Now that I have settled in back at home, and most of my unpacking is done, I am finally realizing that my time in Cambridge has come to an end (I might have been in denial for the past couple days…)

The last week in Cambridge really went by like a blink of an eye. I remember working on a lot of school work, and hoping I had more time to spend outside (so an advice to the future Cambridge groups: start your Art History portfolio as soon as it’s handed out to you!), trying to frantically figure out if I had bought souvenirs for everyone I needed to, and putting off packing as much as I could.

After getting everything off my shoulders, I spent my time walking around Cambridge many times. I walked to the market almost everyday to see if there was anything new. I walked through streets with pretty Christmas lights. I walked to the mall and in the stores where I wish I could buy things, but could not afford (Darn being a college student!). I went into random stores in the streets and found some very cute things as well as creepy naked Barbie looking dolls. Overall, I tried to take in the atmosphere of the city centre as much as I could.
After numerous trips there this semester, I can still imagine in my mind the way to get to the city centre. Walking out of the centre, walking through the street past the hand washing car place, past the castle hill, walking through an area with small shops, the crossroad that took me almost the entire semester to be able to cross, the street that gets much narrower, walking across the punting bridge, being asked by the punters if I want to take their tour, walking past the round church, more stores, and finally reaching the city centre. Even if it is a 20 minute walk to get to the city centre, it was never a boring walk. I hope I will always remember the scenery that I saw walking there and to all of the other places that I have adventured to.
There are SO many other things that I hope I will always remember too. I will never forget how green the grasses were. I will never forget the beautiful buildings filled with history and memories from many, many people. I will never forget the interesting stories – such as the Eagle pub which has drawings on the ceiling by the American soldiers from the second World War, or the ghost that lives on the top floor of the pub and the windows are always open because of it.

I’ve also made great memories with the people there. Talking to a doctor who wanted to become a child surgeon so that he could save the lives of children, which was a great inspiration to me. Seeing a guy whom I had met during one of my first couple weeks there and him still remembering me when I coincidentally saw him again during my last week there. Being able to hang out with students who go to Cambridge University and hearing their lives as students – who go to the number one ranked school (They sure sounded like geniuses!).

This semester has also helped me take a step closer to becoming an independent adult. I learned how to cook, clean well, and go grocery shopping on a low budget (it sure prepared me to become a better wife!). It made me realize that I would definitely want to come to Europe again and strengthened my desire to work internationally. It exposed me to different cultures and how I can adjust to them. It also helped me strengthen my mentality towards certain things and beliefs of my values. I learned how much I love meeting new people and making connections. But the biggest thing I learned is that there is SO much out in the world that I have yet to see and experience.
The mountains, lakes, towns, buildings, grasses, plants – everything I saw was absolutely beautiful and stunning. There were breathtaking moments that I will always keep in my heart.

And a special shout out to my C-90 group. I loved how we were a small group of 10, and that allowed us to become close with pretty much all of each other. There were people in my group that I probably wouldn’t have met at Valpo and am so happy to have had the opportunity to become so close with. I can say that I’ve had special moments with pretty much every member in my group and will treasure those moments. It’s weird to think that we won’t be living together when we return to Valpo next semester, but I’m hoping for reunions where we can talk about this amazing semester that we experienced together. Thank you, C-90, because my experience would not have been the same without you guys (:

Also a big thank you to Cambridge and the program for everything this semester. I cannot be more thankful for all of the experiences I had and am so happy to have made this life changing experience.
Everyone says that studying abroad is an experience of a lifetime…and now, I can truly say that for myself!

Thank you again, Cambridge (:

Until next time…
Cheers!

Aya

Our first weekend in England!

And our last week in England - Merry Christmas!

Now let me tell you, when I first heard the news that the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge were coming to Cambridge for the first time since their marriage, I literally squealed out loud. I mean, who wouldn’t? This is Prince William and Kate that we are talking about! Yes, I was one of those girls who sighed as I watched the Royal Kiss and hoped to have a prince for myself one day. (But I mean, let’s be real…I’m pretty serious!)

