Newgrange and Tara

Posted on March 16, 2013 by hfattor

This has been a busy week and since it’s not yet St Paddy’s Day, I’ll catch people up on a couple of tours I took.

First off: Newgrange!

Lovely, isn’t she?  Newgrange is a mass burial mound and one of the earliest solar observatories ever built.  It’s older than the Pyramids by about 500 years, and older than Stonehenge by about 300 years.  It’s old and it’s very, very beautiful, situated in the Valley of the Boyne (a river that runs through Ireland and was the site of a major battle… There’s a ton of history in this country, it’s amazing) and one of three enormous earthworks/burial mounds/solar observatories.  The other two are called Dowth and Knowth.  Dowth is only partially excavated, and is set up so that the sun passes through the entranceway at sunset on the winter solstice.  Tourists aren’t allowed in Dowth.  Knowth is bigger than Newgrange, is excavated (though also not open to the public), and is set up so the sun shines into it on the equinox.  Newgrange is open to the public (sadlly, you can’t take pictures in there) and is set up so the sun shines into its cruciform chamber at sunrise on the winter solstice.

This stone saved Newgrange.  The hill was going to be dug up in 1699 on the off chance that there was stone in it, but when the workers started digging, they happened to dig directly into this stone with the swirly markings.

This is a picture of the excavation, courtesy of Wikipedia.  Anyway, it was a very lucky break.

Oh, and if you’d noticed, the front of Newgrange looks about fifty times better than this.  It’s all white stone and pretty curves, what’s with that?  Did they clean it up for tourists?

Nope.  That’s how it originally looked, before it became overgrown.  The people who built Newgrange (and it must have taken at least three generations of work, according to our tour guide) hauled white quartz to cover the face of the burial mound.  It’s beautiful.

The inside was so small.  People had carved graffiti into the rocks and I was pissed–until the tour guide informed us that none of the graffiti was younger than 100 years.  It’s 1700s-1900s graffiti in there!

I added my name to a drawing so hopefully I can be one of the 80 people chosen to enter Newgrange on the five days surrounding the winter solstice.  I’d be able to see the sun rise and shine through the passageway, illuminating the interior space.  The tour guide said it was like the stones were lit from the inside and, huge dork that I am, I was immediately thinking CASTLE IN THE SKY, MIYAZAKI, OH MY GOD.  I doubt it’s like that, though.

And then I ate Newgrange (thanks for the pic, Carly).

After Newgrange, we took a bus out to Hill of Tara.  My hands were frozen by this point because the misty rain was intense, so all photos are courtesy of my friend Carly.

The Hill of Tara is the seat of kings.  You couldn’t walk a kilometer without tripping over a king back in the good old Celtic days, but all the petty kings got together and decided on a High King, who lived and was crowned at the Hill of Tara.

This is an overhead shot to add to the drama, because up close

it’s just a lot of hills and ditches and sheep poop.  A lot of fun to run around on, though!

The most awesome-sounding thing on Tara was the Stone of Destiny.  It was kind of like the myth of Excalibur.  If the true king touched the Stone of Destiny, it would roar.

Of course I touched it.

Too bad that the only roaring was me.

There’s what looks like a gravestone in the background of that picture.  It’s a monument set up by the IRA in honor of some rebellion that the British squashed back in the late 1600s or so.  It was amazing to me how much politics have affected Irish heritage sites.  I did not expect that the conflict would have made it to the Hill of Tara, but there you go.

So, that’s one of my favorite learning trips I’ve taken so far.  Yes, I took notes.  Yes, I love astronomy (shout out to James Evans, who taught me how to use an astrolabe and showed me how difficult it is to plot where the sun’s going to end up).  Yes, I went to Tara secretly because it makes an appearance in Artemis Fowl.  It was beautiful despite the misty rain, and I loved learning more about the ancient history of this country.

