Scott's "A Tale of Two Cities" - Chapter Eight: To Work, or Not to Work: That is the Question.

As the title of this chapter may suggest, over the past two weeks (and much to my chagrin!) I have actually had to do some school work. This entry will cover a rather long period of time, from May 22 to June 1, but will likely be short because much of that time was spent doing the day-to-day activities normally associated with being in school. I know you probably don't care, but this blog is as much for me to remember what I've done as it for you to read about it.

But just bear with me, because the next couple of chapters are going to be really good.

Monday (May 22) morning I had the marketing presentation which I had been preparing for in the last chapter. At the time I had my concerns about it, but in the feedback I received a couple of days ago, our professor said we did exactly what he wanted, and he was happy that we had stayed so on-topic. Bonus!

That afternoon I relaxed and took a very enjoyable nap. In the evening I went to the pub with my friends Jenny Kooren (who I know from Ancaster) and Fiona. It was a fairly quiet night at the pub, so we decided to play a game (they have cards and a variety of board games there), and we settled on Scrabble. It turns out that Fiona is some kind of professional scrabble player, and things got pretty intense.

On Tuesday (May 23) I had my first finance class. The class is ridiculously small (6 people!) and the prof is a really nice guy. We started off by watching a movie about the devaluation of the British pound in the early 90s that forced the UK out of the European Exchange Rate Mechanism (which was the lead-in to the adoption of the Euro). After that, he divided us into two teams of three, and gave us our first assignment. The assignment was to research and present information to the class about a couple of other currency crises (my team did the Russian Rouble Crisis and the East Asian Financial Crisis)... and it was due the next day. So, I spent most of the night working on that.

On Wednesay (May 24) we made our presentation in Finance, and that went really well. I had class pretty much all day, until 9pm, at which point I headed over to the pub for what was billed as "card game night." I was Jonesing for some euchre, and I taught a couple of my friends to play. We managed to find some others who knew the game, and we had a lot of fun.

Thursday (May 25) I had class all afternoon. My roommate Jim left for Amsterdam that evening, and I spent most of the night hanging out with my friends here, and chatting with people back home. Because of the time difference, I find most of my friends back home are only online to chat with fairly late at night here.

Friday (May 26) was supposed to be my big report-writing day - the final project in my marketing course, was a 3000-word marketing report due on May 29th. My topic was how to sell Hershey's chocolate in Italy and Iceland; it was an in-depth extension of the consumer profiles we had developed in our earlier marketing presentation. Since I had nothing going on that day and no roommate to distract me, I was planning to be ridiculously productive. Instead, I did absolutely nothing important: I went to the Asda (British Wal-Mart), watched a couple of movies, and then went back to the pub that night.

I woke up on Saturday (May 27), ready to make up for the time I'd wasted on Friday. Instead I took a long lunch in the cafeteria with a couple of friends, watched another movie, and finally settled in to start writing just after dinner. By midnight I hadn't gotten very far, which did not bode well - the next day I was supposed to go on an all-day field trip to Portsmouth. That night I made the decision that I was going to have to skip my field trip in order to get the paper finished; it was a heart-wrenching decision, since Portsmouth (the main UK Naval Base, and site of the Royal Navy Museum) was the one place I decided I absolutely *had* to visit while I was in the UK. I figured missing out was suitable punishment, though, for my ridiculous procrastination.

On Sunday (May 28) I woke up early, since the field trip was scheduled to leave the castle very early in the morning and I had decided to keep to that schedule. I had breakfast with my friends who were going on the field trip, and then returned to residence to get working on my paper. I won't bore you with details, but I finally finished it around 4am Monday morning.

After getting to sleep early Monday (May 29) morning, I slept in until noon, then woke up to do a final edit of my report. When I was satisfied with it, I submitted it via email to my professors, and then took a wonderful nap. That evening I went back to the pub.

Tuesday (May 30) was a fairly non-descript Tuesday. I had 4.5 hours straight of Finance, which is a bit much for anyone to handle. That night I went back to the pub (can you see a pattern developing here?). No, I haven't become an alcoholic; going to the pub is pretty much the only thing to do around here, and it's the natural place for people to congregate. And congregate they do. I played a couple of games of darts with my friend Maureen, and then Maureen and I took on my roommate Jim and my friend Jenny Kooren in several games of foosball. It was an absolute slaughter: I think they beat us five times in a row. Suffice it to say, we were getting pretty rowdy towards the end. So, we decided to mix things up, with Jim and I facing off against the girls. Again, my team lost, earning me the dubious distinction of the worst foosball player ever. It was fun night.

In class on Wednesday (May 31) our finance professor gave us another surprise group assignment, to be presented the next day in class. This time, each group of three had to read a chapter of the textbook - in my case, about accounting (or translation) exposure to exchange rate fluctuations - and then teach the other group the lesson. So, I spent most of Wednesday night working on my section of our presentation. If anybody is interested in learning about such exposure, just let me know.


