Below are the pictures of some of the display boards, which I wrote about and promised pictures of in a previous post. The photos do not do the creativity and amount of time it took to complete them justice, but the pictures are yours for the looking at anyway.
This weekend, I pulled off what could quite possibly be one of the biggest surprises of my life, even though my surprisee claimed that he wasn’t that surprised. Since coming to England a little over a month ago, I have not seen any of my family in person, and have only seen other students that I knew from home once. For the past year or so, I have known that my 15 year old brother, Seth, would be on a school trip to Germany during the same time period that I was in England, and I had planned for about that long to surprise him while he was there. After communications with Seth’s German teacher (who also used to be mine), and struggling to find a flight time that would work for me and my school schedule, I booked my tickets and made a plan to surprise my brother at the Cologne Cathedral. I arrived at the cathedral a little before Seth’s school group got there, and waited anxiously for them to appear. Unfortunately, Seth got his first glimpse of me before I could get my camera ready, but I heard him say “That’s my sister!” and even managed to capture him on camera with the biggest smile on his face after seeing me – I could tell by his reaction that he genuinely wasn’t expecting to see me there, and that he was happy that I was there. I actually was somewhat worried that he wouldn’t want me tagging along in the city with him all day.
After being reunited with my brother, we took a walk through the cathedral and then climbed the 500-600, uneven, narrow, spiral stairs up to the top of the cathedral, which is something that I had vowed four years prior that I would never, under any circumstances, do again. But, I knew that this was a once in a lifetime opportunity with my brother, and I wanted to make sure I took it. After our trip to the top of the cathedral, we walked around the city, going into a few shops, eating breads and ice cream from street vendors, and spending time catching up after not seeing each other for a month. Then, we went to the Lindt Chocolate Museum, which, honestly, was pretty underwhelming the second time around. (Like the cathedral, I have been there before.) But, I would not have traded the opportunity to spend that time with my brother for anything.
As odd as it may seem, in the moment, it was just another typical day with my brother – we just happened to be in a different place than normal. But, after saying goodbye, which was literally one of the hardest goodbyes of my life, and thinking more about what I had just done, I realized how amazing this experience was. Not only did I get to spend a little bit of time with my brother, but I got to spend time with my brother in a foreign country – a country for which we had both studied the language, and a country which I have come to love and didn’t know if I would ever get to visit again. I got to climb up to the top of one of the world’s most famous cathedrals and have that experience with my brother by my side. I will never forget that day, and I am extremely glad that I put my reservations about traveling to a foreign country by myself aside and decided to make the trip. It was definitely worth it in my opinion.
I will leave you with a (not so great) picture of Seth and me standing outside the Cologne Cathedral – I was too busy having fun with my brother to worry about getting amazing photographs.
Until next time,
Steph
Seth and me outside the Cologne Cathedral.
So, it has been about a week since I posted, and I have had a lot of blog-worthy things that have happened in the past week. I wanted to write short posts as they were happening, but last week was really crazy, so I didn’t get a chance. Then, I sat down today to write a really long blog post about EVERYTHING that has happened in the past week, and after two hours of writing and editing, I saved a draft, and none of it actually saved, so back to square one. I don’t want to spend as much time on this post, so I apologize if this post isn’t that detailed. However, I do have quite a few things to share. 1. Display Boards Last week, I was charged with the task of creating display boards that showcased the work of Year 6 students. These display boards are large poster boards that are very detailed and basically look like a giant, high quality scrapbook page. I was supposed to finish 12 within the week, and after 3 whole school days of working on them, along with 4 really artistic students, I had finished 6 and started work on the remaining backgrounds. I don’t think I had ever been so sick and tired of doing crafts and seeing glue sticks in my entire life. The girls that I had helping me were very creative and very good at doing what I asked them to do. I could not have gotten as far as I did without them. However, I did not get to finish them because of some unexpected school visitors, which brings me to point number 2. 2. OFSTED OFSTED is a mandatory school inspection that happens in each school in England at least every three years. The school gets a day notice that the inspectors are coming, and the inspectors stay for two days. They observe lessons, talk to and interact with students, staff, and parents, and even looked through student work. It was a very stressful two days, starting out with staying at school until 7:30 p.m. the nigh before the inspectors came, to ensure that everything would be perfect for the next two days. According to the administration, the inspection went pretty well, but they are not allowed to release the official judgement until the report has been published. As someone who has never experienced a school inspection before, I found it incredibly interesting… and tiring. 3. Barcelona! This past weekend, I flew to Barcelona and met up with Stef and Stef – friends from school, who are also completing the same program I am. It was the first time that we had really seen anyone from back home in about a month. Barcelona was amazing! Initially, I wasn’t even really excited to go, but I really enjoyed my time there and am absolutely glad that I went. Before, I had written awesome descriptions of each of the places I really enjoyed, but as this is my second time writing this post, I think I will just show you through pictures.
