Here we are now, entertain us

First gig in Manchester: Of Montreal with Casiokids opening

On Tuesday, John and I bought tickets for the show (which was last night at the Manchester Club Academy). We're not huge fans of Of Montreal, but we know them well enough that it was worth the £12.50 to check out the Manchester concert scene and just to have a good time.

Boy was it worth it!

I can't really describe what I saw. Well I can take you through what I was thinking in a chronological fashion:

1. Pretty good, nice electronic music. Is the guy lip syncing? The mic is in his right hand by his side, but he's singing into drum sticks? (Casiokids)
2. John's Canadian flatmate thinks Casiokids might be singing in French. Not sure if that's true, but Internet research after the concert shows that Casiokids are Norwegian.
3. The crowd is full of tall British hipsters. I can't see anything. :(
4. I'm trying not to slip on the beer that is being spilled from cups because people are moving to the music. Hey, at least people are moving, better than a CMU concert.
5. Of Montreal taking the stage. One of their guys is dressed in a powder blue tux and a tiger mask???

Little did I know that this was not going to be the strangest thing I saw all night. Apparently I didn't know Of Montreal very well. Try "not at all."

I thought I was going to a twee, innocent indie pop concert like New Pornographers', but was I wrong. The tiger in a powder blue tux was a really big clue. Then the rest of the band took the stage. The lead singer was dressed so flamboyantly like a queen that I couldn't stop looking at his eyes -- solid blue eyeshadow for about 1" radius around his eyes. He was wearing a frilly white dress shirt and actually reminded me of a male figure skater. The rest of the band members were dressed in varying degrees of ridiculousity (made that word up).

They started off their set and the crowd instantly went crazy. As crazy as it can get at an indie pop concert. I'm pretty sure this is what a hipster dance party is like. A girl standing in front of me had a feather headdress on so I didn't feel out of place with my shutter shades. I'm not familiar with the Of Montreal discography to talk about what songs they played, although I recognized a couple of my favorites (like Wraith Pinned to the Mist and Other Games and Requiem for O.M.M.).

Throughout the concert, there were a bunch of "skits." They mostly consisted of the band members wearing animal masks and performing s&m (they even said so). Bizarre! Later, a machine sprayed white feathers out into audience! I didn't get any feather action because I was standing too far away, though. A box rigged above the stage released gold dust on the band members during a song. The animals changed into black leotards and red masks and ran about the audience before returning to the stage and lifting the lead singer up for the ending of a song. Then they changed into blob-like bright pink spandex and performed strange pantomime-like gestures.

At some point, I thought I was watching a satanic cult proceeding. One of the band members, donning a pair of devil horns, proceeded to take off his shirt and basically roar at the crowds. Not to be undone, the lead singer also took off his shirt, but by the end of the song, he somehow was covered in foam. I don't know how that happened since I was standing too far back. Actually, I'd rather not know. Yes, there were heaping generous amounts of strange antics.

Sure it was a good time. I was enjoying it more than I was expecting to. I generally like going to concerts when I know the band well, but this was working out to be a quite acceptable hipster dance party. Then the finale...

SMELLS LIKE TEEN SPIRIT

Yes, they dared perform a cover of the Nirvana song. Right before that, they did a cover of Tom Petty's American Girl, which was lost on some of the crowd, but not on the Americans. Then Nirvana.

The crowd went crazy. A mosh pit instantly formed about two feet away from me, which John pushed me towards. And we were in the mosh pit for the rest of the song. The crowd was jumping up and down, trying not to slip on the beer that people had spilled from rocking out. I was also making sure none of the stuff in my pockets fell out. But that didn't stop me from having a good time, being shoved around a little and feeling so very American in the middle of the UK. \m/

I couldn't hear anything after the concert; in fact I'm only starting to regain hearing at some frequencies as I write this. But damn, that was a great first concert in Manchester. And it'll only get better after this.

EDIT: Someone graciously uploaded the finale on youtube.

Gastronomic Firsts: Pasties, Fish and Chips, Profiteroles, Muesli

Since orientation is finally over and I'm done shopping for stuff I need, I have time to properly write about some notable gastronomic firsts.

