Cambridge, Cardiff, & Kent

I reached the 2000-word mark on my history essay so I figured it was a good time to take a break and update.

I have been doing a lot of traveling lately, which has been great except for the fact that I'm swamped with work! On Thursday, November 1st, I took the bus to Cambridge to visit Johnny. Johnny is studying at Pembroke College at Cambridge University; it is a really nice college that dates back to 1347. We went out to dinner that night, and hung around the college bar later, which is much more posh than the UCL Union bar. The next day (Johnny's birthday!), we walked around Cambridge and got to see a bunch of different colleges, including King's, Trinity, St. John's, and Emmanuel. King's was great to see mostly because of the chapel. Henry VIII put a lot of work into the chapel, including the gift of an organ that is still there today. There were also "HR" initials all over the paneling, as well as "RA" which I think stands for Anne Boleyn.

Trinity had been my favorite college when I visited the university with my dad, but I have to say I liked St. John's much more. It was founded by Margaret Beaufort, mother of Henry VII, and it was quite obvious because all the architecture was clearly Tudor. We then went to Emmanuel, since that's where my dad went, and got to go inside the chapel and the dining hall.

That night, we went to formal hall at Pembroke. Formal hall is something that happens every night at Pembroke at 7:30. You can get dressed up, wear your gown (everyone at Cambridge has one) and get served a fancy dinner, though you do have to buy tickets. It was very nice, except for being yelled at in the beginning for being 5 minutes late. Cambridge students are also very fond of pennying other people's drinks (pennying a drink is essentially throwing a penny into someone's glass, and the victim has to drink the whole glass quickly so the Queen doesn't drown). One thing I found interesting was that you aren't allowed to take pictures if the "fellows" are there, which they were, so I waited to take pictures until they had left. I felt a lot like I was in Harry Potter--everyone sits at these long wooden tables, and the fellows sit at tables that are higher up on a platform at the front.

After dinner we had a birthday party for Johnny, which was a lot of fun. I should also mention that the food at Cambridge is amazing, especially breakfast! Certainly isn't your typical dining hall food.

Saturday night we went to see Elizabeth: The Golden Age which was very good, I recommend it! Sunday we just hung around and did some work, and I left around 5:30.

I didn't have much time to rest, and my coach to Cardiff, Wales was the next morning, Monday, at 8am. It was a 3 hour bus ride, but it was only 5 pounds! The bed and breakfast we stayed in was very nice and cute. It was about a 20 minute walk from the center of the city, in an old Victorian house. We had a bathroom with a shower in our room, and nice comfty beds, as well as a great breakfast each morning. Cardiff is a really cool city, it has the typical pubs, bars, and clubs, but it also has a lot of "arcards" which are these sort of outlet stores with neat treasures in them. I found one store that was an "old books" store, and found a book on the Tudors for only 1.50. We also spent one day walking down to Cardiff Bay, which was really pretty, despite how cold it was! We went to Cardiff Castle (or Castell Caerdydd! I think Welsh is the coolest language), which was basically the focal point of the city. The castle dates back to the arrival of the Romans, although most of what survives today is from the 1800's. The inside was amazing, with really incredible architecture and artwork on the walls and ceilings, but unfortunately photography wasn't allowed inside.

The most exciting part of our trip was on Sunday when we saw Prince Charles unexpectedly. We walked up to a war memorial, quite on accident, and a man asked my friend if we had come to see Prince Charles, and told her that we had just missed him by 5 minutes! Anyway, later on in the day, we were walking by the castle and saw all these police standing outside. We overhead that Charles was visiting the castle, so we waited around for about a half an hour to see him. We were practically the only ones standing there (I guess people either didn't know about it or didn't care), and it was really cool when he drove up in his car and rolled down the window to wave.

I arrived back in London late Wednesday night, and on Friday I was off to meet my dad and Uncle Roger and Karen at a bar in London. I got back to my room late Friday night, and was off again at 8am Saturday morning to go on the Butler excursion to Hever Castle. I had always wanted to see this castle because it was the childhood home of Anne Boleyn. The castle was really pretty, and I got to see Anne's bedroom, which included the original headboard to her bed. It's unfortunate that, once again, photography was not allowed inside.

Karen picked me up from Hever, and I went back to their house which is about 30 minutes away in Kent. Grandma had already arrived, and Lucille arrived shortly after. It was a fun family reunion, and we went out to dinner that night at this great fish restaurant (I had crab cakes, and was so excited to be eating a proper meal for once). I got to ride in Karen's new porsche, which was pretty incredible. The next day, Grandma and Lucille left relatively early since it's a 5 hour drive back to Manchester, but me, my dad, Karen and Roger went to go see my cousin Christopher play football (/soccer). Everyone actually calls him Nippy, so it's strange for me to be typing Christopher. He is still only 15, but is of course 7 inches taller than me. I also saw my cousins Samantha (who everyone calls Wiz or Wizzy) and Shiona, both of whom are also taller than me, even Shiona who is only 13. Wiz has the most red hair I have ever seen and I am completely jealous!

I was originally going to stay until Monday morning, but decided to go back Sunday night to get some more work done. The work is really getting stressful now. I have two 2500 word essays for History due by the end of the term, a Macroeconomics coursework for my final grade, and two exams in Enviro econ and Labour Econ which take place the 11th and 12th of December. I am trying to get my history essays done as soon as possible, so that I can concentrate on studying for my econ exams, which are 100% of my final grade.

I am going to Paris this weekend with Sam who is my best friend from Conn, so expect another update next week, if I can pull myself away from work!