I consider my apple curry a success! Sure, it was missing two key ingredients: chicken, and coconut milk. Sure, I made enough to feed 15-20 people. Sure I was using all four burners on the stove and the oven and I could have used two more burners. Sure, I used every pot and pan we had (except one which really didn't fit with what I was cooking at all) and had to improvise to manage things. Sure, I spent two hours cooking, and about four hours doing preparation work. Sure I made an absolute nightmare of a mess in the kitchen with all the cleaning that had to be done. Ahh, but it was pretty good. Many things were done very well, some things were done less well, but I have bravely navigated into a whole new level of spontaneous cooking combustion.
Ok, now to update on what we've been doing. We haven't been learning much in class, investments has mostly been a rehash of my previous two finance classes and the teacher doesn't really answer my questions. I think Dr. Gritta teaches more WWII history, particularly that which deals with planes, than anything else. My operations course is interesting, but we don't spend much time covering stuff. I'm finding that I do really understand the Tech Ops material extremely well though, which is good, so I'm able to help the students with questions a lot.
On Wednesday we made a trip out to Westminster Abbey and then over to Westminster Cathedral. Westminster Abbey was a whirlwind. I think I could spend weeks going into the Abbey looking over, learning, and studying everything. The vast number of monuments is astounding, each with an amazing level of detail. Monuments are everywhere, even covering other monuments. I think the tour we had was approximately two hours and even then we really didn't even see everything, much less talk about all the things we saw. We'd go to a little side chapel, there would be perhaps 30 things of interest, maybe more, and briefly talk about one or two, then move along. Going through the abbey was definitely an phenomenal experience, and very different from the impression I had of it when watching the royal wedding a few weeks back. Apparently at the wedding they fit a little over 1000 people into the Abbey. At the Queen's coronation they fit over 7000 people into the Abbey. While the building was impressive, I wouldn't say it was necessarily the most impressive building that I've seen here, more that it contained vast amounts more history than anywhere else we have been.
After walking through the Abbey we walked down the street to the Cathedral. This building was constructed in the late 1800's if I recall correctly, but the interior is far from being finished. The ceiling tiles and mosaics in this building were fairly close to incomparable. The vivid colors in all the tiles and scenes was amazing. I'm sure there are buildings more amazing out there, but this one was definitely worth seeing.
After class on Thursday we went to see "Much Ado About Nothing" at the Globe theater. Oh. My. Goodness. I have never seen a better show. I'm not referring to the plot or the play itself, but the entire experience of the show as a show. The quality of the actors, the music, the production, the performance, the use of stage materials, the response to the crowd, the dealing with the raging storm. Oh yeah, London went all Portland on us. It was hot out, had to take off my jacket because I was warm, then it was cold, so I had to put it on, then it was drizzling, then hot, the raining like a shower, then cold, then sunny and cold - all on like 15 minute intervals. People who paid for standing room viewing would scatter so fast when it started pouring down. Many didn't come with rain gear. Many didn't return after the intermission. One thing that really made this performance so much more enjoyable than the previous one was the fact that we had seats in the middle of the theater so you could see what was happening and hear the actors all the time without straining. That, combined with the fact that I had gotten a good nights sleep the night before giving me plenty of energy to sit down and enjoy the show made for a spectacular experience. I wish I could go back again! About 7 minutes after the play ended the storm let up, or really, there was a break in the clouds right where we were at, just big enough for us to make it to the nearest tube station without getting but a few drops on us. What an evening.
On Friday a number of the guys went out to play some football (soccer). There were five of us, so it was 3v2. Kevin and Kenny are in better than 'not in shape' and have played football 'recently' so Taylor, Chris, and me were on the same team. All said, it made for some good times and good exercise. None of us had cleats so traction was an enormous issue. Eventually I got tired of football because I was just getting careless (combination of being out of shape and not having any traction) so I pulled out my disc (frisbee) and tossed the disc around for a little while. The exercise was good, hopefully we'll have more chances to get out again. We also went out for dinner at an Indian restaurant that evening. I got a lamb tikki massala which was exquisite. Everyone really enjoyed their meal, it was nice.
Saturday we went to the British museum. Most of what is at the British museum was stolen or taken in conquest. Nevertheless, it made for a mind boggling experience. Even the building itself was immense and a statement on its own at times. I saw the rosetta stone among many other interesting things. I think one of the best parts of the British museum is that we were allowed to take pictures of almost everything. I couldn't take pictures of the Australian exhibit, but that was about it. Consequently, you can head over to my facebook pictures where I recently uploaded something like 200 pictures of my trip so far. I haven't gotten to giving them all captions yet, but I'll work my way through trying to describe and clean-up the album as I have time. The point here though, is that I took a bunch of pictures in the museum, so you can see bits and pieces of what I saw. One point about the museum though, is that there were different sections for different areas of the world. One random point of interest though is that the museum was broken into geographic regions of the world. In the Korean section I found almost exclusively Korean people speaking Korean. In the Chinese section I found almost exclusively Chinese people speaking Chinese. In the Japanese section I found almost exclusively Japanese people not speaking (they tend to be a quieter bunch).
Of course, on Saturday I also did a lot of cooking. I was a bit tired after all of that, so I stayed in and hung out while everyone else went out to a pub to watch a football game. I don't feel like I missed too much, it was nice to just have a slow evening and relax. Today has been low key as well, mostly involving online updates, doing homework, and helping people do homework. On Wednesday we are headed to Bath, I'm really excited! On Friday a number of us are leaving for Edinburgh (capital of Scotland) for the weekend. There should be plenty to report back on in the days to come.
-Samuel
No comments:
Post a Comment