So I'm not taking a political science class... sorry. However, my roomate and his girlfriend are and we went to Grantham to basically get supplies for their trip to Italy this weekend and complete their project of talking to the Brits about their political system. By the way on a side note... "my class was canceled." Anyways, we get into town by shuttle and end up at The Goose where my two collegues gracefully find two "regular" joes and interview. Myself and Brandon decide to stay and wait for them in the pub to get finished, I find one of those nice comfy booths and plop a seat right down. After about an hour, Justin, the other roomate of my two comes over with the town historian Mick. Mick invites us to get out of the "Yank" bar and head on town to a pub called "The Beehive." As we wander through the crooked and winding Grantham streets we end up finding ourselves outside the pub next to the only tree on the street. I look up and I find a man-made beehive. Mick explains to us that this is the only "free hanging" signed pub in all of Grantham and that it has been there since the 16th century. I'm stoked... entranced, and (amazed the brits just let bee's hang out on the road).
We walk into the pub and Mick gives us the basic lay of the land, offers us a pint on him and introduces us to the bartender. He also mentions that Grantham had at one point over 134 pubs throughout the small 8 mile city. After about a half an hour with one Strongbow down and Justin and Natasha getting a bit restless with hunger we decide to venture out into Grantham once more. We were more than happy to say our goodbyes to this pub, because honestly, we'd rather us four be the only ones who know about it for the sake of the group. This wasn't the end of our personal British education for the day.
Before leaving The Beehive we asked the bartender where a good eatery was. He recommended The Blue Pig. This pub has also been literally untouched by American tourists. We walk in and talk with the bar maids who apparantly you call "AY MO" when you need a drink. I sit next to an older British gentleman who asks various questions about the states, politics. Come to find out that he works for the Sport's division of SKY SPORTS. The largest company in cable throughout the UK. We talked hockey, football, and believe it or not Baseball. Apparantly his alliances fell with Toronto... I showed him my Cubs jersey and we had ourselves a great conversation.
After finishing my beverage another man named Rick shows up to the bar. He asks us all about our experience in the UK, tells us about the history of Britian and about the influence of the media on his 7 year old son. A mysterious fellow he was, however, the entire group of me, Justin, Natasha, and Brandon find that we have spent over three hours in The Blue Pig listening to his stories. Amazing story tellers the Brits, though he was only 1 generation away from being a Celtic Scottsman through and through.
What I didn't tell you yet is the most glorious aspect of this entire story. What we had all forgotten is that the Champion's Cup was being played at 7:45PM between two English teams. This is the first time this has happened in history. Chelsea and Manchester Utd. were playing in the match. We all headed over to The Goose and had dinner as well as watched the match which went into a double shootout. Everyone ended up going home happy because Manchester Utd. was victorious. That was my Wednesday, and to say it was probably the best day finally getting to experience some, "off the beaten track" sort of places. The people were so kind, inviting, and curious, as we as, amazing conversationalists. Spot On I would say.
-Brad
Thursday, May 22, 2008
Tuesday, May 20, 2008
Class in a Castle
Well, I've said that this place is amazing, but can you imagine having class in a manor house that is yearly insured for over 60 million dollars or 30 million pounds???? I can't, and I'm living in the carriage house next to it. Basically, the sun comes out around 4 or 5 AM my time. Since we are so much further north, the sun tends to stay out late, and when the sun rises the sky usually is crystal clear just engulfing the English countryside. I get up around 6:45 or 7:00 for my Contemporary Ethics in Leadership Management class. Its a group of about 7 or 8 students and is held in the Morning Room, which is specifically designed to wake you up. See the architect of the manor decided that a room needed to be built directly where the sun rises in the morning to give Sir Gregory the "imaginer" of the building and wealthy "sickly wealthy" owner of the building a place to wake up. So each morning w/ the sun in our eyes we talk about case studies and contemporary ways of looking at leadership. I don't see myself having much problem in this class, well because if you know me I'm a bit of a crazy when it comes to my leadership positions
So my first day of class, I go into the class and introduce myself and come to find that our class got out early, "usually a custom" for the first day of class. In my mind, I say to myself, "Hey Brad, looks like a perfect day to head out and take a run in the English countryside." So, I throw on my running shoes, blast my iPod to Flogging Molly and take the 1 mile driveway all the way up to the highway... "don't worry mom it has a sidewalk." The view is immaculate, I watch these fields pass me by, I see a soccer pitch "field" along the right side of the road, cars pass me, complete fields made up of just wildflowers, yellow and green just sprawled out as far as the eye can see, sheep grazing on the hilly landscape. Yes, I am truely in England jogging... Its unbelievable, unreal, and I'm completely spoiled.
