Hey, everyone.
With my Dad heading off to Kyrgystan with the Peace Corps, my current e-mail address will no longer be valid, which also means that I'm having to start up a fresh Blogger account. All new posts to "Journeys in Life" and "Journeys in Faith" will be made over at
Well, today marks the end of my third week in England. This means that there are only 11 weekd left. It's too short!! Yet, at the same time, it still seems so far away!
Anyway, here's the happenings of this past week, well, actually it's more like two weeks because I haven't updated since the London trip!
The past two weeks have consisted on many late nights due to both homework and socializing. I've watched several movies with friends because it's one of the few things to do at the Manor besides going down to the Bistro for some drinks, which I haven't really done, unless it's to get something non-alcoholic. Like hot chocolate. Which comes in a really awesome mug.
Since I'm in an Englsh novel class, I've been doing a lot of reading for it, as well as for my British Studies course, which is a 6 credit hour history class. We recently finished Robinson Crusoe, which I din't enjoy too much, and started Pamela. Actually, we're supposed to be done with Pamela by Monday, and I'm really far behind on my reading, so this weekend is catch-up time.
The afternoon, for those back in the States, of Obama's Inaguration was actually evening over here, so the TVs in the Junior Common Room and the Bistro were blazing, and our choir teacher told us to come back when it was over, so I got to see him inagurated. Quite an amazing event. The first black president. That's progress.
As for choir, I absolutely love it. Sally Brown, our director, is a very fun person. She's always full of energy and it always seems as though she's happy. The polka-dotcoat she wore to Lincoln totally fits her. On the British Studies field trip to Lincoln, we had some "guerrila" singing. Meaning we surprised the pastor at the Lincoln Cathedral (Protestant) with three songs that we'd only practiced as a group twice. One was a Viking rowing song called "Vem Kan Seigla," a second was a Middle English/Latin song that I don't think actually has a name, and the third was a Round Dance song in Latin that was actually allowed to be sung in Churches. Now we've moved on to learning a song that Henry VIII wrote. The top part, which I'm in, is a bit complicated and I love the challenge.
In the middle of the week I had the unpleasant wake-up call from a fire alarm. I never want my sleep to interrupted by one of those things again. Of course, the students living down in the Carriage House ended up having two drills. One at 1:00 AM and then the one at 7:00. Still, it wasn't a pleasant morning.
Friday, the 23, was the field trip to Lincoln where went on a Roman walk around the town, saw a Norman castle, and a Norman Cathedral (aka Lincoln Cathedral, the place we sung at). Lincoln started out as a Roman garrison for retired soldiers, so there are ruins all around the city. Then, in 1066 the Normans conquered England and built their mort and bailey castle here, which was updated some time later to become a trial house that is still in session today. The Normans also built most of Lincoln Cathedral, which was later updated with the Gothic style. The field trip was very interesting, but it was freezing cold that day--never got above maybe 3 C (around 34 F) all day. Plus, it was rainy and windy. But I also bought some truffles with Kendra and Carly. Including, chili truffles, and, oh my God, those things are good! In fact, they're a bit addictive.
I also went to Mass for the first time since the last Sunday of Advent this past weekend. The church in Grantham is small and there's not as much music as I'm used to back in the States (they don't sing the Responsorial Psalm or the all of the Mass parts), but it was still a nice service. And, I was able to recieve the Eucharist. Finally! I plan on going back this weekend.
The biggest thing that happened this week was planning a trip for April with Carly, Abby, and Shannon/Shaz/Shaza (oh, Bujak). The weekend before our last week of classes we will be traveling south for a while--as in south on continental Europe. We're going to Barcelona!! Needless to say, I'm pretty excited. Technically, this trip will be the first one I've planned on my own, the first of many, hopefully. We don't have all of the details worked out yet, but we're doing that Monday after dinner. Everything around here happens after dinner.
This weekend is a little dull since most of the school is on the trip to Edinburgh in Scotland. But, hey, I kind of need the down time.
Next weekend is both Jiffy and Abby's birthdays, so we'll celebrate those somehow. Some of us are thinking about a pub, but I know that that wouldn't work well for all of us, so we'll see what happens.
Sorry this post was so long, I'll try and be better about posting more frequently so the posts aren't quite as long.
t has been happening these past two weeks. The second evening we were there, we had an elegant dinner with all of the faculty in the Long Gallery, which is basically the largest room in the manor. It's also where we have all of our British Studies lectures. The next event we had was the Ceillidh (pronounced Kay-lee). This is basically a dance, except all of the dancing we did was traditional dances from many parts of Europe. We learned a polka, and several Irish and Scottish dances (the one we learned from Scotland was most certainly the most difficult one). The band was live and the dancing was great, which made for a wonderfully fun evening. Then, this past weekend, was the college trip to London.
