Lost in Amsterdam

In front of the palace

Alright folks I've finally got around to writing this dam blog (props Emily for the pun). I've been incredibly busy but seeing as I have set up shop in this hostel in East London for the day, I'm sure I will have plenty of time to catch you all up.

So Amsterdam! Amsterdam was a week ago...right? Yeah I think so. So how did I end up in Amsterdam? Well out of nowhere a couple friends from the program invited me and obviously I couldn't say no. In the end Emily Katelyn, Chris, Rob and I were the ones who ended up going. 

I had a final on Friday that ended at around 3. After that I had to run a bunch of errands like obtaining Euros and washing my clothes and straightening my hair. Yes all of those actions should receive equal weight on the priorities list. So it was a bit stressful especially because we hardly planned it at all. Basically our plan was " meet at the Snug at 5." That was it. I didn't know when I was getting in to Amsterdam or where which, as I will explain in a second, made everything really difficult.

So I hurried and got a bag of mismatched clothes packed and had to put on some jeans that were still wet from the dryer and therefore extremely tight and I was already running a bit late so I was in a hurry as I walked to our meet up point. The first thing my friends said to me when I got there was "you have your passport right?" 

They said this as a joke because the week before Brett got all the way to the bus station in London before realizing that he had forgotten his passport and therefore couldn't go to Paris. It wasn't a very funny joke at that moment and I actually screamed because I realized that I had, in fact, forgotten my passport. Run! 

So I ran. It's about a 15 minute walk back to my college and then I live on the fourth floor and then I had to run back and remember how I was stressed out from studying all week and my pants were too tight and I hadn't eaten dinner and I'm also really out of shape? By the time I got to the train station I felt seriously sick. But it all worked out because I didn't miss my train. 

We got to King's Cross and then took the tube to Victoria Coach Station where I was forced to pay 35 pence to use the toilet. Stupid England. I thought they were into free healthcare and whatnot here?

We boarded the train and I ended up being the odd man out in a seat by myself. That was okay though and I had a great time chatting with Emily and Rob for a few hours (apologies to the woman next to me!) We drove to the White Cliffs of Dover and then boarded a ferry for Calais. On board the ferry we were all still bright eyed and bushy tailed excited for Holland so we talked some more and explored the perfume store. ("Womanity" was my favorite find). Oh and there was also a huge Toblerone that cost 40 pounds. It was about three feet long. This is a great birthday present idea for all of you who just can't figure out what to get me. It would take about a week for me to eat it all.

Once we got back on the bus after the ferry it was time to sleep in earnest and we pretty much just did that. Of course there was customs and what not getting onto the ferry but as none of us looked like terrorists or illigal aliens it was pretty uneventful. We stopped in Belgium for a potty break at about 2 am and I went into the gas station and so can now say that I have been to Belgium (or can I? I'm nor sure that it counts). We got to Amsterdam at around 7 am about two hours ahead of schedule. Gotta love that Dutch efficiency. Our driver was crazy. 

We got into the city center and everything was still closed so we pretty just wandered around. It's a fairly dirty city but then again we did show up after the Friday night festivities. At around two we meet up with Sameer. 

SAMEER! 

Yeah so here's where our poor planning really bit us in the butt. Sameer lives in the Hague and as he didn't know when or where I was getting in or even for sure that I was coming it was really hard to meet up with him especially since I was having trouble using my phone on the continent. 

Anyway I met up with Sameer in the square in front of the palace, across from Madame Tussaud's and it was great to see him. We all decided to rent bikes and biked to Amstel. This was a quintessential Dutch experience as we biked past a beautiful Windmill and followed the river all the way to this picturesque little town where we got refreshments at an outdoor cafe. After that we walked around some more and got Asian food for dinner at this place called "Wok to Walk." It was fantastic. We ate it next to a canal with our legs dangling off the edge of the street. 

These two are from Holland Michigan. They were doing the classic dutch kissing couple

Dutch!

gotta have the coke picture

where we ate

Sadly it was then time for Sameer to go home. We were so tired from our lack of sleep that a lot of my friends wanted to just check in to our hostel and sleep but I convinced them to walk around for a bit. Honestly we were trying to find the red light district but it was difficult to find and probably for the best since it was late. I just wanted the real Amsterdam experience. 

Which I think I got. The  lights were beautiful as we wandered around the city and then there was a  really good street performer in the big square outside the palace. He had drawn a huge crowd so we joined up to see what was going on. People danced as he played and the air was full of the smell of smoke and weed. When he was done I tried to get my friends to dance a bit. A middle aged men saw this and suffled up to the group and worked his way in to me and started "teaching me how to dance." Nothing dirty or anything. He took my hands and spun me around and we danced for a little bit before I pulled away and just gave him a big high five and was like "see you later buddy!" And he meandered away. I'm not actually sure if he spoke any English. Obviously he was pretty high and/or intoxicated. 

