My Flatmate Lives in a Hamlet

     I've been wanting to write a post with that title for months now and with my time here in England racing to an end I figured now was the time. The past 6 months I've done a lot of traveling around Europe and in England, which has been the focus of most of my posts. But where I called home was Ainsty Flat D2 Garrowby Way. When I arrived in York, it was dark and rainy. I had no idea where I was living, what my room would be like, if it had a bathroom, how many people I was living with or who I was living with. Similarly, the people I was to live with had no idea I was coming or who I was. One of my flatmates even thought I was German at first! At least we were all in the same boat. Surprisingly, I really wasn't too concerned. I'd just had a wonderful Christmas and New Year's in Germany and was feeling ready for my next adventure.
   Within the first few days, I met my new flatmates and, as we all learned, I was American and the four of them were British. And yes, one of them does live in a hamlet! At first I was a bit overwhelmed as they all knew each other already (and the campus and the country!). Week by week though I started spending a bit more time in the kitchen hanging out with them. By the end of my time, I had to force myself to get out of the kitchen to go study. I learned so much about British culture, words, food, and holidays and I taught them a bit about American culture as well. More than that though, I had a place to call home... friends to eat ice cream out of the tub with and to help me with spider infestations at 1am.  I couldn't have asked for a better place to call home and better group of people to call family here. Unfortunately, each of them has left for home already and I find myself in our kitchen already missing them. My time in England wouldn't have been the same without you. This is not a goodbye, just a see you in a few years. Most of all, Millie, Martha, Olivia, and Megan, thank you. I am so grateful to have met you and while America may be far, the pilgrims made it and so I'm sure with a Boeing-747 so can you.

My British Family 

     I've been lucky enough to travel to 12 different countries in the past year, but the most amazing part of my journey has been the people I've met along the way, many of whom I met on the Camino and then got to visit over Christmas break, spring break, and summer. To everyone who I've been lucky to meet, walk the Camino with, live with, visit, and travel with: you are always welcome to visit me America. I hope to see you all again one day. Thank you for being a part of my year.
     And for those of you at home who I said goodbye to last summer, I'm coming home tomorrow! A year older, a year wiser? We have a year's worth of missed holidays, birthdays, hikes, hugs, and laughs to make up for.

