The Three Rules

Our professor who organized this trip and was our main source of information coming here left us after our first week and will return again in December to take us home. Before she left, she said there are three rules we must follow:

1. Don't die

2. Don't go to jail

3. Don't get kicked out of school

A smaller group of us from Richmond met with a larger group at Kensington campus to take buses to see to world heritage sites today: Stonehenge and Bath. The tour guide we had was great, and I learned a ton about them, especially the history behind Stonehenge. We don't know who built Stonehenge and why. It goes back 5,000 years to about 3,000 BC. The stones arrived in 2,500BC and the building was finished in 2,000BC which was the beginning of the Bronze Age. Britain was heavily forested with lots of deer in in 2,500BC  during the Neolothic age (the New Stone Age). Stones back then were bashed into shape using other stones. Stonehenge is a circle of stones that are shaped in this manner. There are stones going horizontal atop the stone circles as well. It would've taken about 200 people to drag these stones into place. There is a strong likelihood that there were wooden pieces forming a circle before the stones, but they are not there anymore. 2 types of stones make up this structure: smaller (blue stones) which came from 180 miles away in Wales and larger stones ( between 25 to 50 tons) which came from a quarry about 20 miles away from Stonehenge. It would be a 1 week journey on foot from 180 miles away. Stones may have been put on wooden rafts on a river to be brought to the site, then put on wooden platforms, which were put on wooden rollers which were tree trunks. They would have taken the tree trunks out from back and put in front again. It was believed that blue stones had healing or curative properties. 2 full stone circles with 2 semi circles within. What I saw is 50% of what it used to be. Many stones have fallen or been taken for building as it was a source of stone for people. 1/3 of the stone is in the ground to hold it in position. They used antlers of deer to pick into the ground, or the shoulder blade bones of cattle. The bones help us date Stonehenge. It is on a northeast to southwest axis, and it is in line with the summer and winter solstice. The hele stone stands by itself, it is believed it was once one of a pair, as an entrance that lead into Stonehenge. On mid summers day, if you face the sun it rises directly above the hele stone if you are standing in the middle of the stones. 

Bath was also very beautiful with amazing architecture. I think it was a very romantic city with lots of birds, street music and performers, and flowers everywhere. The Roman Baths that we received a tour of are one of the best remaining Roman relics in the country. They were natural springs that were used as communal baths for the Romans inside this temple which we toured. We weren't allowed to touch the water in the bath where most of the pictures were taken, but at the end we had the opportunity to touch and even drink some filtered water from the baths coming out of a fountain. 

All of the souvenir shops around here gave me lots of options for gift purchases for family and friends, and we stopped at a pub for lunch. At a pub, you seat yourself, look at a menu, and go up to the bar, order and pay separately when you are ready. They see where you sit and bring the food to you when it's done. Many of the pubs I've been to so far have the kitchen where they cook the food downstairs and they send it up to the bartender using a dumbwaiter.

On the way back to Kensington, we were able to see Windsor castle in the distance. The royal family resides there on occasion, and it is said that the Queen enjoys spending her weekends there. I have a trip planned through the school here and to Eton later on in my study abroad, but there's no chance that I will see the royal family unfortunately.

A few more things today that I noticed and thought was different about this country are as follows:

Apartments are called flats.

There are 365 pubs in the London area that sell Fuller beer, one for every day of the year. 

"To Let" means "for sale"

Traffic lights go yellow to red to slow down, then yellow to green to warn the driver that it's almost time to go again. 

Our tour guide seemed to call exits off the highway "slip roads"

Public schools require you to pay a tuition per trimester, where private schools do not. The public school where the princes attended costs around 9,000 pounds per trimester, so almost 30,000 pounds for one school year. That is the equivalent of $47,634.