Liverpool...SO not as gross as it sounds, by Hannah

Yesterday Kimberly, Kerri, Jackie, Zoie and I went to Liverpool. After a bit of a rough start, we were on our way! While the day was much less eventful (in the getting lost in dark alleys sense of eventful), I'm gonna have to say that Liverpool was a much cooler city than Leeds. Sorry Leeds dude who commented on Thursday, that's just my opinion, so don't take it personally and go jump off the wharf or move to Liverpool or anything silly.

We went to the Beatles mueseum, like any good tourists, and that was just wonderful, the highlights being the yellow submarine and John Lennon's famous white piano. We also went to the Liverpool Cathedral, which was GI-normous, and we saw a street called Roscoe Street, which made me think of 1) My mother's story about the random birthday cake and 2) My own story about Jonas the Little Selfish Potted Plant. Pretty much we stuck out like sore thumbs and got excited everytime we saw anything that said Penny Lane, Strawberry Fields, the Beatles...etc. When the day was almost over we went to McDonalds, and while laughing at ourselves for being in England and eating at McDonalds, realized that this was no ordinary McDonalds, oh no, this was the Beatles memorabilia McDonalds, with every wall covered in Beatles quotes and pictures. Who looked stupid then, huh??? Probably us, but it didn't matter...we were in the Beatles McDonalds!

Next we take on London--watch out you 12 million+ Londoners, there are 10 study abroad students coming to blend in with your thousands of other tourists for the weekend.

In other news, County College was plagued by two weird guys dressed up as ninjas on Friday. They were running around with toilet paper and post-it notes that said such things as "Tyson likes the number 12.5. Vote for Josh." They ran around the halls and scared people for an hour or so, before descending to the County pub and being forced to unmask themselves before the bartender would serve them. I know what you're thinking, so just shut up. I didn't have anything to do with it.

Hope moving into the apartment went well today, Rach. It's so weird that school is starting...and I'm not there! But it's so beautiful that I'm here, and I don't have to go to classes!

Roscoe Street 

An hour and a half with Beatles history...what else could I want out of my 6 months in England? 

Liverpool...so much prettier than it sounds... 

What kind of fortune is this?? 

I got dibs on Jesus!! by rachel (with help from sam)

That is a quote from my little brother.... excuse me, my younger brother. I am the little one now, I suppose. In any case, all of his input will be in pink (he picked, I swear).

We'll start with Thursday night. Sam played a few of his songs at open mic night at Java J's, a coffee place in Bristol. I think it is in Virginia, but it may be Tennessee. It sits on State Street which is the state line. One side of the street is VA, the other TN. I get confused easily. About everything. In any case, he was in Bristol. He played some of his stuff, and sounded awesome I might add. Especially the one where I sing. Hehehe. Then, the manager - he had awesome fluffy red hair - that's what I was thinking! - asked him to come back and play a set on a Friday night which isn't open mic like you didn't know it was a joke! Friday the 18th if you wanna go heckle. Although, you might end up in the wrong state...

After Sam played and got offered a bazillion dollar contract cause he was that good, these two guys got up there. One with a guitar and one with an accordion. They had just met that night and the accordion guy (Major, that was his name, really!) totally improv-ed (not improved - though he wasn't bad). Shane, the guitarist was... well, lets just suppose that if Jonas and Jaime had a kid together when they were two - when they were two? - (this guy is about 20, do the math) - he would look like Shane. This guy was just like... both of them. It was trippy. And Major looks like Calvin from Berea. Twilight Zone. Or maybe too much caffeine. Did you know that too much of that stuff gives you irritated bowel syndrome? Anyway, Sam and I could tell right off that Shane was a Dave Matthews fan. He tried to sound just like him. The accordion was an interesting addition...

Ok, enough of that. The real adventure was yesterday. Papaw called and asked Sam and I to go out to lunch with him and our cousin Daniel who is a year or two younger than Sam. We go to pick Daniel up and he comes out with a handful of juicy fruit packs. Some kind of addiction, I'm sure. Papaw asked him what was new in his life and he answered, "Uh, I got this gold watch outta one a them claw machines." He then tells us about the doorbell he purchased to go on the outside of his bedroom, so people could ring it instead of knock. "I had to take it down though cause people weren't usin' it fer that, they just wanted to wake me up with it." Then Papaw started talking about how his dad used to sing him a song called "Choked to Death on a Cold Tater Pie." I've never seen Papaw laugh that hard. What's a tater pie anyway?

