Chapter 56: Good Night, Little Whale, Good Night

The sea is an amazing thing. Wow. But I’m getting ahead of myself.

When I left you last, chickens were flapping about Anne Hathaway’s cottage (metaphorically speaking). The following morning we left Stratford and continued on to Bath (the train station is called Bath Spa, hehehe) where we checked into the YMCA and then explored the city’s namesake, the ancient Roman baths. We also downed a glass of the sacred water blessed by the Roman goddess Sulis Minerva. Well I did. Sierra couldn’t quite bring herself to do it. It didn’t exactly taste like Christmas pudding. Or even water, for that matter.

Then the Museum of Costume, which was pretty neat. They had corsets and hoop skirts to try on, not pretty ones, but just so you can see what it’s like to wear them. It was fun. But wouldn’t be if I actually had to wear them all day.

Later I had the biggest noodle meal ever, topped off with wasabi chocolate cake, which is pretty ironic if you recall my adventures in Italy. It wasn’t very good, which was disappointing. I guess I’ll have to perfect that one myself.

Later that evening we had an adventure when the Y was swarmed by what seemed to be a Ridiculous Hats Convention, while we were playing cards in the cafeteria. Never did manage to score a pool table on account of their being occupied by wearers of silly hats. Oh well.

On the way to the train station this morning we had a bit of extra time (weird, huh?) so we were wandering the streets a bit and we stopped to watch a couple of street performers who were just starting their act. Man were they funny. And they did their entire on fire acrobatic routine dressed in… you guess it… leopard print jock straps. It was hilarious, if not slightly traumatizing.

So anyway. Jane and John live in an obscenely cute little area in an equally obscenely cute little house. In the afternoon they took us for a walk to see all the bluebells that had just come out. There were so many flowers it was just a sea of purple, like someone had spilled Gatorade all over the grass, except it looked way prettier than if someone had actually spilled Gatorade all over the grass. Really beautiful. My favorite part was actually this huge mossy beech that was all completely furry. Nice to hug. Hehe.

After that they took us out for a proper Devon cream tea, which if you didn’t know, is totally where it’s at. Scones, jam, and real Devon cream, which is pretty much about the best thing you’ll ever have in your life. Not to mention tea. And all this in the cutest little building you will ever see. Looks like it marched straight out of Hansel and Gretel, thatched roof, flower beds, red-headed little girls, and all. Then we looked at the black smithy across the way and continued onwards to the sea.

Ah the sea.

I couldn’t get close enough with my shoes on, so I tore them off, rolled up my pants, and splashed about in the frigid water. I inspected at all the rocks and tossed the interesting ones to Sierra with commentary. This one is knobbly. This one has a pawprint. This one has a dog. This one has the moon. This one is white. This one fits in your hand. And so on.

I juggled rocks. I selected rocks. I built stacks of rocks on my legs. My sister called me and we chatted like sisters. Sierra found a stick that fits very nicely on one’s ear. I have been wearing it ever since. I now have a rock in the shape of a penguin, another in the shape of a seal, one with a hole that can be used as a telescope, one with a sunset seascape on it, and one that talks when you smell it. I also have a fragment of shell (more like a shell with a fragment missing), and of course a stick that fits very nicely on one’s ear.

Chapter 55: More… Fun… Stuff…?

I’m in a tearoom in Stratford-upon-Avon and am suddenly struck with a desire to write poetry. And here goes:

Sierra with Cream, by Hari Rai Khalsa

Sierra is eating cream.
She has no knife
But those are pointed.
I’m not sure
If my poetry is wroky,
But at the very least
I have grass in my
Paper
And Sierra’s done.
Oh crap.
For a second that
Actually sounded
Poetic.

That was my first masterpiece, which I’m 90% sure isn’t actually supposed to have the word “wroky” in it, but as long as I’m going by my own handwriting, that’s how the line goes. Ok, here’s another one:

Tearoom

Hi Shakespeare.
You like tea too?
Yeah well
Your butter doesn’t
Come in wrappers.
We’re gonna go
Look at you
Being born now.
This poem should
Really be called
Hi Shakespeare.
Oops.
That’s what you get
When you pick a title
Before the fact.

And my third and final contribution to literature:

An Epic Poem

I am not so good
At the underlines.
Gross!
Cheese.
Make her face turn blue!
My baguette
Will save you all.
Chomp.

That last one was getting kind of avant garde, I think. It also has some plagiarism in it. Oh well.

It’s really late and I should definitely be going to sleep but no, not yet, I have to write or I’ll just never get around to it until it’s all dried up and then what’s the point?

