Edinburgh...well the rest of it
We began the day with a Lessons and Carols at a church near our flat and then headed downtown to the National Museum. There were some really cool exhibits full of taxidermy animals, exotic instruments, and some shoes that looked impossible to walk in and could possibly have been used as a torture device. We then visited the Christmas market, which was completely packed and then ended the day at a pub. Josh was brave and had a haggis burger. This was a much pleasanter experience than I imagined it to be.
Berlin
After Edinburgh we boarded a plane to Barcelona and then got on one to Berlin. After some interesting transportation issues (the bus left with only half of us on it from the airport...) we finally made it to our flat in East Berlin. On our first day in the city we decided to stick close to our accommodations and to avoid the city center. (We arrived the day of the terror attack, but were thankfully located far away from it.) We visited the East Side Gallery, which is a 1000+ meter section of the Berlin wall that has been covered in murals After that we took a stroll through Treptower Park and visited the Soviet War Memorial. This memorial was much bigger than I had imagined it would be and felt very Soviet. Day Two of German travels took us outside of the city to a smaller town called Potsdam. We figured this would be a safer place to get some Christmas market shopping done. Josh and I were able to finish up most of our Christmas shopping here and it wasn't too crowded!! I also had my favorite food from the trip there which was a fried dough ball-ish thing. I know that description doesn't do the fluffy oily goodness any justice, but it is the best I can do. We spent the rest of the day in the city visiting all of the obligatory tourist stops: the Brandenburg Gates, the Reichstag, Checkpoint Charlie, and the Holocaust Memorial. Day Three brought us to the German history museum. Josh was in heaven. By this point we had finally figured out the german transportation system...almost. Google maps did not like to bring us to helpful bus stations. On our last day in Germany, Josh and I were on our own (Rebecca and her friend had left that morning and then night before) so we visited the DDR museum. This was probably my favorite museum of the trip because it was so interactive and hands on. The airport was a zoo, but thankfully we were pulled out of the security line so that we wouldn't miss our flight! (Even though when we got through security they told us our flight was delayed...)
Dublin
Our first day in Dublin was Christmas eve. We spent the morning visiting some of Dublin's history museums. My favorite exhibit featured five (I think) bog people. Essentially they are people that died in mostly gruesome fashions, were tossed into a bog, and over thousands of years became leather-y and stopped decomposing. It was amazing how whole some of these people were and how they were alive before the coming of Christ. Josh and I also got lots of last minute Christmas shopping done and bought food to make our fantastic Christmas dinner together. To conclude the day we went to a Christmas Eve Mass at a local church, which featured a beautiful boys choir concert. On Christmas day we ventured out to Phoenix Park in search of deer. Although we were unable to find any, we enjoyed trekking through the park and enjoying the fresh, and quite warm, winter air. On our way home we were subjected to spontaneous downpours and got completely soaked, but still enjoyed meandering through the streets of Dublin. For Christmas dinner we made steak, cheesy-bacon potatoes, and zucchini in the tiny little kitchen of our Air BnB and watched many episodes of Doctor Who while eating mince pie cookies :) We got to FaceTime with family and still be a part of Christmas celebrations back home which took the edge off of not being home for Christmas. On our final day in Dublin we went out to the South Wall and Light House. The walk there was super sketchy as we journeyed through back roads that were devoid of people, but the light house itself was beautiful. It was so nice to be back by the ocean and to smell the sea breeze. If there is one thing wrong with Oxford, it's that it is one of the furthest places from the ocean in the UK. The views from the wall were incredible and it made the almost five straight hours of walking that day beyond worth it. That night we took the scariest bus ride of my life to Dublin airport and boarded a plane for London!