Last Trip of the Year

     I've just returned to York for the last time this year. I spent the past 4 days exploring Belgium. The first day I was in Brussels by myself and went on a lovely free walking tour. I learned lots of random things about food and beer on my tour, such as that there are actually 2 kinds of waffles! The Brussels waffle is crispier and not too sweet and thus you can put loads of sugary toppings on it. The Liege waffle is sweet itself and so you don't put toppings on it. I also learned that fries were invented in Belgium. There was a little fishing village that would catch and fry fish as their main food, but one year it was too cold and the lake froze over so they couldn't fish. Instead, they cut up potatoes in the shape of fish and fried them... and that's how we get fries (according to random Belgian tour guide). Pralines were also invented in Belgium when a doctor decided to coat medicine in chocolate to make it go down easier, then his son/someone I can't remember had the idea to replace the pills with cream. In just 2 short steps they managed to go from a pill to a chocolate dessert.
     Their sugary specialties are not only their specialties, but more like their dietary staples. Brussels was a cool city, but I wasn't too keen on the food options. Basically every block has a waffle place, a Belgian fries place, a chocolate shop, and ice cream. As you all know, I love all of those things and have quite a sweet tooth (I have eaten ice cream for breakfast before... Steamboat Kutandara 2009). Even so, I also do need real food and like eating healthy as well, so dining in Belgium was a tad limited as everywhere you turn all you can find are waffles! I did love my hostel though. In the picture below you can see that the beds were kind of like little wooden caves that you crawled in. Inside, there were even shelves for your stuff and a light. When you left you put your stuff inside and slid the door shut and locked it.
     My second day I went to Bruge which is in the Dutch speaking part (really makes no different to me since I can only say about 5 words in both French and Dutch). The town was so pretty. I went on a boat tour and got to see so many different styles of buildings. Apparently, Bruge was once the richest city in Europe, and it was also once the poorest city in Europe. Now it's doing pretty well with the flocks of tourists. In the afternoon, I took a quick train to the beach in Oostende. I had imagined myself laying on the beach in the sun, but alas it was a bit too cold, so I just enjoyed a long beach walk.
     The next day it was time to go to Antwerp to meet up with Danielle and some of her exchange friends. We had some Thai food and then walked around in some direction I don't remember. They'd been there before so sort of knew their way around. We made a valiant attempt to go to the American Food Store, which requires a walk, a tram and a walk since it's in some odd suburb, but it was closed. Guess I'll just have to wait a week to get American food. We went back to Liege in the French speaking part where Danielle lives and I stayed in a nice hotel in the city. Unfortunately, it ended up a not so pleasant experience since 2 guys tried to get to my room at 1 a.m. (apparently they were incapable of reading numbers or using their brains and thus scared the living daylights out of me). Thankfully the day improved once I met up with Danielle and her friend Emma in the morning. We walked down this 1k long market and then had Chinese food from a mini Chinese festival in the main square. I had sushi and lychee juice! We took the bus up to the citadel and took in the views while eating animal crackers (technically not animal crackers as they were letter shaped). Belgium is an odd place I must say, but it made for a good last adventure (and a waffle dinner of course) and best of all, seeing Danielle again. Thankfully, soon we'll both be home and I won't have to go all the way to Belgium to see her (though the one hour flight for £15 from Manchester was pretty convenient).

Neat hostel bed in Brussels

The beach at Oostende 

 Me and Danielle in Liege

Summer in Poland

     Since about March, my friend Wendy and I had been planning to take a trip together to Poland. Finally, I finished my last exam and it was time to take off to celebrate by exploring Warsaw and Krakow. I was lucky enough to have a few Polish friends to give me loads of recommendations. My Polish flatmate even taught me some Polish, so I was all set to say things like "hello", "goodbye" "please", "thank you", and "I don't speak Polish" (the most important of them all). These are the basic phrases I try to get down for each country I visit, and they usually end up coming quite in handy.
    We started off in Warsaw, which was a fairly sizable city, but we could get most places walking still. Since most of it was burned to the ground in WWII, the city actually has a really modern feel. There are loads of skyscrapers, highways, and shopping malls surrounding the landmark Palace of Culture and Science. The building was a "gift" from the Soviet Union, so it's a bit controversial in that while the building is pretty cool, it's also from the country that controlled Poland until about 1989 and has historically been seen as their enemy. While impressive, my favorite part of that area was actually a crosswalk that was painted to look like a piano keyboard! Another one of my favorite things was the University of Warsaw library which has a cool exterior with giant copper panels with passages in different languages carved onto them. It also has an amazing rooftop garden where we had a lovely picnic. We also visited Old Town, which has some cute narrow streets, squares, colorful old buildings, and wonderfully touristy restaurants. While in Warsaw we tried to do some sampling of Polish food. We tried pierogi, which is typically a savory dumpling filled with meat or potato, but we went for the strawberry! We also tried zapiekanka, which is a food you can get from food carts that is essentially half an open baguette with cheese and mushroom.
     After a few days in Warsaw, we took the train to Krakow. Since Krakow wasn't damaged as much in the war, it has a much more old historic feel with most things centered around the main square in old town. The first day we explored Krakow and went to an underground museum beneath the main square. Around dinner time, we went to a chocolate café and I had an iced chocolate and some mystery truffles (the menu was only in Polish so I just looked at the pictures and picked a few). We may have ruined our appetite for dinner a tad, but it was worth it. We also explored Kazimierz which is the area of town that was historically the Jewish Quarter. Now it's quite a happening part of town with lots of new hipster food places. There are some synagogues and the old Jewish cemetery as well, which has gotten quite overgrown but now there's a lot of refurbishment work happening. One evening, we went to a special restaurant with Jewish food and Klezmer music (though we just went for dessert and the music). While 100% touristy, the music was actually amazing. I'd been wanting to see Klezmer music for quite some time actually after seeing a presentation at Grinnell about its revival in Poland.
   We also took some day trips from Krakow. We went to Wieliczka, which is famous for its massive salt mine that even has chapels, statues, and ballrooms inside. It is altogether 9 underground levels. After a three hour tour, we'd only seen 1% of the mine. We also went to Zakopane, which was a cute little mountain town sort of similar to Estes Park. It's well-known for its oscypek, which is a special kind of smoked sheep cheese shaped like christmas ornaments. Our last day trip was to the concentration camp Auschwitz in the town of Osvięcim. It was certainly a very erie and somber place to visit, but I'm also very glad to have had the opportunity to visit there. I was also amazed to see how many people from so many different countries take the time out of their vacation to visit such a place.
     I didn't have any idea what Poland would be like, but it turned out to be the best place to celebrate the end of exams. There was absolutely so much to do there and I hope to go back one day and visit new cities and also go back to Warsaw and Krakow again. After returning to home sweet York, it was time to get a move on with my very last assignment... a 3500 word essay for my archaeology class. Somehow I managed and I've just turned it in (hence I've now got time to write another obscenely long blog post), so I've officially finished my 3rd year. Tomorrow I'm off to Belgium for a weekend of well, who really knows, but I think I'll go relax on the beach and then I'm going over to Liége to see my now brilliantly-french-speaking little sis.

