The Holiday Lowdown -- Part II (be warned this blog will contain partial nudity)

This is Chris. Decided it was my turn to add something to the running snapshot of our time here in Cambridge. So Melissa left off Part I just returning from Germany, and I am going to continue in the chronology with Christmas and New Years, but I need to update you on a few main happenings during my week of solitude and indulgence as a bachelor. And just to warn you (in case you missed the subject of the blog), I have a scandalous picture to accompany my story...

So Mel left me lonesome, neck deep in readings, essays, and other expected to-do's during the end of term. I was busy, and it was actually good to have some solo time to bust out the work without the endearing distractions of Meltrissa. One evening (about two days into my bachelorhood relapse), I was working late at the computer lab in the business school, a short 10 minute bike ride from home, when I realized that Handel's Messiah was being performed in a halfhour at the Trinity College Chapel - a ridiculously old and wealthy college straight out of harry potter. This was not something to be missed. So I cut the work short, and hopped on my bike headed for home to put on a sport's coat and wax my brows before the big evening. I was running late and the roads were a bit slick, and given the fact that I'm accident prone, I was unable to avoid a sizeable spill on my bicycle (slick roads + wet leaves + skinny bike tires + excessive speeds + idiot rider = inevitable wreck). My front tire slipped on the stone walkway and my rear tire caught, effectively stopping the bike, and launching me over the handle bars and into the busy road. Luckily, sort of, my soft juicy buttocks made good friends with the curb, saving my helmet-less head. Cars screeched to a halt and this lady jumped out of her car and came running towards me. I got up, unsure of my status, and humbly hobbled off the road. As the lady came up to me, she insisted that I take some bandages - which led me to believe I had marred my beautiful complection and was bleeding profusely. Still in shock and trying preserve my manliness, I told her I was fine and didn't think I was bleeding. By this time, traffic had resumed and I started to head home (turns out the lady was really nice, but strange, because I didn't have any real cuts and wasn't bleeding - I'm still not sure why she freaked out on me). So I made it home, and my butt was KILLING ME. After serious inspection and no visible damage, I decided it wasn't enough to keep me from the concert. So I got back on the horse and peddled my way to Trinity College. The concert was amazing, but I was sweating the entire time because I had to keep shifting my weight from cheek to cheek to avoid pain. After Messiah, I went home and was SO SO SO thankful that I didn't hit my head on the curb and vowed to buy a helmet (which Mel and I have both subsequently done).

Long story short, I was really dissapointed that I didn't have anything to show for my accident...until 3 days later. I think the picture speaks for itself, but the purple turned black, the black turned blue, the blue into green, green into yellow, and now you'll all be glad to know my rear-end looks amazing again. Suffice it to say that I really really needed a nurse and my resident medic was no where to be found! (really, I just needed some sympathy).

Family Arrives!
OK, I'm sure I've lost 80% of you by now, so for the faithful remaining few, I'll go into our Christmas and New Year's. After thanksgiving, we were both really homesick. We are completely enjoying our time over here and are ever grateful to be immersed in such a unique place with some of the most incredible people, but there are certain comforts/needs that new places and temporary homes are unable to provide. We just really miss most of you. There are a few of you that we are really really glad to be away from, and school is a perfect excuse to escape your presence. But for the rest of you -- you are certainly missed. So, the arrival of Melissa's family in Cambridge was the perfect mid-december treat! With 209452832948754 pounds of luggage, it was soo soo fun to have Joey, Tommy, Mom, and Dad in our new little city. We spent three days together here roaming around the historic colleges, eating delicious pub food, walking along the famous old walks, and catching up on missed time. We were also able to attend a candlelight service at Great St. Mary's church, which is the grand old University Church where all the students, until a few years ago, graduated and received their diplomas. Check out the pic, it was pretty stunning.

After exhausting all that Cambridge has to offer, we packed up and headed down to London for a few days to enjoy the big city during the holidays. London was great. It is really an amazing city with endless personality. We all used the 3 days in London to take care of any last minute christmas shopping before taking the train up to Scotland to meet up with Matt/Julie and the little kiddos.