Pasties:
*Pronounced past-ee, past like "the ghost of Christmas past."
John and I first tried pasties during the Arcadia orientation last week in London. A pasty (singular, and short for Cornish pasty) is essentially a calzone, but with pot pie filling. Depending on what filling you get, it could very well be just like a calzone-shaped Hot Pocket. I had two pasties during the course of orientation from The Pasty Shop in the London - Euston train station. The first one I had was chicken and vegetable. The crust was soft and flaky, but not so flaky that it left a crumb trail down the front of my pea coat. The crust was lightly greasy, thus enabling the pasty to be sufficiently filling and a meal in itself if needed. The filling was just like that of a chicken pot pie -- chicken and vegetable in a thick broth-tasting sauce. Very delicious.

The second pasty I tried was a chicken balti. Thanks to my Interp class freshman year (the food class), I knew that balti implied curry in terms of food in England. So I ordered one and it was quite good as well. Not too spicy, but not too bland; exactly as you'd expect curry chicken in a pot pie to taste like. Actually, I really liked it a lot -- I'm getting hungry just writing this.

Fish and Chips:
OK, not much to say here actually. Fried fish filet with potato wedges. Mayonnaise comes with it (not tartar sauce!), and a wedge of lemon for seasoning. Quite alright, but I didn't notice anything distinctive from just taking a Gordon's fish filet and adding a side of fries. However, fish and chip outlets are plentiful throughout the UK, and I've only tried it at the food court in the mall on Queensway (London).

Profiteroles:
This is a very delicious dessert pastry that I had during my first night at homestay. At first appearance, I thought they were round eclairs, but they taste slightly different. For starters, profiteroles are moister because the chocolate sauce poured over the puffs does not harden. Also, the chocolate sauce may contain liquer (there was sherry in the chocolate sauce on the profiteroles I had). If that's not moist enough, cream may be poured over the puffs as well (which is how I had them). I consumed these cold, but I'm not sure if they can be consumed warm. Definitely recommended for chocolate lovers or just sweets lovers in general. Again, I'm getting hungry just thinking about them. ::Eyes jar of nutella, the closest thing I have to it::

Muesli:
I had some muesli at breakfast while I was at homestay. At first look, I thought I was having trail mix for breakfast, but my host family told me to add some milk to it and eat it like cereal. Indeed, it tasted just like I imagined trail mix with milk would taste. The muesli I had was a blend of almonds, coconut shavings, sunflower seeds, dried fruit pieces, and rolled oats. Definitely healthy and nutritious; I enjoyed it very much. It wasn't very sweet, but for not having any added sugar or honey, it was pretty tasty.

This Just In: Britain's in a Recession

Actually, they announced this like last Friday.

What this means to me? Awwweeesssooommeee.

The sterling dropped to an all-time low in 23 years. Currently, it costs only about 1.41 USD for 1 GBP. This is way better than what I was getting when I first arrived in London (1.64 USD for 1 GBP), and obviously better than what the poor sods studying abroad last semester got (almost 2 USD for 1 GBP).

Not only that, but the prices of things here are going to decrease soon to stimulate spending (the only way to get out of a recession, I think). Damn it feels good to... be a gangsta.

This is probably only working out for people abroad here this semester. Whatever. This makes budgeting a little easier for me.

Homestay

Thursday - Saturday of last week was homestay. I explained in an earlier post what homestay is about so I won't get into it.

Every student in the Arcadia program got assigned to a British family located near the university at which they will be studying. The students studying at the University of Manchester were assigned to families in a nearby district called Wigan, about 20 minutes from Manchester by train. Prior to leaving for homestay, we went over the details and what to expect with the Arcadia folks. It turns out that I was "randomly" designated as the group leader, which meant I had to make sure nothing went wrong during the whole experience, and liason with the appropriate people if things did go wrong. Wonderful, but it forced me to at least introduce myself to everyone else, since I had been quiet for the orientation up til then. We all took the Virgin train from London Euston station to Wigan on Thursday. It took only 2 hours to travel 200 miles, so awesome.

