London Skies

It's Over...

2006-06-07T04:44:32Z

London? I don't know. Crowded, cold, exciting. I tried to write a poem about it, about the business faces and the brit rockers. I'm think I'm ready to leave so there might be a slightly whiny slice:

[i]London is starving Starbucks breakfasts,
Ties tied too short, black bags, pointy shoes,
Rushing damp tunnels, no kids, no dogs,
No God, only a plastic number for a muse.

London is late morning showerless black coffee
(No longer tea), only skinny jeans and cigarettes,
Cellphone assets, tiny white headsets,
5 o'clock bedtimes, tensomething potentiality.

London is a fat wrinkled elm tree
Ringed with kings, short haired queens,
Ruffled neck writers...so many old things and--
Bombs:
But forgotten fragments are reassembled unknowingly.

London is life packed in ice cold concrete:
Eyes that know every ocean, every dirt color,
Ears that hear faraway gunshots, legs that ran.
We're safe here, under man's own promised land.

London was my beginning and is now the end
Of coach-bus blab, John Smith, and Pretend.

Sorry that you actually read that, nay, all of this blog. But I tried to give something back, maybe even my eyes will slip across this later and remember. I hope to see the 3 or four of you that sacrificed precious moments of LCD screen dreams, studying, sleeping, maybe even the coveted times of absolute nothingness to read my bramble. Whatever. Peace. Cheers. I'll try to write next from Australia.

It's Over... remains copyright of the author nhkramer, a member of the travel community Travellerspoint.

Comment on this entry | Tweet this | Your own free travel blog | More Travellerspoint blogs

Shakespeare's Birthplace

2006-05-27T19:11:11Z

A week of rain and plays. But incredible plays. I saw Antony and Cleopatra, Much Ado About Nothing, Julius Ceasar, and Romeo and Juliet.

Shakespeare's Birthplace remains copyright of the author nhkramer, a member of the travel community Travellerspoint.

Comment on this entry | Tweet this | Your own free travel blog | More Travellerspoint blogs

A Posh Ghost Town after 5:30

2006-05-21T11:54:39Z

I understand now why the Wife of Bath had to make her own 'fun and adventure.' There's not much to do here. Bath has been described as the old Hollywood of England. It's packed with boutiques, overpriced feed-you-almost-nothing restaurants, velvet clubs, slightly withered queen-like powdered women and parks that charge you to lay on the grass. The culmination of all excitement is the fabulous Jane Austen Center. Yey. It makes sense. I like to think that Bath is a sort of "objective correlative" as to how I feel about Jane Austen: gaudy, decorative, lofty, impressive but disengaging ("objective correlative" is a jazz-word our prof taught us, it means when your sad you write that it's raining outside). The two most famous Georgian strips are here: The Royal Crescent and the Royal Circus. They are beautiful and undoubtedly English. I keep wanting to say in a thick accent with my face mostly stiff, "George Banks!" and then swing the black steal gate open with my umbrella handle. But without my imagination, Bath is my least favorite city. I can't like 'em all, right?, or I no one would believe anything I write.

There was a night though, when I wouldn't have wanted to be anywhere else: Barcelona v. Arsenal for the Champions League Final at St. Christopher's Inn. The pub was packed and we all huddled, sweat, and clenched our fists as we watched Arsenal slowly decay, 2 to 1. Every near goal the voices would rise together, eyes widen, and then cease at once to allow for the cussing and cursing at a bad call or missed shot by the two loud, drunk Henry worshippers in the back. I understand a little better now what English football is, what English life is.

The charge me my life here for time ont he information super highway. See you on the 2nd in Sea-town, and 6th in the MN.

Cheers.

A Posh Ghost Town after 5:30 remains copyright of the author nhkramer, a member of the travel community Travellerspoint.

Comment on this entry | Tweet this | Your own free travel blog | More Travellerspoint blogs

King's College, Faculty of Classics, Room 102.