Ok, so when I left you we were still sitting innocently in a train station, naively believing that securing tickets to Macbeth was the greatest of our worries (you can tell that I’m about to tell you another disaster story, can’t you). It turns out that upon arriving in Stratford we ended up having to walk two miles with our fifty pound luggage and our backpacks to get to an overpriced hostel. We couldn’t find the bust stop, what can I say. And all the while we were trying to hurry so we could get tickets to Macbeth before it sold out (this is Stratford after all). And my phone was dead. And I was in boots. And it was hot. Oh it was miserable.

Nonetheless, whining aside, we made it. And Macbeth worked out fine and was a very good show. Graphic. *Shudder*

We decided to spend an extra night in Stratford, because it was pretty sweet. So today we saw Shakespeare’s birthplace (meh), Anne Hathaway’s cottage (flowers!), and Shakespeare’s deathplace (meh), rounding off the whole thing, no sorry, scratch that, starting off the whole thing with tea and piping hot scones, whatever piping means. And a good bout of poetry writing, which of course you have already been subjected to.

In the evening we went to go see Chekhov’s the Seagull starring… Ian McKellan!! Oh my god, he was so good. The were ALL so good. Amazing cast. Excellent show. Incredible Russian play. Probably one of the best theater performances I’ve ever seen. I loved it.

Ok enough of that. It is now serious sleepy time.

Oh, except that I must mention that at Anne Hathaways’s cottage there were baby ducks. Do you realize how cute a baby duck is? No, do you REALLY realize how cute a baby duck is? Check it out sometime.

Also, the historical method of chimney cleaning back in the day had me laughing for about ten minutes. The would take a chicken, tie it onto a rope, toss it into the chimney (basketball style?) and lower it down from the outside. It would flap about in a mad panic (I probably would, too) and thus the chimney would become clean. Sometimes the chicken would survive, in which case it would return to the coop looking slightly sootier than before. And sometimes the chicken would die, in which case chicken soup was on the menu that night. Tragic as this may sound in terms of animal rights, I really found this hilarious.

Chapter 54: Of Boroughs and Bards

Where were we? Ah yes. Belfast.

So then we had an excruciatingly long travel day that involved changing transportation like eight times:

Walk to the bus station.
Bus the harbour.
Ferry to Stranraer.
Train to Newcastle (stopping through sixteen stops I might add).
Train to Sheffield.
Train to Loughborough (which I can almost guarantee is not pronounced like you think it is).
Taxi to the University.
Walk to Shirley’s house.

Man, we were so tired. On the plus side the views were gorgeous, so the travel was actually quite nice aside from the sheer quantity of it all. In the end it was really nice to have one non-chaotic night just staying at someone’s house.

So now we’re in Loughborough train station, Platform 1, awaiting a train to take us to Stratford-upon-Avon, birthplace of the great bard William Shakespeare. If all goes smoothly we’re going to see a show of Macbeth tonight.

Chapter 53: Gone in 60 Seconds, Irish Edition

Well, everything works out in the end. We finally made it onto our train for Belfast and immediately felt much better about the whole episode. The views the whole way to the Scottish coast were so fantastic that it was somewhat tricky to stay irritated about the fact that we were being forced to enjoy them. And the ferry was like being on a freaking cruise ship. (Note: I say this because I have never in fact actually been on a real cruise ship.) We spent the whole time eating fries (chips, should I say?), watching penguin footage (yeah penguins!), and playing Dance Dance Revolution until we ran out of coins. Good times.

Of course it was completely dark by the time we got to Belfast at like 10 PM. Driving through the town to the hostel we could see almost nothing, and what we could see didn't look particularly fantastic. We made it to the hostel, beginning to wonder if we should even bother trying to walk around Belfast at all or if we should just call it an early night before an early morning. Then it turned out we were sharing a room with two really nice girls, one from Sydney and one from Cambridge, and the four of us just inadvertently ended up chatting until about 2:00 in the morning. It was pretty cool, and we felt like our trip to Belfast had not been entirely for naught. Plus, we felt like we'd final gotten a proper hostel experience (you’re supposed to meet other people in those places, aren’t you?).

Then three hours of sleep and back to the ferry. This time we could actually see some of Belfast. Looked quite cute, actually, now that the sun was around to illuminate it. And the Irish countryside (or what we could see of it beyond the town) was BEAUTIFUL. I'll definitely have to go back there sometime. Well, I'll have to come back to ALL of this sometime....