Long time no blog!

Word up, folks!

Well well well. It's been a long time, eh? Yeah. I know. Completely my fault. My mission to update my blog every week was a miserable fail this term, seeing as it has now been 2 and a half months(!!!) since my last post. My life in England this term has been absolutely nuts - tons of partying, competitive dancing, flatmate bonding, bags of crisps, late-night tea-drinking, juicy gossip, quiet reflection, and a whole lot of milling about on the ol' computer. I PROMISE that you will all be updated properly on my past few months at Essex, with pictures and words and enthusiasm and all that jazz, but FIRST......I've got to backtrack a bit and tell you all about my amazing 3-week journey around continental Europe. Below in chronological order you will find some videos I took a few weeks ago of me talking and musing and generally just giving a riveting account of my journey. I've got 7 more to upload, but unfortunately #7 is too long for Youtube's standards, so I need to figure out a way to cut it before uploading it and the rest of the videos (computer nerds, HELP!!!). But for now, I hope you enjoy my rabblings!

Love you all, and I sincerely pledge to make it a regular habit once again of keeping this blog up to date. Even writing this short post is reminding me of how happy I am I started this in the first place......

Cheers!

Madalyn

Last video from Europe...

Well folks, here's the last video taken on my trip through Western Europe. I really enjoyed the whole vlogging experience - traveling is so stimulating, and I found it very difficult to sit down with my notebook and write my experiences as I was living them, so filming myself instead was a good remedy for my lack of focus. I am currently working on an essay about contemporary British Cinema (yay! I get to watch British movies all day!), but slowly, as inspiration strikes, I plan on writing some blog posts about my travels (with all of the good times, stressful times, and beer-drinkin' times) and sharing them with you. I spent nearly three weeks visiting five different countries and I feel each one deserves its own little story, so while I've been a bit lethargic since I arrived back at Essex (but definitely still in good spirits!), I'll hopefully have some more of my meticulous writings up here within the next few days and weeks. For now, here's a video taken on our cramped Ryanair flight (but it got us home in one piece, so I can't complain too much :P). Also, Youtube insists on picking the most awkward screencaps of my face to display >:( In terms of the sound quality, I have no clue why I was whispering, as I now realize you can't hear a damn word I'm saying. I think I said something along the lines of "Hey everyone, we're on our Ryanair flight from Rome to Stansted airport, it's super packed, but it'll just be a little hop across the English channel" and then Steph astutely mentions that our pilot looks about 12 years old (which he totally did - I was close to asking for his credentials). That's pretty much it, haha. Enjoy!

Cheers!

Au Revoir, 2010, Bonjour 2011!!!

For your enjoyment, here are 3 videos I took at Les Champs d'Elysees in Paris on New Year's Eve, plus one video of Stephanie dancing with the glorious Gutenschlaut (more on that later :P).

Hope you all had a fantastic New Year's celebration! I return to jolly old England tomorrow night, and I am very much looking forward to sharing more of my experience with you guys!

Love ya!

Madalyn

In the City of Love!

Salut, tout le monde!

This one will be an old-fashioned written post (I didn't even pull out my camera today, amazingly!). After a freakin' loooooong day, I am now in the City of Luuurve - Paris, France! We're all safe and sound at the hotel (we actually arrived before noon today), but we had a crazy frustrating and stressful day as we ran into a problem with our EuRail passes (curse you, French rail system!). Originally we wanted to reserve a seat on an overnight train from Paris to Rome on the night of January 2nd, but when we arrived at the station haggered and sleep-deprived we were told that the entire train was booked and we had no feasible way of getting to Italy. After refueling with some Turkish food and checking into our hotel we got to work planning an alternative route. So with the help of the AMAZING hotel owner (seriously, he is so freaking friendly and helpful - and he brought us free expresso!) we managed to sort out a new plan for the final leg of our journey. Me, Steph, and Amberle will be spending one extra day in Paris and then heading on a 21-hour(!!!!!!) journey to Rome on the 3rd, and then flying back on the 7th (Julie unfortunately had to ditch her plans of visiting a friend in Northern Italy and will be flying back to England early on the 1st). So it was a really hectic day, but now that we've got most of this sorted out we're excited to explore such an amazing city as Paris and spend New Year's here! (we're going to watch Amelie tonight to get ourselves pumped for tomorrow :P). And I'm really looking forward to practice my French - already I've spoken more French in one day than I have in years, and no one has made fun of me yet, haha! (Mom, I know you'll be proud :P)

Anyways, I'm tired as heck right now, but I'm glad that we're still going to Italy and have a comfy bed to sleep in tonight. Hope you're all doing well (and feel free to send me a message - I love checking my email and Facebook and blog and getting updates from home!)

Love,

Madalyn

Day trip to Trier, Germany!

So what does one do when visitng Luxembourg? According to most people we've asked, you get the heck out of Luxembourg! :P (in case any of the Luxembourgish are reading this, do not fret; I thoroughly enjoyed my brief but pleasant stay in your country - some people are just snobs and think you're too small too be fun). Today me, Stephanie, and Amberle hopped on a train and spent a few hours across the border in good ol' Deutschland. Specifically we were in the border town Trier, which is a popular religious destination as it can allegedly lay claim to having the cloth that Jesus Christ wore on the cross. And it also has beer glasses that are as long as my forearm! (yes, I drank out of one of these glasses - being buzzed at 4pm in a foreign country is certainly an experience, haha!) We bought some souvenirs, including a German flag that I bought that's at least three times as big as the other flags I've purchased thus far on the trip (ironic that the country we spent the least amount of time in memorialized with the largest flag in my collection :P). Anyways, we're off bright and early to Paris tomorrow, but until then, enjoy this video of me trying to pour a beer (riveting stuff, I know). ;)

On a train to nowhere......potentially

No worries guys, we made it! (although it took 4 trains instead of 2 and a whole lot of confused glances towards each other, lol). The hostel here is pretty nice - everyone is very friendly and our room is very comfortable (and the food is great!), although the showers very awkwardly have no doors so the water gets all over the floor >:( Today we spent the day strolling along what was a VERY snowy path towards the city centre, and then we ended up hanging out for the whole afternoon in the Museum of the History of the City of Luxembourg (say THAT 5 times fast!). It turned out to be really fun - there was a whole floor dedicated to the 1960s, and a section depicting the progression of teenage sexuality (with photos included!). Tomorrow we'll do a bit more shopping (we bought some clothes and souvenirs today) and we may even take a train over to Trier, Germany and chill there for a bit.

As for blog posts, I'm enjoying this whole vloging thing; I may continue with it until I get back to England when I have the chance to collect my thoughts and write my trademark novels :P

Hope you're all enjoying the holidays! I'll keep blogging and Facebooking as much as I can!

Peace!