"The Sterling is Getting Pounded"

This post is dedicated to my finance major friends.

Perhaps I should be writing about my last trip, but I had to show you all something fairly remarkable. I was online last last night, and I checked the exchange rate. I noticed the Pound was falling a bit, and so I kept refreshing the webpage only to see it falling about 3 cents in 45 minutes (that's huge, by the way). I went to bed and figured it would have leveled out by morning.

It didn't. It went free-falling from $1.62 last night to about $1.54 as I'm writing...

It's kind of like Christmas: you go to bed and then wake up with a pretty awesome surprise.

Normally, I am hardly interested in international currency markets--in fact, the only class I have ever dropped in college was one by that very name (sorry, Dr. Kohl's)--but needing to watch finances closely here, I have had no choice but to keep watch over the exchange rate. For the past four years, the Great British Pound Sterling's (GBP) value has hovered around $1.80 to $2.00. Ironically, the week I decided to study in London, the GBP hit a high for 2008 of almost $2.02. London is already depressingly expensive, but the dollar's weakness was going to make it even worse.

Then the whole financial crisis hit, and it has been much harder on the UK and Europe than on the US. London has been beaten up especially bad. In the past month, London home prices have plummeted almost 25% on average. Layoff sprees are more and more common, banks are going under, and the fact that the wealthy nations of the EU have to bail out the poorer Eastern European nations, too, has meant that both the GBP and the Euro are skydiving. This is horrible for Great Britain and Europe, but for the first time in at least five years, American tourists and students like me can smile. Yes, Gordon Brown, this is schadenfreude...

The GBP to the USD over the past three months.

In case you're interested in seeing some graphs--the Euro's fall is equally striking--then check out http://finance.yahoo.com/currency.

Next update coming soon

I got home late last night after spending five days in both Switzerland and Munich. It was great, and I even learned some German along the way! There are a lot of photos and such that I need to sort through and a lot of sauerbraten and wurst that I still need to digest, but I promise a long new post will be up soon. In keeping with the whole German theme, this little number appropriately expresses my gratitude for your patience (starting around 0:55)...

Around London #1

I've been in London for just under a month, yet I am guilty of writing about nearly everything but the city itself so far...not fair, considering the name of this thing is Brian's London Blog. So, here's a little bit about the London I've come to know.

Islington/Finsbury/Angel/Barbican-
The above words have become as familiar in terms of explaining my home surroundings as the phrases "Downtown Milwaukee," "Wisconsin Avenue," and "kind-of-near-the-Milwaukee-Public-Library." I'll explain...

Greater London is divided up in so many different ways that I probably shouldn't even begin to detail them all. But humor me, and let me try to explain a few. At the highest administrative level, the city is split into Inner London and Outer London. I'm in Inner London. Then, like New York City, London is divided up into boroughs. The only difference is that while New York City has five boroughs, London has thirty-two plus "the City," which is the financial center of London. The City actually rests upon the site of Londinium, where the Romans settled 2,000 years ago, and it has been the urban center ever since. It has special status as its own sort of autonomous borough and is ruled by The Corporation of London, a governing body older than Parliament.

From these 32 boroughs and the City, each is broken up into postal districts, but those follow fairly arbitrary borders. Therefore, the best way of describing where I am in London is to tell you my borough, my neighborhood, and the nearest Tube stops.

My borough is Islington. If you're from Milwaukee, the closest comparison to Islington is probably Riverwest or the East Side. If you're a Chicagoan, think the trendy neighborhoods surrounding the Loop. Islington boasts a lot of nice places to live, cool boutique shops, a semi-Bohemian populace and a lot of diversity. I'm actually at the very southern edge of Islington. My neighborhood, also called a "district," is Finsbury. Incidentally, my dorm is "Finsbury Hall." Here's a map from Wikipedia with which I took a few artistic liberties:

Islington borough is in red. I'm on the south side of that, in the Finsbury district.

My nearest Tube stops are Angel and Barbican. In fact, I'm almost equidistant between the two: south of Angel and north of Barbican. Old Street and Farringdon stops are also close. I'll spare you the seizure-inducing yet quite artistic map of the London Underground on this page, but if you absolutely need to see it, here you go.

