confusion

Well it’s been a week since I got back… I’ve been very lazy and not updated my journal. In fact I have been very lazy in general, and have done nothing all week. I think I am suffering from depression at being home, not only do I miss C███████, and hate listening to my family bitch constantly, but I have that feeling of being uprooted again. My friends for the US are all in NoVa or somewhere else I cannot get—I have no car. And the people I have been hanging out with for the past year are all 4000 miles across the ocean. Oh well. I am going to NoVa today, to get some paper work done at Mason so maybe I will see someone. I will update my journal when I get back Saturday or Sunday. Final thing: Happy Birthday to C██████ and Jennifer!

Well, as soon as I finish this posting I will turn off my laptop, back it in my bag and head downstairs to wait for the cab which will take me to Heathrow to catch my plane back to the US.

And so my year abroad comes to an end… Bitter sweet—I want to see home and friends and get a job, but I would have liked to get that job in Europe and stay here for a few years, while I am still young.

Much in my life has changed over the past 9 months; there has been pain, joy, disappointment and awe. I have a new canon of stories to tell but it remains to be seen if I will be telling them to the same people I told my C’ville stories to.

I will see many of you soon, most for the first time since I left. Some of you will not be around for a while, and I will eagerly await your return, and some of you I will have to wait too long to see as I am leaving you now. But to all of you I say, thank you for being my friends and keeping in touch. I miss you all.

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Ok, so I got up early this morning to go to the Tower of London—I figure that I should see it seeing as how I have been here for nine months and it’s just down the road. So the Tower is about a mile walk, and half way there I turned the corner and ran smack into a blocked off street. No way to the other side, both sides lined with barricades and police men walking up and down. Seems I was half way between St. Paul’s, where there was a church service commemorating the first 50 years of Queen E’s reign, and the City Guild Hall, where there was a state lunch afterwards. I asked the police if I could cross the street but they said I would have to walk back around (doubling my journey) or wait till the motorcade was passed. I decided to wait. An hour later the motorcade finally arrived, led by a brand new Rolls Royce with the Queen and Prince Philip in it. I managed to snap a few pictures—yea me, I hope they come out.

I think it’s cool that I was here for the Queens 50th Jubilee celebration, though I did not go down to the actually party by the Palace the whole city has been one big party all weekend (we will ignore the fact that the Queen’s celebration is competing with the World Cup pub parties.) I did not expect to actually see the Queen while I was here in England, how often does one actually see her in person?

Anyway, I did make it to the Tower later. Very cool, lots of history and bloody tails. “Off wit ‘is ‘ead!” Walking around the White Tower (the original “Tower” ordered built by William the Conqueror in 1078) and the Bloody Tower (where Sir Walter Raleigh was imprisoned for 13 years) is very cool, but the best part has to be the Crown Jewels. They have their own building and the collection is amazing. The two largest cut diamonds in the world, the largest being the Cullinan I at 530 carets! The sparkle of this diamond must been seen to be believed. She sheer number of diamonds in the Crown Jewels collection is staggering! I think they could spare me a few!

I went to an amazing exibit today, called Körperwelten, or Body Worlds in English. The basis is the anatomical display of the human body (and a few other animals) using a new type of preservation technique called Plastination where the bodies are forcefully impregnated with various types of polymers to preserve the flesh and bone in a such a state that they appear to still be living. This allows the layers to be literally pealed back and cut away showing the structure in a way not possible before. The overall effect is amazing—it must be seen to be fully appreciated, words just don’t work.

OK, now Americans are being warned that their may be suicide (or as the Bush administration now calls them homicide) bombers planning to hit America. Now, I cannot see worse thing for Islamic militants to do (excuse me for jumping to conclusions but based on the what I have seen most suicide bombers are Islamic militants.) Americans already have little sympathy for the “plight” of Palestinians, and little love of Islam in general thanks to the violent interpretation of the teachings which have lead to the Intifada, the Taliban and many plane hijackings and bombings in the past 25 years. If militants decide to bring their dynamite hugging ways to Americans soil then they will have signed a blank check for Bush and the American war hawks. I do not want to seem as though I am waving a pro-America/anti-Islam flag here, but the entire Arab world would be hard pressed to stand against the full might of the American war machine—and that is what will be unleashed on them, sooner or later, if suicide bombers come to America… unless the leaders of these countries (an Palestine) can find a way to curb the terrorist instincts of their malcontents.