Paris

We left lovely Leiden and arrived in Paris, France, birthplace of my husband, on Tuesday, July 14 (Bastille Day). Wednesday was a work day, so in the morning, we ate Parisian breakfast at a nearby cafe (Cappuccino, baguettes, and croissants with butter and jam...mmmmmm). Scott then headed off to measure skulls and I went shopping! I found some great deals and bought a couple shirts, and then headed to the Musee d'Orsay to feed my art addiction (no I didn't go to the Louvre; it's too big and overwhelming and I saw the highlights almost 10 years ago). I would also like to point out that the Muse d'Orsay actually has a discounted ticket for people under 30! I just made it! Anyway, I spent a lovely afternoon here gazing at art. I included a couple good pics here. Below is one of the sides of the main hallways of the museum -- very beautiful with lots of natural light for the statues. I love sculpture. The picture below that is my favorite sculpture in the museum. The girls "clothes" are sculpted from two different colors of marble while she is sculpted in the usual white marble. How did they do that?!



That evening Scott and I headed to the Eiffel Tower. We were not so keen on the massive crowds, or going to the top, so we got some dinner to go and ate on a park bench next to the river where we could still see the tower and take some good pics. The one just below, is me wearing one of my new shirts. The one under that is the pic I took of the two of us. Thus ended our first full day in Paris. Good times!



Thursday was beautiful. A perfect day to see churches. I started with Notre Dame (pictured immediately below). It was just as impressive as when I saw it almost ten years ago when I traveled here while I was studying a semester in college in Florence, Italy. This time I hadn't been there long before they announced they would soon start mass, so I took a respectful seat in the back and attended the service even though I am not Catholic. It found it beautiful and educational. I wanted to climb to the top of the towers to see the gargoyles, but the line was just WAY too long. Instead I walked over to see Sainte-Chapelle.


Like Notre Dame, Sainte-Chapelle, is one of the oldest cathedrals in Paris. It's quite a bit smaller than Notre Dame, but surpasses it in interior decoration. The upper chapel is lined on every wall with impressive stained glass windows such as the one pictured below. Decorating the entrance are many relief carvings of different scenes from the Bible. At the bottom I have included a pic of one of these carvings that I find rather humorous. It is the scene after Adam and Eve have eaten from the forbidden tree and are confronted by God. Adam is covering himself with a leaf and pointing to Eve as if to say "she made me."



Once I was done with these two sites I was very tired and out of spending money, so I headed over to the Luxembourg Garden for a couple of hours and did some reading. Unfortunately, this was all the site seeing Scott and I were able to do. Due to some unforeseen train scheduling problems we had to leave early Friday morning in order for us to be in Italy when we were supposed to be. All in all, that's not a bad problem. "I'm sorry, you'll have to leave Paris a day early in order to go to Italy and meet up with your former college roommate and her husband." "Oh no, not an extra day in Italy, my favorite European country, with one of my best friends!" (please insert the appropriate amount of sarcasm.)

We LOVED Paris, but duty, a dear friend, and awesome seafood called in Italy...OFF TO GENOVA!

A Walk Down Memeory Lane (but not mine)

Before I proceed with my update, I must apologize for not updating sooner. Since London we have been in the Netherlands, Paris, Italy, and I am currently in Berlin. I finally have the time and the reliable Internet connection to begin catching you up on our adventures.

From London, Scott and I traveled to the Leiden area in the Netherlands. This was a special trip for the two of us because this was one of the places Scott lived as a child. The museum where he was scheduled to do his research was the museum his mother used to take him to often. It was significant for me to watch him return to this museum as a grown man with his own questions to answer in the scientific world. It meant a lot to me witness such a milestone in his life and in his career. I am so proud of him!

We arrived on Saturday which meant we had all of Sunday to chill (after having a little Scott and Tressa church of course). The bus system was great there, so we just hopped on one and visited Scott's old house in the nearby community of Wassenaar. It was a rainy afternoon, so technically not ideal for walking around, but it was a soft rain -- the kind that makes everything look greener. The houses were quaint and neat with colorful shutters, and beautiful flower gardens. They looked like they came right out of a post card.