The entire Cambridge community was also excited to hear this news and it was on the newspaper for days. Finally it was revealed where they were going to be and what they would be doing. We had classes this day, but thankfully after working things out we were able to make it out to the city centre where William and Kate were going to be waving to the crowd.
On the morning of November 28th, I woke up extra early for classes. I couldn’t contain my excitement. I brought everything I needed to my classes so that I can peace out as soon as class ended; which is exactly what I did.
All of C-90 walked as fast as we could to the market square, and there were already so many people there. After waiting patiently for about 30 minutes, they finally came out!
I couldn’t believe that I was seeing a real life prince and princess with my bare eyes!

There they are!

The entire crowd cheered with excitement and many were yelling out their names. This was probably the most spirited I have seen of the people here!

The handsome Duke and the beautiful Duchess

Duchess Kate is known for her great sense of fashion and I’ve heard that the girls here love it and it was so true! There was a group of girls near me and I heard them mentioning many times how cute her ankle boots were and that they wanted it. They also couldn’t get enough of her coat. And I do have to say, her outfit was very classy and I loved it too!
A couple other girls and I tried moving towards an area that we thought they might walk past. This was the closest I got to Prince William!

Hello Prince William!

He was quite a handsome man! One of the girls in C-90 were able to shake hands with him and I couldn’t have been more jealous! She definitely was a lucky one.
One of the great things besides actually being able to see William and Kate was to see how many people were there and how excited everyone was. It was so nice seeing an entire town come together and celebrate this historical moment. It was such a memorable experience for me as well and I was thrilled to be a part of this Cambridge history. This was definitely a once in a lifetime experience and although I was jealous of my friend for being able to shake Prince William’s hand, I knew that I was also very lucky to be able to have this experience. Who else can say that they have studied abroad and was able to see the country’s prince? I do hope though, that they will be coming back more often after this time, and the future Cambridge groups will also have opportunities to see them as well!

Cheers until next time!

On a side note, it was released a couple days after this visit that Kate is pregnant with her first baby. So this means that we were able to see William, Kate, AND the future heir to the throne! haha. Definitely a cool experience.

I’m sure everyone knows about the Cinderella/Princess Castle that’s in Disney World and Disneyland, right?
Well, there is a castle called the Neuschwanstein Castle that is located in Fussen, Germany which is what the Cinderella castle was based off of. Being a huge Disney fan that I am, seeing this castle has been on my bucket list for as long as I can remember. Going to see this princess castle was one of the things that I knew I had to do while I was abroad and it finally became a reality the weekend after Thanksgiving.

Holly and I flew over to Munich, Germany which is about two hours away from the castle. During our first night there, we adventured around the city centre of Munich. It was night time, but there were many Christmas lights that lit up the city beautifully!

We were also able to see a gorgeous night view of the New Town Hall, which essentially is a HUGE clock tower. The way that the light was shining on it made it absolutely beautiful.

There were Christmas markets all around the area of the New Town Hall. Sadly, they were all closed at this time so we were only able to see the stands and people starting to close up any remaining stands. But all of the stands had Christmas decorations and it was still very fun to walk through the streets.
One thing that caught our attention was this huge display at a mall. The mall had a stuffed animal store inside it, so it was a display of many, many animals celebrating the Christmas season! It was absolutely adorable and I wished I could take them all home with me…or even better, I wish I could have that display at home! This was probably hands down the cutest display that I have ever seen and it looked like a lot of effort went into it! Here are a couple pictures I took:

Little bears making a snowman!

Look how cute they are (:

At this point, I hadn’t seen a whole bunch of Christmas decorations at Cambridge yet, so this definitely put me into the Christmas spirit. There were so many people there looking at the display and taking pictures; many of them were happy, little children! It made me really happy to see that this display brought out so many smiles on people walking down the street. I wish the States had intricate mall displays like these!

The following day was dedicated to the castle: the day that I have been waiting for (:
We took a train down to Fussen, Munich, and then a bus right to the bottom of the Alps mountain where the castle stands.
It was a very pleasant hike up to the castle. Nothing too difficult, but it wasn’t just flat, boring roads either. I was hoping for some snow, which we didn’t see, but most of the leaves that were on the mountains were red and yellow and colored the mountains beautifully.

