Berlin Day 1

A piece of advice I was given by a student here at a UCL pub one night was, "Don't stick around for reading week, travel!" So that's exactly what my friends and I did, took 6 days to visit Berlin and Stockholm! Of course now I have lots of reading to do this weekend, as well as a paper due on Monday, but I can take some time to tell you about our trip, since it's the reason I have not posted in so long!

So, Berlin made lots of sense to us. I have a cousin currently studying abroad there (not in Munich as I previously thought, sorry Coerte!) so it was a great chance to catch up with him and be taken to the best pubs in the area by a semi-local. Yes, I was taken on my very first pub crawl! Stockholm ended up being a bit chilly and snowy to say the least, but two friends of mine have a friend studying abroad there, and it only costed us €17 (which is about 20 dollars) to fly from Berlin!! 

We left extremely early Friday morning to find ourselves surrounded by German by 9:30! We then made our way to our hostel, called Plus Berlin, which is beautiful and amazing by the way. I highly recommend Plus hostels for anyone needing a cheap, comfortable, safe, and clean place to stay. We'd not had very much sleep, but had limited time in the city so we ventured out to see what we could see!

Our first stop was Museum Island, named so because it is exactly that. An island in the middle of the city with a bunch of museums on it.

The Pergamon Museum 

The National Museum

We went to the Pergamon Museum that first day and were exhausted afterwards, but it was beautiful and so worth it. 

The Gates of Babylon 

 Hoping for an early night, we took some more pictures, some of a beautiful cathedral on Museum Island, and then headed back to the hostel for dinner at their restaurant.

Our first German beers!! 

We went to bed early that night so we could get up and moving the next morning. Which we did, so stories about our three hour tour are to come! Again sorry I haven't posted in so long, there will be many posts shortly about the trip. 

Have a wonderfully marvelous day, bitte! ~ Laura 

P.S. That's pronounced bitteh and essentially means cheers in German.

Tate Dilema

Megan and I planned to meet Liz and Grace at the Tate Museum after our walk around Covent Garden. We had previously looked up the hours of the museum, as everything around here seems to close at 6 o’clock. Luckily for us it stays open until 10 on Fridays! We can’t seem to get out of the flat in a timely manner so this was great news. It was about a 15 minute walk to the museum from Covent Garden; A beautiful walk at that in the pitch darkness of 5:15. The Thames was lit up with large boats and trees along the side with blue and white lights.

We bought some candied nuts on the way, which were sweet, crunchy, and delicious. They were the perfect pick-me-up precursor to the museum. The Tate is not particularly nice from the outside, you would not look at it and think, “oh, that’s a beautiful museum!” I will get a picture when we go in the daylight. We entered the museum and texted the other girls because they had already arrived. They told us the name of the gallery they were in and said there were signs for it everywhere. Upon looking around, we saw very few signs, and none with the name of this particular gallery. So we promptly asked two different museum guides who gave us funny looks and said they had no idea where this particular room was. After half an hour of texting back and forth, going from floor 1 to 0 to 2 back to 0 to 1 ect. we were frustrated and thought our problem was with the fact that we couldn’t figure out which floor to meet on or which gift shop to meet in front of.

Megan finally thought to ask Liz which Tate Museum they were at. “Tate Brittan” Liz responded. We just looked at each other and couldn’t do anything but laugh, as we were sitting in the Tate Modern. Only in London could we have confused two museums with the same name. Though quite flustered at the time, we decided that we would eventually look back on this story and think it funny. Next time we will be using the full names of these two particular museums when referring to them.

Megan and I were not very impressed by much of the extremely modern art at the Tate Modern, but there were a few pieces we did appreciate. We also attended a lecture on a couple of exhibits in British Sign Language (BSL)! I thought there would be an interpreter, but there was not. Knowing American Sign Language I was able to interpret most of it for Megan, but unfortunately missed about a third of what was being communicated. Even so, it was very cool, I was able to pick up on some BSL, and Megan said she had never had any exposure like that to Deaf people so she found it an interesting experience. All and all a success :) 

Have a wonderfully marvelous day, cheers! ~Laura 

Covent Garden

I finally got to Covent Garden on Friday! Megan and I made our way there late in the afternoon and I wished we'd had a bit more time, but I know we will get back there. I didn't realize how much of a magnet it is for street performers! We saw everything from musicians to magic shows, to two men dancing with masks of famous people... There were outdoor vendors as well as shops and delicious looking food. The highlight of my experience was a string quintet made up of 4 violins and a stand up bass. They were absolutely phenomenal, jumping on one foot while they played and having so much fun. They were entertaining as well as amazing musicians.

Covent Garden, there's the string quintet in the corner!

We then had to leave because we were meeting some friends at the Tate Museum. But we did a bit of night sight seeing along the way!

Have a wonderfully marvelous day, cheers! ~Laura

Oxford (lots of pictures!)

We got out of London for our first day trip to Oxford on Saturday! Although early it was nice to make a plan and use the entire day for sight seeing, as we usually don’t get out of the flat till the afternoon. We got to take our first ride on the top deck of a Double Decker bus!! It was very exciting for me, and the other girls laughed at my reaction, which I assume was warranted as I was a bit tired and my coffee hadn’t kicked in yet…

It was a bit cold out, so we didn’t quite see everything in Oxford that we wanted to. We did however take a guided walking tour of the city, which we all enjoyed very much. Our tour guide was what we picture to be the quintessential British man. He knew so much about Oxford, it was very impressive. The city and the university are extremely historical and absolutely gorgeous. Did you know that Dr. Seuss got his postgraduate at Oxford?