City University-
As I've mentioned, I'm spending the semester as an international student at City University, London. Roughly 20,000 undergraduate students attend City U, but Marquette, with only about 8,000 undergrads, feels much larger. The campus of City U is much more disjointed than Marquette, too, but universities in London are especially lacking in real estate. That may explain why I haven't seen grass in weeks, excluding my ventures off campus. City U specializes in business, computer science and nursing, but lacks just about every liberal arts course you could imagine. This is because most students know exactly what their majors are when coming to a British university, and they stick to their core curricula. Major-switching, a uniquely American pastime that I myself enjoy, is almost nonexistent here. City U is especially known for their ever-improving graduate programs (which doesn't help me), but administrators like to brag about the school's rising stature and also enjoy flaunting the new university logo:

I must admit that I'm a fan. It beats the Jesuit bossing around a Native American in a canoe going backwards with a stupid motto.

As much as I miss Marquette, I have to hand it to City U for being so diverse. About 170 countries are represented by the student body. That's twice as much as Marquette's figure. In fact, in one of my classes, we were split into groups and mine consists of a Czech, a Pakistani, a Swede, a French-Canadian and me. I'm definitely in the ethnic minority here, and it's wonderful walking down the hallways; I see tons of Africans, Arabs, Asians, Slavs, Israelis and the occasional white kid that looks like me. Hijabs and yarmulkes are more common that baseball caps, and I hardly ever hear English outside of class.

Here are a few photos of day-to-day things...

Left: I take the Tube, on average, about twice a day. Right: The 56, my most frequently-used bus.

Left: An oft-frequented coffee shop two blocks away from my dorm. Right: St. Paul's Cathedral, rising above the Millenium Bridge


Left: Hyde Park, London's answer to Central Park. Right: Marks & Spencer, my favorite grocery store.

The Green Park. My reading spot of choice.

Happy Birthday, Paddington Bear!

That's right, it's the birthday of London's most famous children's storybook character, Paddington Bear. You're probably all familiar with the book(s) about furry little Paddington, but in case you're not (how shocking!) it's about a loveable, Marmalade-eating and cocoa-sipping bear who emigrates from "Darkest Peru" to London. He is, of course, named for the well-known Paddington Station** in west-central London. Kudos to both Becky and Google for pointing it out.

Even Google is celebrating.

**see the last picture!

Stonehenge, Bath, Cardiff and (surprise!) Oxford

I apologize for the delay on posting. Before I start going into all of the actual stuff we did during the past weekend, I thought that it would help to start with a map of our 400-mile trip as a good reference point...

A. City University; B. Stonehenge; C. Bath; D. Cardiff; E. Oxford; F. London Heathrow

Day 1/Druids and Romans-
Stephanie, Abby, Anthony and I woke up (too) early on Friday morning, and took the Tube all the way to Heathrow Airport, where we picked up our rental car. Europcar thankfully allows 21-year olds to rent and drive, so 22-year old Anthony had the pleasure of taming some English motorways and wild country roads in a diesel, manual, hatchback Vauxhall. When we picked it out we figured the car was about as European as they come...

Kind of looks like a minivan, doesn't it? Pretty trusty steed, though.

We headed for Stonehenge, still getting used to the left side of the street and roundabouts every half-mile. After more than an hour of driving, we crested a little hill on the A303 highway, and there was Stonehenge up ahead, in all of its ancient, rocky, Druid glory. It was actually an amazing sight, even from almost a mile away, just plopped there on an empty farming plain. We parked and walked up to the monument. After hearing about Stonehenge in school and on TV for years, I thought I would be disappointed by a bunch of rocks. I wasn't. We only got within about ten yards at the closest point, but it was easy to appreciate the timeless fascination with Stonehenge. It's pretty crazy to think that primitive peoples lugged 80 stones weighing up to six tons each from Wales--almost 200 miles away--and stood them up in a complex pattern for spiritual rituals. What's amazed me just as much was the fact that the whole thing is still standing and in good condition 4,600 years later. Here are a few pictures...

