Well, first things first: I probably should have mentioned in my last post that when I whine and moan about wanting to run off to Spain and leave my dreary Welsh life behind, I have no intention of actually doing that. I got myself here and it doesn't make much sense to leave now, especially with the Eisteddfod--the one thing I've really been looking forward to--only about a week away. And in any case I bought my plane ticket here on a cheap-ass discount ticket site that won't let you make any alterations, so I'd have to buy a one-way ticket back to the US outright and I simply don't have the funds for that sort of nonsense.
My updates for this week start with the gripping tale of encountering my first giant resident spider. Actually, it was more like the giant resident spider association took a vote and they all decided to reveal themselves to me at once. Friday night around midnight, just as I was getting ready for bed, I noticed a really freaking enormous spider hanging in the space between my desk and my wardrobe. The next hour of my life was spent in a state of frozen terror. At first, I thought maybe the spider was dead, because it wasn't moving, but while its body was small, with its legs it was roughly the size of my palm, and I figured there was no way a spider that big had been there for the past two weeks and I hadn't noticed it. So I was forced to wage an epic inner battle: to act against my non-meat-eating conscious and kill a spider that I knew wasn't actually going to hurt me (which would also mean getting close enough to kill it and risk getting dead spider gunk all over one of my shoes or books or whatever), or to try to find the courage to go to sleep with a really freaking enormous spider only about six feet away. I went downstairs at one point to try to find a flyswatter or something, but turns out I was so paranoid about spiders that I didn't want to touch anything lest there be spiders hiding behind it. I even thought about calling my parents to ask them what I should do. Around 2am (no, seriously, I spent two hours stressing about this spider) I told myself it was just a spider, it would stay in its web, I was going to go to bed and deal with it in the morning.
Then, of course, I slept terribly all night and woke up in the morning...and the spider was gone. Lovely.
That morning I also found another giant (though slightly smaller) resident spider in my bathroom.
Long story short, my landlord came to my rescue and caught the spiders for me--didn't even kill them! Just caught them and put them outside. And then he showed me where the vacuum was so that I could deal with any future resident spiders on my own. And he also asked Bethan, the cleaning woman, to vacuum out all the dusty corners of my room, so I now live in a certified spider-free residence.
On Saturday I went to the Nantgaredig festival with Frances & family (after sitting around my house for two hours...Frances said she'd pick me up at eleven; she didn't actually come to get me til around 1:30). I got to meet the headmaster of the Welsh-speaking primary school, and also an American family who are friends of the magazine and were visiting the area for a few weeks, plus a few of Ed and Tom's friends. It was Ed's birthday, so there was lots of cheap beer, and cake, and a bunch of guys who came over and spent the afternoon shooting air rifles and teaching me how to fire a gun. That night I went out in Carmarthen for a bit with Ed and his friends, and it went about how you'd expect it to go with one American female out drinking with a group of Welsh guys. It was fun, but I made the very smart choice to have Frances come pick me up around 11:30 instead of staying out all night and crashing on some stranger's floor at 6am. So Sunday morning when all the guys woke up hungover halfway to death, I was very happily in my own bed.
Sunday I had dinner with my landlords, which turned into a two-hour-long affair featuring intense discussions of American and British politics.
Monday I accompanied Rhidian's elementary school on a trip to the beach. Of course, it wasn't nearly warm enough to swim, but at least it didn't rain, so it was a pretty good trip. I had a herd of twelve-year-old girls following me around all day asking things like "What do you call trousers?" and "Say 'tomato!'" I helped Rhid's team in the sandcastle competition. I had an autistic eleven-year-old boy ask me a barrage of questions--"what's your name? what's your mom's name? what's your dad's name? what color is your mom's hair? what color is your dad's hair? do you have a car? what is your car's name? what is your mom's car's name?" and so on and so forth--then tell me my name was "Prince Emily" and ask to marry me. Little kids are exhausting! By the end of the day, I was covered in sand and ready for bed.
Tuesday was work. Cataloging and answering phones and generally just wasting my time.
Wednesday I went to the Royal Welsh Agricultural Show, which was especially cool because I got a fancy press pass that got me into just about anywhere I wanted to go. Basically the Royal Welsh was like state fair meets flea market meets food festival, so I spent the morning wandering around looking at Welsh things to buy, and the afternoon looking at the livestock (do you have ANY IDEA how huge cows are? Cause they're HUGE. And TERRIFYING). I got a seat in the bandstand to watch the sheep dog demonstration, and also saw part of the "dancing diggers" show, which was about a dozen of those giant tractor-bulldozer-thingys driving around in synchronization while music played and using their hydraulics to lean forward or backward and shoot colored smoke out of their exhaust pipes. Sounds dumb, but was actually pretty cool. In the evening I met up with Ffion, who I'd met at dinner with my landlords a week or two ago, and one of her friends, so we checked out the camper van display and the pigs and the goats (side note: goats are totally awesome) and the food exhibit.
Thursday Frances passive-aggressively made me go back to cataloging, which made me angry because if we were in the US, I could sue her for making me do bitch work all day without paying me. Internships are supposed to be learning experiences, and I'm pretty sure putting 993 lines worth of catalog information into an Excel spreadsheet doesn't really count as learning.
Thursday I also became so fed up with the lack of professionalism, amount of inconsiderateness, and degree to which I've been taken advantage of here that I actually understand the sensation of being so angry you start to see red. What finally pushed me over the edge was seeing the proofs for the latest issue of the magazine, which has been due to come out about every day that I've been here and still hasn't been published. This issue contains not only at least one full-length article that I edited, but also a couple short blurbs that I either edited, or wrote in their entirety, by which I mean they are completely original and 100% my intellectual property. Despite that fact, I'm not credited anywhere on the articles. Fine--they often don't credit authors right on the articles, and it'd be strange to credit an editor on every single article she worked on. But what really got me is that I'm not even credited on the staff page at the front of the magazine. Yeah, that's right, I've spent eight hours a day, five days a week doing menial tasks for that magazine, not to mention the numerous articles I've edited and the few that I've written in their entirety, and my name appears nowhere in that issue. That's beyond under-appreciation. That makes me wish I was in the US so I could sue for the rights to have my intellectual property at least credited to me.