It kind of made my night.

Our hostel was surprisingly nice. Emily and I shared a private room and I fell right to sleep as she and poor Katelyn worked on their Shakespeare essays all night because they were due the next day. On Sunday they still had to work on their essays (which were due at 6 pm) so they set up shop in McDonalds while Rob and I wandered around the Red Light District. 

Yes you read that right. All we really saw were stupid, innapropriate souvenirs since it was about 10am on a Sunday morning. We found this really cool outdoor book fair with vintage books and looked around that for awhile. We met back up with Emily at McDonald's and then the three of us went paddle boating in the canal while Katelyn finished up her essay. Poor Katelyn. 

Anyway paddle boating was way fun and surprisingly tiring. Then again we were still operating on minimal sleep.  We had to stay out of the way of the big boats going through the water and steering was pretty difficult. My favorite moment may have been as we peddled furiously to get under a bridge before the large boat behind us and a woman from the bridge called down to us asking for directions. Seriously? You ask the paddle boaters for directions? Not only are we clearly tourists judging from the fact that we have rented a paddle boat but we have no idea where we are relative to street signs. 

We also went to the Van Gogh museum which was pretty awesome. 

Anyway, we were all super exhausted on the way home that night. We had to stop in Rotterdam and the Hague to pick up people on the bus route and we were all just out cold on the ferry across the channel. I just laid down on the floor and slept for two hours. But that dutch efficiency will get you every time. We had the same bus driver and we got to London right on time if not early. We still had to catch a train to Cambridge and then walk back from the train station. I didn't get to sleep when I got back but instead did a bit of work before my class. That was the monday of our last week in the program and I was starting to feel pretty stressed out about the two essays, final and supervision that I had due. 

It's okay though. Even if I bombed my classes, I wouldn't trade Amsterdam for an A. 

Cute Katelyn

This picture is for Ashley! Remember Rancho from 3 Idiots?

This is Amsterdam!

deep

they had a lot of really silly things for sale

a canal (pronounced CAN-al)

my lunch

Turtles!

So that was Amsterdam!

A Dose of Pessimism / Playing Dress Up

Don't you love that feeling of normal-ness that creeps in as you get over being sick? Swallowing is so much more enjoyable now than it was a week ago!

So I'm going to annoy everyone with a little bit of pessimism that has come as a result of my loss of ignorance. Feel free to skip because I have a feeling it's more of the same. I just need to iron some things out for myself.

See, I took a class trip to the World War Two American cemetery and Bletchley Park on Sunday. Bletchley Park is where the brits did super awesome code breaking during World War Two. Since then I've been thinking about all sorts things that are a bit too big for my little pea brain to compute. The thoughts are bigger than I'm capable of expressing well, but I'll just say a few things.

Mostly just that War is bizarre. It's an institutionalized form of violence. When your state announces that you are "at war" it is suddenly alright  to kill people en mass.

When I learned history in school, it was always very generalized and simplified so that maybe three or four things could be known about any one conflict that the academics considered important. Let's take World War One. If I were to make a flashcard for this it might read:

1. Assassination of Austrian Archduke Franz Ferdinand = explosion of Balkan "powder keg"
2. Unification of Germany
3. Bad diplomacy of Germany in the absence of Bismark's genius
4. Cultural eagerness for a good old fashioned battle
5. Balance of Power Alliances/Domino Effect


Ok. So I just made that off the top of my head but for someone whose not a historian it's decent enough.The point is that this list is kind of disturbing.  I've been taught to rationalize war as this thing that can be broken up into causes and players and statistics. War is so excepted by sovereign states that we have things like the Geneva Convention that create LAWS of WARFARE.

Yeah. In this anarchic international arena we are allowed to line up and shoot each other as long as we're all decent chaps and don't poison our bullets or release mustard gas or anything else uncouth like that. I mean after all war is just the "continuation of politics by other means," right?

So we have these epic wars where the enemy is vilified and our boys are heroes and we sing songs about them and create war memorials and we get shivers as we watch films that show how brave men can be in the midst of human tragedy. You'd think that we'd learn. As a race we'd have a few bad wars, realize there were other ways and get on with negations or something. But that's not the nature of the human race. Maybe we're addicted to the violence.

But more than focusing on the fact that we all have a bit of evil in us, I want to discuss the fact that there are just sooo many of us. And we keep dying every 60-80 years (optimistically). I mean whats up with that? Imagine all the knowledge that could be amassed if people lived longer and there were less of us.

We spend so much of our lives getting an education in things that were discovered years ago. We become experts in studying dead geniuses. We keep dying out and replacing each other and this circle of life thing just spins round and round. So along with each new generation being forced to learn algebra and chemistry, each new generation has to have its own glorious war. We ask "why don't we learn from history?" but is that a little bit like saying "you read the textbook why don't you understand nuclear physics?" Sometimes you just need to go to the lab and get your hands dirty...maybe...