Left: at the furthest point away on the walkway. Right: Close up

Left: The best part actually might have been the very intense neo-pagans camping out in the adjacent farm field in their RVs. Right: Abby, me, Anthony (rocking the hood, Druid-style) and Stephanie.

All in all, Stonehenge was a successful first stop. Getting to Bath was an adventure, as Stonehenge is far enough of off the direct route that we had to take smaller roads. We made it, though, and were treated to a great view of the town when we reached our hostel atop a hill...

Left: Bath YHA Hostel. It would've been great if the heat had worked! Right: The city of Bath seen from a spot near our hostel.

A Not-So-Quick History Lesson (feel free to skim this):
The Romans came over to present-day England (Britannia, as they called it) around 40 AD, and made it to Bath shortly afterward. They heard of a "magic" hot spring that an ancient tribe of Celts had been venerating in the name of a goddess they called Sulis, and being the culture-mixers/-hijackers they had always been, the Romans were more than eager to conveniently wrap up three of their favorite passions--capturing slaves from the native population, building public baths and mythology--into one, big, flashy new town. They called it Aquae Sulis, or "Waters of Sulis," and the focal point for the town was an enormous public bath center dedicated to a new goddess, Sulis Minerva; Sulis was the Celtic goddess, and Minerva was a Roman one that had a lot of similarities, so they just morphed the two into one. Needless to say, the commonalities helped win over the native Celtic Britons as they adapted to Roman ways.

The baths at Aquae Sulis were enormous, and they were literally centuries ahead of their time in terms of technology. Frankly, they were sweet. People used them every day, and often merchants, politicians and anybody else who could afford to spend time off the farm would spend hours in the baths. I was surprised to find that patrons couldn't enter the main bath until they were clean. So, the whole building was actually a series of rooms...

Room 1: "Locker room." Undress, rinse off.
Room 2: Massage Room. Lay down on a table, get massaged with olive oil which lifts dirt off skin.
Room 3: Hot room. The floor was built upon a hollow chamber, supported by small columns of clay tile. Water from the spring was partially diverted to the hollow chamber underneath the floor. A fire was lit in one corner of the room, and the hot air warmed the water to near-boiling, making the room blazing hot. The bathers would sweat, and use brushes to lift the oil and dirt from off their skin...

Left: Fire-heated water being circulated to the hollow chamber underneath the floor, warming the whole room. Right: the columns upon which rested the floor. Hot water flowed in between the columns.

Room 4: Cold bath. After sweating profusely and brushing off the vast majority of the impurities in the hot room, bathers would jump into a refreshingly cold pool, rinse off, and then jump out.
Room 5: The Main Bath. By now, the bathers were completely clean, and they could spend their day in the hot spring-fed pool. How great does this sound: the water was a constant 100 degrees Fahrenheit, and the spring was so efficient and "bountiful" that the entire pool was continuously being filled and drained so that the bath had essentially fresh water every few minutes. At the poolside were places to sit, eat, converse and relax.

After about 400 years of bathing in their own awesomeness, the Romans sadly had to return to Italy to defend their falling empire. What's worse, the Romans never bothered to show the native Britons how to construct in the Roman way. In the Romans' absence, the Britons had no idea how to take care of the baths, use clay or do any of the other necessary things to keep the most advanced architecture they had ever seen from crumbling to the ground. And that's exactly what happened. The baths collapsed in upon themselves (they were completely roofed, by the way), the Britons came and went, and years of flooding and mudslides buried the Roman structures. It wasn't until the 1880s that a Bath citizen's house started to mysteriously flood. A prominent British civil engineer was brought in, and he and his team began digging. They eventually hit what once had been the floor of the main pool, and the engineer knew they had stumbled upon something special. He convinced the city to buy up all the houses in the vicinity in order to continue excavating, and within a decade, they had unearthed the most complete Roman bathhouse in the world. They built a Georgian-style museum atop the ruins, and the rest is history.