0 and took a coach (bus) tour around the city. Then, a group of eight of us wandered around for a couple of hours before deciding to split into two smaller groups after dinner to go to a pub. The group I was with decided we would prefer to go to a coffee house, and we were going to try one of the actual British ones, except we weren't exactly sure what we would order and therefore decided to go to Starbucks (which was okay because we were basically the only Americans there). Saturday was spent being a tourist during the day and seeing a comedy/mystery called The 39 Steps in the evening. The show was great and all of us enjoyed it. Sunday, was the college tour of Hampton Court Palace, which would have been great, except that many of us were done with being tourists for the weekend and it was cold and windy. Not exactly the greatest weather conditions for touring an old castle.
Wow. This year sure has passed by quickly! Sometimes it's just so amazing how fast time flies! And so much has happened, that I'm going to skip all that reflecting on the past part and just jump right into the resolutions for the future.
So, without further ado, here follow my New Year's Resolutions:
Talk. I have found that I don't tend to be too talkitive, even around really close friends. It's not that it's a bad thing, I just think that I need to learn how to talk a little bit more.
Make memories. Well, considering that in about 30-some hours I'll be on a plane headed for London to begin my semester in England, I figure I should aim to make as many memories as possible--with plenty of photos to along with those memories, of course!
Build relationships. It's always good to have friends! And special someone's are great as well!
Be faithful. I of course will continue my "journey in faith," and I will hopefully strengthen it. This next semester I will be on the leadership team for the Christian Fellowship at Harlaxton, so naturally I am aspiring to grow in faith.
Complete a few to-do items: learn to ride a bike, learn to drive, learn to sew, etc.
I think five is a good number to start with.
Anyway, my New Year's resolutions weren't really my reason for posting. My real reason is this:
With the New Year comes a new path on my journey through life, and this one's leading me to England. That's right, for the next four months I will be studying at Harlaxton College in Grantham, England. For any of you who don't know where that is, Grantham is east of Nottingham and south of Lincoln in Lincolnshire. It's a small town and Harlaxton College is actually located within the walls of Harlaxton Manor.
The photograph to the right is the Manor. So, that is where I will be living and studying for the next four months.
Anyway, I leave tomorrow morning, which is very exciting. And although I will miss all of my friends here in the States, I know I will return home having had a wonderful time.
And don't worry, I'll post here, too.
Today is December 14th. It's the third Sunday of Advent, and also happens to be MY BIRTHDAY!!!
So, Happy Birthday to ME!
After Mass, Soo and HJ surprised me with a cheesecake and candles in honor of my turning 20! As I told Soo yesterday (it was her birthday), even though our birthdays are in the middle of finals week, they can still be fun!
Since it's now finals week, I've been thinking a lot about tests. Especially since one of my finals was to construct a final test for my education class. I have to say that after completing that, I have much more appreciation for teacher-made tests. They take so long to make!
As for my finals, I now have only three left! Two of them are my hardest finals, French and Psychology, but my health final will be a piece of cake, especially since it's an online test. On Wednesday I head "home" to Kentucky with my sister; my Korean roommate, Soo; and another Korean friend from down the hall, HJ (Hyunjeong). They'll only be at my house for about a week and a half, but it's going to be a blast! It's also the last time I'll see them before I head off to Europe for a year (excluding summer).
The past weekend I went on a trip with some of the members of Newman Club up north to the Notre Dame campus.
Excitement! I just discovered that I can get an ENL (English as a New Language) degree while doing all of my other crazy plans for my double-major and a minor! It'll be a lot of work, but I'm pretty sure that I can do it, especially since I'll be getting so much credit for my French major while I'm off in France.
I already have my French major halfway done (being in 434 and all). I only need one 300-level class, and three more 400-level classes, all of which I can get credit for while in France. The only other class I'd have to take would be the senior seminar (which is also the senior sem for my education major).
I'll also be able to take the ENL practicum while in France through an independant study with my internship.
The best part is I can still spend another semester in Japan. Of course, I'll still be a fifth year senior, but at least I can still do everything I want to!
So, naturally, this makes me EXCITED!
I realized that I talk about religion a lot in this blog, so I thought I'd go ahead and create a blog for my Journey in Faith, dubbed "Faith." So if you like my musing of a religious nature, go check it out at http://okamifaith.blogspot.com/!
