Monday, April 28, 2008
David got Hitched
On March 10, I received an e-mail from my brother to let me know that he planned to get married April 5 to his live-in girlfriend Stella. So, we booked a flight back to Boston to attend the wedding. Here's some of the pictures I took:
The rehearsal dinner at Papa Ginos following the rehearsal at the church. Stella chose this restaurant. She's in the green sweatshirt, and my brother is in the middle/back turning to talk to her.
Here they are at the reception in the church basement.
Cutting the cake (it's behind the bride - didn't get a great shot of it!):
And me and Paul - we were sick with colds from all the flying (this was shortly after we got back from Poland, so we were pretty jetlagged too), but we made it!:
We wish them the best.
The rehearsal dinner at Papa Ginos following the rehearsal at the church. Stella chose this restaurant. She's in the green sweatshirt, and my brother is in the middle/back turning to talk to her.
Here they are at the reception in the church basement.
Cutting the cake (it's behind the bride - didn't get a great shot of it!):
And me and Paul - we were sick with colds from all the flying (this was shortly after we got back from Poland, so we were pretty jetlagged too), but we made it!:
We wish them the best.
No More Youth Discount!
I turned 26 on March 31, which means I am no longer a "young person" in England, and cannot get the "young person's discount" on the train. However, I had a really nice birthday. Paul took me out to a Thai restaurant that a colleague recommended to me, called Chiang Mai Kitchen, and it was fantastic. The highlight was scallops with some sort of hot sauce - it sounds strange but it was sooo good!
I also got a second birthday celebration when Danalisa and Amanda took me out for dinner and a movie (27 Dresses). It was so nice to have a girls night, as I don't get to see them as much as I'd like to since I've been working full time. Here we are at the Giraffe having dinner:
I also got a second birthday celebration when Danalisa and Amanda took me out for dinner and a movie (27 Dresses). It was so nice to have a girls night, as I don't get to see them as much as I'd like to since I've been working full time. Here we are at the Giraffe having dinner:
Easter in Poland
Well, it has been a while since I've updated, and Easter was a month ago, but I have pictures! We spent Easter with Paul's family in Rydultowy Poland. The picture at the top of this post is of Paul and his grandfather. And no, that is not a mountain - it is a giant slag heap from a coal mine!! All of that stuff came from under the ground! It is so big they are thinking of putting ski slope on there!
It was great to see all the relatives and to eat Babcia's (grandma) food! It is so funny when Paul's grandma puts out the spread of food for each meal - it's enough for 10 people and it's just me and Paul! We left on a Friday and returned on Tuesday evening, so we had about 3.5 days there. Paul's grandparents life with his great-grandmother, who is 95 years old and always smiling!
Easter is the most important holiday in Poland, and it is celebrated over several days and nights. In fact, it's called Wielkanoc (vyel-ka-notes), which means something like "many nights", because Easter is celebrated over several nights. Pretty much everyone in Poland is Catholic, and it seems like the church bells don't ever stop ringing during this time, as there are masses throughout the holiday weekend. We went to 2 masses, one with Paul's grandfather and one with his uncle. They like to sit up in the balcony with the rest of the men (not to mention some bats!), and with the service being entirely in Polish, it sure was a cultural experience!
We also visited Paul's grandmother's brother's family who live nearby. They put out two huge platters of delicious desserts for us, and served us coffee with milk from their cow! Unfortunately, I ate so much of the desserts that when they brought out some ham and cheese to eat, I couldn't eat a morsel more! I still haven't quite figured out why they have dessert before meals, but the same thing happened when we visited them on our honeymoon, so it's just something I'll have to remember for future visits.
Paul did the talking when he could, and I tried to learn some Polish, but with only a pocket dictionary I bought at the airport, I didn't help too much in the conversation!
Here is Paul's grandparents' house right after a small snowstorm.
Near Rydultowy is a town called Rybnik. We went there one afternoon and walked around the town square, which was all decked out for Easter. Here's a picture of Rybnik's town square:
Easter Monday also has a funny tradition. They call it Smingus Dyngus, which is a nonsense word, but what they do on this day is spray people with water. More specifically, boys go around and spray girls with water, and the girls are supposed to give them a treat. Paul's cousin Jakob tried to explain this to me, and when I told him that if a guy squirted me with water, I'd be more likely to punch him in the nose than give him candy, he seemed very confused. I guess if you grow up with it, it makes more sense!The other neat thing I saw was easter baskets. On the Saturday before Easter, people brought baskets with bread and flowers into church for a blessing. This food was then served at Easter dinner. I haven't fully looked into this tradition, but it was really neat to see all these people walking to church with pretty baskets.