Thursday (June 1) we had our presentation in class. Ours went a little long - one of my group members had developed an in-class exercise that ended up taking over an hour - but it seemed to turn out okay. That evening I did some laundry and packed my bag for our weekend trip to the continent. After organizing myself, I went to bed fairly early, since our buses were leaving for Calais at 7.00 am.

The next couple of chapters will cover a very busy weekend that incorporates my first taste of Continental Europe - our overnight school trip to Calais and Boulogne-Sur-Mer in France, and my trip with some friends to Brussels in Belgium.

Scott's "A Tale of Two Cities" - Chapter Seven: Planes, Trains, and Arthur's Seat

Let me begin by apologizing for the terrible titles I've used for the past few chapters. It' s been raining non-stop here, and I think the lousy weather has sapped my ability to compose any kind of witty remark. At any rate, I spent this weekend in Edinburgh visiting my dear friend Fraser. It was an absolutely amazing time; I think Edinburgh is my favourite non-Washington DC city so far. This entry is long, but it has to be: we crammed more into my two days in Edinburgh than I would have thought possible.

Friday (May 19) morning I awoke around 6am, as my train was scheduled to leave Polegate Station at 8.05 and I was terrified I would miss it. Actually, my intense fear of missing one of my pre-arranged modes of transportation was a recurring theme throughout the weekend: I ended up leaving myself more than enough time to make connections, and spent a fair bit of time sitting around waiting in airports or train stations as a result.

Anyway, I got a cab to Polegate (about 10 or 15 minutes away from the castle) and caught my train to Gatwick Airport in London (which took about 40 minutes) where I caught my flight (which had been delayed) to Edinburgh. I flew easyJet, a British discount carrier of questionable quality. A few minutes after we took off we hit some major turbulence and I nearly had a heart attack as I thought the wings were falling off of the plane. After that, though, the flight was rather quick, and we arrived only slightly later than our original schedule. From there I caught the Airlink shuttle which dropped me off at Waverley Bridge downtown.

Fraser had given me directions to his place (which will henceforth be referred to as 'the apartment,' which is located in the wicked seedy underbelly of the city. The city, you see, is really hilly and his street is sunken down with these old stone bridges for the cross-streets going over it, which lends it a great Dickensian quality. Anyway, after briefly getting lost I arrived at the apartment around 12.30pm. His dear friend Matt from Nova Scotia was also there (he had been in for the week), and after meeting two of his roommates we went out to walk around.

We walked to a Starbucks to grab a sandwich, since they hadn't eaten yet that day, and (except for a couple of British All-Bran Bars) neither had I. After that we walked north, and wandered around for quite a while through the New Town. Don't let the name fool you, New Town is actually quite old. It consists mostly of fantastic (and fantastically expensive!) Georgian row houses arranged along wide boulevards and big circles (called circuses. Circi? I'll go with circuses) around parks. We also found the townhouse where the Icelandic national anthem was written in 1874. There was a plaque. I took a picture.

Actually, I took pictures of everything. It became sort of a running gag with the guys... every five minutes or so I'd stop walking and whip out the camera. Over the course of the weekend I took almost 200 pictures (thanks again for the camera, Dad!), a few of which I'll definitely post in this entry.

We continued walking up to Calton Hill, which is this big park sort of North-East of the Royal Mile. It is, as its name suggests, a large hill. It also offers some rather spectacular views of Edinburgh. At the top are Nelson's monument, a canon, and what we would later discover to be the Scottish National Monument. We were initially confused as to what it was, since there are no signs or plaques, and it looks like a half-finished Greek temple or something. I've attached a picture below:

From there we returned to the apartment for a cup of tea (how delightfully British, I know) before heading out again, this time to the Museum of Scotland/Royal Museum which are two massive museums connected together. Fraser's roommate Tim had recommended the Royal Museum for its interactive displays, and we were not disappointed. Fraser designed a rather accident-prone bomb-defusing robot, while I successfully took on the role of Energy minister for a fake country over a 50-year period. It was a pretty smooth half-century, if you ignore the riots after I opened up that third nuclear power plant (sadly, the game had no "send in the army" button to deal with protests).

From there we walked around through the University of Edinburgh where Fraser has spent the year studying ("studying" should be in quotation marks, I think) before once again returning to the apartment. Somewhere in the preceding three paragraphs we got nachos, but I'm not sure when.

At the apartment we were joined by my dear arch-nemesis, Chase, who I know from High School. He also goes to Queen's, and spent the year with Fraser in Edinburgh. The four of us (being Chase, Matt, Fraser, and myself) went down to the University's campus pub for a few pints of domestic beer before heading out for dinner at a great pizza place down near the old gallows on Grassmarket Street. From there we went to a pub not far from the apartment (called Bannermans, I think) for another pint, and to play some pub-machine trivial pursuit. I think we were all a bit embarrassed at how poorly we fared, especially since Fras and I hold ourselves out to be fairly well versed in most things trivial. After that we returned to the apartment building, where some girls across the hall were holding an end-of-the-year party for a bunch of the university's exchange students. We were there until around 3am or so, at which point we went back to the apartment to crash.

