Stories to tell the grandkids

As Maneeza said last night, "all this stuff we've been doing... they're the stories we'll be telling our grandkids," and she's absolutely right. I cannot even begin to detail what has been going on for the past couple of weeks, but it's been fairly intense, and definitely worth sharing, so I'll do my best.

I left you last time, almost two weeks ago, just on the precipice of what have been probably the single most amazing two weeks of my summer... or at least the strangest. I did my Bob Dylan piece, which was super fun, and then came the big mama.... Stonehenge.

Here's a link to our PG version of my Stonehenge experience.... and for more videos and pictures, check out my Facebook. 

But as for what I couldn't publish for millions to read.... Stonehenge was, in a word: crazy.

The best way I can come up with to describe what I saw at the Stonehenge summer solstice celebration was that it was like what I imagine Woodstock to have been; but in the dark, with harder drugs, and with semi-religious undertones. I was offered pot, cocaine, and pills throughout the night and into the morning, while "pissing rain" and fog went on for hours. It was a struggle to keep my video camera dry and my lens free of small droplets, and the dark conditions made getting any real video until the dawning hours nearly impossible, except for a few shots of the ever-popular glow wands, sticks, suits, and balls used by some of the revelers. In the press tent, I met a photographer for The Independent, who was incredibly nice, and talked to us for awhile. When he asked where we went to school and I said University of Missouri, he brought up POYi! So we talked about that too, and Mizzou's journalism tendrils extended all the way to a field in the English countryside.... we're everywhere! hahahaha... weird, but cool.

Now, it might seem like I didn't have fun, but I did, because it was a challenge journalistically, and the people I talked to were absolutely incredible (read: a little off their rockers, but devoted). I've said it before and I'll say it again, the part of my job as a journalist that I enjoy most is getting the stories of the people I talk to , and the interview process itself. It's exciting, and I often get the most unexpected answers out of people I expected to be rather boring. At Stonehenge, making sure I picked someone who could form coherent sentences or wouldn't get angry at me was another fun step in that story-gathering process.... but something I will never forget nonetheless. I really have very little recollection of how we got home that next morning; I was at the zombie-tired stage, and felt like I had been up for approximately 4 years. All in all, I was drained, but incredibly happy I'd asked to do the story. I got to touch the Stones, see rituals performed, and watch the sun come up (well, watch the sky get lighter, it was cloudy), at Stonehenge for the summer solstice; not many people get the opportunity to ever do those things, but for me, I could say that they were all in a day's (and night's) work.  Pretty lucky. 

Monday was rather uneventful, but Tuesday morning brought with it an early start and a trip out to East London's borough of Dagenham, and the beginning of the chain of events that would bring the week to its peak. The Sydney Russell Comprehensive School in Dagenham was the venue chosen for the first-ever exhibition of Khululeka, It's in Our Hands, a play to teach kids about AIDS and HIV, sponsored by Nelson Mandela's foundation 46664. Kaylin and I went to the school, watched the play, did some interviews of the cast, and, on our way out, were offered two tickets each to Nelson Mandela's Birthday Celebration concert. What amazing luck. I couldn't wait to go, and ignored the huge blinking sign that said "ETHICS BREACH" in my head. I would not miss out a chance to be a part of something historical just so I could be fair and balanced in my reporting of a play educating kids about AIDS and HIV. I mean, come on. 

In the meantime, between Tuesday and the megaawesomeness of Friday at 6:30 pm London time, I kept busy at work by taking a boatride to Greenwich with Kaylin to get some interviews and video of the new Greenwich Observation Wheel, a new "competitor" to the London Eye. It was a bit smaller than I thought it would be, but was a really great way to get out of the office and out on the water for a bit on one of the most beautiful days I've seen in London so far. I'll be putting out a story along with Kaylin's video and photos, hopefully sometime next week. I've also done a few blogs on our News blog on North Korea's nuclear declaration and Italy's new plans to fingerprint Gypsy children, but on to the events of Friday, before I explode.

When you're standing as only one person in a crowd of 46,664, it's hard to grasp the enormity of the larger group. I realized this once I viewed this video of Queen and Paul Rodgers' performance last night. Beyond the physical massiveness of the concert, the emotional and historical context is just now sinking in as well. Maneeza, Emily and Jenni stood there along with me, and we not only saw some incredible performances by musical greats, but also witnessed what is thought to be the last public appearance of perhaps one of the worlds most beloved men of all time. We watched Mandela give his last public address and call to action. 

I'll never ever forget that I was there, and I'll treasure my memories, photos and videos from that day forever. Again, what an amazing job I have and what incredible doors it opens up for me. I'm truly lucky.