So we finally get to the China King Buffet and as we walk in the door, the hostess said in a thick accent, "You bring your ladyfriend?" Papaw said, "Nope, brought the grandkids." I said, "Yeah, he traded his ladyfriend for his grandkids." The hostess thought it was funny, but I don't think Papaw did. Ah well.

We load our plates up with all kinds of fried goodies and return to the table. Daniel takes a bite of his sushi (rule #1 of chinese buffets in TN: don't eat the sushi) and makes a face. "Is it bad?" I asked him. "Yeah, but it's better than last time." (rule #2 of chinese buffets in TN: if you are dumb enough to break rule #1, don't do it twice) Then Daniel decided to tell us a story. He was like, "There's this crazy lady that lives in an apartment underneath Josh [Daniel's older brother] and she calls him Scott." Apparently she'll come around and ask if Scott is there and Daniel will say, "You mean Josh? No, he's not here." She'll say, "Oh, I know his real name is Josh, I just like to call him Scott." Daniel continued with, "And she's got this crazy eye!"

Sam went back to get dessert and came back with a plate of orange jello. Attempting to keep Papaw from regailing us with his "nervous jelly" story, Sam tried to remind Papaw he'd told us already by announcing that he brought back nervous jelly. Hang your head, Sam. It didn't work. As soon as Sam said that, Papaw started in, "Back in the Navy, they used to make huge vats of that stuff and it'd wobble around and we called it nervous jelly." I am so sick of that story. Then he started talking about the spaghetti for some reason... I asked him if it wobbled around and he was like, "No..." He didn't think that was funny, either, I suppose. I decided I wanted some nervous jelly of my own, so as I was getting up to get it, Sam made a sick face, poked his orange jello and said, "Get the red." I did, and it was... thick.... (rule # 3 of chinese buffets in TN: don't eat yellow snow, but that's not important) (rule # 4 of chinese buffets in TN: don't eat the jello if you can't chew it - it doesn't matter what color it is) I also brought Sam back some of TN's finest much much more... Hannah, you would be proud... it was a beautiful, shiny, red crawdad that freaked Sam out cause it was staring at him. He wasn't appreciative at all!

As we were about to leave, the waitress asked Papaw, "You wan some mah tea?" Papaw began looking around frantically. I could tell he was confused. She repeated her question and he started patting himself down, looking for something. I finally said, "Papaw, you want more drink?" Immediately, he said, "Oh, no, I'm fine." (rule #5 of chinese bu...oh, you get the point: if you don't understand the waitress, just smile and nod)

As Papaw was paying, Daniel tried to get a bouncy ball with 2 quarters. He was about to break the crank off of the machine cause it wouldn't turn. That's when I said, "Daniel, it costs a dollar." He shrugged and Papaw, Sam, and I walked out into the parking lot. Daniel soon followed and smiled at Sam. He had spent his 2 quarters all right... in the machine with bubba teeth. They were gorgeous. The two front teeth were like massive white chiclets... reminded me of Dennis the Menace. The surrounding teeth were... rotten. The ride home consisted of me trying to listen respectively to Papaw's stories while not laughing at Daniel who was smiling and waving at people in the cars next to us. Every once in a while I would slip though. He got quite a few double takes. When we got to his house, he got out, grinned at us and started walking away. He quickly returned, opened the door, looked sheepishly at us, and grabbed a loose piece of juicy fruit from the seat. As he walked to his house, he tried to put the gum in and chew it with the bubba teeth still in. I never want to chew juicy fruit again.

What a day. I'll leave you with another stellar Sam quote. "You know it's a real burp if you can taste it." Chew on that.

A shoe store called "Size?" Because of either the ducky or the question mark, I was inspired to go in and greatly disappointed. But I did take a picture. 

St. John's  

Jackie, Kerri and Kimberly at the Lancaster station...innocent before experiencing Leeds!!! 

Josh eating my newly invented delicacy: pea stuffed lemon with brown sauce. 

