University of Delaware

I have formally accepted the offer from University of Delaware. I was accepted into the IGERT program which will provide extra funding and some really interesting opportunities. I also want to work with the IEC and study solar cells there. I'm not crazy about Newark, DE but I'll only be there for five years and I feel like they have some excellent opportunities. As long as I work smart, I will graduate around May 2014 at age 28. That is not too old, my goal is to graduate before I turn 30 so as long as research and coursework goes well I'll reach my goal. In addition I will get some great experience and connections and have some world class facilities at my disposal. I'm so relieved to have made this desicion!

Quite Evening

I'm just enjoying a quite night in right now. I worked on my coursework all afternoon and did some laundry. The weather has been so LOVELY in London. I almost didn't know sunshine could exist in this rainy bit of the world! The breeze is blowing in, cool, but not chilly, from my open window and I've got some Andy McKee guitar playing on my laptop. When I stopped at Summerfield's to pick up laundry detergent I got one of those rotisserie chickens (wonderful that they have those in the UK too and it fits perfectly in my largest tupperware), some salad greens, pre-made mash and a bottle of Merlot/Cabernet Sauvignon from the Bordeaux region (haha 3£)! An amazingly simple yet comforting and delicious meal. I think it cost me 10£ and will make at least three meals! Plus I didn't have to cook it, just heated it up in the microwave after my laundry was done.

As I fold my laundry, I am separating out clothes to take on Easter Holiday. I'm going to Germany and Poland with Beth. With the lovely weather I almost don't want to leave London! My mood is contemplative and sitting in Trefalgar Square, just watching people sounds like the best thing to do in the world (which I would have done this bright shiny afternoon except for my three course works due this coming Wednesday and not nearly enough progress on them!). However, Europe calls, and besides I found out the due date for my art history paper is April 16, so I'll be cutting my travels short and returning to London to spend some time in the Library and the National Gallery. Oh, such misery my life is - studying the great artists and genres in the greatest city on earth, eating roasted chicken and drinking wine, feeling at home. I love being here.

It occured to me that nothing makes you feel like your home than the little routines. Making dinner. Doing laundry. Cleaning house. I've already put down my roots here. I was home three weeks after I arrived. I miss London and I haven't even left. I suppose I'm nostolgic because before April 1st I have to decide where my next home will be - Atlanta GA or Newark DE. I don't want to go back and start another home. I can't imagine any place holding my heart like this one, besides Traverse City, Mi. In college, at Michigan, it was the PEOPLE that hold my love for the place. Now that many of my closest friends (aside from Kate) have graduated and moved on, I don't feel much about Ann Arbor, besides Michigan Pride and loyalty. Austin, TX was amazing but I think a lot of it was also the people. I've made some friends here but not super close friends like in Austin, Ann Arbor or Traverse City. The people I'm with are all just so different from me - different interests and studies - and we all know that there's not time to really bond, so friendships are looser. The only explaination for my attactment to London then is that I truely love the PLACE itself.

I'm also feeling contemplative, about the future and the past and the present because I found an old friend on Facebook today while I was doing my laundry. She never really updates her profile, so when I saw the new pictures - baby pictures (!) - I had to check it out. Ally and I were friends in High School. We weren't super close but I would count her among my good friends and was invited to her wedding, as she will be to mine if I have one. We've drifted apart since she got married (at age 20) and we were both off at different universities. This January she had a son. I found her blog on a link to her profile and am reading about her trip to Isreal with her husband who is a seminary student.

Just thinking about it. Having a baby! She's young but not terribly. It makes me think about my future and my plans for my life. It makes me savour this time here, drinking it like this wine. I am my own person. I am alone here. But alone in an indepentend way. I know that if I am in trouble there are a dozen people to call. I am alone the way you are alone when you sit out by the dock on the lake and look up at the stars. It's strange and amazing to think that with the millions of people in this city - the sirens, the car alarms, the motor bikes, the traffic, the congestion on the tube - that I can feel like I do when I'm at the lake. Alone and content.

Someday there will be no alone time. Nothing will be private and there will be a husband and a child. At least that's on the goal list. Alone time will have to be portioned out like I portion out chocolate. I am glad that I have learned to enjoy it, and treasure it now. I am glad I can travel the world on my whims and not be constantly comprimising and catering to other people. I am choosing to see Eastern Europe with Beth. If she and her friends drive me nuts then I can go off on my own without much concern. I am so completely blessed to be here, to have this opportunity and to have these experiences. A tight group of friends would be great but I think I'm doing more growing this way.

So in addition to finding out my Art and Society paper is due April 16 (it's our LAST essay) I found out my Rise of the Novel exam is April 24th. My courseworks for Writing London and Theater are due Wednesday and that's the end of the course. The exam period extends well into May and I'd assumed I would have more class. I cannot believe how short the semester was! Truly this is not what I was expecting, though it's a pleasant surprise. Essentially I have April 25th until July 6th that I have no classes! Again, not in the plan. Though traveling was in the plan so I'll get another Eurorail pass, hurang Melissa into traveling with me, and see where we end up.