Highland-bound
We left London early on the nine-hour train bound for the northern Scottish town of Inverness (which happens to be the home of the Loch Ness Monster, Nessie...). We packed good bread, cheese, meat and wine for our journey which took us through the English countryside and into Scotland along the coast (check out the view from our window!). It was a great trip through picturesque little villages and beautiful stretches of rugged coast. At last, we arrived to the Inverness train station and were warmly greeted by Matt who loaded us up into their sweet new mini-van and hauled us all to a quaint lodge on the Black Isle (about 30 minutes from the city). We were so incredibly fortunate to stay at the home of one of Matt/Julie's friends - it was perfect. The home was right on a river and near the edge of this amazing forest with old estate ruins and perfect walking paths. We basically spent the next 6 days together tucked in this ridiculous country home going for walks, playing with the kids (on the rope swing!), cooking/cuddling next to the Aga stove, exploring the forest, and engaging in relational conversation (is it possible to avoid the latter with the Clifton clan?!). One definite highlight was to be able to roadtrip one day down to Matt and Julie's new parish in the tiny tiny tiny town of Methlick (population: 300 people, 8000 sheep). It was really meaningful to be able to see their new home and the beautiful old church where Matt will begin his first position as head minister. We can't wait to go back for a visit!

Christmas was just great. We had a long drawn-out morning of opening gifts and lounging around with coffee and the kids, then took a fabulous 3-hour walk in the surrounding countryside, and then rallied for a great home-cooked Christmas feast at night! (including a tasting of 3 delicious whiskeys, compliments of Matt.) Despite having a perfect time with Mel's family, I couldn't help but miss my mom, pops, maggie, the fish, Jamal the cat, our two christmas trees in Bellevue, gus the hamster, morning stalkings, and... my sister katey I guess (goodnight mom, goodnight dad, etc..... some payback kt). That was an inside joke that applies to only 20% of our 5 readers.

The trip in Scotland with Melissa's family was a much needed time for us. We felt so rejeuvenated to be around our family, and really could not have asked for a better holiday. Lucky for us, though, Scotland was not the end of our journey. After saying goodbye to the family, Mel and I bussed down to Glasgow (through the most unbelievable Highland scenery) and jumped on a quick 45 minute flight to Belfast in Northern Ireland to be with our good friend Krista for New Years!

New Years in Belfast
Krista worked at a church in Ireland all last year and was back visiting old friends, so we decided to join up with her and check out Belfast and the Irish coast. Given the history of Belfast and the terrorism, it was really interesting to wander the city and see the remnants of conflict. We ventured into some really cool pubs, had a delicious Sunday roast, and got meet some of Krista's friends from last year. It's always really good to discover the context of people's experiences, and we are now able to place Krista's last year abroad. A real treat. We spent our new year's at one of Krista's friends house for a charity bash supporting Habitat for Humanity or something wierd in Madagascar, I forget. Regardless, it was an african costume party, which really meant that all the girls got dressed up in elaborate african garb and the guys showed up in jeans and shirts. I stuck out and wore a jacket (I looked fantastic). Mel and Krista wore matching tiger stripped shoulder shirt things, which were very festive! I managed to get a girafe neck/head on me by the end of the night, check it out.

The highlight of our Ireland trip, though, was a venture up to the northern coast. We rented a car, and drove on the left side of the road for the first time. It scared the crap out of me at first, but after I was able to get used to changing gears with my left hand, we survived without any major problems. The northern coast of Ireland is phenomenal, seriously gorgeous. It just made the top ten places to see before you die, so I only have nine left. The windy roads obey the amazing coastal landscape and tiny villages adorn the rocky green beaches. We stopped a few times to just get out, and soak in the beauty. The pictures do not do it justice. Our final destination was the Giant's Causeway, which is this crazy part of the coast with hexagonal pillars of stone strewn along the waterfront. The video at the visitor's center explained the origin of the bizzare stones - allegedly, ancient volcanic lava cooled really quickly and somehow formed these crazy, perfectly geometric-shaped rocks. I don't get it. The video gave an alternate explanation which makes much more sense -- a big, bully of a Scottish giant built a causeway (roadway) with the hexagonal stones in order to connect Scotland to Ireland so that he could challenge his Irish rival to a brawl. But when the Scottish giant actually made it over to Ireland for the fight, the Irish giant realized that he was going to get owned by the humongous Scot. So, the Irish giant pretended to be a sleeping baby and when the Scottish giant saw the huge "baby," he decided he didn't want to be around to meet the baby's father, and thus he fled back to Scotland. After the Scot ran back across the hexagonal-rock bridge, the Irish giant destroyed most of it so that the Scot couldn't ever return. Turns out that there are some of this amazing stones on the Scottish coast too... definitely beats the BS volcanic explanation.