View from the walk to the castle!

As we neared closer to the castle, I was almost hyperventilating from excitement (a little dramatic, I know).
We finally made it to the top, and the castle was everything that I hoped for. It really was just like the Cinderella castle at Disney and I could really tell that it was modeled off of this.

I was so happy to see it up close, but I also wanted to see the view that I’ve seen in pictures. I knew there had to be a way to get up there, and while Holly and I went inside the castle grounds and looked out to the beautiful view, we found it:

The bridge!

So our next task was to find how to get to the bridge since it seemed like it was on the other end of this part of the mountain. It wasn’t too difficult though, since we realized that there were a bunch of people heading the same direction. On the way to the bridge, we were able to see some great views. This was a more rural area, compared to Munich, and it was very beautiful in its own way.

There aren’t mountains in Cambridge (the biggest “lump” of land we have is the Castle Hill, which really is just a hill) so it’s a nice change seeing such big mountains. Not to mention, they are just beautiful. If I had more time here, I would loved to have gone hiking. But our nice, little hike up to the castle and to the bridge will have to do for this time!
Finally arriving at the bridge, it took me a lot of courage to walk on it, but it was definitely worth it. Here is the castle of my dreams!

Hello, Neuschwanstein Castle (:

Aaaaaand crossing that off my bucket list (:

I could not have been more thrilled to see the castle of my dreams. Being abroad gave me the opportunity for me to accomplish something that I have always wanted to do and I am so thankful for that. This was the last out-of-England trip that I made, and it was a great way to start wrapping up the semester. After traveling to Italy, Ireland, and Germany this semester, it strongly encouraged my desire to come back to Europe one day again. Next time, I will know exactly the places that I want to go to but will also be willing to see new things as well. Flying (and taking the ferry!) is right under my belt, and I’ve become a much more confident traveler 🙂 Maybe backpacking throughout Europe will become a reality one day in the near future!

Until next time,

Cheers!

So here is part 2!

On Sunday (the last day of our trip), we went to see Stonehenge and the Windsor Castle.
It was the perfect day for Stonehenge and I could not have been more blessed! The sun was shining bright on them and it seemed mystical and almost magical. I don’t think even words could describe how beautiful it looked so let me just show you a gallery of pictures!

Okay, so maybe I lied and it won’t let me upload a lot of pictures because they are too beautiful and high def. But, you do get the picture, right? It was an absolutely stunning day! I think this is one of the very few moments where my camera captured the complete beauty of the moment that is being taken.
The Stonehenge seems to remain a mystery on how and why it was created, but after my observations I have decided that each of those “tunnels” lead you to another dimension like Narnia, the Enchanted Forest from Once Upon A Time, or Hogwarts… I really wish!
Leaving my fantasies behind, it really was such a great and iconic thing to see and I was very glad to be able to experience that.

After Stonehenge we left for our final destination: the Windsor Castle.

What was really awesome about the Windsor Castle was that it is still used by the Royal family today. I was really hoping to casually bump into Queen Elizabeth, but sadly that did not happen. However I did get to see very neat things such as the Dollhouse display and the inside of the castle.
The dollhouse display had miniature furniture for every room! They were all so well made I couldn’t believe it. If I were a size of a thumb, I could definitely live there. Apparently the light and water actually work inside the dollhouse, so really, I actually COULD live there if I was like tiny Tom!
The inside of the castle was of course amazingly beautiful as always. Everything is so intricate and delicate. It’s always hard to believe that a human being was able to create such a thing! It’s really amazing to realize how skillful a person can be. I really wish I can show some pictures but they don’t allow pictures inside so I guess the only way you’ll be able to see it is if you join the Cambridge program or go see the Windsor Castle yourself (:

Castles weekend was something that I have been looking forward to since I signed up for the program and I can’t believe that it all happened so quickly. I loved every moment of it though and it got me excited for the following weekend that I had planned: a trip to Germany to see the Neuschwanstein Castle! This was one of the things I’ve wanted to do for a very, very long time and will give you the full details next time!

