Mi piace gelato!

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This past week was an interesting one, to say the least. There have been some ups and downs, but I think and hope everything will resolve itself, so fingers crossed.

To start off with, I went to see Wicked on Monday night. It was AMAZING! For the few different plays/musicals that I have wanted to see, and am going to see, I splurge a little bit and by the playbill. That way, it's something easy and compact that will fit in my suitcase! The same goes with the postcards. While I am still sending out postcards every so often, I always buy and extra one or two to keep. Maybe I'll make a giant collage of the postcards and pictures from this experience!

So anyway, back to Wicked. It seems there is always one character that has the understudy playing the part. For Legally Blonde, it was Emmett. For Wicked, it was Elphaba. This was kind of disheartening to hear, since she is the main character, but it turned out to be amazing! I will admit, because I've been a fan of the original soundtrack with the original cast, I always compare the people singing with Idina Menzel and Kristen Chenoweth (the original Elphaba and Glinda). The actresses playing these parts for this performance were amazing! I still prefer the original, but it was definitely not a waste in money! We were seated in the VERY last row, but because they had not sold out, got to move a section closer. However, I do think that if we had to stay where we were, it would have been fine. The theaters are made so everyone can see and hear no matter where you are sitting. However, you may not to be able to see the facial features super clearly....but you can rent binoculars for £1! One side note: I am in complete love with Fiyero, who is Elphaba's lover...and ex boyfriend/fiance of Glinda...oh the drama! I recommend everyone to go to this musical! It definitely puts a new twist on the Wizard of Oz story, however, I do like the book better...But you don't have to read the book to love the musical, actually, I advise against it!

Another play that I went to see was the Heretic. This was for class. It is about a skeptic scientist and global warming. The play follows her, her daughter, a new student, and a colleague of the scientist. The scientist, Dr. Diane Cassell, has received a death threat from an environmental activist group. Her daughter, Phoebe, is an activist, like the new student, Ben. Her college, Professor Kevin Maloney, is straying from learning and discovering about environmental science, to just wanting the school to have funds. When Diane receives the death threat, he blows it off and tells her to keep her head down, especially to not publish her research that seems to point to global warming as a myth. Ben starts to believe the same, angering Phoebe. The play follows this group of people as they deal with different issues, but are all connected by the global warming problem.

At first, I did not like the play. I thought that the overall idea of the play was a good one. A play that seems to address and hopefully simplifies the problem that is global warming. Even though the main character is a scientist, the use of the scientific terms made it very difficult to understand. The use of the terms added a realistic atmosphere, but if the audience had never had an environmental science class at a high level, they would probably end up being lost and confused. A lost and confused audience would probably not enjoy the play.

I really liked the character of Diane Cassell. To me, she seemed realistic in the sense that she is passionate about her profession, and is very stubborn in what she believes. She reminds me of my environmental science teacher in high school. The teacher would go on and on about how global warming is a myth or is at least not caused by humans. She made many people mad in and out of the classroom. But she held to her beliefs.

I would recommend this play to family and friends, though I would have to warn them about the possible difficulty in understanding the dialogue from the terms used, and the heavy accents of some of the characters. Sorry for the mini-rant on this play. I really did like it, and just wrote my review for class on it, so I'm in that mind-set


So, onto everything else! Though I will admit, I think I'm mixing up my thursdays...So two thursdays ago, the week I went to Ireland, my Thames class went to Greenwich. This is the home of the current, and probably permanent, location of the Prime Meridian. We are at 0˚Longitude. For the longest time, the "longitude problem" was the biggest problem of the age. It got to the point where the British government was offering a 'kings' prize to anyone that could solve the problem within half a degree, which I think is about 30-60 miles...It's interesting to note that many people believed that the answer was in the stars and heavens. However, John Harrison, a clock maker/carpenter, was the one to truly solve the problem. He created four clocks, three that were pendulum clocks that solved the problem of keeping time at sea by being frictionless and able to withstand the heat and cold without getting off in the time. The final one, H-4, was a pocket-watch. So of course, no one believed that a pocket-watch could solve the longitude problem...but it did. It took years for people to finally accept that. However, the watch is not frictionless, so while it's on display in the museum, it is not in working order because the lubricant used to make it word would only allow the watch to last for a 'small' span of time...