2006-07-21T17:52:36Z

Writing from Jaffa Net Cafe, a pale yellow slit in the "pick-your-own-raw meat" ethnic food strip. My eyes are tearing up from the sweet apple and cherry Huka smoke, my dark-skinned, bald, middle eastern brothers stare blankly past me, probably at my now gray, once white computer monitor held together by sticky tack. There's a shiny silver sword hanging above my head.)

Cambridge: you're about 3 maybe 4 nestled in a onezie with booties, wrapped in your infant blanky, lying in a stroller with the the little flap blocking the direct sunlight, there's a breeze, you smell grilled chicken and freshly mowed grass, your mom softly whispers to you pointing out the colorful shiny things, you might doze off, you might eat a snack: peace: Cambridge. Mokshada Anil Patil, "Mona," got bored with the beauty here. In India she is used to filthy streets, hot humid air, sweat, dust, and broken glass. She could not believe that every tree was made for a picture, every street swept, every flower in bloom. "There is no ugliness, it's too perfect," she said,"I need a frame of reference."

Yoshi said he asked God to bring him here after he dies, to the "Garden of Eden" as he keeps calling it. He asked if that pink tree in the courtyard of St. Johns was the tree of the knowledge of Good and Evil. I told him about Mona after a break from Fear and Trembling and A Handful of Dust. He was pissed: "There's no frame of reference in Heaven."

I am a college student and I guess I look like one because I can walk right through the guarded gates of King's College and into the Faculty of Classics building, Room 102, for a philosophy course on Aristotle. I was expecting a lecture hall of at least a hundred, but ended up an odd face out in a class of under 30. Drew, Yoshi, and I did the whole half-laugh thing at the English jokes we didn't understand and prayed that we wouldn't be called on. We weren't. We left scott-free with some damn good notes on Form and Matter.

Well, no one in the group was right, I have yet to meet my wife in Cambridge. I flirted with a Swedish bar tender a little, but she just kind of flightely smiled and nodded at whatever I said. I only know one swedish word, so I took my beer back to the Spade's table. Joe and I lost for the first time.

I'll leave you with some Wordsworth to chew on:

[i]Sweet is the lore which nature brings;
Our meddling intellect
Mis-shapes the beauteous forms of things
We murder to dissect.

Everyone should listen to Josh Rouse. (Thanks sister.)

Next to Bath...

Cheers.

The Gateway to Trinity College:

King's College, Faculty of Classics, Room 102. remains copyright of the author nhkramer, a member of the travel community Travellerspoint.

Comment on this entry | Tweet this | Your own free travel blog | More Travellerspoint blogs

Much Ado About "Much Ado About Nothing"

2006-07-21T17:51:48Z

Edinburgh has captured my attention and catered to my idealism more than any other city. The cobblestone streets wind through stone high-rises from the 16th century onward. Closes (nerv-rackingly skinny little ally-ways connecting streets and often leading to hidden courtyards)cut through the seamless line of whiskey shops, pubs, woolen suppliers, and kilt-makers. The huge green meadows and parks are dominated by University of Edinburgh goers playing pick up soccer and rugby games and lounging on blankets.

Time is out, I will write more soon, hopefully after more stories find their way into this place.

Cheers.

..................................

I'm now in Cambridge, and for the sake of keeping everything smooth and organized I'm now going to describe the rest of my stay in Edinburgh, in a series of short declaritive sentences:

We stayed at St. Christopher's hostel. It was run by Australians and a little French Canadian named Gi (Gee). Our rooms were small full of other people's hair. We ate breakfast in the pub below our rooms. My favorite coffee shop and place to write essays on Shakespeare's portrayal of women and his development as a playwrite through the vehicle of true love was named the Elephant House. I bought new shoes on Princes Street. Edinburgh Castle is high above the city on 'retired' volcanic hill. I toured it. I saw where David Hume lived. I like scotch now. We had class in the pub too because the beer garden in the back ally was too cold. Drew didn't listen in class, he watched wrestling on the TV behind Dr. Reinsma's head. Some of us were pissed, hence the incredibly clever title of this entry. I bought a wool tartan blanket for £10. I played mandolin in an ally one night and a Swedish guy took my picture. Yoshi sat in on open-mic night at Belushi's and made all the other musicians feel like crap. He has a really good falsetto. None of the 22 girls have killed each other yet.

