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| Chapter House in York Minster |
The title is my somewhat tongue-in-cheek conception of York during the 4 days we were there. The city does exist, if you go and visit Yorkshire, England,
you will find a lovely old city. But we had the equivalent of “finals week” over the period of 3 days while we were in York so between studying for exams, writing papers, working
on group presentations and having to walk 30 minutes into the downtown area, we
saw very little of the historic city, at least, I did. On Sunday morning, we went to York
Minster for service which ended up being 2 and ½ hours long, 30 page bulletin,
because it was a special service for deacon ordination. While it is great that
people are being ordained to work in specific positions in churches, we were
already tired and it was a VERY long service. I did walk around the city a
little bit after church, mostly poking around antiquarian bookstores.
So TANGENT. One of my favorite things about the trip as a whole was definitely
shopping in secondhand, antiquarian bookstores all over England, from London to
Canterbury to Cambridge to York. Wherever we went I was always on the lookout
for a bookstore and I would inevitably stop at whichever ones I passed. Here’s
a quick excerpt from my travel essay: “I
search for the old, wrinkled covers that tell me they were published at least a
hundred years ago, if not before, not giving more than a glance to the books with
their shiny, bright colored covers that looked “new” and “modern”.” I loved the
musty smell that greeted me when I pushed open the door. I loved caressing the hardbacks with their yellowed pages and the handwritten notes on the flyleaves to this or that person along with a date often in the 1800s or early 1900s. I found so many lovely books that I would have purchased if I had enough space in my suitcase and an endless amount of money. It was fun to go with friends as we shared titles with one another or exclaimed with recognition over certain authors. English majors are the best because they understand why antiquarian books are so cool and why this or that author is particularly special to you. The common bond that one shares over books is not to be taken lightly. I did get a few books for myself and as gifts but not nearly as many as I would have liked.
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| Friends + chocolate = great combo |
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| Yorkshire Pudding |
Back to York... The little that I did see of the city, once "finals" were over, helped me figure out that York is known for being the site of an old Roman fortress when they occupied Britain over 2000 years ago or so, chocolate (Rowntree and Cadbury) and ghosts. I explored all three with some of my Wheaton in England compatriots. We walked on the city walls that encircle 3/4 of York and tried to imagine that we were soldiers standing guard on the ramparts. Didn't quite work as 3 out of 4 of us aren't taller than 5'3" thus in some places we could barely see over the walls. But it was fun to walk on them in a light English rain, very classically British. We went to the York Cocoa House, with an--I kid you not--all chocolate menu, literally everything from scones to drinks to cakes to dinner entrees had chocolate in, on or around them in some way. We shared a fondue platter and each got a mug of thick, scrumptious hot chocolate. After that we decided that we HAD to try Yorkshire pudding in York so we went to The Golden Fleece, the most haunted pub in the city, and split it between us. It's not actually as interesting as it sounds and it's not a sweet pudding. It's a pastry kind of crust in a bowl like shape filled with mashed potatoes and some kind of meat. Typical English food that tastes kind of bland but that fills you up. So there's a quick bit on York. I didn't tell you about homework and finals because that's just depressing and I'm glad that it's all over. I have one more post about Haworth and the Lake District and then the England section of my blog will be over.
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