Some last Updates...

So I don't really have much else to say. I may get around to talking about Romania, but probably not. I don't even know if anyone out there is still reading this. If you are, please note that I have added the last of my photo albums to the links section on the right. Please view them at your leisure (though keep in mind I haven't really edited them yet- so gravity may go sideways in some pictures).

Heathrow

14 hour layovers suck......that is all I have to say...for now...

Last One...

Wow. I barely even know what to say...

I'll start with what I did today. This morning I got up and went to the Underground station to meet up with Suzanna (she had a day layover in London). Her flight was delayed, but she got here eventually. We then walked around a little and she decided she wanted to see Billy Elliot. So we got tickets On our way back to school, we walked through the park and I did some last minute souvenir shopping. When we got back we let Jared know we couldn't meet him at 4 (it was a 2:30 show) and then went back to watch the show. It was extremely good. I won't do a separate post for the show, but the same kid played Billy, but Michael (his best friend), his father, and grandmother were all different actors from before, so the show had a slightly different kick.

After the show we came back to school and got dinner. Now we're finishing up packing and going to bed, even though it's barely ten now. Suz has to leave at 2:45 (fortunately Trevor is going on the same bus to the same airport as her, because he's going to Italy tomorrow) and we have to be ready by 4. So it will be a short night tonight and a long day tomorrow. But my day will be shorter than everyone who's going home, because I have a shorter flight.

I found out they are flying out of the same airport right before I bought my bus ticket, so I can just ride with everyone else.

In conclusion, this has been an amazing trip. By all means keep checking in, but I don't know if I'll be able to update in Romania at all. When I get home I am going to upload the rest of my photos onto facebook (Paris, Rome, and Cornwall) and hopefully do the final blog post. But for now, we have some conclusion. So, with a farewell to Western Europe and my Study Abroad Experience, I leave you all for a short while to do God's work in Romania for a time.

Some more Cornwall Pictures

On top of the world:
The edge of the world....you can't see it, but I'm pretty sure I'm crying.

Wicked Take 2

It was better the second time around, and not just because I had a better seat (though that did have something to do with it.) It is such an incredible show, and to watch these actors get onstage and do such a great job every night is a phenominal experience. Most of the actors were the same as last time, though the Wizard was played by the person in the role (whereas it was his understudy before). I'm so glad I went to see it again and I will always remember it.

Tying Up the Last Few Things...

So today was spent walking around the city. Jared and I got up fairly early (compared to the hour we went to bed) to go on the London Eye. We got there as it opened, so we got our tickets and then got in line. They loaded up the first three pods and we were almost to the entrance, when they started dismissing people and bringing the people that were already on back down. They had to close for maintainence. So we just continued on with our plan.
We went to the Victoria Theatre and bought tickets to see Wicked (yes, again, but this time in the stalls). We then wandered over to Buckingham Palace to watch the Changing of the Guard. There was nothing exciting about it. It was like a glorified marching band parade. We left a little early.
After lunch we came back to school to drop some souvenirs off that we had bought, then went back to the London Eye. It was running this time, and had a REALLY short line. We were on in 15 minutes. It was pretty cool, but when you've been at the top of every main city you've been to (Eiffel Tower Paris, Reichstag Berlin, Vatican Rome, Guinness Factory Dublin) the London Eye kinda loses some of the effect. Regardless, it was still fun.
Jared and I then came back and packed. He did not completely pack, but because I am spending the day with Suzanna tomorrow, I wanted to be as packed as I can be. I managed to get everything into my bag (though my carry-on is really heavy) so hopefully everything will run smoothly in going to Romania on Sunday.
We then went to Sports Cafe because the school was having a little "Goodbye" party for us, so we grabbed some food and went to the show. Now I'm going to try to upload as many pictures as possible before going to bed, though I'm really tired.

New Albums

I added a couple more albums. Sorry I'm behind, but these computers suck. There is a slight chance that I will get Rome, Paris, and Cornwall up before I leave. If I don't, I regret to inform you that it will not be until I get home at the end of July or beginning of August before I upload them. But don't worry- it will happen.

Cornwall Pictures

Just to warn you, these pictures may actually be too beautiful to look at. Please feel free to take a break if necessary.

Also, they are indeed real. If you see me standing on rocks that are 100 feet in the air, I really am. I am not greenscreened in, and the cliffs actually exist.