Until then,

Cheers!

As I mentioned in the previous blog post, last weekend was our last group trip – Castles Weekend!!
This was the trip that was the determining factor between choosing this program and one other program so it was a pretty big deal for me.
Our destinations included: Conventry Cathedral, Warwick Castle, Stratford Upon Avon, Bath, Stonehenge, and Windsor Castle.
Although I had to wake up at 5:30am on a Friday morning, needless to say, I was absolutely ready for it.

Friday, as I just said, started pretty early…when it was still pretty dark outside.
We arrived at the Coventry Cathedral around 9am. This was a really neat cathedral and one that was different than all of the other ones I have seen in the past. It consisted of 2 buildings; one was the ruins of a cathedral built in the early 15th century, and the other was a new cathedral built around the 1950s.
The older one, was bombed during World War II and is the reason why it remains as ruins – to hold the memory in place.

the ruins

Notice the row of benches in the picture, and if you take a closer look at one of them (which I can’t upload the picture of it for some reason :/) it says “Valparaiso University U.S.A. February 1964”. So Valpo must’ve donated to this Coventry Cathedral for its rebuilding! Isn’t that neat? It was great seeing a part of Valpo in England.

The light coming through from the glass windows were absolutely beautiful! Especially because the sun rays were at the perfect angle in the morning. It was great seeing two parts of history in one place.

All of our group at the Cathedral!

But the next destination was something that I was really looking forward to: a castle!

Our first castle that we headed to was Warwick Castle. I had the impression that it was going to be just be a regular castle, so I was really surprised to see how touristy it was built to be.

This is the view from the walls that were surrounding the castle. Walking along the wall was very fun, although we climbed almost 600 steps to get to the top of it! The staircases and doorways throughout the walls were really small, and even I felt a bit confined going through it. It really shows how much smaller the people used to be several hundred years ago. Good thing that population started becoming taller throughout the years! …except I might that missed that boat.
Another thing that was really neat about this castle was that it had a “King’s making” attraction that showed what the King’s servants did behind the scenes. The wax figures looked very realistic, and they made me jump a couple of times. There was a wax horse that looked really real, and it’s tail moved all of a sudden which made me definitely startled. They were all really well made.

Servants making weapons.

We were also able to see a WHOLE bunch of peacocks, and I’ve never been so close to a peacock in my life!
They were really pretty, but much larger than I expected and were quite intimidating to be honest.
But while they were perched up on the benches and resting, they were a really nice sight.

After the Warwick Castle, we drove to Stratford Upon Avon, and went to see the house that William Shakespeare grew up in.
It was a nice, small house, but with lots of rooms. It was really amazing to be standing in the house of a historically famous person who lived there a few hundred years ago.
That same night we went to see a play at the Royal Shakespeare Company. The outside was different, but the inside looked almost exactly like the Globe Theatre in London. It was a great experience to be able to see both the Globe Theatre and the Royal Shakespeare Company. A nice little deja vu!

The following morning, we headed to Bath to see the Roman Baths.
Now the Roman Baths has a LONG line of history. It was first found during the pre-Roman period and the water was thought to be able to heal. That tradition still exists today and visitors come to drink the water from the fountain.
Our group was able to drink some of that water. When we were first offered it by the tour guide, I was very excited. I had been pretty thirsty all morning so this was going to be a great thirst quencher, especially if it had the ability to heal and make me really healthy, right? Well I was wrong. It’s true that it’s healthy but the water was warm, first of all, so it wasn’t very pleasant to drink. It also tasted faintly like blood, which I found out later was because there’s some iron in the water.

Look at the heat waves!

The rest of the day was spent in Bath, and I loved the town! It was a very cute, typical English-looking town. I just can’t get over how adorable the towns are here.

Pretty lights!

Most of the town was already in Christmas season (as am I!) and the lights were so cute!
We also saw the Royal Crescent, and saw a beautiful sunset.

So that was Bath, and it was just splendid.

I realized that this post has gotten pretty long and I don’t want to bore you, so I will post a separate entry for Stonehenge and Windsor Castle. I have LOTS of stunning pictures from Stonehenge so stay tuned!

