So the last few days I have been in London after going to Egypt- which I think Ankit covered pretty well in his blog cept a few things:

The pyramids were so big, you couldn't look at them without losing your knees a little bit, and looking up from the base it really just looks like a mountain of rocks. And also, I did make a mental note that they were the product of slave labor- but at the same time I wondered who the person who put the very last block at the top... can you imagine what that must have felt like?

I loved the egyptian food- even the pigeon!

sheesha who knew? one night we were all sitting in a room in Cairo when a guy confessed that he used to work at Prince in Georgetown... so basically the world is inhaling or something.

I miss the heat... It's been pretty nice here in London but I miss the sun.

and I have 15,000 words to write by April 27.. so that's a little worrisome... especially since I'm leaving for amsterdam in the morning. where I'm meeting my mom. and my aunt. c'est super.

I've been reading a lot of poetry, like more than usual, because for one of my essays I have to analyze the effect of Pindar, who wrote songs for the athletes of Greece a few hundred years before the birth of Christ... on Samuel Taylor Coleridge and John Keats, who lived in the nineteenth century- but on the bright side I get to read a lot of Keats, who I have a huge crush on now, "tender is the night" and also on poets.org there is a recording of Stanley Plumly reading To Autumn by JK and I heard Plumly in person once, he has an incredible deep resounding voice, like in another life he was a Presbyterian minister or something, but it's amazing.

Anyway, I'll be home in about a month and a few days. I've been in London for four months. I've been living in cities for three years. I'm not sure I like it anymore.

Anyhow I tried to make a little video of the stuff that was cool in Paris, there are some pictures and videos of the crepes, the Eiffel Tower, the Arc de Triomphe and inside the Louvre are the statues of Psyche and Cupid kissing, Michelangelo's Dying Slave.... most importantly... Winged Victory, Nike of Samothrace... annnd stuff like that all while listening to J'ai Bu by Paul Azvanazor

I have been remiss

oh well.

Today I had the wonderful experience of seeing Swan Lake at the Royal Opera House in Covent Garden. I was not really looking forward to this, I have never been to the ballet before and I did not really see what the big deal was- but I get it now! From the first scene opening with this very rich, colorful set and all these characters acting their own parts through body language and dance- it was really amazing.  I went with my friend, and on the other side of me when the man sat down, he put his hand on my thigh! He looked down when I started, and his face went white, to the degree I think that mine was red, and then he said, "Why I'm so sorry, I thought you were an armrest!" I just smiled and him and his date and said something like, " no worries" while my friend cracked up.

But the ballet- well it was beautiful, there was always about five different places I wented to focus my attention on the stage- except when the lead ballerina was on, she just stole the show completely, it was so breathtaking to watch her even just move her wrist, every motion was so graceful... and I especially loved when all her swan maidens were on the stage, it was an eyeful of white tulle and did I mention that the music was wonderful too? Haha I closed my eyes at one point to just listen... ok so my point is I am a convert.

Afterward walking around, it was like being in the presence of so much grace and ease lingered in the audience, I have never been so aware of myself, it's strange.

P.S. Spring is here, and I like it. Here's to spring.

Horace, Odes, Bk 4, no 7

Snow's gone away; green grass comes back to the meadows,

and green leaves

Back to the trees, as the earth

Suffers her springtime change. Now last month's torrents,

diminished,

Keept to their channels. The Grace

dares to unrobe and, the Nymphs and her two sweet sisters

attending,

Venture a dance in the woods.

Yet be warned: each year gone round, each day snatching

hour says

'Limit your hopes: you must die'

Frost gives way to the warm west winds, soon summer shall 

trample

Spring and be trodden in turn

Under the march of exuberant, fruit-spilling autumn, then

back comes

Winter to numb us again,

Moons make speed to repair their heavenly losses, but not so

We, who, when once we have gone

Downwards to join rich Tullus and Ancus and father Aeneas,

Crumble to shadow and dust.

