Now my charms are all o'erthrown...

Or almost!

As I finish up (finish being a loose term) my two final papers and prepare (prepare being a VERY loose term) for my final exam tomorrow, I want to take a moment to, well, to procrastinate. 

I still have a longish night ahead of me, but I'm not in terrible shape. One paper lacks a conclusion and the other paper lacks about a thousand words--which is about one-sixth of what I'll have written in the past two days, so child's play as far as I'm concerned. 

Tomorrow, after I finish my papers and take my exam, I'll head over to the final formal hall (which takes the form of a "masquerade and disco") in King's. I expect that this one will be more lavish than all the ones since the first, which is an exciting and fitting end to the program. Friday will be a day for me to explore Cambridge and maybe make one final trip to The Orchard for a farewell scone. I'll also have to PACK (what!) and do some shopping. Saturday I return home. 

My thoughts are, as of right now, get me out of here, but it's only because I have so much work to do. On Friday, I'll write another post, and I am willing to bet (not just because I'm the one who writes it...) that I'll be thinking I don't ever want to leave. 

Now it's back to paper-writing for the Erica!

The Final Stop

Okay, before I jump into the story of my weekend in Amsterdam, I think I need to do a little reflecting.

The title of this blog is a quote about England by Shakespeare, the URL is "erica-in-england," and I've spent the majority of my summer in England, yet by far most of my posts are about other European places and my adventures in them. As Harrison pointed out when he stayed with me for a few days after our trip to Amsterdam before he headed back to the States, I've SUCKED majorly at exploring Cambridge. In two days here, he saw over fifteen colleges. In my seven weeks here so far, I've seen about four or five. That's PATHETIC. So my goal for this weekend, besides writing two term papers, is to do some serious Cambridge exploring. If I'm feeling adventurous, I'll make my third trek back to The Orchard (more on that in a second). I'll visit more of the colleges and learn some Cambridge history. I'll be a good little explorer. 

Good, now that I've got a goal, let me work backwards in time. I had a take-home midterm due today for my Avant-garde Lit class. I also had the final exam for my Shakespeare class which went okay. Earlier in the week, Harrison was here. I took him to The Orchard in Grantchester (where many famous writers, etc. hung out), which is the next town over, and we had some delicious tea and scones at this QUAINT--I capitalize QUAINT because it is especially QUAINT there--although our trip was somewhat dampened by the rain (HA!) and by the swarm of bees trying to eat the honey from my little honey pot. That was anti-exciting because I am terrified of bees (never having been stung by one, I fear that it will be the most painful thing ever). But there was good news: using my newly discovered bee-trapping talent, I slammed the lid onto the honey pot and sentenced that little bee to his not-as-sweet-as-it-sounds death. It went like this:

OWNED. 

Anyway, I want to go back one more time before I leave, so that might have to be this weekend. 

Harrison and I also went punting for both our first times and it was fun although also kind of terrifying. 

So, that's Cambridge. Now, Amsterdam. 

Amsterdam is an absolutely charming city--the houses are skinny and tall, the canals are wide, the streets are overrun by bicycles, and there are prostitutes and pot. What more could you ask for! 

No, but the city is really beautiful. I was expecting seedy, but I got clean and charming and pleasant. Despite a debacle with our hotel room having been overbooked and thus given to someone else (we didn't so much smooth out the situation as pay an extra 30 euro to rent out one of their apartments), we had very few problems with logistical stuff. We got in on Saturday morning and went on another free tour, run by the same company that ran the Dublin one. This one was much better. The guide didn't repeat himself three times for everything he said and he kept up a good pace. He received a slightly higher (ha) tip than the Dublin guy. 

After the tour, we walked over to watch the Gay Pride Parade float down the canal. There were a bunch of characters and lots of phallic imagery. This couple was particularly adorable: 

Then I think we went back to the hotel to check in (at which point we had our debacle) and ended up in a kinda sketchy apartment, complete with red Christmas lights, a giant stuffed tiger, and a disco ball. The toilet and shower were also not at all separated, even by a shower curtain. Whatever, it was a place to sleep. 

We headed back out, grabbed dinner, and then went to take a tour of the Westkerk. We climbed to the top (stopping on a bunch of the floors to see the carillon setup) and had a pretty nice view of the city.

After the church, we went on a canal cruise which lasted for about an hour. I was far too tired to pay attention to much of the information (which was first said in Dutch, then German, then English) but the views of the city from the water were nice. I like this one:

After the canal cruise, we walked around the Red Light District for a bit, which was awkward and interesting. Some of the prostitutes stand there with their doors open, flirting with potential customers and trying to draw them in. We went to bed pretty early (I didn't really sleep on Friday night since our flight was so early) and then got up early Sunday morning to do the bulk of our sightseeing. 

We started off the morning with a visit to the Rijksmuseum, which holds some of the most famous Dutch art (Rembrandts and Vermeers and etc.) and then we made our way (a bit too slowly) over to the Van Gogh Museum. When we got there, there was a pretty long line, but we waited it out and got in after about forty-five minutes. I enjoyed it, Harrison not as much. 

After Van Gogh, we walked across the city to a windmill! An actual windmill! It looked like you might imagine a windmill to look:

There's me in front of the windmill!

Then we walked back to our apartment, gathered up some strength, and headed back out for dinner and more sightseeing. We had pancakes for dinner! They were delicious (apple and bacon, yum!). Then we went to the Homomonument (which is exactly what it sounds like). It was beautiful and moving and a lovely monument to all those persecuted because of their sexuality. This is just one of the three pink triangles that connect together to form a large pink triangle (the Nazis forced gays to wear a pink triangle as identification). 

Ending our sightseeing on sadder note, we went to the Anne Frank House and Museum. The museum was the saddest one I've been to since the Holocaust Museum in Berlin. At the same time, it was uplifting to see how Otto Frank survived and carried on and helped to build this great historical place which now plays a role in anti-discrimination and anti-hate movements. He must have been one the strongest people ever--to have lost his entire family and then to create something like the Anne Frank Museum--and that is inspirational. 

After the museum, we walked over to what should have been the Skinny Bridge but was instead a re-built not-so-skinny bridge. But Amsterdam is pretty by night: 

We went to sleep pretty early again, got up the next morning, checked out without too many problems, and headed back to Cambridge. 

This trip marked what was basically the end of my European travels. My passport is much fuller than it was at the start of summer. I've added London, Cambridge, Edinburgh, Dublin, Rome, Amsterdam, Barcelona, and Ibiza to my list. That is pretty impressive for a short nine weeks. This summer has been FULL of wonderful experiences and I could not be happier with how it all turned out. 

I've got one week left and it's time for me to buckle down and write some term papers. The upcoming week involves lots of homework, the final formal hall, and a few loose-ends, and then I'll be headed back to the US. That final trip will be bittersweet, I think, but more on that later in the week. 

Lovely(?) (Two) Day(s) for a Guinness

Continuing on my limited European tour, Harrison and I headed off to Dublin. My flight was delayed like five hours, which was awful, but didn't really throw off our schedule. We got to our hostel pretty late and when we went into the dorm room (parents, see, it's better that I tell you about these things after the fact, that way you can see I'm still alive!) which had five bunks of two beds which were *supposed* to be labeled with numbers. But we didn't want to turn the lights on and wake the sleepers, so we resorted to the ever-useful "cellphones are flashlights" rule. My bed didn't have a number, but using our deductive reasoning skills, we figured it out. I slept terribly and woke up the next morning not even sure I was waking up from sleeping.
Saturday morning we headed over to the tourism office to pick up our Dublin Passes, which cost us 35 euros and saved us about 3 euros. Then we went on a FOUR hour walking tour with a guy whose main phrases were "ladies and gentlemen" and "brilliant" but he was kind of funny and at times, informative, so we gave him a reasonable tip (the tour was free) at the end. After that, we headed over to Trinity College to see the Book of Kells, but once we were in line, we decided we didn't really want to spend 8 euro on a book we hadn't heard of until we started researching Dublin, so we walked over to the National Gallery and saw some art instead. Then we kind of wandered back to our hostel, showered, and headed out to find some dinner and walk up one of the main streets in Dublin.
Finding dinner was a struggle, because basically the only restaurants in Dublin are pubs, and I wasn't really in the mood for pub food. Eventually we found this pub and I was delightfully surprised by the penne chicken broccoli dish I had. Then we walked to the Temple Bar area to go for the Irish pub experience, but everywhere was super crowded.