Once we arrived at the Wigan station, all the families were ready to pick up their student. Each family only had one student. The families were all of retired couples whose children are all grown and moved out. The couple I stayed with consisted of a retired head teacher (principal) and a part time magistrate (a judge). They had hosted about a hundred students before because they've been participating in the Experiment in International Living (EIL) program for about 30 years. They had lots of stories to tell me about pretty much everything: their daughter (who recently married and had a son), the town of Shevington (a suburb of Wigan and Greater Manchester), and anything that'd be useful for me to know this semester. We sat down and ate meals together. I particularly enjoyed muesli at breakfast and profiteroles at dessert (I may devote a Gastronomic Firsts post to these items). We also watched a lot of BBC during meals and after dinner, which ended up being more interesting than I had expected. Of course, the very few commercials on British television helps.

The following day, Friday, I went on a walking tour of Wigan and Shevington. I got to learn about the history of the town and look at the canals that were once used for shipping cotton from the United States. It was very scenic. We walked about the town, which was very nice and made me wish the suburbs back home were more walkable. It was only a 20 minute walk to the town center where all the shops, library, post office, chemist, etc were. The schools were nearby too. I also learned a lot about how the British government spoils its people! The country's unemployment problem partly exists because people don't want jobs. The jobs are available, but the benefits the government issues to the unemployed are fairly comparable to a full time minimum wage income; unemployed citizens don't need to pay for housing and receive a weekly stipend adequate to cover all living expenses. It works out to be only 10 GBP less than what they would make working full time for minimum wage. Absurd. Additionally, students in low income families receive 35 GBP per week once they turn 16 and attend college (the school that comes before university. There's a difference in this country). College is free, though. University tuition and fees are standardized throughout the country, at about 5000 GBP per year, which some feel is too "expensive." Oh, and did I mention they have universal health care? I'm not sure how I feel about all of this, but I won't attempt to go into here.

Friday evening, another American student arrived at my family's house for homestay. She's studying at Lancaster this semester. The whole group of families and study abroad students went out to dinner at a local restaurant. A good time was had by all. I tried the Yorkshire pudding for the first time, which actually is not a dessert, but an appetizer. One of the homestay couples mentioned that Oasis will be playing Manchester in June, so I'm going to look into that. :)

We students departed for Manchester on Saturday morning. All in all, everyone had a good time with their host families. Grace attended choir practice with her family, and then went to a pub immediately following hehe. Jen stayed at a really big estate so she got to see how the wealthy lived. It was the last slice of home-living for a long while.

Wrapping up London

OK now that I'm at Manchester, I have proper internets for updating!

I'll start by summarizing what happened in London.

So in case people are a bit confused with the orientations that I've been doing, I'll explain. I'm studying at the University of Manchester, which is in Manchester. However, I applied through Arcadia University's Study Abroad Office, so they had their own orientation for all students studying in the UK who also applied through them. Arcadia's orientation was in London. There were students studying at the University of Manchester and University of Nottingham, as well as students participating in Arcadia's own programs, like the internship program and the semester abroad program for freshman. Orientation was Monday - Wednesday and consisted of informational sessions in the morning about adjusting to life in the UK. They gave us the afternoon free to explore London and helped us by graciously providing unlimited tube passes and tickets to a play Wednesday evening.

London was unreal. It's definitely a city, but it's too clean and too royal-looking. Re: cleanliness - the tube did not reek, and there was no graffiti anywhere. As for the architecture and the like, the buildings were very consistent. They all look like they were built during the same era (like 1600s) which was nice to look at (Manchester's not the case). This also made London very historically-rich. It was definitely very pretty, although it seemed like a fake city for being so ... nice.