Who knows whether the all-high gods intend an addition

Made to the sum of today?

Give to your own dear self: that gift is the only possession

Fingers of heirs cannot grasp.

Once you are dead, Torquatus, and Minos delivers his august

Verdict upon your affairs,

No blue blood, no good deeds done, no eloquent pleading

Ever shall conjure you back,

Great is the power of Diana and chaste was Hippolytus, yet

still

Prisoned in darkness he lies.

Passionate Theseus was, yet could not shatter the chains

Death

forged for his Pirithous.

London Theatre

I am taking a course called Modern Theatre, it's really great and this week we went to see Mrs. Affleck at the National Theatre, which has three stages, and ours was the smallest room, The Cottesloe. Mrs. Affleck is an adaptation of an Ibsen play called Little Eyolf, which was taken from Norway 1890's and put into England 1950's. The play was about a dissatisfied woman who wants her husband to in some way commit to her and her alone, but the problematic relationship they have with their son gets in the way. The son then dies, and the play takes an odd turn, but the actress playing Mrs. Affleck was wonderful, she was like Audrey Hepburn with a spine.

on Tuesday I went to see King Lear at the Young Vic Theatre- it was a modernized production, but the original Shakespeare text. Pete Postlethwaite from Romeo + Juliet annnd Jurassic Park. He spent the last two acts in a sundress holding a pink parasol, looking down at himself as he said, "I have been greatly abused." The end was very moving though.

I have also gone to the Old Vic to see Committed with Richard Dreyfuss, which was not great. The set up was cool- the stage floor was made into tens of tv screens, and the moral of the play was interesting, although sort of ambivalent in the end, but the actors were not really all that convincing, I never forgot I was watching a play.

Tomorrow I'm going to see the Taming of the Shrew at the Novello Theatre- it's the Royal Shakespeare Company, so I'm excited to see it.

Night, Chelsea

Je t'aime.

ah so last week I went to Paris. So.... this is going to be a long entry.

It was a strange spur of the moment trip- by which I mean I only booked my seat on the Eurostar Rail three weeks before leaving.

I left at 6:30 on Saturday morning, so as to have the whole day. It did not occur to me at the time that this would mean (allowing for the hour + bus ride to St. Pancreas International) that I would have to wake up at 4am. That would have been fine, but my friend Sarah was visiting on Friday and I spent the day walking around Westminster and having high tea at Kensington Palace. That was really fun, actually, cucumber sandwiches and cinnamon tea followed by breaded studded with nuts and raisins and then some sort of cake. We went to see a free jazz show on the South Bank of the Thames, that was fantastic also (Mishka Adams). Anyway, I got back to my dorm at 10:30 ish and still hadn't packed or showered. 

London at 5 am on Saturday morning is an interesting scene. It was mostly quiet except for the people walking and riding to their early morning jobs, or else returning from their very late partying. I made it to the rail without incident, and very much enjoyed the lax security and easy journey into Paris, only about 2 1/2 hours. I walked from the station to the hostel, which was also really a happy surprise, it was about a ten minute walk from Notre Dame and the big blue door opened into a stone courtyard with lots of light and vines on the walls. If you are looking for a place to stay, I'd recommend this place: MIJE Rue de Fourcy.

So I met up with my friend Ashlee and her two friends from Muhlenberg College in PA, they are all doing home stays in Aix en Provence, where Paul Cezanne lived. We stopped at a sandwicherie for lunch (chicken sandwich and chocolate croissant, best ever). Then we walked to the Louvre and through the Tuileries Gardens outside of it on our way to the Champs-Elysees. This was a long long walk that ended with us trying to figure out how to get to the Arc de Triomphe... there were about 8 lanes of traffic and we were seriously considering making a run for it when we noticed the very small sign pointing to steps that led to an underground tunnel to the Arc. It was very cool to see, I loved seeing all the detail that went into the stonework. We walked from there to the Eiffel Tower, then headed towards home. We were exhausted by this time, and so when we saw a metro we were thrilled... until we got on to it and in the crush of people I managed to get pickpocketed. I didn't realize my wallet was missing until we had switched lines, and  deferred my meltdown until the next day, but in my mind I can almost see the hand with grey and brown hair on it reaching into my bag.

