Over the past few weeks I got bored and got one of those "Free 10 Day Trials" from Ancestry.com, and did a bit of ancestry work. I have already done work on my Dad's side before, so this time I decided to do work on my Mom's side, and I found some pretty cool stuff. Obviously if you are able to trace ancestry back far enough, you will inevitably find something cool and interesting. I happened to be able to trace one of the many great great grandparents on my mom's side all the way back to the 1300's in England and as it turns out, my 14th great grandfather, Samuel Maycock actually studied at Cambridge University from 1612-1614 before moving to Jamestown, Virginia and being massacred by native americans in 1622. The college he studied at is Gonville and Caius College, which is literally right beside King's. I may have mentioned the above info in a blog post a couple weeks back, but I mentioned it again because I actually walked inside Gonville and Caius College today to see what it is like. There is one courtyard that is actually original from well before the 14th great grandfather studied there. I know it sounds really cheesy, but it was kinda cool to walk around the college grounds and think that exactly 400 years ago one of my many 14th great grandparents was living and studying in the same exact buildings and grounds. He may be a very obscure ancestor, but without him I suppose I wouldn't be here. Here's the college grounds:
Even the wooden floors are all uneven and old and creaky. Although I would bet those stairs and floors were added in the 1700's or 1800's when most colleges were refurbished.
And Mom, the picture below is to show you what I meant yesterday when I said just about all pubs have the best floral arrangements in town. This isn't even one of the nicer floral arrangements you see outside pubs. I'm telling you...if you want to see nice old storefronts with nice flowers, go look for old pubs. For some reason they are the nicest looking businesses in town. Same thing goes for the pubs we walked past in London... this pub happens to be in Cambridge though.
Tonight we walked into a bakery to get a little treat, and as I walked in I heard the store owner talking with two customers that were tourists from Asia. I heard the tourists say "This is nicer than Oxford... we heard about a rivalry between Oxford and Cambridge." and the store owner says "Yeah, it's a huge rivalry...kind of like, eh, Harvard and Princeton in the States."
I'm thinking: WHAT.
I was waiting in line thinking (not actually mad or upset of course, just amused) of how he would even get that. Even a non-American knows that the biggest rivalry has been between Harvard and Yale for more than 300 years. How does someone even think Harvard and Princeton are the arch-rivals? Haha, the funny thing is, Princeton students consider themselves to be both Harvard and Yale's arch-rivals, but Harvard and Yale students view Princeton as the third wheel that wants to be more of a rival than it really is. It was just funny... it's kind of like saying the University of Georgia and Kentucky are arch-rivals. Nope. Same conference, but no. Haha.
My fiance leaned over to me and said "You're bitter he said Princeton instead of Yale, aren't you?" Humorously enough, I was bitter...but in the funny way, not in the actually bitter way.
Last night I got to watching some bluegrass music videos on Youtube and started thinking about how nice it was when my biggest concern was how much time I would have each evening to play my fiddle. In retrospect, my life was much simpler in middle school and high school when I only had about 30 minutes of homework each night and played fiddle for hours on end. Of course in another 4 years I'll look back at this and say how much easier and simpler it all was...so it's all just relative. I know one thing - I'll be happy to get back home and play some music and not be gone all the time. Even in Europe, traveling gets old after a while when you're a homebody, haha.
I do think that if I decide to pursue studying in Denmark for a semester, I will feel much more at home. Having lots of family in Copenhagen helps, and quite frankly it's just a really nice place to be. It's a place where everyone's main concern is enjoying time with friends and family. So much in fact, that virtually all Danes get off work by 4 pm. The idea is that people/workers will be much happier if everyone gets to eat supper with their family instead of working late. That's definitely my kind of culture.
