Oxford Castle

I toured the Oxford Castle today with the Newcomer's Club. I tried to sign up for this tour last term, but it was cancelled. So was fun to check out the local castle. Now really, it's not a castle in terms of a romantic, beautiful, royal castle. It's just the remains of a Saxon castle tower built in like the 1100s and then a jail was built hundreds of years later. The interesting fact is that this jail was used for prisoners right up until 1996. Talk about a medieval punishment! Now, the entire area of castle, prison, and mound has been turned into a modern-day tourist attraction and entertainment center with posh restaurants, bars and a 5-star hotel. The prison was actually turned into a 5-star hotel, with a "prison" feeling. A night costs about 230 pounds ($460 a night) so it's a "destination/experience" type hotel. To be honest, I'd rather spend $460 a night to spend in a true romantic Victorian English castle or something.

We climbed to the top of the tour for a great view of Oxford and the spires.








Picture of the crypt below.
















A section of the prison cells they have left to show on the tour.















A bit morbid, the actual pull handle used in the hanging executions at the Oxford Castle Prison in the 1800s. The pull handle opened the drop floor, pulling the floor out from underneath the person being hanged. Yikes!

Had coffee after the tour with a few of the ladies at the cafe to chat. Another successful Newcomer's tour!

Funny Foods

I know we've lived here for almost a year now, but we still can't help laughing and making a bit of fun of their food or food names over here. We still can't believe the mixture of foods sometimes here, such as prawn cocktail. Which all it consists of are small shrimps and plain mayonnaise. They even have potato chips (crisps) with Prawn Cocktail flavor. Blah!

So just recently we discovered these pork nuggets (warning, very un-PC):

Of course Brian won't touch them with a 10-foot pole, and frankly I won't on these either! Ha ha!

And another fave of ours:

Now you'll never look at peanuts in a shell the same again!

January Update

Happy New Year! We're already a couple weeks into it, and not much is different in 2008 than 2007 so far. I thought I'd blog about the latest news, happenings and activities we've been up to. Although don't get too excited, it's been pretty chill here. :)

Just this past week, I've wrapped up working for my cute little home shop down the street. I was a bit sad to be done, but all the staff was changing over, and it's time to get back into marketing, so it made a lot of sense. But I had a great experience there, learned so much more about British culture and people, and made great new friends. Also we have Charlie returning to this side of the pond. He arrived in Belgium this week to get back into playing baseball for the LLN Phoenix, just south of Brussels. So hopefully we'll see him soon, and at least in March for birthdays.

If you're following international news, you've heard that the former Prime Minister of Pakistan, and leader of the democratic party Benazir Bhutto was killed a few weeks ago. She was a University of Oxford graduate from Lady Margaret Hall. Her father went to Christ Church College. And her son, a fresher (freshman) at Christ Church College is taking over her leadership for the Pakistan People's Party. I'm mentioning this, because it's very interesting living in a city where there are extremely high-level people from their respective countries living and studying in Oxford. And while everyone carries on about their own business here (which is great), it's slightly unsettling knowing that there are also students/employees who need extra special security because of what they represent.

Back to personal news. We have lots of friends and family members announcing births of little ones or first-time pregnancies. Congrats to Jen Krause and Andrea Barnwell for their little girls this month. And we found out over the holidays that Brian's bro Rick and wife Kate are expecting their first! Whew, Brian and I are really running behind in that department!

Random thing to tell you about. But I still enjoy hearing differences from everyone's perspectives over here. An acquaintance of ours Barry, who is an American, but has lived in England now for 20 years, had his children over here. When they go back to the US to visit the grandparents in Ohio, the kids are amazed at the McDonalds over there. And it's not because they don't have them here, there are tons of McDonalds over here. But it's because of the SPACE they take up. Over here, the McDonalds, or the KFC, Burger King, whatever, is a small store front on the High Street, where you walk upstairs to sit and eat, or just take it out with you. Barry's kids can't believe that in the U.S., a McDonalds has it's entire large building to itself, including a huge lawn all around it. And that the lawn isn't even used for anything. And that there is possibly an entire Burger King right next door, with it's own building, lawn, parking lot, etc. Sounds funny huh? Since that is what we American's are so used to. All of that space. I've said before in my blog, that is probably the one biggest thing I miss as well over here. Is space.

