about 40 minutes actually.

Upon arriving, we took the train into the Amsterdam city center, then walked to the Anne Frank house. We had to wait in line for over two hours to get in, but I would say it was worth the wait. The tour took us through the different rooms of the house that the Franks hid in. Having never read the book, I didn’t know the entire story of Anne’s life. On the walls, there were quotes from her diary and screens playing videos of people speaking about Anne, even some who knew her personally. The stairs throughout the house were very steep; I can see why Hazel from The Fault in Our Stars had a hard time climbing all of them when she visited. At the end of the tour, we got to see the original diary of Anne Frank.

With the wait and the time it took to go through the house, there wasn’t much time to spare. My main objective upon going to Amsterdam was to see Vermeer’s Girl with a Pearl Earring, which is in the Mauitshaus in the Hague, which is an hour train ride from central Amsterdam. The museum closed at 6 pm, and so did the canal boat cruise I wanted to take. I left the group and went to the canal cruise, which was pretty underwhelming. Essentially, it was an hour of being in a too hot boat watching murky water and seeing the same architecture over and over.

Soon after, I jumped on the train to the Hague to see one of my very favorite paintings. I didn’t make it to the museum until 5:10, which I thought wouldn’t be enough time to see everything; I expected the museum to be similar to the Art Institute of Chicago, which is HUGE. I mean, with such iconic paintings (also The Anatomy Lesson of Dr. Nicolaes Tulp, Rembrandt) I expected the grandeur of the museum to match. This wasn’t the case, and the museum was only two floors and didn’t have too many paintings, which was actually perfect for the time crunch I had. I immediately went to the Girl with a Pearl Earring and, to put it in cultural terms, marveled at it’s splendor. It was quite beautiful, and somewhat smaller than I expected. I took many (too many, I was getting weird looks) selfies with the painting, and explored the rest of the museum, which was nearly deserted. I thought it would be crawling with people, but the fact that there weren’t crowds made the experience better.

Afterwards, I went to the gift shop and got a postcard and a phone case with the painting on them, and exited the museum right before it closed. I had to make the trek back to Amsterdam to meet up with the group to tour the Heineken factory. We had prepurchased tickets, but when I was on the train to the factory, Carlie texted me and said that even though our tickets said the factory was open until 9, the last tour started at 7 (which it said in the fine print). By the time I arrived at the factory, the group already went back to the hotel, so I explored a little bit and bought some souvenirs. Then, I began my trek to the hotel.

So there are three ways to get around the city: bus, train, and tram. I quite liked the trams; they were like little streetcars that ran in the middle of the street on track and overhead wires. Since the tram that was right in front of the hotel didn’t run from the city center, I had to take a different one that ended up close to the hotel, but not that close. I got lost in an area that didn’t look so safe, but after some panic, internal cursing, and glossy eyes close to pouring tears, I managed to find the one open restaurant with people who pointed me in the right direction. At that point, my phone had died, but Carlie was waiting for me outside the hotel and everyone else was inside as well.

At this point, I’m exhausted, and still pretty sick. It was a struggle to speak during the day because I lost my voice, so to everyone I asked for directions throughout the day, I probably sounded like an elderly man. A funny shopkeeper even asked me why I was whispering, and then understood when I told him I was sick. The rest of my group went back out to see what the nightlife of Amsterdam held, but I facetimed my parents then totally knocked out.

The next morning, three of us took a plane back to London, while the other four took an overnight, 11 hour bus ride back Sunday night. The flight was short and easy again, but we ran into problems at customs. Bri and I got through just fine with our letters from the study abroad program, though the customs agents were kind of rude. He asked me while it said Cambridge instead of Gonville and Cauis (the exact college in Cambridge) and I didn’t know what to say. However, Carlie got an especially nasty customs officer. He wouldn’t let her through with just the letter, he said she also needed to show financial proof that she paid for the program, which was confusing because the letter means that we are enrolled in the program. We walked over to help her out, and the man said we didn’t read the criteria for entering the country. When I asked him what criteria he meant, he rudely responded, “Do you not know the meaning of the word criteria?” It was unreal! Eventually we got on the phone with the assistant program director, who spoke to the customs agent, who was incredibly rude to the assistant director as well. It was a terrible experience, but we eventually got through.

Amsterdam was an experience I’m glad I had, but the city wasn’t as beautiful as anticipated. I was expecting crystal blue waters, when they were really a murky brown. I just booked my plane tickets to Madrid in two weeks, and I’m super excite to practice my Spanish and go to an authentic, Spanish Catholic mass. Until then, I’m just going to keep exploring and getting to know Cambridge!

July 13, 2015July 18, 2015 by rosemcbride Leave a comment

Hoppin’ around Cambridge

Well, I’m sick. I guess travel, not enough sleep, and a six hour time difference can do that to ya. I had a sore throat yesterday, but today the congestion and tiredness really hit me. Other than that, today was a nice day. I woke up for breakfast, thinking it was Saturday (breakfast is later on Saturday) so I missed it. Instead I went to Pret to get a croissant and a green tea to help with my throat.

This afternoon, we had tickets for the “hop on, hop off” bus tour, which took us around Cambridge to see the whole town. The bus was lovely, with fresh air and wind blowing in my face as I sat on the top of the double decker. A group of us got off at the Cambridge Botanical Gardens, which was quite beautiful. There were plants from all ranges of climates, and some pretty fountains and waterfalls as well. It was pretty cool, but I think the Chicago Botanic Gardens are better, though I’m biased. We had lunch in the cafe, and then headed back to the bus to go to the next stop.

 

We hopped off at a American WWII cemetery and looked at all of the crosses with names of those who died. There was a pond in the cemetery, which kind of emulated the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool by the Washington Monument in DC.  When we came back we had dinner at a burger restaurant, then back to the rooms to get a good night’s sleep for tomorrow’s 7 AM flight to Amsterdam.

*I forgot to mention when I first wrote this post: I was walking back from dinner and I was wearing my Teravainen Blackhawks shirt (cause Teuvo is bae) and a younger boy said “Go Blackhawks!” It took me a second to connect the dots but then I gave a little fist pump is response. It’s amazing that the dynasty even crosses the ocean.

July 10, 2015July 15, 2015 by rosemcbride Leave a comment