Our tour guide in a dining hall at Oxford

We we so lucky to have a beautiful sunny day! 

The weather being sunny but frigid, made us quite chilled after the tour so we decided to enjoy Afternoon Tea for the first time at the oldest coffee shop in Britain called The Grand Café. The tea included light and fluffy delicious scones with clotted cream and jam. We decided to order three different types of teas, Lady Grey, Assam, and Darjeeling. My favorite was Lady Grey which had a sweet aroma and wonderful taste. It was just what we needed to warm up and sit for a while. We did end up sitting at the coffee shop for a couple of hours so it was already pretty dark when we left.

The tea cups say "The site of the first coffee house in England"

The bus we had reservations for was not for another three or four hours but there was not much else we could see. We went in a couple of stores including one called Fat Face that I believe I remember my cousin Christine suggesting I go to. I didn't buy anything but liked the store very much.

The bus ride home flew by because we were able to sit at a table and Grace and I taught Liz and Megan how to play Euchre (yes, I had to look up the spelling). I was very excited to find out that Grace also loves the game as usually no one has heard of it. Liz and Megan caught on quickly and like it which is awesome because you need exactly four people to play and most of the time there are four of us! All and all a good trip which I hope we make again.

Have a wonderfully marvelous day, cheers! ~Laura  

Course Work

I have now had 3 weeks of classes and I must say I could get used to the schooling system here. I only have class monday through Wednesday and I only have about 7 hours of class a week! I am taking 4 classes:

Psychology of Language and Cognition

Linguistics of Sign Language

Ancient World History in London Collections 

and my fourth course is helping with a research project called Famous Face Recognition in Deaf users of BSL. 

I am enjoying all of my classes and the reading for them. It is a fair amount of reading per week because of the small number of hours in class, but it's manageable and I find it interesting. 

Last week my history class was held in the British Museum. I had not been to the British Museum and found it impressive. There are so many large sculptures from Egypt. Including the Rosetta Stone which helped linguists a great deal in deciphering hieroglyphics. The artifacts that are in the British Museum are much different from the artifacts we saw the week before in the Petrie Museum. These artifacts are much smaller, but there are many more of them and tell us more about Egyptian life. In comparing these two museums we will be exploring what it is that museums tend to tell us. The comparisons will also help us see how a people and culture can be displayed and thought about. 

I also just started the research project I will be helping out with on Thursday. I had a meeting with a Deaf woman named Jo. She learned American Sign Language (ASL) quite a few years ago but remembered most of the language, which was helpful as I know virtually no British Sign Language (BSL) and the languages are vastly different. It was exciting to communicate with her in sign language, because I hadn't used the language in so long. She seemed to appreciate the fact that I signed and we didn't need an interpreter. I am pumped to do some research on the subject and analyze the results of her study. I will also be creating a new test tailored towards Deaf people which she will use in a clinic! Stay tuned for more information about the study as I will keep you updated on what I find to be the fascinating aspects. 

Have a wonderfully marvelous day, cheers! ~Laura 

Tea and Crumpets

I had a lovely late night snack of tea and crumpets. To feel more British I had my tea the way the Brits do, with milk and sugar. My mates and I had taken a Jack the Ripper walking tour in the bitter cold so the hot peppermint tea helped to thaw my hands. It was just what I needed. For a mere 53p (pence) the grocery store will sell you eight crumpets. They tend to expire quickly so they are great for sharing. We don't have a toaster so the stove gets fired up to toast them. Our stove is quite slow at heating up so it's quite the process to cook anything, but so worth a warm delicious crumpet. We then butter both sides of the crumpets, place them on the stove, and wait.

When they are slightly brown on both sides, the crumpets are ready! They are too hot to hold or take a bite, but this is immediately done. Slightly crunchy on the outside, but fluffy and a little sweet in the middle, a crumpet is a scrumptious, perfect snack. They remind us a bit of popovers. I only hope I am able to find them in the states, as they have become a staple here and I don't want to have to miss it. You all should start on a search for these so we can eat them together when I get back! 

Have a wonderfully marvelous day, cheers! ~Laura 

Hyde Park and Buckingham Palace

The birds here are not afraid of people. When running through a group of them the ones you get closest to nonchalantly take a few steps out of the way. The rest just stand there watching and hoping you have food. I find this kind of cool and scary at the same time. I hear that geese can be aggressive and mean but I still couldn’t resist getting as close as I could to them and the swans, this distance being about a foot. I had never seen a swan in person, let alone gotten close enough to touch one, until Megan and I went to Hyde Park on Friday. The swans were my favorite of the many birds flying around. I couldn’t believe how much snow accumulated as I heard it hardly ever snows. So we decided that Hyde Park would be beautiful covered in snow, and it was. It was a bit cold, but totally worth it.

This bird had so much attitude! 

This is my favorite picture of a swan that I took

We went to a café by the lake in the park called Serpentine Bar and Kitchen. We both bought a chocolate croissant and hot chocolate, which were a bit pricy but ended up tasting delicious. The warmth of the café was also totally worth it.

After warming up we made our way to Buckingham Palace. Can you imagine 1. Living in a castle (which is my dream by the way) and 2. Having your home guarded by men who are not allowed to smile? I certainly can’t. The Palace was huge and the architecture gorgeous. The gate was adorned with golden lions and other beautiful details. The lawn was covered with a perfect sheet of snow. We asked a man to take a picture of the two of us standing in front of the gate. I simply couldn’t believe the grandeur of the site. Unfortunately we couldn’t get close to the guards because Megan had some jokes at the ready.

We will definitely be going back when it is warmer out to see it again.

Have a wonderfully marvelous day, cheers! ~Laura