Study Abroad e-diaries
Mark Duhaime '09
English majory
Currently studying in the London Internship Program for fall 2007
Cark Diaries: Submission Number 5. "I'm Leaving in a Week. Bollocks."
The real wonder of London is those moments in which I look about and I think, "oh the places I find myself in". And I just think, "Here I am." So at various times there I was coming out of the Westminster tube stop and Big Ben stands towering over me, dwarfing me, and all the swarming snot nosed tourists and government types. Or there I was once in the great hall of Parliament staring at a plaque in the floor that read, "Here or about this place was tried the Scotsman William Wallis in year 13 something or other."
But there I was last night sitting on the top floor of a double-decker bus in a parking lot in East London. A double decker vegan, organic, bus/diner, thing surrounded by factories turned into pretentious Vespa-only garages and T-shirt temples in an area between Brick Lane and Spitalfield's markets. It was a hell of a find.
Living in this city, especially for such a short period of time, because of my harried attempts to digest London in 3 ½ months, I find myself constantly wondering questions such as, "How can I walk through the simultaneous grit and pretension of East London, with its curry counters, overpriced Lee's (now coming back into style as seen by the idiots paying such prices for them), waifs haranguing around in oldpeople-Keds, and find myself in one of the most beautiful places in London. There is a wall behind the bus, and atop it, at one end of the bus, is a 60's Jag XJ spraypainted all kinds of colors and patterns in a rectangular glass case. Flanking the other end of the bus, again sitting atop a wall, is a white Hyundai Accent with a wrecking ball sitting in the windshield. In the word that defines this generation, "Random."
I'm by myself now. There was a couple up here, the man was speaking broken English in a not Spanish accent and the woman was trying to pry from him a Spanish lesson in the wonderful manner all British people have of being totally unable to accurately reproduce foreign pronunciation. People say Americans butcher foreign language pronunciation. The British massacre them, wholly and utterly. Which is one of my problems with the British. Other than making fun of us for saying "bathroom" while they sound even more like clowns when they are running around asking for the nearest "loo", they also think we are the ones with the accents. But hearing British folks try and speak Spanish, French, Czech, Hungarian, and German, as I have seen, is a much adder sight than seeing an American do the same. Gives us something to be proud of.
The couple left, and now I'm chatting it up with the manager and the waitress, alternatingly, as they come up to serve me and ready the dining room for dinner. The whole of the dining "deck", as we'll call it, is lighted by candles and the glow of the surrounding factory floodlights. The manager is a dancer who is taking a year off and helping his friend with her gastronomical business venture, and one of those supercontent, softspoken vegans for which I have the utmost admiration. The waitress is a sweetheart, a bit shy, quite cute, but more importantly an absolute sweetheart, didn't get her story, though, sorry. The food only added to the otherworldy beauty of the place. I had peppermint tea, quite good and organic of course, but it was nothing compared to the winter vegetable soup and wedge of bread I had. Everything is made "in bus". They bake the bread, do the soup stock, only the tofu is brought in from elsewhere, if you call a shop around the corner much of an elsewhere. The bread was out of this world, dense, like a lemon pepper but not quite as sweet, and the soup was full of tender vegetables, warming, sweet, again, with the odd mouthful of parsley and pepper kernels. Twas about the best soup ever, and one of the best eating out experiences in London, which doesn't mean much because most of the restaurants are either horrible or ridiculously expensive. It's depressing that I only found this a week before I leave. Depressing that I only have a week more. After all this has been, and it has been one hell of experience, I find myself more and more having these moments of reflection. (I wonder how many times in these dispatches I have said that same thing). Sitting here on the couch in the flat, drinking Irish coffee made cowboy style in a saucepan on the stove, Mike's behind me writing about the IRA, with a toga party tonight to which we have invited the Australian bartender and Swedish cook from the local pub, I think, sure, it has been one of the most absurd times of my life, and though it will be wonderful to collapse at home for Christmas, I have to come back here sometime. I have to. God knows what will come of it, but I need to come back. At least once more. To a town that simultaneously infuriates and enlivens me like all cities should and like none other have. Another full-swooping ending to another dispatch. To add, if I come home with a British accent, you have my permission to give me a good slap for it. I have the suspicion that I will sound more British back at home than I will have here. Oh the wonder of it.
