Oh Henry Potter, Oxford, Victoria & Albert Museum, and the British Museum

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Thursday the 15th I took another trip back to the British Museum! This is by far my favorite museum because there are so many interesting exhibits and collections of things that interest me. Me and a few friends traveled in more depth the Egyptian exhibit and the Roman collection. There were so many mummies and hieroglyphics it was so interesting. I've never been to a place where there were so many sarcophagus' in one area! An exhibit was dedicated to money and it was so interesting the differences of coins and paper money. Many countries have so many colors in their paper money compared to American dollar bills. It's actually quite pretty to see. Then they had other funny money like bank of hell or bank of love written on the bills.

On Friday we had a planned trip to where Henry Potter...oops I mean Harry Potter studied! That's right, we went to Oxford University. This is where there were scenes shot in the courtyard, dining hall, and the house selection process. It was incredibly mind blowing and I think I love the series even more since I feel so "connected" by being in the same spot. This is apart of my childhood recreated at this spot and I must say I've been a little obsessed since I got my first Harry Potter book and everything imaginable that Christmas in the fourth grade. I still even have my calendar, trivia games, and multiple books.

It's actually a church in the university called Christ Church, where the movie was shot. The Cathedral part of it is actually quite beautiful although no where near as extravagant as St. Paul's. There's a huge courtyard in the middle with a darling fountain. The dining hall is exactly like you would imagine in the movie, with all of the surrounding pictures. On the other hand, it isn't quite as large as you would imagine. Still it was really cool to see it and be in the same place as the movie was.

The rest of Oxford was really neat just to see a different part of London and the styles of architecture. When studying there you actually can't have a car. Instead everyone rides bikes everywhere and I never imagined so many bikes in one area. It was really neat! The streets are really narrow because cars aren't allowed and the universities aren't as spread out as you would think. What was surprising as well was how many shops there were near the university. I know some universities are built into cities but this shopping square was just a street dedicated to souvenirs, clothing shops, many cafes, deli's, grocery stores and almost anything you could think of. The prices were much more reasonable than Chelsea too. I think almost anything is much more reasonable than Chelsea.

Today a few friends and I ventured over to the Victoria and Albert Museum. This was one of the most random museums I have ever been to. The first exhibit I saw was an old bedroom that described how they were fashioned in the 18th century. As I ventured a little further there were dress patterns, cloths, and silks and described how they were put together. Other random sights were old jewelry boxes, sculptures of buildings from Rome, amazingly beautiful old jewelry and even different theatre costumes. They had some concert costumes from people in the 20th century. There were sections in the museum that was split up into the type of material that objects were made out of too. For example there was a wood section where there were beautiful cabinets and clocks. Because it was so random and a little hard to go through it wasn't something I would particularly go to again unless I knew of something specific I would want to see.

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