After my run I meet up with a few friends Dina (sp) "I still mispronounce her name," Beth, and Jess. We decide that there is no time than now to start booking a trip to Ireland... so yes mom and dad I'm going to be spending a little more money than anticipating. We walk around the manor and we're all still trying to get our directions straight. We have lunch in a "refrectory" not a cafeteria, and eat Sheppard's Pie. It was pretty decent. Eventually, I decide that it would be a good idea for me to go to Grantham by Harlaxton shuttle and buy some shampoo and some hair gel. Yea, the Brits love their hair gel, the breathe the stuff I'm convinced. Beth decides to join me because she needs an adaptor and a few other supplies from the ASDA "British version of Walmart." We walk around Grantham, she exchanges some Dollars for Pounds and we have a drink at the Goose. One of the friendliest and cleanest pubs I've ever seen. Well, after sitting and talking for a while we lose track of time and find that we missed the shuttle back to Harlaxton at 3:30. So we go to the Morrison's "Scotts, Kroger" and chill around 4:00 watching the school children get out of class. It does look like they are all at Hogwarts, each child is in uniform and all of them are headed to the train station.
After about an hour and a half of waiting for our shuttle which was a half an hour late, we end up getting our ride back to the Manor. We all indulge in something that looked like chicken and head back to the carriage house. Everyone then tells me that people are hanging out in the basement Harlaxton pub called "The Bistro." So Lissa and myself decide there is no better time than the present to go down to the pub (2 pound) pints... and watch the taped Yankees and Mets game. We have a blast down at the pub, I hang out with a great many students some from Southern Florida University, UE, Kentucky and others. No crazy drinking games here, just people enjoying each other's company and watching baseball.
I end up after a few drinks coming back to the carriage house to begin my reading assignment for my Contemporary Leadership class and then start planning for my Ireland trip. Boy was that a blast, we just hung out shopped for hours on Ryan Air and booked what we could. I'm pretty pumped about it, a Paddywagon tour will take us all over the southern and "CATHOLIC" part of Ireland. So I'm definitely going to be able to get to mass. Anyways, at about 3AM I end up gearing up for bed and say my goodnights to the roomates. A good lad told me something today that was really interesting about the life we're living over here, "Everything moves extremely slow and fast at the same time." Picking up on the cultural cues while waiting for shuttles, and then making purchases is just amazing. This UK is like Indiana in a great deal of ways, but just twisted a little bit. I'm going to be posting some pictures of a tour I took of the Manor house yesterday I hope you enjoy them.
-Brad
So my first day of class, I go into the class and introduce myself and come to find that our class got out early, "usually a custom" for the first day of class. In my mind, I say to myself, "Hey Brad, looks like a perfect day to head out and take a run in the English countryside." So, I throw on my running shoes, blast my iPod to Flogging Molly and take the 1 mile driveway all the way up to the highway... "don't worry mom it has a sidewalk." The view is immaculate, I watch these fields pass me by, I see a soccer pitch "field" along the right side of the road, cars pass me, complete fields made up of just wildflowers, yellow and green just sprawled out as far as the eye can see, sheep grazing on the hilly landscape. Yes, I am truely in England jogging... Its unbelievable, unreal, and I'm completely spoiled.
After my run I meet up with a few friends Dina (sp) "I still mispronounce her name," Beth, and Jess. We decide that there is no time than now to start booking a trip to Ireland... so yes mom and dad I'm going to be spending a little more money than anticipating. We walk around the manor and we're all still trying to get our directions straight. We have lunch in a "refrectory" not a cafeteria, and eat Sheppard's Pie. It was pretty decent. Eventually, I decide that it would be a good idea for me to go to Grantham by Harlaxton shuttle and buy some shampoo and some hair gel. Yea, the Brits love their hair gel, the breathe the stuff I'm convinced. Beth decides to join me because she needs an adaptor and a few other supplies from the ASDA "British version of Walmart." We walk around Grantham, she exchanges some Dollars for Pounds and we have a drink at the Goose. One of the friendliest and cleanest pubs I've ever seen. Well, after sitting and talking for a while we lose track of time and find that we missed the shuttle back to Harlaxton at 3:30. So we go to the Morrison's "Scotts, Kroger" and chill around 4:00 watching the school children get out of class. It does look like they are all at Hogwarts, each child is in uniform and all of them are headed to the train station.
After about an hour and a half of waiting for our shuttle which was a half an hour late, we end up getting our ride back to the Manor. We all indulge in something that looked like chicken and head back to the carriage house. Everyone then tells me that people are hanging out in the basement Harlaxton pub called "The Bistro." So Lissa and myself decide there is no better time than the present to go down to the pub (2 pound) pints... and watch the taped Yankees and Mets game. We have a blast down at the pub, I hang out with a great many students some from Southern Florida University, UE, Kentucky and others. No crazy drinking games here, just people enjoying each other's company and watching baseball.