As all good things come to an end, Mel and I eventually made our way back here to the comfort of our Cambridge home. Although we were stoked to get out of Cambridge at the beginning of the holiday, we were delighted when our train finally stopped at the Cambridge station. A fine ending to a really great holiday.

We got back on Friday, I had a 3,000 word essay due Monday morning, and I've been trying to stay afloat in school ever since. We just started a cool project with a company in London to find creative ways to integrate carbon offsetting into their exisiting work, and am beginning to have to think about my disseration (yikes). Any ideas? Please float them my way. Its difficult to save the world in 15,000 words or less and I'd love to know if any of you have already figured it out. It might save me some stress.

Mel is back at work as the incredible breadwinner that she is, supporting my worthless self. She decided not to do choir this term in order to concentrate more seriously on her spanish, and we've both decided to do yoga. Should be cool.

All the best to you all, and thanks for sticking with this marathon posting...


~Christ of the pilgrim path,
and of every pilgrim heart,
thank you for revealing yourself
in situations we would prefer
to pass by.
(- Iona prayer book)

We dearly miss all of you!
Love,
Melissa and Chris

The Holiday Lowdown -- Part I (by the way, Happy New Year to you all!)

Hello beloved family and friends!! First off, we must sincerely apologize for being such absolute slackers with our blog. It seems as if Thanksgiving started this rollercoaster of events that catapulted us straight into 2007! So, we will do our best to give a brief update on the past six weeks... including our English Thanksgiving celebration, my trip to Berlin, the arrival of our family to Cambridge, Christmas in Scotland, and lastly New Years in Belfast, Ireland! (but... because this has the great potential to be a HUGE posting, we'll break it up into Part I and Part II :)

Thanksgiving
When we wrote our last blog entry, we had no idea how we were going to celebrate Thanksgiving. However, a few days before the actual holiday, we bumped in to one of our only American friends named Tom. He suggested that we refugee Americans at Wolfson College band together (all six of us) and have a potluck Thanksgiving meal. I offered to do the yams, and after a few trips to the grocery store, a phone call to mom for Auntie Anna's renowned recipe, another phone call to mom for emergency advice due to some unexpected yam behavior, we finally arrived to the celebration with our (most impressive) yams in hand. It turns out that our friend Tom decided to invite almost everyone he bumped into over the few days preceeding Thanksgiving, so we ended up with quite a large crowd including us token Americans (about five in all), several Brits, a Ghanan, some Malaysians, a Greek, a few Chinese, a Saudi Arabian, and a few others we can't remember now. Our friend Tom (pictured) took on the turkey job, and it was fabulous! We also had stuffing, our yams (which were a huge hit), mashed potatoes, gravy, cranberries, homemade pumpkin pie (from real pumpkins!), and then some very bizarre additions like fries, greek pancakes, vegan cooked spinach, and chocolate cake. Although we would have of course loved to be home with our family, our makeshift Thanksgiving dinner brought us some comfort :)