Cheers!

I don’t know if any of you knew me at Valpo, but I’d like to consider myself a studious student (:
This meant that I spent hours on end at the wonderful Christopher Center Library, which maybe you have seen me at.
Now I’m the type of person who gets pretty lonely doing homework by myself, so I like to surround myself with people when I’m working on things, even if they’re strangers (weird study tactic, I know).
So discovering that there is a public library in the city centre of Cambridge was a grade saver for me.
I have visited the library at least once or twice a week, and although it’s a 20 minute long walk, it’s never a chore.

As I decided to walk to the library today to get some papers done, I thought, why not share my little walk to the library with everyone? It’s actually quite pleasant. So this is my tour of Cambridge: the library version.

Walking out of the doors of the centre, it is immediately a bigger road. I keep following the road and as usual, see the hand wash car washing place (usually has some pretty good looking chaps there, for you ladies!). Then I cross the road, which is actually a struggle for me since I am not very used to the pedestrians not being yielded like in the States. Those cars will be pretty angry at you if you try to take over the road.
Then I continue following the sidewalk for a bit, passing a couple restaurants/bars, the castle mound, a few more shops. I reach the bridge at this point, which I always love watching the punts. I can’t imagine going punting in cold weather, but there are always people there!
As soon as I walk across the bridge, the livelier part of town starts showing. There are a lot of people walking, stores and restaurants everywhere, and a lot of huge buses. Not to mention bicycle users EVERYWHERE! I mentioned this in an earlier post, but bikes are a very used form of transportation here than compared to the US.

Look at all of those bikes that are parked there!

Once I’m walking on the street you can see above, I know that I’m close to the city centre. In the middle of the city centre, I usually hear performers singing or playing instruments. Today, I decided to take a little detour and drop by the market.

So many of them!

The market is open every day until 5 pm. It has so many shops with a huge variety of materials. Some have typical things like clothes and accessories. But there are some really creative ones like accessories made from materials inside a clock, or wine holders made from aluminum. There are markets all around Europe, (or at least the places I’ve been to so far) and I always love seeing the creative inventions that are made.
Here is another view of the market.

After strolling through the market, I turned the corner down to a street and entered the Lion Yard mall. This is a really neat mall because although it is technically not an outdoors mall, the ceiling is so high and open that it feels like it.
Surprisingly, this is where the library is at. Yep, inside a mall!

You might think it’s pretty small considering it being inside a mall, but it’s actually quite large and cozy. It also has 3 stories!
There’s plenty of tables and chairs, although most times that I’ve been there it’s been pretty occupied. I guess the English people must like to utilize their public libraries!
There’s always a broad range of people there. I see older people reading newspapers or working on crosswords, and sometimes I would see kids who look like they are in middle school. Of course a majority seem to be students and adults but there are times when I see a bunch of adorable children too.
It’s really a comfortable environment to get work done and is a nice way to get out of the centre sometimes.
For those of you planning or thinking of coming to Cambridge, I would highly recommend using this library! Getting a library card is free (:
Well, I hope you guys enjoyed my “tour” to the library and the next time you hear from me will probably be about the Castles Weekend. I can’t wait for it!!

Cheers!

This past week was my second break and what did I decide to do last minute? Yes, go to Ireland.
Ireland was a country that I really wanted to go to this fall, but looking at my budget for the rest of the semester, I wasn’t quite sure if I could squeeze it in.
But it was probably the best last minute decision I have made, and I am SO glad to have done it!

One of our C-90 group members Holly and I decided that we’ll do a random travel – not have anything specific planned but just do what we want to do at that moment.
It was a great plan at the start, but we did realize later that maybe we should have done a little more thinking when we did our hostel bookings…something to keep in mind for future travelers!

Our journey started off early in the morning since we wanted to take the ferry to Ireland. We took trains up to Northern Wales where our ferry port was. We were able to see some great views of Wales on the way! The ferry was very nice too; I wouldn’t mind cruising for a few weeks on this ferry!

After about a 3 hour ride, we arrived in Dublin. Dublin wasn’t a huge interest to either of us, so it was just a stop on the way until we headed for Galway the next morning.

And let me tell you, Galway was absolutely AMAZING. I think that it could be one of my favorite towns that I have been to so far, with Venice and Cambridge as close seconds.
I don’t know exactly what it was about it, maybe it was the Irish spirit, but even just walking around town not doing so much was enjoyable.

Our hostel that we stayed at was very welcoming too. The staff were really friendly and the accommodations were great! We met and chatted with our roommates who were visiting their friend studying in Galway. They were from France!
It gave us a bunch of options that we could look into during our stay in Galway. We decided that on the first night, we would go on the pub crawl, and on the second day take the tour to Cliffs of Moher.

The pub crawl wasn’t necessary as crazy as I thought it might be (but maybe that’s because we weren’t partying with the Irish!), but Holly and I had a great time. We met a group of three, who graduated school recently and were traveling before going into grad school, or into the horrifying “real world”. It was nice talking to Americans and hearing their stories on why they were traveling.
(I don’t know if any of you guys reading this are Glee fans, but one of those guys looked like a brunette version of Cameron Mitchell from the first season of The Glee Project. I am a huge Glee fan, and of course, I was thrilled with that.)
The pub crawl ended at a club, which I was pretty excited about. As I went to the club though, I realized that the music was different from the ones that I have been used to at Cambridge. Cambridge clubs tend to play mostly music similar to what we Americans listens to. There are a couple British songs, but most of them I can recognize. But this club in Galway, had maybe two or three songs that I knew during the hour or so that I was there. We came to the conclusion later that the Irish like American music that was popular in the 80s and 90s. So any Americans travelers around their 40s-50s will probably have a blast at these clubs!

The next morning we went on the tour to Cliffs of Moher with our two French roommates.
The tour guides we had – on the bus and when we went on a little hike – both knew exactly what they were talking about. I love the fact that it is actually fun to learn about the things they were telling us because they have so much passion in their history that they want to share. What I liked about Ireland in general was how much Irish are proud of their culture and history. They want to continue to remember and pass down that history which gives them their identity. And you can really tell how much pride they have. I think that’s what makes the Irish spirit so special.
Our tour headed to Cliffs of Moher with a couple stops on the way, such as the Burrens and a little town called Doolin. But I do have to say that the Cliffs of Moher was my favorite destination out of them all. Although it was absolutely terrifying to stand so close to an edge that was unbelievably high, the beauty was haunting.

There are a few films that have been filmed here too. I’m a huge Harry Potter fan so hearing that a scene in the Half-Blood Prince was filmed here (the part where Harry and Dumbledore go into the cave to destroy the horcrux) got me really excited.
I also watched Leap Year right before going to Ireland, and the proposal scene was filmed here as well. And for those of you Princes Bride fans, this was “The Cliffs of Insanity”!

The tour was about 7 hours and it was a great opportunity for us to be able to see some major sites. It was only about 18 euros (about 23 euros) so I would highly recommend it to anyone thinking of going to Ireland. Which I think everyone should do anyway (:

I mean, just look how beautiful it is!

Although we were pretty tired from the tour, it was Halloween so we figured we needed to go out in town this night. We decided to go out with the French roommates and their friend studying in Galway. As we walked into the city centre, all 5 of us were astounded by how CRAZY it was. It was nothing like I’ve seen before! Everywhere I looked there were people dressed in costumes; it seemed like EVERYONE was dressed up!
None of us knew that Halloween was such a significant event in Ireland and we were bummed that none of us had costumes. But it’s the spirit that matters, right?
We had a great night going to a pub and a club (this time with more music that I actually knew!) and met a couple Irish people!
It was definitely a very memorable Halloween.

This Ireland trip feels special to me because of the connections that I made with other people. Since it was only Holly and I traveling together, it might’ve been easier for other people to approach us and for us to join with others. It’s weird to think that I probably won’t see any of the people that I met this past week ever again, but having that experience and time spending together with someone from another country is such a great perk of being abroad.
I think that this was a great experience, and I am definitely convinced that I will be returning to Ireland – hopefully sometime in the near future!

