Steampunk, King Henry VIII, and Chronophage

Today was really cool because Hannah and I started the day off with a crafts fair in the market place at Cambridge. (Well, technically we started the day off with breakfast, which, yes dad, offered beans and toast and coffee, among other things. lol) Wandering around, I got to talk to a lot of very cool vendors who were interested to hear I was from California and subsequently proceeded to talk about where they had been in the United States and the differences between the weather on US beaches and the weather in England (although it has been sunny and warm as of late, it definitely isn't always). These two topics seem to be the exciting things to speak on whenever people learn where we come from. I think people are very eager to share their experience with the US and to see if we are familiar with those places in our country they have been. I also learned that we are not automatically assumed to be from the United States. One vendor initially asked us if we were from Canada. I think that my assumption that we would always be understood to be Americans comes from the US's relative isolation from other countries. We assume that people know where we come from because it is obvious to us and because we have not experienced the point-of-origin guessing that goes on daily here. Today I saw people from Germany, Italy, Japan, Britain, the US, Scotland, and a few countries I couldn't name. I heard languages from all over and fought to get through a very diverse crowd of tourists. This is definitely not something I experience every day, but it goes on in Cambridge all the time. The people who come to this market must have an amazing international awareness, something I would like to work on in myself.
Several of the vendors I spoke to worked with leather and had some very cool leather bracelet designs that I would love to try to learn to make. One of the vendors had been working with leather for twenty years. My most exciting conversation was with a vendor selling jewelry made from silver, resin, or amber. He had a section of steampunk-flavored jewelry called Impossible Fossils which made me extremely excited and got me into a conversation about the steampunk culture and events in England. Unfortunately, the events he mention were in September and October, so I guess I'm just going to have to come back for those some other year. The Impossible fossils were made of industrial grade resin cast into ring and necklace ornaments with clock parts embedded within them. I got one. :) I think the larger clock-piece looks like a plane, which is why I like it.

Another thing I am finding I love about the Cambridge atmosphere is the great numbers of street performers. There are so many musicians and performers, it is difficult to walk from one end of a street to another without coming across someone doing something cool. There are violinists, pipe players, guitars, bands, singers (some who can and some who can't), street musicians, and knife jugglers on eight foot unicycles. I'm kidding about the last one. Or am I? (see below)

Knife juggling Englishman on an 8ft unicycle

Cambridge market, or part of it

I also took a tour of the University and the surrounding town with my program. The tour guide was from Scotland and spoke like someone who was well rehearsed in what he needed to say. He told us about the history of some of the buildings (King Henry VIII had a lot to do with Kings College, Kings Chapel, and Trinity College, not to be confused with Trinity Hall). He also walked us around town and showed us a few of the cool sights, like Keys College and Clare College (where we are staying), where Watson and Crick were enrolled, the Cavendish Laboratory, where Watson and Crick discovered the structure of DNA, and the Eagle, the pub where they went after discovering the structure of DNA to announce it and likely get totally drunk. I ate dinner there- it was really cool. Not only does it have a plaque commemorating these two, the ceiling of the pub is covered with WWII graffiti done by American (mostly) airforce pilots who weren't sure whether they would come back or not and so left notes for future pub-attendees. As if this pub didn't have enough history behind it, it was also burned down once (before WWII) in a fire in which a woman died. This woman is said to haunt the pub and it is written into the lease that the window of the particular upper floor room in which she stayed must be kept open at all times, no matter the weather because if it is ever closed, the pub is supposed to catch fire again.

Courtyard at Trinity College

More of the Courtyard

Entrance to Trinity College

Due to a practical joke over 100 yrs ago, Henry VIII is holding a wooden chair leg instead of  a scepter.

WWII pilots graffiti

The Eagle pub

One of the bars in the pub

The inside plaque, very fuzzy

One of the other things we saw on our tour was a £1,000,000 clock which was unveiled by Steven Hawkings a few years ago. This clock is very, very cool. The three circles are supposed to represent the big bang and blue LED lights around the edges of these circles indicate the second, minute, and hour. The evil looking monster/insect on the top is called Chronophage, eater of time, and is based on a Greek myth. He actually walks along the clock, pulling it around (eating up time). He stays at the top and winks/blinks at you at random intervals 6 times per minute. I like him. I think he's cool. (Mom- there have been soooo many clocks that I know you would love this trip. I'm bringing back lots of pictures).

Chronophage

A sun and moon dial in Queens' College

Tomorrow is the first day of instruction, so things are about to get hectic. Let's hope I can remember everything I've read in the textbook! I've got to get up at 6:30 tomorrow to go run!