History lesson over. We, of course, went to visit the Roman Baths Museum. The bath, as it stands today, is only original up to about six feet from the ground, but that's okay, because the whole system (draining, filling, everything) still works as perfectly as it did almost 2,000 years ago! I always knew the Roman civilization was impressive, but until I saw Bath, I had never fully appreciated their collective brilliance and influence on technological progress...

Left: the opening of the natural hot spring, looking and working exactly as it did for the Romans 2,000 years ago. Right: how the Roman bath complex of Aquae Sulis probably looked around 200 AD

Left: Sentinels and Caesars keeping watch. Right: on the upper level, with the Gothic Anglican Bath Abbey, another famous sight, in the background.

Not too shabby.

Day 2/Darjeeling with Dickens. And then Cardiff.
After waking up, getting a decent breakfast, and checking out Bath Abbey (the main Anglican church in Bath), we decided to check out a local favorite: Sally Lunn's. In business since 1680, Sally Lunn's is been widely known across Britain as one of the nation's best teahouses, so I wasn't about to leave Bath without going. They are famous for their tea, enormous "Sally Lunn Buns" and, of course, for the historical atmosphere. It wasn't by any means a snooty place, but the waitresses dressed in early-20th century outfits and plaques on the wall noted famous patrons of the teahouse, including Charles Dickens. Apparently, he stopped there quite often and is thought to have even authored some of his stories while sipping tea and eating buns. We all got a cinnamon and butter bun, and I ordered what turned out to be a pretty phenomenal pot of tea. Moral of the story: if you ever get to Bath, order a Darjeeling at Sally Lunn's; you won't be disappointed...

Left: a fantastic cup of tea. Right: warm, fluffy, sugary, buttery. Happiness on a plate, basically.

We left Bath and drove in a fairly miserable rainstorm all the way to Cardiff, the capital of Wales. I really wish I could say nice things about Cardiff, but I can't. Honestly, it was the biggest disappointment any of us have had since arriving in September except for the fact that nobody has said "Pip pip!" yet. Anthony said that it was like visiting Rockford, Illinois, where he's from. I've been to Rockford before; Cardiff is a close second place. Our hostel wasn't special, the city was pretty boring, and to top it all off, we got a parking ticket. The highlight of our time spent there was either my Sweet Onion Chicken Teriyaki sandwich from Subway or seeing The Duchess, Keira Knightley's new movie. There wasn't even anything interesting enough to get me to take a picture.

Day 3/"Hey, how about going to Oxford?"-
Since we didn't want to go home completely disappointed after what had begun as a nice weekend, we decided to take a slight detour to visit Oxford. Incidentally, my sister-in-law, also a Marquette alum, studied abroad in Oxford when she was at school. In fact, she might have been responsible for planting the seed in my head to go study abroad when I was old enough. I was only about 7 years old at the time, but it was cool to visit a place that I have heard about from her.

We only spent about an hour in the town, but walking outside of the forty colleges that comprise the world-famous University of Oxford was interesting. The colleges are almost like fraternities that students join when applying to Oxford. They all have their own residences, students stay within their college for four years, each college has some degree of autonomy, but they aren't subject-specific, and they are all under the jurisdiction of the University. The closest comparison an American could draw to Oxford's structure is probably that of Rice University in Houston or Yale, in that people become very attached to their dorm's unique culture...

Left: a really famous arch thing, but I can't remember what it was called. Right: Radcliffe Camera, built in 1737, and houses humanities texts.

I had to sneak into Hertford College to snap this photo of its grounds.

Next up: Stonehenge, Bath and Wales

Four of us will be leaving early tomorrow (Friday) morning for a weekend road trip to Bath and Wales, with a stop at Stonehenge along the way.

By the way, National Geographic teamed up with Nigel Tufnel of This is Spinal Tap for a little Stonehenge "special" recently. Since Spinal Tap and NG are two of my favorite things, I couldn't help but post this:

Scotland (well, really just Edinburgh)

It seems fitting that, sixteen years following my "graduation" from Lads and Lassies Preschool (no joke) and two years following my graduation from the Home of the Highlanders (note Angus, the mascot), coupled with my love for all things plaid, I ended up making it to beautiful Scotland. And let me tell you, it surpassed all of my expectations.