In London, I ended up doing a bit of sightseeing, though I didn't get to everything. During orientation, I met the other Manchester students. Actually, I would like to note that everyone else is either a business or an English major, which was interesting for me as a math major. Ok, so I met Ivy, a student at Grinnell who studies English, and Filipe, a student at Hartford who studies business. John and the rest of us went down Fleet Street looking for a barber shop, but to no avail. However, along the way, Ivy spotted a couple secret houses that belonged to famous English writers, so that was cool and off the beaten path. Eventually we made it to the British Natural History museum, which was super cool but we didn't go in. A bit further along, we got to Parliament and the Big Ben. We went into the Parliament to sit in on a House of Commons proceeding, but it was too full so we ended up sitting in on a House of Lords proceeding. We preferred the House of Commons because we've seen on CSPAN that it looks like a pub; the MPs would be throwing things at each other and telling jokes, lots of fun. There weren't any seats left, so we sat in on the House of Lords, which was supremely boring, but I had fun counting the number of Lords who were passed out haha.

We saw a play, as a group, on Wednesday night, The 39 Steps. It was a comedy based on a Hitchcock film of the same name, and referenced a number of Hitchcock's works, so it was a nice little game to spot the references. I can officially say I've been to a British play.

That's a pretty good summary of London. Right now I'm going to go grocery shopping with John and Filipe. Later tonight, we're going to dinner and a pub crawl to celebrate Filipe's birthday so it'll be lots of fun. I'll write more about gastronomic firsts and my homestay when I get a chance. Bye!

Inauguration Day, from the UK

(Note: Due to lack of free internets in London, this post has been published later. Post date and time are reflective of the approximate time at which this was written.)

This morning, while I was getting ready for orientation, I had the TV tuned to BBC. The British reporters are ruminating at the prospect of having a black Prime Minister. I thought that was pretty amusing. On the whole, BBC seemed to be responding positively to Obama being inaugurated today.

Conveniently and very appropriately, we had the privilege of having an open panel discussion with 3 members of the British Parliament, Diane Abbott, Julian Brazier, and Lord Richard Taverne. The students at orientation asked a mixture of general questions about British politics, for example: what critical issues the major parties differ over and how relevant politics are to young people in Britain. While it lent great insight into the impact of politics on the general public, it was not as interesting as the questions about how British politicians feel about Obama being president. It was not a surprise that the general sentiment is relief and admiration that Americans have become so progressive. Americans really have set an important precedent for being able to "turn the page" and uphold the original founding principles of the nation so quintessentially, as MP Abbott had said. "Your new president's mother is from Kansas and his father is from Kenya. He has remarkably succeeded in getting so many young Americans involved in politics. This is something that can only happen in America, and you should all feel proud of your country for coming this far." Lord Taverne also added that it is impossible to underestimate the significance of Obama being elected, for he has instilled a sense of optimism and pride in not only Americans, but also other people around the world. If McCain had been elected instead, the impact would not be as great, but would feel like "business as usual." MP Brazier, a member of the Conservative party, was a McCain supporter, but still feels optimistic for the future of America and the free world since Bush is leaving office. A student then asked how the British reacted when McCain selected Sarah Palin as his running mate. MP Abbott answered the most humorously and candidly, "Sarah Palin is an interesting choice. She staunchly supports abstinence-only education, yet her 17 year-old daughter got knocked up. She is an environmentalist but shoots polar bears from a helicopter. When Katie Couric asked her what newspapers she read, she answered 'Every newspaper,' which really means none. Only in America can you have someone from the religious right be this prominent in politics; the religious right has virtually no influence in British politics."

All in all, I enjoyed the orientation sessions about the uK. I found that the country is quite reasonable and agrees with a lot of my sentiments. Apparently, only 8% of the British population consider themselves to be regular churchgoers (compared to about 60% in America). Gay marriage and abortion are not the main issues dividing the political parties; the British resolved gay marriage conflict by renaming marriage as "civil partnership" and letting marriage remain a mostly religious term, and the only discussion about abortion is over when the latest term is to have one. The separation of church and state is quite clear, which is something that I admire and wish the US government was more like this.

Gastronomic Firsts: The English Breakfast and London Pride

(Note: Due to lack of free internets in London, this post has been published later. Post date and time are reflective of the approximate time at which this was written.)