We flew on Wizz air, a Hungarian discount airline. It wasn't that cheap since there is huge demand for flying to Poland for Easter due to the large number of Polish people living in the UK. But, it's the only airline that flies direct to Katowice. Anyway, it started to snow when we got to the airport to go home! Fortunately, it wasn't enough to delay our flight too much, so we managed to get back on schedule.
Here's our plane waiting out the snowstorm before we could board!
Sunday, March 16, 2008
I went to Bath and got a Shower
As exams are coming up this week at the Business school, I and a bunch of my girlfriends who also have partners in the program decided we should go on a trip together to get away from the stress of studying. The group of us were a big international melting pot - there was Alka, Vinita and Bhakti from India, Nina from Denmark, Karen from Australia, Janick from France, Alina from Romania, Mikki and me from the USA. We all left after work so we still had a chance to go out for dinner on Friday night. Bath is just a 45 minute train ride from where I work near Didcot. We stayed in a B&B just to the west of the city center, which had a lot of English country charm and a nice hot breakfast. It rained the whole time, but that didn't stop us from having a great time! We're already excited to start planning another trip together.
A bit about Bath: It has been known for its hot spring baths since about 800BC when the Romans were in the area. They liked the springs so much that they built a whole complex for them. The Baths themselves still exist as both a tourist and an archaeological site. Archaeologists have found all kinds of items at the bottom of the pools, including over 13,000 coins! There's not much else for industry around there, though it seems the city was a stop on the way up the Avon River where boats could unload cargo into warehouses to be shipped to other areas of the country.
Friday night we went out for some Thai food, then went to a couple pubs. The first pub was called "Mole's Pub" and it was located in a cave-like basement with lots of little nooks and crannies to explore. Neat place!
Unfortunately they were at the end of their set, and the pub was closing (most bars close at 11pm in England) so we had to find another place to hang out! The city center was bustling at night, and unlike Oxford, you didn't see lots of cops and falling-over-drunk college students. I have been reading a lot about England's drinking problems, so it was nice to see that it's not always that way. Anyway, we had a blast at night and didn't get back to the B&B until about 12:30. Here's what the Bath Abbey looks like at night:
The next morning we had our breakfast and left for the city. Alka was nice enough to offer to take our luggage back to Oxford since she had driven to Bath. That meant we had more time to explore the city without lugging all of our overnight things around with us. Our first stop was to make sure we saw the old Roman Baths. Here is some of the group in front of the entrance (clockwise: Karen, Janick, Mikki, Alina, Bhakti, Nina; missing were Alka and Vinita, who had already seen the baths and went exploring the shops instead):
Here is part of an old temple wall that has been reconstructed after being found on the site:
And here's what I thought was really cool: old curses that people had written and thrown into the pool:
Here's a close-up of one of them:
Here's Karen, Nina and me in front of one of the drains at the baths:
And here's the main bath. It really is that green from all the algae and other creatures living in it. There were signs all around not to drink or even touch the water! You can see the steam rising up because of all the rain.
This is a piece of an old roof, which shows how the Romans used hollow bricks to make the arches more lightweight. Pretty clever stuff!
This was a weird part. This area was all dark, but when I looked in, I thought I saw what looked like big eggs all around. Turns out they're stalagmites! The sign in there reads "hypocaust" which is an old Roman term for "central heating" (thanks Wikipedia for that definition!) I'd suggest looking it up if you're interested, it's pretty neat! I heard from a tour guide there that they would have children cleaning out the ashes from the heating system because they were the only ones who could fit down there! Yuck!
After that experience, we needed to do something that wasn't so damp, so we went to the Jane Austen Center for Afternoon Tea. I'm not a big Jane Austen fan, but the place was really charming and put on a great tea. The sandwiches weren't the best (butter & cheese and butter & cucumber), but the sweets and the tea itself were delicious! Most of the girls had never been to Afternoon tea before, so it really was a treat - and a true English one at that! We all felt very English and very proper.
We spent the rest of the day poking around shops and seeing sights like the Royal Crescent:
The inside of the Bath Abbey, where the choir was practicing - so pretty!
And the outside of the Bath Abbey:
The Pulteney Bridge (apparently one of four in the world lined with shops on both sides)
And last, but not least, this handsome pig statue:
A bit about Bath: It has been known for its hot spring baths since about 800BC when the Romans were in the area. They liked the springs so much that they built a whole complex for them. The Baths themselves still exist as both a tourist and an archaeological site. Archaeologists have found all kinds of items at the bottom of the pools, including over 13,000 coins! There's not much else for industry around there, though it seems the city was a stop on the way up the Avon River where boats could unload cargo into warehouses to be shipped to other areas of the country.