Day 1/King's Cross to Waverley; New Town, Old Town and The Royal Mile-
There are six of us Marquette students studying abroad here at City, and we decided to spend our first full weekend together in Edinburgh, the capital of Scotland. **Just as an aside, Wikipedia has a great entry on Edinburgh with tons of photos. It's definitely worth checking out** Anyway, we left King's Cross Station in downtown London around 10:00am, and we spent about four hours on the National Express train as it cut through the heart of the English and Scottish countrysides. The trip took about four hours, and we arrived at Edinburgh's Waverley Station. This was the set of views that awaited us in one direction--the part of Edinburgh known as "New Town"--at the top of the steps leading out of Waverley...

Left: The Balmoral Hotel, Edinburgh's finest. Right: The Sir Walter Scott Memorial, dedicated to the author of Ivanhoe, Rob Roy and other famous Scottish-themed works.

...Then, looking over the station to the other side of town was "Old Town," which I'll talk about in a bit. I think I froze when I saw this view. Unfortunately, there wasn't any way to snap a picture that could possibly do the view justice, so I found one that is close from trekearth.com...


Honestly, I fell in love right away. The city of Edinburgh, geographically, is quite unique. Essentially, it's split in two, with a ravine in which Waverley Station rests, running right down the middle. On the northern end is New Town. "New" is a relative term here, though, because it was designed for the wealthy elite of Edinburgh way back in the 1700s. Yes, their "New" Town is older than our country. Meanwhile, Old Town, sitting about five stories higher across the ravine, is what's really special. Centuries-old row houses, churches, apartments, administrative buildings and shops sit perched atop a steep drop. From the edge of New Town, Old Town looked as if it were floating on air. At the far southwestern edge of the core of Old Town, the road begins to rise dramatically and the 875-year old Edinburgh Castle rests even more precariously atop the apex of Old Town. Here, I must apologize because for my lack of photography skills, as I couldn't fully capture the Castle in relation to its surroundings...

FYI: that hill continues down about 100 more feet before leveling off.

Take my word for it, the sight of Edinburgh Castle is impressive. Here are some better pictures, courtesy of trusty ol' Google Image Search.

But that's enough about the view. We caught a shuttle from Princes Street (Main Street in New Town) to our hostel, the Globetrotter Inn of Edinburgh. This place is owned by the same nice people who run the Globetrotter Inn of London, where Abby and I stayed our first night and were very satisfied. Somehow, the Edinburgh Globetrotter was significantly nicer than the London one, but now I'm actually beginning to worry that my view of European hostels has been distorted by the Globetrotters and my future lodgings in other countries will resemble something along these lines. But yeah, here it is...

Globetrotter Inn of Edinburgh: great hostel.

After dropping off our things, we got a ride back into the city and ate typical pub food in a typical Scottish pub. We were fortunate enough to be joined by a Scottish-born friend of Kate (one of my Marquette friends here), who became our tour guide for the rest of the evening. We walked into Old Town and explored the Royal Mile, a mile-long stretch of cobbled road that runs between Edinburgh Castle on one end and Scottish Parliament on the other. The Royal Mile is home to some of the nicest and most authentic Edinburgh flats.

Looking down a street that feeds into Royal Mile from just outside Edinburgh Castle.

Alan, Kate's Scottish friend, brought us to a pub at the end of the Royal Mile, and we spent the night hanging out, meeting his friends and having him dispel a few myths about Scottish culture. First of all, he assured us, haggis is pretty tasty. "It's just some spices, onions, meat and some other stuff." "Other stuff," I learned later, equals sheep's heart, liver, and lungs all wrapped up and boiled in sheep stomach. Ummmm, no thanks. I slowly learned how to imitate a Scottish accent pretty well (Edinburgh, by the way, is pronounced "Eddin-brah," and you kind of roll the Rs). Also, to my sheer disappointment, he informed us that what I refer to as plaid is really called "checkered" by the Scots. Nobody calls it plaid. And "tartan" is the bona fide stuff that's specially patterned for members of a clan or special group. I was excited when I returned to London to find out that even Wisconsin has its own official state tartan.

