Saturday: pub, quiz, karaoke, German guys (Hannes, Felix, Alex and Jan), dance, Academy Club, Britpop, sleep
Sunday: church, lunch!, city tour, party restaurant, salsa lessons (with Dutchman named Thijs), foam party, ruined Howlies shirt, God bless McDonald's
Monday: faculty* orientation, supermarket finally, meeting with tutor*, compulsory fire safety seminar, enrollment
Here are some picture of my church, Holy Trinity Platt, whose worship was pretty much identical to CCP except the church is prettier, and everyone has an accent. Also, they had lunch, which was awesome since I still hadn't had time to go to the supermarket.
There are also some picture from the City Tour. I apologize if they're wobbly. We were on a coach bus, so we kind of just passed things.
The church built by the "Lord of the Manor" after he was excommunicated in 1215 for...signing the Magna Carta. The pope agreed to forgive him as long as he built a church. It was one of the only buildings in Manchester to get through the Christmas blitz of Manchester in 1940 unscathed, and the tour guide (a 70's-ish woman named Kay) was quick to point out how remarkable that was.
Manchester was the site of the beginning of the Industrial Revolution, and it was the first city in England to use trains for public transportation and is the site of the beginning of the Railway Age. This is the first public train terminal in the world, built in the mid-1800's.
This is Ordsall Hall, a Tudor manor where, reportedly, Guy Fawkes planned the gunpowder plot to blow up James I, the royal family and the aristocracy by blowing up the House of Lords on the Opening Day of Parliament. He did not succeed, but instead, he was drawn, quartered, and hanged. November 5 is still Guy Fawkes Night, and it's apparently a big deal in Manchester, and everyone tries to burn effigies in front of the house, thus the fence.
Here I am at Salford Quays (where they let us get out and eat - it was a 3 hour tour). Salford is northwest of Manchester, but there's only one street that differentiates them. The cities here aren't like in the US, it's really city upon city upon town upon city on and on. You're in a different town (all in the county of Greater Manchester) about every 4 or 5 bus stops. Kay kept saying the name of the body of water I'm in front of, but it took me awhile with her accent to figure out that it's the Manchester Ship Canal. I'll let you guess what I thought it was.
I didn't get a picture of Old Trafford (the stadium is ENORMOUS), but I did get a picture of the pub next door, which looks like the right kind of pub. Apparently, lots of people go there to watch Manchester United. Kay stressed to us numerous times that Manchester United was bought by Americans and was the most popular football team in the world, but if the people of Britain decided to stop going to the games (strike that, matches), the Americans would lose all their money. She and the bus driver were also obvious fans of Manchester City, as are apparently most of the other residents of Manchester that I've come across.
And finally, for my beer-loving compadres, The Royal Brewery. No, Boddington's isn't made in Manchester anymore, they closed that (and per Kay, made a lot of folks seriously angry). Scottish & Newcastle (who, says Kay, were just bought by Heineken/Carlsberg and created some sort of beverage monopoly in Europe) bought the Royal Brewery (shown) and while they used to produce Harp lager here, now it is the home of Foster's and San Miguel.
Oh, and for the curious, here are a couple of photos of my dorm room. It looks kind of small, but it's actually pretty roomy (well, except when you're practically showering on top of the toilet). The closet is practically empty! Now what am I going to do about that?
*Faculty - not the people who teach the classes at school, it's the division that your department is a part of i.e. mine is the Faculty of the Humanities. Tutor - unfortunately not someone who assists you with your homework, your Tutor is the advisor for your degree program (in my case, Dr. Szechi - who taught at Auburn for 15 years).
No comments:
Post a Comment