Fantastic end to a fantastic summer.

Now that the dust has settled on my last two days in England, I've survived the 23-hour journey back to the States, and I'm all moved into my new New Orleans apartment, I guess I can blog about the end of the summer school. Prepare for the overly sappy.

Thursday morning the Shakespeare pathway had its last lecture of the summer school. It was another play-specific session on The Tempest, taught once again by Prof. McRae. This time, though, the lecture was much more engaging, and I don't think that we lost any students to sleep. (Possibly.) I'm glad that we had another lecture on that play, because it was definitely my least favorite of the works we had to read. Sitting in class and discussing it, however, helped me realize just how much there was in the play that I hadn't picked up on by reading it once. I appreciate it a lot more now, that's for sure. Though I don't believe I'll be writing my final paper on that particular play.

The afternoon was free of lectures and was technically "independent/group study time" - so, naturally, people only took a fraction of that time to study. After lunch, I met with my group to discuss how we were going to organize our project. We had already chosen a topic - Shakespeare and love as demonstrated in A Midsummer Night's Dream - the question was how we were going to organize what each person had researched into the presentation. Luckily the meeting went pretty smoothly, and we had a presentation hammered out and practiced within two hours. (Shout out to Veronica, my other awesome Saint Louis girl, for choosing a perfect background for the presentation.)

After we felt like we were comfortable with the presentation that we were scheduled to give the next day, all five of us split off in different directions. Anu and I went back into town to finally go on the quay - our goal was to go kayaking and then do some last minute souvenir shopping for ourselves and friends/family. When we got down to the river (after finding our way down there - we got temporarily turned around), we unfortunately learned that kayaking was sold out for the day. No worries. There was a sign for paddle-boating not too far away, and the paddle boats were much, much cheaper than renting a kayak. Plan B success.

Anu looking fab even in her 'kayaking clothes'

Me looking not so fab in kayaking clothes

On the river! Praying we wouldn't drop the phone into the water.

We found a really awesome and fairly-priced souvenir shop by the cathedral and stopped in there to buy gifts. I picked stuff up for friends from home and got a souvenir spoon of the royal birth for my friend Emily's younger sister - she was following it super closely, so hopefully she likes it!

You have no idea how quickly Royal Baby merchandise appeared on shelves.

After we returned from our venture into town, it was time to pack and prepare for final presentations the next day. A lot of people were in denial that we all had to leave - none of us wanted to believe it. All the same, we went out to The Firehouse one last time before we all had to leave. Anu and Luis had an epic pizza eating competition, I wished once again that I could take toffee apple cider back home with me, and great times were had. (Seriously, though. U.S. needs to get on this cider train.)

Last Firehouse pizza! Delicious.

Friday morning eventually rolled around, despite every single Exeter ISS student dreading it. Everyone put just a little more effort into their appearance that morning, since almost every track would be presenting in front of their pathway and two Exeter professors. (Everyone except International Management. They got away with no presentation and just a paper. And people say business is hard...) I think that our specific presentation went very well - we stayed inside the twenty minute time limit, made great points, and had a good presentation. I think the five of us - me, Veronica, Anu, Stine, and Sherrie - made a great team! Our geographical diversity (we represented the USA, India, Denmark, and China, respectively) definitely helped us in our analysis. Even though we were well-prepared, we all breathed a sigh of relief that it was over.

Presentations being over meant that we had to face the fact that we were spending our last afternoon in Exeter. People remained in denial and refused to pack. A lot of the Shakespeare group got lunch at The Ram one last time and talked over the "Exeter ISS in One Minute" presentation that we wanted to do at the dinner later on. After that, I walked around with Anu and Lindy and got some last minute pictures of the city that I'd somehow come to love so quickly.

Description of the ancient city wall

Ancient Roman wall in a modern English shopping district.

Exeter's 'Big Ben'

These signs came in handy so many times. It's such a tourist-friendly city.

Sign for The Imperial, at which I left a good portion of my money.

Before I knew it, I was back on campus, was mostly done with packing, had changed my clothes, and was ready for the Gala Dinner. It really surprised me how much I dreaded saying goodbye to everybody. I had been super skeptical during the welcome speech when the director told us that we were going to make lifelong friends at this summer school. I kept thinking that I was only going to be there for three weeks - how was I possibly going to form a lifelong friendship in three weeks? But I did, with people from all over the world, and I was so far from ready to say goodbye. 

