Stop Touching the Statues!!

The British Museum is like the holy grail for students of history. (It's also really pretty.) So many amazing things are located in this museum that it could take one at least an entire day to go through and really soak up all of the items. Hell, you could spend more than an entire day there and not see everything that exists. The history that exists in this museum is paralleled in only a few other museums in the world and it is worth a trip if your in town.

Hey, you can totally see my reflection!

Alas, everyone and their mother agrees with my assessment that this museum is the place to be. What they don't understand and what drives me insane, is that if the sign says, "Don't touch the Object," you don't touch the object? What a novel idea! It was absolutely infuriating. If I saw one more tourist touching the hieroglyphics on a sarcophagus, I may have caused a scene. Are these people insane? Don't they understand that by rubbing their greasy, grimy, germ-ridden hands on the hieroglyphics, they run the risk of eventually erasing the images. Angry hands!

Well now that I've ranted to you about annoying tourists, I shall continue with my tales of 13 Friday, 2012. Our class met at the British Library at 10 a.m. for our tour of the British Museum Archives. We got an awesome tour, about which I blogged here, and then were on our own for the rest of the day. Thus, we went out on an adventure to see the British Museum in two hours or less. First Stop: Egypt! They have the Rosetta Stone, which obviously attracts everyone. But they have a lot of other cool things that were brought to the museum from excavations. The museum also has a great collection of Greek and Roman items, most specifically the famous Elgin Marbles, brought "legally" to England by Lord Elgin in the mid-19th century. Greece is still clamoring to get them back, but when one looks at the mess that Greece is in currently, one wonders if that is the correct decision.

The Olympic Medals!

After going through the ancient Mediterranean region, we quickly went through the more modern times, seeing artifacts from the Middle Ages. Cotswold and I took a picture together by a statue from Easter Island, and then we saw a special exhibit about horses! It was all awesome and we did it in under two hours. Inconceivable! (We do plan on returning during our last week here to see a special Shakespeare exhibit. So look for more on the BM in a week or so).

After the Museum, we walked through Soho to find the holy grail of mashed potato places: Mother Mash. They have the most magnificent mashed potatoes, and some seriously awesome meat pies, and truly glorious gravy. I'm hungry just thinking about it now. I'm eating well, my friends. Probably too well. Then we found Ben's Cookies, an amazing homemade cookie place tucked away on Oxford Street. So, so, good. Much to the happiness of my stomach, we stopped our food tour of London after that and headed back to the dorms to rest and blog. One more day left before my trip to Scotland!

- Kate

Two Hemispheres, One Person

Today began our second week of classes (time is flying by already!) and we started this week by a trip to Greenwich. Greenwich is located to the East of our location but is still within Greater London. To get there, we took a boat on the Thames that allowed us to capture some great photographs of Tower Bridge and other sites along the Thames. When we arrived in Greenwich, we walked around the grounds of the Old Royal Naval College and then around the downtown area.

We then headed towards the Greenwich Maritime Museum, where we were to have our coursework for the morning. We were unable to access the Library, for they are closed because of the Olympics. However, we did go to see a special exhibit that is happening through September 9, 2012, and was erected in honor of Queen Elizabeth II's Diamond Jubilee. I will blog about this on my other page and you will be able to access it here.

I'm between two Hemispheres!

After going through that exhibit, we visited the other parts of the museum and then went in search of the Prime Meridian, since that is kind of an important thing for people in Greenwich. Now, the entirety of Greenwich (and London in general) has been overcome with construction for the Olympic Games, which begin in about 18 days. And Greenwich will be hosting the Dressage Competition, so they need to get the stadiums ready. Which means, they need to shut things down in the area where the Dressage Competition will occur....so that means the Royal Observatory is closed. And the Royal Observatory is where the big Prime Meridian sign is located, and where most people go to get their photographs taken in two hemispheres. Alas, we couldn't get there. Now, if we had been scheduled to have gone to Greenwich, say, last week, it would have been open and we could have seen it. But that wasn't the case. Nevertheless, we overcame this issue and found another spot on a random side street where the PM is located and took our photos there. Crisis averted!
 

Elementary!

After succeeding in finding the PM, we went off in search of some shops and then lunch. We found Britain's Oldest Brewery, Shepherd Neame, where I had a pint of their Bishop Finger and a lovely sandwich. It was quite good, but tasted much like a Yuengling. Go figure. We then took the boat back to our home location, and Jenny and I headed towards Baker Street. Here, we saw the Sherlock Holmes Statue and then decided against going into the Sherlock Holmes Museum because of the ridiculous line. Thus, a quick trip to the gift shop was all that was necessary before I headed back to the dorms to catch up on my blogs and diary entries. A short but successful day!

- Kate