The first set of stairs going up the cliff. Come to find out this is one of the easier and less teacherous paths
Jared's having a Gollum on the Stairs of Cirith Ungol moment.
Enjoying the ocean air
We climbed out to the end of each one of those outcroppings. The one way in the distance is the one that I'm standing on in the previous picture
Gollum attacking a sleeping Frodo Quite the fall. Don't lose your step...Looking back on how far we've travelled. You can't even see the first cliff anymore...Land's End with a sign pointing to New YorkSt. Michael's Mount with the tidal road leading to it.



So I can't watch videos on this computer, but I'm pretty sure there's a general shot, then a Lord of the Rings: Fellowship of the Rings recreation, then the Walking up the Hill Revealing shot, then another general sweeping shot.

Jared has more cool pictures on his camera, but I don't have access to them right now. Maybe when I get home I'll put them up. In the meantime look to his blog and facebook.

Rome pictures

The first cool fountain

The Colliseum
Inside:
Mallory and I eating pizza
Mallory in front of the Vatican. See that dome in the background? That's the cupola. We climbed to the top. (550 steps) The view from the cupolaThe main hall inside

Mal and I eating gelatto, pretty much the most amazing ice cream ever.Another cool fountain.

Back in London

We're back from Cornwall safely. I'm just relaxing for the night. I think I'm going to try to get the rest of my computer work done tonight (positive thinking) so I can pack and enjoy London tomorrow. I may go back and see Wicked again tomorrow...

Pictures to come (they're part of "computer work")

The Alchemist

Miserable. It was a bad show, bad acting, overacting, bad delivery, cold, raining, and uncomfortable seating. The theatre was cool, because it is built into the cliffside, with the ocean as a backdrop to the stage. But that was the only cool thing about it. I didn't watch hardly any of the show because it was so bad. I can't even say anything good about it. And watching it in the freezing cold and the rain made it even worse. Just a horrible night that I don't even want to talk about. A hot bath and hot cup of tea made me quickly forget about the horrible night. Hopefully I will have a better theatre experience this weekend to take away as my last memory of English Theatre.

Cornwall

What a difference from Rome. We're out in the country, with hardly anything here, and it's cold and raining. Like, 50 degrees out.
We got here Monday afternoon and hopped on the bus to our costal location. Jared and my room is awesome. For once, we have a bigger room. And we have an awesome view of the beach from here. It's beautiful. We went to the pub for dinner and then we just took it easy Monday night. Jared and I discussed, in detail, our plan for our next movie (Pyramus and Thisbe). We wrote the script and started planning out our shots and specifics.
Tuesday (yesterday) morning I had a Full English Breakfast and then got ready for the day. Rachel, Amber, Jared and I wandered down the beach, just because Rachel wanted to. It was way too cold to go swimming, but we stood by the water and Rachel put her feet in. We looked to the side of the beach and saw a perilous set of steps climbing the side of the cliff. We totally did it. In the US there would be all sorts of ropes and barriers. No such thing here. If you step half of a step to the left, you fall fifty feet. It's your own fault. So we climbed to the top of the cliff where we discovered the Minack Theatre. But I'll write about that later (we saw a show there last night).
We ran into Valerie (our teacher) at the top of the cliff, and she said we should continue the cliff walk, as it was beautiful. So we did. Rachel had to turn around at one point because she needed to take her final exam, but Amber Jared and I forged on. It was absolutely gorgeous. Again, the camera situation here sucks so I haven't posted anything, but once I do there will be all sorts of pictures. We climbed on rocks, down treacherous paths, stood on top of the world, felt the fresh sea air blowing in our faces, teetered on the edge of the world, and walked pretty far along the coast. It was amazing. Words can't describe the feeling. Normally I'm afraid of heights, but only once did standing 100 feet in the air with nothing between me and falling actually bother me. I climbed out on ridiculous cliff edges, just to experience it. Overall it was a 5 mile hike from Porthcurnin to Land's End. After a mile and a quarter we came across a small shop where we bought some refreshments and she told us about some of the terrain and the path. The path went up and down hills the whole way, so there was a ridiculous amount of climbing that we did. When we got to Land's End, we saw the sign pointing at New York and browsed the souvenirs while we waited for the bus. Poor Jared couldn't find an ATM- he tried our town where we were staying, but it was only English banks. Land's End's ATM was down. He walked ten minutes down the road and the next ATM was down too. Finally, another 5 minutes down the road he found one and just barely made it back for the bus. We rode the bus back and made it in time for dinner and the show.