(Sagrada Familia – Very beautiful. It’s been under construction for over 200 years, and the detail is amazing.)
(Magic Fountain Light Show – One of the coolest things I’ve ever seen.)
(eyescream and friends – the cutest and tastiest ice cream in Barcelona.)
4. Volunteering As part of my program requirements, I have to do some volunteer work in the community that I’m living and teaching. I’m doing my work at a local youth center, and today was my first day. I am helping with a girls only club. Today I was able to talk to and get to know one very bright girl named Carly, and watch quite a few of the others interact with each other. The people at the youth center are all very nice, and I really like it there. Hopefully, I will continue to have a great time volunteering there on Mondays.
Well, I’m going to sign off for now. Hopefully I’ll be able to do more detailed posts for this coming week. -Steph
So, it wasn’t really foggy as the title of this post suggests, it was more of a cloudy day in London. While some people may have been inclined to complain because it wasn’t sunny for their visit to London, I was actually somewhat excited that I got to experience London the way that Michael Buble sings about it. I was only in London for about 5 hours, but I got to see more than I would have thought possible. I still want to go back and spend some more time there, whether it’s before July or on a completely different trip, but I was very pleased with what I was able to see in such a short amount of time.
There were three thoughts I had almost immediately after exiting Victoria Station and taking in my first sights of London (that weren’t from an airplane or very jet lagged eyes in a taxi). First, the theater that Wicked! on the West End plays in is RIGHT THERE, RIGHT THERE! Literally, it was the first thing I saw when I walked out of the train station. I am going to go see it one weekend, but I was excited enough for now just to be able to see the theater. Second, the Buckingham Palace grounds are RIGHT THERE. They may not have been as close to the train station as the theater, but I was surprised with how short of a distance we had to walk before I was actually able to see some of the iconic London sights without traveling too far. Third, London is very crowded! It took me awhile to get used to the sheer amount of bodies that were moving around on the streets and standing in front of the landmarks. I was somewhat surprised that I felt this way, because I have been to Chicago, New York, and Los Angeles, so I thought I knew how busy and crowded large cities could be. However, it felt like there were many more people walking around – or stopping in the middle of the street – in London than there were at some of the busiest times in Times Square New York. That was something I definitely wasn’t expecting.
After I got over the initial shock of the crowded streets, I was ready for a whirlwind sightseeing tour that rivals the speed and efficiency of the contestants on the Amazing Race. In just a short time, I got to see the sights of Buckingham Palace, Piccadilly Circus, Trafalgar Square, Horse Guards Parade, Big Ben and the Parliament, Westminster Abbey, Downing Street, and the London Eye. All of them were amazing, but there are a few that stood out for one reason or another throughout the day.
Buckingham Palace was the first and the last stop on the London Tour. I loved seeing the building and seeing the flag flying stating that the Queen was in residence, even though I didn’t know that until after the fact. But, I was especially enthralled by the guards. Yep, you know the ones with the red coats and the fuzzy hats that stand still and never crack a smile. I stood and watched the guards, looking for any sign of movement, for quite awhile. One of the guards kept raising his heels off of the ground (caught him!), but I also learned that the guards do get to march every 10 minutes or so, so that they do not get too stiff – although I never quite figured out, even after my research, how they know when to march/signal to his partner that it’s time to march. Another cool thing that happened at Buckingham Palace was that we got to see someone with a police escort and a guard in a Land Rover following them, enter the Palace grounds. We don’t know exactly who it was, but we are pretty sure it was someone important.
Big Ben and the Parliament was another sight that I really enjoyed. As my dad is a big fan of National Lampoon’s European Vacation, I’ve spent my entire life hearing “Look kids, Big Ben, the Parliament!” every single time we circled a roundabout. To actually see Big Ben and the Parliament in person was pretty cool. And you better believe I stood on the street corner and videoed myself saying “Look Dad, Big Ben, the Parliament!” to show to my family.
Finally, I really enjoyed seeing the London Eye. Though I didn’t get a chance to ride it, something that’s still on my bucket list, just seeing it in person is something that I consider to be pretty cool. Obviously, I knew it was “really big” before I saw it, but I don’t think that photographs do its size justice. In fact, I don’t think you can truly understand what “really big” means until you’re standing directly under the Eye and you look up and see the size of the people in the cars that are easily bigger than some public restrooms. In all, I would consider the trip to London a huge success, and I can’t wait for the opportunity to go back again.
This week, I am back to the “real world” as Half Term Break is over. About 2/3 of Year 6 is gone to camp this week, so we are letting the remaining students have a lot of independent research time and are doing some fun learning activities. I am also helping one of the teaching assistants put together some display boards of students’ past work to display in a common area in the school. Hopefully I won’t be too tired of cutting, pasting, photocopying, and being creative by the end of this week.
Until next time,
Steph
Cup of Tea-ching 