Throwback to 5 weeks ago: a city that is still bright and sunny at 10:30 pm in the summer, has the sleepiest split-timbered buildings, a skyline dominated by church towers and palace towers instead of big business skyscrapers, and when all else fails there is a bridge connecting to Sweden. If you can't tell, I like studying in England very much, but England doesn't feel nearly as nice as Denmark. :-)
Yeah so we did all of the cliche London stuff, like Buckingham Palace and the Tower of London...etc. But we also experienced a few things that are not normally unique to London. On Saturday, we were walking out of Hyde Park past the French Embassy and started the long walk to the Victoria and Albert Museum. But it was strange, because although were walking alongside one of the main London thoroughfares I started to realize that no pedestrians were on the sidewalks and no cars were on the streets. All I saw were police vehicles and policemen everywhere. There was even a police helicopter above the street. This was an eerily quiet street. And then all of a sudden we turned around the curve and saw swarms of protesters screaming Anti-Zionist and Anti-Israeli chants in the streets. As my luck would have it, we had mindlessly stumbled upon one of the largest Anti-Israel protests in Western Europe. And were going against it, right through the crowd. But since police were everywhere, I didn't just turn around go back into the park. Personally, I believe it's best to witness these types of events. They're history in the making...and to just ignore events like this is to be ignorant. But I had to take videos and pictures of the events, so here:
Cut me some slack...I know they're a bit shaky. In the video below, look past the protestors to the men praying. In addition to the crowd of over 10,000 people (media sources confirmed the size in articles posted later that afternoon) there were hundreds of muslims praying in the streets and chanting "Palestine will be free...Blow Israel into the sea." I am pro-Israel, and I don't care who knows it... so don't get the idea that I'm promoting protests like these. Also, check out the symbolism... lots of people marching and praying in front of the Queen's portrait. Hmmm.
And here's the main video. It's long (4 minutes). I don't expect you to watch it all unless you feel so compelled to do so. But it is here in case you do want to follow me weaving against the crowd of people.
And here is another picture:
And of course we experienced the typical London attractions. We actually were able to get tickets to tour the state rooms of Buckingham Palace, which is generally only open for a couple months each year. That was neat, but no photos allowed. I suppose you could google pictures of it anyways. We saw the throne room though, and that was neat.
We also toured the Tower of London today, where the crown jewels are kept and where they tortured and killed many people for hundreds of years. That was really cool as well. Overall, London was a great city to be in and to visit. easy to navigate, and lots to do. I'd probably go back later in life.
Anyways, here are a bunch of pictures of the weekend:
I would love to say that I remember what this monument is, but I don't. :-)
A lot of the following pictures are of the Tower of London.
The red things you see in the next few pictures are individual pieces of metal shaped like poppies. For those of you familiar with World War I and/or the British military, you know that poppies are significant to many Brits. They are important because at the end of the battles of WWI, red poppies were the only living things left on the battlefield. In fact, many wear them each year to remember the Commonwealth soldiers that have died in and since World War I. They are in the process of installing a metal poppy for each serviceman that died fighting in not only the British military, but all Commonwealth forces fighting for the Crown since WWI. We were told that by mid-November the entire place will be covered with those poppies.
This guy is a Yeoman Warder ("Beefeater") that lives in the Tower of London. They aren't tour guides...they're the ceremonial guard for the Queen and they also protect the Tower of London. Just to be able to apply for the job, they need a minimum of 22 years served in Her Majesty's Armed Forces with perfect conduct. The Yeoman Warder who gave us the tour served for 27 years in the Royal Marines. So no, they aren't tour guides dressed in funny uniforms. They still guard the Queen on high-profile state events.
Henry VIII's armor.
The dude below was beheaded in the English civil war by Oliver Cromwell.
Swords of many of the Kings.
The guy in the middle (below) is my favorite King. America was born under his rule. #America
The below pictures are the tools for executions. The mask the executioner would wear, and the chopping block for beheadings.
Cannons captured during the Napoleonic Wars:
The Tower Bridge is below. That is not the London Bridge.
And below are some pictures from the torture chamber:
The King's chamber in the Tower of London:
Below is what would have been the King's view of London and the river Thames.
And the picture below makes me happy that we arrived right as the Tower of London opened, because the tour group in the below picture is so much larger than ours was.
Once again, glad I showed up early.
Everywhere I go in Europe, I always take a picture of the worst-looking pigeon I can find. This one below takes the cake for London.
Below is the line to see the crown jewels. The line is twice as long on the inside of the building. When we went to see the crown jewels earlier in the morning there was no line. We walked right in. As we walked out (only 15 minutes later) this was the line. Just in time, eh?
They still raise ravens at the Tower of London!
The two pictures below are of the Traitor's Gate, where the traitors were brought into the tower from a boat on the river.
This was a funny sign outside of a pub as we walked by:
And we also had fun in Chinatown. We found a really good restaurant that was cheap called Young Cheng. It was kind of sketchy since they only had room for us down in the basement, but I would argue that the sketchiest restaurants usually have the best food.
And this was the breakfast at the hotel. People on Tripadvisor complained, but I don't see why. It was all-you-can-eat buffet style breakfast.
On our way to Buckingham Sunday morning, the subway was completely empty. At 9 am. I muttered to my fiance "Well maybe they're all in church...London needs some Jesus."
And this is us leaving King's Cross for Cambridge this evening!