I haven't forgotten why I am here however! To learn literature was one of the goals of the Fellowship, and since I just devoured "Northanger Abbey" (what can I say I am smitten with Jane Austin) I am in the mood for more literature. The bad thing about train travel is the long streches of traveling through the countryside - the wonderful thing about train travel is the long strechtes of traveling through the countryside. I picked up Mary Shelley's "Frankenstein, Rudyard Kipling's "The Man Who Would Be King" and Daniel Defoe's "Robinson Crusoe" at the discout book shop today for my train trips. These are three books that I feel you cannot be well read, without having read and which I have felt downright illiterate having not yet read. The list of such books is long (including quite a bit of Shakespear that I'm saving for my weekend jaunts around the UK when I'm at Cambridge), but these three will be a good start on my 7 hour train ride from Brussels to Berlin, and the 6 hour ride from Berlin to Krakow. I'd like to pick up a book or two on the Holocost and World War II because we will be visiting some of the most historic sights of that era on Easter Holiday and I know I would enjoy it more if I could at least refresh the details in my mind. I must be careful however, my backpack will get quite heavy if I take too many books!

Newark, Delaware

I was back in the States, this past weekend, visiting the University of Delaware. It was extremely considerate of them to pay for my flight all the way back to the USA and I really liked the department. MSE has a brand new beautiful building and lots of new equipment to use - everything I can imagine that I would need. The students and Professors were friendly and the research was really interesting. I was also very impressed by the IEC. My only wish is that I could have more information about Georgia Tech. I've e-mailed a few professors, but I just don't get a good sense of what the school is all about. I like that Delaware is a small, newer department. At Michigan I often felt like a small fish in a big pond - at the same time gold fish grow to fill their containers, whenever I visited a little pond, having grown up at UM, I felt like a big fish.

It wasn't until my visit this weekend that I noticed some of the differences between the US and UK. The first thing I noticed was how much more friendly people are in the US. It could be a big city thing in London, but ten minutes after getting off of the plane several people had stuck up small talk with me. An astronomer from CalTech reminded me to grill the graduate students when the professor wasn't around, and the ladies at the hotel were adorable! The hotels in the states are also much much nicer. So are ladies rooms in restaurants and cafes. Most cafes in London don't even have them and if they do they are cold, lack toilet paper and are rather less than clean. There is better public transport in London and everything doesn't look the same like it does in the states. Diet cokes tastes better in America but chocolate is better in the UK. I almost had reverse culture shock being back "home" for a few days. I am quite glad to be back in London.

This last trip I took got up my courage to finally plan my journey for spring break. I will be traveling with a class mate Beth to Germany and Poland. I got the global train pass and will take a detour back to London through Austria, France and possibly the Czech republic. Beth is flying straight back from Berlin, but I'm going to head out on my own for about a week. I've got a friend in Paris I think I'm going to visit also, but I haven't made plans other than to work out the first week and get my train ticket. If I end up going back early I can use the days on my train pass for up to two months. I've been traveling a lot but I'm getting used to finding my way around and making due.

Speaking of DUE I have a few assignments whose due dates are loomin gso I will be off to finish those!

Back to Work

Back in London and back to normal. All the guests have left and I am blissfully solitary. I love my friends but I also like a bit of time alone. Plus I have reading and course work to catch up on! Acting as tour guide was like a full time job and I went from being one and a half novels ahead of the class to one novel behind! Yikes! I have to get started on my essay also which is due at the end of the month and my presentation for theater class is due around that time also. For The Rise of the Novel I would like to write on the topic of either how the novels deal with women and marriage (the professor hinted that this was not going to be on the exam and would be a good topic to cover in the essay because we're not allowed to overlap material from the essay in the exam). I am also interested in the question that deals with how the novels are particularly English - though I'm not sure I'm qualified to talk about how "English" the novels are I'm interested in the qualities that make something "particularly English" and I feel it's part of the cultural and social experience I am trying to learn about here and would be beneficial if I explored the topic in context of the novels.

One thing I've thought about, if I could address any topic on the novels, and not just the ones assigned would be how London is portrayed in the novels. A few of the novels don't deal with London at all, or rather mention it in passing, but Moll Flanders and Fanny Hill take place exclusively in London. I'm fascinated at how differently London is portrayed and yet how similarly. In Fanny Hill the "inside" is shown - the inside of brothels, the activities that take place behind the curtain. Fanny is only twice described outside of a house or inn or brothel or shop. Moll Flanders is a woman out on the town. She's described seeking her fortune just about everywhere in London. At the same time, London is a place of sin and crime and low morals. It's a place that corrupts. I could definitely write an essay on this, if only it were one of the approved topics!

