“Huge knots of sea-weed hung upon the jagged and pointed stones, trembling in every breath of wind; and the green ivy clung mournfully round the dark and ruined battlements. Behind it rose the ancient castle, its towers roofless, and its massive walls crumbling away, but telling us proudly of its own might and strength, as when, seven hundred years ago, it rang with the clash of arms, or resounded with the noise of feasting and revelry.”
--Charles Dickens
We wandered around the coast for a bit and then Laura and I checked out some of the historic sites in town. There wasn't much to see besides the beach. Margate has a nice beach, but the town is kind of shady. I wouldn't want to be there at night.
On Friday, we were able to get a tour of the Cathedral as well as the city of Canterbury.
It rained a lot during the city tour, but I was able to get some nice pictures of the inside of the Cathedral.
This is the inscription above the door to the alcove where St. Thomas Becket was murdered on Tuesday December 29, 1170. He was one of four archbishops of Canterbury who were murdered (though not all of them were Catholic Archbishops). According to witnesses, St. Thomas Becket passed through this door at about 4:30pm to go say vespers in the Cathedral. He was followed by four knights of the king (who had accused him of treason, and had been arguing with him for the entire day). They called him back down these steps…
…and then dealt him several blows. The monks that were accompanying him tried to protect him (one of them was unfortunate enough to have his arm severed), and finally, one of the knights dealt Thomas a blow to the head so severe, it chopped off the top of his head, and broke the sword.
This Modern sculpture is supposed to represent the four swords of the knight, as well as the broken sword (the shadows are intentional). The sculpture is situated in the alcove where the murder took place.
After the Cathedral tour, we had a tour of the city of Canterbury, but it was raining, so I didn’t get very many good pictures. Here are some random photos from the guided River Tour that we took on Saturday.
The tour was fabulous! Our guide was very entertaining – he was a student from a rival university, which made it even funnier. We learned many, very British, tidbits about old buildings around the river, and about the river itself. 
This is the official “ducking stool” which was used as a punishment for nagging wives. According to our river tour guide, the woman wasn’t ducked under the water for very long – but what made the punishment so horrific was the large amount of sewage in the river. It was meant to teach her when to close her mouth :P
On that happy note…Cheers!
~Laura
The castle is called Canterbury Castle, the town prison. Apparently, they once kept a Saracen prisoner there (as the security guards at Uni tell me). A few days ago we got lost and had to consult the security guards at Uni where they gave us an impromptu history lesson about Canterbury. We learned about the castle and about some place along the river where they used to drown "witches." If the woman drowned, she was innocent, she was guilty (in which case the punishment was death by drowning). One of the guards informed us that "my missus passed the test." They were both quite charming. He said that there was a nice river walk near the spot where they kept the same cage they drowned the witches in. We plan to do more exploring tomorrow.
We also visited The Canterbury Tales Museum which has figures act out the stories from Chaucer's Canterbury Tales. It was very charming. 
Maybe more.Well, I finally made it. I'm writing this on my first night here, but you won't see it until a few days from now when my internet gets fixed (ITS is gone today).The plane ride wasn't so bad. I hate takeoffs and landings, but other than that, it was endurable. Unfortunately, I got little to no sleep because of the nighttime antics of my fellow passengers. We landed a little earlier than we expected and so expected to take a long time getting through customs and finding our contact person. Customs was a piece of cake. I showed the lady my passport and a landing card. That was it. All the reams of paper I had in my backpack of letters and support letters I didn't need after all. When we got to the other side of customs we looked at each other and said "that was it?" It was that easy (Praise God!)
The next part wasn't so easy. We hauled our luggage around and searched for our contact person. Finally a lady, who could see we looked lost, herded us into a group of seats that were occupied by some other American students on their way to Canterbury. We were all suffering from Jet Lag so we really didn't get to meet them (supposedly we get to tomorrow). We just know they are from the USA and live in the same dorm. That group anyway.
Finally, after about forty minutes or so, our contact person showed up. It was understandable, since she thought our flight was coming later. Then, we spent another fifteen minutes or so because she thought she was missing some students (i.e. us). She checked off our names, but it didn't click that we were from the missing university. (she couldn't speak/understand English that well). Well, we finally got the problem solved and filed into a bus bound for Canterbury.
It was an interesting bus ride, to say the least. Four people who seemed exempt from the drag of jet lag talked the whole way there, LOUDLY. I was hoping for a nap, or maybe some silence, but it didn't happen. They didn't seem to be my kind of crowd. The scenery was beautiful though (which the talking people missed). England has more hills than I thought it would. To cut grass, they use sheep. Very eco-friendly.