Dispatch #4, or something, from London, 5th of Nov.
Remember remember
The fifth of November
The gunpower treason and plot
I know of no reason
Why the gunpowder treason
Should ever be forgot
So I’m sitting in my flat on November 5th, Guy Fawkes Day, and it sounds like a freakin warzone outside. There are so many different fireworks going on and its incredible. It beats 4th of July, I’m sorry, but it does. The guerilla fireworks, even, are near professional. It’s very cool. It also doesn’t help that I’m writing a paper that references portions of the original V for Vendetta comic, and that I’m about to watch the movie itself in celebration.
I’m finally becoming comfortable here. But at the same time, not. I’m no longer feeling the urge, the obligation to go out and see and do as much as I can, though I am still keeping up a good pace. This, I feel, is resultant of a settling in, of finding myself becoming more and more a Londoner, but, at the same time, I know it’s also coming from exhaustion. I’m feeling spent. Emotionally, physically. Especially today. I’m recovering from a weekend in Paris. This time last night I was running to catch the train back to London, after booking it from the top of the Eiffel Tower.
Sidenote: the Eiffel Tower is HUGE! It is absurdly huge. At one o’clock in the morning they turn off the yellowy main lights that illuminate the whole tower after dark and they turn on strobe lights for ten minutes. The Eiffel Tower is covered with strobe lights, and it sparkles for 10 minutes. Ten minutes at one o’clock in the morning, this huge, huge, huge, fairly useless, tower, mass, thing, sparkles. It’s beyond anything I have ever seen. Even the first time we saw it. My friend and I were walking on a bridge across the Seine towards the Louvre, and I see off in the distance Monsieur Eiffel poke his head through the buildings, and all I could say was, “OOOH OOOH OOH OOOOOH!!!!” And at that, all my friend (the great Katie O’Leary) could say was, “OOOH OOOOH OOOH!!!!!” and scramble to find her camera.
So Paris was nice (understatement) but I am starting to feel the distance from home, starting to miss my family in Boston and Worcester. And I think of how nice it will be to get back to my friends, to my home. I have an apartment on Hollywood street waiting for me when I get back and I am so excited to have my own place, my own room, you have no idea. A place that isn’t as temporary, isn’t as bleak as my tiny, characterless room, in my tiny flat. We have had to make for ourselves a family here. We have had to make our flats somewhat a home. I tried putting all the cool stuff I could find on my walls. I even found a bike wheel on the street and propped it against the wall on top of my dresser. We have had to make London our home. We had no choice. I am more than lucky that I have the kind of family I have here. However small, however funky, it’s a lot better than it could have been. Better than what most other people on the program have. But I’m still drained. After feeling let down, disappointed, however much I try and cheer myself up, with my internship, with my accommodations, I am starting to really feel drained, starting to need some home time for a bit. Some Boston time.
At the same time, I am starting to feel like going home, being at home, won’t be the same. From leaving a city with some of the most amazing history and museums, and museums, and shows, and museums, I know in a sense I am going to be disappointed with what I have to go home to. Relationships with my friends will not be the same. My friend and I were saying the other day that we left our friends back at Clark and at home on the usual tracks while we took on for ourselves something hugely unusual. If we did not come here, we would have had about the same experiences as them, and that would have been fine, we were doing quite well for ourselves as far as living and growing before we left. But, as everyone back home is developing and proceeding on one, usual, fairly gently sloping and constant incline toward maturity, we feel like, over here, we have skyrocketed, shot on a totally different trajectory, very different from those back home. Though we’re better for it, it’s different, something only we can really understand, and it has made us a lot different. Especially the kids who have sought to make the most of their stay here, we have changed so much that we have had hardly any time at all to really stop and think about it. And maybe that is what is making me feel so shot, and shocked; this realization of a monumental change, to maturity, to self-realization, or however else you want to say it. Maybe it’s finally hitting me, or, maybe, things are about to kick into a higher gear than ever before, that’s a bit scary, but I still stand with open arms.
