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(12/10/09 2:39am)
Demonstrators were encouraged by slogans and videos projected on a large screen by the Stop Climate Chaos Coalition Saturday in London on Grosvenor Square. The group members were marching as a part of The Wave, an activist movement to encourage British Prime Minister Gordon Brown to represent their concerns at the UN climate change conference this week in Copenhagen.
(11/23/09 3:16am)
____simple_html_dom__voku__html_wrapper____>CANTERBURY, England - It’s easy to imagine the type of questions one would encounter during the first few weeks of living in a foreign country. But there was one question I wasn’t expecting to come from my international roommates and friends with such genuine curiosity and interest.“What about Thanksgiving?” they asked me, during tea time in the second week of the term. “Isn’t it a big deal for you Americans?”This immediately sparked an onslaught of questions by the other foreign students in the room – yea, what do you do? What’s it like? What’s the point of the holiday anyway?It was difficult for me to answer the question without at least a little bit of sarcasm. “Yea, it’s like most American holidays, you know. You get the family together, you eat a lot, you fight and you watch football, I guess.”After a more polite explanation of the holiday’s origins, customary cuisine and personal family traditions, I realized that maybe I would miss Thanksgiving a bit this year. After all, there’s nothing like your mom’s cooking and a few days of relaxation to take the edge off of the end of the semester mania.Still, to most of us who have celebrated the holiday, it doesn’t really seem all that special. Our roommates and friends from France, Germany, Switzerland and England, however, were extremely excited about it. They have insisted, from that day on, that we all celebrate Thanksgiving together and have asked me about it at least once a week.“When is Thanksgiving again? Oh it’s not until the 26th? I’m hungry,” they’ll say.Or, more recently, “What else are we going to do? Do we get to talk about what we’re thankful for? Are there decorations?”Of course, it’s not that they’re genuinely fascinated by the holiday itself. I’m sure that most of the interest stems from an attempt to make me, their American friend, feel more at home while I’m here. So, while many American students on campus will celebrate Thanksgiving, my American neighbor and I will prepare a traditional Thanksgiving feast for our housemates and attempt to recreate the spirit of Thanksgiving in our small, student kitchens here in England.While I can’t reflect on the experience yet, thinking about it has made me appreciate the holiday more. There’s something really nice about the idea of a day set aside for the giving of thanks, spending time with family and friends and enjoying a good, home-cooked meal.
(11/13/09 3:47am)
____simple_html_dom__voku__html_wrapper____>While the U.S. honors all soldiers who have served in the armed forces with Veterans Day, citizens in the United Kingdom, France and Belgium celebrate Remembrance Day – also known as Poppy Day or Armistice Day.Commemorating the end of World War I with the signing of the Armistice, Remembrance Day includes two minutes of silence at the 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month, the official time at which the Armistice became effective in 1918.In Britain, it is tradition to remember the fallen by wearing a poppy on one’s jacket, usually on the lapel closest to the heart. Wreaths of poppies are also placed on tombs and memorial statues. The story of the poppy comes from a famous poem by Canadian Lt. Col. John McCrae, “In Flanders Fields,” in which he writes of his experiences in the war following the death of his best friend in Flanders. The famous poem begins with the lines: “In Flanders fields the poppies blow / between the crosses, row on row.”Following the bloody battles, the land was completely devastated, and small crosses marked the graves of the many soldiers in the fields. In the sea of mud and death, the only thing that survived were the poppies, whose seeds rest in the soil until the ground is disturbed, only blooming when the earth has been uprooted. The vivid red color of the flowers is appropriate for remembering the bloodshed in the battle. Thus, the poppy has served as a national emblem of remembrance in England since 1921.The poppy wreaths and pins are usually sold at the end of October and beginning of November, with proceeds benefiting the Royal British Legion. Some people begin wearing their poppies Nov. 1, while others choose to wait a week later for Remembrance Sunday.This year on Nov. 11, a special service at Westminster Abbey led by the Queen marked the “passing of a generation” as the three of the last British veterans of the “lost generation” passed away this year: Bill Stone, age 108; Harry Patch, age 111; and Henry Allingham, age 113. At age 108, Claude Choules is now the last surviving British veteran from World War I and one of only three surviving WWI veterans in the world.In addition to honoring the soldiers who fought in World War I, remembrance ceremonies paid homage to British soldiers who have served the nation in all major conflicts, including the five British soldiers who were recently killed in Afghanistan, making this year “Britain’s bloodiest since the Falklands,” according to a Daily Mail report.