So this past weekend, I had the opportunity to go to a Christopher West seminar with the campus Newman Center here at UE on Pope Jean-Paul II's Theology of the Body.
Theology of the Body is really hard to put into simple terms because it encompases so many different Christian teachings and tries to further explain and, in a sense, re-evaluatem them. The theology is mostly focused on explaining "how the Christian sexual ethic corresponds perfectly with our deepest yearnings of our hearts for love and union." (Christopher West, http://www.christopherwest.com/). The theory really attempts to reverse the negative connotations that our modern Western world has about sex.
Anyway, the talk was really very interesting and it helped me learn a lot more about my religion. However, there are still some things that I don't totally agree with, and there are, of course, many things about the whole theology that I don't understand. The theology is just so vast, that it's nearly impossible to fully comprehend it--just like with any theology, really. I mean, Christopher West has been studying the Theology of the Body for 15 years, and he's still finding things that he never understood before!
Really, the biggest issue I had with the whole theology was the deal about contraception. I'm not saying that someone should take contraceptions lightly or anything like that, but there are people out there who might medically need to be on contraceptives. If a person has thin blood, for example, but heavy periods, would you really want them passing out all the time due to blood loss? Wouldn't the Pill be an acceptable answer? And if a family really cannot financially, emotionally, etc support a child, wouldn't the Pill be an okay answer instead of the woman having to take their temperature everyday and check their fluids everyday so that they know which week to avoid having sex? How acurate is that going to be? Honestly, I'm all for people having kids, I just think that the world would be better off if the kids came into famillies that could support them, instead of having over-run orphanages and children suffering from the foster care system, which really isn't all that great of a system.
Anyway, if you want to find out more about the Theology of the Body, which I suggest you do because it's worth taking a look at, even if there are some thigns you don't agree with, then Google it, or head to Christopher West's homepage: http://www.christopherwest.com/ or http://www.theologyofthebody.net/.
So, I thought I should give people an idea of what a Sunday generally looks like for me.
First, I sleep until around 10 if I'm going to mass on campus. If I'm going to church over at the Christian Family Church or at St. Ben's, then I have to get up earlier (8 for CFC and 9 for St. Ben's).
If I'm not going to CFC, then I get brunch over at Dunnigan Dining at about 11:00. When I go to mass here, I usually sing or participate in the greeting of partitioners. For that, I need to be at Neu Chapel at about 12:15. Mass starts at 1:00, and is usually done at around 2:00. Then, I head back to my room and clean and study, because generally this hasn't gotten done yet.
So, there you have it. A typical Sunday. Saturdays are even more uneventful.
Yesterday my mom and I moved my sister in to Brentano,which is the female residence hall on campus. I was so excited to be back on campus that I was practically shaking when we checked her in!
Today, we moved me in to my room. It's a little bit empty since Soo isn't here yet (and neither is a fridge or microwave, since we forgot the microwave back in the garage), but everything I brought is now put away. Right now I'm the most organized I'll be all semester! I'm not sure if I like having the movable furniture yet. My desk surface is wider and it does have more drawers, however, it doesn't have as many shelves, so there's not enough space for all of text books and notebooks and the books I brought from home to read. Plus, there's not as much storage [or room (never thought I'd say that!)] as when we had the built in stuff.
Thw bathrooms are nice, though. There's only two toilet stalls, but I don't mind the renovated showers! Especially since there is no longer that disgusting tub....and shower curtains. Having all new stuff is certainly a plus.
Anyway, I'm really glad to be back at UE. It's like being home again!
Well, for me anyway, summer's almost over: I start classes in one day short of a month (I move back to campus in three weeks), and I move to Kentucky in less than a week (yikes!). My last summer in Boulder has just flown by all too quickly.
So lately I have been struggling with my religious path (liberal Catholicism). I guess you could say that I havent felt the same religious "high" that I had while at UE. Maybe it's the fact that the church I used to go to has undergone many changes since the Paulist Fathers left, or mybe it's because I didn't have a regular group to attend any more, or maybe I just no longer fit in as well, the same way I don't quite fit in to Boulder any longer. Who really knows? No matter the reasons why, I'm struggling a bit with my faith.
I guess one analogy that could work to describe my situation in a completely unsatisfactory manner, is riding a bike up a rather rocky hill. Only it's a hill that you can't see the top of and therefore you feel as though you're getting nowhere.
This very bad analogy came to me while I was walking the half-hour hill from my dog-sitting job back home this morning. Along this uphill walk of mine, I pass by a Methodist church along Gillaspe. Along with various signs advertising a Korean service (in Korean, of course), was the English sign with a little saying on it:
