I'm back in Luxembourg, everybody! 11 days of travel/vacation have come to a close. It seems like it went so quickly, yet it feels as though it's been ages since being in Luxembourg! It admittedly feels great now that I'm back, unpacked (mostly), showered, and polished (my finger nails), but I have to say that this is the saddest I've been to leave somewhere that I'd visited. I think both Alex and I agree that we both loved this trip and loved the UK. Both Edinburgh and London were very special places and I grew quite attached. It's so interesting to visit somewhere that's so modern, yet involves such an extreme level of history.
I left off on Saturday, which was Day 2 with our class. We started out nice and early, and went on a Coffee House Tour - all 30 of us with our professor. Our class is about social media, so doing a Coffee House Tour helped to illustrate one of the oldest forms of social media: the spreading of information, knowledge, and culture through communal coffee houses. Lead by an adorable British guide (aka Benedict Cumberbatch (not really)) we visited the first coffee house to ever have been built and made several other stops to similarly significant places. "Coffee Houses," or old-fashioned cafes/salons, arose in the 1700s and were available to anyone (as long as you were a man) and were a place where you could go sit down, have a cup of this fabulous bitter drink that sharpened the senses and activated the mind (especially if you were a bit woozy from only having beer available to drink all day - no clean drinking water in London then!). At these coffee houses, men would sit, ponder, read, and discuss various things of philosophical importance.
At the time, this bitter drink was imported from Turkey and was brewed very ruggedly, and was similar in taste to soot or sludge. This is actually a first-hand opinion...Dr. Cumberbatch actually brewed some 18th century coffee and gave it to us to try! Yet people drank it anyways, enjoying some of it's supposed and legitimate effects.
On our tour we passed by this carving (which was located by the first coffee house). Does it look like another coffee-related mermaid that you might be familiar with? It's not a coincidence!
Following our morning tour, we had some free time. We'd formed a wonderful group of friends - 2 other boys and 2 other girls, making a nice even (and always hysterical) group of 3 boys and 3 girls! Alex and I have a good time on our travels together but I think we have both admitted that it's been fun to travel and explore with friends as well! So after our tour, we wandered off with our group of 6, and eventually the other 2 girls broke off and Alex and I and the two boys found lunch. We actually ended up in a café, where the boys ordered hot chocolate and I got an "English Breakfast Tea."
The drinks came in bowls, not tea cups or mugs!
After some time in the Victoria and Albert Museum on Saturday (that's Queen Victoria and Prince Albert), our group of friends did a Jack the Ripper tour. Our professor actually joined us! It was very cool to be one on one with him and that we were cool enough for him to hang out with ;) The tour was one of my favorites over the course of the trip, and was very informative about all things Jack the Ripper. An expert on him led the tour - a young woman. She had lots of pictures and visual aids (such as copies of letters to do with the cases, etc) and would pop them up on bare walls or sides of buildings using a tiny, portable projector. The tour was about two hours and we travelled all through the East End where the murders of the "Canonical Five" took place. There wasn't much to see, but we did learn a lot and got sufficiently creeped out. This was even more creepy than the ghost tour in the vaults of Edinburgh.
Afterwards, we went to a local pub, where our professor also joined us! I really enjoyed talking to him the entire evening, outside of a classroom context and getting to know him. Turns out he's really interested in Jack the Ripper and historical mystery - he recommended a new series to me.
The next morning we trekked onward - we went to tour the British Museum with our class. All we had to do was an hour-long tour, and we were set free before noon. With our friend group, we wandered around and saw the Rosetta Stone, an Easter Island Head, and even an old suit of armor that a Samurai warrior used to wear!
Afterwards, one of our party wanted Chipotle, another wanted "fish 'n chips," and the rest of us were flexible. So we set out wandering until everyone was satisfied. Then we headed back over to Big Ben, The Eye, and that sort of thing. Alex and I had talked of seeing the Tour of London, but ended up ultimately deciding that it was too expensive and wanted to stay with our friends. We walked for quite awhile in the park near Buckingham Palace, where we saw many exciting species of birds (pelicans, etc) and where Alex made friends with the swans.
The pelicans! We were there at feeding time.
Revisiting Big Ben from a new angle.
Friends!
That evening was a long awaited special treat. We had tickets in the 7th row at the Queen's Theatre to see Les Miserables. Most of the others in our friend group had theatre tickets to various shows, so we all decided to get dinner at "Wagamama" which was a nearby Japanese restaurant. This all ended up being located in the same vicinity as M&M World and we were able to orient ourselves pretty well. Our professor joined us once again for dinner, which I thought was great! I had a yummy tofu/noodle dish and was very pleased! Afterwards Alex went to Ben and Jerry's and then we walked over to Haagen Daas where I had a bit of chocolate caramel praline aka my new favorite ice cream flavor.
Then it was time to hit the theatre.
Let me just say...I was blown away. The actors were so talented that I felt transported into their world. I was really surprised by how similar the cast looked to the movie cast - Marius, for example, even had his hair coiffed the same way and looked very similar to the actor in the movie version of the musical. The most striking difference was that Fantine was Asian! She was amazingly talented, and blew us all away. At one point during the Javert/Jean val Jean duel in the hospital, Alex looked over at me and said: "This.Is.Great." I thought it was really interesting how now that I've seen several versions, I can see that there is a certain "type" cast for each character. I've been reading the book as well, and I'm slowly starting to feel that I know the characters more and more. We both loved it and now we want to see even more theatre! Some of our friends saw Phantom of the Opera that night and I really would like to see that now too.
The next morning, we went to exchange our Oyster cards at the train station and get some money back for them. This of course meant introducing our friends to Millie's! I didn't get a drink this time but I tried a tiny "cookie cupcake" which was delicious. I'll miss this place.
Then the 6 of us went to squeeze in another walk in a new park (this time we went to Regent's). We had to be back at the hostel with our class at 12:00 and wanted to cram in as much sight-seeing as we could. This park was very pretty, and I could picture myself running around in it for miles! The perimeter probably wasn't very long (a couple miles) but there were many, many twisting paths through the center. I'm sure I could easily rack up at least 8 miles in there! I adored the flowers (daffodils and crocuses are already up in Europe) and the fountains.
Our friends have been very good about taking pictures of us for our scrapbook. Sometimes it turns out quite nicely.
Moments later this happened.
Luckily I didn't actually fall in. Phew!
We got back home by about 8:00PM. I made some more chicken breasts and rice for Alex and my roommate and then a big fresh salad which I enjoyed. After showering, unpacking, and tidying, it was 12AM by the time I finally got to sleep!
Luckily I got to sleep in this morning (Wednesday) and then even still had time for a run. I must've still been tired because a tripped on a clump of grass that was sticking out into the paved trail, and went down. Hard! I caught myself on one side with my hand, but my other hand held my pepper spray (which I just learned is illegal here!) and my knee hit and slid. No hole in my running tights but a big, bloody lump! I'll spare you all the pictures.
Just one class this afternoon and I had the option of staying for a lecture, but felt I really needed more time to catch up on work, rest, and to regroup. I headed home on the 4:59 train an was shocked to see...sun! This is my first time in 5 weeks coming home from class when it's light out. Spring must slowly but surely be coming!
I just unpacked my favorite thing to collect...mugs.
We'll be here in Luxembourg this weekend but are thinking of traveling somewhere with one of our new friends the next weekend, and then we are meeting our high school friend in Amsterdam the following weekend! And unbelievably, after that is when my family will be in Europe! I'm so excited for all of these things - March will be quite the exciting month! (Then again, I can hardly think of a non-exciting time while I"m over here!)
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