(11/05/09 5:45am)
____simple_html_dom__voku__html_wrapper____>Consider the last time you went on a “cultural excursion.” Perhaps you watched someone perform traditional dance or music. You could have visited an important landmark or place of worship. Maybe you enjoyed some authentic cuisine prepared by someone with knowledge of food preparations in a particular region of the world. But have you ever considered visiting a grocery store as a means of cultural experience?Think about it – food is widely considered to be a central part of how we define as a culture. As a necessary part of life, what and how people eat can offer a great deal of insight into societal customs and attitudes. Just as important as the preparation and eating of the food is the gathering of it. And this is where the modern day supermarket comes in. While farmers’ markets and smaller venues of food vending still exist, the overwhelming source of food for citizens in the UK is from the local grocery store, where you should be able to find any type of food you should need, and then some. In Canterbury, there are three main choices for your grocery shopping needs: Tesco, Sainsbury’s and ASDA. After the first couple of weeks of shopping at Tesco because it was the only one I knew of, I asked my roommates if there were any other grocery stores in town. Little did I know, this simple question would launch a debate about which place is the best and why. “It’s simple,” one of my roommates said. “There are three stores, and each one is more industrial than the last. You have little Tesco, then Sainsbury’s and finally ASDA, where you feel like you’re shopping at a warehouse. The prices are cheaper at ASDA, but the quality is best at Tesco.” Another one of my roommates argued that there is really no big difference. The prices are about the same, but she said Sainsbury’s is average in price and value so it’s the best place to go. The third roommate in on the discussion argued that the real supermarket in town is ALDI, because it’s German, but that’s another discussion for another time.Interested in their analysis and having some time to kill, I decided to visit each of the grocery stores for myself to see the differences. What I found were not only differences in price and quality of food but also a notable contrast in the types of people that frequent each store and what sorts of foods are offered. Each grocery store seems to serve a distinct part of the population in Canterbury, making a visit to each store a different cultural experience. For example, Tesco tends to cater to the younger, student population of Canterbury with its proximity to the city center and easy access by buses that run by campus. It is smaller than the other two stores, but offers a sufficient variety of foods and a large frozen food section with items that are quick and easy to prepare, which cater to the needs of young (and perhaps lazy) people living the college lifestyle. On the other hand, Sainsbury’s is further away from the city center, and it offers a wider variety of foods in general, as well as a greater selection of foods that could be considered “English.” This store seems to be frequented more by young families and English students who live off campus. Finally, there is ASDA, the industrial superstore of Canterbury that offers a selection of furniture, toys and electronics in addition to the food lining the fluorescently lit aisles. This store seems to be more for families who live in the surrounding areas of Canterbury, but not necessarily in the center of the city or near the university. It has the greatest selection of traditional English food, as well as the sterile and impersonal feel of a corporate powerhouse. I could go on for days about the little differences in each store, from the Starbucks installed at one to the extremely efficient self-service kiosks at another. However, the real point is that you don’t have to go to an exotic market or on a hunt to kill an animal to experience the culture involved with food gathering. The local supermarket is full of just as many cultural nuances and interesting surprises worth observing, if you’re in the mood to learn about the mysterious behavior of human beings in the modern age.
