Mumsy comes to Guildford

      The best Easter present, by far, was Mom coming to visit me in my new home. Before heading to London, we explored my town, Guildford. Unfortunately, the weather was not as lovely as we would have hoped, but we still managed to have an amazing time. Our trip started out typically for the two of us. I was slightly stressed about taking the train by myself for the first time to pick Mom up from the airport. Her flight arrived at 8 am, and I made sure I woke up early to give myself extra time to make it to the train station and then take the 7:30 am train to get to the airport in time for her arrival. I successfully rode the train, even making the correct transfer connections. Once at the airport, I searched the board listing the international arrivals, after I saw the flight coming in from Florida, I heeded to the appropriate gate and waited. This seemed like such a piece of cake...I could do this. However, I saw that the flight had not landed yet, and I assumed that the flight must have been slightly delayed.
    So I waited, and waited, and waited. After about 45 minutes of waiting, I began to get slightly nervous...where was her flight? Becoming a tad panicked, I tried to check my email on my phone for the flight info. I had forgotten to top up with the phone company and had no data processing on my phone, and the wifi in the airport wasn't connecting, so I had no Internet, therefore no access to the flight information. Even though it was now only 9am, I called my friend(who was in a dead sleep, and answered crankily) and she looked up he information for me online from her dorm room. Now armed with the flight information, I went to he information desk, and close to tears, desperately asked the woman working about my mother's flight. Somewhat condescendingly, she informed me that flight had landed early 2 hours ago in the NORTH terminal, and I was in the south terminal. I was so embarrassed, I wanted to melt into floor. I thanked her and excused myself. It hadn't occurred to me that where ever there there is a south terminal, there must also be a north terminal. I ran to the shuttle that transported me to he correct terminal. En route, I received a call from an unknown phone number, upon answering, I learned it was my mother! She was frantically worried that I took the wrong train and was in another city far away. I may be flighty at times, but even I wouldn't confuse the chunnel the the national rail, although Paris is lovely this time of year... I reassured her that I was on my way to her to the correct terminal.
     Moments later, we were reunited in a happy embrace! We had a good laugh at how paranoid we both were about the other's safety. We  thought my my mom would be able to use her phone while in England, and that's why I was so worried when I was calling her after her flight was scheduled to land and received no answer. Since we didn't activate international data roaming, her phone was useless. She had to purchase at $10 calling card just to contact me. This would only happen to us.
    Now close to 10am, we were both hungry, so we decided to eat and get a coffee at Costa in he airport, we sat and chatted for about 2 hours, we had so much to catch up on! After eating, we proceeded to the train station to catch the train to Guildford. We had just missed the train, and the next one would not be arriving for another hour. We killed time by getting a sausage roll and chatting some more. We went outside to the platform early to ensure that we would not miss this next train. A train was already outside, but I assured mom that this was not our train, our train wouldn't be arriving for at least 5 more minutes. Apparently, the time displayed on the train time table was the time the train leaves, not the time it arrives. We realized this after our train left. We then had to wait another hour for the next train to arrive. My attempt to prove to my mother that I could master public transport was an epic failure so far. We finally got on the correct train and enjoyed a nice ride back to Guildford. We were successful in that I managed to get us on the fast train(a 40 minute ride) instead of the slow train (an hour and a half ride.) We arrived in Guildford at 4pm, remember, my Mom's flight landed at 8am. Nonetheless, we made it to my town, safe and sound.
    For our first evening in Guildford, we decided that we would be posh and cultured and bought tickets to see Barefoot in the Park, which was showing in our local performing arts center. Before going out to the show, Mum and I had dinner at a very cute restaurant. Apparently, the dinner did not sit well with my stomach and I felt extremely sick! I felt so bad that we couldn't go to the show. If only Dr. House was A) real and B) in England. Mom thought that I must have what we deemed "the rare and dangerous Malaysian tape worm." Luckily, whatever I had passed the following day and then I was fine for more adventures!
     Now, my room is hardly big enough for me and all of my belongings. Adding my mom and her luggage was a very interesting mix, how we fit, I will never know. Since it was relatively good weather, I took mom on a tour of the campus, spending extra time at the lake, my favorite spot. We poked around in town as well. I had grown accustomed to Guildford's hilly topography, but it was a little difficult for mum, who was used to Florida's flatlands. But, she was a trooper and made it through the hilly treks of her visit. We actually grew to like climbing the hills. The more we climbed, the more we could eat and not feel guilty about! It was my duty to introduce Mom to good quality cider, we would order a pint at every pub we visited! We also tasted the obligatory fish and chips while dining out, as well. Mom was especially fond of the pasty stands selling cheese and onion rolls, we had at least one every day!
        On one of our outings, we (successfully) took the train to Denbies Wine Estates. Here, we participated in a vineyard tour and tasting. The vineyard is located in the town of Dorking Deepdene, this title was hilarious to Mumsy and myself. The vineyard is a beautiful property that hosts various events throughout the year. I am currently in contact with Denbies human resource manager about potential employment in the future if I decide to stay in England and pursue a masters degree. Since mom was visiting, I had to be a terrible hostess and take advantage of her trade, she was an amazing mother and cut and dyed my hair even in vacation. I took the plunge and got fringe! I am officially English now! We were going to go view the Guildford castle, but weather did not permit, so pictures would have to substitute a real visit. We also window shopped on the very posh High Street, the Rodeo Drive of Guildford. Then we went to London, the big smoke....