This is the second time I've been stolen from in the last four months. 

But Ashlee covered me for the whole weekend, and I got my mother to give her mother a check to deposit in Ashes debit account... it all worked out, but what makes me mad is that both times I had to pay to get a new student ID - $15 at GW and L10 to King's. So unjust. 

Sunday: I have to mention breakfast- it was just at the hostel, a half a loaf of bread with strawberry jam, a small chocolate croissant and a cafe ole and an oj, but something about that petite dejeuner was really beyond incroyable.

 clock in the musee d'orsay

We went to the Musee D'Orsay, which used to be a train station long ago before it became an art museum. There was some really wonderful Van Gogh and Ashlee loved Degas's dancers.

There was also a painting from 1890 called L'origine  du monde, (Origin of the World) and it was a close-up of a women's vagina, by which I mean spread legs. It was very funny, only men were taking pictures of that one, and an English girl whispered in a shocked voice to her companion, "how horrid!"

We got panini's before going to Saint-Chappelle (an overpriced tourist trap church, but there was beautiful stained glass) and Notre Dame (free, and magnificent- but I did feel strangely about walking around while there was a service happening.) We paused for crepes outside of Notre Dame and reflected on how unreal it felt. Then I went and introduced date marry dump to the Muhlenberg girls and we played that with various french and english royalty for a while.

That night we went to a restaurant called Bodega near our hostel. It was so good we went again Monday, they had this walk poulet, chicken with haricot verts and mushrooms and onions, so good with a margarita.

Monday began early, we had breakfast and got to the Louvre by 10, and explored the Egyptian wing first. Then to Greek statues and Italian from there. Michelangelo's Dying Slave was very cool to see, but the highlight for me was Nike of Samothrace, or Winged Victory. I wrote an essay on this statue freshman fall at GW, I've wanted to see it since then- it's just so intense, the wet drapery and the outstretched wings and posture, it's all so breathtaking.  It's headless, which is strange but somehow it just makes the statue more interesting, more scope for imagination.

Of course, we saw the Mona Lisa, and she seemed to watch me everywhere I went, which was fun. It was more impressive live, after seeing so many reproductions though, it was not really possible to be so awing. 

My favorite painting was probably this huge epic masterpiece of Napoleon crowning Josephine- I could have stared at it for another hour, it was - there's no other word- sumptuous.

We also visited Napoleon III's living quarters which have been preserved, they were attached to the Louvre- a lot of red velvet and crystal chandeliers. 

After much walking through the Louvre we went to Angelina's, a place made famous by its rich hot chocolate and guest list (Coco Chanel and Proust were both frequenters). The chocolate chaud was so rich my friend couldn't finish hers, it really did taste like melted chocolate, that thick, and along with it the waiter brought a vase of heavy whipped cream.

Our last visit Monday night was the Eiffel Tower- E12 bought us a ticket to the top on the slow moving elevator, and by the time we got there it was exactly 7, dusk was setting in and the tower was glittering, as it does every hour after dark.

 We stared for an hour at every possible view as it got darker and Paris lit up (City of Lights, after all), then bought some cheap post cards and I purchased a E1 Eiffel Tower key chain from one the many street merchants, one of whom murmured "eh sexy" after realizing I definitely wasn't going to buy something. 

We split a litre of wine with our dinner and stayed up late talking about American and French boys, but without coming to any definite conclusions.

So I wasn't kidding about the length of this thing- but I can't believe it was only three days, still. I left early Tuesday morning so I could get back in time for Jacobean Shakespeare. All day I kept thinking, yesterday at this time I was ___. But it still feels unreal, or maybe everything else seems less real... je ne sais pas, mais Paris est une belle ville.