Out.

Old Heaven's Fortress, Edinburgh Castle:

Much Ado About "Much Ado About Nothing" remains copyright of the author nhkramer, a member of the travel community Travellerspoint.

Comment on this entry | Tweet this | Your own free travel blog | More Travellerspoint blogs

'Sprezzatura' at the Barrow House

2006-04-26T09:35:55Z

from my Journal April 21:

I'm losing track of the days. I forgot what I did yesterday or if the day before yesterday is today. It is a blessing, though, to have the days blend a little, for Time to let loose and not be so strict and pressing. In the Lake District, time goes slow if you want to linger a little longer at a pub or it moves right by you in an instant if you want it to be bed-time. I made mine early last night, about 10:30, so waking up at 6:30 to catch the fog over a glassy Derwent Water was welcomed. On my way out, I could only finish a half cup of my bitter, instant coffee until I couldn't feel my mouth anymore, kind of like the after-cigar cotton mouth. I smoked last night, bumming a puff or two from Mark's Havana and Robin's old-man pipe stuffed with "The Best Blend" tobacco. We sat around and french inhaled and then, when the smoke stopped, proceeded to session the picnic table with our intense freestyle walking antics. A few heads poked out of the hostel's self-serve kitchen to clap and gawk ar our stunts. Among them, Dr. Reinsma smiled with his usual child-like adoration and curiosity. He soon found his way outside to have a closer look. I asked him if he wanted to join us. He said "well, it's quite late," looking down the drive to the water as if internally calculating how far we could get along the lake trail before it got too dark. Anticipating his thoughts, I said kinda laughing, "no, right here, we don't go anywhere." Mark launched up to the table top with a styly but akward 180 to heel stall makeyourbodystiffasaboardthing. Dr. Reinsma got excited. I think his mustache wiggled. I told him to give it a shot and I slowly demonstrated a "beginner's grab" on the lower bench seat. Cautiously and focused he approached the bench, stepped up with his right leg, bent his left knee, and raising his foot up to his reaching right hand, stuck the grab like a natural. After the word spread, Yoshi couldn't believe it: our white shaggy-haired mustachio professor in a crane-like poise on a picnic table. He wished I would have taken a picture, but this deserved even more praise and attention, "I'll write it down in my journal."

'Sprezzatura' at the Barrow House remains copyright of the author nhkramer, a member of the travel community Travellerspoint.

Comment on this entry | Tweet this | Your own free travel blog | More Travellerspoint blogs

Kites, Accordians, and Black Gold

2006-04-18T13:10:42Z

A coach bus scooped us up from the Havod Arms and took us to Holyhead in order to catch the ferry for Dublin. The bus-ride was long, but after a short bathroom stop my attitude was transformed. Drew bought me a coloring book and some colored pencils which instantly lifted my spirits, but nearly getting hit by a car a second later made me feel like it's just good to be alive, even if I'm stuck on a bus with the beautiful heavy scent of bus-stall hovering. (I hurriedly ran across the street to get a sweet new hat, yea, but I left the book and pencils in the shop, crap). The "Cruise-ferry" as they called it, brought us to Dublin fresh from a nap and energetic with instant coffee (that's all they got here, but it's kinda good). We made it to our apartments, ran out to get some Indian food, and spent the rest of the night fighting sweaty Irish at the Bleeding Horse (a pleasant pub name), ecstatic with our first Guiness's-in-Dublin. Yes, they taste better here, and after a tour of the Guiness Storehouse I know, well, I guess I know where it comes from. But, regardless, the Black Gold is good.