Last Friday, one of my C-90 mates, Angela and I decided to use our 3 day weekend as an advantage and went on a day trip to York!

Traveling wasn’t bad at all. It took us about 2.5 hours and we only had to switch trains once.
The first thing I noticed as we got there was that it was super COLD!
Cambridge had still been in the high 50s – 60s, so we haven’t experienced anything really cold yet.
I thought that wearing a blazer would be fine but I ended being cold the entire day that day.
I should’ve known, since York was much more north than us…I’ll keep this in time for next time I decide to travel up north!

That was the only bad thing though. York was a pretty small town and it was a great place to come for a mini day trip.
From the train station, we walked across a bridge, which showed a beautiful view, and we were already pretty much in the city centre.
There was a beautiful cathedral that Angela climbed up and got this beautiful view of.

A lot of the buildings were made of bricks, which I love! I feel like brick buildings can even make a simple strip mall look pretty darn cool (:

(like this!)

There were a bunch of market places here too. It seems to be a trend in the UK in general!
They always have so much variety with “stores” in these market places. This time I saw things from vegetables, to clothing, to books, to handcrafted decorations, and even pet things!

I think that there must’ve been a field trip to come to York this day because I saw so many children in uniforms.
Seeing them wearing little uniforms was adorable!

These were children probably around 2-3rd grade, but I even saw some kids that looked like they were 3 or 4 wearing the same uniforms, except tiny versions. It was absolutely adorable!

My favorite part though was probably walking on the city wall, which was built way back in the day. I don’t remember when exactly the wall was built, but it was restored in 1889, so must’ve been built even before that!
It wrapped most of York, and would have been quite a walk if we had walked the entire wall.
We just did about 2 km but the view from the wall was great!

(part of what the wall looked like)

We ended our day by going into a garden that was beautiful. The sun was starting to set, which was a great view for us.

(you can see me sitting on the bench!)

It was a long day of walking in the cold weather, but overall it was a great experience.
York was a small, but very homey and cute, town and it was a great way to spend a relaxing day.
Hopefully this prepared me to be able to do day trips on my own because that’s what I’m planning on doing for our upcoming week of fall break!
My plan is to visit castles all around the UK, and I can’t wait because I absolutely love castles. Not to mention that I booked my flight to go to Munich, Germany to see the Fairytale castle for the end of November. SUPER EXCITED! (:

One more week of midterms until the long awaited fall break. At least that gives me motivation to work hard on my school work!

Those 3 words were probably used a billion times during my 6 day trip to Italy last week.
Now let me just tell you, Italy was absolutely amazing!
I didn’t realize though, that English was not very prominent in Verona where 2 other group members and I decided to stay at.
We learned Ciao pretty quickly since we heard it everywhere. It’s neat that it can be used both as hello and good bye. How convenient is that?

I personally was a little spoiled in thinking that I would only need to know ciao (hello/bye), scusi (excuse me), and grazie (thank you) in order to make it through my week just fine – I had assumed that English would be pretty well spoken there.
I was wrong.
As soon as we got to our B&B where we stayed for 4 nights, we realized our assumption was wrong. The B&B was more like experiencing a stay with a host family. It was a large, beautiful home owned by an old Italian couple. And they spoke barely any English. This was a problem to us since the city centre of Verona was actually about a 25 minute car ride away and we couldn’t figure out how to get there at first. However, the couple were such sweethearts (we decided to call them our host grandpa and host grandpa amongst ourselves!) and they appreciated every effort we made in speaking Italian.

The first night that we flew in to Italy, we were all so exhausted that we didn’t do a whole a lot. But on the second day there, we had planned to take a day trip to Venice! At the Verona train station, we met up with 3 other more members of our C-90 group and all 6 of us headed to Venice together. Being in Venice was a bit more of a relief since the language barrier wasn’t as big here. Most shopkeepers came up to talk to us in English, and flatter us so that we will buy their things haha. None of us had specific monuments or buildings that we wanted to see in Venice; we all just wanted to wonder around and take it all in. And Venice was just absolutely beautiful. It really is a town that’s floating on water, and the houses are all so colorful and adorable!