On the more interesting side of things, Amy Winehouse performed "Rehab."

It was sad to see someone in such decline, but I couldn't help to chuckle as she sang a song so close to her own life at the moment, and was, frankly, astounded that she (or someone else) chose to sing that particular tune. Her eyes looked vacant and she erratically stumbled through her lyrics, but, I will give it to her, "Valerie," which she performed later, was quite a bit better. 

Will Smith, the host for the evening, along with his wife Jada, joined the party and sang a mix of his song "Switch" and... get this,  THE FRESH PRINCE OF BEL-AIR theme song. It was like a hug from Mandela himself.... almost. Simple Minds (who?) also played the song that plays at the beginning of The Breakfast Club (ohhh....), while Annie Lennox performed with a children's choir from Africa and Leona Lewis belted out a couple of songs, including "Bleeding Love." The Soweto Gospel Choir added a distinctively African flavour to the night by singing supporting vocals for many of the songs. Queen, as I mentioned before, was definitely the highlight of the evening and helped release some of the "we need to rock out" energy that had been pent up by the more chill Josh Groban and Eddie Grant. It was just an amazing evening, and the important part is that 46664 got the visibility for its mission and Mandela got the recognition for his life that he deserved. Incredible. I can't really express the gravity of it any better.

Still high on our experience of the night before, Emily, Maneeza and I headed off to the National Gallery the next afternoon and got to see some of the most famous works by Picasso, daVinci, Monet, Degas, Seurat, and countless others. I was most impressed and affected by the fact that I got to see, first hand, the works that I studied and analyzed just last semester. Picasso's "Sunflowers" and daVinci's "Virgin on the Rocks" were particularly special highlights. We then grabbed a yummy and quick bite in the crypt at St. Martin-in-the-Fields... where Maneeza told us tales..... in the crypt.... get it ? :) After the crypt we tubed it and walked over the Thames on Millennium bridge to see Merry Wives of Windsor at The Globe. It was hillarious, and a great way to end our cheap day of culture.

The most amazing thing about this week? The pricetag:

Seeing an exhibition of Bob Dylan's artwork: $0

Getting to Stonehenge and back: $0 (reimbursed)

Debut of 46664 play in Dagenham and meeting some amazing kids: $ 0 (reimbursed)

Seeing the Greenwich Observation Wheel and getting out of the office and onto the Thames: $0 (reimbursed)

A night at Nelson Mandela's historic birthday concert: $0 (comped)

Viewing the works of masters: $0, as all London museums

The memories from this week: Priceless. 

Miss and love you all...

God Save the Queen! Or at least Nelson Mandela. (No joke this time). Cheers :)

Bob Dylan, Barney, Bush Bashers, Summer Solstice = One Week?! YES.

She works hard for the money.... so hard for it honey...... Or no money at all actually, but hey, that's perfectly ok with me! Work at MSN has been nothing short of great so far and the people are wonderful too. It's all good all the way around. I'll try to take pictures of the office sometime, maybe go in super early or something. I've already had the opportunity to do a feature with a gallery of pictures and a small story, a couple of blogs on the fuel workers strike, the crisis in Zimbabwe, and the protests held here against Bush, and have set up message boards for each one of those, which has been a cool experience, (click on the link-looking parts of that sentence if you'd like to see my work.... they are actually links :)... if not... read on!).

This week takes it up a notch, as I'll be going to a gallery tomorrow that is showing the world premiere of some of Bob Dylan's artwork and interviewing/taking photos for that, and then on Friday I'm going to cover the Pagan party of the year, aka the Summer Solstice at STONEHENGE. My friend Emily is covering it for her internship at the AP, and I was just going to tag along for the fun of it, but then realized I could cover it in multimedia form for MSN... sooooo... I pitched the idea to my editor on Friday and she gave me the green light! It's my baby! My flatmate Maneeza, who, as I've mentioned here, also interns at MSN, asked to join me, so we'll be getting tons of coverage with four hands instead of two! I'm totally excited and can't wait to experience such a huge event with Druids and rituals and large amounts of gratuitous partying (not for me... I'll be on the job....).... at Stonehenge.... and watching the sun set and rise there.... it's going to be amazing, I know it. So that's work. Now for the rest of my life....

Over the past weekend I didn't feel so hot on Saturday, so I stayed in all day and got better, but Sunday I was ready for action and went with Maneeza, Emily and Jenni to observe two protests going on while George Dubya, our fearless leader, was in town on his Europe trip.... that was pretty interesting. The first protest was at Trafalgar Square and was protesting the imprisonment of a British student at Guantanimo... and the use of torture music.