Anyway, I'm going to stop talking about it there, because once I get going I have trouble refraining from long, heated rants on this particular subject.
This morning Frances was twenty minutes late picking me up. Didn't even bother to call to say she was going to be late. And this comes right on the heels of Wednesday night, when she was fifteen minutes late picking me up at the train station when I got back from the Royal Welsh, despite the fact that I'd told her hours beforehand when the train would be in. It was also raining very heavily and there was no shelter on the train platform.
I'm also peeved because the Dylan Thomas photo shoot fell through and Frances hasn't made any plans for the Dylan Thomas house visit yet, I was supposed to go on the architectural salvage trip today but it's now been postponed til tomorrow (even though tomorrow is Saturday and I really, REALLY don't want to be doing magazine work on the weekend), and I haven't heard a word about the rescue mountaineering article I was supposed to do. Whatever. Three more weeks and I'm done.
I'll end on a happy note: it's not raining today! Huzzah!
Friday, July 23, 2010
Friday, July 16, 2010
ROAR OF FRUSTRATION
When I mentioned in my last post that "I think this week should be an exciting one," fate clearly chose to punish me. This week has, in fact, been so mind-numbingly uneventful that it's actually worth remarking on.
Monday, I did nothing during the day. Came back to the Fig Tree after work and had a phone chat with my fellowship adviser at school about my Watson application. Long story short, after a painful period of existential angst, I'm not so dedicated to my Watson anymore. I'm still planning to apply, but at this point...I'm not so sure I'd accept Colgate's nomination if it were offered to me. I like--no, love--the idea of the Watson, but it's actual execution? A year traveling the world alone? I love traveling, but I realized my favorite travel memories are when I was traveling with someone, and I'm starting to get tired of moving around so much--maybe instead of always focusing on where I'm going next, I should settle down for a year or two and focus on building relationships with people instead. That, plus anything I could accomplish during a Watson year I've either already accomplished (like having the confidence and independence to travel alone or do things like eat dinner by myself at a restaurant) or will be able to accomplish later in my life (like studying endangered languages once I have a Master's in linguistics). So, like I said, existential angst.
Tuesday, I did nothing. I felt exhausted and tired and fatigued all day.
Wednesday, I was sick. Or "sick," rather. Granted, I was genuinely sick--was I sick enough to warrant calling into work and saying I couldn't come in that day? Well...that's a matter of interpretation.
Thursday, I had a runny nose, so clearly was too sick to go to work. I continued my trend from Wednesday of sitting in bed and watching 30 Rock on the internet.
Today, I'm about ready to rip out chunks of my hair in frustration. The best I can tell, it's a combination of two factors. First, I've about had enough of the lack of professionalism prevalent throughout Wales. It's ironic, because Frances and Henry are always complaining about how there's this attitude in Wales that "oh, it's only Wales, you don't have to try so hard because it's not London so no one cares." They say they always try to fight that attitude...and yet. They've been running the magazine for, what? twelve? fifteen? years now, and they don't seem to even have a set publishing date. What I mean is, Time magazine gets delivered to my parents' door every Saturday, without fail. You always know when to expect it. No such regularity with this magazine. It's bimonthly, but when during the month--and, to an extent, which of every two months--that you get the magazine seems to depend on the whim of the publisher (ie, Frances and Henry). They keep extending deadlines for advertisers who are waffling. They don't even have a complete collection of all their issues--I'm in the process of indexing, and of the 80 or so issues they've published, I can't find 19 of them. Nineteen! That's fully a fourth, ladies and gentlemen. This whole country is also completely incapable of being on time--I've learned that if someone says they're going to pick me up at nine, they really mean more like 9:15, or, depending on the circumstances, possibly ten. This morning I waited (*cough*in the rain*cough*) fifteen minutes to be picked up, only to then get a call saying my ride would be there fifteen minutes after that (it actually turned out to be twenty) because they were running late. And the tardiness isn't in the relaxed Spanish way...it's more of an "oh oops I forgot about you" way.
My other gripe is that I'm completely, overwhelmingly bored. I've had some really fun experiences in the two weeks I've been here so far, and I'm sure I'll have plenty more, but in between the fun experiences, my brain is rotting from atrophy. I was at work from 11:30 until seven today (fully two and a half hours longer than I should have been...again with the never being on time) and in that time, I edited one piece of advertisement, indexed three magazines, and answered the phone maybe six times. I spent the rest of the time browsing around Facebook and reading user comments on CNN.com articles.
It'd be one thing if I were being paid to be a secretary; I really couldn't complain in that case, because I'd be making money and it's pretty easy work. Indexing is mind-numbing, but once you get into the rhythm it goes quickly and it's nothing to complain about when you're being paid. But the thing is, not only am I not being paid, but I'm actually losing money on this adventure. In addition to the plane ticket (which my parents were gracious enough to pay for), I'm spending about $150 a week on rent (and that's all my own personal money). I reached out to publishers in Wales because I wanted a productive internship. I wanted to be editing manuscripts or helping develop advertising strategies. I wanted to work with authors and be in a creative, busy environment. Instead I'm sitting in a cold, converted barn by myself (or with Frances, on a good day) answering the phone and doing menial tasks. It, quite simply, sucks. I'm supposed to have all these articles I'll be writing, but I'm pretty sure they aren't actually going to happen at this point because part of the lack of professionalism here is that no one is capable of following through on anything.