After walking into The Temple Bar and walking out about three minutes later, we just decided to head back to the hostel and ask the "concierge" there for a recommendation of a less crowded, less expensive pub.
He told us to go to the Cobblestone, which turned out to still be crowded but not unbearably so, and so we did. We ordered pints of cider (YUM, America, please get cider, you NEED it) and stood at the bar, chatting and people-watching. There was a really good musician playing in the back room, but it was 12 euro to get in there, so cheapness prevented us (also, I don't think Harrison really cared for her music, but what I heard through the door was beautiful and I wish I could remember the name).
We went back to the hostel early and got in a solid eight hours of sleep before beginning our heavy day of sightseeing.
Although Dublin doesn't really have that one main attraction to draw tourists in, it's got a bunch of little stuff that adds up nicely. We started out with St. Patrick's Cathedral:

took a long walk over to Kilmainham Gaol:

which was interesting, and then headed back toward the center of the city and stopped at the Old Jameson Distillery. Here we went on a tour to see how Jameson whisky is made and then were treated to a "complimentary" (read: included in the price of your ticket) drink at the end. Harrison even volunteered to be one of eight whisky tasters, which meant he learned the differences between a Scotch whisky, an American whisky (Jack) and Jameson. When the tour guide went around the eight of them at the end, asking which was each person's favorite, he blasphemously said the Jack Daniels! They gave him a certificate for being a qualified whisky taster anyway:

Left: Harrison with his certificate; right: my Jameson and ginger ale. 

ALSO, as we walked into the square where the distillery was, we were greeted by HORSES and lots of them. It was weird and I don't know why they were there, but that's that.

Anyway, after Jameson, we walked over to Christ Church, which holds the infamous(?) mummified-ish cat chasing the rat. The story goes that a cat chased a rat up an organ pipe, both of them got stuck and were years later pulled out of the organ. They're preserved down in the crypt of the church and the whole thing is kind of dodgy.
After the church, we went to a museum/hands-on experience called Dublinia, which is more geared toward children, which was kind of relaxing. I didn't learn very much, but we had fun fooling around with the various children's activities. Then we went to the New York Times recommended Queen of Tarts for an afternoon scone (yum!) and then walked up to Dublin Castle for our 4:30 tour. The castle doesn't look like a castle in the medieval sense, because most of that was destroyed and it was rebuilt in the 18th century. There were some really beautiful rooms there, full of Waterford crystal chandeliers and so forth.

They also ushered us underneath the current castle to where you can see some of the old foundations of the original castle, which was built by King John (of Robin Hood fame).
After the castle, we rushed over to the Guinness Storehouse for our final stop of the day and easily the one that draws the greatest number of visitors. We traveled up the floors of the exhibition, working our way toward the Gravity Bar, which is a 7th floor, circular, glass room where you get your "complimentary" pint of Guinness at the end. The view was pretty great, which you'd normally be surprised by, since it's only seven stories, but most of Dublin is short, so we could see basically everything and there weren't many taller buildings than that. Harrison drank about one-sixth of his pint and I (proudly!) finished mine off. I actually kind of like the taste of Guinness, which reminds me of coffee.

I bought my Ireland souvenir in the Guinness gift shop, which is a new poster for my room. It's the one on the right here. 
Then we stopped back at the hostel, picked up our backpacks, and hopped on a bus to the airport. While we were waiting for the bus, we ran into a Yale student on the streets. Small world!
We made it back to London EARLY this time and I was even able to wiggle my way on to an earlier bus back to Cambridge, which was nice, because I was really behind on my homework, and as I write this, I'm only falling more behind.
This week's almost over, and we're leaving for Amsterdam early Saturday morning. This will be the last big trip of my summer, I think.

On an unrelated note, I had my first real pangs of longing for home today. The weather here was AWFUL (like, 50 degrees and raining) and I REALLY wanted to be at home, sitting in the sunshine, doing whatever it is I do when I'm at home in New Jersey with no work to do. So, I'm now looking forward to going home (which could also be a product of the fact that I have a lot of work to do and more to come).

You can find some more pictures (biased toward pictures of Harrison doing weird things and me standing in front of barrels) here. There's a short video that you can find here. I apologize for the terrible videography and the even more lamentable editing.