I learned that one of the most often used songs for torturing terrorism suspects is the Barney song. Yes. The Barney "I love you, you love me" song. Apparently, the interrogators blast this music at high volumes over and over again in order to force people to talk. Anyways, in recognition of this fact, apart from the usual large orange underpants that read "Fair Trial My Arse," someone was dressed up in a Barney costume. Kids loved it; parents loved it too until they realized that Barney was wearing a protest sash.... 

The next one was a short walk down to Parliament Square, right in front of Parliament and Big Ben. This was a more general "Bush is a terrorist" and "What do we want? BUSH OUT! When do we want it? NOW!" sort of affair.... needless to say it was interesting.... and highly awkward. People were blasting John Lennon's "Give Peace a Chance," carrying huge signs urging us getting out of Iraq and Afghanistan, and just about every other issue you can think of that people think Bush has handled poorly or hasn't handled at all but should. Some were camping out in front of Parliament, while others wore "Arrest Bush" t-shirts while countless others handed out pamphlets and underground papers explaining their causes. I want to make it clear that I didn't participate in either protest, just wanted to watch it all go down and see for myself how bad the feelings were against the US. Let me tell you, they were bad. I took just my phone to take pictures, but I'm having a hard time getting them posted, so those will probably not go up for awhile... but look at any news source and you'll see what I saw.

Later on Sunday I called the family and felt really the first true pangs of homesickness I've felt since I've been here. It was tough not being there on Father's Day, but I get to see Dad in July, which is just fine with me :) I'm still having a great time even though I do miss everyone! Keep in touch!

Anyways, sorry for the delay again on the post, but that's what I've been up to! I'm sure I'll have fun stuff to talk about later in the week. Some more Bob Dylan research and then I'm off to bed.... gotta go interview and shoot tomorrow! Miss and love you all!

God Save the Queen! Or at least the Barney song.... actually,  scratch that. I hear it's pretty irritating... torture even.... Cheers :)

Ice Ice Baby.... and the glory that is Primark

This weekend has just been cool. Literally............. (wincing at the pun).

Friday was a fantastic day of discovery through people, places, and finally, parkas.

After a leisurely morning, and while the other flatmates were either at work or with their families, Maneeza and I headed over to Oxford street for some shopping. After dipping into a couple of the stores without much success, we finally found the store we had heard so much about from the locals; Primark.

This place is unlike anywhere we have in the United States. Imagine a huge downtown store in any big U.S. city, with multiple floors, men's and women's (and children's) departments, anything you could want to clothe yourself. Shoes, accessories, purses, outerwear. You name it.

And it's all in-style. And it's all absolutely dirt cheap. How cheap you ask?

I got two pairs of ballet flats for 4 POUNDS PER PAIR. That's only $16.00 (USD) total. Comparable shoes in the states would probably cost me at least $20.00 per pair. Easily. A pair of jeans there = 6-8 Pounds. That's 12-16 USD. I now understand why everyone in London, almost without exception (seriously), is always dressed fashionably; they have no excuse when they have Primark to fund their wardrobes!

And no I'm not kidding. And no they weren't having a blowout sale. It's all this cheap every day of the year. For this American student dealing with the daily grind of British sticker shock and a horrific exchange rate of approximately $2 = 1 Pound, I vowed to return to this place that I could actually find real bargains on great stuff. How wonderful! I might start a letter writing campaign to Primark pleading them to come to the U.S. Yep. Sounds like a plan.

After the exuberant hour and a half or so at Primark, we went back home, hung around for a bit, made some dinner for ourselves, and got ready to go out to Absolut Icebar London, where we had reservations for 11 pm.

After meeting up with some other friends, we arrived at Icebar, donned the "designer" parkas they provide, and went into the deep freeze for 40 funfilled minutes in a room entirely made of crystal-clear ice imported from Finland. The entry fee comes with one drink in your own personal glass made out of, you guessed it, ice. That was pretty fun and a once in a lifetime experience. 

It's always on the rocks at Icebar!

We met some fun Londoners inside the Icebar and hung out with them for the rest of the night down in BelowZero's Reindeer Lounge, the uber-classy place underneath Icebar. I found out later that the space that holds BelowZero is the old wine vault for England's monarchy! Pretty sweet! Anyway, it was great to meet new people and we all had a blast until the wee hours. Great night!

Me, Azeema and Lacey at Icebar

Yesterday and today have been fairly relaxing, as yesterday we went out to dinner at Zizzi to send off our friends leaving in a few days after session one concludes. How fast the time has gone! We'll miss them to pieces!  

