An Introduction

So, as y'all must know by now, I'm going to Europe! I've started this blog as a simple way to inform everyone about my trip, much easier than writing individual emails and such. In case you don't know about my trip, I'm spending 5 weeks at Brasenose College at Oxford University studying the works of Virginia Woolfe and William Shakespeare. A week before I get to Oxford I'll be traveling around Paris and even stopping for a bit in London with 2 friends of mine who have chosen this summer to tour Europe. I'm really excited that I'm able to join them for at least the Paris leg of their trip! 

Well the name of the blog is kinda what I've decided to make of this opportunity- a chance to find my roots. As you can tell from my last name, I have a strong British ancestry. I've always found myself to be more drawn to England because of this. I even like to believe that I am a descendent of John of Gaunt, and may have some blue blood flowing through my veins! Although that theory is often thwarted by my mom.

The truth is I do have genealogy (going back as far as 20 generations) traced to Lancashire. One weekend while I'm at Oxford I've been planning on traveling up to Lancaster to visit where my heritage may be. To walk down the same path that an ancestor of mine could've walked. Kinda trips me out at times.

On St, Patty's day this past year I looked in the old genealogy book of mine just to see how Irish I really am. Turns out a lot less than I thought! But, what I did see is that I'm a lot more Scottish than I imagined. Well, during my program, I'm fortunate enough to have 2 long weekends (Thursday at noon-Sunday) to independently travel. Well, I'm going to use one of those weekends to travel to Edinburgh, Scotland, to see if I can find some sort of connection there too.

It turns out one of the 2 weekends we're given matches up with the Edinburgh Military Tattoo festival, which is one of the biggest annual events of the country. It's main attraction is watching the Scottish military dance and play music. Unfortunately, those tickets, especially so for the opening weekend when I'll be there, sold out months ago. BUT, people still travel all over the world to come just for the experience and atmosphere, which is what I plan to do!

So far my preparation for going to Scotland has just been watching the movie "Trainspotting" which a copy of the script next by. It's all about learning how to understand the language! Or at least that's what I told myself...

For my second long weekend I'm pretty sure I'm going to try to go to Wales, although I have that a lot less of the traveling worked out. As far as I know, I don't have any Welsh blood, but I would love to learn otherwise!

On top of my independent travels, we'll be doing a lot of class traveling all over England. This includes going from Stratford-Upon-Avon to Bath to Warwick castle. We'll also be seeing Shakespeare plays performed at the Globe Theater and also done by the Royal Shakespeare Company. There'll be at least 1 activity going each week for me to report on!

Anyways, back to the important part of the trip, the schoolwork. Reading, another part of my roots. Not only do I want you to follow me with my travels, but I hope that you'll also be able to follow me with my readings! I'll post later which books and plays I'll be reading, and if you so wish, you can read them with me too!

So, I hope to be posting almost daily while at Oxford. The school's wifi has gotten better in the past couple of centuries. To get used to posting blogs, I'll be posting up to leaving for Europe. So I guess you'll be able to see what I've been up to so far this summer.

Keep followin'!