First Few Days

Hi

As most of you who are reading this probably know, I'm spending a year in England doing an MA program in Theatre and Development Studies at the University of Leeds (which incidentally is in Leeds, not London). I'm here on a Rotary Ambassadorial Scholarship so in addition to studying hard I'll also have th opportunity to meet Rotarians and get involved with some of their service projects here.

I've been in the country for about five days now. I'm renting a room in a house with an artist and a music student. I was able to arrange that much before I got here so mostly I've just been getting settled in, learing how to get around, registering for classes, etc...

So far the biggest challenge has been crossing streets. Yes, really. Several people warned me about this in the month before I left and I thought they were being ridiculous. I mean, how hard could it be--you always look both ways before crossing a street anyway, right? Actually, you probably don't and have never realized it because your instincts tell just you whether you're crossing an on-ramp or an off-ramp and from which direction the semi will come hurtling by. I've spent the last few days walking all over the city crossing many, many very busy streets but still every time I get to the curb, especially if it's near a corner, I sort of panic, make a desperate attempt to randomly guess which way the traffic will come from--look both ways about 8 times and sprint across.

Today I had my first out of town adventure. I took the bus to Fountains Abbey. It's a world herritage site that contains the ruins of a huge 12th century abbey and corn mill as well as an Elizabethan mansion, water garden and deer park.

The corn mill and mansion.

Fountains Abbey

After exploring grounds I had tea and scones on the terrace overlooking a lake with swans. On the way back I decided to walk the four miles back to the bus stop rather than take the shuttle bus. I asked for directions at the entrance and was half expecting the woman to give me a funny look and tell me that there was a shuttle but instead she happily suggested two different routes, a direct one and a longer one. It's so nice to be in a place where walking is in acceptable mode of transportation.

The route back took me through the deer park. I had asked my roommate the night before what a deer park was exactly and what was the difference between a "deer park" and any other wilderness area that has some deer in it. She couldn't really say. Probably she just thought it was a ridiculous question because clearly a random wilderness area where you might see a deer or two is very different from an area that's completely packed with deer running around in giant herds like sheep. It was bizzare. There were at least a hundred of them roaming around right by the road with cars going by.

I walked on through a picturesque little village and through the countryside on a convenient little foot path. When I got back to the town of Ripon I stumbled on to a cricket club and stayed a while to watch the game. I had just started making a list earlier in the day of things I want to make sure to do while I'm here and already I'd accomplished three of them, riding on top of a double-decker bus, having tea and scones, and watching a cricket match. As I continued on I saw a random castley looking thing in the distance and decided to check that out too before bussing back. It turned out to be a fancy old cathedral. I walked all the way around and I was going to have just a quick look inside but there was a choir practicing--a really amazing choir with an orchestra doing traditional music. I love choirs like that anyway and to hear one in that setting is just unbelievably beautiful.

Sorry about the wonky layout. I think I've maybe finally figured out how to not lose my photos over and over but I haven't quite got the hang of making them stay where I want them.