Kreeger and I left early the next morning for Galway via train (West Coast). I expected a beautiful ride through rolling green hills and old stone castle ruins, but we pretty much just saw flatness and once in awhile a mound of garbage. I guess the Irish dump all their old lawn chairs, broken bikes, ripped car seats, and garbage bags over the fence on the track banks. Galway was cold and sunny, then cold and rainy, then kinda warm and sunny, then cloudy--all within the two hours we spent there. We ate at Finnegan's, a little section of old brick in the midst of the newer shops, for lunch...dang good. After a wander around, we hopped a bus for the country to the "birthplace of traditional irish music," Doolin. We entered a full bus, but ended up being the last two on it an hour and half later. We were suprised, after expecting to discover a lively town with pubs and music everywhere, when the driver stopped outiside a sad little strip of shops behind farms of sheep and horses. We said "no, we're actually going all the way to Doolin," he said sharply in his thick accent, "This is Doolin." Drew says the place smelt like EZ cheez. We dumped our gear at the hostel and headed for the only place to go, Gus O'Connors. We sat at the bar and before we knew it the Irish blokes came to the bar, one after the other, to grab a Guiness and proceed to tuning their instruments. Soon 9 musicians were circled around a round table playing their country's heart with laughing eyes. We couldn't have asked for a more incredible night. Here we were, in Ireland, the heart of the country in a place that smells like cheese, in a dark Irish pub, no tourists, only farmers and some travellers, listening to accordians, bazouki's, flutes, bagpipes, penny whistles, and bellowing Irishmen holding their glasses high. We slept well and content.

The next morning we walked four miles to the Cliffs of Moher. I have no words really to give you, they were unbelievable. Even though the place is a tourist Mecca complete with paved walkways and info signs, the Cliffs are untouched and "couldn't be bothered" by all the camera's and souvenirs. Drew and I sat on a sandstone ledge that stuck out to a point over the atlantic about 650ft. We sat, as it's called in Doolin, on Europe's window ledge and looked at our home from the other side of the pond. Incredible to say the very least. And then my recently made dream came true: we flew a kite over the rocky cliffs, catching the furious wind from the ocean. Well, we didn't really fly it, we tried though, it would kind of float for a second and then dive, but we did it. The kite, the only one we could find, was all the colors of the rainbow, and Drew and I, without shame, ran with it smiling. Yea, people stared. Anyway, no time left, will write soon.

Cheers.

Kites, Accordians, and Black Gold remains copyright of the author nhkramer, a member of the travel community Travellerspoint.

Comment on this entry | Tweet this | Your own free travel blog | More Travellerspoint blogs

"17th Century Bridge"

2006-05-07T15:40:10Z

Not that many of you have actually checked this blog, but for the two or so of you who do, I'm sorry for leaving you in the dark as to my adventures in Wales and Ireland...I have excuses. In Wales, our group took over a small hotel in the middle of the hills (no town, no internet, no people) next to Devil's Bridge, a stone archway built-over three different times: the first constructed by the Roman's circa a long time ago, the second in the 17th century, and the third in the last fifty years? Anyway, it is beautiful and tall and old and we climbed it. In fact, Drew, Joe, and I rediscovered the glory of being twelve and pretty much climbed everything from trailhead bathrooms to Cathedrals. We even devoted a whole afternoon to exploring the woods and river banks behind the Havod Arms Hotel, skipping rocks, climbing trees, and swinging from old rusty cables. Wales was undoubtedly a place of rest, study, beauty, inspiration, and quiet--a much needed escape from the constant scrambling in London. And, after spending an hour in the hotel pub with some old Welsh guys and hitching a ride into town from another, it seems that they would all agree that the hills of Wales beat out any place in Great Britian, or, even though most of them have never left the island, any other place in the world.