Before the Sugarhouse--Mary, Kerri and Zoie in the front, Jackie, Kim and I in the back 

Leeds...oh what a day, by Hannah

Yesterday Kimberly, Kerri, Jackie and I decided to go to Leeds. We had a sort of free day (some of us had the pleasure of skipping a religion lecture that surely would have sucked), and Leeds isn't too far away, and the boys basketball team from Lancaster was playing against a team in Leeds. So everything is running smoothly, we make the first train, where we will change at Carnforth, and we get on the train, we get the train to Leeds, everyone goes to sleep and I grapple with the intro to Orlando (oh my...). We get to Leeds, get lunch which is a success, and then head to St. John's church. Thanks to Kerri's superior map reading skills we get there without getting even slightly lost! And it was beautiful. It was built in 1634 and almost everything is still intact. From there we decided that the Royal Armouries Mueseum sounded interesting, and we headed off in that direction.

I just want to state, before I retell this episode, that we followed the signs THE WHOLE TIME. We walked for about a half an hour, and ended up in a dark and dirty alley beside some dumpsters and big construction partition things. We NEVER FOUND the armoury crap, no, we didn't. We did, however, get to see the Wharf, and British construction workers. On the way back into the city, commenting on how smart it was for four American girls to wander back into a dark alley on the outskirts of one of the biggest cities in England, somebody spotted the newspaper headline for the day: "Police still searching for Leeds Sex Attacker." We all swore not to tell our parents!

After this we were exhausted, having walked in a huge circle all the way around a huge city, so we headed back into the downtown area in search of a coffee shop or tea or something warm. Our search took us to a little Italian place with coffee drinks and it's very own drunken weirdo sitting in the corner behind us. He was high class though- no beer for him, he was having late afternoon brandy coffees. God, these British...when we first walked in, he was just wandering around the resteraunt with a pretend cigarette. Then he sat down, and started talking to us. He mostly left us alone, but he did try to buy us a bottle of wine. As we were leaving, he asked if we were American. We said yes, and he said oh god, he hoped none of us were from Utah, with those Mormons. I was laughing uproariously at this time, but one of the other girls wasn't turning around and he said "I bet she has the book of Mormon. You have the book of Mormon don't you??" He kept getting louder, and we left faster. Oh, I love drunken weirdos.

During the restaraunt visit we talked to Josh, who told us where the game was. He said, and I will quote him, the Leeds Met University Blue Court. So we get directions from the waitress to the Leeds Met Uni, and head that direction. We found it! We were so excited, it was true beauty. Then we went inside, and they said that no, the basketball courts were on the other Leeds Met campus, 2 miles or more away, and we needed to take a bus. So we did. And then we got off the bus, and we still had to walk a long freakin way. Beside an old cemetary, with a big high fence with sharp ends, no less. It was so creepy. It was dark and cloudy and full mooned and everything else bad. Cold, rainy..you name it.

We finally get to the building the Blue Court is supposed to be in, and Josh is still wondering where we are, since they're in the fourth quarter and we're not there yet. A little illustration: the game started at 5. We didn't get there until 6:50. It was classic, classic. After an unfortunate incident with a turnstile, in which Kimberly (and the rest of us, honestly) completely lost control and got hysterical with laugher and tears combined. When we got there we went to the court door instead of the viewing door, and we pressed our faces up against the glass like poor little orphaned children until Josh came and showed us where to go watch from. We watched, approximately, the last 4 minutes of the game. We did win though, by 1 point. By this point we were completely gone, laughing at anything and everything and then having a big group moan of pure agony. This includes the gross basketball players picking wedgies. After one of these moments Kimberly starts making this hyperventilating noise, and points at the floor of the basketball court right below the balcony we were standing on. There was this little red splot on the floor. When she regained her composure, she informed us that the red splot was her cough drop, dropped while laughing. I really lost it then. It was just too much.

After waiting an hour for a taxi (we said a big hell no to walking back to the bus stop through the cemetary) and meeting some great sports hall workers, we finally got back to the rail station and got on our train. When we finally stumbled back into Lancaster, feeling like we had been walking for days, Kerri, Jackie and I headed to the Walkabout to help our Aussie friends Nick and Zoie celebrate Australia Day, and didn't get home until about 1:15...oh, what a day, what a day.

