14 North Parade

Though I am sometimes loathe to admit that my parents are right, I could not be more grateful that they booked my flight the day before my program started. Snow storms hit the southeast part of England on Monday (notably London), ravaging the country with its worst weather in almost 20 years. Heathrow essentially shut down as did the rest of London. I had safely arrived in Bath on Sunday morning by about 11 a.m. and thus avoided the chaos. Only about half of the 50 or so students had arrived by the alloted time. My flatmate, Mary Ann, had her flight diverted to Cardiff, Wales and from there caught a bus to Bath. All the late arrivals had their own horror story. I almost feel left out. Not really, though. There were small flurries in Bath, which freaked out our program coordinators who were shocked by the thin veil of snow on the ground. I tried to appear sympathetic but struggled considering the massive amounts of snow dumped on Rochester every year.

The train from London to Bath is only about 1 1/2 hours, and unfortunately, I was so exhausted from my flight (plus the fact it felt like the middle of the night) that I promptly passed out and missed seeing the scenic landscape from my window. I actually drifted in and out of sleep and got the vague sense of green hills and little one lane towns with houses outside that had a lot of roaming sheep. I do distinctly recall waking up twice and catching two startling views. The first was a huge white horse that appeared painted onto a hill. I still haven't gotten the scoop on the painted ponies, but I'll figure out the story behind them and get back to you. Second, I saw a castle. It may not have been a true castle per se, but it stood by itself amidst the hills and had a small drive leading up to it. The building was gray and had spires and thus fit my rudimentary definition of a castle.

Because I could not immediately check into my hostel for the night, I wandered looking for food and found Demuths. The restaurant's tagline was "positively vegetarian." It seemed like the right place for me and was absolutely delicious. I got soup and bread and was surprised when it came with a small salad. The portions were very generous, too. I will defintely be returning. Today I discovered the restaurant owner offers vegetarian cooking classes, and while I am a competent chef I would be interested to learn how to make Indian or Moroccan dishes. For dinner that evening (which occured around 9 p.m. when I awoke from my amazing nap), I went to an Indian restaurant. Partly because I love Indian but also because the town shuts down pretty early. Granted it was a Sunday night. By the end of my meal, I was the only customer and stayed talking to the waiters until almost closing. One was perplexed by my choice to study English when it's the same language spoken in the United States. I don't think I did a good job explaining the distinction between literature and language and what my studies focus on.

Monday I was able to move into my house, Nunes. During my walks on Sunday, I tried to find my residence, 14 North Parade. I got to 10. The obvious answer, as I discovered on Monday, was that I hadn't gone far enough down the street. In my defense, I thought it was a restaurant, which is partially true as there is a Greek restaurant directly below us called Opa. Many of the buildings in Bath have a ground level entrance for one store and then have a set of stairs leading down to a completely different one. Last night we disovered the patrons are a rather rowdy bunch. Luckily, I'm a sound sleeper.

Nunes House is named for the founder of the Advanced Studies in England program, Don Nunes. He actually went to the University of Rochester at some point during his academic career. Like most of the buildings around, the house is old, dating back to the 18th century. Nunes is divided into four flats, so there are fifteen of us total. I live with two other girls and we share a kitchen, two toilets and a shower. The shower is electric. Very different. No real pressure to speak of, but the hot water is a great relief as our small abode is very cold. We have these old brick heaters that we've sworn never to tamper with as they have been pre-set at the perfect setting. The bricks heat up over night and then the contraption slowly dispenses heat throughout the day. It's about 6:30 p.m. now and I think we're out of heat. Bummer. Those of us who made it in last night went to a pub called Crystal Palace Tavern to grab dinner. I'm definitely going back next Sunday as we discovered they host trivia nights, though I'm confident we'll all be terrible as I suspect it will be British trivia.

We have orientation all this week. Essentially we get talked at a lot, get to walk around and find grocery stores (Sainsbury's) and pharmacies (Boot's). The week is capped off with a trip to Stonehenge. Then we start classes on Monday. Hooray! I feel pretty much settled in at this point. My room's clean and organized, and I can walk around a small part of the city and still make it back to my house without getting lost. There are a few places I know I want to check out after today's brief tour of Bath. The Porter is a pub up on Walcot St. and often has live music and an entirely vegetarian menu. Right across the street is Harvest, a natural/organic grocer. Those are my two stops for tomorrow. Tonight after dinner a group of us are going to the Huntsman, a pub that is literally one block away. Sounds like a good way to cap off the evening.