We only went to the Royal Observatory, mainly because they are going to start charging £10 to go into it, even where the prime meridian line runs down. I hope you enjoy the pictures of me, and Ethan, standing on/over the line! It was fun trying to come up with different poses that could be done on the line. I also went up into one of the towers at the observatory and saw this 28 foot telescope. That was pretty amazing to see as well, though you couldn't look in it. I'm going back to Greenwich today to finish looking at the museums and such!

Internship update: everything is going good. There is a new 'work experience' girl, so I'm not the only person on the 'bottom.' However, I think I've finally been given a 'permanent' desk and been added into the morning rotation for going through the newspapers/magazines and finding any relevant news and emailing the entire department, so that is kind of exciting. I've decided to forgo law school at the present time and focus on PR. I really like it, so this should make the bank account a little happier...

Now, onto the weekend!

This weekend, March 10-13, was spent in Italy. Before flying out, I forgot my passport at the flat, so thanks to Julia Murphy I didn't show up at the airport without it. I then proceeded to get on the wrong train to the airport, so I had to pay an extra few pounds, but no big deal there....it happens. I flew into Bologna on Thursday night and ended up taking a taxi to the hotel I was going to spend the night at. This was a better idea then trying to get to the train station and see if there was a train going to Florence late that night. So I basically got to the hotel and crashed on my bed. I woke up later then a thought and started the hike to the train station. I finally arrived in Florence around 11ish.

It was so great to see my friend Catherine. She is probably one of my closest friends at Elon. So, since I had been to Florence a few years ago, I had already been to most of the museums and such. Because of this, we kind of stayed away from the more touristy spots. We basically just walked around. I got to see some of the Tuscany countryside and beautiful views of Florence from up the mountains on the outskirts of Florence. There was a lot of walking up hills and mountains, but the views made it worth it. Especially when Catherine showed me her 'secret' walk around this church on the top of the hill/mountain. It was SO BEAUTIFUL!

That night we went to this small, family run restaurant. According to Catherine, we were sat in the "Italian" section and not the "American" section, which is a room away from the main part of the restaurant. We then apparently passed the test...we did not put parmesan cheese on anything. They were happy we were at least trying to be Italian: no cheese, no being loud, and speaking in Italian to them even when they spoke to us in English.

After dinner, we went back to her apartment, had some wine, and just chatted. It was amazing!

The next next, besides walking around some more, going to the market, and making an amazing lunch/dinner, we went up on top of the Duomo. This is one of the main churches in Florence. You can go up into the dome of the church and be within a few inches of the paintings along the dome. You can then walk up and out of the dome, seeing a beautiful view of Florence. We spent probably 30-45 minutes on top of this dome, looking out over Florence. It took that long to catch our breath from climbing the stairs up to the top. They aren't kidding when they say it is a strenuous hike up!

We made a large lunch/dinner and had some lovely cheap, but good, wine. Since 'going out' to a pub or club is not really the Italian way, we decided to stay in again and just keep talking. It was great to have someone to talk to about different issues that have started to crop up, and after program plans...so Mom, if you are reading this, are we still doing our adventure after my program ends? Can you let me know...?

The following day, we woke up earlier then the day before...and ended up flooding the apartment a little. I have been spoiled with English plumbing...for some reason the plumbing decided to clog up, so when I took a shower, the water came up out of the floor next to the shower...I didn't notice until I got out of the shower...So, I ended up having to leave Catherine there to deal with a partially flooded apartment (though it was drying out pretty well by the time I left), and made my way to Pisa. I left later then what I wanted due to the flooding. So, I had less time in Pisa then I wanted. The basic plan was for me to get off the train, find the leaning tower, take a picture, then get back on the train to go the extra stop down to get to the airport on time. Well, I got slightly lost trying to find the tower. So in order to stay on time, I had about 5 minutes near the tower...so unfortunately, not enough time to interrupt someone to take a picture with me trying to 'lift' the tower. But oh well, i got to see it, was slightly unimpressed by it, but I can check that off my college bucket list! End point, I got to the airport on time and made my flight back to her Majesty's country. So, besides spring break, this will probably be my last trip outside the country until May 9th...due to money and budgeting issues. =(

Anyway, I had a great time in Italy, at the internship, in classes, and at the plays this past week. This friday starts spring break. I will be going to Greece, Italy (for one night in Milan), Switzerland, and France. Hopefully I don't get lost...

PS. This means I probably won't blog next week, unless it's a really bad day out at one of the places I will be....and I have internet access...

Cheers!

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Photos

Florence
The view from on top of the Duomo