It also doesn't help that the Fig Tree is 13 miles from the closest town, I don't have a car (obviously), and the bus station is two miles down the road...and the buses are infrequent and unreliable.
Don't get me wrong, I'm still really excited for the Eisteddfod, and if I get to write my articles, those are going to be really fun adventures. Plus it's looking like I'll get to spend a day or two at the Royal Welsh Show next week. But like I said, in between those things? Mind-numbing boredom, and not at all something I signed up for.
How on earth do I keep ending up in situations like this? Last summer it was the Morocco fiasco, then last month it was the boredom of working (yet another) unpaid internship in Champaign where I did nothing but sit around all the time (coupled with living with my grandparents), and now this. My boyfriend suggested I do like I did in Morocco last year: get out while I still can and flee to Spain for a week or two. It's tempting, especially since there's nice weather in Spain, whereas today in Carmarthen there was a high of 58 and I haven't seen the sun since I got here.
One of these days I'll stop aiming for creative summer experiences and just get a job frying burgers like everyone else.
Monday, I did nothing during the day. Came back to the Fig Tree after work and had a phone chat with my fellowship adviser at school about my Watson application. Long story short, after a painful period of existential angst, I'm not so dedicated to my Watson anymore. I'm still planning to apply, but at this point...I'm not so sure I'd accept Colgate's nomination if it were offered to me. I like--no, love--the idea of the Watson, but it's actual execution? A year traveling the world alone? I love traveling, but I realized my favorite travel memories are when I was traveling with someone, and I'm starting to get tired of moving around so much--maybe instead of always focusing on where I'm going next, I should settle down for a year or two and focus on building relationships with people instead. That, plus anything I could accomplish during a Watson year I've either already accomplished (like having the confidence and independence to travel alone or do things like eat dinner by myself at a restaurant) or will be able to accomplish later in my life (like studying endangered languages once I have a Master's in linguistics). So, like I said, existential angst.
Tuesday, I did nothing. I felt exhausted and tired and fatigued all day.
Wednesday, I was sick. Or "sick," rather. Granted, I was genuinely sick--was I sick enough to warrant calling into work and saying I couldn't come in that day? Well...that's a matter of interpretation.
Thursday, I had a runny nose, so clearly was too sick to go to work. I continued my trend from Wednesday of sitting in bed and watching 30 Rock on the internet.
Today, I'm about ready to rip out chunks of my hair in frustration. The best I can tell, it's a combination of two factors. First, I've about had enough of the lack of professionalism prevalent throughout Wales. It's ironic, because Frances and Henry are always complaining about how there's this attitude in Wales that "oh, it's only Wales, you don't have to try so hard because it's not London so no one cares." They say they always try to fight that attitude...and yet. They've been running the magazine for, what? twelve? fifteen? years now, and they don't seem to even have a set publishing date. What I mean is, Time magazine gets delivered to my parents' door every Saturday, without fail. You always know when to expect it. No such regularity with this magazine. It's bimonthly, but when during the month--and, to an extent, which of every two months--that you get the magazine seems to depend on the whim of the publisher (ie, Frances and Henry). They keep extending deadlines for advertisers who are waffling. They don't even have a complete collection of all their issues--I'm in the process of indexing, and of the 80 or so issues they've published, I can't find 19 of them. Nineteen! That's fully a fourth, ladies and gentlemen. This whole country is also completely incapable of being on time--I've learned that if someone says they're going to pick me up at nine, they really mean more like 9:15, or, depending on the circumstances, possibly ten. This morning I waited (*cough*in the rain*cough*) fifteen minutes to be picked up, only to then get a call saying my ride would be there fifteen minutes after that (it actually turned out to be twenty) because they were running late. And the tardiness isn't in the relaxed Spanish way...it's more of an "oh oops I forgot about you" way.
My other gripe is that I'm completely, overwhelmingly bored. I've had some really fun experiences in the two weeks I've been here so far, and I'm sure I'll have plenty more, but in between the fun experiences, my brain is rotting from atrophy. I was at work from 11:30 until seven today (fully two and a half hours longer than I should have been...again with the never being on time) and in that time, I edited one piece of advertisement, indexed three magazines, and answered the phone maybe six times. I spent the rest of the time browsing around Facebook and reading user comments on CNN.com articles.
It'd be one thing if I were being paid to be a secretary; I really couldn't complain in that case, because I'd be making money and it's pretty easy work. Indexing is mind-numbing, but once you get into the rhythm it goes quickly and it's nothing to complain about when you're being paid. But the thing is, not only am I not being paid, but I'm actually losing money on this adventure. In addition to the plane ticket (which my parents were gracious enough to pay for), I'm spending about $150 a week on rent (and that's all my own personal money). I reached out to publishers in Wales because I wanted a productive internship. I wanted to be editing manuscripts or helping develop advertising strategies. I wanted to work with authors and be in a creative, busy environment. Instead I'm sitting in a cold, converted barn by myself (or with Frances, on a good day) answering the phone and doing menial tasks. It, quite simply, sucks. I'm supposed to have all these articles I'll be writing, but I'm pretty sure they aren't actually going to happen at this point because part of the lack of professionalism here is that no one is capable of following through on anything.
It also doesn't help that the Fig Tree is 13 miles from the closest town, I don't have a car (obviously), and the bus station is two miles down the road...and the buses are infrequent and unreliable.
Don't get me wrong, I'm still really excited for the Eisteddfod, and if I get to write my articles, those are going to be really fun adventures. Plus it's looking like I'll get to spend a day or two at the Royal Welsh Show next week. But like I said, in between those things? Mind-numbing boredom, and not at all something I signed up for.
How on earth do I keep ending up in situations like this? Last summer it was the Morocco fiasco, then last month it was the boredom of working (yet another) unpaid internship in Champaign where I did nothing but sit around all the time (coupled with living with my grandparents), and now this. My boyfriend suggested I do like I did in Morocco last year: get out while I still can and flee to Spain for a week or two. It's tempting, especially since there's nice weather in Spain, whereas today in Carmarthen there was a high of 58 and I haven't seen the sun since I got here.
