Exams, Day 3

My third exam was in the morning today, and I had the rest of the day free (with my next final not until Saturday afternoon), so I had grand plans to walk along the route to Herstmonceux village today and take some photos. I went for a run yesterday part of the way there, and was awestruck by how beautiful it was! I had almost forgotten, since I had only been that way once at the very beginning of the term. I wished I had my camera with me, so I decided to go for a long walk today along the same road, stopping to take lots of pictures. However, the weather was against me- it's been raining all day with extremely strong winds. Hopefully I can go tomorrow!

So, in the absence of those photos, here's some more from my window :) This was at sunset around 3:30pm yesterday. This whole term I've tried to remember to just stop and appreciate where I am, and that's feeling especially pertinent now that I'm leaving so soon. The area around the castle is beautiful, and I love taking pictures of it- hence the repetition, the view always seems different to me but still pretty.

Exams, Day 1

Not much time for picture taking the last few days, because I've been studying for my first two exams, which were both today. This morning though, I couldn't resist taking a few pictures out my window :) I know I've posted this scene before, but that has mostly been sunset shots, not early morning. It was dark when I got up, but by the time I left for my first exam it looked like this- so beautiful! Right before I took these, some movement caught my eye, and I noticed two rabbits in the field- I'd never seen any rabbits out my window before! No luck catching them on camera, unfortunately, but it was a cheery way to start the day.

Sunny Week in East Sussex

road to Herstmonceux village

The last few days have been the warmest yet! Everyone is walking around in shorts and dresses like it's summer, not almost October. It was actually a fair bit colder when we first arrived than it is now.

pathway branching off the walk to the castle;
taken this Thurs, sunny afternoon

On Wednesday, because the weather was so nice, we got to have our Shakespeare class outside in the Shakespeare garden! That was a really nice surprise, and so was the Time Team episode we got to watch in Early Modern Britain history class. Time Team is a popular UK archaeology TV show, and this episode was about excavations of Henry VIII's palaces, including Hampton Court, which we're going to this Sunday! Some of the experts interviewed during the program had job titles that sounded like dream jobs to me: "Buildings Curator, Historic Royal Palaces" and "Research Curator, Hampton Court Palace" for example. 

path to the castle (you can see it on the far right)

along the path to the castle

On Tuesdays, I have a 4-hour break between classes, so two friends and I walked to the village of Herstmonceux, about 40 minutes each way. I had never been there before so I was excited to see what was there, even though I knew it would be small. It consists of 2 convenience stores, 4 restaurants, a hair salon, a post office, and that's basically it. And this is the nearest settlement to us- the bigger town, Hailsham, is even further away.

Here's some pictures from our walk there:

In Herstmonceux proper:

Lastly, a few uniquely British treats in the convenience store!

First Week of School

Silent Reading Room in the castle

It's been a very busy first week of classes, but good nonetheless! So far the classes have exceeded what I was hoping for when I came here. All of the field studies we get to do sound amazing- I am really excited! I think I won't list them here in one big post but will surprise you with photos as they happen :) (Although I'll be listing the ones coming up the soonest in the "What's Coming Up" section over on the right).

Elizabethan Shakespeare class: there are only four students! It's more like a seminar than a lecture. We'll be studying Much Ado About Nothing, Hamlet, Henry V, Romeo and Juliet, Twelfth Night, and A Midsummer Night's Dream (and I'm in luck, because I've already read them all except for Henry V!).

British Studies class: it's a mix of British history, literature, geography, and popular culture. Some standout lecture topics coming up include the Royal Wedding, the London riots of August 2011, and British attitudes towards France and Germany (this lesson includes a screening of a Fawlty Towers episode!! Jaslyn, I know you'll be able to guess which one).

Art History class: we're starting off with ancient Greek sculpture, focusing quite a bit so far on the Parthenon sculptures. So I'm on somewhat familiar ground right now, which is nice! And we'll soon be moving on to things I know nothing about but am looking forward to (eg Renaissance paintings, different periods of architecture etc).

Early Modern Britain: the time period we're learning about in this class is my favourite in English history- the Tudors and the Stuarts. First lecture was about Henry VIII and his wives, so again I was on familiar territory, which was comforting (but don't worry, I'm still learning lots!). For the last 20 minutes of the lecture the prof taught us in the Elizabethan Rose Garden. It felt too stereotypical and perfect to be true: there was no one else in the garden except the six of us students and the prof, it was the nicest day yet and the sun was shining, the only sound was birds singing, and we were learning about my favourite period of history. I almost felt like laughing because it seemed like something from a movie.

Britain Since 1851: our final paper for this class is a primary source critical analysis. The prof gave us each a package containing five different original letters from WWII, and we have all term to analyze and research them and write a paper about what they reflect about the writer, British society, and life during WWII. I was and am so excited!

The tiny class sizes are very different from UBC, but I think I'm going to like that, at least as a temporary change. There's definitely also the sense that these professors are all here specifically and only to teach us, not because they have to in order to be able to do research. Everyone definitely takes academics here seriously- it's definitely not a "let's have you go to 'school' but really you can travel to Europe whenever you like and everything's an easy A" type of atmosphere, and I think almost all the professors here have their PhDs. I'm trying to start out being on top of readings while it's not as busy yet with field studies.

view from the bench where I like to
study (not too cold outside yet!).
The library doors are the ones on the right.

Back to work...