Saturday (May 20) morning we woke up fairly early, as Matt had to leave to catch his train. After he had left, however, Fras and I quickly fell back asleep until sometime around noon or 1pm. We went to a "West Coast" coffee shop called Black Magic (or something like that) for coffee and a muffin before setting out for another day of wandering. We went down to this massive park beside the University, and then looped around to end up near Edinburgh Castle. I say "near" because the castle itself is built into a large rocky hill surrounded by a large garden-filled chasm. To actually reach the castle you have to come in from the east along the Royal Mile (which is the street running down the smooth side of the castle's hill). Attached is a picture from the impregnable south-west side:

Anyway, there was a little farmers' market happening on the sidewalk near the castle garden's parking lot, where I sampled blood and kidney sausage. It was (thankfully) far less disgusting than it sounds. We walked through the gardens on the north side of the castle and then up one of the side streets on the hill to the Royal Mile. At the top of the Royal Mile, near the gates of the castle itself, are a number of monuments to various military units.

We then proceeded down the Royal Mile itself, which leads from the castle to the royal palace of Holyrood. Along the way, I dragged Fras into a number of hoakie tourist-oriented stores looking for souvenirs. We also came across an absolutely fantastic store which sells prints of really old maps. I was in heaven, but sadly I had no way to transport any of them home.

Eventually we reached the bottom, where we saw the new Scottish Parliament. I don't care for the building myself - it strikes me as something that belongs in Spain rather than Edinburgh, but that's not important. I'll also spare you my "they shouldn't have a bloody parliament in the first place" rant. Just past the Parliament we came upon Holyrood Palace, which was closed off and teeming with people (including many men in kilts, and many women in fancy hats). The army was there, and when I asked what was going on was told simply that "they were having a dinner." Just south of Holyrood is Arthur's Seat, a mountain (at least, I'm going to call it a mountain) which is another giant park sort of in the middle of the city. We decided to go up a little bit to see over the hedges and get a better view of what was going on in the palace grounds. I'll attach a picture of Arthur's Seat below:


Sadly, there were tents. But we decided to keep climbing anyway, and went all the way to the top. The views of the city were absolutely spectacular, and you could see for miles and miles. Fraser and I sat at the top for quite a while; we also used the opportunity to take pictures of ourselves looking pensive. You'll find one attached below. This was, without a doubt, my favourite experience of the entire trip: It's hard to explain, but it felt so perfectly Scottish to be up in the "highlands" (even if we were in the middle of the city). To add to the atmosphere, the party at Holyrood had bagpipers, and their music could be heard faintly while we were at the top. It was like having a soundtrack to the climb.

Getting down was a bit more awkward, since we took a less gently-sloping route than on the way up. Once we were down we walked over to this intensely socialist coffee shop called The Forest where all the employees are volunteers and nothing is as it seems. It was pretty cool, and we had a late lunch/early dinner (it was around 5 at this point, I think). After we were finished, we headed back to the apartment where we relaxed and just hung out for a bit. Since I had to get up early the next morning, going out to a party was not in order for the evening, so we decided to go see Mission Impossible III. It was something like a half-hour walk each way, I think, but it wasn't too bad, and we got back around midnight. We went to bed shortly thereafter.

Sunday (May 21) morning I woke up around 6.15am, exhausted, and left to catch the 6.45 Airlink shuttle bus back to the airport. My flight back was scheduled for 8.25, and, again, I was terrified I would miss it. I didn't of course, and spent about 50 minutes sitting in the airport. The flight back was quick, and we arrived earlier than scheduled. As a result, I waited for over an hour for my train back to Polegate. Then I hopped a cab back to the castle and arrived around noon, where I promptly had a three-hour nap. I don't know why I went through all those travel details, since they were just the "going to Scotland" details in reverse, and this entry is already so long.

This concludes the interesting part of the chapter. The rest I'll cover briefly.

That afternoon I worked somewhat diligently, and finished up the slideshow for my Marketing presentation on Monday. Later that evening the castle people had arranged a trivia night, which I had signed up for with a few of my friends. When that was over, I met up with my Marketing partner and we ran through our presentation a couple of times.

Then, absolutely exhausted, I collapsed into bed.

Scott's "A Tale of Two Cities" - Chapter Six: Giggling Uncontrollably, or, Why You Never Serve 'Spotted Dick' to Young Canadians

While this chapter was supposed to outline the period from Monday, May 15 to Thursday, May 18, I made a couple of glaring omissions in my previous entry. It's just as well, though, because this section of my story is light on photographs, and two of these omissions come with pictures. Here we go.