Today, we wanted to go to St. Michael's Mound and St. Ives. We missed the stop for St. Michael's so we went to St. Ives first. We did a little bit of shopping (grabbing a pastry and a pasty) but it was raining hard and it was freezing. We went back to St. Michael's. It's an island just off the coast of Penzance. There's a castle at the top. The cool part is that there's a road leading to it, but the road is only usable during low tide. We happened to be there at low tide so we walked across and took some pictures. We were too cold and wet to go into the castle (it cost money and we had to leave soon) so we just went back and waited for the bus. When we got back we ate a hot meal at the pub (there's something about the meals here that really heat you up from the inside- it really combats the cold and wetness). We then took hot showers/baths and changed into dry clothes. We're just relaxing for the rest of the night. Tomorrow we go back to London.

Tomorrow is (hopefully) getting all of my pictures up and maybe working on my paper that's due when I get back to the States. Friday is packing and any last-minute souvenir shopping (and maybe a show). Saturday, Suzanna is coming to hang out, because she has a layover in London, so that'll be fun. And Sunday morning (really early) is off to Romania. That means there won't be too many more posts. But like I said, I will post lots of pictures from Rome and Cornwall tomorrow, and I'll hopefully get a chance to keep it up-to-date until the very end of the trip.

When in Rome

So, we actually do have (limited) internet access here (though it's windows ME which means accomplishing anything is real difficult). But, because I am a computer genius, I managed to connect my camera, though facebook uploads are more of a pain here than at Schiller.

Anyway, on Rome:
So, after a day of travelling (walk to tube to bus to airport to train to metro to bus to walk) we finally get to our wonderful hotel. It was a little outside of central Rome, but it was a nice hotel on top of a hill and we had a balcony with a sweet view. We threw our things in the room, but we couldn't figure out why our power was out in our room. There was a little glowing slot on the wall that looked like it would hold our keycard but that didn't fit so we asked the front desk. Come to find out, you use the other (thinner) side of the keycard (and it has nothing to do with the computer chip). Anyway, we went to dinner at a real Italian restaurant right down the street. The waiter started out by asking us if we ate horse meat. We should've seen that as a warning. So, I ordered a coke and Mallory ordered a water. I got wine and she got water. We switched. Our first course came out and it was a salad, bread, and some odds and ends. In one plate was a mushy substance with olives (it tasted pretty good but had a funny texture) and some fried peppers (also good). In the other plate was....well...some sort of meaty textured, thin-culiflower looking thing (dry and gross). Also in the other plate was what can only be described as chunks of cold animal fat. It kind of tasted like I was trying to eat candle wax, but it was slightly more clear than candle wax.....it was extremely gross and it took everything in me to swallow it. After awhile the pasta came- one was a speghetti with a meat sauce, and the other was noodles with a tomato sauce. We decided to just get the noodles and that was it. It was a fairly lengthy meal, as we had to wait for awhile between each course (and half an hour for the bill) but Mallory and I enjoyed conversation and some live Italian music. After eating we crashed in our hotel.

Okay, so pictures are incredibly painful, so I'll post them in a separate post tomorrow.

Day 2 in Rome:
We started out with a breakfast (some cereal and pastries) and then jumped on the shuttle into Central Rome (provided by the hotel). We decided to go to the Colliseum first. It was gigantic. It was really cool walking around in such an ancient building. It's hard to comprehend something that old and big because American culture is only 200-years-old. Seeing the huge amount of work and architecture was awesome.
After the Colliseum we went to Vatican City. Also very beautiful. We climbed to the top of the Cupola (550 steps). The steps got narrower as we climbed higher and it was hard to resist the claustrophobia. But we finally emerged at the top of the dome and looked out across the city. It was truly beautiful. We then climbed back down (again, 550 steps) and went into the sanctuary area. The artwork and size were breathtaking. It was really cool to be in such an important place in history and the Catholic Faith. We thought about going through some of the tombs, but we decided against it.
We then did some suvenir shopping. That was fun. For lunch we grabbed some pizzas. As we did our shopping we wandered around to various places, looking at the fountains all over the city. There were both decorative fountains and practical fountains (for drinking and washing). The practical fountains were more frequent than in Paris, so it was fairly easy to refill our water. We stopped quick to take a picture of the Theatre dell'Opera, grabbed a quick bite for dinner (Kabop) and then decided to rest and wait for the bus.
As we were waiting for the bus, a little ways away two men got in a fight. One of the guys ripped the other guy's shirt. The other men in the area got them settled down, but the guy with the ripped shirt just went a little ways away and kept harassing the other man. After a few minutes, the other man started to leave (walking past Mal and me) when he turned around and advanced on Ripped Shirt. He then broke a beer bottle and chased Ripped Shirt away. It was a little scary, but we were okay. We just relaxed in our hotel room the rest of the evening.