Soon we were able to find Scott's old street, Dominee Honderslaan, seen here in the the picture. From there we were able to find his old house, and the park he used to play in. Next to the park there is also a pond where Scott had an incident involving frogs, a bike, and a rusty nail. Scott is pictured on the left next to the infamous pond. Check out Scott's blog if you want to know the story (scottmaddux.blogspot.com), it's one of our favorites! We laughed at old stories and memories. Scott marveled at how so much hadn't changed, but at the same time looked so different simply because he was now grown.

We walked around the neighborhood some more, and unbelievably Scott was able to walk us right to the old pancake house he used to eat at! We stopped here and had some delicious lunch. Scott said it was just as good as he remembered it. We then continued our exploration of Scott's childhood by walking into the main part of town where we found Scott's favorite pastry shop (unfortunately it was not open), toy store, and the big windmill. We also stopped for a little "pick-me-up" of cappuccino and chocolate cake, mmmm...

On Monday, it was once again time for work. Since this was Scott's only day to work at the Naturalis museum in Leiden, I took my trusty "Pride and Prejudice and Zombies" book and headed to the museum with Scott (pictured right). There I spent the day reading among shelved and shelves of mammoth fossils in the collection room where Scott was working. We did get out of the collections room some. We had some lunch with the curator and two other American anthropologists that Scott knew, and we also got to check out the museum itself. If you also read Scott's blog then you already know that they have the world's oldest rock, and the first H. erectus discovery (see Scott's blog for details), an amazing mammoth skeleton, and a tiny dwarfed elephant skeleton. For me, one of the highlight was imagining Scott running around reading everything he could and marveling at all the cool new things he was learning.

There is something special to me about being able to see and learn about the places significant to the childhood of those I love. As I develop friendships, and especially close friendships, I find conversations often go back to stories of childhood experiences. I think we tell those stories because those experiences were part of shaping who we are. The foundations of who we all turn out to be are laid in our childhood, so for me to now be able to see a place in my mind where my husband explored, and learned was an intimate experience. The park, the pond, number 11 Dominee Honderslaan, are all part of where my husband learned to be the man he is today, and I feel privileged to have been able to walk down memory lane with him.

I think God had a surprise for me today...

Well, I wasn't planning on updating my blog today, but I also wasn't expecting the kind of day I had today. I had an amazing afternoon. As I posted yesterday, my plan today was to go to St. Paul's. Quite honestly I was trying to think of other things to do that didn't cost money. However, I knew I wanted to see it, and I had financially planed all week to do so...so I went. Boy am I glad I didn't talk myself out of this one!

Once I arrived and bought my ticket, I heard music coming from the inside. I thought, "Cool. Is it a live group? Let see...why yes it is, and an orchestral group at that...wow, they sound really good I wonder If I can find out who it is? Oh look, a sign. I'll just go take a look." The sign said "Rehearsals in Progress for City of London Festival Concert. Symphony No 9 Bruckner. LONDON SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA" AHHHHHHHHHHHHHH! THE LONDON SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! It was all I could do to hold myself together! They were playing right there in front of me under the dome! I almost wept! I couldn't understand all the indifferent faces around me! Why were people just walking by and looking at other things?! I got as close as I was allowed, found the French horn section and stayed there for the next two hours until they finished rehearsing.

How did I get this awesome privilege to hear the London Symphony play Bruckner at St Paul's in London on my last day of site-seeing, for just the regular price of admission to see the church?! I hung on every note they played. Every time they would stop playing the sound would linger for several seconds in the acoustically perfect dome! I watched the conductor with wonder. How could he possibly hear anything to be improved upon? It was all liquid gold in my ears. To add to the beauty of the whole scene sometimes the sun would shine in just right through the side and dome windows and light up the violin section or the horn section. I hope and pray that I never forget those moments. I could have spent days in there listening to them under all those breathtaking Victorian mosaics.

The only sad part is that you have only my feeble words to experience the afternoon I had with the London Symphony and St. Paul's. No pictures were allowed inside, so I don't have a picture to share of the sparkling Victorian mosaics that decorate the ceiling above the choir and the high alter. Nor do I have any pictures of the orchestra, and it is impossible for me to recreate the sounds as I heard them today. I wish I could. It seems selfish to keep such an experience to myself.