I hope all of you people back home are doing well and having good clean January fun. I hear that Clay is getting ready to move and the dynamic duo will soon be split up. Sad, sad, sad. Rach, I still haven't mailed the Jammie Dodgers, the post offices here are retarded! But they'll get to you someday...I P-R-O-M-I-S-EEEEE.

As you can see, I finally got the picture posting program to work. I will soon be adding pictures from the Sugarhouse School girl night and pictures from the Leeds incident!

Jesse in York 

York Minster in York 

The Sugarhouse, by Hannah

Last night we went to the Sugarhouse in town. It's a club that is owned by the student union, so it's only open to students and you don't get loads of creepy old drunk guys. Just creepy young drunk guys. You get the idea. Every Friday this place has theme night, and it's always "Frisky" vs. something else, "Frisky" being typical UK club music, which is, b to the w, very very not typical American club music. Last night was "Frisky vs. Old Skool" which inspired ALL of my friends and half of the female student population to dress Britney Spears style-naughty school girl and inspired the DJ to play such things as the Backstreet Boys. Now, let me explain what I have witnessed so far about English clubs: they don't really dance. They stand around, drinks and cigarrettes in hand, and sort of wiggle a little off beat. I have no idea why this is called dancing, because surely they've actually SEEN real dancing before? There are a few good things about their methods though--no booooty dancing (which means no nasty guys rubbing up on nasty girls), and they get to dance to REALLY cheesy music (again, the Backstreet Boys), AND all the boys dance with the boys. I loooove it! Now keep all of this in mind as I describe the night.

First we all got dressed. I'm not going to go into great detail about this because we canNOT outdress these dirty British girls! I am utterly amazed at how little they wear on such cold and windy nights. I think they're all counting in that drunken warmth when they leave. It is insane. When we finally left we went to Wetherspoon's, a resteraunt/bar in town and found, to mine and Kerri's absolute dismay and amazment, that they were "out" of fish n chips. Go figure. We weren't mocking the entire fish n chips movement, we really wanted some! After 4 pitchers of what I took to be very weak drinks the six of us left, much to the amusement of all the dirty old men laughing at the school girl costumes (NOTE: I wasn't wearing one) and the skallies (UK white trash. They tuck their pants legs into their socks and they all have nasty attitudes, as explained to me by my British floormate). When we got out into the freezing street all of my smart friends were freezing in their little mini skirts, so we went to the Aussie club down the street to check it out in advance of Austrailia day celebrations (Jan 26th). When we finally reached the Sugarhouse I was exhausted, but we stayed until almost 2. I drank more water than I ever have in my life before. People with claustraphobia should so stay away from this place.

I didn't wake up today until 12, with Kerri knocking on my door. I heart sleep, forever and ever amen. Since I woke up I have eaten, taken a shower (I think I'm going to start referring to the toweled walk down the looong hall to the bathroom at 1 pm on Saturday when everyone knows you've been out the night before "the Gauntlet." I keep ducking hoping nobody's door opens.), and cleaned up my room. Now I'm going to tackle Virginia Woolf's Orlando. Apparantly it's about a young man who lives for over 300 years and becomes more and more androgenous, to end up in 1920 as a woman. Should be interesting.

I finally have the internet in my room! If I can get the picture posting program to work (so far it's being stupid) I'll put up some pictures today. And now I can talk to all of you without going down to the skanky computer lab. Be good!

Old Man pants- by Hannah

way to go Rachel! Actually, I can visualize, and I bet you look like one little hot old man midget. I missssssss youuuuuu