Well we're heading to London tomorrow to get out of town and hit up a free museum and hopefully get some cheap last minute theatre tickets. It's so amazing to just hop the train and check out London for the day!

Sorry my blog is so random today, but just wanted to pop in and let you know I haven't given up on the blogging. Just not much is happening during the dreary months of winter here.

Happy New Year's Eve!

Hi everyone,

Just sending a quick Happy New Year's Eve wish! We're heading over to our friend's Matt & Donna's for a dinner party and imbibing too much I'm sure. We thought about a night in London again, but were too slow on the plans, and everything (hotels, restaurants, shows) booked up already. Oh well, next year!

Have a great evening and have one for us!

K&B

Christmas Eve, Christmas and Boxing Day

This was the first year Brian and I have been away from home for Christmas. Well, actually that is not true. Brian spent his first year away from home last year while writing his dissertation. I was still able to be back in Minnesota/Iowa. It doesn't seem that long ago! So this was officially my first Christmas away from family. I'll admit, it was a bit tough on Christmas Eve not able to attend church and have dinner with everyone like I've done for 29 years! But if we had to spend Christmas abroad, Oxford was a pretty okay place to be!

Christmas Eve we kept busy enough. I actually had to work all day at my little shop, and Brian worked too. I was a bit sad all day, but we did all wear Santa hats, had treats in the shop and Christmas music on, so by the end of the day I was feeling more in the spirit. After we locked up, a few of the girls shared bottle of bubbly before we headed our separate ways. I came home to a nice vegetarian dinner made by my hubby, and we relaxed a bit before heading off to the midnight church service. We chose to go to Christ Church Cathedral again, since we enjoyed their Easter service, and because it's an amazing Cathedral and has a wonderful choir. We decided to walk into town, about a 30 minute walk. Mainly so we would stay awake and wanted to get there ahead of time. The service was very nice, but not as Christmasy as I was hoping. We only sang one Christmas song at the very end and only one of the lessons told the story of Jesus' birth. The rest of the service just seemed like a regular traditional service. But I suppose we're not familiar with the Church of England's annual service plans (or however I would call that) so it's always an experience if nothing else. Also, the Brits seem to really be into organized carol services held at churches and community centers leading up to Christmas. Usually they are free, but you have to get a ticket ahead of time for a seat. We didn't know this until after the fact, so next year we'll check it out. But sounds like at these services they sings lots of Christmas carols and alternate with Christmas readings and such. Our service also included communion, which I partaked in. Although I was surprised to see only about 50% of the attendees also did. It seemed all the same as we're used to, except that everyone drinks wine from the same goblet, and they just wipe it off. Kinda gave me the creeps and really wonder how that doesn't spread sick germs around. Oh, and the wine tasted much different than the Lutheran wine. We walked home and it was really amazing to be walking the streets of Oxford on Christmas Eve at 1 a.m.!


On Christmas morning, we opened a couple of Christmas crackers, and Brian donned on the paper hat from his cracker, and we played out the charades included. A cracker is a decorated paper tube with twisted ends, which you pull apart. When the cracker breaks, it "pops" and out tumbles a little hat, joke and trinket of some type. They are extremely popular here, and usually are pulled once you sit down for a proper Christmas meal. We had some great presents shipped to us from my family in the States. It was so great to have presents to open on Christmas morning! Also our good friends in Eugene, Jeannette and hubby Dave sent us some fun American treats as well. Thanks guys! Had a quick breakfast cause then we had to make an apple crumble for bringing to our Christmas dinner at Brian's advisor's house.