Posted in Hannah Fattor '14, Ireland | Comments Off on Newgrange and Tara

The Perfect Pair — Hiking and Salsa

Posted on March 14, 2013 by bcameron

Last weekend I decided to stay in Santiago rather than traveling out of the city. With orientation just ended, it was our first time to really relax and have some substantial time to explore our surroundings. A group of us therefore, decided to do a hike that supposedly had a waterfall and was just outside Santiago. We all met up around 10 am at the outskirts of the city and then bussed to what we were sure was the entrance to the trail. It took us about 30 minutes to finally find the entrance, though, because it was inside a huge sporting complex of one of the local universities and the guards at every field gave us different directions.
When we finally found the entrance, the man working at the entrance of the trail told us that we wouldn’t find any waterfall at this park because it was too dry. We had to go to another entrance to the park that would probably take us about an hour to get to. We decided, since we were here, we would hike the trail at this entrance and enjoy the day. The guy kindly showed us the trail we needed to take and we were on our way.
About 20 minutes into the hike, we all quickly realized that this was much harder than any of us expected. While the views were breathtaking, it was fairly steep uphill and it didn’t look like it was flattening out anytime soon. Once the trail opened up, we saw a trail marker with a green band. The man had told us to take the yellow trail—which was the easier trail. The green trail, the guy had told us earlier when we said we wanted to take this one, was very difficult and for this reason, not many people could successfully do it. We all kind of looked at each other as we all took another swig of water. We were this far into it now. We weren’t turning back. “All or nothing,” we said, and continued on. The hike did not get any easier over the next 2 and a half hours and our group quickly thinned into three smaller groups.
The final ascent was the most precarious, with no truly defined trail, we guessed which direction to go up, decided that way was too steep, came down, and then went up another way. Once we finally reached the top, we all took in the outstanding view. With the giant Andes surrounding us in every direction and the city of Santiago in the distance, we couldn’t ask for a better place to picnic. We enjoyed the top of the mountain, eating lunch, taking pictures, and of course, putting on more sunscreen. We all felt like we had accomplished something incredible—reaching the top of the Andes after a very difficult hike.
The descent back down to civilization only took us about an hour and a half and was much more leisurely than the hike up. We conversed with another and enjoyed the much needed relaxation for our muscles. As we climbed on the bus to return to the city, we were all sweaty with dirt climbing up our legs and buried in our shoes. Me and some other girls decided to go to a pool at one of the girl’s apartments. Getting our feet wet after a long, hot day could not have felt better.
If I wasn’t tired enough, I decided to go out that same night, expecting to have a drink or two at a restaurant near by and be in my bed by midnight. As we finished our drinks though, one of the girls, Maya, looked up and said, “So the salsa dancing is in Bella Vista.” Salsa dancing? “I don’t know if I can,” I admitted. The girls, though, quickly persuaded me to come with, saying their would be Chileans there to show me how to salsa and what else would I do. I agreed. You’re only in Chile once, right?
The salsa club was this eccentric, low-lit room with a two-story patio inside with small tables to order drinks. We found the Chilean we were meeting, who we met at the university the day before, sat down and ordered some drinks. After talking and meeting other Americans who were also studying in Chile, we decided to start dancing. At this point it was around midnight and we were about the only ones on the dance floor. The Chileans taught us how to salsa and literally within 2 minutes we had guys coming up to each one of us to ask if we wanted to dance. I was shocked. I think I’ve been asked to dance in the United States about 5 times. To be asked right as I stepped on the dance floor in a style in which I felt completely uncomfortable and extremely awkward with, I was nervous to say the least.
All the Chileans, though, were especially nice, showing me the different steps of salsa and how to follow the beat of the song. I consider myself a pretty rhythmic person and I can usually pick up on dance moves quickly, but salsa was a different thing. I felt the whole time I was one step behind and couldn’t quite get the hang of it. This didn’t stop all the guys from asking any of us Americans to dance. One guy I danced with for about an hour and half. At first we didn’t talk much but then he asked my name and where I was from. We started to talk a little bit and he showed me the steps of salsa (probably the third person to show me how to salsa that night). He must of thought I spoke amazing Spanish or something, because the next thing you know he was speaking so fast I couldn’t understand a word he was saying. Not only was it incredibly loud in this club but now I had a native Spanish speaker speaking faster to me than I could understand English in.
At the end of the night he ended up giving me his number and his business card to the restaurant he worked in. I couldn’t tell you exactly what he said but his business card is still in my purse with his number scribbled on it. I really hope he doesn’t call though. Although he was cute, I know if he called I would not understand a word he said. We ended up slinking out of the club at a mere 4 am (the lastest, I believe, I’ve ever stayed out in my entire life). The club was still jam packed when we left too! Literally, I think we were the first ones to leave for the night, as if it was like 9 pm or something. Overall, a very successful weekend where I got to explore the culture and life in Santiago.