As expected, travelling with a group of thirty people has been rather trying, especially on travel days. When we enter a new city, get off the bus, and waddle over the streets with our bright colored wheely bags, I feel like a drop of water that breaks free from the American tourist puddle (I often try to hang back a little), but I'm soon sucked back and morphed into one pool-of-SPU and continue to flow with the group over streets and sidewalks as we frantically search for our hotel. It's good though. I need get over my need to be the experienced,independent, and mysterious traveller, because I'm not. I'm just as American and curly haired and flared jeaned and tennis-shoed and white-teethed and clean as all of us Yanks are. But more importantly, I'm really learning that these two months are much more about the people I am travelling with than anything else. I am not only being taught patience, but I am learning to live with a constant heart of service especially in the moments when all thirty of us are tired and hungry, and to just enjoy the conversations and moments spent with this eccentric, overly-emotional, oddly artistic, consistently intense, and incredibly entertaining group of English Majors. Mountains, Georgian architecture, local music, pubs, and museums are all inspiring, but the people are what truly bring life to this trip. I know this all seems obvious, but I'm learning this in a new way and I anticipate a lifelong lesson to stem from it.

Right-O, enough for now, but I'll try to force myself to return to this sterile cafe soon and write about my adventures in Ireland. Again, thank you all for your prayers. I continually think back to our last night when you all surrounded Drew, Joe, and I and prayed for us. I have prayed for friends like you all my life. Blessings.

Cheers.

"17th Century Bridge" remains copyright of the author nhkramer, a member of the travel community Travellerspoint.

Comment on this entry | Tweet this | Your own free travel blog | More Travellerspoint blogs

A Pint in Bloomsbury

2006-04-11T09:58:31Z

It's hard to write about the last 3 days in London. They have been hectic, as expected, but quiet moments of prayer and overwhelming awe have forced their way into my non-stop schedule. The anxious shuffling of crowds on the street are silenced by the majesty of St. Paul's dome, or by the almost arrogant wisdom of Big Ben, or by the qued pointed roofs that make me wish I was a chimney sweep in Mary Poppins, or by the lit towers of Westminster Abbey. The history within the beautiful buildings and the stories within the pubs give me the sense that I'm part of something, part of the place that so many of my favorite authors have written about and lived in. I just had a pint in a favorite pub of Virginia Woolf's, walked the streets where Karl Marx thought, stepped over the graves of Charles Dickens and Samuel Johnson, and ran up and down the steps of where John Donne went to mass every Sunday.

I've toured museums, stared at the crown jewels, walked Soho at night, but one of the most incredible experiences was in a back, slightly hidden nave at Westminster Abbey. We walked in the huge, dark wooden doors just after Big Ben struck 8:00am. There was no one at all in the church, except for an old man with white hair in a large bright red robe. He signalled for us to follow him, and led us to the rear of the church and through a small side door. There we sat, only about ten of us, and took part in the liturgical communion of the Anglican church, led by the priest of Westminster. We rose, and sat, and rose, and sat, and said "and also with a you" for about fifteen minutes, but then we surrounded the alter in a half circle, prayed, and recieved the sacrament in one of the most beautiful buildings I have ever seen. The ceremony was so deeply rooted in tradition, so respectful, so silent and cautious, that it felt like I was undergoing this sacred experience for the first time. The priest's eyes were so kind, but so fearful of the Lord. I felt a little ashamed for I feel like I have forgotten how powerful and holy our God is. But at Westminster, I was reminded.

Tomorrow morning we board the bus for Wales, to the middle of nowhere.

Please leave me a message whenever you get a chance, or email me: kramen1@spu.edu or nhkramer@hotmail.com. I'll write soon, from Wales.

Cheers.

A Pint in Bloomsbury remains copyright of the author nhkramer, a member of the travel community Travellerspoint.

Comment on this entry | Tweet this | Your own free travel blog | More Travellerspoint blogs

Unsettled at Home

2006-03-20T16:20:50Z

To spare everyone from the dreaded mass email, all updates, thoughts, pictures, and adventures will be inadvertently spilled in a travel blog. I hope you all will check it as often as I can update it. Hopefully this works.

Anyway, Minnetonka is beautiful now with about a foot of blanketing snow, but London is too close--home just seems like a transition city in route for upcoming glory.

Take care, and thank you all so much for your prayers. I'll write next from London.

Unsettled at Home remains copyright of the author nhkramer, a member of the travel community Travellerspoint.

Comment on this entry | Tweet this | Your own free travel blog | More Travellerspoint blogs