I've finished a rough draft of my creative writing drama piece, which I'm writing about the kids that stole the Stone of Destiny from Westminster Abbey. For creative writing I just have to edit the drafts of the first prose piece and polish up the drama. My writing log is pretty much finished and it's supposed to be informal anyway. I'm surprised at how short the semester is. We've just a few more weeks of class before Easter holiday and after that is examinations!

I fly to University of Delaware on Thursday after class. I went to an earlier session of my Friday Rise of the Novel class that I will be missing today. I've been accepted to UD, Georgia Tech and the master's program at Cornell. Given that I have two schools willing to pay for me to go there I think I'm going to turn down Cornell. Especially since Georgia Tech is just as good for Materials Science. I haven't heard from Washington or MIT, though I don't expect to get into MIT, I'm emailing Washington to find out when I can expect an answer. I have to decide by April 1st. I have no idea what to choose. Geogia Tech is a more established prestigious program, but UD is up and coming. They have a lot of new funding for alternative engery research and an NSF Fellowship program that allows students to take classes in public policy, economics and alternative engery technologies which also provides an extra 15k/yr on top of the graduate student stipend. I feel like I could stand out more at UD, be a big fish in a little pond. However, I don't know that for sure and even if I'm a littel fish at Georgia it's going to stand out on my resume that I went to Georgia Tech. They have more professors to work for and more resources. Being more established means I wouldn't be starting a project from scratch. There would be people there who had the experience and the equipment to work on what I was interested in and there are connections with solar industries and start ups in Atlanta. Minor considerations are the warm weather and my friend Sejal is working for Manhattan Asc. in Atlanta, while UD is close to Philidelphia, New York and Washington D.C. My mom's routing for UD but I'm not really sure why. Oh well, have to get back to reading.

Rome!

Last weekend was Dublin, this weekend is Rome!
Summery: Greg, a friend of mine from the States flew to London for UM Spring Break to visit me. My other friend Kate also flew in Friday and she and I flew to Rome on Sunday, at the same time Greg was flying back to Ann Arbor.

In Dublin Greg and I saw Trinity College and the Book of Kells, which was extraordinary. We went on a tour of the Guinness Storehouse and learned about brewing Guinness and beer in general (which Greg already knows quite a bit about as he brews his own beer). We walked all around Dublin and saw churches, ate good hearty Irish food (and even some Thia AMAZING food! I highlly recommend the restaurant MAO! in Dublin) and saw the Irish National Museum and Gallery. I liked the archeological pieces at the museum and learning about the various influences, Viking, Roman, Christian etc on Irish culture and history. There were some beautifuly worked gold bracelets, torchs and dress fasiners of all things as well as weapons and wooden ships to keep Greg interested. I had wanted to visit Galway by train but as it was Greg's spring break and my Edinbourgh trip was rather exhausting we were a bit too lesuirly in the morning and didn't catch the train in time. Over all it was a great experience though I'd like to go back to Dublin or Ireland in general when the weather gets warmer and I have a little more time to sit around under a tree in the green fields and write poetry.

On Friday night we went out to see La Cage aux Folles at the Playhouse theater and had some pretty delicious pizza and wine afterwards. La Cage was one of the shows I had to see for my London Theater and Performance class and I found it hilarious and amazing.

I finally finished reading Fanny Hill and have started on Joseph Andrews. Fanny Hill was...interesting. Explicit in the extreme, though in a quaint, eighteenth century way, it was still rather repetive and hard to sit still though. I don't consider myself a naive girl, but Fanny Hill was down right shocking. I've never read cheesy romance novels but from what I've heard I imagine they are similar to this rediculous book. I'm glad to have moved on. At least Joseph Andrews is being satirical with his cheesyness.

I know are papers are coming due soon so I have to start working on a topic for The Rise of the Novel. For Art and Society I'm writing about a series of paintings about Pamela and discussing how the eighteenth century saw the rise to prominance of the middle class in art, trade, economic power and social influcences and how their values of hard work and virtue translated both into the novel and the artwork.

I turned in the draft of my short story for Writing London and it was very well received by the professor. I have a few changes to make but she actually likes my style of writing and complimented my mechanics so I am pleased. I also have an idea for the short drama that we have to write. When we were in Edinbourgh we heard the story of the stone of destiny - part of the Scotish crown jewels it was used to crown many of the Scotish kings before it was stolen by the English and kept in Westminster abby under the throne on which the English kings were crowned. In the 1950's a group of university students from Scotland managed to steal back the stone from Westminster Abbey and their escapades sound like a great thing to write a drama about.

I am in Rome today with Kate. We walked pretty much around the whole city and I am surprised at how small it is! We traversed pretty much the whole city without the aid of bus or train or tube, which it pretty impossible in London! We saw the Parthenon and ate roasted chestnuts and saw about a dozen piazzas, palazzos, monuments and ruins. Too many to remember or name, though tomorrow, when everything is finally open we are going to go to a few of the sights we'd like to see in more detail. I'll be uploading pictures to Piccassa soon!