Posted in Brenna Cameron '14, Chile | Comments Off on The Perfect Pair — Hiking and Salsa

Lesson Learned…or Not. In which our heroine has multiple unfortunate encounters with snowdrifts, while riding her trusty two-wheeled steed.

Posted on March 10, 2013 by kschmidt

According the the Ostsee Zeitung, last month was unprecedentedly cold, dark, and sunless.  We were granted about 27 hours of sunlight in 28 days.  Ugh.  No wonder there is a plethora of sun lamps up here.  Greifswald spent almost all of December, January, and February under snow.  Once in  a while, there would be a couple warmer days, and then Greifswald would be very slushy.  Last week, however, we saw the sun, for days, and the last vestiges of our snow blanket melted.  We sat outside, on our balcony, sipping tea and soaking up the sunshine.  When someone told me it was going to snow this weekend, I wanted to cry.  I wanted to beg, please, no!  Not more snow!  Let the sun stay!

Yesterday was a prelude to what would come.  Yesterday, the wind was icy, and the sky overcast all day.  I woke up this morning to a once-again snow-covered city.  It snowed almost six inches overnight, The awful thing about Greifswald’s weather is the wind.  There is always wind, and it turns even nice, sunny days, chilly.  When there is rain or snow, it worse.  The wind is very strong, and sends thousands of tiny, icy needles into our faces.  Even if it is not actively snowing, the wind picks up snow lying on the ground, and flings it into us poor mortals.  Today, it was only ~24 miles/hr.  I wanted nothing more, this morning, than to stay warm and dry, curled up in bed and maybe reading a good book.  However, on most Sunday mornings, I volunteer at a local animal shelter, and I knew they would need my help today, even more than usual, because of the weather.

Reluctantly, I dragged myself into semi-awake state.

This is Lucifer. Despite the name, he is an absolute sweetie. He is not quite a year old, and a little bit shy, but he loves to cuddle.

The bike ride to the animal shelter is usually only 10 minutes, very easy.  However, at 8:45 am Sunday morning, the sidewalks and bike lines were not yet cleared of snow.  I hesitantly pedaled out into the street, finding it only marginally easier to navigate.  Each driver was being exceedingly cautious, because of the snow, so they were driving only slighter faster than I was biking.  Keeping my bike going straight was probably the hardest, and scariest part of the bike ride, because I never knew if the snow would slip beneath my tires, and send me sprawling in front of a car.  Eventually, I came to a busier street, and the sidewalks were partially cleared, so I moved over and onto them.  As I had feared, I did indeed fall, although thankfully not in front of a car (and they were going so slowly, I probably would not have been hit).  In total, I fell 5 times; 3 times on the way to the animal shelter, and twice on the way back.  One time, my bike just sort of stopped going forward, because the snow was too deep.  I suppose one could either applaud my perseverance, or criticize my inability to learn that biking in snow is not feasible.  I am just glad to be inside, again, chugging hot tea, and telling you all about my morning.  The snow made it a lot more exciting of a morning than it would have been, otherwise!

Posted in Kat Schmidt '12, Germany | Comments Off on Lesson Learned…or Not. In which our heroine has multiple unfortunate encounters with snowdrifts, while riding her trusty two-wheeled steed.

