Turkey Day, Take Two

Our flat had our Thanksgiving dinner yesterday. It went really great! There were nine of us all together: five of us from the flat (one of our flatmates couldn't make it), one girl from another flat here, and then three of our flatmates' friends. It was a very international Thanksgiving. :) So for our party we cooked a turkey (which Helen named Ben after Benjamin Franklin, oddly enough--we kept slipping and calling the turkey a "him" all night, which frankly is pretty creepy if you think about it), stuffing, green bean casserole, red cabbage casserole, mashed sweet potatoes, salad, rolls, cranberry sauce, and an apple crumble for dessert (courtesy of Valentina and Sarah). It all turned out pretty delicious, I must say.

There was one slight, if hilarious, mishap. (Part of my brain is telling me not to tell anyone this story, but the other part of my brain is saying it's too hilarious to not tell it.) Helen and I were in charge of cooking the turkey, and I knew that when you buy frozen turkeys from the store that they have the innards still inside. So when we were getting ready to put the turkey in the oven, we took out what was inside the cavity (the neck, I think, and some unidentified turkey innard bits). So we cooked it for 3 and a half hours, and it looked great. Then we sat down to dinner, and I started cutting the turkey. And Helen said, "I think there's something shiny in there..." And she reached over and pulled out this humongous giblet packet from between the skin and the meat of the turkey. Needless to say, everyone in the kitchen burst out laughing. It was hilarious and mortifying all at once. Seriously, isn't that something that only happens in the movies?

We started dinner at eight, and the last of us didn't leave until one in the morning, so I'd say it was a pretty successful evening. It was certainly the most fun I've had so far. Valentina made a music playlist, Gabby bought roses for the table, and we even had candles. Finding enough pots and plates and cutlery was a bit of a challenge, but we managed. And since it was Gabby's birthday as well, we put candles in the apple crumble and everybody sang Happy Birthday.

So much fun!

Happy Thanksgiving

Happy Turkey Day, everybody!

As Thanksgiving is not a British holiday, I still had class today. Afterward, though, I went out with my flatmates and we bought all the supplies we'll need for tomorrow's post-Thanksgiving Thanksgiving dinner. It's going to be great!

Nice Night

Ah, weekends. They're really quite lovely. (You can imagine that in a British accent, if you want. I think my flatmate Helen's speech patterns are rubbing off on me a little.) I went to ASDA (British Walmart) today via the free "grocery bus." I got some pretty cool stuff--a comfy throw for the coming cold winter nights, a small but very cool lamp, and potpourri that smells like chocolate! My room feels so much cozier now, which makes me smile. And I also bought little slippers that have cow spots on them, and little pink bows on the toe. They're so cute!

We've decided to start propping our doors open in the flat now. We figure it'll be easier to be more sociable throughout the day that way. Unfortunately, the doors are really heavy, so I've got to push my little chest of drawers in front of the door to keep it open. And this evening, Gabby, Helen, and I drew Thanksgiving turkeys (you know, tracing the hand and drawing in the turkey's face and feathers and all that) and hung them on the fridge. Oddly enough, we also hung Christmas lights above the windows in the kitchen, and put the mini Christmas tree in the corner. Yay holidays!

Museums, Museums

I decided to be productive and do a little exploration today, so I went to the Canterbury Museum and the Roman Museum. The Canterbury Museum was very nice--it's housed in a medieval building known as the Poor Priests' Hospital. It really focused on how the town of Canterbury has really changed over the centuries, from a pre-Roman town, to a Roman town, to a town under Norman rule, to a medieval town, and so on.

The Roman Museum is actually underground, which was cool. You go down one flight of stairs, then you walk through the exhibits, part of which is a glassed-in area where you can see parts of a Roman house-floor that archaeologists excavated. There are also a lot of hands-on replicas of pottery and building materials. It's always kind of cool to see museum exhibits where you're encouraged to, rather than prohibited from, touching objects on display.

I know it's still a bit early for this, but I've already gotten into the Christmas spirit. I bought a mini fake Christmas tree for our flat yesterday (I won't put it up until at least after Thanksgiving, though) and some festive lights. I've strung the lights along the top of my bookshelves in my room, and it looks very cool. I haven't started singing Christmas carols though. Yet.

Mini Pub Crawl

Hey, everybody! It's been a while since I've posted anything. I've been keeping busy with school and exploring the town. Last week I finished my first two papers for my classes. So now I'm just eagerly awaiting the grades. I hope they don't mark me down for my American spelling/grammar. :P

Last weekend I went to a cool Moroccan restaurant with Sarah and Valentina. The place was great--there were lots of cool lanterns and pillows and stuff. And I think it was probably the best meal I've had since coming here too. It was duck with almonds, raisins, and squash. Yum yum! (Usually, dinner is canned ravioli or a cold-cuts sandwich, so that was definitely a nice change.) And best of all, it was half-price because it was students' night.

A few days ago I went on my first pub crawl. We went to three places in town. (I'm not sure if that counts as a "real" pub crawl--is there a minimum number of pubs you have to go to?) I even got to try a James Bond-style martini. It was actually pretty good. So that was a really fun night too.

Right now, three of my flatmates have visitors (parents and siblings), so things are pretty crowded. The language barrier is a little difficult, since most of them don't speak English. Mostly it's a lot of smiling and hand gestures. Awkward, to be sure, but I'm just choosing to look at it as valuable cultural exposure. Yep, I'm a veritable cultural sponge.

Woooooooohooooo!

It's 5:24 a.m. right now and I'm wide awake. I just spent the night watching the election results with a lot of other students. It was really cool to have everyone gathered around the TV, totally focused on the election and the future US president. I had gone to an election party in Keynes building earlier tonight, but it was too crowded and loud to hear anything. So instead I opted for the smaller TV lounge (which I've recently discovered) in the building next to mine.

It wasn't until 4 o'clock in the morning for us that they announced Barack Obama as the winner. Everyone in the lounge started cheering and high-fiving each other right away. And there were even some people outside who were running back and forth across the car park, yelling and cheering.

I had planned on going to bed at a decent hour and finding out the winner in the morning, but I'm glad I stayed up. It was quite the experience. I especially remember what one girl said right after they announced Obama's victory: "Maybe Americans aren't so backwards after all."

London Again!

I went to London again this past Saturday. It's so amazing there! If I had the money, I think I'd go just about every weekend.

I went back to the British Museum. I wanted to see more of the galleries, since last time I spent most of my time in the Enlightenment Gallery. I spent about 3 and a half hours in there this time, so I had lots of time to wander around. There is so much stuff there! I started out in the Egyptian gallery, and I took pictures of just about everything, but as time went on I started to realize that if I took a picture of everything that looked cool I'd have about 1500 photos.

I got to see Big Ben and the Houses of Parliament too! That was really cool. By that time, though, it was after dark (it gets dark about 4:30 now!) so it was hard to get a good picture. After messing with the camera and taking more than a few blurry pictures, I was able to take a couple good ones of Big Ben from across the River Thames. It was really rainy and windy and I got totally soaked walking around, but it was worth it. Also, it's a real confidence booster that I was able to figure out my own way around London. I'm a total pro at the Underground now too. :D

Alas, I've got two papers due at the end of this week, so I've really got to get cracking. My first one is about the French Revolution's impact on the development of European museums, and the second one is about how contemporary diagnoses of ancient diseases influences our view of that time period. Heavy. Off to the library I go again, then!

London 2