An Update All the Way from Germany

Hello everyone,
It's been more than a week since my last post, and I apologize for the delay. I actually started writing a post, but I had to stop before I could get very far, so here is another attempt. I am currently on my spring holiday in Germany, visiting our old exchange student aka my 'big brother Grischa'. First though, I'll try to catch everyone up on London life. This post is going to be a bit long I'm afraid, and I will post some pictures later, once I get back to London.

Since my Easter post, I've seen two plays for my theatre class. ''Dancing at Lughnasa'' is an extremely depressing play which I had the pleasure to be hired to choreograph a couple of years ago for a PAHS production. It's a nice enough story, but I've seen the play in parts and its entirety many times, and I wasn' excited to go through it again. However, the performance was nice and it was quite a bit more interesting discussing the play in class. I was happier to read the second play though, ''Alphabetical Order'' which is a comedy. It was really fun to read and discuss because it was humorous, but the director or someone decided to change the ending of the play and it ended up being a little sad. However, we did get to see Zoe Wannamaker (or however you spell it) who played Madame Hooch in Harry Potter. She wasn't performing (although I think her husband was). She was just there to watch.

I went with a group of friends and saw Phantom of the Opera. Even though I've seen it many times and have had the entire show memorized since I was 8, it was definately worth seeing it in one of the world's theatre capitals!

For my Contemporary Britain class (which is on Wednesday), we went for a 'field trip' to the Imperial War Museum since we have been discussing Britain and it's views and involvement with war. It was a really nice museum with a beautiful section devoted to the Holocaust. It also had cool fighter planes suspended from the ceiling and a submarine replica that kids could climb through. That evening, the theatre class got to go on a tour through the National Theatre which was very cool even though we won't get the opportunity to see a play done there.

The 16th was a very long day. We got up really early so that we could meet just outside of King's Cross St. Pancras station where we got on a bus and took a trip to Stonehenge, Stourhead, and Avebury. We also saw one of the old chalk horses that are inscribed on the hills around the area and several neolithic burial grounds. Fun stuff. It was absolutely amazing, although the trip was about 12 hours and we were all exhausted by the end of the day. Totally worth it!

The next day, I had to meet my friend Selena at the Victoria tube station so that we could catch a bus to Canterbury. She had gotten the tickets for 6 pounds roundtrip, so we decided it was worth it to go that early. It defiantely was; Canterbury Cathedral is probably the most beautiful church I've ever seen.

The day after that, I hopped a bus to Oxford with Marbie and Naomi. That was really interesting as well. It's the birth place of Alice in Wonderland, which is one of my favorite stories. Plus, it's much smaller than Canterbury, which I found surprising.

The rest of the time I've spent exploring London with friends and sometimes by myself. On Thursday, my architecture class went to the Sir John Soane's Museum, which was interesting and then went for a walk together nearby to study some old churches. That left me only a little bit of time to get ready to go to Germany on Friday!

I've been in Germany since last Friday evening. I'm staying with Grischa and his wife Ayla whom he married last June in Istanbul. I've also gotten to see his parents, Gila and Dieter, and his uncle Klaus. The weather has been nice in London lately, but since we've all been somewhere interesting for our spring holday, I think I've gotten the best luck with the weather. Hamburg was beautiful and sunny all weekend long. We went for a boat tour in the harbor on Saturday and had a barbecue on the balcony. Grischa and Ayla took me out for the night and we didn't get home until 4:00 in the morning :-) In London, most places close down at 11:00 or at least by 1:00, but in Germany, that's when everyone gets started! On Sunday, we went for a canoe rides in the canals and on Monday, Uncle Klaus was kind enough to take me sightseeing in Hamburg. Yesterday, I took a train to Berlin and went sightseeing there. It's an extremely beautiful city...in fact, all I've seen of Germany so far is really beautiful. Grischa and Ayla are leaving this afternoon for a long weekend in Holland, but I am going to dinner with Uncle Klaus and one of his colleagues and he is taking me to the airport tomorrow. Phew! I'm so lucky to have such wonderful friends to take care of me and I'm so grateful for the great care they've taken with me this week. More soon!