Please Take the Next Number, It Will be About 4 Hours

Posted on March 8, 2013 by bcameron

This week has basically been my first week by myself in the city. When I say this, I mean that I wasn’t in a classroom for orientation all day and had to navigate the city by myself. With this new found freedom, there have definitely been some crash and burn moments and also some really cool things to witness as well.
In order to study in Chile, you need to have a student identity card which they call a cedula here. During the first week of orientation, IES took us as a group to wait at the PDI to register our visa. There were about 300 people when we got there at about 10 am. We waited about 2 to 3 hours for everyone in our group to get through the line. Even though it was a crazy place with absolutely no air circulating, it didn’t feel so long because it was nice to get to know everyone in our group and it was the closest thing we had to free time in that first week.
After our visa was registered, we received this big white card that had my picture on it and all my personal information, like my name and address here. Once IES had made copies of everyone’s passport and white card that we received at the PDI, we were told that we needed to go to ANOTHER office on our own time in order to receive the actual card. They emailed us with everything we needed to do and said we needed to complete this by Friday of the next week.
On Monday I went to this office with three other girls before we needed to meet at IES for orientation activities. We thought we would walk in and wait for about 20 minutes and leave. No. We walked in and pulled number 98 and they were on 16. We decided it wasn’t worth it to wait because we knew we wouldn’t be called before we needed to meet at IES, so we left and decided to come back another day. Our orientation activities that day ended early and so me and another set of girls decided we were going to go to the office and get our cedulas. We pulled number 78 and they were on 40, so we thought it wouldn’t be too bad of a wait. After about 20 minutes of still not being called we went to go check what number they were on and realized that not only were they only on about 50, but they were on A50 and we were B78! Since we had no choice, we were in for the ride and waited for another 2 and half hours before they even called the first person in our group.
At this point we were all very excited to get our cedulas and leave. It was around lunch time and we were all very hungry and tired of waiting. The first girl went up to the counter and very quickly returned, no cedula in hand. We asked what happened and she said that the employee told her her entrance stamp wasn’t legible and that she had to go back to the PDI and then come back to this office in order to receive her cedula. We were all freaking out now. Would we all have the same problem. We checked our passport and saw that all of our stamps seemed very clear except one other girl. Next, Martha went. Her stamp was clear and she was sure she would get her cedula. As she walked to the counter though, the lady asked for her photocopies, which Martha didn’t have. In the email that IES sent us with what we needed to bring to this office, they never mentioned photocopies. Martha left the counter, not saying anything and clearly very pissed.
I was really upset for her. Not only did she wait 2 and a half hours to get her cedula, but now she had to come back and wait another time to get it. But I was confident that I would get mine. My stamp was clear and I had my photocopies. I walked up next, said Hola, and handed her my passport with my photocopies. She quickly looked through them and then curtly replied that I couldn’t receive my cedula because I didn’t have a photocopy of my entrance stamp. I looked at her with a blank stare. Really?! REALLY?!!! I did my best in what I’m sure was broken Spanish to sound as mad as possible and try to explain that I had waited 2 and a half hours simply to be turned away and this wasn’t fair, that I couldn’t wait in this line again. She just looked at me, no sympathy, and said there was no way I could get my cedula without a photocopy of my entrance stamp. I was absolutely furious! I slunked back in the chair for about a minute, not moving. Then I asked why she couldn’t just make a photocopy there but she quickly refused to do that. I walked away, with no cedula in hand, and absolutely furious.
That day, only about 3 out of 9 people got their cedula. Two people didn’t have legible entrance stamps, one didn’t have their photocopies, one had a copy of the wrong entrance stamp in their passport, and I didn’t have a copy of the entrance stamp at all. None of this was our fault. And we had waited 2 and half hours in line to pay the price.
We told everyone in IES after this happened to check their photocopies and make sure that they had everything with them. A group went the next day and while more of them got cedulas, they waited 4 and half hours in line because the computers crashed about 20 minutes after they opened!!! About a day later more people went and couldn’t get their cedulas either because their name was spelled wrong on different documents. All around, nobody had an easy time getting this cedula. It hasn’t been the best experience I’ve had but it has made for an interesting story and I’ll tell you one thing—I will never complain about the DMV again.

Posted in Brenna Cameron '14, Chile | Comments Off on Please Take the Next Number, It Will be About 4 Hours

Belfast

Posted on March 7, 2013 by hfattor

I didn’t know a lot about modern Irish history when I came over here.  I taught myself about the Easter Rising because I loved Yeats and I knew he loved a woman who was involved in it, but it was so much bigger than I could have understood on my own.  I’ve been learning about it for seven weeks now and it’s terrifying.  I had to write my first midterm paper on my perspective on the Northern Irish Troubles.  After visiting Belfast over midterm break, I have images that convey something of what has gone on in that city.  I’m in no way an expert, but I don’t think a lot of people know about the conflict in Ireland that’s still going on.  Here’s a quick history lesson, taken almost verbatim from the paper I turned in yesterday.  Yes, there’s a bibliography at the end of this for anyone who’s curious.  You can also Wiki any of these events.  Or you can skip this history lesson and ignore Irish troubles.  A lot of America does.