Mum was intrigued by the different brands

Naturally.

My campus!

The Student's Union

What a vineyard with no grapes looks like

My home! It's not the first day of school, but this can be added to the collection.

Such a pretty lake

Grandmother willow?

All of the houses in town have such cute gardens

Alice in Wonderland Inspired statue, it is reported that Lewis Carroll wrote parts of his famous story in this park.

 

Kiss me! I'm (not) Irish!

    When studying abroad in the UK, what else would we do but spend St. Patrick's day in Ireland?! Since the land of the leprechauns is only a hop and a skip away from England, traveling there was quite easy. It seemed as soon as the plane had leveled from our take off, the captain announced preparation for our descent! The flight was approximately 45 minutes, the shortest I had ever been on, I wish all travel was this simple! There was not much of a change in scenery, we left cold, rainy, gray Guildford to arrive in cold, rainy, gray Dublin! Dublin was decked out in St. Patrick's day decor, from the moment we stepped off the plane into the airport, there were orange, green, and white balloon arches, shamrock decorations, and Irish flags wallpapered the airport. Our hotel was spruced up for the holiday as well. We stayed at a Hilton, the usual, but this hotel was quite a trek from the city center of Dublin, in fact, there was really nothing nearby the hotel aside from a bus stop and a Tesco supermarket. The employees of Tesco became very familiar with our group, as we were in the shop every day. It was there that we purchased our St. Patty's accessories, our snacks, medicine,(we needed aspirin for the uh...elevation change of course...) and whatever else we needed, Tesco was the place to go.
     Until our Irish adventure, I was not very familiar with public bus systems, but I had become a pro at hailing taxis, as well as traveling via train and underground tube. I learned very quickly that no one in all of Dublin knows how to give proper directions. At the beginning of our study abroad experience, I would have blamed myself and my travel companions for our lack of directional skills. However, we are now expert navigators, and the directions given to us were simply rubbish. We spent half of our four day trip walking in large circles around the city, and going down incorrect roads on the buses.
    A public bus in Dublin is the last place you want to get stuck on for an extended period of time, there are quite a few characters inhabiting the city. Safety in numbers is all I have to say about that one. There was also a language barrier issue, you would think that since we all speak English we could communicate effectively. Not so much. I could not understand half the things that were said to me with those Irish accents! I thought the British accents were confusing, but this was like a whole new language!
    The most ironic part of the trip was that we met more American and other various nationalities than we did Irish folk. Apparently, all of the locals flee the city during St. Patrick's day because they don't want to deal with all of the rukus of the celebrations. The tourists then replace them. I don't blame the locals leaving, the town was one massive sea of green, drunken fools. If I was not one of those fools I probably would've hated the experience. We adopted the "if you can't beat em, join em mentality" of the weekend's debauchery.
     The entire weekend was filled with holiday themed events, with St. Patrick's day being the main event. We watched the St. Patty's day parade down the main street, drank green beer, watched the Ireland vs. England rugby match on T.V. in a pub, and had Irish car bomb drinks. Funny thing about those drinks, apparently it is very politically incorrect to order those in Ireland, although it is perfectly acceptable to order them back in the states. Luckily, our bartender was not insulted, he just advised us to not use that name while ordering, oops! You learn something new every day...I was lucky that I did not get thrown out of the pub from yelling at the top of my lungs and rooting for England during the rugby match along with my other exchange friends. We had to be faithful and cheer for our adopted home!
    At the end of our last night, I met a girl who also went to Bloomingdale High School! She graduated 4 years before me and now works in the hospitality industry, now I have a great new contact! It really is such a small world. We also took a tour of the Guinness factory, which really is the only thing that Dublin takes pride in. It was an interesting experience to see how the beer is brewed, we learned the history of Arthur Guinness and how the "black stuff" came about.  I'm not usually a fan of beer, more of a wine or cider gal, but Guinness isn't half bad! We even got to enjoy a complimentary pint after our tour, the was everyone's favorite part.
     I hiked yet another mountain! It is becoming my tradition of traveling to a new country. We grew tired of the dirty city of Dublin, and went in search of the picturesque countryside. Our main goal was to see "the rolling green hills and sheep," as we envisioned Ireland to look in our minds. We took the train about two hours outside of the city and came across a beautiful shoreline and mountainous coast. This mountain was a bit more rugged than the one in Barcelona. It was about a 50 degree incline, not even exaggerating. We had to grasp the roots peeping through the ground to haul ourselves up, there were no nice stairs or cleared paths. At one point I dropped my scarf in some shrubbery and when I attempted to put it back on, found that there were sticker thorns all over, and lord knows what else. Once we reached the top, I could feel every inch of my legs burning, mouth dry and in desperate need of water, and my heart was beating faster than a hummingbird. But the view was once again worth it. We finally got to see sheep! And horses too, and gorgeous hills, there was green everywhere you looked.
   On our last day, we decided we should be cultural and see the important architecture in the city. We toured Trinity College, the oldest college in Ireland, which was absolutely gorgeous. We viewed the Maggie Malone statue, and General Post Office building on O'Connell. We became very familiar with the Temple Bar district, as well as the famous Temple Bar in the Temple Bar district.
   Unfortunately, the luck of the irish was not with me. On this trip, my black eyeshadow shattered and pigmented dust covered my entire makeup bag and some of my suitcase, my curling iron broke, and I was carrying a bag of shot glass souvenirs in the rain and the paper bag ripped sending my glasses catapulting to the ground, of course they shattered. The funniest part was, on my first day I bought a key chain with a real four leaf clover in it to give me good luck, and that broke too! Even with the minor setbacks, Ireland was yet another successful adventure!

