April, 2009

My head is still spinning. I'm trying to comprehend all of what's happened this past April, but it's all so much I can't really grasp on to it. It was like a dream you don't want to wake up from. It started in Amsterdam and ended in Barcelona with Romania in between. The vast difference between each culture and each experience is overwhelming, I need a moment to collect and arrange my thoughts. I know this trip has enriched my life, to what extent I don't know just yet. Perhaps I will keep these stories and moments for myself, I fear any attempts at explanations would lessen the bliss each moment, for now they will be mine, and I am grateful for them.

Where's Wally?

So there's been some pretty interesting things going on the last few weeks. Lately I've been going to the glass center eveyday because my documenary class isn't ready to film, so I want to do as much as I can when I actually have the time, I think they call that "being productive" it's pretty new to me. My theam for the final still life is glasses with coins melted in the bottom. So hopfully I'll be able to make shot glasses and whisky glasses with coins in the bottom that make you think there's a coin in your drink. Not the greatest consept but hey I'm a nube.
Other interesting things are hanging out with the snow sports. They have a dry slope here for snowbording and skiing and it's absolute shit - I stoped going after the first time when I fucked up my knee and my wrist. But they still invite me to go out drinking with them. They go out every other wed and have big dress ups partys - the first one I went to was Where's Wally? It was pretty fun.

Other than all of that, spring break is coming up and I have no idea where to go. Any sugjestions?

Glass Work

So I've been pretty busy with school work, trying to find someone new to rent my apartment back home (don't even ask) and juggling the new friends I've acquired over here. That is my excuse for not updating this in a while. But just to let you know, I'm loving every minute of it. And some really interesting opportunities have come my way. Some of the glass blowers I've met invited me to a thing called "Art in Action" google it, it's a thing where like 300 artists from around the world come and demonstrate their art and sell their work and they'll even make you some right there if you want. So far I've only made a flower, a shot glass, and a bigger shot glass. My bowl didn't make it - Enjoy

Oh and I added some neat pics I took of around Sunderland, The bridge I have to walk across every day, and a rainbow over campus.

York

These are from my trip to York the school had set up for all of the international students for the first weekend we arrived. It was really neat but not enough time to see the entire city. We actually went up in the tower and then we went out for tea, I don't have those pics though, they'll prolly end up on facebook though. Then we came back to the Minster and took our time.

The one on the left of this paragraph is of the Rose window which I only thought was on Notre-Dame but apparently England and France have had a War of the Roses for a while.

These are the pictures of the remains of the Roman fortress and the wall that surrounded the city.

Right above this one is St. Mary's Abbey

This is of a pic of the York City Art Gallery

And as you can see the others are just some of the crazy stain glass, you know the usual, Mary and baby Jesus, a wall of the saints (i think), Adam and Eve, God smiting people.

York Minster, This is the second biggest minster in England next to the Westminster and I believe if not half, more than half of all the stain glass in England is in York. Which really prolly means just this building. The Great East window depicts the beginning to the end of the world in over 100 scenes.

Also you can tell it's from the Gothic era because of the flying buttresses. In one of the shots from the top of the tower you can see the ruins of St. Mary's Abbey and in front of the Minster there is part of an old Roman fortress.

The other one is Nataija and I on top of the tower. A little note, the winding staircase to get to the top was crazy narrow and steep, and it was freezing at the top which is why I look like a goon, all in all though well worth it.

Snow and Penshaw Monument

I had the day off today because I can't meet with my advisor until tomorrow, so following in yesterdays footsteps I decided to go exploring. Yesterday I went for a walk to try and get my barrings around the city and after getting lost a few times I think I've figured out the gust of it. Today I was a bit more ambitious, today was all about figuring out the bus system. Sounds easy enough I mean they speak English over here (kind of).

Anyway I got on a bus that was going to take me to Penshaw Monument (most of the pics)

and everything was fine. The only problem came while waiting for the bus to come back to pick me up. I had just missed one and had to wait 25 mins, and on the dot the second one came, and just like that he went. Apparently you have to wave the buses down even though your standing at the bus stop their supposed to stop at. So after waiting an hour and walking a few miles I waved the next one down and all was well again.

Here are some pics of the snow we got on my first morning here, and some pics of Penshaw Monument.

Same Sky Other Side of the World

Funny staring out my window Monday Febuary 1st. There was a chill in the air and snow on the ground. I couldn't help but to give a laugh but apparently London was compleatly shut down because of it. Truthfully though the weather here is shight. It went from snow to sun to rain all in the same day and in that order and today is beautiful. I'll upload some picture as soon as I can figure out how and or have time/feel like it.
On a side note I slept through the induction meeting yesterday, so today I've set some goals the main one being buying an alarm clock. (one of the things I forgot to pack while watching Suan of the Dead) and I'm not sure that was the best research because now my inner monolog speaks to me in an English accent. And after a brife oh fuck we're all going to die moment of turbulence (sp) over the ocean I desided if I was going to die it wasn't going to be while watching a Marky Mark movie (Max Payne) so I continued my research with Rocken Rolla (Guy Ritchie)
Also I'm glad I missed yesterday because because of it I had a flat mate (someone who lives on the same floor (we all share a kitchen)) Natalia (a Russian girl who is a cute as her name leads one to believe) show me around campus.

Well that's going to have to be it for today (at least for now) I have to run off to the City Center to find my alarm clock, everthing in the city shuts down after 5 p.m. so I'm off.
Cheers

Preperations and Procrastination

Among the last minute packing for this 8 month adventure abroad I began to think that perhaps I should have planed this out a little better. Instead of planning on what to pack and what I still needed to buy and what I probably shouldn't have bought I came to the conclusion that doing a little research would ultimately benefit me more. So with that in mind I lined up all of the movies I have that either take place somewhere in England or feature an actor with an English accent.

My research included:

Stardust
Finding Neverland
Shaun of the Dead (brilliant)
Prince Caspian
Gangs of New York (Irish accents at least)
and In Bruges

Research I own but either forgot about or didn't have time for:

The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy
28 Days Later
Monty Python's The Meaning of Life
Harry Potter (don't know how I missed that one)
Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels
Trainspotting
oh bollocks I forgot about Snatch

and technically I have the BBC version of Planet Earth, and there's probably some that I missed
but Now that I've made this list I don't think I did a very good job with my research and I probably forgot to pack a bunch of shit too

Ah Well
Cheers

ps. I was more of a way the world work over here, a human study really