I end up after a few drinks coming back to the carriage house to begin my reading assignment for my Contemporary Leadership class and then start planning for my Ireland trip. Boy was that a blast, we just hung out shopped for hours on Ryan Air and booked what we could. I'm pretty pumped about it, a Paddywagon tour will take us all over the southern and "CATHOLIC" part of Ireland. So I'm definitely going to be able to get to mass. Anyways, at about 3AM I end up gearing up for bed and say my goodnights to the roomates. A good lad told me something today that was really interesting about the life we're living over here, "Everything moves extremely slow and fast at the same time." Picking up on the cultural cues while waiting for shuttles, and then making purchases is just amazing. This UK is like Indiana in a great deal of ways, but just twisted a little bit. I'm going to be posting some pictures of a tour I took of the Manor house yesterday I hope you enjoy them.
-Brad
Sunday, May 18, 2008
Plane has Ported
Well, I arrived at Heathrow at about 8:00AM England time. That is 3:00AM Indiana time. Anyways, so we end up sitting in the terminal for about four hours waiting for the rest of the flights to get into Heathrow before all of us could meet up for the charter "coaches" to Harlaxton Manor. It was pretty cool, I must say. I ran into a few people talked up a great deal of stuff, and made a few friends. When we got to Harlaxton College we had an orientation session from 6:00-6:45. The information was rather bland, it discussed what we were doing here, what the rules were, and where to find things. Before hand I went outside w/ some pretty girls... and we checked out some of the landscape. This place is extremely beautiful, I truely am living in a castle for the next five weeks.... just hoping that I won't blow too much money, though I think it may happen for the first time in my life.
Later that night around 9:00 PM or lets just say for you guys it was more of about 4:00PM I had my first Guiness (red) on draft at the first English pub I've ever been at. We went out with a great deal of people who are all students here at Harlaxton. After "THE GOOSE" we hit up the night club called "Gravity." Boy, was I gravity. I danced w/ four students who were with me in the manor for like an hour and a half straight. Finally, we ended up at "CLUB IT." I had a great tasting lager called Michaels Draught, and danced to some more techno and London-type hip hop. The Brits are horrible dancers by the way.
I woke up around 12 PM because I was soo incredibly tired from my previous night. We went to an orientation meeting at around 1PM and my roomate Justin and I and his girlfriend decided that we were going to go into Grantham in order to buy some basic supplies... and boy did I need supplies. We ended up walking the distance of about 10 miles all day. I had my first fish and chips in the UK and they actually served me some peas w/ my meal. The best peas I have ever tasted. Anyways, we checked out the town and ended up in this amazing Anglican Church that was entirely Gothic. The sun was beginning to get lower in the sky by about 5:30PM, so we made the long trip back to the manor. Anyways, I'm off to go learn how to play SNOOKER... a british version of pool.
Catch you all on the flip side.
--Brad
Later that night around 9:00 PM or lets just say for you guys it was more of about 4:00PM I had my first Guiness (red) on draft at the first English pub I've ever been at. We went out with a great deal of people who are all students here at Harlaxton. After "THE GOOSE" we hit up the night club called "Gravity." Boy, was I gravity. I danced w/ four students who were with me in the manor for like an hour and a half straight. Finally, we ended up at "CLUB IT." I had a great tasting lager called Michaels Draught, and danced to some more techno and London-type hip hop. The Brits are horrible dancers by the way.
I woke up around 12 PM because I was soo incredibly tired from my previous night. We went to an orientation meeting at around 1PM and my roomate Justin and I and his girlfriend decided that we were going to go into Grantham in order to buy some basic supplies... and boy did I need supplies. We ended up walking the distance of about 10 miles all day. I had my first fish and chips in the UK and they actually served me some peas w/ my meal. The best peas I have ever tasted. Anyways, we checked out the town and ended up in this amazing Anglican Church that was entirely Gothic. The sun was beginning to get lower in the sky by about 5:30PM, so we made the long trip back to the manor. Anyways, I'm off to go learn how to play SNOOKER... a british version of pool.
Catch you all on the flip side.
--Brad
Thursday, May 15, 2008
The Night Before My Flight
Basically, this is it. The big jump over the pond. This is the night before I realize what else is out there in the world. I've always been curious, about who and what can influence me.. However, I'm shocked to know that my friends back in the States are living their own lives and will miss me, but will live on their lives. I'm going to miss my home, my friends, my family, but I'm ready to encounter a new adventure in my life. Thank God. I hope that you all enjoy my blogging.
-Brad
-Brad
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