The Beginning of the End

Temple Church, for all you Dan Brown lovers

(Author's Note:So I just realized that this blog has been daily activity heavy and I really haven’t written anything introspective about my trip. I want to do this and I’m currently working on several opinion blog posts. I wrote several of these in an airport, working on about three hours of sleep and annoyed because my flight was delayed. So bear with me a bit.)

Moving on from that, I need to update you all about my last week in London. We only had two days on class, Tuesday and Wednesday, and the rest were free days to just relax and get everything together before exiting the country. On Tuesday, we had two site visits, one the morning and one in the afternoon.

The morning visit took us to the Inner Temple Library. If you know anything about the law system in England, all of the barristers in England must join one of four temples. These are the Inner, Middle, Grays, and Lincoln. They are all located near each other on Fleet Street in London. I am not blogging about this one for class so I will discuss more of it here. When you become a barrister and subsequently join this temple, you are given free rights to use the library of that temple. We visited the Inner Temple, which allows any member of a temple to use the library.

It is a beautiful and old library that has been in existence since the early 16^th century. It was bombed and destroyed during WWII but rebuilt afterwards and reopened in 1958. The architecture in the library is beautiful. It is all English oak, while high ceilings and large windows that allow in a lot of light. There is a gallery above that gives it that 19^th century library feel. However, the shelves are very high which is an issue for the librarians who need to reach books for the patrons.

Each inn has a core collection of law in England and Wales, as well as other special collections that are specific to each library. The Inner Temple, for example, has items regarding to part of the commonwealth nations as well as Scotland. It also has a very important manuscript and rare book collection. While we were unable to see them in person, we did see some of the copies they have on the walls in the library. For example, the library has the only copy of Edward VI’s will, in which he bastardized his step sisters, Elizabeth and Mary, and said that he wanted Lady Jane Grey to be the regent in the event of his death. Edward was a sickly child and this was written on a few months before he passed away. (History Note: Lady Jane Grey did assume the title, only to be arrested nine days later and have her head cut off. Then Mary took the throne, a role she eventually relinquished to Elizabeth.)

This library is very focused upon reaching out to their patrons needs. They spend a lot of time answering reference inquiries for the barristers, many of whom are crunched for time. They also spend a lot of time updating their blog, which compiles all of the news about cases, law, and verdicts that they believe is important to their patrons. This takes up a lot of time, but they recently won an award for it so they are thinking quite highly of themselves right now.

It's so pretty with the rings!

After visiting the library, we headed to lunch at a pub across the street. Called the Bank of England (check on this), it is the site on which Sweeny Todd is based. Lunch was paid for by our professor, which was very nice since I’ve been bleeding money ever since I arrived. We then hurried to our second and last tour of the day at the Royal Geographical Society. I won’t get into this here because I will link my post on the other blog here but it was so awesome. Super, super cool for anyone who likes explorers.

That was the end of our school day, so Jenny, Melissa, and I headed over to Tower Bridge to start checking off our checklist of things to do. Step one, walk across Tower Bridge. We did that but then had to walk all the way back to our dorms, which was much longer of a walk than originally anticipated. We do that a lot. I guess that’s why our calf muscles look so great, but it has led to lots of blisters over the past month. Before heading back, we grabbed dinner at a Mexican place that has the best burritos I’ve ever had. (I plan on blogging about food as well, since I’ve eaten quite well (maybe too well) since I got here.)

Fire Dancing!

I thought this was the end of the night until Jenny “cacawed” outside of my window and made me put on pants to go see something. I begrudgingly put on pants, signed off of my Skype session, and then found myself in a fire garden! It was so awesome. There is a Fire Garden in grounds of the National Theatre for three days every summer. We caught all three days. Melissa, Jenny, and I went to go walk through it and danced to the fire-themed music they were playing. Jenny took videos of our awesome dance moves. I have a feeling these may resurface in the future.

Thus, we ended our Tuesday on a high note. The countdown to the end had already begun with only three more full days left until I said goodbye to London. Cheers!

-         - Kate