(10/29/09 3:57am)
____simple_html_dom__voku__html_wrapper____>CANTERBURY, England - In a society of multi-tasking consumers and technology-driven lives, efficiency is the key to success. Each task in one’s day must be performed in the best way possible, utilizing the least amount of time, in order to ensure that we follow Horace’s ancient advice, “carpe diem.”After all, our lives are short, and there never seem to be enough hours in a day to accomplish everything we’d like. So why not extend this concept of efficiency into our leisure times – travel? After all, if you’re really going to work hard and play hard, you should travel just as efficiently as you work, no?It is upon this principle that modern tourism business thrives. Geared toward that over-achieving, multi-tasker in all of us, travel agencies around the world are teeming with opportunities for people to see “everything” a city, nation or even region of the world has to offer in time spans ranging from one day to one week. Visit London and you can see the entire city in one day. Fly to France, and you can see the entire country in three days. Or why not see all of Europe in five days, with one of the many economical “Travel Europe” packages?While the appeal is obvious – after all, not all of us have all the time in the world to see and do the things that we want – I can’t help but cringe every time I see one of these tours advertised. The injustice that it does to each of the places and its people is just too great. Think of where you grew up, or the place where you have spent the majority of your life. Regardless of how long you have lived there, there are probably still places and people that you have not discovered, adventures waiting to happen, given the right amount of free time and an attitude of exploration. Once you enter a new city or country, the number of adventures and new experiences waiting to be had expand infinitely. With so many opportunities, why reduce yourself to something as mundane as a generic tour? You’ll be missing more than you’ll be seeing.In the true spirit of wanderlust, I believe that the only way to really appreciate a new place is to explore it on your own. Do a little reading beforehand and chart out your own personalized tour, seeing what you want to see and leaving room to explore the places in between. I have already learned countless times on my journeys that the most interesting things are found off the beaten path of sightseeing tours and pre-planned excursions. Or, if you’re feeling really adventurous, don’t plan at all. Get lost. Yes, you read that correctly. For a real adventure, go somewhere you have never been before and simply rove. As you orient yourself, remembering where you have been and charting your new paths, you will see your new surroundings in a completely different light than you would if someone else were leading you around.Yes, I have been on a sightseeing tour before. The tour guide was charismatic and enjoyable to listen to, and I saw a lot of very nice things in a short amount of time. But in the end, I felt like I could have gotten the same thing out of watching a documentary on television. The sense of fulfillment after a day of guided sightseeing is nothing like the feeling of having truly explored a city on your own.
(10/23/09 4:10am)
____simple_html_dom__voku__html_wrapper____>The first thing I saw after stepping off a plane and into the London Heathrow Airport was a sign. “CCTV,” it said in large letters. And underneath, “For your safety and security, this area is monitored by closed circuit television.” I thought nothing of it at the time, assuming it was standard procedure for an airport to monitor activity within for security purposes. But over the last four weeks, I’ve learned that the CCTV operating system is not unique to the London airports – it’s everywhere.Every shop in town, every building on campus, even the restrooms in the underground system in London are monitored by CCTV. And, while video surveillance is certainly nothing new to me, I can’t help but feel as though I’ve walked off a plane from the United States and into the pages of Orwell’s “1984.” According to a 2002 BBC News article, “the average citizen in the UK is caught on CCTV cameras 300 times a day.” This number has undoubtedly risen over the past seven years as campaigns by United Kingdom police have successfully led to the installation of thousands of new CCTV cameras all over the U.K., including a new set of “talking cameras” introduced in 2007. These new cameras monitor littering and “anti-social behavior” in public places and actually talk to people to monitor their behavior immediately. For example, if a man leaves a can on a bench, the CCTV camera will spot it and a voice will come over on the speaker: “Please fetch your can. The bin is behind the phone box. Thank you for using the bin.”Beyond surveillance of city streets and shops for small crimes, littering and anti-social behavior, CCTV footage has been used in the past decade by UK police to track down missing children, monitor traffic and even identify terrorists (as in the case of the 2005 London bombings). These successes and uses are great, but does that make up for the blatant violation of personal privacy and civil liberties?Information Commissioner Richard Thomas has argued that Britain is “sleepwalking into a surveillance society,” while other opponents of the system have resorted to vandalism to show their dissatisfaction with the surveillance. Some choose to merely impede the surveillance by spraying paint over the lens or covering the lens of CCTV cameras, while others deliberately destroy the cameras in hopes of making a political statement. While these means of protest are relatively ineffective, they are prevalent, adding fuel to the ongoing debate of whether or not the widespread use of CCTV in the U.K. is justified.I’m certainly not here to say whether the use of CCTV is right or wrong. I am but a student of the world, here to learn about the way people of another culture live their lives. But of one thing I am sure – the American inside of me will probably never shake the feeling that, in the U.K., Big Brother is watching, and his name is the CCTV.