View of the piano crosswalk from the top of the Palace of Culture and Science 

Climbing the flying pink horse in front of the national library

Zapiekanka snack time 

My first time to a cat café

23 plaques - each written in a language spoken by the Jews

Aldi Society

    It's time for me to tell you a bit about one of my favorite places in England: Aldi. Aldi is such a beautifully simple two syllable name. Easy to spell, easy to say, and even better to visit. Aldi is a supermarket chain that has basically mind-blowingly low prices, super odd organization, and great finds every time.

     While in Europe, I've become quite a fan of grocery stores anywhere and everywhere, because, well, what's not to like about an organized room full of food? That said, grocery shopping and cooking is not always a looked forward part of adulthood as you have to actually take the time to go buy the food, then bring the food home, then cook the food. I've been to many a grocery store, and Aldi is the one that tops them all. While I may seem a bit over-enthusiastic about a budget grocery store, I obviously am not alone in my love for Aldi. 

     Most recently, the Aldi Society was founded by it's three core members, myself, Millie, and Olivia. Previously, Millie and Olivia were generally online shoppers at Sainsbury's, which is convenient because food is delivered right to your door. But believe it or not, even with the 30 minute walk to and from Aldi, they were still converted to Aldi devotees. Our main activities involve a weekly trip to Aldi. Prior to the trip, you may hear things like "I'm so excited about our trip to Aldi today" or "Oh my gosh guys can we just go to Aldi right now". Since it's a bit of a walk there, we suit up with our empty backpacks and walk through the fields and army barracks till Aldi is within sight. You really never know what new things you might find. You can get snap pea crisps, a whole pot of yogurt for 45p, organic mushrooms that are cheaper than the nonorganic ones, 6 bananas for 69p, a box of tropical fruit popsicles for 99p. They even have hummus. What's not to love? It just never ends. The store's not too big that you feel overwhelmed, but it is easy to get thrown off by the organization, or lack thereof. You'll find lightbulbs by the frozen fruit or eggs by the kitchen roll. It's easy to feel overwhelmed at first by the nonstandard supermarket experience, but once you get the hang of it, it's always an experience to look forward to. 