At the fountain of the Guinness Factory

Yay for pints!

Shamrock face paint is always fun

O'Connell St. for the parade

Irish Car Bombs!

Green beer is a must on St. Patty's

The coat of Dalkey, Ireland

All beach towns must have a carnival

Not the ideal beach to go barefoot on, look closely at the pebbles instead of sand

View from the top!

I'm the Queen of the worlddddddd!

Dalkey Sunset

General Post Office of Dublin

Trinity College

Maggie Malone

Public Park 

The famous Temple Bar, serves the best green beer in town!

My Surrey family line, Grandma Kait, Momma Aly, and Baby Dessi <3

    

Donde Esta El Disco- Barcelona

I absolutely fell in love with Spain! Such a beautiful country(especially the weather.) Locales son muy amables y la comida es delicioso!(Very nice locals and great food!) I had finally just gotten over my nasty chest infection before our trip to Barcelona...so I was ready to have some fun! My travel companions consisted of my best friends in our exchange student group. We planned this trip rather spontaneously, we saw an ad for very inexpensive flights, and decided to just go for it!  We stayed in a Hilton as usual, compliments of Aly's discount.
        The start of our voyage was not exactly according to our plan...we did not really think our "cheap flights" through and we realized that in order to catch our 6am flight, we had to arrive to the airport at 4am, meaning we had to leave campus at 3am. The trains don't run that early/late(however you would like to view it) so we had to order a taxi van. The taxi driver could not find his way around campus so he was 30 minutes late to pick us up. We were late getting to the airport and slightly stressing out. Then, everyone in my group passed through security perfectly fine, but of course I was stopped. Normally, when someone sets off the alarm in security, TSA agents just use the little wand and wave it over them to make sure they don't have any weapons. However, at Gatwick airport, you get frisked. A female agent had to pat me down(for a good 5 minutes) including checking the inner lining of my pants(so awkward) while the rest of the people waiting in line were staring and my friends were laughing at me. To this day  I will never know what set off the alarm, but I was just happy to make it on the flight alright!  Our group decided it would be easier to just not sleep the night before our flight, rather than trying to wake up in the middle of the night. Once our flight landed in Barcelona, it was 8am and no one had slept a wink. I had the honor of a wonderful duo behind me, a crying newborn and an unruly 5 year old who thought it was a great idea to kick my seat for the entirety of the flight. But none of that mattered, we were in BARCE! The taxi ride from the airport to the hotel felt just like I was in California. The topography and the weather were very similar, so beautiful. After our pleasant ride down the coastline, we finally arrived at the hotel.