One of these days I'll stop aiming for creative summer experiences and just get a job frying burgers like everyone else.
Sunday, July 11, 2010
Reading, networking, casually hiking up mountains
My great Welsh adventure has continued in an onslaught of meeting fascinating people, learning interesting things about common topics, and answering phone calls.
There wasn't too much to remark on that happened at the magazine this week, really. Tuesday I brought my GRE study book and reviewed some middle school math in between phone calls. Then Frances asked me to read a book--Sapphique, by Catherine Fisher, a young adult novel about...well, a living prison and some people who are trying to escape it, basically--and then review it for the magazine. I was about halfway through the book when she realized she'd actually already had it reviewed for a previous issue (well...that's Frances for you), but I really didn't mind because I was enjoying the book so much that it was hard to consider it wasted time. Seriously, though, it's a good book, though I do recommend reading the prequel, Incarceron, first. I didn't, but I rather wish I'd gotten to.
Thursday Frances and I ducked out a bit early to run some errands in Carmarthen. I finally bought contact solution--you don't even want to know the dark depths I'd stooped to in order to keep my contacts from drying out before that. She also took me along while she went grocery shopping, which sounds mundane but was actually sort of interesting. Grocery stores are one of those very non-touristy places where you start picking up on minute cultural differences. Also the young man working the check-out line told me he liked my accent. I told him the feeling was mutual.
Thursday night I had dinner with my landlords and a friend of theirs, who runs a Welsh-medium broadcasting company, and his 18-year-old daughter. It was a great dinner (especially since I managed to eat beef without getting sick) and, once again, I'm really amazed at how interesting all the people I've met have been. Ffion, the daughter, and I exchanged numbers and she invited me to come to the Royal Welsh, a giant agricultural festival, for a day or two next week, so I think I'll do that. When I mentioned Frances and I were planning to drive to the Eisteddfod each day, I also got an invite to stay with Ffion and her family overnight in their camper, since apparently there's a lot that goes on in the evenings that I shouldn't miss. So that's something to be excited about!
Friday I got off work early and enjoyed my afternoon off by doing absolutely nothing. I was hoping to get a chance to go investigate the castle that's right down the street but it was, as always, raining.
Saturday I went with Frances & family on a picnic at Llyn y Fan Fach--the lake of the small mountain. Some of their friends--including Wales' foremost painter and a well-known sculptor/actor--came as well, as did Tom's friend Diego, who is visiting from Paris. I had a great talk with the painter, John Uzzell Edwards, as we were leaving. We discussed the Mabinogion and history in the Welsh landscape and the artistic process...more and more I wish I had business cards I could give all these people I meet; he even said he wanted to give me one of his, but didn't have any on him.
...I'd also never met such an artist before. I took everything he was saying very seriously, and it was all very interesting, but he was also telling me things like "you have to make the painting as big as it wants to be. If you listen to it, it will tell you want it wants." Ooookay. I am not nearly artsy enough to truly comprehend that sort of advice.
The cool thing about Llyn y Fan Fach is that it's the location for some really great Welsh fairy tales; namely, the Lady of the Lake. We parked the cars and hiked up the mountain (took us maybe 45 minutes or an hour, I'm not sure)...in the ceaseless rain...I was actually soaked completely through by the time we got to the top, despite the "waterproof" I was wearing. It was beautiful scenery the whole way up, though, and at the top--where the lake is--it was very eerie. With the mist, especially, it was easy to imagine all the mythology that takes place in Wales. As we were eating the sun came out and rain cleared up, so we gathered at the edge of the lake and read the story of the Lady of the Lake out loud. At the risk of sounding corny, it really was cool. I'll retell the fairy tale some other time when I have a copy of it in front of me so I don't forget anything, but the man who was reading the story--I think his name was Richard, maybe?--was explaining to me how he has a theory that it's all based in fact, that there are caves and tunnels under the water.
Afterwards, Ed, Rhydian, Diego and I walked around the perimeter of the lake, which was a bit silly cause it was really rocky and unsteady in some parts...we're actually kinda lucky Rhyd didn't fall and get hurt or anything, cause I'm pretty sure I would have been deported for endangering a child.
Anyway, after that it was back to the Fig Tree for eating and resting and showering and most importantly, being dry, though warmth is, as always, still just slightly out of my grasp.
In other news, still no sign of giant resident spiders, but I did find a centipede in my shower this morning. Yuck.
I think this week should be an exciting one--I have a phone appointment with my fellowship adviser tomorrow night about the Watson, Wednesday I'm visiting a couple Welsh-medium schools, and sometime soon I'll be taking field trips for the magazine. Plus there's the Welsh Royal next week and the Eisteddfod shortly after that!
There wasn't too much to remark on that happened at the magazine this week, really. Tuesday I brought my GRE study book and reviewed some middle school math in between phone calls. Then Frances asked me to read a book--Sapphique, by Catherine Fisher, a young adult novel about...well, a living prison and some people who are trying to escape it, basically--and then review it for the magazine. I was about halfway through the book when she realized she'd actually already had it reviewed for a previous issue (well...that's Frances for you), but I really didn't mind because I was enjoying the book so much that it was hard to consider it wasted time. Seriously, though, it's a good book, though I do recommend reading the prequel, Incarceron, first. I didn't, but I rather wish I'd gotten to.
Thursday Frances and I ducked out a bit early to run some errands in Carmarthen. I finally bought contact solution--you don't even want to know the dark depths I'd stooped to in order to keep my contacts from drying out before that. She also took me along while she went grocery shopping, which sounds mundane but was actually sort of interesting. Grocery stores are one of those very non-touristy places where you start picking up on minute cultural differences. Also the young man working the check-out line told me he liked my accent. I told him the feeling was mutual.