Berlin
Just a few days after Thanksgiving, I hopped on a plane headed for Berlin! I had been quite homesick a few weeks prior, and so Chris encouraged me to take a trip to see my good friend Annika who lives in Berlin. It was also good timing for Chris because he had loads of work to complete before the term ended, and I can occasionally be a distraction :) Berlin is a fascinating city, with much of it restored and rebuilt after the air raids of WWII but also plenty of evidence from its tumultuous place in the 20th century. Pictured here is the view from Annika's art studio (click on the picture to see it more detail)... a neighboring building riddled with bullet holes from the Battle of Berlin, a week-long standoff between Soviet and Nazi forces that resulted in Hitler's suicide and Nazi Germany's surrender in May, 1945. A major highlight of the trip was visiting the Holocaust Memorial Museum in the heart of the city. Above ground, hundreds of grave-like cement blocks stretch across a vast open area, a haunting representation of the millions of Jews and minorities who who were murdered. In the middle of the expanse of 'graves,' an almost imperceptable stone staircase led to the underground exhibit. This memorial was one of the most moving exhibits I have ever seen. Dimly lit, noiseless except for a few whispers mingled together with the quiet weeping of some, we moved slowly and reflectively through each room. The purpose of this particular exhibit was to chronicle the devastating events that led to the Holocaust, but far more importantly, to share the letters, stories, and pictures of many who suffered and died. One room (pictured) was completely dark except for the eerie greenish lighting that illuminated exerpts of letters and diaries from those in the concentration camps. After I left the memorial, it took a while to recover from the shock and emotion of what I had just experienced. As if WWII and the Holocaust weren't enough of a devastation on Berlin, evidence of the Cold War's effect is a strong presence as well. In addition to a few small remnants of the actual Berlin Wall, a stone strip traces the actual location of the wall throughout the city as a remembrance to the terror and control that Berlin and all of Germany suffered at the hands of the Soviet regime. See the inscription, "Berliner Mauer, 1961-1989." ... But in case you think that I didn't have any fun or light-hearted adventures in Berlin, think again! One of the best things to do in Germany around christmas-time is go to the famous Christmas markets! Hundreds of these markets spring up all over the country, with stalls selling all sorts of knick-knacks such as nutcrackers, christmas ornaments, wooly hats and gloves, jewelry, and of course delicious treats such as candied nuts, mulled wine, crepes, cotton candy, caramel apples, and authentic German weiners! Most importantly, I was able to spend some quality time with my dear friend Annika (and her hubby Marty!)... and thus, I returned to Cambridge refreshed and recharged.

... Stay tuned for Part II!

Back from York!

Last weekend we had a bonnie adventure to York, one of England's most famous medieval cities with so much incredible history you can hardly take it all in! As a short recap, York was first established as a military fortress by the Romans in 71 A.D. due to its prime location at the confluence of two rivers. In time, the fortress developed into a true city and became second only to London in population and importance. In 867, the Danes conquered the Romans and ruled the city for 200 years, until it was won back by an English king. Stone walls were built around the city in the 13th century to fortify the city, reflecting its importance and strength among the competing cities in England. ... Where did I learn all this useful knowledge?? From our Britain guidebook (generously given to us by our church family!), in the early morning hours as we made our way, via train, from Cambridge to York!! Although, as you can possibly detect from the picture at left, we may have done more sleeping than reading, as we were both exhausted from the week. I worked until 1am the previous night, only to get home at 2am, pack our bags, and groan at the sound of our alarm ringing at 6:15am. But the imminent adventure helped to pry our heavy eyelids open and we began our journey to this fascinating city...

Upon arriving to the York train station, we looked up at the blustery blue sky overhead, shook the sleep from our groggy heads, and set off with great anticipation. With a map of the city in hand, we dropped our one small bag off at our hostel, and proceeded to FREEZE from the incredible arctic wind that whipped through this city as through a windtunnel! And we thought Cambridge was a windy city! Neither of us had brought "wooly hats" (one of my favorite British terms), so we jerry-rigged our scarves to protect both our freezing heads and necks. Thus protected, we made a beeline trajectory for the city centre. The first thing we happened upon was the impressive wall (remember, it was built in the 13th century!) that wraps clear around the city. There are about four main entrances to the city... the one pictured is called Micklegate Bar (a "bar" is an opening) which used to exhibit the heads of executed criminals. You can imagine walls, equally as beautiful and massive, stretching out to the left and right of this main entrance. Once inside the city walls, we allowed ourselves to roam with no particular destination, just to get a feel for the city. Before long, however, we found ourselves rounding a bend in one of York's many windy roads and what came into view made Chris and I exclaim in unison "Hoooollly Shhhniiiikeeeeess!!!!" York Minster is definitely one of the most impressive man-made structures I will ever see in my lifetime. The pictures don't even begin to do it justice (so we figured we might as well ruin it by taking a self-portrait with it as our backdrop... don't we look super-imposed as in a cheezy 50s film??). Of course, we wasted no time in paying our reasonable entrace fee and began to slowly take in the beauty of the cathedral. Stunning stained glass windows surrounded us on every side, framed by intricately carved stone arches. Behind me is the Five Sisters Window, named for the five 50-foot tall windows of awesome medieval stained glass (though you can only see four in the picture). As we continued to explore, we came across a wall commemorating 16 prominent English kings, carved into stone and so lifelike that you practically expected them to jump out and yell "OFF WITH HIS HEAD!!!"... not to mention that they measured about 10 feet tall. It seems pointless to try and continue to describe the grandeur that surrounded us, but it is something we will not soon forget. In the largest picture shown here, you can perhaps grasp a small understanding of the magnitude of this cathedral, for at the very bottom of the picture is the row of stone kings.