So I didn't. I just took pictures at the wine reception of us looking fabulous in our smart attire and told myself I would at least see everyone the next morning.

Lale, Lauren, and Lindy - three lovely Ls

Best friends I could have asked for in Exeter.

Veronica and I - representing Saint Louis!

Me and Chloe - smile big :)

Dinner was really great, though people were slightly upset when they saw that we had assigned seating. I was not happy to be separated from my friends at first, but it did give me an opportunity to have a conversation with people I hadn't spoken to as much and even connect with some professors. The professor sitting nearest me was an American who had been living in Ireland for the last twelve years. He had been a lecturer for a different pathway, so it was a great opportunity to speak to him. (I asked him why he'd chosen Ireland. His answer? "Well, I got my master's over there. Then I decided to stay and get my PhD...and then I met a girl." D'awww.) 

Things got a little bit emotional once people started getting up to make speeches. How we all became so emotionally invested in a program after only three weeks is a mystery to me, but somehow we did.

 My fancy-schmancy dinner place setting

Anu giving her farewell speech

After the dinner, they held a disco for everyone. The DJ was actually really good, so we used the opportunity to tear up the dance floor one more time. A lot of people went out on the town for one last time, but most of my friends and I decided to stay back and just hang out on the terrace for our own private celebration/commencement. It was chilly, but being around those people one last time was worth the goosebumps. 

Enjoying the company

Jenna brought down her comforter to keep warm. It swallowed her.

I ended up staying awake until about 3am, even though the coaches were due to leave at 7 that morning. Despite my sleep-deprived state the next morning as I struggled to get my luggage on the bus, it was completely worth it. I've learned so much from everyone on the trip and made such great friends - why wouldn't I want to spend a few extra hours with them? 

I've just got one more thing to say before I can end the sugar-fest that is this post.

Exeter ISS 2013, you were fantastic. Absolutely fantastic.

Acting Part 2 and St. Ives

So winning an Oscar for acting is probably not in my future. However, I did have a great time both in acting workshops all day yesterday and in the town of St. Ives today!

Yesterday the Shakespeare pathway had its last two acting workshops. In the morning we worked on voice, which made me feel a little bit ridiculous. Although we weren't singing (thank god - I relegate myself to shower singing only), I'm still not used to going through the scales of my voice or 'feeling the color of a vowel.' Nor am I used to contorting into different shapes on the ground and attempting to find whatever my natural voice is. It really was an interesting workshop, though, and even the most ridiculous-seeming things had some sort of purpose. Maybe I should change my major and just skip while reading Shakespeare all day instead of sitting and studying it...

I hadn't realized how much the inflection in an actor's voice conveys the meaning of the lines, or how something as little as pronouncing a vowel sound differently can change the emotion behind a word. I gained a new appreciation for actors all over again. From the outside, acting can seem easy, especially when we see random pop stars suddenly becoming actors and actresses. I know there's no possible way that I have a full conception of the job with four acting workshops, which means there's even more work that goes into it than I know - but even with the amount I've learned, my hat goes off to actors.

The second workshop of the day was 'abbreviated Shakespeare'. A great example of this is the Reduced Shakespeare Company - and if you have never heard of them, please watch this video:

Most of our academic discussion centered around whether reducing or adapting Shakespeare causes the work to lose its integrity. While the Reduced Shakespeare Company's work is certainly far off from the original, it has become a new thing that offers its own analysis and contribution to the drama world. Shakespeare's work lives on, just in a different manner. 

Then we broke up into groups of around 5 (my group was Bryan, Maddy, Veronica, Juliette, and me) and attempted to condense a Shakespeare play into 5 minutes. We chose Macbeth and made Lady Macbeth sound like a New York mob boss and gave the witches the "byeeeeee!" from the Most Popular Girls in School. After performing that and receiving critique, we had one more challenge - reduce the play again...down to thirty seconds. 

I think we did pretty dang well. Macbeth in thirty seconds:

The rest of Tuesday consisted of a failed shopping trip to bring back clothes from England (British sizes, what you say is a US 10 is NOT a US 10), preparing for group presentations on Friday, and watching Pride and Prejudice in one of the lecture halls. The movie was occasionally interrupted by construction outside the door, but I don't think it was really preventing any of us from sighing over Darcy. Men included.