Day 2/Edinburgh Castle, Old Town by Day, and Scottish Bachelor(ette) Parties.

We hopped on a tour bus the next morning and had a nice tour of the city. We got off at Edinburgh Castle and spent most of the morning there. The Castle, which has fantastic views of the entire city, was built around 1130 AD, although all that remains of the original structure is the tiny Saint Margaret's Chapel (I've got to be honest, Saint Joan of Arc Chapel at Marquette is cooler). Everything else on the grounds is the result of one king or another's desires to make changes and additions over the course of the next nine centuries. Edinburgh Castle was long prized for its obvious defensive assets: sitting atop a sheer cliff covered in slippery moss and partially surrounded for centuries by a moat, the ruler of the Castle could stave off the vast majority of attacks by simply crossing his fingers for extra rain to make the enemy's hopes of trekking upwards even more unlikely. Today, the Castle holds the Honours of Scotland--Scotland's version of the Crown Jewels--as well as the Stone of Destiny, the Scottish War Veterans' Memorial, various mini-museums and boasts the second-best 360-degree view of the city (I'll tell you about the best in a minute). I'd go into more detail, but I think pictures work better than words...

Left: Almost there! Just inside the gates and walking up to the main square. Right: Pretty great view.

Left: Scottish War Veterans' Memorial Building. Right: Small houses and "offices" now converted into exhibits.

After seeing the Castle, we got a late lunch and visited the Tartan Weaving Mill. Natalie (MU student, too) discovered that she was in fact Scottish and part of the Mitchell clan. Pretty exciting. She spent the rest of the day making up hilarious stories about the exploits of the ancient clan...something about being traitors to Scotland. After we got our tartan fix, we proceeded to walk around the city and stop in shops until after sunset. Here are some nice pictures I took while walking...

Left: There were essentially two levels of buildings in places near and on the Royal Mile. The neatest part is how there's a walkway atop the roofs of the first-level buildings, and from the street, the second-level buildings seemed to be stacked on top of the lower ones. Right: A statue of David Hume, considered by some as the foremost Scottish intellectual in history, being altered slightly by a traffic cone thanks to some locals. There has to be a good pun here, but I've got nothing.

Left: Street view of the two-level layout described above. Right: Typical Edinburgh architecture on Candlemaker's Row.

We had to search along the Royal Mile for a place to eat that either was less than $30/person or didn't have an hour-long wait. Ironically, we ended up in a restaurant called "The Filling Station," that bore a strange resemblance to Fuddruckers but was just a bit nicer. Honestly, I was pretty excited to eat an American-style cheeseburger. We sat down in a booth next to a table filled with women in their mid-twenties that all seemed to be dressed up like it was Halloween. The night before, we had seen a similar sight: grown men all curiously dressed up as Toy Story characters walking around the city. It turns out that it is customary for members of a bachelor or bachelorette party to not only go around all night, restaurant- and bar-hopping (among other things, wink wink nudge nudge) like they do in America, but also to be dressed up in ridiculous costumes the entire time. The six of us--especially me for some weird reason--seemed fascinated. Here's proof...

I'm just not sure who should be most embarrassed in this picture.

Day 3/Arthur's Seat-

On Sunday morning, we checked out of the Globetrotter Inn and hopped back on the same tour bus thanks to our 24-hour tickets. It dropped us off next to Arthur's Seat, a 900-foot hill across the street from Scottish Parliament. From most points in Edinburgh, you can see Arthur's Seat looming high above everything, even Edinburgh Castle. We decided that this would be our final stop in Edinburgh before catching our train back to London, so the six of us took a deep breath, and hiked to the top. It wasn't as tiring as we had expected, and we were definitely treated to the best view in Scotland...

Left: No way was I getting any closer to the edge. Right: Looking back down the trail leading to the top of Arthur's Seat.

Stephanie, Natalie, Kate, me, Anthony and Abby all being blown by the wind atop Arthur's Seat.