London
We flew into Stanstead, took a bus to London, took another bus to Oxford, and finally arrived at our Air BnB around 3 in the morning. Then woke up at 7:45 the next morning so we could catch a bus back into London to visit the Star Wars Identities exhibition. I really enjoyed seeing all of the costumes and creating my character as we walked through. Josh was a fountain of knowledge and got very excited about every artifact which made the whole exhibit much more enjoyable. After that we headed over to the West End to see the RSC's production of Love's Labours Lost. It was so funny and so well done that we decided to come back and see the same cast do Much Ado About Nothing, my favorite Shakespearean play. Being able to see so many shows in England has been one of my favorite parts of my time here and I really enjoyed sharing that with Josh. In between shows we had some time to explore the West End and went to Chipotle for dinner. Normally this would not merit a mention in my blog, but while I was there I noticed a familiar looking person in the line. Jamie Parker had come to eat dinner in between shows and I almost died. (For those of you who are not as in tune with the Harry Potter Universe, Jamie Parker is currently playing Harry Potter in Harry Potter and the Cursed Child.) Somehow I summoned up the courage to talk to a stranger and asked for his autograph (I had missed out on seeing him at the stage door) and we had a nice little chat about the show. All in all it was quite the eventful day and I was thankful to have some time to sleep on the bus on our way home that night.
Home Sweet Home
Josh and I spent his final two days on this side of the pond in Oxford, my beautiful home. On our first day I gave him a walking tour of the city including favorite sights such as the covered market and Ben's Cookies, Wycliffe Hall, Christ Church, and the Ashmolean Museum. We had a great deal of fun roaming the museum in search of their must see items and also re-naming many of the artifacts with more accurately descriptive titles. We finished the night with a visit to the movie theatre to see Rogue One. Josh enjoyed it immensely and I think I kind of understood why it was significant, but the music was great, which is all that really matters. On my birthday we went to the Pitt Rivers Museum, which I have always wanted to visit. I especially enjoyed the many touchable objects, the visiting insect photography exhibit, and the shrunken heads. After the museum we headed off to Port Meadow, the most beautiful place in Oxford where we finally found the horses. (I spent a good portion of last term looking for them!) One of them was obsessed with Josh and rubbed up against him before following him around for a bit. The meadow was a mud pit, which made the walk much more difficult, but also much more entertaining. Finally, we went to the Eagle and Child (home of the Inklings) for dinner. Josh engaged in my celebratory twenty-first birthday drinking for me because we are in England where the drinking age is eighteen and I do not actually like alcohol. The next morning Josh had to catch a bus to Heathrow at some ridiculous hour where the sun doesn't shine and I moved on to my final resting place before term.
Elisha and I had an enjoyable week relaxing and writing. I spent a lot of time composing post cards and letters to friends while also working on music for various compositional and arranging projects. For New Years Eve we took the Oxford Tube into London and watched the various fireworks displays around London from Primrose Hill. It was fun to spend the day exploring the city and to see all of the people excited for the new year.
Here We Go Again
I cannot believe that it is already the second week of the Oxford term. I have been at Wycliffe Hall, my home in Oxford, for two and a half weeks now and am finally getting back into the groove of life here. I really like the new people that have come this term, but I still expect to see old friends when I go down to the kitchen for a late night snack. This term I am taking one tutorial in music history and another in composition. I am excited to be challenged further in composition especially and to hopefully develop some skills that will help me to write my own musicals someday. Since being back at Wycliffe I have had some fun experiences such as late night sardines games around Wycliffe, late night G&D's runs, Focus group from church, orchestra, and a return to the constant stream of tea being consumed. This past weekend I went to London with a bunch of people from the program. While I spent most of the day in a Library and then a coffee shop studying while they toured the city, we met up to see The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Nighttime. I could spend an entire blogpost alone talking about how amazing the acting was and how innovative the set design and staging were, but I will spare you all and just leave you with this. You HAVE to see this show. The humanness of the characters and their interactions is something that we are missing from our daily lives. The misunderstandings and chaos we face day to day can be redeemed through our love and kindness for one another regardless of how similar or different we are.
If you made it to the end of this post you have earned 15 points for your Hogwarts House. (Or you can donate them to Gryffindor :P)
~ Brynn
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