Odds and Ends

This past weekend was our last opportunity to site-see together. Naturally, on Saturday we set a prioritized agenda of things we definitely didn't want to miss. Then we checked our London guide book and discovered that everything we wanted to do costs money. We then cut our list to ONE thing we were willing to pay for. All of a sudden most of the things on our list didn't seem so important. From the picture you see here, Westminster Abby made the cut. It's a good thing we cut so many other sites because we spent most of the day in here. It's hard to believe how long Westminster Abby has been around! Every ruler of the UK has been crowned and buried here going back to the 11th century! We saw the tomb of Edward the Longshanks. We were pretty excited about that considering our favorite movie is Braveheart. We were not disappointed with our choice for the day!

On Sunday, not knowing how to get back to the C of C we went to last weekend, we visited a church that was recommended to us that is actually quite close to the museum where Scott is working. We enjoyed the service, but we miss our home church back in Iowa. We then headed down the street to the Science museum. We walked around in there for a couple of hours, and then we just decided we were too tired to do any other site seeing. The rest of the day we spent lazing about -- it was nice.

On Monday afternoon, I enjoyed a trip to the Tate Britain museum. After that, I met Scott after work and we took the tube to Waterloo. There we ate some pub grub and headed to the Waterloo bridge to watch the sunset. We had a great view of London, and a great night out.

Tuesday, I enjoyed the afternoon at the National Gallery. This was a memorable visit for me. Courtesy of a Rick Steves London book, I took my own tour and saw so many great famous paintings. Some of these included paintings by Michelangelo, Raphael, Rembrandt, Caravaggio, Van Gogh and more! I was in art history heaven! They don't let you take pictures in that museum, so I have none to include here. :( After work, Scott and I needed to go to the train station to book our chunnel tickets out of London. Once we did that we had a chance to look around. It's a beautiful station. We had some good fish and chips there for dinner, and I took this picture with a statue while we were there. We had a nice time. :)

This brings me to today. Today I realized that I am just about museumed out. After some debate, I ended up back at the V&A. I had a scone and some tea at the cafe while I read "Pride and Prejudice With Zombies" (thanks Jerry it's great!). When I was done I was ready to see more. Today I saw the fashion exhibit, and one of the British history exhibits. Here are some highlights. Fashion: work by Prada, Westwood, Versaci etc including the work of the 2008 graduates of the Royal College of Art; British history: lots of beautiful old furniture (and other things that I wasn't quite as interested in). The more I go to the V&A museum the more I like it. It has a vast variety of things to see, something for everyone if you will, and there exhibits are accessible, informative, and just look great! In my limited world travel experiences I think its my favorite museum ever. Although it is not topped by the Corcorin's exhibit on modernism that I saw in DC.

Tomorrow, I am planning to visit the Borough Market, and St. Paul's. All too soon, Scott and I will be cleaning and packing up to go to Leiden. I am looking forward to it, but as all the other places I've been I will be sorry to leave London. Until next time...

Daily Life in London

We are staying at the home of Mike and Debi Kirksey. They live here in Chelsea London for half of every month for Mike's job. The other half of the month they are in Houston, Texas. Debi and my mom have been friends since high school, and they have been generous enough to let Scott and I stay here while we are in London. Thanks Mike and Debi!!!!

Since we have been fortunate enough to be here for awhile we have been able to establish some routines. Scott and I have switched roles for the summer. He has to get up and go to work, and I take care of things around the house. This includes, laundry, dishes, lunch packing, and grocery shopping. We go grocery shopping just about every day, so that we don't have to eat out every meal. There are two grocery stores within a 5 minute walk of the house. However, let it be known that Scott still makes dinner! He does a great job and I am ever so grateful that he does! Now about the house...

There is one characteristic that sets this home apart from others in which we have stayed. It is built in a rather vertical manner. The stair case you see in this picture is the stair that connects this home's 51/2 floors. It has all the normal living areas, it does not occupy an entire block, it is simply built...up. Can you say daily workout? This house has ALMOST cured me of forgetting things that I need with me at any given time. On the ground floor is the entry way, where all shoes live, and a bathroom. (Scott's shoes are not in the pic because he is at the museum measuring skulls.)Down one flight of stairs is the kitchen and eating area and the utility room. This is the area that Scott and I have turned into blogging/planning central with our laptops as you can see in the pic. To the right of this table and chairs is the kitchen. It's all part of one open room. Down three more steps (thus the "half" floor), is the TV room, another eating area, and a bathroom. Sorry, no pic of that. Up one flight of stairs from the ground floor is living area, ya know...with some couches. Then up one more floor is the master bed and bath, and a study/computer room. Sorry, no pic of the master bedroom.