I’m not a huge fan of tourist-y areas, but Venice gave you the feeling of home but at the same time it was a complete foreign place. It really was a magical time being there!

On the second and third days, we spent it in Verona.
The bus system from our B&B (Negrar, Italy) to Verona was very confusing and we didn’t really understand it during our entire stay there. But we did figure out how to get to Verona’s city centre so that was a relief. Verona was also another adorable city. It didn’t seem as ancient as Venice, but still had the look of having long history behind it. Although the buildings were older, there was a main street with lots of modern stores, mostly for clothing and accessories. Those were definitely fun to window shop at (:

A group of us decided to go see a castle on top of a hill, and the view was absolutely beautiful! It was a long way up, but definitely worth it. Not to mention we also got a little bit of nice, warm sun!

On our 4th morning, we bid adieu (or ciao in our case) to our host grandparents to head to Florence. Even though we didn’t get to have long conversations with them, we were able to communicate in bits and pieces and that was such a great feeling. Going to a country not knowing the language, but still being able to connect to someone can bring such happy feelings!
I decided to travel to Florence by myself while the group left a little bit before me because of train situations. It was only traveling by train, but it was a great feeling traveling by myself in a foreign country. The other group members made sure I was okay, and we met up once I got to Florence. Now Florence was a little different that Venice and Verona. It has a bit more contemporary feel to it. The buildings looked a bit different and there were many more English speaking people. My highlight in Florence was probably seeing the duomo. There were so many intricate details on the building I couldn’t even imagine someone creating it.

I only spent about 3 hours there but it was great. That night we headed to Pisa, our final destination.
On our final day, we spent the day in Pisa. Of course we had to go see the Leaning Tower. And it really was leaning! I didn’t realize this, but there were also 2 other church related buildings right next to the leaning tower.

We were all pretty tired this day since we had to carry around our heavy backpacks. There was a nice patch of green grass next to the leaning tower of Pisa and we decided to take an advantage of that and laid out and enjoyed the almost 80s weather. I’d like to think that I was able to get a bit of tan on! The weather was absolutely beautiful and it was such a great moment and the best way to end our amazing week at Italy.

I was able to see some beautiful buildings, views, and adorable houses during my trip and also learn the struggles of a language barrier which was a great experience for me. I enjoyed every minute of my stay in Italy and I definitely want to go back again! Next time, I will hopefully know a little more Italian though (:

Cheers until next time!

Aya

It’s hard to believe that our C-90 group has already been here at Cambridge, England for over a month. Wow, time flies!

So far during this month, we have gone on 2 big group trips to London, and the Lake District. Both of these trips were splendid and of course, I took a lot of pictures 🙂

London was really all an awe. The only negative impression that I got was that there were SO many people there. Everywhere you go, there’s people, people, and more people! That got a little tiring. But what can you say, it’s London! Other than that, it was really neat seeing landmarks that I have only seen on TV before. We saw the London bridge, the London eye, and – the main entree – the Big Ben. The Big Ben really impressed me because there were so many delicate details throughout the building that you can’t really catch from looking at a picture. We spent a total of 2 and a half days there but it wasn’t enough and I know that I definitely want to go visit there again sometime this semester!

Our second trip to the Lake District was probably my favorite out of the two. I have actually never heard of it before so it was almost like a blind date, waking up from a coach bus after a 3 hour drive. As soon as I got off the bus though, I knew this weekend was going to be a blast. I saw mountains beyond mountains, with absolutely no flat lands. We hiked on the first and second days and they were quite an adventure. A lot of us were determined to become friends with the hundreds of sheep we saw, and we all were happy to be taking in vast amounts of super fresh air. On the third day we went to see the Chatsworth House, home to a duke and duchess, and the house was so big! It was also absolutely beautiful.

So those 2 trips were we’re definitely a blast. And in 2 days I’m headed to my first own trip outside the country – Italy! I cannot wait for Italy since its always been a place where I have wanted to go to. Let’s see how romantic this country is!