The animosity the exists between Catholics and Protestants can be traced back to the plantations of Ulster which began to appear in 1609.  Protestant farmers took Catholic land in an attempt to introduce ‘civilized’ British living to the ‘wilds’ of Ireland.  This led to the Catholic slaughter of Protestants in 1641; Cromwell’s suppression of Catholics in 1652; and, eventually, the Williamite-Jacobite War that took place between 1698 and 1691.  The partitioning of Ireland supported Protestant control, as Unionists insisted that Northern Ireland should only consist of the six most Protestant counties of the nine counties of Ulster, ensuring that Protestants would hold the majority in elections.  This strategy succeeded; throughout the political history of Northern Ireland, Unionist members of Parliament consistently outnumbered Republicans until Britain disbanded the Northern Irish Parliament of Stormont in 1972 after Bloody Sunday.

A student currently living in Northern Ireland spoke of the fear of Catholic violence which is still promoted and impressed upon Protestant children today.  Catholics still feel like they’re oppressed. Since the formation of the Northern Irish state in 1921, Catholic citizens suffered under Protestant Unionist social reforms such as the Special Powers Act.  These reforms resulted in severe oppression, including Catholic unemployment rates that, in the 1970s and 80s, were three times higher than Protestant unemployment rates.

The Catholics borrowed tactics from the American Civil Rights Movement of the 1960s and began peaceful protests for their own civil rights.  When the protests were ignored by politicians or attacked by Unionist-affiliated policemen and civilians, this led to violent outbursts such as the Battle of the Bogside and the creation of Free Derry.  While Catholics previously sought change by working within the political system, when Bogside homes were threatened by police forces, the Catholics went for weapons rather than political reforms.  This created a self-sustaining loop, for Protestant fears of Catholic rebellion were realized when Catholic Republicans rose up against them; Protestant Unionists still refused to yield to Republican demands for civil rights, and thus Catholics fought back all the harder.

Britain itself had little interest in Northern Irish affairs and is still seeking to find a way for Northern Ireland to govern itself with little to no British involvement.  This would only be possible, however, through a collaboration among Catholics and Protestants.  Both Unionists and Republicans must be invested in the state’s well-being before Northern Ireland can be politically stable without British intervention.  With Protestants still seeking to control Northern Irish politics, though, and with the rise of Catholic political parties who work within the parliamentary system to bring it down, it is unlikely that such a collaboration will take place soon.  At least, that’s what I think after two months of learning about this.  I could be wrong.

Anyway, this is what I knew going into our Northern Ireland trip.

When we arrived in Belfast after a three hour train ride, we had to pay with British sterling instead of euros.  The signs were only in English, no Irish to be seen anywhere.  They call their Bulmers cider Magners even though it’s the same label, same taste.  It was very…strange.

Also, Belfast is a very new city.  It’s been bombed and rebuilt so many times, I don’t think there were buildings over fifty years old there.

We went to see the Belfast murals.  The first ones we saw were in Shankill, a Protestant neighborhood.

This one says “Nothing about us without us is for us.”  The government has been trying to get rid of the Belfast murals for quite a while now but the people who live in the neighborhoods with this art are resisting.  The mural is made up of pictures of people who live in this neighborhood.

The reason the government dislikes the murals is most likely because some of them

are pretty terrifying.  This one’s showing how scary the IRA is.  The IRA is the Irish Republican Army over here.  They plant bombs.  Two were defused while we were in Belfast, we learned later.

Some murals have a history lesson behind them.

This is the Red Hand of Ulster.  Two chieftains were bookin it towards land because who ever touched the land first would own it.  The losing chieftain cut off his own hand and threw it so it landed first and thus he won Ulster.  Hooray!  Never surrender!  Northern Ireland is made up of six of the nine counties of Ulster, so they use this symbol on their flags.

Then we went out of Shankill…

This is the checkpoint people pass through to get from Protestant Shankill to the Catholic Falls area of Belfast.  It’s open until around 6 at night.  It closes completely on weekends.  It’s a part of one of the longest Peace Walls that runs through Belfast.

