Traveling, PMQ, and Shakespeare.

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Hey all. Again, it's been a long time since my last entry, but I have been so busy! I hardly even have time to do all of the homework I have. Not only do I have two pretty intense classes at ISH, I also have to do a paper and a photography project for the tour of Europe we went on, a paper and a log for my independent study class, and a huge paper and log for the political science department. All of this on top of working 25 hours a week, site-seeing in London and traveling. Argh. Oh well, I like to stay busy and always do my best under pressure.

Speaking of traveling, I booked two trips already, and I'm working on a third trip! The first trip coming up in November is to Ireland with Aurelia, Heather, Jenny and Kara. We're going on a "Paddy wagon tour" where we tour the south of Ireland for three days. It should be a good time, I'm really excited. I also booked another trip at the end of November. I really wanted to go to either Greece, Egypt or Turkey, but those trips were way too expensive, so I had to find a lesser known alternative. Well, that alternative is Malta, a small island in the Mediterranean just to the east of Sicily, Italy and north of Tunisia, Africa. I am way excited because I absolutely love islands, and I love the Mediterranean. It was a very important trade route way back in the day, so the countries and islands on the Mediterranean have a historical and architectural blend of all kinds of cultures from Asia, Europe and the Middle East. I'm going to Malta from a Friday to a Monday, and the island is very tiny, so I shouldn't have a problem seeing everything I want to see. I booked an 8-hour tour on Saturday, which goes all over Malta and really delves into the history of the island. On Sunday I'm going to try to get to the Blue Lagoon, which is a system of underground caves in the south of the island. The pictures I've seen show the bluest water I have ever seen, and the water also turns orange, purple and green depending on the various minerals present in the rocks. It really seems like an amazing opportunity. So far I've booked it by myself, but Aurelia might come with me. I wouldn't mind if I had to go alone, I'm definitely not a group type of person. My third trip might happen, and it might not. I'd love to go to Edinburgh, Scotland, but we'll see if that will happen.

In other news, last Wednesday Aurelia and I got tickets from my office to go see the Prime Minister's Questions! It was probably one of the best experiences I've ever had in all of Europe. My boss didn't tell me anything about how to go about getting these tickets. She just said show up and ask a guard where to go. We did this and after asking about 5 guards where to go, we finally got our tickets and were seated in the guest area in the House of Commons. From where we sat above everything, the Labour Party MPs were seated to the left, while the main opposition, the Conservative Party sat to the right. In front of us sat the Clerks, who basically made sure everything going on stayed legal and the best thing about them was that they wore wigs. Behind them the Speaker sat in this nice chair that looked like a throne and basically oversaw the proceedings. At noon, the Prime Minster stood up and read off a list of names of British soldiers who had died that week in Afghanistan. Afterward, the Shadow Prime Minister George Osbourne (the leader of the Conservative Party) began the debate by asking Gordon Brown questions. Most of the questions had to do with finances and the banking system, as the government had just hours before released to the press their bail-out plan. I definitely learned a lot about the economic problems, but I especially enjoyed watching the behavior in the room. It was basically the type of situation where you could speak your mind and completely embarrass and insult the opposition if you chose to. Whenever someone would make a good point, a whole side of the room would say "yay" and if someone said something bad, everyone would get really animated and start yelling and waving whatever they had in their hand at the people on the other side of the room. It was so incredibly entertaining! I really hope that I can get tickets to another sitting, even if it's not Prime Minister's Questions.

Yesterday was also one of the best days I've spent in Europe. We went to Stratford upon Avon, the city where Shakespeare was born and ended the day by seeing a play by the Royal Shakespeare company. We toured the building where Shakespeare was born, and then the house where Shakespeare's cousin's uncles' dog's doctor lived. It wasn't really that ridiculously distant, but we saw some house that I really wasn't too interested in. I would have much rather sat in the beautiful garden off of Shakespeare's house. The highlight of the day was definitely the play. We saw the comedy Love's Labour's Lost which wasn't a play I was familiar with, but is now my absolutely favorite play. I liked it so much I bought the play and can't wait to start reading it. The theater and the acting was amazing, and although we had the cheapest seats, they were still really good. The joker in the play was my favorite, and I loved it every time he came on the stage. So of course after the play I was super happy to see that he was outside of the building signing autographs. A few friends and I went over to him, and I had him autograph my program, and then we all took a picture with him. It was the first time I've met someone famous, and I am now officially star-struck. Ha! He was on some TV shows and in movies, all based in England I'm assuming since I haven't really heard of them. But the fact that he is a part of the most prestigious Shakespeare company is awesome.

Well, I'm off to go write some papers now. Adios.

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