Goodwill Hunting by Rachel

So, today I had a crazy try everything on day. Yeah... one of those. First, my friend Myra and I (who happen to share a birthday albeit 4 years apart) went to David's Bridal where I tried on a bride's maid's outfit for my dear friend Ashley's wedding in May. I looked cute! THEN, we went to Old Navy where we tried on lots of stuff that we couldn't afford. At one point, Myra had on white dress pants with dark pin stripes and this strapless pink layered... thing.... it was beyond words. I tried on a pair of pin striped capris and they were actually too short! Usually for this legal midget (yes, for all you readers out there who didn't know... I am a legal midget) capris fit me like normal pants, but the one time I need them to, they don't. *sigh* After Old Navy, we hit a shady stationary store in downtown Johnson City called Razzle Me Dazzle. We were scared too. They had all kinds of weird things that were not stationary in there including, but not limited to: chocolate fondue sets, scary bee lady bags, a poofy powder thingy, perfume with glitter in it, and champagne flavored chapstick. It was great fun. The store owner followed us around and showed us everything. I was kinda scared. Our final stop was the Salvation Army or Goodwill (I forget which) also in downtown JC. I got man pants, Hannah! They are light brown with maroon pinstrips (I know, it sounds ugly but it actually works!). In any case, Myra found these awesome gray slacks with no pleats (that is a must). Unfortunately, there was a big burn hole in the crotchetorial area. Myra was like, "Maybe you could do something drastic in that area to cover it up." Hmmm... still thinking about that one. I'm also still thinking how that burn hole happened. Yikes. In any case, we both tried it on. Our new phrase is, "Holy Crotch!" Hahaha. Myra also found what I fondly refer to as "the hot pants." Now, whatever designer who came up with these, and subsequently anyone who actually bought them, has to be daft. Seriously. They are black pants with this shiny red thread all throughout them. There are lots of pleats... so many that they look like M.C. Hammer pants. I'm not kidding!! I just wish I had a camera. The scary part was that Myra had the hot pants on with this silk light pink blouse, and she actually pulled it off!! She made it look good! THAT is talent if I've ever seen it. We tried on a few other things including an 80's prom dress and a red dress that the devil's wife would wear... or maybe the devil, who knows. In any case, we had a blast. And I have man pants. Holy Crotch!

Thanks Rachel!!! by Haaannah

Thanks Rach! You think I should 1) Mail him home 2) Check him or 3) Put him in my carry on luggage? What a decision!

to hannah love rachel

Any pigeon of yours is a pigeon of mine. Especially if he is named Leopold. :)

Leopold by Hannah

Happy Sunday, yo. I'm sitting here in the computer lab, surrounded by poor little British kids doing homework. Not me! Although I do still have to conquer the most intense feminist essay I've ever encountered sometime before I go to bed tonight. It's about 17 pages long, and it's taken me since Friday afternoon to get through the first 6. Seriously intense. I guess that's what I should expect when taking Junior level Women's Studies courses at the #1 Women's Studies University in the UK, right? Silly me.

I just got back from town--some people I will let remain anonymous woke me from my much needed nap to go tour Lancaster Castle this afternoon. Unfortunately, we missed the last tour and ended up walking aimlessly through the streets of Lancaster. We did run into a group of Skallies (apparantly they're the equivilant to white trash type people in America) on their way to the Blue Anchor, a skanky pub. They were all dressed up like Halloween, Frankenstein and all. No idea what that was about.

My brother was in town this weekend again, on his way to London tomorrow to fly out on Wednesday. We left Friday morning to go to York. Let me just state that Thursday night was some special night at the County (the pub in my college/dorm. I don't have to even go OUTSIDE to get there) which means that it stays open until 2. I had a seminar at 10 and then we left at 11. I was not feeling....my best....if you know what I mean. Eesh. So we went to York, the long way (Look on a map. We went from Lancaster up to Carlisle, down to Leeds, and over to York. I don't know exactly why but it was FUN). York was great, once things opened up. Wet and cold, like everywhere else in this country, but it's really pretty. After York we went to Durham, then to Newcastle, and then back to Lancaster last night.

Most interesting train moment(s): On the way to Newcastle, there was this large group of large Scottish guys...I'd say 25 or 30 years old, most of them, and another group of younger and wild British girls...I'd say most of them were under 25. They were sitting across from each other on the train, and I was sitting right behind them. Oh, I love listening in on people's conversations on trains. It's wonderful. Before I take this any further, I want to state that the Scottish guys were working on a case of Smirnoff Ice. Any American guys out there drink Smirnoff Ice?? NO, because it's a girly drink. These guys LOVE it. It's so weird. So the Smirnoff-drinking Rugby looking dudes were loud and obnoxious, and the funny British chicks were equally so. About 20 minutes into the ride one of the girls decides to go change clothes. On the train. Anybody ever been in a train bathroom? I just want to say...wow. So she leaves, and as she walks off she drops something from her bag. It's a lacy black see-through-ish bra, and it lands right at the feet of the most obnoxious of the Rugby guys. Hilarity ensued, the high point being when the girl came back and her friends told her what had happened. Oh my, what a time. There are so many lessons to be learned from this, I can't even begin.