As a happy endnote, I mentioned museums earlier. I have never seen as many museums, with as many high profile exhibitions and collections, never a city with as diverse a group of museums, ever before in any city. Not in New York, not in D.C. Now, a lot of major European and U.S. cities have amazing museums that really stand out. NY’s MOMA and MET, DC’s Holocaust Museum and Air and Space Museum, Berlin’s Jewish Museum all come to mind as really outstanding museums, but there are more museums in London that fit the top of my list than any other city. It’s really impressive. I could go on forever about what I have seen, how accessible they are. Just come here. Go to the Tate Modern and the Victoria and Albert, my two favorites. I’ve been to the Tate Modern about 4 times so far. I’ll probably hit six before I leave. It’s amazing. They have this piece in the main hall right now, kinda unusual, though. It’s a freaking crack in the floor. The people at the Tate Modern have allowed an artist to put a huge crack that runs the length of their huge main reception area. People are tripping over it all the time, it’s a couple inches wide, and people are coming to the museum just to see the crack. It’s huge look it up, and it’s one of the most badass things I have ever seen.
So with that, all that, I leave you. Take care, and go to Paris at some point, and remember: bread, cheese, crepes, rinse with wine, and repeat.
-Mark P. Duhaime Esq.
Dispatch #3: 19-10-07 (that's how the euros do it!)
Hey Clark folks!
Sorry it's been a bit of time since my last bit of input, but I have seriously become lost in the whirlwind that is living and working in London. It's been tough trying to find a niche in the workplace and in the whole London social and cultural scene. It's hard living in central London because in a lot of ways it has lost a lot of its personal London feel from the influx of people to other countries, the geneal overrun of tourists and short term clowns like myself, and the fact that it is otherwise populated by rich folks. It's hard not living in a real neighborhood, as is the truth with the Bloomsbury and Russell Square area in which I live. It's a lot of fleeting tourists because of the many hotels in the area and that gets tiring having to wade through the luggage being dragged around the tube station. It just doesn't feel like a home in a lot of ways. We have to work hard to make homes for ourselves in our flats and I'm glad that some friends and I have created a real family for ourselves.
There are some neighborhoody gems here and there, though. Some real people. We are recognized at our local pub, and the people who work there are nice folks, even though they don't live in the neighborhood (and that's a distancing thing that we definitely feel). We live in a row of old horse stables, so on the ground floor is this row of garages that are used for various things. One of the hot dog vendors in the area parks his stand right below our flat and we have gotten to be acquaintances with them, too bad I'm vegetarian. And in the midst of the obnoxious and super-lame chain cafŽ's, coffee houses and restaurants in the area there are a few here and there that are comfortable and homey to sit in, too bad it's too expensive to eat or drink out anyways, so not much chance for sitting in them anyways.
We have had to go out of our neighborhoods to find solid places to hang, have had to pass over the over-advertised clubs that real Londoners and British people don't actually go to, well, at least the ones you would want to talk to. Too many places are overrun with tourists, obnoxious beer slurping Americans, and generally creeptastic men and trashy women. The less advertised and "alternative" (stupid term) clubs and spots are so rich though. They love their 50's music, their funk, soul, and reggae, which is fine with me. There is a club called Madame JoJo's in Soho that is just awesome every night with rockabilly on Saturdays, funk on Fridays, burlesque on Thursdays. East London is always a good choice, full of non-pretentious, actually reasonably priced clubs and shows. So there has been some necessary sifting through, but the more we do, the more we find favorites, the more we like it, and those used to having to break past the mainstream to find a home will be quite satisfied with what they find.
What's tough about getting out there and experiencing London and getting into the scene here is that getting up at 6:30 in the morning and going to work 5 days a week is tiring. Usually we take it easy first half of the week and go out during the second half, but sometimes you feel so drained, even on Friday and Saturday nights, you feel like you don't want to do anything. I don't feel like we've been stretching it, but we all sometimes still feel so drained and sometimes it feels like time wasted. It's a funny thing, because I am the kind of person that wants to get out, do constructive things; but sometimes you just want to pop in a movie and veg out and for me that has been a big part of the struggle. I dunno maybe I should just let it be and not worry.