Day 3 in Rome:
We decided to take it real easy on Sunday, so we checked out of the hotel but then went to the pool. We sat by the pool, occassionally getting in, for about 4 hours (it was about 90 degrees). It was relaxing, though I got some sunburn (even with suntan lotion). We then made the journey back to London and went to bed, ready to head out again to Cornwall.

Made it back

We made it back from Italy. Unfortunately, due to a day of travelling and a late return, I will not have enough time to elaborate on Italy until my return from Cornwall on Thursday. We leave in the morning, and I'm already exhausted.
That's pretty much it. Look for new posts on Thursday evening!

A Quick Hey

So this will be my last blog for a couple days because I'm going to Italy tomorrow with Mallory!!! We're excited, but I am a little nervous because it'll be my first time on my own in a non-English speaking country. It'll be fun. Anyway, we get back Sunday night and then leave Monday morning for Cornwall. We're in Cornwall until Thursday. There is a chance that I may get an Italy post up on Sunday, but if not I will at least get a post up saying that we made it back!
Super excited!

The Chalk Garden

An excellent play that was well done. The characters were full and alive and performed extremely well. The only problem with the show is that there was no plot and no conflict. There seemed to be a lot of screaming, but there was nothing to move the story forward. Again,the characters were amazing and the show was about discovering the characters, but it would've been nice to discover the characters through the course of a plot.
Overall an enjoyable experience, but it did get slightly dull in some spots.

Free Outgoing

This was done at the Royal Court Theatre. It was okay. It was about a modernized India and the technology gap that exists (technology gap- the gap between advancing technology and the culture that it is exposed to). A girl makes a bad decision and it leaks onto the internet, causing a riot outside their house and a disturbance to the entire residential area. It is interesting watching a how a different culture responds to a situation that would be hardly noticed in the US.
Overall the performances were good- the leading lady's being exceptional. But the script was somewhere between community theatre and professional theatre.

More Albums

I added a couple more albums. It took a really long time, so people better look at them. I haven't finished labeling the Warwick Castle pictures so just use your imagination for now. I just got really sick of waiting five minutes for the computer to respond to my clicking.
Enjoy!

De Profundis

Written by Oscar Wilde, this is a letter from Oscar to his male love, Bosie, from prison (Oscar was married). Oscar puts the reason of himself being in prison on Bosie and recounts the several years leading up to it. Indeed, Oscar reflects on most of their relationship and how unhealthy it was.
The letter was performed as a one-man show by Corin Redgrave. It was heavily cut (most of the second half of the letter was omitted, as most of it was just repetition) but it was about an hour. It was very well done. The ability of Corin to have memorized that much (especially after having a stroke to which he lost a lot of his memory) and to keep the audience engaged in such a piece while seated in a chair was brilliant. I was impressed. Where the letter doesn't really make much of a show, it was well done and engaging so it was not torturous. It was a good experience and I'm glad we had the opportunity.

A Magical Day

Ricky, Greta, Carrie, Rachel, Jess, Amber, and I all walked around together on the second day. The reason is because the other half of the group went to Versailles for the day. So we started out by walking to the Arc de Triumph. It was awesome. And huge.
After that, we walked over to the Eiffel Tower. Now I make it sound easy, all of this walking, but it wasn't. It was pretty much half of the city, and took about and hour and a half to get to the Eiffel Tower. When we got there, we decided to go up.

This is the Eiffel Tower from the ground:
This is from the middle (second floor):
And this is from the top (you can see the point in the upper left of the picture):
This is the view from the top: Probably the worst part of going up the tower was the elevator ride. The elevators were glass, so you could see everything as you ascended. And it was painstakingly slow. Rick and I got a little queasy, but once we were at the top and on solid structure again, we were good. The view was amazing.