I finally found out how to check my mail today. There are three things you have to check. There's a locked box for each letter of the alphabet, and while I thought you checked by what section of the dorm you're in, you actually check by last name (or surname, as everyone says here). But that's just for 'external' mail. For internal mail you have to check the 'pigeon hole' with your last name on it. So far I haven't gotten anything in either one. Not even a pigeon, which there are an abundance of here. THEN you have to check for packages, and I actually haven't figured that out. But I will be sure to tell you when I do.

In other news, I made friends with a pigeon at the Carlisle rail station. I named him Leopold, and I plan to write a wonderful children's book about him. I'm going to bring him home. Is it okay if he lives in our room, Rachel??

I miss you guys soooo, email me!

sam playing for thousands of people... woot! 

miniature golfing... notice the green club! 

woot - by rach-el

This has been a crazy weekend. I went with my youth group to gatlinburg for TCTC (the Tennessee Christian Teen Convention... not TCDC, the Tennessee Christian Dean Convention... not that I have anything against Deans or anything). It was a blast. I learned a lot... the theme was dreaming wild. "Hello, my name is Pedro Sanchez, and if you vote for me, all of your wildest dreams will come true." Ain't that the truth! Anyway, Gatlinburg was fun, I went miniature golfing (not putt-putting, mind you). James got a star on top of his score because he hit the ball in the water. I never knew that miniature golf balls float. And there was that stupid singing mouse with the cheese... I was about to knock its head off with my little green club. I picked the green one... with the blue ball... you could pick! ANYWAY.... Yeah... at one point, I sucked so bad that I fell over and couldn't get up. Everyone with me was doubled over with laughter, so they couldn't help me up. See what happens to them next time they are laying on a putt-putt - I mean - miniature golf course with no one to help them up. Yeah. They'll just lay there. Ha.

The condos we stayed in were brilliant. Fireplaces and everything... even a big jacuzzi that I never got to try. If you went out to the balcony you could see this river. Yay for rivers!

The conference itself was awesome. The main speaker was really good and the Skit Guys and Bean and Bailey were funny, too. I particularly enjoyed it when the Skit Guys did "The Ways Not to Witness"..... "Share Jesus, Timmy... No, don't put Him in your mouth!" "Serusly, we had to paint over the beany weenie bump!"

Sam won first place in the singing competition, so he blew over 3000 people away with his song "My Ways" Teen girls throughout the state of TN now have photos of my brother that they are all droooooling over. Yuck. But serusly, he was good! Aaaahhhh, inside jokes... they crack me up. It's no fun laughing by yourself though. Well, sometimes it is.

I talked to Hannah today... she called yesterday, but I couldn't get out of bed cause I had surgery Monday... we won't go into that except to say that I am fine now. Let's just say there was a septum where no septum ever need be. You know I was drugged if I couldn't get up to talk to Hannah. She seems to be enjoying herself, what with all the alchohol, the unpolitically correct coffee, and FERGUS. HA! Oh, and the jammie dodgers. Ah, the British... I miss her loads though, and hope to talk to her often... and maybe her disappearing Aussie mate. Hehehe.

Anywho... to all of you in Berea, I miss you tons!!! And to all of you who are not in Berea... you are lucky!!!

Coffee shortage by Hannah

So, they drink tea in England, right? But surely they HAVE coffee some places, like America has coffee EVERYWHERE and tea some places, right? NO! I wake up this morning at 9:30, which sounds really nice, but in my reality is really 3:30 am. I'm DYING for a cup of coffee, and before I go to the bus to go into the city, I run into this little pastry shop thinking surely they have coffee. They do. Out of a vending machine. In a little teeny tiny shot glass sized plastic cup with no lid. And my choices are "black coffee" and "white coffee" which is, as I understand, coffee with cream in it. Talk about being politically incorrect...wow. So I take my itsy bitsy teeny tiny shot of watery coffee outside to drink it, as there is no place to sit in the little shop (called Gregg's, I'm told I'll go there a lot but I'm thinking I will definitely not be frequenting any place with such coffee), and as soon as I step outside the lovely Britain wind hits me from three directions, and the overflowing lidless cup of coffee like liquid starts blowing away...I was exhausted by 10:45 am. Ahh, life abroad...I feel a bit like a refugee.