About 2 p.m. Brian's advisor Ian, picked us up as well as our other American neighbors Matt and Donna and their girls. I just realized this now, but I had wanted to watch the Queen's Christmas speech at 3 p.m. on the tellie, and I totally forgot to watch! Although now I guess she's technologically advance, and they are showing it on YouTube for the first year ever. So I'll look that in when I'm done blogging! Ian and his wife Katie, and their three kids, Alex, Nathaniel and Clair were the lovely hosts. As you've read before, we've actually been to their house now for three holidays. Easter, 4th of July and Christmas. It was so nice for us to have a place to go and relax and be merry for the day. We visited for a bit with drinks, and then sat for dinner about 4:30. And boy did we have a proper Christmas meal! We weren't officially done until about 8:30! We had about 5 courses and it was all wonderful. Especially since the main course was a huge roast beef from Scotland! I was in heaven.
Good thing there was a veggie option for Brian. :) But we had a starter of broccoli soup. Then the main including; roast beef, green salad, bread, green beans, roasted potatoes (they roast them instead of mashed, and properly cooked in goose fat) and a squash gratin. The next 2-3 courses we get confused about. Because there is pudding and there is dessert. Over here, they often call desserts - puddings. But we had sort of both, and don't know which was first. Let's just say the pudding was first. This was then the crumble I made and a trifle Donna made. Then we had tea and coffee after that. Then we had another very Christmasy treat over here called a Christmas Pudding. Think of sort of a really heavy fruit cake, that doesn't really taste all that great, but you have it anyway since it's traditional. And it's served with brandy butter. Major calories! Oh, and you pour brandy on the cake and light it on fire first. So fun for tradition. After that, we had dessert, which is a cheese platter, fruit and port. Lastly, we had more port and chocolates. Whew! We had to be rolled home. Good thing the kids there had a Wii, so we could play some video games and burn off a few of the calories! Not long after dinner it was time to head home so we could call our families back in the US.

Now I see the enjoyment of Boxing Day, so you can walk off the calories from Christmas! Like I said before, everything is still closed on Boxing Day since it's a national holiday. So Brian and I slept in after a late night on the phone. Once we were up, Brian had made a yummy veggie egg tart for breakfast for something special and fun. Then we took a really nice long walk around North Oxford and along the canal. We baked some sugar cookies with a recipe from Grandma Anderson in Two Harbors and they were yummy! Then watched the classic American Christmas movie - A Christmas Story. Pretty good Boxing Day!

Christmas in London

Happy Christmas and New Year's everyone! It's December 27 now, so a couple days past the big day. But I wanted to tell you about what it's like celebrating Christmas over here in England and what we were up to.

Overall, Christmas in the UK is just like Christmas in the US. Everyone puts up Christmas trees, shops like crazy, and has a big turkey or goose dinner with their families and friends. The main difference I've noticed though, is that Christmas Eve isn't that big of a deal. Everyone still works and shops that day. But it's because they celebrate Boxing Day here on the 26th. I also know Canadians celebrate Boxing Day as well, and everything is closed and quiet on Boxing Day (and Christmas Day of course). Supposedly, Boxing Day was established a long time ago, for the servants of the house. Since they served their masters all day on Christmas Day, Boxing Day was the day for the servants to have a day off of work and celebrate with their families. Boxing Day is now also similar to the American "Black Friday" (the day after Thanksgiving). It's when the popular UK stores slash prices and the Brits get in long queues for stores to open at 5 a.m.