Today is a day of organizing, cleaning, shopping, and getting my thoughts in order to start my internship tomorrow morning at 10 am. I'm mostly excited, with a little nervous mixed in there, but I'm sure it will be a great experience. I can't wait to start putting all my schooling, so far, into real-world practice, and see how everything works first hand at MSN News. 

Ohhhhh boy! Well, it's off to be productive! Hope all is well with all of you back home! 

God Save the Queen! Or at least the geniuses who created Primark and thought to import Finnish Ice to the old royal wine cellar..... BRILLIANT.  

Cheers :)

Take a breath and use the restroom before reading this post. Maybe grab a snack.

Again, I have fallen short in the blogging category over the past week or so.... more like "or so"....  I apologize. I'll really try to get better at keeping up with it.

In other news, I have a job! I will be interning at MSN UK  News and I start Monday! I'm super excited about that and I'll keep you posted. The building is only a few tube stops away and is really slick, sophisticated and modern... everything you'd expect from a Microsoft establishment... pretty neat. If you want to see it from above, visit the site below. It's the big one that looks like a floppy piece of steel and glass pie.... : 

http://maps.live.com/?v=2&sp=Point.skgh3ygznffr_100%20Victoria%20St%2C%20London%20SW1E%205%2C%20United%20Kingdom___&encType=1

My flatmates all got hired at great places too, and, one of them, Maneeza, is also working at MSN with me, but in a different department. So that will be cool to have a buddy to go to work with each day :)

Since I last posted I've been going to class, going to interview for my internship, waiting to see if I got it, chilling with my flatmates, and doing some generally excellent galavanting around London and the countryside seeing the sights. Some activities included seeing A Midsummer Night's Dream at the Globe theatre on the Thames, Stonehenge, Bath, Warwick Castle, and Stratford-Upon-Avon, or as I like to refer to it, Shakespeareland. Much like Disney World, but with more pubs, and more rain, and more tourist traps. No, I'm not lying on that last one. It was mildly disappointing, but at least I can check it off the life list of things to see. I also sampled my first little half pint of Guinness in the "oldest pub in town" while it was pouring down rain there.... I liken it to drinking a loaf of bread, but I enjoyed it. But more about S-U-A to the von later. I'll have Facebook albums up of those other places soon, and brief descriptions of what I did at each one a bit farther down the post. 

Yesterday was, by far, the most tantalizing of all of our days for me. We had a tour of Parliament (absolutely incredible) in the morning and then went to tour the BBC in the afternoon..... politics and journalism in one day? Did I enjoy myself? Um, YES. We got all business-casual-ed up and took the tube to Westminster at the lovely hour of 7:45 am and were sitting in the Liverpool Room of the Parliament building (er, more like castle/cathedral) at around 8:30, after a brief walk and rousing security frisk.

In the Liverpool Room, Conservative Minister of Parliament (MP, like a Representative in the House back home) Graham Brady gave us a lengthy, but fascinating, introduction to Parliament and shared some insight on the current British political landscape and the history of British parliamentary politics over the past half century or so..... from his point of view ;)

We were then whisked away back to the Great Hall  where Winston Churchill and many famous others have lain in state and where Henry VIII played tennis with his family (they found the leather tennis balls in the rafters hundreds of years later!). We met up with a guide who would be our, well, guide, around the place for the rest of the afternoon. He showed us the House of Commons, where elected members of Parliament meet, and the House of Lords, where appointed/hereditary members of Parliament meet. The two groups have huge contempt for each other reinforced by policies like calling the House of Lords "The Other Place" when you're in the House of Commons, and vice versa. Like the House of Representative chambers in the US, the chambers for Parliament look bigger on T.V. than they actually are, but unlike those in the US, the MPs vote by hand, in person, the old fashioned way, standing in line, on paper. I think that's awesome. That being said, the amount of gold (22 carat) in the House of Lords where the Queen sits (once a year) is similar to the amount of sweat on Kurt Cobain in the "Smells Like Teen Spirit" video.... so there's lots of it. Insane amounts.... but it's shiny, and pretty and does not smell like Teen Spirit... more like old room / tourist place / dust... you know the smell... moving on....

Bottom line: The Parliament building is an old palace and the amount of glitz and political theatre and men in tights and wigs and rules like "tourists or non-Lords cannot sit down in the House of Lords" make our political system and buildings (even in D.C.) look downright homely and casual. But, hey, I guess that was the point of our independence, eh? I wish I could illustrate this point with pictures, but, of course, photography was forbidden. So, please see the photo album I made of my few pictures from the tour on Facebook....... which will be up soon. Really.