Also, I found the most British card ever:

Today was our last day trip, and they definitely saved one of the best for last - Saint Ives! It's a beautiful fishing village in southwest England and we had perfect beach weather today. This definitely is one of my favorite day trips. First of all, just check out what the village looks like:

View of Saint Ives from the hill where we parked

Rocky coastline

Saint Ives street view

After walking around and grabbing some lunch, we went on a boat trip to the lighthouse to see seals. I think we went about three miles or so offshore and saw a ton of seals sunning themselves on the rocks and playing in the water. The boat ride itself was really fun, too - I even got to drive the boat!

My thoughts in the moment: "This man is crazy for letting me touch the wheel."

Water at the dock - it's so clear!

All smiles! Daniel, Grace, and Jenna

On the water!

View of the lighthouse

Seals! If only the iPhone had better zoom...

After the seal tour we went swimming - the water was cold, but it was still fun! I didn't stay in for very long and chose to read on the beach instead, which was just as enjoyable for me. It was uncharacteristically warm for England - I think nature must have known we were coming and wanted to give us a good last trip. 

At the beach!

The rest of the day was mostly spent walking around peeking into boutiques and eating ice cream - so basically wonderful. Saint Ives was such a great choice for a day trip! We were all so exhausted by the time that we got back to Holland Hall that staying in and working on presentations actually sounded like a good idea rather than a chore. Lindy, Anu and I managed to make it fun, though - late night jam sessions to a 90s playlist will liven up any Shakespeare study session. Random fire alarms will, too, but in a much different manner.

Only two full days left here now, and we already had to say the first goodbye to Ronak today - I'm not ready for this to end.

Being abroad does not improve Mondays.

So...

England doesn't make Mondays any better. Mondays are still crap. 

I'm very tempted to just say, "That's it. That's the blog post for today." I guess I'll be a good person and writer and actually describe my day...though compared to my weekend, it was extremely boring. 

We started off the day with a quick briefing about what was going to be happening this week. Lyndon, the program manager, also decided it would be a great idea to remind us that this is our last week. Not a good idea, Lyndon. We're all going to cry - none of us are ready to leave, even those of us continuing on abroad somewhere else! 

Classes started as usual for each pathway after that initial presentation. Our morning lecture was taught by Dr. Ed Paleit, who was lecturing on Shakespeare's classicism. The talk itself was engaging, but I kept getting distracted by the way he spoke - he often stopped for long pauses at odd times or would close his eyes and gesticulate while speaking. Honestly, it kind of looked like this:

Sorry Dr. Ed, not to compare you to Zefron as a person, but this is what you look like.

I did enjoy the lecture, though. It was interesting to discover what Shakespeare would have been taught during his school years and then look at how that education manifested itself in his written work. That also led to a discussion on how much freedom of thought the British grammar school system offered at that time, and if they were educating their students to be free-thinkers and analyzers or molding them to follow the crowd. It was my favorite lecture of the day by far.

After lunch (during which I spent no money on food - YAY), we went back upstairs for our second lecture. Unfortunately, this wasn't quite as engaging as the first - no offense to Prof. McRae, the man of those two hours. It was our first specific session on The Tempest today, which I enjoyed. The first hour of class, however, was used up by our professor speaking in this monotonous and calming voice. A few of the girls sitting behind me fell asleep. I managed to avoid sinking into a stupor, but I did notice my notes getting progressively messier as the lecture went on. You can practically see my level of attention on the page, determined by the messy or neat state of my handwriting. 

After class, we went to an information session about graduate study in the United Kingdom. I'm not completely sold, but I am definitely not taking the possibility of getting my master's degree abroad off the table. I know that I'll want to go back to England, and graduate study abroad is an easy step towards that goal. I'm thinking Spanish-speaking country for my next abroad experience, though...we'll see. 

The highlight of my day would probably be going back to The Firehouse (we seem to be making this a habit) and finally ordering one of their famous pizzas. It was delicious! We had a group of 8 that split the pizza between us, and not only did it taste great, but it was cheap. Once we split the bill, the total came to less than a pound for each of us. Difficult to beat that one.

After the incredibly eventful last few posts, this makes today look even less eventful than it did before. I think I needed it, though - a nice, slower paced day was what I needed after the bustle of the weekend. Just wait. Come tomorrow, everyone's energy will be back again...

Starting August off with a bang

All of these super eventful days are definitely giving me a lot to write about. They're also making me tired, so I can't think of a very creative way to introduce this post - I'm just going to dive right in.