Canterbury is so cute J All the streets look like medieval England. When we arrived at our house (which is the CRAZIEST house I've ever been in. I get lost in it all the time) there was a crew of people there to help us. The first thing I had to do was to lug my forty pound suitcase up a steep flight of stairs. My arms still hurt L Fortunately I got some guy to carry up my other one. I've got a wardrobe in my room…a really cool one J We unpacked our stuff and then went around sightseeing. Laura and I bought some food at the local Tesco's and ate it in my room. Our house is so confusing that we went exploring and discovered a nice kitchen in the basement. Every two feet or so, there is either a staircase or a door. To get from one end of the house to the other would take an eternity if one wanted to go about it quietly, so no one does and you can hear the constant slamming of doors. Our kitchen (the one we are assigned) smells really bad and is filthy, which is due to the Russian students who don't clean up after themselves. They are nice people, just extremely messy. We have to use a different fridge from them because they keep liverwurst in theirs. The rest of gang went to a party at the university, but I was so tired I fell asleep just as they were leaving and so missed the party.
Day 2 (written on the day in which they occurred)
Ok, now on to today's events. Orientation was today, so I got up at a reasonable hour and shivered my way through breakfast. It's colder here than I thought it would be. Laura's room faces the rising sun, so she is fine. My room, however, is larger (more deluxe) than hers, so I pay for it in shivers. We ate our breakfast in the basement kitchen and made coffee with the stuff we bought the night before. I tried to boil water on the stove for ten minutes, but the thing was still cold. It was then I discovered the water-heating machine. The coffee tasted terrible because I made it too strong and we didn't have any milk to put in it.
By this time, everyone else got up and went out for breakfast and then together we went to the University for orientation—but we were at least twenty minutes early. In Britain, one can never be early, and everything happens at least five minutes later than posted. We got to meet one of our professors today who will be teaching our modern Britain course. He and this other cute British chap Doug were in charge of registering us for classes. By hand, no computers.
Ok, one would think that in a university with over 15,000 students, they would have a computer system like they do back home. Nope. Registration took four hours. There are a couple hundred American students here and they all had to be registered. Apparently, they said they didn't have our paperwork, and so didn't know what classes we want to take. (I was SO mad after all the hours I spent figuring out my class schedule so nothing would conflict). Luckily, I remembered what courses I wanted (that will transfer back). I am taking Victorian Novel and Children's Lit. Do I get to pick a section? No! Apparently,(to be read in a very British accent) "If I talk to the person real nice, they might let me in." Everything here is so happy-go-lucky and disorganized. There is a ton of stuff that they didn't tell us at orientation, like about our mail, our internet, etc—that they didn't mention. Instead, we watched a video about fire safety. Good, but not that necessary.
We were so tired after orientation that we went shopping. Twice. I bought a lamp for my room (my room is very dark) as well as some hangers, groceries, and the washcloth I forgot to pack. Then we went to eat. I tried fish and chips…they were amazing except for the fact that they were fried (not the healthiest thing in the world). I am making it by buying (and intending to eat) some broccoli.
It's funny, but I don't feel like I stick out here. Everyone is really friendly and nice and there are lots of foreigners so no one stares at the silly Americans. I'm proud to be an American. I might feel differently once class starts and I interact with more British kids, but for now, everything is cool.
Whew! That was a long post, partially due to my lack of internet, which I just fixed. You may expect shorter posts in future.
Cheers!
--Mary
Yes, we survived the long plane ride and managed to arrive in Canterbury with only a mild case of jet-lag… though as the evening wears on, I am beginning to realize just how much sleep I missed on the plane. In fact, I didn’t hardly sleep at all on the plane. Mary and I decided to watch Prince of Persia on the plane (the airplane actually had a selection of movies!! which, on my last trip, was unheard of).
When we arrived at the airport, we were greeted with… no one. We breezed through customs and piled our suitcases in a heap and tried to figure out what to do. Finally, someone in our group started asking smart questions of intelligent-looking people, and we sat down to wait – for a very long time – with another group of American students going to Canterbury. After a long while (which was not helped by all of us being very sleepy from a sleepless night) someone from the University found us, and after another long while we were packed into a bus (for a very long ride) to Canterbury.
The countryside of England is similar to the US of A (at least, where I live) but they have sheep EVERYWHERE! Cheap lawn service, I suppose :)
The internet wasn’t working quite properly – for some strange reason half of our group figured out how to obtain internet access, and the other half tried but failed…) We’ll probably find out tomorrow how to use the internet at our orientation :S
As usual, the photos are random, but I hope you enjoy them all the same :)
This was our dinner today… which deserves a small explanation :) After unpacking, we decided to take a walk around town and pick up some dinner. Keep in mind that we only had breakfast on the plane (and could stomach that very well – the coffee digested admirable, but just not the greasy croissant) and no lunch because of the long wait and bus ride.
We must have walk around the town center twice before Mary agreed with me that we should turn around to find food. We sought and found Tesco’s, and purchased some fruit, cheese, crackers, and yogurt… as well as an Aero chocolate bar—you gotta have your veggies, you know ;) Seriously though, the cheese, apples, and crackers made a fine, light, dinner – without making tons of dishes.
This has been the longest day ever, and I am quite ready to go to bed.
Cheers!
~Laura
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