Thursday night I had dinner with my landlords and a friend of theirs, who runs a Welsh-medium broadcasting company, and his 18-year-old daughter. It was a great dinner (especially since I managed to eat beef without getting sick) and, once again, I'm really amazed at how interesting all the people I've met have been. Ffion, the daughter, and I exchanged numbers and she invited me to come to the Royal Welsh, a giant agricultural festival, for a day or two next week, so I think I'll do that. When I mentioned Frances and I were planning to drive to the Eisteddfod each day, I also got an invite to stay with Ffion and her family overnight in their camper, since apparently there's a lot that goes on in the evenings that I shouldn't miss. So that's something to be excited about!
Friday I got off work early and enjoyed my afternoon off by doing absolutely nothing. I was hoping to get a chance to go investigate the castle that's right down the street but it was, as always, raining.
Saturday I went with Frances & family on a picnic at Llyn y Fan Fach--the lake of the small mountain. Some of their friends--including Wales' foremost painter and a well-known sculptor/actor--came as well, as did Tom's friend Diego, who is visiting from Paris. I had a great talk with the painter, John Uzzell Edwards, as we were leaving. We discussed the Mabinogion and history in the Welsh landscape and the artistic process...more and more I wish I had business cards I could give all these people I meet; he even said he wanted to give me one of his, but didn't have any on him.
...I'd also never met such an artist before. I took everything he was saying very seriously, and it was all very interesting, but he was also telling me things like "you have to make the painting as big as it wants to be. If you listen to it, it will tell you want it wants." Ooookay. I am not nearly artsy enough to truly comprehend that sort of advice.
The cool thing about Llyn y Fan Fach is that it's the location for some really great Welsh fairy tales; namely, the Lady of the Lake. We parked the cars and hiked up the mountain (took us maybe 45 minutes or an hour, I'm not sure)...in the ceaseless rain...I was actually soaked completely through by the time we got to the top, despite the "waterproof" I was wearing. It was beautiful scenery the whole way up, though, and at the top--where the lake is--it was very eerie. With the mist, especially, it was easy to imagine all the mythology that takes place in Wales. As we were eating the sun came out and rain cleared up, so we gathered at the edge of the lake and read the story of the Lady of the Lake out loud. At the risk of sounding corny, it really was cool. I'll retell the fairy tale some other time when I have a copy of it in front of me so I don't forget anything, but the man who was reading the story--I think his name was Richard, maybe?--was explaining to me how he has a theory that it's all based in fact, that there are caves and tunnels under the water.
Afterwards, Ed, Rhydian, Diego and I walked around the perimeter of the lake, which was a bit silly cause it was really rocky and unsteady in some parts...we're actually kinda lucky Rhyd didn't fall and get hurt or anything, cause I'm pretty sure I would have been deported for endangering a child.
Anyway, after that it was back to the Fig Tree for eating and resting and showering and most importantly, being dry, though warmth is, as always, still just slightly out of my grasp.
In other news, still no sign of giant resident spiders, but I did find a centipede in my shower this morning. Yuck.
I think this week should be an exciting one--I have a phone appointment with my fellowship adviser tomorrow night about the Watson, Wednesday I'm visiting a couple Welsh-medium schools, and sometime soon I'll be taking field trips for the magazine. Plus there's the Welsh Royal next week and the Eisteddfod shortly after that!
Monday, July 5, 2010
A brief correction concerning spiders and vampires
True Blood did not air an episode last night, so now what am I supposed to watch?
In more important news, I just found my first in-residence spider; and by "in-residence," I do in fact mean residing in my bed. I am praying to all the Celtic gods who ever presided over Cymru that the spider I just found meets the Welsh definition of "huge," because by Midwest American standards, where we get things like wolf spiders, this one was not particularly large or threatening. Actually, I considered him rather small, enough so that I could flick him off my bed rather calmly rather than screaming in fear, running out of the room and spending the night sleeping on the hallway floor.
Of course, with my luck, it was probably just a baby and I'll be meeting its 2398402938490 siblings and giant momma spider soon enough.
In more important news, I just found my first in-residence spider; and by "in-residence," I do in fact mean residing in my bed. I am praying to all the Celtic gods who ever presided over Cymru that the spider I just found meets the Welsh definition of "huge," because by Midwest American standards, where we get things like wolf spiders, this one was not particularly large or threatening. Actually, I considered him rather small, enough so that I could flick him off my bed rather calmly rather than screaming in fear, running out of the room and spending the night sleeping on the hallway floor.
Of course, with my luck, it was probably just a baby and I'll be meeting its 2398402938490 siblings and giant momma spider soon enough.
The first few days
I think I mentioned in my pilot post that the last few days have been strange in that nothing has really happened, but I've nevertheless been really busy. I've done so much over the weekend that it's weird to think I've fit everything into only a few days; I feel like I've been in Wales for ages already.
Arriving in Carmarthen was sort of a daze. Thankfully my UK phone, which was left over from my term in London last fall, still had a few pounds on it, so I was able to call Frances once I got through that immigration ordeal to meet up with her at Port Talbot when I got off the train. We then drove the, I dunno, 30 miles or so from Port Talbot into Carmarthen--I was so tired I wasn't much of a conversationalist, but awake enough to get a certain thrill out of seeing that not only were the road signs all bilingual, but Welsh was the first language and English the afterthought. Welcome to the stronghold of the Welsh nationalist movement.