I don't know how I forgot to mention that on Saturday when we reached the corner of Charing Cross Road and Oxford Street we were greeted by possibly my favourite statue in London: what I can only assume is supposed to be a promotional statue of Freddie Mercury outside the Dominion Theatre where the Queen musical "We Will Rock You" is playing. Since I have wanted to see the show since it opened 4 years ago, and I'm going to see it with my Mom when she gets here (unless a certain mother forgets to order tickets...) I've been getting excited every time I see an advertisement for it anywhere. You can see it below:

The second thing I forgot to mention was basically a shout-out to Claire and her mother, Mrs. Marchant. While walking down Haymarket Street I came across a very large, and very old-looking Burberry's store, which I assumed to be the first. It also had this really cool clock hanging off the front. Sadly, they were closed so I couldn't go in and pretend to be rich, as is Claire's and my style, but I took a picture of the outside for their enjoyment:

Finally, Sunday being Mothers' Day, that night I called home and after playing a bit of Trans-Atlantic phone tag I finally got to talk (albeit briefly) with my Mom. Having been a bit homesick, and having not spoken with her for two weeks, it was quite nice.

Now, Monday was another crazy day with six hours of marketing class. That night I went to the pub with some friends, so it was a pretty standard evening.

Tuesday was another crazy day with six hours of marketing class. That night, however, was a little bit more interesting. The castle people organized a bonfire out near the cricket pitch, which turned into a whole lot of fun. Although it had been raining during the day, and the grass was wet, stars were out and it was as beautiful evening. The route to the bonfire was a bit menacing: at various points along the way there were large ditches in the ground, and logs placed as though designed specifically to trip you up.

Most people (myself included) went to the pub for a little bit, before heading over to the bonfire itself. It was a pretty fun evening, people were drinking, roasting marshmallows, and mingling. We also had a number of sing-alongs, which seemed to get louder and less coherent as the night wore on. The highlight of the evening occurred after I had left, however, as my roommate Jim attempted to jump over the bonfire. Thankfully he made it, but sprained his ankle rather dramatically in the process. As a result, he would be basically stuck in the room for the rest of the week.

I can't remember anything important happening on Wednesday, so in the interest of brevity I'll ignore it altogether.

On Thursday night Maureen invited me to go with her and some friends for dinner at The Brewer's Arms, a pub in Herstmonceux Village. It was a very pleasant evening, and I had the traditional English pub nachos. One thing that I found interesting was the presence of dogs in the pub - there were two of them hanging out behind the bar.

When the time came for dessert, the special was an English staple called 'spotted dick.' Maureen commented that she'd never had it before, and that she's always wanted to try it. Naturally, this led to all the 'spotted dick' jokes you can think of, and then some. After we'd basically run that into the ground, the waiter returned to take our orders. Somehow, she managed to order it with a straight face... until she looked over at me and we both started cracking up. The waiter, to his credit, merely chuckled and carried on as though nothing unusual was happening.

It turns out that 'spotted dick' is just a cake with raisins and custard sauce, and is quite delicious. Of course, when Maureen commented on how good it was, the jokes started all over again. By the time we were done it was dark out, and we walked home. I went to bed shortly after returning home, as I had to be up the next morning for my trip to Edinburgh.

Scott's "A Tale of Two Cities" - Chapter Five: Hit the Road, Jack

Saturday (May 13) was the Jack the Ripper walking tour for my British Studies class. That morning we had to wake up early to grab breakfast and pack a lunch as our coach buses left for London bright and early at 8am.

The bus dropped us off at the Tower of London. Outside the Tower Hill subway station we met up with our teacher and the tour guide for our tour. In my British Studies class, we had been studying the Whitechapel Murders (perpetrated by "Jack the Ripper") which terrorized London in the fall of 1888. Our walking tour took us around through the Whitechapel neighbourhood and the surrounding area to see the sites of a few of the murders, and to a few other historically significant spots. Of course, the cityscape has changed dramatically in the past century, so a couple of times we encountered a "the body was found where that office building is standing" situation.

It was pretty interesting, though, to see where everything took place after we'd spent a couple of classes learning . The tour guide did a really great job of blending some history and a lot of background information into his story; he also provided a number of grisly details. So that was great. We also walked through Spitalfields Market, which is like a gigantic St. Lawrence Market (for those of you familiar with Toronto), and ended up at the Aldgate East subway station where we were released for free time.