(10/16/09 4:04am)
____simple_html_dom__voku__html_wrapper____>On a recent visit to London, I was fortunate enough to visit a number of the city’s great venues of art, from the Tate Modern and the National Gallery to the Dali Universe and the Photographers’ Gallery. It was all incredible – some of the greatest collections of art that I have ever seen. But I count myself even more lucky to have seen a form of art in London that is perhaps less widely appreciated by the art community – graffiti. Just as in any great city – New York, Paris, Berlin – the streets of London are fertile breeding grounds for the underground art community, bringing forth a wide variety of graffiti styles that range from the simple tagging and stenciling to complex murals and imagery rife with social and political commentary. For those who stand strong in the belief that graffiti is never art, that it is always vandalism, I would challenge them to look at some of the graffiti that is being done in the world’s biggest cities today. You might be surprised by the power of a spray can on a cement wall to celebrate diversity, preserve culture and even provoke a change in the way that people think.Walking along Bethnal Green Road in East London, I came upon a display of graffiti sponsored by the charity organization Rich Mix. Created in April 2009, the 90-meter mural combined the work of professional graffiti artists and young people from the community to create a work of art that would celebrate the variety of cultures in the area. One of the signs on the mural explained the work’s purpose: “This piece is about a journey of cultural exchange, from the art form’s birthplace in New York City and Philadelphia, all the way across the water to London and beyond. In the mural’s main message of ‘one life, many styles,’ we also emphasize the fact that life is made up of a cross-pollination of ideas and human expression.”While this work was unique because it was sponsored by a charity and came together as a community effort, other graffiti efforts in London are beginning to be recognized as being worthwhile contributions to the community. The most prominent example comes in the case of world-renowned street artist “Banksy,” a Bristol, England, native whose controversial works of art have stirred city councils and community organizations around the world. While some, such as Peter Gibson of Keep Britain Tidy, argue that Banksy’s work “glorifies what is essentially vandalism,” others have celebrated his works as true art. In fact, the Bristol City Museum and Art Gallery featured a large exhibition entitled “Banksy vs. Bristol Museum,” which drew crowds of thousands during the 12 weeks that it ran this past summer.While few city councils have chosen to protect the work of graffiti artists, individuals and organizations are beginning to take action to protect Banksy’s works around the city. I managed to find one of Banksy’s remaining works on Pollard Street in Bethnal Green, “Yellow Lines Flower Painter.” The work, which is now missing some of its original paint, remains as the building’s owner has insisted that it is his choice, not the city council’s, on whether or not the work should be removed. Now, Banksy fans who visit the work will notice a small addition above the painter’s head which reads, “Vandals found vandalising this vandalism will be prosecuted.”
(10/08/09 4:37am)
____simple_html_dom__voku__html_wrapper____>CANTERBURY, England - In just a couple short months, we will watch as more than 15,000 officials from 192 countries convene in Copenhagen, Denmark, and attempt to tackle what is arguably the most urgent international issue of our time – climate change. With the United Nations Summit on Climate Change in New York and the G20 Summit in Pittsburgh now events of the past, the push for serious action in Copenhagen continues to grow.U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon stressed importance of coming to an agreement in Copenhagen with his closing remarks, “There is little time left. The opportunity and responsibility to avoid catastrophic climate change is in your hands.”In the United Kingdom, media attention concerning the summit has shifted as well. While reports previously focused on the economic implications of new climate-change legislation worldwide, the number of stories concerning the United States and its attitude toward the issue has increased.More specifically, there seems to be growing concern about the fate of the Kerry-Boxer bill in the Senate as a means of gauging how serious the US is about taking on the issue in an urgent manner. BBC News environmental correspondent Richard Black wrote in a recent article about U.S. involvement in dealing with greenhouse gas emissions and the recent push for the Kerry-Boxer bill, quoting Jennifer Morgan of the World Resources Institute who said, “It’s fundamental because it’s the way in which the world can get a sense of how serious the U.S. is in tackling climate change and what level of effort it’s ready to undertake.”But this concern about U.S. involvement in reducing emissions is not uniquely British. There seems to be a growing worldwide anxiety that the U.S. does not take this issue seriously enough. “I think the criticism of the U.S. has been worldwide on this issue,” said one French student at the University of Kent, “that the current U.S. attitude toward climate change is not serious enough. This is a serious problem that requires serious action on part of all nations. As one of the most powerful countries in the world, it is imperative that the United States does more.”While all of this is, of course, only speculation, it will certainly be interesting to watch during the next few months how attitudes continue to change and pressure grows on nations such as the U.S. to “step it up” when it comes to climate change policies. To quote Gordon Brown from a recent Newsweek article, “Copenhagen or bust!”