I met the family: Frances's husband, Henry, a staunch Welsh nationalist who ran for MP with Plaid Cymru (the liberal party advocating an independent Welsh state), flies the flag of the last "true" prince of Wales, Owain Glyndwr, and quite calmly states he has no doubt the British government screens his phone calls because of his association with the movement for Welsh independence; the oldest son, Ed, who just finished his first year of university and seems to enjoy drinking, gym time, and metaphysical poetry; the middle son, Tom, who, despite never having been to the States, has a bizarre passion for White Castle; and the youngest, Rhydian, who, with his messy hair, freckles, and Welsh accent, is probably the cutest kid on the planet.
While I spend all my time over at their house, I'm actually living a bit down the road, at a restaurant/hotel/beautiful old Welsh farmhouse known as the Fig Tree. I'm renting a room that belongs to the owners' son, who is currently on an around-the-world trip with one of his brothers. The room is lovely, absolutely huge with a bed, two couches, desk, table, arm chair, fridge...I heard a rumor about giant spiders in residence, but so far I've seen no proof of that so I'm going to continue living in denial. I have this whole half of the (huge and beautiful) house to myself, since the sons are all grown.
By 7pm on Friday (the day I arrived), I'd settled into my room and, more specifically, my bed: begin 16 straight hours of jet lag-induced sleep.
Saturday when I was finally alive again, I headed back over to Frances's house. The day was largely uneventful; for the most part we sat in the kitchen, which seems to be the family gathering point, and talked. This is what I mean when I say I did absolutely nothing. But the talk was pretty damn interesting--about Welsh language, culture, nationalism, independence, politics, history, fairy tales, television, everything. Some of what I learned I'll relay later, I'm sure, but for now it's all largely overwhelming.
Saturday night I had every intention of returning to the Fig Tree, taking a shower, and going to bed, but before I managed that, my landlady, Monica, came in and asked if I wanted a tour of the grounds. They'd just had a wedding that morning that was still lingering on, so I'd have a chance to meet the staff. Monica is just about the nicest woman on earth, so I agreed; the quick tour turned into a complimentary glass of house wine which turned into splitting a bottle and a half with Monica's son, Tom, who is the head chef for the restaurant. For two hours I sat at the bar with Tom and his new fiancee, and the topic of conversation ranged from SCUBA diving to vegetarianism to that rumor about the giant spiders that I mentioned earlier.
Sunday morning I woke up unhappy with a hangover. It rained all day, which was rather miserable, but in the late morning I went with Frances to deliver food she'd made to a puppy show some friends were having. They raise hounds for hare hunting, and apparently what's done is that the puppies are fostered out to be trained for the first six months of their lives, and then this show is when they're all introduced to the public before joining the pack. We weren't there long, but I got to see the kennels and the hounds were fantastically beautiful. Frances made duck for dinner, and I bent my rules about eating meat ever-so-slightly because I'd never had duck before. I don't feel too bad about it, though, because it was an organic free-range duck that Frances bought at a co-op, and in any case my body hasn't quite forgotten how to digest fowl meat just yet so I didn't have to suffer through any physical pain brought on by my infidelity to my vegetarian diet.
Today was my first official day of work with the magazine, which consisted of discussing article prospects with Frances, answering the phone, and trying to combine two biographies into one shorter biography. I'll have much more interesting work later on, I promise.
I decided to be on my own for the evening and fend for myself for dinner (read: raid the Fig Tree fridge) largely because the last few days have been so chaotic and full of meeting people (just today it was a former Plaid MP for this region and an internationally-recognized English novelist/writer) that I needed some time to myself. The weird (though I have to admit, I'm rather thrilled about it) symptom the past few days in Wales have had on me is that I've already become much more outgoing--it usually isn't in my nature to do things like ask ten million questions of people I've only just been introduced with; normally I'm considerably more reserved around people I don't know (I blame the mild case of prosopagnosia for my occasional social anxiety). But it's a good sign, and proving to be one of the best confidence builders as I work on my Watson proposal, since my Watson year would be pretty miserable if it had turned out I was too shy to ever talk to anyone.
I think that's more than enough for now, and in any case, I'd really hate to waste my evening off by blogging about my last few days on...there's a new episode of True Blood that was just on in the States that I need to find and watch illegally on the internet, you know. Priorities.
Arriving in Carmarthen was sort of a daze. Thankfully my UK phone, which was left over from my term in London last fall, still had a few pounds on it, so I was able to call Frances once I got through that immigration ordeal to meet up with her at Port Talbot when I got off the train. We then drove the, I dunno, 30 miles or so from Port Talbot into Carmarthen--I was so tired I wasn't much of a conversationalist, but awake enough to get a certain thrill out of seeing that not only were the road signs all bilingual, but Welsh was the first language and English the afterthought. Welcome to the stronghold of the Welsh nationalist movement.
I met the family: Frances's husband, Henry, a staunch Welsh nationalist who ran for MP with Plaid Cymru (the liberal party advocating an independent Welsh state), flies the flag of the last "true" prince of Wales, Owain Glyndwr, and quite calmly states he has no doubt the British government screens his phone calls because of his association with the movement for Welsh independence; the oldest son, Ed, who just finished his first year of university and seems to enjoy drinking, gym time, and metaphysical poetry; the middle son, Tom, who, despite never having been to the States, has a bizarre passion for White Castle; and the youngest, Rhydian, who, with his messy hair, freckles, and Welsh accent, is probably the cutest kid on the planet.
While I spend all my time over at their house, I'm actually living a bit down the road, at a restaurant/hotel/beautiful old Welsh farmhouse known as the Fig Tree. I'm renting a room that belongs to the owners' son, who is currently on an around-the-world trip with one of his brothers. The room is lovely, absolutely huge with a bed, two couches, desk, table, arm chair, fridge...I heard a rumor about giant spiders in residence, but so far I've seen no proof of that so I'm going to continue living in denial. I have this whole half of the (huge and beautiful) house to myself, since the sons are all grown.
By 7pm on Friday (the day I arrived), I'd settled into my room and, more specifically, my bed: begin 16 straight hours of jet lag-induced sleep.