Yesterday's lectures were by two very interesting professors. We were taught in the morning by Professor Nick Groom, who was covering the "Shakespeare myth". The best way to describe him, honestly, is the perfect mixture between British gentleman and 60s hippie. He entered the classroom wearing a suit and suspenders, which was the first thing I noticed. The second thing I noticed was the ponytail that reached the small of his back. The third thing I noticed was his earring.

See what I mean? I need to steal this guy's description for some work of fiction; it's too good to pass up. (If I ever do, I'm going to delete this post and my readers will never know.)

Character description aside, the lecture was interesting as well. Prof. Groom gave us a good amount of biographical details about Shakespeare and invited us to think about why this writer became so famous despite the lack of information about him. When one considers the kind of fame that well-known writers have today (you know J.R.R. Tolkien's name, you know his works, but can you recognize his face?), it becomes even more interesting. There isn't really a right answer to the question, but we eventually decided that there's a flexibility to Shakespeare's work that allows it to be used for many different purposes and in many different cultures.

Our afternoon session centered around Shakespearean adaptations and Olivier's Macbeth, taught by Dr. Jennifer Barnes. Something that really stood out about Dr. Barnes was how her work related to the lecture - she discovered manuscripts of and documents for Olivier's unfinished Macbeth screenplay in early 2010 and recently published about it. For all of you reading from my generation, Olivier was THE cinematic authority on Shakespeare in his time. (You know how Kenneth Branagh somehow shows up in every modern adaptation of a Shakespeare play? Olivier did it first.) He starred in/directed/wrote several Shakespeare movies and had begun working on Macbeth. He never finished it due to financial reasons and claimed that no copies of the work remained. Uh...not quite true.

Dr. Barnes making that discovery was a big deal. Like NPR interview big deal. So naturally, the first hour of her lecture centered on the unfinished adaptation that she discovered and what the work-in-progress could tell us about 1) 20th century film adaptions of Shakespeare and 2) contemporary ideas of stardom. The lecture itself was great, but I was also impressed with her creative use of PowerPoint - geeky, I know, but she did a great job with it! During the second half of the class, she showed us film clips from adaptations of The Tempest and A Midsummer Night's Dream. Then we discussed how they were adapted from page to screen and how the meaning of the work could change depending on how it was staged and acted. Students don't normally give professors grades, but you got an A+ from me, Dr. Barnes. Also, your polka dot dress is incredibly cute.

Even though it was 3:30 by this point in time, our day still wasn't over. Those of us on the Shakespeare track had a lecture to attend at 5 that would kick off the Exeter-Fudan Research Colloquium. We got to listen to Don Boyd discuss his work on a 'Hamlet in China' film adaptation that was ultimately never made for financial reasons, in an odd parallel to our afternoon lecture. (Actually didn't realize that until I wrote it down just now.) The best thing was being able to watch behind-the-scenes footage of things that went into the movie production such as location scouting and casting. Professor Boyd told us that things like that are normally never released to the public, so that was pretty awesome.

Finally, after a wine reception with the lecture attendees (yep, day still isn't over!), we headed over to The Ram for a buffet dinner and karaoke night. Karaoke was...interesting. It started off like this:

Normal karaoke. Tame. Just some people singing.

And ended up like this:

Karaoke insanity!

Definitely the most fun I've ever had with karaoke. Though I suppose the above picture is what you can expect when you put about 100 college students in a bar, provide them with alcohol, and then send them up to a mic...you know, just maybe. Blogger won't load my videos for whatever reason, but those are what really do this justice.

This morning we had another lecture as a part of the research colloquium, and this time we heard from one of the visiting Fudan professors. Fudan University is one of the most prestigious universities in China and the world, so that was definitely a rare opportunity. We heard from three professors in the hour and a half we were there, and all of them discussed Shakespearean adaptations - predictably, considering the subject matter. We were there from 9:30-11:30, including the 'tea and coffee break' after the first hour and a half of lectures. (That is so British. A break for tea right after breakfast...with tea.) The colloquium lasted until 5, but the Exeter Shakespeare students only attended the morning session.

The rest of the tracks had a completely free day today, so Lindy and I joined up with about twenty other Exeter kids to go to the beach at 12:15. It was a beautiful day to be outdoors - sunny and no rain, which is a big deal for English weather. We took the train to Dawlish, which is only about 15 minutes away by train, and spent the rest of the afternoon on the shore!