East Market predators

Today I sent in my application for a double major in English and Creative Writing- I had to send in 15 pages of poetry and someone in the english department will be reading it and assessing it. I don't even really know how competitive it is, but I am aware of at least one other guy I know applying too- and also that he's got an obsession with pro-wrestling.

That's what's so strange about creative writing courses by the way- you walk into a room of strangers, tell them all intimate and sometimes bizarre information about yourself, and then leave. Once a class of us were packed into an elevator and all I could think was, "she's slept with fifteen guys and calls them interchangeable" until it occurred to me that She might be thinking, "that girl hangs out in cemeteries and writes poems from the point of view of her ex boyfriend". You see my point? It's such a show of flying freak flags. 

Anyway I also went to the East Street Market today, where Charlie Chaplin once shopped. While I was looking at a pretty and cheap shirt, a man next me starting whispering and I thought he was talking to himself so I just walked away. Later I was purchasing some nectarines and there he was again, next to me and muttering. Then, the man and wife who owned the stall I was at came out from behind their counter and forcefully ejected the man from the marketplace. Did I mention that all this time I was wearing headphones and listening to Nirvana? They returned and asked if I was alright, and I asked what he was saying. The husband cocked an eyebrow at me and the wife just shook her head and told me I owed her 2 pounds 50 pence and to be careful. The mystery remains, and I think I'm fine with that.

I've been spending a little time with a guy from my english class, who told me he was a lord- it has occurred to me that he's pulling my leg, but I'm afraid to question him for fear it will offend some sort of weird royal sensibility. Anyway he's very dry and sarcastic and calls me droll and tolerable. Mostly I want to use him to understand British politics better, I think he's the equivalent to a poli-sci/ journalism double major at GW. 

My English Lord and I avoided each other today, we are equally phobic, it looks like... but all in all it was a great Valentines Day. I went to explore Notting Hill and maybe hoped to run in to Hugh Grant falling in love with Julia Roberts, but had no such luck. I did wander around Portobello Market for hours, it was so cool: there are about 2,000 vendors on Saturdays and they all have these little tents and make everything, crepes, falafel, hotdogs, and beyond food there were really great clothing tents and a whole section of antiques and jewelry and I purchased a little clay elephants for my collection- the man who I bought if from said his friend the potter made it. 

Then I met up with friends to go see Vicki Cristina Barcelona- which I loved but also thought was missing something in its characterization of american women- haha Woody Allen still doesn't get it... maybe even less than he used to. Anyway, it was very funny, and Javier Barden is crazy hot, suddenly I understand Morgann's obsession.

I think my next stop is Kensington Palace.

Library and Charing Cross Road

So recently in my Modern Theatre class we've been reading Strindberg- the guy credited for beginning naturalism in the theatre- or at least writing the manifesto for it. We were talking today about his Dream play- he was so interested in dreams and what they meant at the same time as Freud, and He also believed that there were symbols, but also that dreaming enabled a spiritual place of transcendent experience- not sure what that means? Me neither.

(This is Maughan Library- it's not Gelman, but it's home. ps it's one of three prime examples of Gothic architecture in London- also on that list is Parliament)

The last dream that I can remember was going back to visit GW, and everything was slightly wrong, but I was still happy to be there... maybe this means that the exact same thing will happen senior year?

Side note: I just found out that I got 2135 F street housing, but I can't find out who my roommates are. It's sooo frustrating.

Ok so today I visited Charing Cross Road,

 and I love it- I walked about ten minutes and passed five book stores int at time- and I got a deal! Bought a Tale of Two Cities and Fathers and Sons for only 8 pounds! Tomorrow (if it's over 40 degrees) I'm going to Notting Hill and Portabella Road Market, then to read Dickens where it is meant to be done- Fleet Street. I know- I should stop my crazy partying.

P.S. Does anyone know where J.K. Rowling wrote Harry Potter? I remember reading that she wrote part of it sitting outside a Starbucks or something in London... I must go there.

Love, Chelsea