Saturday when I was finally alive again, I headed back over to Frances's house. The day was largely uneventful; for the most part we sat in the kitchen, which seems to be the family gathering point, and talked. This is what I mean when I say I did absolutely nothing. But the talk was pretty damn interesting--about Welsh language, culture, nationalism, independence, politics, history, fairy tales, television, everything. Some of what I learned I'll relay later, I'm sure, but for now it's all largely overwhelming.
Saturday night I had every intention of returning to the Fig Tree, taking a shower, and going to bed, but before I managed that, my landlady, Monica, came in and asked if I wanted a tour of the grounds. They'd just had a wedding that morning that was still lingering on, so I'd have a chance to meet the staff. Monica is just about the nicest woman on earth, so I agreed; the quick tour turned into a complimentary glass of house wine which turned into splitting a bottle and a half with Monica's son, Tom, who is the head chef for the restaurant. For two hours I sat at the bar with Tom and his new fiancee, and the topic of conversation ranged from SCUBA diving to vegetarianism to that rumor about the giant spiders that I mentioned earlier.
Sunday morning I woke up unhappy with a hangover. It rained all day, which was rather miserable, but in the late morning I went with Frances to deliver food she'd made to a puppy show some friends were having. They raise hounds for hare hunting, and apparently what's done is that the puppies are fostered out to be trained for the first six months of their lives, and then this show is when they're all introduced to the public before joining the pack. We weren't there long, but I got to see the kennels and the hounds were fantastically beautiful. Frances made duck for dinner, and I bent my rules about eating meat ever-so-slightly because I'd never had duck before. I don't feel too bad about it, though, because it was an organic free-range duck that Frances bought at a co-op, and in any case my body hasn't quite forgotten how to digest fowl meat just yet so I didn't have to suffer through any physical pain brought on by my infidelity to my vegetarian diet.
Today was my first official day of work with the magazine, which consisted of discussing article prospects with Frances, answering the phone, and trying to combine two biographies into one shorter biography. I'll have much more interesting work later on, I promise.
I decided to be on my own for the evening and fend for myself for dinner (read: raid the Fig Tree fridge) largely because the last few days have been so chaotic and full of meeting people (just today it was a former Plaid MP for this region and an internationally-recognized English novelist/writer) that I needed some time to myself. The weird (though I have to admit, I'm rather thrilled about it) symptom the past few days in Wales have had on me is that I've already become much more outgoing--it usually isn't in my nature to do things like ask ten million questions of people I've only just been introduced with; normally I'm considerably more reserved around people I don't know (I blame the mild case of prosopagnosia for my occasional social anxiety). But it's a good sign, and proving to be one of the best confidence builders as I work on my Watson proposal, since my Watson year would be pretty miserable if it had turned out I was too shy to ever talk to anyone.
I think that's more than enough for now, and in any case, I'd really hate to waste my evening off by blogging about my last few days on...there's a new episode of True Blood that was just on in the States that I need to find and watch illegally on the internet, you know. Priorities.
Sunday, July 4, 2010
The great Welsh adventure
Bore da!
To be fair, it's actually evening right now, but I only know the word for "morning" and have to get by with what I can.
I'm nearing the end of the third day of my great Welsh adventure, and given the fact that I haven't actually done anything yet that sounds too terribly adventurous, it's nevertheless already been a bit of one. The journey over was itself somewhat harrowing. The international flight was as all international flights are, meaning long and uncomfortable. I had the luxury of no one sitting in the seat next to me, which meant I could lie down in a remarkably uncomfortable little ball while trying to sleep, covered up with the three-foot-by-three-foot blue tissue paper that is as close to a blanket as airlines seem capable.
Immigration at Heathrow, however, threw me for a loop. I've gone in and out of I-don't-even-know-how-many countries, but this was the first time I'd ever been seriously concerned that I was going to be sent home. The immigration officer apparently took his job extremely seriously: not only did he ask me the usual "how long?" and "business or pleasure?" questions, but then elaborated upon those and launched a full-fledged interrogation into my exact reasons for wanting to go to Wales. He wanted out of me the names, phone numbers, and addresses of damn near every Welsh person and their cousin; wanted to know how I'd met Frances, my contact and the woman I'm working with; wanted to know when I'd been to Wales, and why, and for how long, and then wanted to know my specific itinerary for the last time I was there (I presume because he thought I was making the whole thing up, and thus wouldn't be able to name any Welsh towns); wanted to know exactly, and I do mean EXACTLY, what I would be doing in Wales--as in he wanted me to account for every hour of every day of the six weeks I would be here, apparently because he doesn't think there's enough in Wales to keep an American occupied for so long; he wanted to know about the semester I spent in London, including the address where I stayed and information about the professor who led the study group; he even wanted to know how much money I had...when I told him how much I had on my debit card, he asked about cash. Well, officer, I haven't even been officially allowed into the country yet so I'm afraid I only have a left-over twenty-pound note from the fall, but I hear Britain has invented this brand-spankin'-new device that's a sort of automatic bank teller, and if I feed it my debit card it will spout out British pounds in return, to my heart's delight.
The man even had the gall to point out, as if it were evidence of my guilt (guilt of what, I'm still not entirely sure), that I was becoming rather flustered. Clearly that couldn't be because I'd just gotten off an eight-hour flight, my internal clock thought it was 2am, and I was being grilled for information that I couldn't see had any bearing on the situation at hand (the situation being that I'm an American who wants to learn Welsh, not a terrorist after the Queen--but to an Englishman perhaps that's only slightly less of a crime?). Finally he said he was going to let me in..."with a warning." I crossed into the United Kingdom feeling vaguely uncomfortable about all the CCTV cameras, of which there are said to be more in London and in higher density than anywhere else in the world. The immigration officer was so fervent about his duty to Queen and Country that I was mildly paranoid they'd watch me all the way to Wales just to try to catch me in the lie.