Anyways come to London, it's nice, and for the prospectives, come to Clark, its nice there too.
Cheers
-Mark P. Duhaime Esq.
Diary Entry Number 2: 16-9-07 (that's how the euros do it!)
This week's entry will be a bit more organized, I promise. I started my internship as a teacher's assistant in the 3rd grade classes at the Hall Junior School in North London. :Inhale: It's in the neighborhood where Kate Moss and I think Jude Law lives there too. No sightings yet, but be sure I'll let y'all know first thing. It's a really exclusive and expensive school, the likes of which a public school rat myself has never seen. I still have a hard time believing that when I need supplies I can actually find them, or when I need to use something it actually works.
Its an all boys school, the kids I'm teaching are 8, and there's just a lot of cute going all around, all over the place. Kids with British accents are awesome. However, I want to teach high school eventually,
like,
as my real job,
as in,
for the rest of my life,
but that'll come when it does, let's not think about that right now. So I was a bit apprehensive about being placed in the 3rd grade, don't totally know how that happened, but it did and I'm making the best of it, and I'm gonna work it out so I do a few days of the week over at the senior school. But what's great is all the little personalities they've already been developing. I was once operating the best paper cutter in the world outside of the classroom, doing one of my myriad arts and crafts projects for one of the teachers. Seriously, by the time I leave in December I am gonna be an arts and crafts master. MASTER! So I was sitting out there the other day and one of the 50 Williamses comes out on his way to the "loo" and he just chats me up all about another boy's birthday and the cupcakes he brought (he had a frosting photo of his face on each cupcake, a little much) and when I'm leaving and where I'm from. It was cute, to say the least.
'Kids with British accents are awesome.
The first day in the classroom, the one of the teachers I'm assisting asked the boys to guess where I was from, and they said just about every other continent and country except the US, and Antarctica, I was surprised they didn't try that last one.
This past week was a blur, though, still recovering from it all. Only today did I remember I said I would write one of these entries each week, and that I hadn't started one for the week. Monday I walked over to Soho and found a street with a bunch of vintage clothes shops and record stores. Perfect. Each record store had a bunch of turntables and I put on a Blondie record and "Atomic" and "Dreaming" never sounded so good. There's so much warmth and power lost in digital sound. I'll only buy vinyl from now on, but I could not have made this resolution in a worse place. There is so much good rare brit-punk vinyl to be had in this town. Never in America would I find first and only pressings of the old X-Ray Spex singles, and not just "Oh Bondage". Or impossible to find live Clash recordings. I would buy them but they are…
A: Esspensive! As is London's general way of operating.
B: I don't have a really safe way of getting them back to the states other than in a checked bag on the plane. So we'll forget about that tragedy for now. Wednesday I went to see the Lion King, which had just about the best costumes and set I have ever seen. There was an elephant, like a big elephant puppet with people in it coming down the aisle in the whole beginning "Circle of Life" song. That alone was worth it. Cheetahs, Antelopes, Zebras, all puppeted by some of the most graceful people on the face of the earth, really impressive stuff. The acting wasn't too convincing, and the general pacing of the whole thing seemed kinda rushed, and when older Simba talked he sounded like Michael Jackson, which totally threw me off. But the costumes made it super worth it. And they sang "Hakuna Matata", and anytime that song or phrase is included in anything makes it awesome. If I was in line at the DMV and "Hakuna Matata" came on, it would make everything alright. If my leg was being amputated (could happen!) and the guy with the bone saw started singin' that song, it would be like rays of sunshine.
Moving on, The British Museum is HUGE. It took my friend Katie and I 2 hours to go through the Greeks, Romans, and Egyptians, and that was less than a fourth of the place. But I live seriously around the corner from the thing so I can go anytime I want.
I also had the first meeting of my class this week on the 20th century British Novel, and (get ready, shameless Clark plug!) I am, honestly, one of the most prepared kids in the class. But the professor's really cool, and it'll be a good class, it just seems like a lot of the kids haven't done a lot of this stuff before and it seems a bit daunting for some of them. But then again, that could very well just be my ego talking, and sometimes it talks a bit much, so we'll see how it goes. I have to read "A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man" by Wednesday, and I just realized that it's a lot longer than I thought it was. So Jim and I will have some serious quality time over the next few days, and, actually, I think we need to go have some now. I'm hungry, so I'll see how I can doctor up a can of beans (because beans and toast is about all I eat here: as I said, EXPENSIVE!) and then settle down to hang with Stephen and Jim.