(10/02/09 4:25am)
____simple_html_dom__voku__html_wrapper____>From the minute I open my mouth, everyone knows. I am American.“Oh, you are from America – everything’s bigger in America,” is how I am often greeted by my European classmates. This generally leads into a fairly interesting discussion of the stereotypes we carry about our respective countries. The University of Kent boasts an international student population making up 19 percent of its student body, meaning that I have many classmates from all over the world – Germany, France and Malaysia, to name a few. And while it is fun to discuss the stereotypes of each different country, the conversation always leads back to the initial topic – Americans.We are known as loud, self-centered, gas-guzzling consumers who eat McDonald’s all the time. And, while some people might take offense to this, there’s no arguing that this is at least partially true when you consider Americans as a whole.However, I have particularly enjoyed hearing some of the stereotypes that my European friends have told me and have compiled a few of them here for your own personal amusement.1: Every American has a car, it is a big car and he uses it to go everywhere, even if this means to drive 200 meters down the street or five minutes to the grocery store. Public transportation does not exist in America (with the exception of New York City, of course). 2: Everyone in America is religious. A German friend actually cited a “statistic” for me, saying most certainly that at least 90 percent of America is religious, meaning that they go to church every day and adhere strictly to religious codes. 3: Americans are terrible at geography. Inevitably, this conversation topic will lead to countless YouTube references, citing videos where “random” Americans on the street have been asked to point things out on a map of the world and have failed. My favorite is the video where Americans are asked to point to Iraq, and all but one of them point to Australia, which has been mislabeled as “Iraq” as a test. 4: All Americans who live outside of big cities – namely Los Angeles, Miami, Las Vegas, Chicago or New York – are cowboys. They wear checkered shirts, cowboy hats and boots. They live on ranches and have lots of cattle and horses. This is supposed to be especially true for people who live in the Midwest. Indiana, this means you.5: Americans can’t cook. If they’re not eating fast food like McDonald’s or Burger King, they make a frozen pizza. And of course, every good American always has a jar of peanut butter on hand, because everyone knows that Americans eat peanut butter with every meal.Before you get angry and pen a letter to the editor about my “un-American” attitude, I would like you to remember that these are only stereotypes – characterizations made based on the activities of the group as a whole. And while some may find these offensive, I find a few of them to be frighteningly true. So, while I hope that you have had a few laughs while reading some of the more outrageous ones, I would encourage you, my fellow Americans, to perhaps use these stereotypes as a means of self-examination before you put your cowboy hat back on and finish your peanut butter sandwich.
(09/25/09 4:05am)
____simple_html_dom__voku__html_wrapper____>Canterbury – Where you can party all night and still get eight hours of sleep.Think back to your last night out in Bloomington. You probably wait until 8 or 9 to really begin the evening; before that, you’re eating dinner, running errands, perhaps even finishing some homework – following the mantra “work hard, play hard.” Nevertheless, once you begin, the fun doesn’t end until maybe 2 or 3 a.m., at the earliest. Some of you don’t even begin until 11 or midnight and this is OK, because in Bloomington, the party lasts all night. For the majority of students here in Canterbury, things are a bit different. Shops in town close at 5:30 p.m., and the evening festivities tend to begin around 6 or 7. If you’ve waited until 8 or 9, you are already far behind your peers who have knocked back three or four beers by that time. There are a number of bars and even a club on campus here at the University of Kent, but, in local fashion, most of them close by midnight. So if you’re really wanting to get in a good five or six hours of party, you’ve got to start earlier. Of course there are exceptions to this rule – house parties that go on until perhaps 2 a.m. – but for those who spend their evenings out at the bars, the night ends early.Many other international students like myself were not expecting this when we first arrived. One girl who I went out with on the first weekend got very upset when the evening ended just before midnight. “This is just awful,” she cried. “I can’t believe we’re going to bed already.” While this may be offsetting at first for those of us accustomed to partying until the wee hours of the morning and beyond, there are some really nice side effects of enjoying the evening in such a manner. If you’re done partying by midnight, you’ll probably be in bed by 1 or 2 a.m. at the latest, setting yourself up for a full night of sleep, something that I know I don’t get at IU very often. And with all the time to rest, you may not even have to worry about a hangover. Chances are, you’ve slept it off by the time you wake up, and you’re ready to tackle the next day. So it’s not all that bad, and although I doubt it’s a tradition I would continue when I return, for this year it might be nice – begin the party earlier, get a full night’s rest, wake up refreshed and repeat.