This peace wall runs all the way up onto that hill you can see in the distance.  It’s seriously huge.  Belfast asked graffiti artists from around the world to come and make it prettier (as pretty as a 60-foot-high wall made of concrete, corrugated metal, and chain link fencing can be).  Even cooler is the fact that the men who drive the Black Cabs in the Black Cab Tours dole out pens and crayons so visitors can add their own marks to the wall.

There were a lot of messages promoting reconciliation, understanding, and compromise.  There were messages of solidarity, love, and tolerance.  There was a surprisingly small amount of filthy graffiti up there.  I’m kind of proud of people.

Anyway, we made it into the Falls.

They had a whole row of murals that commemorated their own struggles, but also expressed their solidarity with other causes.  There was a copy of Pablo Picasso’s Guernica and a couple other political uprisings that the Catholics apparently condone.

This was also the only place I saw Gaelic in Belfast!

By the way, I really doubt that this was a Gaetacht.  They totes spoke English more than they spoke Irish.  That’s fine, though, at least they learned Irish at all.  Irish makes me kind of happy, in case you can’t tell.

So, these are some of the things I saw in Belfast.  I got some very interesting perspectives on the Troubles from the Black Cab drivers, saw some disturbing images, got hassled by twelve year olds, and saw no violence even though it turns out some almost happened while we were there.  A successful Belfast trip!

(Here’s my bibliography for the interested:

Dixon, Paul.  Northern Ireland: The Politics of War and Peace. New York: Palgrave, 2001.

Farrell, Michael.  Northern Ireland: The Orange State.  London: Pluto, 1980.

Feeney, Brian. Sinn Féin: A Hundred Turbulent Years.  Madison, WI: U of Wisconsin P, 2003.

Moloney, Ed.  A Secret History of the IRA.  London: Penguin, 2003.)


Posted in Hannah Fattor '14, Ireland | Comments Off on Belfast

All My Ireland Missions COMPLETE

Posted on March 5, 2013 by hfattor

When I came to Ireland, I had two VERY IMPORTANT things I wanted to do/see.  I shall explain both of them.

The first one is related to the book The Wish List by Eoin Colfer (of Artemis Fowl fame).  In it, a man explains that there are many things people must do before they die, but one of them is spit over the Cliffs of Moher.

So I did that.

Photo credit to Mr. Fattor.

Just for reference, the Cliffs are actually worth seeing and not just spitting over.

Beautiful.  I got there at sunset with my dad and it was marvelous.  Don’t go on a rainy day, though, and when you inevitably jump the shoddy fence to get really close to the edge, BE CAREFUL.  Make sure the cliff isn’t undercut (that it’s straight down rather than carved out underneath) because

that is a really long way down.  (Again, photo credit is my father)

Anyway, that’s Life Goal Number One down!

Life Goal Number Two owes itself to Where The Hell Is Matt?, or at least that’s the source I can remember.  I wanted to experience the Giant’s Causeway.

Oh man.  It was exactly what I’d hoped for.  The beginning was worryingly touristy, with a gift shop and a lot of people with maps and cameras and audioguides (I got one and named it Stephen).  There were mobs of people streaming out of that center on the short hike to the Causeway itself.  I got nervous.

Then I saw the herd thinning out, and once we reached the Causeway, the cowards backed away from the slippery rocks, the roaring sea, the shaky or sheer stones littering the Causeway.

I started climbing.

It was magnificent.

What can I say, rock formations make me happy!

Photo credit for that one goes to Dana Thornquist.

Anyway, I spat over the Cliffs of Moher and tucked myself into the Giant’s Causeway.  This past week was an eventful one.  My next post will most likely be about Belfast, so stay tuned!  You’ll get a history lesson and a bunch of strange pictures to go along with it!

Posted in Hannah Fattor '14, Ireland | Comments Off on All My Ireland Missions COMPLETE

Oxford Blues

Posted on March 4, 2013 by emma de vries

A couple weekends ago, I went on a day-trip to Oxford and the Cotswolds. One two hour bus ride later and my friends and I arrived in Bourton-on-the-Water, a charmingly small town in the Cotswolds. After wobbling our way through what remained of the ice and snow on the ground, we came upon the heart of the village, which seemed to consist mostly of tea houses– not that I was complaining! The bucolic image was further enhanced by the first sun that England has seen for days.