I suppose the people of England can sleep easily at night knowing the good men of immigration and border control are keeping their country safe from an invading onslaught of Welsh enthusiasts. The Welsh might lose a little sleep over the racism.
Turns out--and I only found this out later, after I told Frances about the ordeal--that I'm not the first Wales-bound traveler to be accosted at immigration. Earlier this year two Argentinian women, who had been raised in largely Welsh-speaking Patagonia and wanted to visit the country of their ancestors, were actually turned away at immigration, after being detained for twenty-four hours or so, and a couple more girls the year before. The English apparently suspect that the Welsh are running some sort of black market trade in cheap au pair labor and have dedicated the full resources at their disposal to stop this illegal industry. There is, of course, no such thing as an au pair Welsh black market, but it's hardly the first time the English have gotten themselves into a tither concerning the Welsh.
The good news is that three days later, immigration has yet to come pounding on my door so I'm hoping they've either decided I was telling the truth about my intentions or they found something productive to do with their time.
In any case, officially arriving in the United Kingdom with the immigration officer's reluctant blessing was followed by a train to Heathrow central terminal, a train to Paddington Station, and then another train into Port Talbot, where Frances picked me up. The ensuing three days, my first three living in Wales, have been absolutely stuffed with amazing conversations, sights, and experiences, most of which seem completely commonplace but were actually quite exciting. I'll have to get to those later, however, as it's very nearly dinnertime, and (with Frances cooking, anyway) that's an event worth being on time to.
To be fair, it's actually evening right now, but I only know the word for "morning" and have to get by with what I can.
I'm nearing the end of the third day of my great Welsh adventure, and given the fact that I haven't actually done anything yet that sounds too terribly adventurous, it's nevertheless already been a bit of one. The journey over was itself somewhat harrowing. The international flight was as all international flights are, meaning long and uncomfortable. I had the luxury of no one sitting in the seat next to me, which meant I could lie down in a remarkably uncomfortable little ball while trying to sleep, covered up with the three-foot-by-three-foot blue tissue paper that is as close to a blanket as airlines seem capable.
Immigration at Heathrow, however, threw me for a loop. I've gone in and out of I-don't-even-know-how-many countries, but this was the first time I'd ever been seriously concerned that I was going to be sent home. The immigration officer apparently took his job extremely seriously: not only did he ask me the usual "how long?" and "business or pleasure?" questions, but then elaborated upon those and launched a full-fledged interrogation into my exact reasons for wanting to go to Wales. He wanted out of me the names, phone numbers, and addresses of damn near every Welsh person and their cousin; wanted to know how I'd met Frances, my contact and the woman I'm working with; wanted to know when I'd been to Wales, and why, and for how long, and then wanted to know my specific itinerary for the last time I was there (I presume because he thought I was making the whole thing up, and thus wouldn't be able to name any Welsh towns); wanted to know exactly, and I do mean EXACTLY, what I would be doing in Wales--as in he wanted me to account for every hour of every day of the six weeks I would be here, apparently because he doesn't think there's enough in Wales to keep an American occupied for so long; he wanted to know about the semester I spent in London, including the address where I stayed and information about the professor who led the study group; he even wanted to know how much money I had...when I told him how much I had on my debit card, he asked about cash. Well, officer, I haven't even been officially allowed into the country yet so I'm afraid I only have a left-over twenty-pound note from the fall, but I hear Britain has invented this brand-spankin'-new device that's a sort of automatic bank teller, and if I feed it my debit card it will spout out British pounds in return, to my heart's delight.
The man even had the gall to point out, as if it were evidence of my guilt (guilt of what, I'm still not entirely sure), that I was becoming rather flustered. Clearly that couldn't be because I'd just gotten off an eight-hour flight, my internal clock thought it was 2am, and I was being grilled for information that I couldn't see had any bearing on the situation at hand (the situation being that I'm an American who wants to learn Welsh, not a terrorist after the Queen--but to an Englishman perhaps that's only slightly less of a crime?). Finally he said he was going to let me in..."with a warning." I crossed into the United Kingdom feeling vaguely uncomfortable about all the CCTV cameras, of which there are said to be more in London and in higher density than anywhere else in the world. The immigration officer was so fervent about his duty to Queen and Country that I was mildly paranoid they'd watch me all the way to Wales just to try to catch me in the lie.
I suppose the people of England can sleep easily at night knowing the good men of immigration and border control are keeping their country safe from an invading onslaught of Welsh enthusiasts. The Welsh might lose a little sleep over the racism.
Turns out--and I only found this out later, after I told Frances about the ordeal--that I'm not the first Wales-bound traveler to be accosted at immigration. Earlier this year two Argentinian women, who had been raised in largely Welsh-speaking Patagonia and wanted to visit the country of their ancestors, were actually turned away at immigration, after being detained for twenty-four hours or so, and a couple more girls the year before. The English apparently suspect that the Welsh are running some sort of black market trade in cheap au pair labor and have dedicated the full resources at their disposal to stop this illegal industry. There is, of course, no such thing as an au pair Welsh black market, but it's hardly the first time the English have gotten themselves into a tither concerning the Welsh.
The good news is that three days later, immigration has yet to come pounding on my door so I'm hoping they've either decided I was telling the truth about my intentions or they found something productive to do with their time.
In any case, officially arriving in the United Kingdom with the immigration officer's reluctant blessing was followed by a train to Heathrow central terminal, a train to Paddington Station, and then another train into Port Talbot, where Frances picked me up. The ensuing three days, my first three living in Wales, have been absolutely stuffed with amazing conversations, sights, and experiences, most of which seem completely commonplace but were actually quite exciting. I'll have to get to those later, however, as it's very nearly dinnertime, and (with Frances cooking, anyway) that's an event worth being on time to.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)