After eating a Cornish pasty in the cafe in the bottom of Parliament, and keeping a "House of Commons" paper napkin as a souvenir (classy, I know), we went out into the London sunshine and headed to the long tube ride out to the BBC, or as I like to think of it, a Mecca of high quality journalism. We were shown around the huge place, saw the newsroom, a massive studio the size of a high school gym, the set of the children's show "Blue Peter," and a dressing room that Coldplay supposedly used. Very cool, very interesting, learned that 8,000 people work there. Took some dorky pictures there, almost bought a pen, end of story. 

Now back to my previous adventures. These will be brief summaries as it is almost 1 am.... if you want more detail ask me!

Midsummer Night's Dream at the Globe on the Thames: Great play done by passionate actors in an incredible setting. We were the groundlings, so we stood the entire time, but it was worth it. I've seen this play twice and performed it once and this was, by far, the most excellent performance. Definitely check out the Globe if you can if you ever make it to London.

Stonehenge: Big circle of stones in an empty field. Beautiful English countryside, mystical origins, expensive concessions, surrounded by sheep and plagued by june bugs. Very neat, but only would visit once... check out the pictures on the FB.

Bath: What a neat city! Everything there is made from a honey-colored stone and the city was the height of fashion and culture in the Victorian era and the Roman one! I saw the Roman baths, touched the "toxic" and "slightly radioactive" water that I wasn't supposed to (I mean, really, how could I resist...) and drank some from the spring (mildly purified I'm sure) for the price of 50p. The intricacy of the Roman network of pipes and bath rooms was amazing and fascinating, and the Bath Abbey nearby was absolutely the most incredible church (if I could even call it that) I have ever been inside.... though I haven't been to Westminster  Abbey yet..... or the inside of St. Pauls.... I wish I could have spent some more time in Bath, and maybe eat there every day! My lunch, including a Cornish pasty, can of Diet Coke, and a blondie-like "flapjack bar" was only 3 pounds. That's less than half what my lunch would cost in London... more like a third... 

Warwick Castle: A really really awesome castle where a few scenes of Monty Python and the Holy Grail were filmed, and one of England's best preserved. An entire section of the castle was an exhibit called "A Royal Weekend Party" depicting a gathering of important and royal figures using wax models from Madam Tussaud's.  It was fascinating. Also interesting was the Warwick Ghosts Alive "exhibit" I decided to go see...... I should have known better. I was scared shite-less. It was the depiction of a lord that used to own the tower and his murder, by stabbing, reenacted. It was dark, smoky, and the actors got centimeters from my face. I'm still scared actually. It's dark now and I don't even like writing about it. So I'll stop. The castle was cool though, don't get me wrong. Again, pics on Facebook soon of the castle... not the ghost thing. EWWWWWWW. Never again. Like trying olives again after a 17 year hiatus earlier this year, trying a haunted something-or-other again just to see if I'd like it was a bad idea. Oh well. 

And finally, back to Shakespeareland. After seeing Warwick in the morning, we traveled to Shakespeareland in the afternoon where we saw Will's birthplace, his wife's, Anne Hathaway, digs a short distance off, and saw Taming of the Shrew at the Courtyard Theatre performed by the Royal Shakespeare Company in the evening... and got home at 1 am. The birthplace and Anne Hathaway's cottage were fairly what you'd expect... I wasn't too impressed, but they were neat to see nonetheless. The play in the evening was pretty interesting.... confusingly interpreted/presented by the RSC though. The whole play had changing scenes and costumes from traditional Shakespearean garb to modern clothing and various states in-between.... very hard to follow.... but, on the upside, the actress that plays the Indian love interest in The Darjeeling Limited, Amara Karan (yes I looked it up), played Bianca... and came down the stairs and asked us to let her by before the show! Brush with famous person.... cool beans. I have to owe it to Maneeza on that one who, when Amara hopped over the shoulder of one of my friends said, "Oh my god, I think that's the girl from The Darjeeling Limited!" after having seen her for probably 1/16th of a second. Mad props yo. 

Well, it's officially 2 am here and I'm signing off.... going to shop on Oxford Street or maybe up in Camden or somewhere tomorrow... after the Science Museum today and a yummy dinner at nearby quick neo-Portuguese eatery Nando's (free refills and ICE for soft drinks = unheard of and AWESOME), I'm calling it a lazy day. 

Miss you all! Lots of love to the fam and the friends!

God Save the Queen! Or at least the architect of the MSN building and his/her vision of creating a piece-of-pie building... must have been hungry...... success I'd say! Cheers :)