I don't know. Like I said it's all much too big for me and I probably sound really stupid trying to articulate this. It was just so strange to go to the war cemetery and see the way the bodies were entombed. Those soldiers were about my age and they died "fighting for freedom." Yeah the Nazi's sucked and I'm really glad we won that war. But it was very strange to see statues of larger than life 1940's soldiers beside the names of those who "sleep in unknown graves." Or to go into the chapel and see a 2-D mosaic on the ceiling of bomber airplanes next to flying angels. We worship this memory of war with totally anachronistic throwbacks to an art form more comfortable in medieval Rome. What is the cultural significance of this?

a relative?

Glory. You can't have heroics without an enemy to push against.

For God and Country

After the cemetery I went to Bletchley Park and spent a few hours looking around at all those early super computers that broke German codes. I ran into a few World War Two re-enactment dudes who were camped out with authentic tents and equipment and they let me handle their artifacts and take pictures. I looked really serious in my picture with the rifle and they kind of laughed at that but I said that I didn't want to smile with a gun in my hands. They asked why and I just responded "because I'm anti-war."

I didn't realize that was how I felt until I said it. These British guys gave me a hard time saying I was the first American "anti war campaigner" they had ever met. They tried to talk some sense into me by reminding me of all the good things that come out of war. Like technology.


Really? Is the internet worth a man's life? Maybe from the totalitarian/utility view but you'd get a very different answer if you asked his Mom.

Sorry this is so moody. I did have fun with the war paraphernalia. Here's what I might look like if I were a freedom fighter:

rocking a gas mask

So yeah. I'm still trying to figure war out. I just had my last lecture for my War class today and it was amazing (we talked about media representations) and it makes me really want to continue on this International Relations trajectory and find out all I can about why the world is the way that it is.

Now for Dress Up!
On a completely seperate note I went to a formal yesterday at King's and I got to walk on the grass. I took lots of pictures in my "princess dress" (remember my Kate Middleton outfit?) and skipped around on the fancy lawn. It was great. And not related to conflict at all :)

skipping on the lawn!

I was skipping and then Brett was there so naturally we ran into each other

and a twirly hug was the natural result!
I don't know why, but I have a lot of twirly hug friends.
It's not romantic or anything. I just like being twirled.
...and some guys like pretending to be prince charming I guess

congratulating each other on the epic-ness of our twirly hug

band album cover

ze boys!

classy

Actually classy. This is the Great Hall where I have my cafeteria meals

Well that's the end. Just in case you are getting too jealous of my formal hall pictures, I'll tell you that the food sucked. Atmosphere was great though!

Roommates are Great

I'm going to go on a bit of a tangent that only relates to Cambridge by way of conspicuous absence. That would, of course, be roommates. While having  two huge rooms to myself sounds pretty awesome I've noticed that there are a few downsides as well.

To be honest, it took me a little while to get used to living with people since I'm pretty private and I was especially worried about having 6 girls living in one small apartment this past year. But it turned out to be amazing and I find myself missing my roommates all the time. So in honor of my beloved Apt 37 I would just like to take a few moments to reflect on the virtue of roommates.

My Second Family!

1. Roommates are loud. This means that whether they mean to or not they often wake you up in the morning. This is great as it prevents you from sleeping in. They may say to you "hey Jenny, I know you were up till four last night working on that paper and I'm sure you're really tired but if I remember correctly I think you have class in ten minutes so it'd be a really good idea if you got up." This would have been a wonderful thing to happen yesterday when I ended up sleeping through two lectures and not waking up till 11.

2. Cleanliness. As a human, I create pollution such as dirty dishes, a messy room or excess noise. If I lived by myself I would probably be an absolute pig. However, the social pressure of a community forces me to keep those negative externalities in check and thus the opinion of a group is a positive force on my home life. What I mean is that when I live with people I try to be less messy. Or at least I feel bad about it when I am messy and try to clean it up faster. When I live alone, things like this tend to happen:

there's just crap. everywhere.

3. Chats. Sometimes you just want to talk to someone at 2 in the morning. Sometimes you want a big hug after a long day. Sometimes you want a laugh. My roommates this past year were some of the funniest people I have ever met. We had what I considered some really witty exchanges and just incredibly silly moments together (time out wall anyone?)

4. Help. Roommates are great for giving help. They help when you have computer problems, printer problems, boy problems, car problems etc etc. They tend to give great advice.  And when they can't give great advice they still have phenomenal ears. My roomies put up with all kinds of crazy from me this year and I'm really thankful for that.

5. Home. Whether its sleeping like lions, making Christmas stockings or playing guitar in the bathroom, they make me feel safe and loved.