     Arriving home from Aldi is a bit like coming home from a good vacation. You sit down and breath a sign of relief as you take your heavy bag off your shoulders. You bask in all the lovely foods you've brought home and look forward to eating them. Then, you realize you have to get back into reality, reorganize your refrigerator shelf, and wait until the next trip to Aldi.  

Testimonials: 

"Aldi is love. Aldi is life." - Millie (S. England)

"I thought I'd discovered heaven on earth. Turns out, it's a place called Aldi". -Olivia (N. England)

"It's always a good day when you go to Aldi". -Briannah (W. America)

Society photos: 

Strawberries left behind on some cleaning spray

Lightbulbs above the frozen fruit

Member Millie taking a break to contemplate her shop

The Aldi Society leaves you with these parting words of wisdom: 

     "Look after the pennies and the pounds will look after themselves."  

  

De Vuelta en Salamanca

      Last weekend I returned to Salamanca, Spain for the weekend to visit the incredible city that was my home last semester. In some ways nothing had changed, but on the other hand, it seemed like everything had changed. Even though I'd already lived there for 5 months, in my weekend there, I got to see new places and meet new people. I also got to stay with my host family and visit some of my favorite places (i.e. La Croissantería).

Change is inevitable...

1. The butcher shop, Hipercarne, on the Villamayor (street I'd walk home on) is now a Vodaphone. The fast food pizza place next to McDonald's is now an ice cream place. 
2. My neighborhood is the best neighborhood in the world because it is filled with amazing street art. But they tore down the building that had my favorite painting on it... :( 
3. Goodbye favorite painting, but hello new installations made out of bike tires and miniature gardens made by school children. 
4. Sara's door (i.e. Villamayor 40). My best friend Sara lived a few blocks down the street from me and would always be waiting for me outside her door to walk into town together. They'd been doing construction on the interior of her building previously, but now the door is completely different! 
5. In the plaza between the cathedrals and linguistics department, there's a new Henry Moore sculpture exhibit. 
6. My host mom has another dog. While she was mostly very friendly, she also was very protective and did not like it when I was home alone and tried to do outrageous activities like peel an orange or pour myself a glass of water. 
7. There's a vegan tapas bar! And get this... Spaniards (including my host family) actually go to it. The tapas were incredible and we even went there twice. 
8. There's a new statue with a digital screen counting down the days and hours till the 800th anniversary of the university (in 2018).
9. My friends are gone... Walking around the city made me miss the people who made the place so special. Most of them have scattered across the world to their homes in America, Germany, and New Zealand. It was odd to walk down my street and know that Sara would never be waiting for me there again. I'd never walk to the croissantería with Áine again. I wished more than anything they could've all been there too, but time brings change and we all had new places to go and homes to return to.  

Some things never change...

1. LA CROISSANTERÍA PARÍS. Did I mention that I love the Croissantería? Well the first time I went over the weekend, the person working there was someone I'd never seen. The second time I went (to buy 3 croissants for the road) the owner who is usually working was there and he recognized me! He remembered me and my friend coming in every Monday and Wednesday afternoon after class. 
2. The study abroad center is still filled with all the lovely staff and professors. It was nice to see them all again and see that things are still happening as usual there. 
3. The Plaza Mayor is still looking grand as ever, and the ice cream places have reopened for spring. 
4. The cathedrals are still standing and looking a bit more lively with tulips in front. 
5. The days in Spain are still somehow way longer than elsewhere. You don't eat lunch till 2:30pm, so it's as if you have an entire day before lunch. Then, you don't eat dinner till 9:30pm, so the day just keeps going and going! 
6. There's still some holiday at least once a week. Saturday was the 'Day of the Book', which, naturally, celebrates books. There was a nice outdoor market in the Plaza Mayor filled with books from every local bookshop. 
7. All the buildings from the 15th century are still so much the same that they are using Salamanca as the setting for a new American TV series, "Still Star Crossed". Over the weekend they were setting up for filming to make Salamanca look like Verona. One of the streets was entirely covered in sand and they had old market stands set up. On Monday they started filming and they had lots of horses, riders in armor, extras wearing clothes from the period, and trucks filled with swords to be used as props. Now just to wait for the show to be released.