Friday night we went out for some Thai food, then went to a couple pubs. The first pub was called "Mole's Pub" and it was located in a cave-like basement with lots of little nooks and crannies to explore. Neat place!
Unfortunately they were at the end of their set, and the pub was closing (most bars close at 11pm in England) so we had to find another place to hang out! The city center was bustling at night, and unlike Oxford, you didn't see lots of cops and falling-over-drunk college students. I have been reading a lot about England's drinking problems, so it was nice to see that it's not always that way. Anyway, we had a blast at night and didn't get back to the B&B until about 12:30. Here's what the Bath Abbey looks like at night:
The next morning we had our breakfast and left for the city. Alka was nice enough to offer to take our luggage back to Oxford since she had driven to Bath. That meant we had more time to explore the city without lugging all of our overnight things around with us. Our first stop was to make sure we saw the old Roman Baths. Here is some of the group in front of the entrance (clockwise: Karen, Janick, Mikki, Alina, Bhakti, Nina; missing were Alka and Vinita, who had already seen the baths and went exploring the shops instead):
Here is part of an old temple wall that has been reconstructed after being found on the site:
And here's what I thought was really cool: old curses that people had written and thrown into the pool:
Here's a close-up of one of them:
Here's Karen, Nina and me in front of one of the drains at the baths:
And here's the main bath. It really is that green from all the algae and other creatures living in it. There were signs all around not to drink or even touch the water! You can see the steam rising up because of all the rain.
This is a piece of an old roof, which shows how the Romans used hollow bricks to make the arches more lightweight. Pretty clever stuff!
This was a weird part. This area was all dark, but when I looked in, I thought I saw what looked like big eggs all around. Turns out they're stalagmites! The sign in there reads "hypocaust" which is an old Roman term for "central heating" (thanks Wikipedia for that definition!) I'd suggest looking it up if you're interested, it's pretty neat! I heard from a tour guide there that they would have children cleaning out the ashes from the heating system because they were the only ones who could fit down there! Yuck!
After that experience, we needed to do something that wasn't so damp, so we went to the Jane Austen Center for Afternoon Tea. I'm not a big Jane Austen fan, but the place was really charming and put on a great tea. The sandwiches weren't the best (butter & cheese and butter & cucumber), but the sweets and the tea itself were delicious! Most of the girls had never been to Afternoon tea before, so it really was a treat - and a true English one at that! We all felt very English and very proper.
We spent the rest of the day poking around shops and seeing sights like the Royal Crescent:
The inside of the Bath Abbey, where the choir was practicing - so pretty!
And the outside of the Bath Abbey:
The Pulteney Bridge (apparently one of four in the world lined with shops on both sides)
And last, but not least, this handsome pig statue:
Why I love Abingdon
Abingdon is a town just south of Oxford, about a 15 minute bus ride away. I decided to go there a couple of weekends ago because I found out they have a Polish store where you can get Polish food. Well, the store wasn't that great, but the rest of the town was awesome! This is what I had in mind when I found out we would be living in England.
The town square is pictured above. Oxford doesn't really have a town square, so it was neat to see what one looks like in an English town. They have a lot of great shopping around, most notably a Woolworths (kind of like a small version of Wal-Mart) and a Waitrose grocery store (similar to a Whole Foods). Both do not exist in Oxford, and both made me very happy, as it's nice to be able to get cheap household items and it's wonderful to get good quality groceries. As Oxford is a college town (average age seems to be about 19), it was so refreshing to see people of all ages and all walks of life out shopping on a Saturday.
Outside of the town square is Abingdon Abbey gardens, which are quite nice for a stroll.
The old ruins in the garden are pretty neat. I don't yet know the history, but I did get a self-portrait in them. :)
Needless to say, I will be back to Abingdon, if for nothing more than the fabulous groceries!
Paul the Football Goalie
As you may or may not know, Paul has been the Templeton College football goalie this season. You can see him in action near the goal on the right. Paul's wearing the light colored shirt.
I didn't go to any games this season except the last one, which they won against Magdalen College 6-3. It was really cold and blustery on the field ("pitch" as they say here), but I braved the chill to take a few pictures and support the team (though they didn't have any benches to sit on). Note the "colorize" feature i used on the camera :) )