The English Breakfast:
Once we settled into our hotel rooms, John, Lee, and I set off to explore the area around our hotel. Our hotel is situated adjacent to Hyde Park, which is London's equivalent of NYC's Central Park. We stopped by a pizza buffet (called The Pizza Factory) and had our first authentic English breakfast. The English breakfast consists of Cumberland sausage, baked beans, bacon, potatoes (usually in hash brown form or wedge form), scrambled eggs, fried eggs, grilled mushrooms, and grilled tomatoes. I'm quite a fan of Cumberland sausage. While I don't know what's in it, I do think that it is not entirely made out of meat. The bacon actually looks more like ham in terms of thickness and color, but shapewise it resembles American bacon. Very filling breakfast, although very similar to the American fatty breakfast. What I do like about the English breakfast is tomatoes and the mushrooms; don't see a lot of veggie (and fungus) action going on in American breakfast unless it's an omelette (wait, are omelettes French?).

London Pride:
After exploring SoHo, John and I decided to grab a pint before heading off to bed. We went to a pub near the hotel, called The Black Lion. We stepped inside and asked the bartender to give us the most London beer he had. He poured each of us a pint of London Pride. I'm not a fan of beer, but since I'm in England and I like horribly cliche gimmicks like celebrating the first night in London by getting a pint, I drank the whole pint. And was not the least bit affected (if anything, the Tropical Sunshine margarita at Chili's affected me more). However, WHAT A NASTY TASTE! Even John, more of a beer connoisseur than I, agreed that it tasted "like ass" (a claim which Felipe challenged him on later, eventually leading John to admit he doesn't know what ass tastes like). The after taste was so bad, and we just each had a pint, that we developed beer munchies. The pub did not serve food after 10pm (!) so we ended up walking down Queensway to get something. A 10 piece bargain bucket at KFC would've hit the spot, but they were out of chicken! So we eventually settled on getting lame ass shit off the value menu at Burger King, which didn't hit the spot at all, but at least got rid of the after taste.

Moral of the story: don't order London Pride

P.S. I didn't get carded at the pub. :)

JFK-LHR

(Note: Due to lack of free internets in London, this post has been published later. Post date and time are reflective of the approximate time at which this was written.)

I have arrived in London!

Sorry for the tardiness of this post. There is no free internet in London.

The transatlantic flight went very smoothly. This was my first time flying with British Airways, and it has left me very impressed. For starters, a small bottle of wine came with dinner! I was so confused when the flight attendant asked me, "Red or white?" Yes, I'm a total n00b. For posterity, here's a list of food that I consumed on the flight:

• pretzel bites
• orange juice (lots of it)
• chicken and pasta
• a slice of dutch apple pie
• salad
• dinner roll
• Kit Kat bar
• milk tea
• red wine
• apple bear claw

Yes, a lot of food for a 7 hour flight.

I tried sleeping on the flight, but a mixture of excitement and general inability to sleep on flights kept me awake. Thus I ended up watching and episode of Flight of the Concordes (Bret battles self-image issues, exacerbated by Jemaine's accusations of him being bulimic), How to Lose Friends and Alienate People (coincidentally, the last book I was reading at home but did not finish. This movie wasn't that great, despite Simon Pegg being in it), and an episode of Friends (Rachel gets an Egyptian cat, Phoebe decides to move in with the dude who was on Boston Public, etc etc).

Eventually, we landed in London - Heathrow at around 6am local time. After clearing through immigration, John and I waited for the Arcadia shuttle to the hotel (it didn't arrive until 9am). While being shuttled from the airport to the hotel, we couldn't help but notice that London looked so eerily similar to Hong Kong; the road signs and the cars were the same. Of course, this wasn't too surprising, considering Hong Kong used to be a British colony.

<24 hours

I have finished packing. It actually wasn't too bad. In fact, I'm not bringing a whole lot of stuff; I only have one large suitcase of clothing, a smaller suitcase of stuff (including peanut butter <3), a duffel bag for Week 1/potential luggage loss, and a backpack for my electronics and documents.

Today I went to NYC and bought a gift for my homestay family: a NYC snow globe depicting King Kong terrorizing the city and a baseball key chain. There were a few snow globes to choose from, with varying degrees of NYC loyalty and patriotism. I went with the King Kong one because I thought it was the most special, while still being appropriate in case my homestay family is anti-American. I also bought a baseball keychain because baseball's pretty American and "I <3 NYC" was written on it. Gotta have the "I <3 NYC" merch.