Since the automated ticket-vending machines at that station were broken, Maureen, Kate, Megan and I walked down to Aldgate (proper) station and hopped on a train to Piccadilly Circus. When we got off the underground, we entered the Trocadero (which is like a giant downtown shopping mall) to find washrooms. I must admit I still haven't entirely gotten used to the concept of pay-as-you-go toilets. However, it was worth the 20 pence, as on our way out of the mall we stumbled across a children's Postman Pat ride. I was ecstatic, understandably, as I've been unable to find anything either (a) Postman Pat, or (b) Thomas the Tank Engine themed since I arrived in Britain. It was an especially proud moment since most of my friends here are not familiar with Pat, and probably thought me crazy when I was complaining earlier about not being able to find him anywhere. Naturally, we had to take pictures. Postman Pat's black-and-white cat is clearly visible behind me:

So, we left the Trocadero and, through a navigational error (and not really knowing what Piccadilly Circus was), we missed Piccadilly Circus completely. Anyway, we went east to Leicester Square Gardens, where we stopped to have our bagged lunch. After that we stopped off at the Ben and Jerry's shop for some iced cream. Shocked by the prices, I foolishly purchased the smallest size which turned out to be like half a scoop. I was mocked mercilessly. And it still cost me $4.

We had to drop Kate and Megan off at the British Museum, as they had another field trip for a different class in the afternoon. With that objective in mind, we headed north along Charing Cross Road as it sounded famous/familiar to me. It seems to form the eastern boundary of SoHo, and was full of neat little artsy stores, dozens of theatres, and a number of adult bookstores. When we hit Oxford Street we headed east, where we found this really cool store that's been selling only umbrellas and walking sticks since 1830. We spent a bit of time browsing; as you may or may not know, I really want a walking stick. Sadly, though, the good ones were a bit out of my price range. The store is pictured below:

We still had a bit of time to kill before the girls' field trip, and we saw a sign saying that Covent Gardens was only 6 minutes away. So, we followed the arrow south down Shaftesbury Avenue in an attempt to find it. We were foiled, however, when the street curved west leading us back to Charing Cross. By the time we'd realized what had happened, we had to head straight to the Museum, which we reached in fairly short order. The British Museum itself is an absolutely fantastic building; it's very similar to the government buildings in Washington. It's also enormous. I'll attach a picture below:

After dropping our friends off at the museum, Maureen and I walked back west along Oxford Street, which is apparently a posh shopping district. I didn't see much that was particularly interesting (or not available in North America), but we did go into Marks and Spencer where I purchased a guidebook for Paris. Hopefully it'll come in handy.

From there we decided to wander through SoHo, in an attempt to find some cool little stores. We found a couple of places worth stopping at, the best of which was a store called Scribbler. It was a store that sold greeting cards almost exclusively, and it was filled with a wide range of the most colourful, random, explicit, offensive, and wildly profane greeting cards I've ever seen. Maureen and I probably spent 45 minutes in there just laughing hysterically to ourselves. Sadly the cards were fairly expensive, which prevented me from purchasing the dozen or so that I wanted to. We also stumbled across a small "red light" district. Like the tourists we are, we tried to take pictures of all the funny signs, and then got yelled at by the bouncer from a strip club.

After that we made our way to Trafalgar Square, which was absolutely amazing. We didn't have time to go look at all the statues, and I was saddened to discover that Nelson's Column is undergoing repairs (it's totally covered with scaffolding). We also saw Canada House, which is a beautiful building on the west side of the square. I'll have to go back and check out the inside, since my friend Fraser has told me it's quite nice, and it apparently has the best non-pay-as-you-go public toilets in London. I'm attaching a picture of it, too. I'm not sure if you can tell, but it says "Canada" in gold letters on the portico:

Across the square from Canada House is South Africa House, another gorgeous, large building. This made me feel kind of bad for Uganda, as Uganda House appeared to be a rather non-descript storefront just south of Nelson's Column. Anyway, by that point we were starting to run out of time, and we headed off to Cleopatra's Needle, our standard pick-up spot. Maureen knew a weird way of getting there, and we walked through this cool concourse under what I'm guessing are the train tracks to Charing Cross Station. Regardless, we made it back on time, and rode our coach buses back to the castle.

The next day (Sunday May 14), I slept in quite late, and then spent most of the day trying to find anything I could do (laundry, editing other peoples' work, blogging, etc.) to procrastinate and delay writing the paper I had due on Monday for as long as I could.

Scott's "A Tale of Two Cities" - Chapter Four: Duck Tales

So, it would seem that it hasn't taken very long for me to fall behind in my posting. Last week (May 8 - 12) was pretty routine, and quite busy with lots of class from Monday to Thursday.

Monday was, by all accounts, fairly uneventful.

Tuesday (May 9) was a day of some excitement. There are a number of ducks and geese that live at the castle, mostly in the moat. There are two families, though, with about a dozen ducklings each, that come in and out of the courtyard in the middle of the castle where they nest. Anyway, on Tuesday during a break in our marketing class, a couple of girls noticed one duckling by itself inside the courtyard - it had been left alone when the mother took her family outside that morning.

So, the girls took it upon themselves to reunite this little duckling with its family. They ushered it through the main hallway and outside, and then started taking it around the moat to where its family was sitting. Partway along, though, the duckling hopped up onto the ledge that runs along the moat, and then fell about 12 feet down into the moat. Luckily, though, the duckling could swim (who would have guessed, eh?) and it just sort of floated among the lily pads calling out for its mother for a while, not really knowing what to do. Luckily, though, a male duck swimming in the moat was passing by, and the little duckling just started following it around.