Finally, the top floor is has two guest rooms, and two bathrooms. The room pictured here is the one we stayed in. From the lack of luggage and clothes in the picture you should correctly assume that I took the picture after cleaning up our stuff.
We are enjoying these two short weeks of stability before we embark on about 2 weeks of bouncing around from country to country before we land in Vienna for awhile. Hopefully we'll be in great shape for our travels thanks to the vertical house.

Lovely London

It's hard to believe that I am closing in on the end of my first week in London. Scott met me at the train station in London on June 26...our five year anniversary! I regret that I don't have any pictures of the actual day. I was quite tired, and too ecstatic to see Scott to worry about getting just the right picture. Scott took me to (ironically) a wonderful local authentic Italian restaurant called Ziani's in Chelsea, where we are staying. It was so authentic that the staff spoke Italian to each other, and for a minute I was trying to remember all the Italian I had just used the day before. The food was fantastic, and the place was cozy and romantic. I'll have to take a picture of it for the blog later. Our anniversary was perfect, and I can't imagine how it could have possibly been better!

We continued our celebration over the weekend with some site seeing, that I do have pictures of. We started our Saturday site-seeing around lunch time. Here Scott is finishing what's left of our order of fish and chips. Like most things I've eaten so far on this trip...sooo good!

We then headed to the Natural History Museum (duh). This is the museum where Scott is doing his research, but that doesn't mean he has time to actually see the museum. I took a picture with the lion...rwar. (Must...not make...joke...about school!)

The Natural History Museum is in a beautiful building and the exhibits are great, and quite kid friendly. When we were there it was really crowded with families -- lots and lots of kids.

Next we headed out to see the essential sites of London. This is me in front of the statue that's in front of Buckingham Palace. Just chillin.

Next, Westminster Abby. Unfortunately we didn't get to go inside. We arrived just 15 minutes after they closed. We are planning to go back on Saturday.

Parliament! Soooo cool!

On Sunday, we went with the Kirksys (people we are staying with) to the only Church of Christ in London. Of course the message was given by someone Harding affiliated, Charles Ganus. C of C people are everywhere! We went to lunch with him at a great Chinese place where I had some roast duck with rice (very good!). Then we headed over to the British Museum where I got my picture taken with the Rosetta Stone! That was one great weekend of site-seeing!
On Monday, Scott went back to work at the museum witch means I was left to my own devices. This means that I consumed as much art as I could possibly handle! I have discovered that art museums are just about the only thing that I actually enjoy doing all by myself. I can gaze at a work of art as long as I want to, and I can read everything about them without worrying if I am boring anyone that might have ventured to come with me. As long as the museum has a cafe, I can literally spend all day in a museum that I really like. The Victoria and Albert Museum is one of those, and I spent Monday and Tuesday afternoon there. Below is one of my favorite pieces. The cabinet is decorated with Mosaic! The gold is painted, but the details of the flowers, ribbons and such are not. They are different kids of stone cut in the exact shape needed for the picture. Again, apart from the gold, all the colors in the decoration are the colors of the natural stone! The affect is not captured properly in this photo, but it was so amazing that I decided it was blog worthy.

They also had a great modern/contemporary art exhibit that I also enjoyed immensely. This is my favorite piece from that exhibit. It is actually the design for two tables combined into one, an end table and a longer traditional table. The design for the end table is most visible on the end closest to you in the picture. Can you see it? The longer table design is one the longer less visible side in this picture. Just a really cool way of combining traditional and contemporary design!

In the middle of the museum they have a great court yard with a little cafe, a wading pool and beautiful blooming hydrangeas. I enjoyed a lovely avocado sandwich out here.

When I was done with the V & A on Tuesday afternoon, I met Debi, our hostess, and Carol, a friend of hers, for tea at the Chelsea Physic Garden, around the corner from Debi's house. It is the oldest botanical garden in London, established in the 1600s! In this picture I am having my proper English tea with scones, clotted cream and some kind of strawberry spread. I put milk in my tea and everything. There are two more pictures below this one from the garden. It was beautiful, peaceful, and so interesting.

I have no idea what this plant is, but it looks cool!

London is treating us well, and it's nice to stay long enough in one place to know where things are. Today the Kirksy's left to go back to Houston, so Scott and I are on our own here for a while. Hope all of you are doing well!