Cheers,
-Mark
Email: September 10, 2007
I just finished my first week living in London, I haven't started my job yet, I don't even have all the things in order that I need in order, but it feels like I've been here forever and I'm already starting to talk like these people. I'm only just getting used to looking the wrong way before crossing the street, though a couple times of almost getting hit has helped. Not sure quite where to start, I'll highlight a few things that have stood out to me a smidge. Right then.
First: They drive on the wrong side of the road and the steering wheels are on the wrong side of the cars. Its wrong and weird and freakin me out. They have painted on the edges of the sidewalks "Look Left" and "Look Right", but it sure as hell don't help anything. Once, I thought I saw a 10 year old driving and I flipped out before I realized she was just texting on her phone in the passenger seat and I had just failed to look to the other side of the car. Freaky.
'I went to Dover today. Those white cliffs are for real! Way cool.
I'm living in a fairly posh (see? I'm already startin it!) part of town right by the University of London and the British Museum, however, the address I got beforehand telling me where I was gonna live said "The Colonnade" with no street address, just "The Colonnade", which made me think it was gonna be some stately building that was too cool to have a number address and everyone would just know by name.
Not so much, "The Colonnade" is, for all intents and purposes, an alley, and the building has the words "Horse Hospital" painted on the sides, but since I haven't seen or smelled any horses, I think we're doin okay, but I essentially live in a tiny flat with 3 other guys above a row of garages that must have been stables. Quaint. But don't get me wrong. I love my little alley, it's a good little escape from all the glam around, but its still an alley nonetheless. just my type.
It hurts me everytime I buy anything, physically, I feel pangs in my temples and in my thigh, right where my wallet is. Unless you've been living in outer Siberia, you know how horrible the exchange rate is, but you don't really know how horrible.:Shudder:
They are a lot more conscious of their carbon footprints in this place, though, it doesn't make up for the horrible prices (nothing will). You can recycle plastic shopping bags (they call 'em carriers) and they have bags for cheap that will proclaim "this bag is, like, not bad for the environment, or something" to that effect. They do it well over here.
Crumpets are delicious.
And the folks on the street and in the stores, are really nice, though they might not look it when you see 'em from afar, they might look a bit euro aloof, but when you get 'em talking, they can be real nice, mildly bashful, and altogether cute. For the most part. Some of 'em you can really tell where the term "bloke" comes from, fits better than spandex. Which brings me to my next point, a friend and I walked down to Hyde Park the other day, beautiful day, beautiful park, and we notice all these really nice canvas lounge chairs set up all over the place in front of a nice pond. So we say to each other, "Tre Picturesque", and sit down for a nap. Nary were we seated 5 minutes when this cheeky bloke strolls up all smiles tellin' us it will be 1.50 pounds sterling quid whatever each for sitting in the chairs, i.e.- I had to pay 3 bucks to sit in a chair.
English Muffins are just muffins, and the muffins we know as muffins are called muffins too.
"Pants" means "underwear". That was a stupid move. I just have to make sure I don't run around talking about my supafly new pair of pants.
OH! And I before I forget. I went to Dover today. Those white cliffs are for real! Way cool. A really nice quaint town except for the huge port stuck right in front of a few hundred yards of white cliffy goodness. Don't worry, there's plenty more, but its still a big eyesore, don't know why they couldn't have picked an uglier place for it. But, nevertheless, the white cliffs are nice.
Signing off, Cheers, Tally ho, Bangers and Mash, and so on and so forth. This is the first little dispatch from London. The kids are really cute too and thanks to the Brits I can still watch my stories on TV Links. So, if you don't mind, I have nothing to do tomorrow, so I'm gonna go play grandma for a bit and fret over Jim and Pam on the Office, even though we all know how it has to come out, any other way would be a crime against humanity.
-Mark P. Duhaime Esq.