Anyway, we had to go back to class, but everyone made a point of checking in on the little duckling throughout the day. Eventually, however, the male duck it was following swam close enough to the mother that it and the duckling saw/heard each other, and eventually they managed to reunite successfully, I guess. So that was my excitement for the week. And as a result, the ducks have become a topic of much conversation through the rest of our marketing classes.

That night I went to the pub after class with my roommate and some friends. I think I mentioned the pub earlier, as I had been there in the previous week. It's called the Headless Drummer, and is named for one of the three ghosts that live in the castle. The pub itself is pretty cool... to get to it at night you go over the bridge across the moat, and the pub is just inside the big main gate. Anyways, we had some beer, and played darts and foosball. It was a lot of fun.

Wednesday (May 10) was just another day. In class we discussed the Sherlock Holmes novel, The Sign of Four, that I had read over the weekend. We also watched a film adaptation that was pretty good. On Thursday (May 11), we talked about Jack the Ripper in class, and watched clips from a bunch of different films about the Whitechapel murders. This class set the stage for the "Jack the Ripper" Walking Tour we were taking in London the following weekend. That night after class a bunch of people went down to the pub for my friend Milan's birthday. A tonne of people turned out, and they were playing pretty good music, so it was a lot of fun. After heading home (the pub closes at midnight), a few of us went down to the common room and watched Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me. It's a fantastic movie that I hadn't seen in years.

On Friday (May 12) I slept in really late, and spent most of the day procrastinating instead of doing work. My roommate Jim and I played several games of pool (we've been playing a lot of pool, lately) before he left for London for the weekend. I'm pretty sure I did something Friday evening, but I can't for the life of me remember what it was.

That wraps up the week. But, as always, there will be plenty more to come: another trip to London, another week of classes, a drunken bonfire, and (soon!) my trip to Edinburgh.

Scott's "A Tale of Two Cities" - Chapter Three: The Candyman Can

I suppose it would be helpful if I gave you a bit of background... My marketing teachers, Dan and Mike (yes, Taylor, we've got Dan and Mike -- they're hilarious!) are self-proclaimed chocolate fiends. As such, our two projects this term are related to marketing and selling various types of chocolate in different European countries. For example, I am tasked with trying to sell Hershey's chocolate in Italy and Iceland. Word to the wise: Iceland is a fish-oil soaked logistical nightmare that, if I had my way, would never see another piece of chocolate arrive on its barren, volcano-ridden shores. But that's neither here nor there.

Our intrepid professors decided that as a treat we should visit the gigantic Cadbury factory in Birmingham and the attached Cadbury World attraction. So, Sunday (May 7) was another early start. The coach bus left the castle at 8am sharp for a 4.5 hour ride up to Birmingham, which is north-west of London.

Since it was such a long drive, and since I had never seen the original Charlie and Chocolate Factory movie, Maureen brought her laptop and we watched it on the way up. We also stopped off at a futuristic highway rest stop in Oxford which was far, far nicer than any highway rest stop should be. It looked like a high-tech airport terminal, and had a large deck facing a large pond complete with fountains. Long story short: way too swanky for a Burger King.

When we arrived at Cadbury World, we were somewhat disappointed to discover what looked like a giant high school attached to a sketchy 19th-century factory building. I had, quite naturally, pictured an Epcot-like structure made to look like a giant Cadbury's Creme Egg. Anyway, we had a bit of free time before the tour started, so we all went to the "World's Biggest Cadbury Shop" to purchase cheap, delicious candy.

I've been trying to make these chapters shorter (and more readable) but I'm going to take a moment to discuss the glory that is Cadbury. They had one wall that was absolutely covered in the most spectacular collection of Dairy Milk chocolate products. I thought I had died and gone to heaven. Beyond the normal Dairy Milk and Fruit and Nut bars, they offered (let's see if I can remember):

Dairy Milk with Whole Nuts
Dairy Milk with Shortcake Biscuit Chunks
Dairy Milk with Mint Chips
Dairy Milk with Orange
Dairy Milk with Caramel
Dairy Milk with Creme Egg Filling (that one was damned good)
Dairy Milk with Crunchie (toffee) Bits
Dairy Milk with Turkish Delight
Dairy Milk Bubbly (like an Aero bar)
Dairy Milk Crispy (with rice crispies)

Listing all of those types of chocolate bar reminds me of my aborted attempts to remember all the dozen or so police forces I saw while I was in DC. Obviously this list is far more delicious. They also had a gigantic 5kg Dairy Milk bar which I not-so-seriously considered purchasing. It's pictured below. Only 28 quid.

Anyway, once we had finished buying a disgustingly large amount of chocolate at even more disgustingly low prices (250g Fruit and Nut bars for $2. It was absurd) we regrouped for our tour. As we entered, a friendly bloke in a purple Cadbury blazer (I was SO angry they weren't selling those in the gift shop!) handed us our first two free sample candy bars.