After descending again, we wandered the direction of Notre Dame (though we eventually got sick of walking and jumped on the metro). We got Kebab (meat shavings, french fries, ketchup, and lettuce in a pita) for lunch and chilled in front of Notre Dame.

After eating we went in. It was fun. I mean, after awhile all the Churches start to look the same, but I guess that's just because I'm not as interested in the inside of them.

There were several gypsies in the courtyard of Notre Dame. Now I'm not talking about the culture. I'm talking about the ladies that walk up and ask, "Speak English?" and if you say yes they thrust a piece of paper into your hand asking for money. It's annoying, especially because they are fully capable of getting a real job. At one point, Rick gave one of them an Eiffel Tower keychain. She initially refused, but he insisted so she took it with a smile. The second he turned his back she glared at him. A minute later she came over and tried to get it back. He wouldn't take it. She tried again, and he still wouldn't take it. So she glared at him and tossed it over her shoulder behind her and stormed off. It was hysterical.

Anyway, we wandered some more, stopping at Haagen Das for Ice cream (I got cookies and cream. So happy...). We then rushed back to the hotel, because we were late to meet the other half for dinner. When we got back there was no sign of them, so we thought they had come and gone. So we showered then went back out.

We weren't very hungry for dinner, but we wanted to eat at a nice place, so we found a sort of nice place and sat down. It wasn't super nice but it was a restaurant. Well, we just ordered appetizers, and apparently that wasn't enough money for them, so we left.

We then went to the boat tour area and waited for the other group. Again, they didn't show. So we got on the last boat tour of the night (10:30) and travelled up and down the Seine. It was beautiful.

At the top of every hour after dark, the Eiffel tower lights up in a sparkling show for ten minutes. It was beautiful to watch, especially because we were on the boat when it happened. It was a magical evening.



The sparkling tower:

The lit up tower:

So after a stop at the Moulin Rouge to see it at night, we went back to the hotel to bed.The next day was basically just spent wandering around buying souvenirs. We went to the Moulin Rouge area first because they are cheapest there, then we went back to the Notre Dame area for lunch and just to chill until it was time to return home.

The Louvre

We started out in Paris with a bus tour of the city. I did not pay much attention because I was cold, tired, and hungry. I couldn't take any pictures, and I didn't really know where we were when he was showing us stuff. All that aside, it was fun being able to get a quick overview of the city.

Once we were done, we checked into the hotel. This took three hours because of some problem with the system higher up. It was really frustrating. When I finally got to my room, there was next to no ventillation and we couldn't open the window. Trevor stayed in Mal's room because our room smelled of cover-up smoker and the smell was enough to give us headaches.

After a brief rest, we started the walking tour. We were shown several areas of the city (some of which I didn't know where they were so we couldn't go back later. Again, tired.) and our tour guide told us some info on them. It was quite boring.

Sacre-Couer:
Oldest tree in France. Planted 1602
Notre-Dame After the walking tour was over, we stopped at a sandwich shop and got some baguette sandwiches. They were really good. We then decided to go to the Louvre because it is free for under-26 on Friday evenings. It was amazing. The building was gigantic and it was completely filled with artwork. It used to be Napolean's place of residence, but now it's a museum of art. The artwork there was amazing.

These flowers are beautifully detailed, and are about twice the size of my head.

The little white dot at the bottom of this painting is the flowers in the above picture. Needless to say it's gigantic.

Here's a quick shot of Napolean's Apartments:

After visiting the Louvre, we went back to the hotel to "freshen up" before going out. Unfortunately this took a really long time. Regardless, I still went out with everyone else. But we went to an English pub. Everything French was further in the city. After a quick drink we went back to the hotel and to bed.

Waterstone and Conversation

Today, before class, Jared and I went to the largest bookstore in Europe- Waterstone. It was awesome. There were five floors, and each floor was about half the size of a typical city Borders. We lost our selves for two hours. I was kinda mad, though, because they didn't have Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows. They had all the rest of the books.

After class (really boring, of course) we all went to Conversation with Corin and Vanessa Redgrave. Basically it was an onstage interview of Corin and Vanessa for about half an hour, then about twenty minutes of audience questions. I can see how it could've been interesting. The problem was I've never seen them before and I don't know who they are. The other problem is that they didn't talk about acting or what they did, but they talked about how their whole family is into acting, and what it was like growing up in a theatre household. It was boring. And the audience questions were dumb too- Can you reflect on so-and-so? How do you feel about your humanitarian views? I mean come on. How about a fun question like, What was your most embarassing moment onstage? Anyway, it was quite boring. Like I said, it was probably because I didn't know who they were.