After an hour wandering through the town– and grabbing a spot of tea!– we headed off towards Oxford.

Once we got to Oxford, we had a bit of free time to grab lunch, so naturally we went to the market. It’s getting to be a habit now! After some delicious soup, we joined back up with our group for a tour of Christchurch. We got to see the Dining Hall that the Great Hall in Harry Potter was based on and had a look around the college. The gardens and grounds of the university were my favorite– they were just so quintessentially English!

Honestly, I fell quite in love with Oxford. I’ll definitely be heading back there at some point– hopefully for grad school in a few years!

Posted in Emma de Vries '14, Netherlands | Comments Off on Oxford Blues

Una Buena Primera Semana

Posted on March 3, 2013 by bweist

I’ve successfully completed my first week in Chile! I don’t know where to even begin. Orientation has been extremely overwhelming with tons of information. It’s been easier to understand and talk in Spanish than I thought it would be. I must say I’ve surprised myself with how much I know and how much I can actually function using only Spanish. For orientation we’ve pretty much been sitting in a room all day and talking about Chilean culture—the words they use, the gestures and habits they have, etc.—the layout and safety in Santiago, how classes at the university and IES will work, and other useful things we need to know in our first few days here. We have a teacher who has been the main instructor for most of orientation who’s name in Claudia. She walks into class and takes total command of the room. She always wears a tight dress that’s flowy at the bottom and heals and has an incredible body, if that’s not too weird for me to say. She is extremely intimidating, saying that we cannot use English at all and giving us literally 20 minute long lectures when she catches a group of us talking in English. But even though she sounds like a very intimidating person, I also love her. She teaches us so much and the way she speaks is so clear that I pretty much understand everything she says.
I’ve been having some pretty fantastic conversations with my host family at dinner this last week and I think all that I’ve learned about the Chilean culture and about the Spanish language this week have really helped. Literally, in only a week my Spanish has improved more than in my entire education of Spanish. With my host mom I’ve talked about some of the history of Chile and some of the corrupt sexual acts that happen in the Catholic church. My host mom is extremely Catholic, which is a little out of the ordinary here. Even though about 98% of the country say they are Catholics, only about 4% of the country actually goes to church every week and practices the religion. I couldn’t go to church with my host mom today because we were doing a tour of the Centro de Santiago but hopefully I can go next week. My host family is so fantastic though. Every morning my host mom leaves out a peach and puts some bread in the toaster for me and sets out a cup so I can make coffee. The coffee here is very different from the coffee in the United States. In houses, they only have instant coffee, which isn’t as good but for four months, it will do. My family is so patient with me too. When I don’t understand what they’re saying, they’ll explain it in another way or show me with gestures. Eventually, I always end up understanding what they’re saying.
On Friday, after a long day of orientation and lots of information a group of us decided to go out for happy hour. Here happy hour is from about 6 to 9 because they eat so late here. It was about 7 when we decided to go out. Someone had recommended this bar to us but when we got there it was closed. We were just about to walk away when this man came up to us and asked if we wanted to go to his bar which was right across the street. He would give us free French fries and cheap drinks, he said. In the United States this would have been a really sketchy situation—which by the way the equivalence of sketchy in Chilean Spanish is flivate. But since we were in such a big group, we decided to go with him to the bar across the street. It ended up being very safe and the free fries he gave us were fantastic. The drinks here are very very strong. I had a piscola which is pisco with coke—pisco is a liquor here that is like brandy—and it had about the equivalent of three shots in one glass! We also ordered a chorillana which is French fries with a fried egg on top and onions and meat. It was super good!
This weekend our group went to Valpariso and Vina del Mar, two cities on the coast right next to each other. We first went to Pablo Neruda’s house in Valpariso. I was so excited because Pablo Neruda is my favorite poet. The house was absolutely beautiful with so many antiques. The guide was totally in Spanish though, and for some reason that day I wasn’t able to understand much. I don’t know if it was from the day before where we talked so much Spanish and had so much information thrown at us that I didn’t understand anything but for some reason or another it was my hardest day for understanding Spanish. After the house of Pablo Neruda, we walked around the streets of Valpariso. There were so many murals in the street. They were literally everywhere you looked and all of the houses were really colorful, colors like purple and blue and yellow. I learned that there are no murals in Santiago because it’s illegal in the city but in Valpariso it isn’t so there are a lot. After Valpariso we all went to this super nice restaurant for lunch in Vina del Mar. The food was so good but they gave us huge portions and I was so full afterwards that I didn’t eat dinner that night. After lunch, we walked on the beach. There was a guy making sand castles but they weren’t the ones that kids make. There was one that was a gorilla about three feet long just coming straight out of the sand. It was so cool.
Today we went to Plaza de Armas in the Centro de Santiago. There was a cathedral that all the cities in the country have in the center of their cities. Inside the church was so beautiful. It was probably the biggest and most grand church I’ve ever been in. We walked around the Centro and looked at a lot of the government buildings. Pablo, one of the teachers at IES, told us all about the different buildings and the political history of Chile. He talked so slow which was great for me, because otherwise I don’t think I would have been able to understand anything he was saying. It’s hard enough for me to understand politics in English, but in Spanish is was pretty much impossible. I understood what Pablo was saying but I was confused about the different people and the sequence of events.
After returning from the Plaza de Armas and eating empanadas in IES, most of us went to the Cerro de San Cristobal. The cerro is basically a really big hill or a foothill. On the top of the cerro is a huge statue of the Virgin Mary. The walk was super super long, although we did take a lot of breaks to take pictures and explore the different parts of the cerro. Basically as you walked up the foothill there were multiple parks and picnicking spots, tiendas which sold drinks and food, etc. The views were absolutely amazing and it was really nice to get some exercise after about a week of not being active at all.