Before I forget, I need to post a little about my journey over here. It was a trip, in all senses of the word except the one which implies drugs. Definitely not that. My original flights were last Tuesday from Nashville to DC at 1:00pm, from DC to Munich at 6:00pm, and from Munich to Manchester at 9:20 am, from Manchester I would take a train to Lancaster, taxi to the University, and be here by 2 pm. When I got to the Nashville airport on Tuesday morning, everything was great. By noon, my first flight had been delayed 4 hours, which put me missing my connecting flight to Munich, and so on. So I pretty much stood at a United Airlines desk for 5 hours trying to find any flights from anywhere that would get me here in time for Orientation, 10 am on Thursday. There were none. So we finally left Nashville at 6:30 and when we got to DC I argued with the customer service people until I got a hotel room. The receptionist at the hotel (the Hyatt, it was very nice) was a lovely Uzbekistani girl. This brought back all kinds of memories, as I hope it will do for you guys (all the Berea boys...)

The flight to Munich wasn't until the next night (Wednesday) so I spent about...6 hours in that airport as well. The flight to Munich was the best one, although it was long (almost 7 hours). There was a little more leg room, we could walk around, and there were movies (I watched Wicker Park and Vanity Fair. Vanity Fair was good, but sad, and Wicker Park was just retarded). The food sucked a lot, although there was free alcohol. I didn't feel like rolling into Munich with a hangover, so I resisted the strong temptation.

Once we got to to the Munich Airport, the atmosphere was entirely different. For once, English wasn't the dominant language! That was sooo weird. The flight from Munich to Manchester was the worst, because I was tired, late, cold, and my ears were popping and such. By the time we got off the plane I could hardly hear. I sat in between two Chinese exchange students. The one of my left was very nice and had a lot to say, but I, unfortuantely, between the language barrier and my temporary deafness, didn't understand most of what he said. The most exciting thing on that trip was the coffee, which was a lot better than anything else I had. We were on a 9:20 flight and they served SALAMI sandwiches. Germans are so weird, they really are. Oh, by the way Rach, you'll be getting something exciting in the mail soon: an orange shiny German sugar packet! It says "Zucker." That cracked me up.

The train and taxi rides were uneventful, but I did miss allllll of the orientation. I've heard it was very boring.

Yesterday I registered for classes and slept, and today I went on a historic tour of Lancaster, complete with the Lancaster castle, which is owned by the Queen, because she is apparantly the Duke of Lancaster. Does anybody remember the Madrigal Dinner last January when everyone laughed at me and Rachel for being "Duke" and "Sir Knight"????? Apparantly it's not so unheard of. The historian told us something about how a past king of England had also been the Duke of Lancaster and it's just been passed down since then. Also, the castle houses "Her Majesty's Prison." If I was going to prison, I would want it to be in a castle. Also, I want a prison to be named after me at some point in my life. AND I would still like the moose from Coffee Conspiracy. If ANYONE cares. I've been lied to so much about that moose....

After the tour I went shopping with some other study abroad students. We went to Woolworth's, and a big grocery store called Sainsbury's, where you have to bag your own stuff. I didn't like that much. Also we took a double decker bus back to the University. It was lovely, everytime we turned I thought I was going to slide out of my seat, through the window, and die. It's a lot of fun, I give it my highest recommendation.

Tomorrow is a trip to the Lake District, and hopefully more sleep.
Classes start Monday....
I miss you all...be good!

There's a bar in my dorm, by Hannah

I am here, finally. After the fun time of 603 plane delays, 4000 customer service representatives, and 24 hours later, I am here. Classes start on Monday, and I can't seem to wake up enough to get my computer hooked up before the weekend!!! I'm going to work on that now. I'll update again soon- we're touring historic Lancaster and the Lake District tomorrow and Sunday!!
I miss you, all my Berea people (and my family, of course).

Yes, Ladies and Gentlemen... by rachel

Hannah has left the country.

We talked on the phone before she flew out, and, as she pointed out at the end of the conversation, it wasn't goodbye because we will talk in a few days. That made me grin because, at this rate, we'll never have to say goodbye. Ever.