View of the beach from the train window

Hooray for sun! Me, Grace, and Lindy

Lindy was pretty proud of herself for braving the frigid ocean.

This adorableness deserves a picture.

View of the beach! 

The only downsides were the wind, which was determined to blow as hard as it could, and the water that was WAY too cold to swim in. I went in knee-deep and called it a day. The British know their beaches, though, and brought wind shelters to sit on the beach with. A lot of us were looking pretty enviously at them when the wind decided to blow particularly viciously. It was still a great time, though, and completely worth it! To top it all off, the Exeter student buddies knew the train station to get on where they wouldn't check us for tickets, so we got a free train ride to and from Dawlish. Free day at the beach - I call that a success.

Tomorrow we're headed to Bath, and Sunday I'll be on a train again to go to the Harry Potter studio tour in London! Can't wait for the weekend - it's going to be epic.

Devon cream tea, a terrible ghost tour, and the Eden Project

Another super eventful two days! That probably explains why I'm too exhausted to do anything but write a blog post and look over my reading for tomorrow. And let's be honest - I procrastinated writing this post in favor of Tumblr. I'm not even going to lie.

Yesterday's classes were Early Modern Print Culture with Dr Sara Barker and another play-specific session of A Midsummer Night's Dream with Dr Sparey again (I can't call her Vicky, I really can't). Both of them were interesting, but I definitely enjoyed our morning session more. Dr Barker is very engaging, I loved the subject matter - how the first printed books were created - and the class incorporated a Stephen Fry documentary and a hands-on activity. That's a definite plus in my book.

Mini-'folios', or early books, that we folded in class

In the afternoon, we decided on what we're going to tackle for our group projects. Our group (Anu, Veronica, Stine, Sherrie, and me) has set our general theme as love and autonomy in A Midsummer Night's Dream - how we're going to narrow that down remains to be seen, but no worries about that until Friday!

Directly after class we headed to Exeter Cathedral for traditional Devon cream tea. The cathedral operates a café as well, which is where we were situated. Tea was absolutely delicious - if I could find a way to take the scones and tea back with me (or find the space in my suitcase), I would in a heartbeat.

Feeling fancy. Or British.

At tea we heard about a ghost tour leaving from the Cathedral later on in the evening, so we headed back after dinner. Unfortunately, the spooky ghost tour that we had hoped for turned out to be more funny than terrifying. Our tour guide was sweet, but she kept getting facts mixed up and didn't take us to any truly haunted places. Points added for creative stories about the different places in Exeter, minus points for this well being the creepiest thing we saw.

No one died in it or anything. It's just there.

Ah, well. We managed to make it fun.

We're so terrified that we burst out laughing after this was taken.

Today served as a nice break from classes - we headed to the Eden Project! What it really reminded me of was a much bigger version of the Missouri Botanical Garden back home, only situated in Cornwall and with an impressive rainforest biome. We spent about four and a half hours exploring everything the Eden Project had to offer. I really loved the opportunity to go - it was great to be surrounded by so much diverse plant life and learn about different climates around the world. Plus, the Eden Project is also a charity, so I knew that the money I paid for lunch went to education and conservation efforts. (A good amount of the food offered is grown on site. How cool is that?)

Of course, being tourists and college kids who love social media, we took pictures of almost everything we saw.

Great view of the biomes!

My favorite biome and where we spent the most time.

View of the rainforest biome from 165 feet up!

On top of the rainforest

Group picture! Ranuk, Jennifer, Veronica, Anukripa, me, and Lindy

Somewhere along the line, I decided that I fancied myself a nature photographer. Armed with only an iPhone. 

This one is by far my favorite.

Not bad, iPhone 5, not bad.

I am thoroughly enjoying my time here in England and I can't believe it's halfway done already. I've learned so much: not only in the classroom, but from my peers as well. The longer I spend with people from outside the United States, the more I realize the little cultural details that both make us the same and set us apart. I now know that people from the USA, Canada, India, Russia, France, Belgium, and Holland can all unite in England over a game of Mafia, and that Americans toss around 'I love you' much more casually than other countries. I know I've said repeatedly that I've learned a lot and that I've loved every single day, but honestly, I really am on top of the world.

Or maybe that's the Imagine Dragons on my Spotify.