Posted in Brenna Cameron '14, Chile | Comments Off on Una Buena Primera Semana

100 Minuten

Posted on March 1, 2013 by kschmidt

I am no longer convinced I work at the Gymnasium.  On Monday, I was feeling sick, so I stayed home and rested.  I mostly slept and drank tea.  On Tuesday, I was needed in neither the 8C, or the 7B.  I taught for 55 minutes in the 11A, and 45 minutes in the 7A.  Wednesday, there was a teachers’ strike in the entire Bundesland, so no school.  Thursday, the 8D was taking a test, so I didn’t go to them, and instead of teaching in the afternoon, I accompanied the 11th and 12th graders on a field trip– to the cinema, where we watched the new Lincoln movie.  Thus, I worked a total of 100 minutes, this week.  O_o

I have been putting the time to good use, working on applications for when I get back.  The average job hunt takes six months, and I return in just four.  Even I am jobless and homeless when I return, at least I will have started my search!

Posted in Kat Schmidt '12, Germany | Comments Off on 100 Minuten

Arriving in Santiago

Posted on February 27, 2013 by bcameron

Hola de Santiago de Chile! After a few bumps in the road I have finally arrived in Chile. The day my flight was supposed to leave, there was a blizzard in Denver and all the flights out of the city were cancelled. I had a get a flight for the next day and miss the first day in the city with my group. I was really upset at first because I was so excited to leave, but once I got here it didn’t seem like such a big deal. On the plane ride from Miami to Santiago, I sat next to the nicest man. He helped me with my bags and spoke to me in both English and Spanish and it helped me practice my Spanish before I got here. Because my flight was delayed a day I had to go straight to orientation. I was able to change my clothes at the center which felt great after about 24 hours of traveling. The first day of orientation was really long and there was so much Spanish, I was very overwhelmed. Yet I absolutely loved the day and diving right back into Spanish with almost a year of not using it. After orientation yesterday, I met my host family and they are absolutely fabulous!!! It’s a single mom with a 14 year old son and the son knows a little English which is very helpful when I have no idea what they’re saying. For dinner last night we had a tomato salad which was very good and beef with rice. The food here is pretty bland and they eat a really big lunch usually later in the day, about 2. My host mom packed me such a big lunch today that I couldn’t even finish it all. Today we got to explore the city a little bit and it was really nice to walk around and get to know where I will be living for the next 4 months. I absolutely love the city so far. It’s beautiful and fun and there seems like there is so much to do. I’m so excited for the next 4 months and hope it doesn’t go by too fast. Chao por ahora!

Posted in Brenna Cameron '14, Chile | Comments Off on Arriving in Santiago