When we emerged from the Minster, we felt that we could've gone home and been completely satisfied. But instead, we listened to our stomachs and ate a classic pub lunch at Ye Old Starre Inn. The food was less than superb, but the cozy atmosphere and respite from the cold was absolutely perfect. To round out the day, we decided to take a tour of the York Brewery. All we have to say about this is that if you want a brewery tour where you can actually hear the tourguide, actually see the process instead of imagining it in your head, and actually stay awake and interested instead of nodding off at the tourguides random tangents, go to the Redhood Brewery in Redmond! Tired and happy, we walked back to our hostel as night settled in and decided to balance out our truly "English" day with an American finish... so we put a frozen pizza in the oven, and watched Mission Impossible.

Sunday morning came, and thank goodness it did! Because we spent 1/2 the night swearing we will never again sleep in a dorm-style hostel room. Not 12 inches from Chris' head lay a man who could snore for a living. Sometime around 3am, Chris and I switched bunks (because I can notoriously sleep in ANY kind of racket), but even I couldn't fall asleep! Twice, in desperation, I reached over and violently shook the stranger, intending to wake him and ask him politely (but firmly) to roll onto his side. However, in his drunken state, he simply moaned. Thankfully, he shifted positions enough to quell the snores. Needless to say, we were ready to check out and head back into the city for another full day of exploration.

Our first stop was the Jorvik Viking Centre. a historic exhibit intended to take you back in time to when the city was ruled by the Danes. In the 80s, archaeologists discovered the remains of an extensive and well-preserved viking village underneath a few city blocks of contemporary York. After a few decades of excavation, they turned the site into a historic exhibit intended to take you back in time to the Danish York, or "Jorvik" (mid 800s-1000s). Although thoroughly cheezy, it could actually be enjoyed... Chris and I sat in our underground "time capsule" (sort of like a moving gondola) and wove our way through reconstructed York as it existed in the viking era. The highlight was probably the dorky picture we took in our viking helmets.

The rest of our day consisted of walking the quaint streets of York. In particular, two famous streets called "The Shambles" (pictured at right) and "Stonegate" are lined with peculiar asymetric buildings that date back to the 13th century. To wrap up our blitz tour of York, we had a traditional meal - complete with yorkshire pudding (which is a sort of pastry thing that they fill with mashed potatoes, meat, and peas... not a pudding at all!) and famous yorkshire tea. It was a delicious way to cap off our time in York.

This past week we have realized that school is getting in the way of our social lives. Chris has been locked to his computer and is neck deep in reading and finishing his essays since the fall term ends in two weeks! Time flies. Although we will be lonely during Thanksgiving, we are eagerly anticipating the arrival of our dear parents (on the Clifton side) along with Joey and Tommy come mid-December!

We are a bit homesick, so if any of you fancy a quick (or not so quick) trip out to the UK, please take advantage of the fact that you'll have a place to stay and enthusiastic tour guides!

Ok, much love to you all, thanks for sticking it out through this epic volume and have a great Thanksgiving back home!!!

Love,
Mel and Chris

ps - hope them dawgs poop on the cougs today in pullman (love, chris)

Punting, Harry Potter, and Football...

hello again! we apologize for being a bit lax with our blog entries, but with chris blazing ahead with school projects and papers and me with my new job, it's sometimes hard to find time for our blog. anyhoo, here we are, with an update on the happenings of the past few weeks...