     Obviously in my time living there I had enough of a routine that I noticed even the slightest changes upon returning. Even with all I got to do last semester, there were still many new adventures over the weekend. In Salamanca, there's a cupcake shop run by a woman from California and I finally went there! I had an amazing carrot cake cupcake and spoke in English for a while with the owner. Not only was the cupcake delicious, but it was nice to have some homemade "American" food and speak with someone with the same language and accent as me... filled my carrot cake and American accent void all in one. I also got to meet my host mom's best friend, Lola. I felt like I knew her already since she and my host mom were on the phone with each other practically every day! As it turns out, she is also a bit of a linguistics nerd, which of course meant we somehow ended up talking about case marking systems in various languages. 

     When I left Salamanca in December I knew I'd be returning to visit sometime in Spring. I knew it truly only was an Hasta Luego ('Until Later') as they say in Spain instead of goodbye. This time I left knowing that it may well be a very long time till I return. I hope it's still just hasta luego as I know Salamanca, the people I met there, and my Spanish host family will always hold a very special place in my heart. 

Hasta Luego Salamanca 

Back at IES Abroad

New installations in the neighborhood

Trekking down the sand covered street

Me and my host mom exploring the market

Me and Lola ready for filming!

Spring tulips at the cathedrals

Me, Mom, Sheep, and Chips

     For the last week and a half of break, my mom came to visit and we traveled all around Ireland, Northern Ireland, and London. We started off with a tour of the west coast of Ireland. We spent our first night in Glaway, which has a nice downtown pedestrian area. Ireland has loads of sheep so they make a lot of sweaters. We basically ate some dinner and went in about 10 sweater shops. My mom and I used to not be such great shopping buddies, but now I think our team shopping skills have shaped up quite nicely. Perhaps a day full of cute sheep was helpful to group shopping. The next day we went to the Cliffs of Moher, which are absolutely gorgeous. To my mom's dismay, we were unable to find a puffin, but we did see lots of other cool birds. We took some postcard worthy photos and then headed off to see the Blarney Castle. The castle is most well known for the Blarney stone, which is a stone that gives you the gift of eloquent speech for 7 years. You've got to climb up to the top of the castle and then lay on your back and hold onto a bar and hoist yourself up to kiss the stone. Let's hope the legend is true and both of us have got 7 years of eloquence to look forwards to. If anything, the adventure worked up my mom's appetite for chips (i.e. french fries) and she became an instant fan. We continued our little Irish adventure by going around the Dingle Peninsula. We saw the beehive huts, which are stone huts thought to be built in the 12th century. On the other end of the historic timeline, we saw where they are filming the new Star Wars! On the way back to Dublin we stopped at Barack Obama Plaza in Moneygall. Barack Obama's great-great-great grandfather was from Moneygall and immigrated to the US, so Obama went there to visit in 2011 and naturally the town needed to name a giant rest stop gas station the "Barack Obama Plaza". After embracing our American-ness for a tiny bit, it was back to Dublin. The next day we had a free day and decided to go to Kilmainham Gaol which is a former prison. The British kept many members of the IRA there. After the 1916 uprising some of the main leaders were jailed and then executed there. It is only visitable by guided tour and they were all booked, but we got super lucky and got on the waiting list and eventually got to go on one. The tour was definitely worth the wait and one of the best guided tours we'd been on.