Back in the UK

I'm back from Paris. It was amazing. I'm utterly exhausted and won't have any posts up until tomorrow at the earliest. I have a ton of pictures, though. It was an awesome weekend.

Just a random thought- this is pretty much my last week in London. This weekend I go to Rome and next week we're going to Cornwall. I have 6 days left in London. Wow...

The Weekend

So after a few boring days of class (and a little bit of theatre) I'm taking the night easy. We leave for Paris early (5) tomorrow morning. This means that I will not be updating for a few days. Other than that there's not much going on (but at the same time a whole lot). It's hard to believe that there is little more than two weeks left in this country. Then to Romania.
Anyway, keep sending love, as it is always welcome!

Twelfth Night

So, Paris better be awesome, because this was the second bad theater exerience in 24 hours. The problem with this show was that the actors spent so much time trying to make the meaning of the text clear with blocking and gestures that the words were completely lost. The poetry made no sense, and I could barely understand anyone. This was partly because we were outside, but there was a sound system, so this should not have been a problem. The fool (clown character) was completely incomprehensible. I did not understand a single word he said the entire show. His actions were funny, and I probably would have laughed if any of it had made sense. He was an excellent singer, though (regardless of the fact there were no consonants in his singing).
Overall I was unimpressed. This show can be better done.

The Happening

This movie fell short. Very short. The movie started too late in the plot. The previews sell it to you on, "What is the Happening? What's wrong with these people? What are they running from?" All of these questions are answered within the first 5 minutes of the movie. And there is no build-up to the problem. In fact, the build-up happens after the problem starts. There is a story of a "rough" marriage that is highlighted, but the stakes aren't very high. The wife had dessert with another guy. There is no exposition and no resolution. And the idea, though I think a decent one and almost original enough, ends up just being the same as every other horror movie. The problem is that it's not a horror movie- there's very little horrific about it.
The lines are iffy and the delivery of them is even worse. It seems as though M Night Shyamalan isn't capable of even inventing a real marital problem and dialogue to go with it, let alone ever having experienced it. With a marital problem that seems too insignificant to need a giant catastrophe to fix, and a natural disaster that is poorly executed and resolved there is little substance to believe in this movie. The entire northeast population dies, and three months later schools reopen. WHAT?!
I though that Armand Schultz had the best performance in the whole movie. (Army is an NU graduate. I've unfortunately never had the chance to speak to him, as he tends to visit when I have other things to attend to.) This is kinda sad, as he is a news reporter with a small amount of dialogue at the end of the movie. But I think he was the only believable character in the whole movie...

Layout

It may come as a shock to some of you, but this is my first blog. This means that I am constantly learning, and therefore constantly shifting and improving the layout to my blog. I just recently learned how to add label links to the sidebar, so that you don't have to search for a post with the same label. Here's how it works:
Let's say you want to see all of my posts on theatre. Instead of finding them all in the archives, you can now just click the theatre link on the sidebar, and it will filter the posts to show all the theatre posts. Pretty cool, huh? It also tells you how many posts have that label.
I also added dad's blog to the blog roll.

Hopefully this is as much of a learning experience for all of you as it is for me! Remember, comments can be made by clicking on the 0 comments located under each post, you can email the post to your friends by clicking the little symbol of a letter (also under each post), or you can subscribe to get an email every time I update by clicking the link next to subscribe at the very bottom of the page!

Billy Elliot

Number 1. Hands down. It was an awesome musical. The story is inspiring and enveloping. The music is beautiful (Elton John). The dancing was beyond words. And to top it all off it was Fox Jackson-Keen's (Billy Elliot) first night. It was so cool to be a part of his first time onstage performing as Billy. I was so blown away by the performance that I forgot to take a picture of the theatre on my way out. To see a thirteen-year-old boy dancing in ways that I've never seen anyone dance was amazing. He was also a gymnast, so he could not only do turns but also hand-springs, front flips, aerials, and wall backflips (the coolest one). He could do ballet, tap, and modern, all of which were showcased in the show. He played the part wonderfully and the audience was very excited to see him for the first time.