we have had an unusually beautiful autumn here in cambridge. the locals tell us this is a rarity indeed, and we should not expect this to continue much longer. with that in mind, we have tried to take advantage of exploring our new hometown and being outside as much as possible. one of the signature activities here in cambridge is called "punting," where you float down the River Cam in a long, narrow boat, or "punt." the appeal of this activity is that you can view the backside (or "the backs") of the massive and exceedingly impressive colleges. in fact, this is the only way to see this part of the colleges, as many of them are private and not open to visitors. so, last weekend we decided to rent a punt and make our way down the river cam to check out cambridge from a unique perspective. (**ok, i'm going to let chris take over here. i was trying to figure out a tactful way to tell about chris' punting abilities, but i'll let him do the honors!**) Ok, it's Chris here. Basically, I have discovered that I am a horrible punter, just plain bad. I swear these boats are harder to steer than they look. For some reason, everyone voted for me to start as the punt driver. After about 10 minutes, I had nearly capsized the boat 18 times, hit 4 other boats, and had managed to travel only 12 feet down the river. Thankfully, another brave friend of ours named Bashar (our palestinian friend from the gaza strip) took over and allowed me to relax, dripping with sweat, and enjoy the ride with Melissa and a few other friends. If any of you get out here to visit, we are definitely going punting! (though I might force you to drive.)

A few weeks ago, I was officially inducted into my college and given lifetime membership to the University by "matriculating." Basically, it means that I signed my life away to the college and that if I ever get in a car accident, they can use my organs for research. The whole process culminates in a very harry potter-esque dinner, with the gowns and all. It's a pretty funny deal (the picture shows me with my long sleeves, and you can't see it but the gown goes right to the floor - it's hilarious and very formal). You are addressed by the President, eat a seriously fancy meal, drink plenty of wine, and chum it up with fellows of the University.

Along the school theme of things, I had my first assignment due -- an essay on education in Afghanistan -- and I'm neck deep in reading and other class projects. A few people are pretty confused on what I'm studying, and I've apparently been horrible at describing it... so check out this link. The engineering department actually ran a story on our program and for some reason decided to highlight my classmate from Kenya and... me. Check 'er out to hear about what I'm up to (and see if you can tell which one is me):

http://www.eng.cam.ac.uk/news/stories/2006/MPhil_Sus_Dev/

Melissa and I have had a relaxing weekend. The weather here has been beautiful and cold, and we have been able to go on some great walks. There are a few nature preserves in Cambridge that are seriously unbelievable, and we're beginning to learn about all of the cool random connected trails that weave in and out of the city and through the countryside. (By the way, Melissa was riding her bike the other day and got hit by a cow! Yup, that's right. She was super nervous to ride past this ginormous cow, although she didn't have much option because it was directly in the middle of the bike path. And just as she was trying to sneak past it, the beast threw its head right into her shoulder -- nearly knocking her off the bike, where is the hidden camera when you need it?!).

So, today we explored the amazing botanical gardens here in Cambridge. Even though it's wintertime and most everything has died off, we still had a great time wandering through the maze of ferns, flowers, foliage, and ... can't think of any more f's ... but its a really cool park with amazing benches that overlook ponds bursting with plants/trees (I promise it's way cooler than it sounds).

And today was Melissa's very first concert. The Wolfson College choir sang in Great St. Mary's Church during this morning's service. Great St. Mary's is the old University church that houses all the important University ceremonies. This morning was the tribute to the benefactors of Cambridge (guys like King George I, King Henry VIII, some cool guy named Richard Sheepshanks... you know, no one important) and there was a lot of history as to how the University has evolved and come to be what it is today. It was a typical Cambridge event -- everyone was in gowns and afterwards there was a time of mingling with wine and a chance to challenge the pastor on his sermon, a pretty cool idea. Anyhoo, the choir was wonderful and much better than expected (they look pretty bush league during practice, but really threw it down for the concert).

Also, yesterday was Guy Fawkes day - a big day in England (look it up in wikipedia if interested). So there were fireworks, a huge carnival, and drew 25,000 people to a huge park in the middle of the city. We couldn't believe how many people were there... it was quite a site - like the Puyallup Fair x 10. So Mel and I, along with a couple of our new friends from Jamaica, Trinidad/Tobago, China, Guyana and the Gaza Strip, biked out to the fireworks. Pictured here are two other guys from my program. On the left is Duane from Jamaica (who is incidentaly the reigning national chess champion of Jamaica) and Abdel from Trinidad. They've become some folks we hang out with quite a bit... same program, same college, and they are hilarious.