     The next day we said goodbye to the Republic of Ireland and went to Northern Ireland, the 6 counties that remain part of the UK, thus we also made the currency change to pounds and adjusted our ears to the strong northern Irish accent. We did the Black Taxi Tour of west Belfast, which was fascinating. The taxi driver takes you to the neighborhood where there is still a wall up between the British (Protestant) side and the Irish (Catholic) side. Each side looks so distinct, with different flags and political murals. They still close the gate each evening. Conflict in Northern Ireland ended in the 1990s, but they think that it's best to leave the wall up for now as the conflict is still so fresh and they don't want to cause any conflict. On a lighter note, Belfast is also known for being the building site of the Titanic, so we went to the "Titanic Experience" and learned a lot about the building and saw the port where it was constructed. We also ventured all the way north to see the Giant's Causeway which is a rock formation of hexagonal basalt pillars that is leftover from volcanic tectonic occurrences millions of years ago (that's about the extent of my geological knowledge). The legend about the giant who built it is way cooler, but I'll tell that part to you in person (since my horrible story telling skills are at least slightly more comical in person).

     Then it was time to return to my temporary home country of England and experience London. Neither of us had ever explored London, so we were both ready for an adventure. We went on one of those super touristy (but pretty great) hop on hop off busses. We stopped for a bit to see some Van Gogh at the National Gallery and the changing of the cavalry guard. We of course saw the London Eye, Big Ben, the Tower Bridge (which is the really impressive one that people, including myself, usually think is London Bridge), and the Tower of London. We took a river cruise on the Thames back towards the center and then went on a guided tour of the House of Parliament, which was incredible. You can't take pictures, but the inside was so ornately decorated and full of odd traditions and history. The next day we took a day trip out to Stonehenge with my friend Shanaz who is studying abroad in London. I honestly thought Stonehenge would just be super touristy, but it was actually really peaceful and impressive. And there were sheep... always adds to the scenery. On our night out in London we went to the theater to see Billy Elliot. To quote an anonymous reviewer "If I was in London again, I'd just go to the theater every night, that's it". 

The Cliffs of Moher

Kissing the Blarney Stone

Visiting the Wall on the Black Taxi Tour 

Me and Shanaz at Stonehenge

An Irish Easter

     One of the fun things about being abroad for a year is getting to celebrate holidays in different ways and in different places. There’s also new holidays to be celebrated, such as Pancake Day, an English holiday where you eat pancakes! Anyways, for Easter weekend I was in Dublin visiting my friend from home Maggie who lives there now. I hadn’t seen her in a year and had never seen her new home, so I was super excited. Sometimes it seems like just yesterday she and I were madly playing bass and baritone to Mhondoro together and now she’s married and living in Dublin and I’m studying in York. I’ll admit I was worried that both of us had become all serious, but that was definitely not the case and we quickly returned to our silly ways. We spent a lot of time walking around and letting me see the sights of Dublin. Being the amazing host and friend she is, Maggie made sure to take me to the best ice cream place, Murphy’s. We took a day trip up to Howth to see the seaside and eat at this incredible restaurant that has beds that you can sit on to eat your meal. Naturally, we spent a good 4 hours sitting in bed eating lunch and drinking wine. Then, it was time to prepare ourselves for our Easter celebrations, which had three main components. 1) Chocolate chip cookie dough ice cream for me, and chocolate soy popsicles for her 2) Watching Kimmy Schmidt on Netflix 3) Making paper bunny ears for the large mushroom we discovered creeping through the floorboards (it has since been removed, R.I.P). Other than our fabulous little Easter celebration, that weekend was also the 100th anniversary of the 1916 Easter Rising, which was an Irish rebellion against British rule. Though it failed, after many more rebellions a few years the later, the Irish finally gained independence from the UK. Maggie and I tried to go see a bit of the parade for it but it was way too crowded to see, but a fun and historic experience nonetheless. Then, we took the train down to Cork to visit there for a bit, since her husband there for the weekend. Cork is the next biggest city in Ireland but it is still way smaller than Dublin. We drove to Kinsale, a costal town with gorgeous cliffs, beaches, and ports. Afterwards, Maggie and I speedily made our way to the train station to head back home to Dublin. I wish the weekend could’ve been longer, but it was time for Maggie to go back to work and me to meet up with meet up with my mom and continue my travels.