The doors opened into an Aztec jungle where we learned about the beginnings of cocoa. This transitioned into the story of how chocolate arrived in Europe via Spanish conquistadors. I especially enjoyed this section as it combined two of my favourite things: candy and imperialism.

Next we arrived in Victorian England where we learned about the beginnings of the Cadbury chocolate company. From there we were shown how chocolate is made, and then toured around their factory and observed the machines at work. On our way out we received more free chocolate bars. Then came the best part: the Cadabra ride.

I can best describe Cadabra as a crappy, crappy, "It's a small world after all"-type ride. Clearly designed for two year olds (or people who are stoned out of their minds), it comprised a painfully slow car-ride through several "countries" of freaky cocoa beans (they looked like California Raisins painted brown). Many of the beans were stuck on blatantly visible metal rods that moved around and made them dance to bizarre background elevator music. Also, scattered throughout were a number of bizarre sights: there were a pair of inexplicably muscle-bound cacti, a couple of gigantic robotic cows, and a black-lit tunnel full of neon cocoa beans. Anyways, my friends and I were killing ourselves laughing the whole way through. Below are some of my friends riding "through the jungle." You'll notice several stationary cocoa beans at the bottom.

After that we walked through a demonstration area where they had free samples of chocolate for us to try. Next we tried our hand at the "Happiness Room" which was like a crappy, crappy version of DDR (I don't expect that many of you are familiar with DDR. It stands for Dance Dance Revolution and is a video game where you have to dance and step on the coloured squares as they light up. Note: my friend Claire is a DDR master). Basically, a spot on the floor or wall would light up and you'd have to hit it. It was painfully slow, but we succeeded in achieving some measure of happiness... at least according to the computer.

Then we walked through a couple of rooms which showed off old TV ads that Cadbury has used over several decades . And, while most of them were British ads I had never seen before, they played one old ad for Crunchie that I used to love as a kid: It was the one where they had an animated rollercoaster made out of chocolate (full of people made out of chocolate) that went spinning around all over the place and melted into itself to the tune of "I'm So Excited." It was great.

That pretty much finished off the tour. We then walked outside to the new "Essence" attraction which they had just opened behind the existing Cadbury World. Inside "Essence" we travelled back in time to see Mr. Cadbury create his famous Dairy Milk chocolate by putting one and a half cups of "real dairy milk" into his chocolate-making machine. Anyway, after that we were herded into a room with a large chocolate bar (I mean bar like where you serve drinks) which had liquid chocolate on tap. At the bar you would order a type of candy, which they would place in a plastic cup. They would then fill the cup with liquid chocolate from their tap to create your own chocolate concoction. By that point of the day, though, I had reached the point where I never wanted to eat another bite of chocolate again, so I didn't partake.

That was pretty much the end of the day. We all re-boarded the buses around 3.30, and set off back to the castle. On the way home I read the Sherlock Holmes novel I had been assigned for my British Studies class, entitled The Sign of Four. It was quite good, and I've decided I should look into reading some more Holmes when I get home. We got back to the castle around 8pm, and after a (very) small dinner I spent the evening talking to various people, and distributing fairly vast amounts of chocolate throughout my residence.

Well, that concludes the chapter on Cadbury. I was going to give a quick overview of the last week, but this section already appears to be rather long. So, that shall have to wait for another entry. But, ridiculously enough I will probably write that entry tonight, anyway!

Oh, and as a note, I'm going to go back right now and post a few pictures of the castle itself in the empty "Book the First" posting that I made on May 7. That way you can see where I'm actually taking classes and living.

Scott's "A Tale of Two Cities" - Chapter Two: The Fresh Prince of Corioles

Following a very busy week, I had a very busy weekend to look forward to: I had field studies scheduled for Friday, Saturday and Sunday. Each will be addressed in turn.

Friday (May 5th) was my British Studies field study at the Palace of Westminster (which contains the Houses of Parliament) in London. We had to get up rather early to eat breakfast and pack a lunch, as the buses left the castle at 8am sharp.

We arrived at Cleopatra's Needle (a large Egyptian obelisk on the north side of the Thames) around 10am, where we were given free time until 3pm. Maureen and I had spent some time the previous night discussing what we wanted to do on our free time, and we decided to visit the famous Tower of London. So, a group of us (Maureen, Colin, Meghan, Kate, and myself) set off on the subway (hereafter referred to as "the Underground," or "the Tube"). We had originally expected that it would only take us an hour or so to look around the Tower, but we took the Beefeater tour and ended up spending the whole of our free time there. After looking at the crown jewels (which are pretty spectacular, I might add), we sped through the exhibits of royal armour and other artifacts, and rushed back along the Tube to make it back to the Palace of Westminster to meet up with the rest of our group on time for our tour.