       I have to preface this next paragraph by emphasizing that we are all college students, and therefore, very poor. We thought it would be an intelligent idea to cram 4 people into a room. That way, we would only need to pay for 2 rooms for 8 people rather than 4 rooms. Sounds great on paper, but not so much in practice. We all know now that none of us would make it as a spy or an agent in the secret service, we are about as inconspicuous as fireworks in a church. But what do you expect from a group of Americans and Aussies in the middle of Spain? The front desk not only told us that we would have to purchase more rooms, but then proceeded to lecture us about how we did not know the value of the euro(of course not, we know the value of the dollar) and how we should be more respectful towards hospitality companies(um, what is my course of study?)  Needless to say, we were not well-liked at the front desk, but we did stay and ended up buying extra rooms. We managed to win over the staff by the end of our stay, though! The hotel was a stunning property, very modern with a breathtaking view of the shoreline from our room. There was also a luxe pool on the roof, unfortunately it was still slightly too chilly to enjoy some swimming.

         I was thrilled that I was able to practice my spanish with the locals. I was amazed by how much I actually remembered, I haven't taken a language class since high school. It made me motivated to try to become fluent....Rosetta Stone soon? There is this idea: "everyone speaks English in Europe." This is definitely NOT the case in Spain. Only one other girl in my group and myself had any spanish speaking training, and thank goodness that we did. We had to translate for the rest of the group when getting directions, on taxi cab rides, and ordering food. It was so strange to see a McDonald's menu in Spanish! Some places had employees that spoke English, but I actually preferred being fully immersed in the culture and being forced to speak the language to get by. The time our linguistic skills was the most helpful was when we got lost. We went into the country side(the middle of nowhere) to go to the Highlands Park for a stunning view of the city. Halfway through our journey, we found out that to get to this high point, we would have to hike up the side of a mountain. Apparently there are no outdoor elevators in the countryside of Spain, go figure? You did read that correctly, I did go hiking, outside, amongst the nature. I think my body didn't know what to do with all the fresh air that I breathed in that day! I obviously wore my designer boots whilst shuffling through mud and rocks on this epic hike. The trip was well worth the view, it was amazing! Once I stopped wheezing and regained my normal breathing patterns, I took in the sites. Mis amigas and myself had a picnic lunch, how is it that food always tastes better at the top of a mountain? The hike back down was much easier, but the sun had begun to set, and we had no clue how to get back to the tourist area and to our hotel. In the countryside, NO ONE speaks any English. There was not one bus, taxi, or even a horse to ride back to our hotel. Luckily we came across a very sweet elderly gentleman that was very helpful. My friend and I explained our situation(in spanish) and he called a taxi for us on his cellphone and waited with us until the taxi arrived. He told us that we reminded him of his granddaughters and that he hoped someone would do the same for them if they were lost in a foreign country. We called him our abuelo de vaccaciones, our "vacation grandpa," such a saint that man was! 

    We ate tapas and drank sangria every day, it was quite the good life. In the spanish culture, people do not eat dinner until around 10pm, and do not go out to the clubs, know as discos, until 1am. Our first night out we were sightseeing all day long and then were out at a disco until 5am the next morning! Somehow sleep is irrelevant when on vacation in a foreign country. I danced with some of the locals and I felt like I was in the movie "Dirty Dancing, Havana Nights." Wrong country, but right story line.

    We could not visit Spain without seeing some Gaudi artwork. We were amazed by the Sagrada Familia Cathedral, incredible architecture! We also visited the Picasso museum, and the Museo de la Xocolata(Museum of Chocolate, my personal favorite.) We had to take advantage of the scenery and spent one of our days at the beach and visited a few local parks. It was a very successful trip! As corny as it is, when I left, I knew I left a bit of my heart in Spain, mi corazon es en Espana...I know this won't be the last time I see this gorgeous country!

Tapas y sangria!: Everything has the face on it still...

El Disco

Our hotel and transportacion

Amor= <3

Probably written by the front desk staff...

La playa

Yum?

Our view from the Highlands Park after hiking

Sagrada Familia: Gaudi

Coming home after a night out...watching the sunrise, then going to sleep

Arc de Triumph....not in France