I'm spending my final 24 hours at home not really doing anything. I think I will try to finish the book I've been reading (How to Lose Friends and Alienate People. "Like you need any help with that!" you may jest). As for the bigger picture, I'm feeling pretty excited about spending a couple days in London meeting other American students in the study abroad program and just taking in the sights! As for the even bigger picture, I'm pretty optimistic about how the overall study abroad experience will turn out. I'll definitely be trying new things and, whether good or bad will come of it, I will be glad, regardless, for having the opportunity to see what's out there in the rest of the world. Corny, but true.

And now I will peace out. My flight isn't until 6:25pm tomorrow, so feel free to call me if you want to chat. I will sincerely miss every one of you. If you would like to stay in touch with me (outside of this blog), just ask me for my contact information (I even have Skype!).

Good bye and see you in London!

2 Days

I actually don't have anything important to write; I'm just pinging the blogosphere.

I will say that my Eurail pass arrived at my permanent residence a couple days ago. At least I'm ready for Spring Break lols.

I haven't really started packing. I've only packed one bag so far, the bag that I will be living out of for the first week. I'll get to the other bags tomorrow. I made a list of stuff to pack, and it's not too bad. Today, I even found out that bedding will be provided by my university, so that takes off a couple items on my list. Booya!

Sorry for the lameness. Expect a panicky packing post tomorrow, or Sunday morning...

9 Days

John and I just bought our Eurail Global Passes for the legen-(wait for it)-dary spring break trip across Europe. Oh yes, the reality of Europe is totally hitting me with full force.

Today I was supposed to make a list of things to pack. The day's almost over and I don't have a list yet. However, as far as electronics go, I think I'll only be bringing two that rely on outlet power (laptop and hairdryer), which feels like an accomplishment. Is it?

As for the gift for my host family, I will be venturing into NYC next weekend. I've received tips from a couple friends (Thanks Sweta and Gus!) that non-US people seem to go gaga over "I <3 NY" merch, so I'll probably shop along those lines. Of course, ideas are still welcome, as I still have a week before I go to the 212.

10 days

Hey everyone, I'm still alive and have not crumbled from crippling fear. Over the past few days I've grown more confident and less scared about living abroad for a handful of months. Europe! Yay the feeling of going to a foreign land (a foreign land in the western world, but still a foreign land) is washing over me so I'm actually more excited than scared. Also, Natalie gave me a really cute Paddington Bear for Christmas which is preparing me culturally hehe (I've been watching some Paddington Bear cartoons on Youtube).

Also, I got my housing information today. Apparently I'll be living in an off-campus self-catered dormitory in the Fallowfield Campus of Manchester. Everything about it seems great except for the off-campus aspect of it; a quick querying of Google Maps tells me it's roughly a 30 minute walk to the academic campus. It is along a really convenient bus route, so I'll deal. I guess I've been spoiled by the convenience of Morewood Gardens back at CMU. Haha. Some good things about the Fallowfield location, though, is a 5 minute walk to Sainsbury's, which is a supermarket, and plenty of social places like bars, shopping, etc. Should be a fun time.

There's still some stuff I need to do.

1. PACK! Lots and lots of packing. The challenge is fitting everything I need into 2 checked bags (note to self: call British Airways to make sure I'm allowed 2 pieces of checked baggage), a backpack, and a carry-on.
2. Buy a voltage converter for my laptop.
   
3. Buy a gift for my host family. After the Arcadia orientation, I will be spending 2-3 nights with a British family, "homestay," to get a more immersive experience of British life. I will be bringing a gift that is reflective of my "home." I could bring something that's uniquely American (but what? High cholestrol? Ok just kidding.) or something unique to my region (the Jersey shore? the NY metropolitan area?). I can't really think of anything special, maybe saltwater taffy or something nifty made out of seashells, I really don't know. If you have any ideas, feel free to share them with me.

That's all I really have to say for now. Tootles!

Two weeks

Two weeks until I leave for England.

I'm scared.