What came next, our tour through the Houses of Parliament, could probably be described as the highlight of my life thus far. The Palace itself was absolutely amazing, and to walk around in the hallways and chambers where so much history has taken place was a truly phenomenal experience. That said, most of the Palace, (despite its appearance) isn't particularly old. It was constructed between 1837 and 1860 after a fire destroyed the original Palace of Westminster, which dated from the 11th century. You'll have to excuse the next few paragraphs, because I'm going to gush. They didn't allow photography, though, which broke my heart.

We started off at the Royal Entrance, where all the Kings and Queens since Victoria have entered the building to open Parliament. We then proceeded through the Queen's Robing Room to the Royal Gallery. The Gallery is absolutely amazing... it has statues of various Kings and Queens, along with two massive paintings - one on each side of the room - showing the great British triumphs in the battles of Trafalgar and Waterloo. From there we walked through the Prince's Chamber (which contains a large statue of Queen Victoria, and paintings of various monarchs and their consorts around the top of the room) to the House of Lords. The House of Lords itself practically defies description; it was one of the most lavishly appointed rooms I think I've ever seen.

From there we walked through the giant central lobby where the four main corridors of the building meet. Above each doorway is a portrait of one of the four patron Saints of the constituent nations of the UK. We then proceeded down south hallway to the lobby outside the House of Commons. This lobby is filled, at the suggestion of Winston Churchill, with statues and busts of "successful" British Prime Ministers. Those represented include himself (not surprisingly), David Lloyd George, and a number of others (including a few who I personally wouldn't rank as particularly successful). Our tour guide was a brilliantly stereotypical old Englishman who made a number of pro-Thatcher comments throughout the tour, and at this juncture he pointed out an empty pedestal beside the entrance as the spot where the statue of Baroness Thatcher is likely to be put. Needless to say, I was quite happy.

After that we walked around the sort of lounge area beside the House of Commons, and then into the Commons itself. It's an absolutely amazing place, again because you're standing in the presence of so much history. The room itself is surprisingly small - I'd estimate about half the length of the Canadian House of Commons. There are no desks and chairs like in Canada, just long benches on either side of the room where the MPs sit.

One thing I found interesting was that after the House of Commons was destroyed by the Luftwaffe during World War 2, Churchill ordered it rebuilt to its original specifications (which is too small to actually hold all of the MPs) in order to maintain its intimate feel. After leaving the Commons, we walked back out to the central lobby and then down St. Stephen's Hall (which was also filled with statues of various old Prime Ministers) to Westminster Hall.

Westminster Hall is the oldest building on the palace site, having survived both the fire which destroyed the first palace and the German bombing. The walls date from the year 1099, while the current roof, which is apparently a model of medieval engineering (they call it a "hammerbeam" roof, which uses beams sticking out of the walls to support itself, eliminating the need for columns) was built in the 1390s. It was integrated into the Houses of Parliament when the present Palace was constructed, and is now used for major public ceremonies. Unfortunately it was undergoing renovations when we were there, so we weren't able to walk around. That was the end of our tour.

After that we walked back to Cleopatra's Needle, boarded the bus, and drove back to the castle. The next day (Saturday May 6th) we were heading back to London again, this time for a "Cultural Studies" trip with the entire school population.

We left the castle around lunchtime and arrived in London (back at Cleopatra's Needle -- generally speaking it's our drop-off point) at about 2.30. At 3.00 tour guides boarded our buses, and we went on a coach tour of London. That lasted for about 2 hours, during which time we went all over the city and saw a number of things that I'm looking forward to investigating in person later on, including Australia House (where they shot the scenes at Gringott's Bank in the Harry Potter movies) and the HMS Belfast. A lot of major roads were shut down, however, due to a parade involving some moving French elephant statue (my details were sketchy) so I still haven't seen Trafalgar Square or Buckingham Palace!

At 5.00 we were dropped back at Cleopatra's Needle, where Colin and I had arranged to meet up with my friend Ethan and his girlfriend Ann. Ethan is currently on exchange in Copenhagen, and is travelling around Europe with Ann before he goes back to write his exams. We wandered up to a pub on Fleet Street called the King and Keys, and caught up on his crazy adventures over a pint.

At about 6.30, Colin and I left Ethan and Ann, and walked across the Millennium Bridge (the really cool, and somewhat famous footbridge across the Thames designed by Norman Foster) which took us right to the Globe Theatre. We met up with the rest of our group there, and saw a presentation of Shakespeare's play Coriolanus. It was quite good, but the acting and storyline were overshadowed by the fact that the actor who played Geoffery on the Fresh Prince of Bel-Air was playing the role of the Roman general Cominius, which was awesome.

After the play was over we all piled back into the buses again, and returned to the castle. We got back around 1am, I think, and I went to bed fairly quickly - in addition to being exhausted from the running around for the last two days, I had another early-morning field trip on Sunday! This trip, to Cadbury World in Birmingham, will be detailed in the next chapter.