Last Friday we went to London for the day to check out the lights and see how Londoners celebrate. It was a bit cold, but definitely nice and brisk (and not raining)! We took the train in and headed to Hyde Park first where we heard there was a Winter Wonderland festival going on. We just strolled through, checking out the German Market and the big ice skating rink. Seems like Londoners love to go ice skating for Christmas, so there were like 8 different huge rinks set up around the city. Sounded fun to do, but realized it was just packed with people and little kids who couldn't really skate. So not sure that it would have really been worth the money. :)

Next we walked down to Trafalgar Square where the Norwegian Spruce Christmas tree is up and decorated. I have to admit, I was expecting it to be larger and more impressive, but at night when all lit up it was prettier. The tree is a gift from Oslo, Norway ever year since the Second World War when the British supported the Norwegian resistance.


Then we went to Covent Garden to see their shops and decorations. Covent Garden always has some interesting street performers - and this time they had these "angels" flying around!


The main event of the late afternoon was to walk along the infamous Oxford Street in London. It's probably a mile or two long of high street retail stores and department stores. It was absolutely packed with Christmas shoppers, but also small groups playing music, loads of street lights and just festive cheer. Was fun to see the department store window displays and join in the crowds.

We hadn't really taken time for any proper food, so we just stopped in a Italian restaurant by Leicester Square for dinner. And after that, we roamed around a bit more, stopped for hot chocolate, and then headed home. No pub this time!!

Visit to Cambridge

We visited Cambridge at the end of October (yikes!). It was a beautiful sunny day and Cambridge looked golden and glowing on the old college buildings. We tagged along with our neighbors Magnus, Elin and Rebecka. They hadn't visited there yet either, and Magnus knew a past colleague living there and so wanted to visit.

We arrived just in time for lunch, so found a popular UK lunch eatery called Cornwall Pasties. (Pasties is pronounced like you would start to say pasta, but with an "e" sound at the end.) I was the only one who had eaten there before, and they are really tasty. Basically they are shaped like a calzone, but with a thick pastry surrounding some sort of meat filling. Typically it consists of pieces of beef, carrots, onions and potatoes. Yum for me! Brian tried the chicken one of course. Also, Brian and I had brought along a couple of PB&J sandwiches in case we needed as a snack. We also knew that Elin and Magnus had never had PB&J! (Not very common in the UK or Europe at all! One of those things you think every kid grows up on, but we've learned it's VERY American!) So we shared our PB&J with them and Rebecka so they could give it a good taste. It went over okay, but they said they wouldn't make it for themselves! A required taste for sure!

After lunch, we visited the main Cambridge sites, starting with King's College, founded by King Henry VI in 1441. King's Chapel has impressive gothic architecture with the largest fan vaulted ceiling in the UK. It's huge and was built in 3 stages over 100 years. It's known at the symbol of Cambridge, and probably the most photographed building in town. Alongside the backside of the College is a huge green grass area and then leads to the River Cam. Punting is a huge pastime in Cambridge (even more so that in Oxford) and many punters were out. It's also because the boats glide along the "Backs" as it's known, which is not only the backside to King's College, but about 4-5 other colleges as well. It's an easy way to see right into the college grounds.


After King's, we walked up the road to see other colleges. In front of Trinity College is a true descent of Isaac Newton's apple tree from which he sat beneath and formulated the laws of gravity! So of course we had to get a photo of physicist Dr. Brian in front of that one!







And at St. John's College, we found the Bridge of Sighs, named after the Venice, Italy one, but not the same architecturally. It's a covered bridge over the River Cam and in the middle of the college grounds.











In the evening, E, M & R went to have dinner with their friends, and Bri and I went off in search of "the" Cambridge pub. Supposedly we found it just around the corner, called The Eagle. Seemed pretty much like a popular and old school University pub! Also then went to find the infamous Cambridge physics building, the Cavendish Laboratory, where in 1953 the first accurate model of DNA was developed. Over 29 Nobel Prize winners had come from the Cavendish lab - so obviously it's pretty amazing in the physical science world.

I have to say, our planned dinner options of finding the best Indian restaurant in town didn't work out, so we settled for mediocre chinese. But we had an amazing day, so can't complain too much!