reconnect, recollect

i have truly been out of touch, and in all of this lost time my usual sense of guilt over neglecting a regular posting effort has even become more passive. but there are only largers gaps still to come, so i must take advantage of this smaller window of elapsed time, when the substance it contains is still somewhat conquerable, expressible.

i have taken my own small holiday for part of my spring break around england for the past long weekend, and it has contained many things, perhaps a little too many of the unexpected variety.
to begin with london, i arrived early friday morning and was pleased to find that i remembered how to get around to my hotel on foot without needing to ask anyone - i even gave directions myself to a brit later. it was excellent to familiarize myself with london, if only its central area, a bit more, to know how to travel on the tube in its ever-reaching intricacies. my time in london was characterized by many, many art museums (though far from all that i would've liked), cold showers in my hotel, which i found to be odd but i didn't want to complain too irritatingly, lots of food from the eastern world, a common cold virus that just about everyone seemed to snag at some point, myself included, and my great and scattered companions. it is a difficult project to orchestrate the society of about 12 mutual f riends/acquaintances at once, but we managed it somehow over the course of the trip- john and his girlfriend justyna made a huge moroccan dinner for all of us at the hotel where she works/i was staying, and there was much couscous and crawfish and wine and toasting (john mandated this last bit; mine for 'to being stupid together' and 'to the talking heads being the greatest band name ever'). i also managed to meet up with sid, a friend of mine from uva, who is studying in london via the nyu program, and we had a lovely chat over coffee/tea - somewhat cleansing in its substance, which had nothing to do with the plans and idiosyncrasies and dynamics of a group of intimate friends and relatives who had been travelling together for a very long time. but it was really great to do the arty thing with my arty friends, and just to see people together, to see their everyday life unfolding in their collective behavior - i have lost touch with their quotidian.

but honestly my favorite parts about being in london involved just walking around, taking in the energies of the place and stumbling upon exciting finds, architecturally or culturally or historically or whatever. i treat edinburgh this way, i think - it really needs to be walked through for proper understanding and immersion. of course, london is much more expansive and complex, and i came away feeling that i had made but a dent for all that i'd like to do there; in fact i hope to go back sometime in may for a weekend, finances permitting. walking through the city was also great because much of the substance of my architecture class is based in london, so whether i wanted it or not i found myself observing with a head full of errant architectural phrases and historical tidbits, conducting its own review session. by the time i got to oxford on sunday evening - which is so old and established that it came up almost never in my modern architectural history course - i was weary of this, and ready to just let the aesthetic of the town, self-important and austere and hoary and deserving of all of those moods, wash over me. meghan was, as i imagined she would be, a very informative tourguide, and i came to understand lots of things about the innerworkings of a particular college and its relationship to the whole and the others. there is much college spirit - meghan has the bug as well - and that kind of pride in participation can be very adorable and enviable. she took me to her college's bar and i had some fun conversations in an academicky mode that i have fallen slightly out of touch with here. i also thoroughly enjoyed oxford's famous blackwells bookstore, the largest in the uk, in which i could've spent hours and hours but only got in about one. if someone is ever at a loss for a gift they can buy for me, i suggest samuel johnson's dictionary of 1755, which is published in an abridged version nowadays. therein my word obsession combined with my love for narratives will truly be fed for flourishing.

anyway, we saw all the main, most beautiful colleges - the harry potter hotspots - and i feel i got a sense of englishness, the kind i read about in my anglophilia-inspiring books. we also, fortunately accompanied by suddenly gorgeous weather on tuesday, took a countryside stroll through port meadows, which was notably very, very flat - i forget how topographically excited my home in edinburgh is. but it was peaceful and beautiful, with mud, horses, a decaying structure of an old monastery, the isis river (what the thames is called as it goes through oxford only), and the company of some of meghan's friends from school as well. at the end of the walk we were rewarded by lunch at an old pub called the trout inn, perched next to a bridge and small waterfall with many resident peacocks making their proverbial strut, preserving the overall image of reverence.

this is all rather lovely, right? at this point i was set to leave for durham by train to meet julia and spend a short holiday, but i instead was deterred by karmic intervention. while waiting for my train at the food court area in the oxford rail station, i walked away from the table where my bags were residing for about one minute total and in this time one of them was stolen, meanings that its very valuable contents - digital camera, ipod, expensive eyeglasses, u.s. passport, debit card, drivers license, books, earrings etc - are also pretty much gone forever. i of course filed a report with the police and everything, and they are going to look at the security camera footage for any kind of illumination, but i am without hope. basically some derelict was watching me as i sat and saw an window of opportunity to jump in and grab the bag running, and no one happened to see any of it transpire. of course, most of these items are just things, luxuries, and i will be fine without them. what is truly worrisome and stressful is the loss of the passport, as i am supposed to be travelling with my family by plane to ireland in a week from today and i have no proof of my identity whatsoever.

the story gets even a little bit better, as i decided not to go to durham any longer because i had too much to take care of and i didn't think i would be much fun anyway, so i got the next train from oxford to edinburgh. there was supposed to be a change at the birmingham station, but when i got off there and became confused, i was informed by the station staff that there are no more trains to edinburgh that evening, and that i was sold a ticket that did not exist. in a frantic effort i hopped on the train to glasgow, which was not set to arrive into the neighboring (by about an hour's drive) city until 11:30pm. now i was looking to be stranded in glasgow! the last buses into edinburgh leave at about the time the train was to get in. luckily the train manager was incredibly kind and helpful, and did all kinds of research and string-pulling to get me where i needed to be. in the end, after he moved me in first class for comfort and quieter surroundings, he got the rail company working out of oxford to order me a taxi from glasgow to edinburgh on their tab. but, because i have an adventurous and generous boyfriend with a car, he came to meet me at the station instead. i was greeted there by andrew and his scottish friend pete, who is hilarious and kind and daring, and they immediately demanded my company for a short expedition up to the roof of the hilton hotel. after sneaking our way through the corridors undetected, we found a rickety (worrisome) ladder up onto the tiny roofsquare and basked in our view of the nightlit cityscape. pete did a handstand, ate some chocolate and andrew took pictures on his mobile while i mostly used my eyes to explore and stood in place, chilly from the wind and worried about the heights (i am no fun, really - too porcelain). a better ending than i would've come up with to this story, i'll say.

so, back to life, i was left with no keys to my flat or my room with all my flatmates away for the holidays. i was quite worried about this, because all of the uk's social services have just embarked on the biggest strike since the 60's for an improved national pension plan, but (at least i was not snowballing) i was able to get new keys in about two minutes in the office downstairs. then i discovered the extent of the efforts that would be required of me to remedy this situation. and so, in an attempt to fight the good fight with the paper-pushers, i am headed tonight after work on an overnight sleeper train (because i can't fly) to london for an appointment at the american embassy in the morning to try to argue my case to be issued an emergency passport. and it almost becomes absurd, in that because i have no official photo identification, i need to have someone come along with me who does have a passport and has known me for longer than two years to make a written statement vouching for my identity. thank god for john and his geographical proximity, he is really saving me and my family some heartache and money losses, even though there are still plenty of those to speak of in all of this.

so, i will be absenting for another spell of time, until saturday, at which i need to start preparing for my epic adventure with my family. sadly, i have no pictures to speak of from my england travels - even though i had taken some really wonderful shots, especially at the old remains of the monastery - and i will continue to be without that sort of documentation in all of my upcoming escapades. hopefully a concerted descriptive effort will be able to suffice.

wish me luck in london; i'm planning to bat my camel-lashes.
<3