Half way and all is well

Well it is now half way through my stay in this cold but beautiful country. At the moment I am in London after a great Easter break full of snow, cold and starwars. The latter of these was caused by the addition of my seven year old cousin Cameron who is totally starwars mad and thus when an older (and very nerdy) cousin shows up he utilized this event to its fullest extent. I was playing with him for most of the time up there in Berwick (Wooler), Though since it was also lambing season we went out for walks to look at the Views (I give this a capital as they are magic and deserve all the praise they can handle) and as it had lightly snowed (it was cold enough for it to settle) we made a snow man- yes he was only 10 inches tall but he was great!- with buttons from my coat and pound coins for eyes he was ‘special’.

On Monday I had the three hour train journey down to London. Being Easter Monday it was packed, with people stealing other peoples seats left right and center. I sat next to an interesting gentleman who was originally a farmer from Zimbabwe but for the last two years had lived in Devon working on a farm as he could not make a living in his own country. Since the Train had free Wifi I used the time well and looked up places to eat while in London, making a booking into St Johns – a really good English food restaurant. I departed from Kings Cross station – carefully making sure to take a picture of platform 9 and ¾ (yes they have made one). I arrived at the cheap hostel “ashlee house” and found my self pleasantly surprised- it was clean and cheap hurray! It is rare you find both together.

That night I went to the west end of London- Lester Square specifically. I had arrived an hour early to find my bearing and so I did what any self respecting traveler would do – I just walked around randomly and found my feet lead me to china town, there was the smells again but this one was a lot better than Newcastle’s attempt. This one felt used though- mainly by tourists, but still used and alive. It was thirty minuets later I walked out of China town and down a block of shops turned left and found my self staring at the Noel Coward Theater home to the Westend Production of Avenue Q. It was a great show...


But thats enough for now more later on London... tomorrow im off to Dublin with the International group.

Efforts in the past; mean pay offs now

I have just handed in a 2000 word essay which i pulled an all nighter for. I am not proud of the fact that i had to pull an all nighter, but i am proud of the essay. Yet that is not what i wish to talk about.

When i went to hand in the essay at the school of Geo. soc, and pol office (on the 5th floor of a sky scraper) i had forgotten that it was the due date for all dissertations as well- hence a line that meant it was 15 min before i saw the front of the line. I then realised that i did not have a cover sheet for my essssay (i had printed the Geo not politics cover sheet) . The man in fron of me had the same issue and the secretary told him to go to the politcs common room (located 5 min walk away in another building) to get one. I the approached and asked the same question.

Thankfully she handed one over to me. Why may you ask? well when i was enroleing i chatred with the secretarial staff for about 3 hours of the 6 hour ordeal and firstly knew their name by the end of it. but the next day i bought them a box of chocolate as way of saying thanks. This in turn has made my life a lot easier with them. Hence today has been a lot more stress free as a result. Hence; if you want to get ahead buy the secretaries chocolate. (The academics may think they have the power but we know different!)

Radio and accent

I have just been on Newcastle Student radio (http://nsr.unionsociety.co.uk/) with my swing dance teacher Lloyd. oh it was a barrel of fun.

now i have to learn to say this in a cockney accent without taking a breath-

"Cor blimey lummey lawks strike a light and no mistake do what John more thanmy job's worth knock it on the head up the old Kent Road, 'ow's ya father, down the apples and pears I don't squeal to no rossers you're'aving a laugh ai't ya? Where's me whelks you muppet!"

tara for now
~c

Economcs teachers and styles

I have 2 lecturers in Economics this semester at Newcastle Uni. Both of them are great and passionate teachers- though both have different styles.

For Risk Economics i have M.W. Jones-Lee. Who for me is really a stereotype of an old school lecturer,(in a very good way) he has great dignity about him (he wears a waistcoat) and really get discussions in class moving with stats ("how much would you be willing to be payed to increase your risk of death from 1 in 1000 to 1in 100?") And for him its the concepts that you need to get a hold of he dosn't rush and its great being in lectures where everybody want to know what is being taught.

While for Information economics i am taught by F. Kiraly, a Hungarian lecturer who really knows his stuff and expects you to as well (and by Gorge im trying!) His lecture style is very similar to Dr Barreto's and one of his favorite phrases for Pareto optimality is "what would Stalin do" which i originally found amusing but is now quite useful as a learning aid. He sometimes goes off topic in a major way such as talking about rammstein or insurance policy and lung cancer. but you have to be quick and follow where he's going as its always a busy lecture. I digress

i have no idea why i'm typing this but i'm trying really hard to lean this stuff this semester and for the most part i'm succeeding. i hope i do well.

Hadrians wall- the long and the short of it

On saturday last weekend i went with a group of International students to the nice little town of Corbridge; which is a fair walk to Hadrian's wall.
At 9:30 we boarded the bus and soon green hillsides were taking the place of the bleak industrial landscape of the north country. at 10 we got off the bus and realized that we did to have a very good map of the area so i headed to the nearest petrol station of a survey map; well worth the 1 pound fifty.

The weather was brilliant (about 15 with a strong breese) with blue skies and a rainbow guiding us to our first stop which was not the wall but in a westerly direction; a huge old roman villa ruins. When we got there however it cost 3 pound to get in and being the thrifty students that we are; we decided to continue. It was a good walk and by 12 we had reached the halfway point crossing some great country side and nearly walking into a bulls paddock (one of our party was wearing a bright red jacket so we could of had a decoy) and many other adventures. By 1pm we go to an abby and stopped for a picnic of bread, cheese, apples, raspberries and batturnburg cake (jasper fford readers take note) now from the abby we could etither do another 3 hours of walking on a nice hike back to Corbridge or try for a 5 hour hike to the wall and back. Now in answer to this conundrum the skies suddenly over cast, the wind picked up and it started to rain- just like traditional English weather. Hence we chose the shorter of the two and headed back over hills and thought a great little forest in which the path had turned to mud.

An amusing event on the walk back was with the rain pelting all around we were talking about life and some how we got on to the subject of tango. Saara(the aforementioned Finnish girl in the red jacket) and I both do this at the Newcastle Uni Tango society, and some how we were asked/ made to show ppl what we do. so out in the pouring rain and howling wind on a steep hillside we danced for about 20 seconds and then collapsed laughing. due to the nature of the situation.

We got to the Corbridge pub at 4ish and had hot bowls of soup and warmed up. I was lucky- my Dry-za-bone had kept my torso and upper body dry but my lower half was soaked thought- some of my traveling companions had just brought hoodies with them.

Anyway we got back to the city after a sleepy bus ride. I raced to Henderson Hall to eat dinner (Yorkshire puddings and gravy with banana custard for dessert) have a warm shower and change into a bit better clothing and went out to a swing dance night at the Jazz cafe. I was discussing what i had done that day with the swingers (don't ask) and Lloyd the head swing teacher replied "why did you go so far? you know that the street this cafe is on is built on Hadrian's walls ruins? Thats why it weaves thought this city."

So in the end i did reach the wall but not in the manner i expected. This city is big and old and i keep on discovering its secrets.



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