I have been playing a fair amount of soccer, and joined the college team. I have to admit, the competition here is less than impressive -- but its still really fun and gives me a chance to stay moderately fit (or at least run off the beers and crumpets). Our team is doing pretty well in the league so far (we're in second) and I have managed to steer clear of any red/yellow cards -- a miracle by any standard. (**this is mel here... just have to let you know that despite chris' position as sweeper, he scored a goal in the last game!! everyone calls him "the big man" or "big chris" or "the really good guy on our team" ... needless to say, i'm so proud.**)

Back to Chris. All in all, things have been going pretty well. We're still a bit unsettled as we haven't found many folks we really click with. We've met some amazing people that are incredibly diverse, but we've yet to get in and make close friends. But we're hopeful. Maybe we aren't as cool as we think??

We are heading to York next weekend for a little trip away from Cambridge. It's a beautiful walled city with castle, cathedral, and a bunch of viking history / ruins. Should be fun and we'll be sure to update our blog with pics documenting the experience.

Thanks for reading, hope all is well back home (or from wherever you're reading this) and please make sure that Seattle replaces the viaduct with a tunnel.

Love,
Chris and Mel

Our first visitor!

Greetings! Mel and I were gladly reminded of home last weekend when our good friend Kyle Cressman came to London on a business trip. We of course trained down from Cambridge to spend the weekend with him running around London and exploring the many sites the city has to offer. Kyle had meetings through Friday evening, so we met up with him Friday night and had a marathon walk along the Thames, highlighted by Big Ben, the London Eye, the Millenium Bridge, and of course routine stops at fun little pubs along the way. On Saturday, we basically re-traced the steps that Tommy, Melissa's brother, took us on when we first visited London a year ago. We hit up the famous Portobello Market, Hyde Park, the quaint little shops of Notting Hill, and finished the day off with a evening walk along the London canals (used to serve as primary commercial trasport routes back in the day) and a delicious meal at a cool upscale restaurant off Piccadilly Circus. After a Starbucks breakfast on Sunday morning, Kyle took off to the airport while Mel and I hopped on a train back home to Cambridge. The quick visit inspired us to inspire you to visit us. Cambridge is only 45 minutes north of London by train, so if any of you are close, let us know!

Aside from the nice weekend reminder of home, I have been busy at school, trying to stay afloat with all the reading while adjusting to being a student again. My first 3 weeks of school have been a really exciting time, as I've been able to dive into some really diverse material and interact with some really cool and focused people. And I've quickly learned that this program is not at all limited to the environment, it deals with development as a whole. I've been tossed into economics, education issues in Afghanistan, energy efficiency in buildings, management of technology, the relationship between cell structures and public policy (really random, but super interesting), entrepreneurship...the list goes on and my head spins after leaving each lecture. Nonetheless, I am really valuing my time here and am encouraged by my choice to learn here for a year.

But onto more important things...I need to tell you all about my darling little wife. I could pour into how grafeful I am for her encouragement and confidence in moving to a new continent with me and jumping head first into a stuffy and intimidating academic culture, or how she is slightly timid to admit to new folks that she isn't actually studying (what a humongous dwingie), but I'll stick to updating you all on what she's been doing since we got here since her humility would restrict her from telling you herself.

First off, she got a JOB! Not just any job...after briefly entertaining the heinous thought of pushing coffee at starbucks, she perservered and finally found a great little cafe/lounge called the Snug and is now their newest waitress! The Snug is slightly upscale -- which is perfect for Cambridge because it keeps out all the undergrads naively experimenting with cheap alcohol, while not overpricing everything as to exclude the normal person looking for a beer and good food. Its inviting charm includes dark wood, dim lighting, comfy leather chairs/sofas, and great service (something super rare her in England). She just finished her first week and and is encouraged by the cool folks she works with, and I'm stoked because it is right around the corner from the Engineering Department, and is the perfect mid-day coffee oasis.

Aside from her new job, she is the cutest little active member of Wolfson College. She joined the college choir (with her first concert in less than two weeks at the huge University Cathedral in the center of town!), the aerobics group (with the most ridiculous and endearing instructor named George), the yoga club, the wildlife society, and is still finding time to learn SPANISH!

Dwingie, dwingie, dwingie. Aboslute dwingie.

Hope this posting finds you all well, and know that while we are soaking up the experience, we certainly miss the connection with family/friends/community back home. We are looking for a little church to attend while we're here and hopefully a little community to plug into.

Love,
Christopher