Basically, what I realized this past year is that my roommates were my best friends, my family and, collectively, my surrogate mom. Our apartment just fit together so well and cohesively  and each person had their strengths that really helped me when I needed them most.

When I think of returning to BYU in a few weeks I think of going back to Lafayette 37 but then I have to remind myself that I'll be in a different place this year with slightly different people. I'm incredibly sad that Kasey and Kristy won't be with us in the fall. Both, funnily enough will be in China. Kasey on a mission in Hong Kong and Kristy on a study abroad. It won't be the same without them, but I know that they are on to amazing adventures.

such an amazing roommate and incredible friend

But onward and upward right! Great things lie ahead! Specifically I get to have the wonderful Lottie for a roommate this year! Who knows what kind of crazy we will get up to? I Imagine it will be a bit like this:

snuggle time

Or maybe even this: 

a photo that defines our friendship

Alright, so I know this was a bit sentimental and probably not too interesting but since this is what I've been thinking about lately, it's what I wrote.

Thank you Ashley, Smitty, Katie, Kasey and Kristy for sharing your loveliness with me over the past year!

good luck on your mission KaseFace!

Beauty Beauty Everywhere

Alright, I know this is totally nerdy but I really love having a library that stays open 24/7. I have my own key to get in and there aren't any guards or anything there. You're just expected to turn the lights out if your the last one to leave. It's like having an affair with knowledge.

Well it's 3 in the morning in this here Cambridge and I'm a little too high strung after finishing my essay on World War One espionage to go straight to sleep. By that I just mean that it's hard for me to wind down after working all day. I don't mean high strung like I just watched James Bond or something.

Oh man. Writing here feels good. 


Here's the thing here. I'm either with people for five hours straight and kind of lose myself in being super outgoing to the point that I just want myself to shut up or I'm alone for seven hours doing work with absolutely no human interaction except "thank you" and "is this where I fetch a book?" (and yes, fetch is the word round here if you need to request something special in the University Library). Add to this communication drought the fact that I have lost my voice and I'm finding myself becoming a bit manic. I just want to say words and have someone listen and then say some words back to me. Is that really so much to ask?

Well, I'll get to the point of this post which is beautiful pictures of my trip to Yorkshire this past weekend since that's what your all really interested in. Not my developing schizophrenia. Here's what we did: on saturday morning we took a coach to Yorkshire and went on a tour of a coal mine and then went to the Bronte's house and then a pub and then the next day we went on this four or five hour ramble across the countryside. People have great accents there and our tour guide at the mine was obsessed with the way I said "Missouri." He kept having me say it over and over again.

Outside the Bronte's house. They've got a bunch of their clothes and old furniture and everything in there all preserved. I was in the room where they wrote their masterpieces!
(it actually wasn't that exciting. the cemetery next door was pretty creepy though)

don't kid yourself, that cat loved me

sheep! england!

Me Katelyn and my food baby Heathcliff

lovely

our PAs!

this is the cliff where they filmed the scene in HP7 p 1 where Hermione and Harry are camped out and then they have that random dance scene. Katelyn and I were just trying to recreate it.

we had a romantic weekend together. All our other friends went to Paris.

the sign of the deathly hallows! (still at the film place)

I've found the clue! (you can't see it but its the hallows pictured above)

Me and one of the PAs, Simone. She is from Sweden but her Dad is American and lives in St. Louis on the Illinois side which is incredibly random.
She met Orlando Bloom one time in a liqueur store in Stockholm.

It's called a Tarn

I was the only one who braved the water!

return of the matching waterproofs!

I think I found the shire

horses at the mine. Ok so I was having a bad hair day....weekend

typical pub

I was sooo hungry and the food was sooo good

this is gonna sound weird but it kind of tasted like Pizza Hut pan pizza.
I was probably just having hunger hallucinations.

Some favorite memories of the weekend were:

1. walking on the moors behind the Bronte house after dinner. I went with people I don't usually hang out with and it was fun to get to know them better. We passed this outdoor party in someone's yard with a legit band that was soo English. I wish I'd gotten a picture. Then we just wandered and yelled out "Heathcliff!" a fair amount. The best moment was when all the girls held hands, ran out into the grass and just screamed Heathcliff's name at the top of our lungs.

2. Playing in the park. There was this really great playground. It had a weirdly spaced climbing wall though and I got stuck at the top and could not hoist myself up and Maharu was like "you look like Winnie the Pooh!" which I thought was hilarious. It's a new image for my happy place. I'm sure I looked so silly.

just like this!

3. Chatting with Katelyn

4. Drinking the Yorkshire Air. I was getting sick that weekend and so the hike was a bit strenuous for me but when I opened my mouth in the wind it literally felt like I was drinking medicine. I can see now why they say that country air is good for you.

That's about it. It was a good weekend.
Ta!