The rest of the show was also cool. Like I said before, the music was phenominal, having a wide range of styles but still having the Elton John feel to them. There was everything from string ballads to electric guitar rock. The lyrics were absolutely beautiful, and the music and lyrics flowed into one.

The choreography was unbelievable. The ability of Peter Darling to place each and every person as an individual on the stage but still have them create a unified picture was magnificent. Truly remarkable. People could all be doing a different piece of choreography but the same dance. And the combination of different styles and techniques was a visual work of art that was almost necessary in order for the show (and of course, Fox) to shine.

Everyone on the team worked really hard to put together this show, and it is very clear. It is a wonderful show, top to bottom, with the only problem being that the Underground goes underneath the theatre so that some of the quieter scenes were underlaid with the rumbling of trains passing underneath (and indeed sometimes shaking the seats). The production team is the same team that created the film plus Elton John for the music. It was in this way that they could effectively tell the story. It was the same but at the same time completely different, lending itself more to the stage.

Truly remarkable.

Westminster Abby

Jared and I got up early this morning to get tickets for Billy Elliot tonight (which we got awesome seats.) On the way back we decided to stop by the Westminster Abby and do the tour. We have to do it for our paper, so we figured we'd get it out of the way. It wasn't very exciting-just a bunch of tombs, altars, shrines, and cloisters. It was huge, and Poet's corner was pretty cool. Edward Bulwer-Lytton once said, "The pen is mightier than the sword." All you have to do is walk through Westminster Abby to see that it's true. If you were to look at the names that you recognize from the lines of Kings and Queens and then look at the names you recognize from poet's corner, there are significantly more in poet's corner.
I don't really get too excited over churches. Yeah they're cool, but I don't really think it was worth the 9 pounds I paid to get in.

The Incredible Hulk

Jared, Dan and I went to The Incredible Hulk tonight at the IMAX theatre right next to school. It was actually pretty good. I was not really expecting anything much, but I enjoyed it. The actor who played the general was flat and I didn't like him. At all. And Liv Tyler (aka Arwen) played Betty Ross, Bruce Banner's girlfriend. She did very well, though there was one point where she was on the verge of tears, looking straight into the camera, and said, "Bruce?" and I laughed out loud. Now there was nothing funny about the moment, except it was pretty much exactly the same shot as the Fellowship when Frodo's dying with the blade in his chest- "Frodo!"

Anyway, I never saw the Hulk so I can't compare, but I do know it's a completely different crew, top to bottom, and they kinda gloss over the initial story of how he became the Hulk and pick up where the last movie left off. Not a sequel, but it's still a continuation of the story.

Was it worth the 9 pounds? I dunno. Maybe.

Windsor and Hampton Court Palace

Today a couple of us went on a day tour to Windsor (Castle) and Hampton Court Palace. It was pretty fun. We started out at Windsor Castle. Windsor Castle is where the Queen currently lives.

The architecture is obviously pretty sweet, but as it's a modern castle, the interior isn't too exciting. I'm more of a medieval castle kinda guy, so walking on red carpets looking at walls of portraits, tapestries, and unused weaponry set up in a decorative fashion doesn't really float my boat. There was a cool hall though dedicated to the Order set up by Edward III and the Black Prince. It had all of the coats of arms of the members of the order from its founding through to present day.

After exploring the castle, Jared and I went to a chocolate shop (I don't remember the name off hand). It basically makes its own chocolate, but it imports some. I tried a sample and it was delicious. They've won awards for their chocolate. So naturally, I bought some. We'll see how long it lasts. I haven't opened it- I want to be able to enjoy it, so I'm saving it for when I want chocolate, but not every piece of chocolate in sight.

After Windsor, we headed to Hampton Court Palace. This was even less cool that Windsor Castle because it had all the boring interior with no cool exterior. We walked through the entire thing as quickly as possible, Jared and I talking about various fantasy novels and video games, barely paying attention to what we were doing.

Once we got through the insides, we checked out the gardens. Those were pretty cool.

Jared and I did sit down to an afternoon tea that was quite delicious. We did the classic tea cake and scone (tea with milk and brown sugar, scone with cream and jam). It was delicious.After the Palace we came back to the university and chilled.

Just a quick note, I did upload some of my pictures onto facebook, and I added the Dublin album link to the links section on the right of this page. Check it out!