This City Makes Me Swoon

Six days ago, I re-arrived in Cambridge. Since most of my stuff was already here, it was like coming home to both the alien and the familiar. I had no idea what to expect from my flatmates or the university or the city at all. Even though I had met all three a few weeks ago, it still felt so up in the air.

I'm pleased to say that I'm adjusting very well. The city, first of all, is beyond breathtaking. The first moment I saw King's College, I'm pretty sure my heart skipped a beat. The river is picturesque and seems stuck backwards in time with its old-fashioned punters gliding along it. The market is inspirational and brimming with the most beautiful vegetables and fruits and ohmygosh the most yummy looking bread!

Did I mention that to get there it is less than a ten minute walk?

I am so lucky.

Cambridge itself just seems to overflow with things to offer me. Last weekend, at the park that is even closer to me than the market, there was a food, garden, and produce festival. My flatmates cooed over the animals, and one of them even paid £1 to have the amazing experience of holding an owl on her arm. We nibbled on everything to offer and perused the produce competition.











Now that I've explored everything, though, I need to get used to having classes again... Moll Flanders, I'm coming for ya'!

Out, Again.

Recently, I decided to take up baking bread, both for the fun of it and because it saves a few pennies every week and yields a much tastier product versus store-bought bread. Most of it went well, except for one disastrous batch where I may or may not have killed the little yeastie beasties...

But this is not a baking blog, this is a blog about my journeys in England. Let me show you where this is going:

Everything you can buy in America comes in a number of sizes, and one of those options is usually 'super size.' There is no dispute about the hugeness of American cars, meals, and (yeah, yeah, we've all heard the Americans are fat thing...) people.

Americans like hefty things. They like bulk. Most of the time, I love the smallness of the UK (though I am terrified to learn to drive on those eensy-weensy streets!). But sometimes I need bulk.

Like when I'm baking, and I screw up, and I have used up the last of the flour. I can go to the store and lug home three or four of the largest bags (1.5 kg), or I can buy it as I need it. At Liam's house in Norwich, this was a bit of a trek. We bought our flour from the Tesco in town - a twenty minute walk there and the same back. That doesn't so bad, but one of those bags for life full of groceries is surprisingly weighty a half mile into the walk!

Okay, so I might need the exercise going back and forth, but at seven p.m. on a Sunday night, when the English thing to do is shut shops at four (!!!), it would be nice to not run out of flour after one bread recipe...

7% Cambridge, 93% Norwich

For someone who lives in Cambridge, I haven't really spent much time there since I arrived. In fact, percentage-wise, I have spent 7% of my time in my new house in the most beautiful city in England and 93% of my time at Liam's house in my familiar surroundings of Norwich.

It isn't that I don't want to be in Cambridge - I love the city, what I've seen of it so far. But there is a definite pull here in Norwich. Yes, of course, Liam is a part of it, but Norwich itself has a certain charm...

Norwich was the first city I ever lived in outside of Tucson. It was a surprisingly easy transition to make, but I think it helped that I spent most of my first few weeks exploring the city as a tourist. After that, it was already like an old friend, and getting to know it even further made me feel like there was nowhere else that could compare.

And I know that feeling will change once I truly settle in to Cambridge. Living in new cities is something that gets easier with practice, like making crepes or poached eggs. But certain places and things in Norwich will always hold my heart. I get that fluttery excitement whenever I'm not there and I think about its quirky university campus, its market stalls with their cheesy colours, its overabundance of both pubs and churches, its hidden heaths and fields full of blackberries and punctuated by skate parks, and its beautiful rail station, which has on so many occasions been a gateway to somewhere new and then a welcoming sight as my train clickity-clacks back home to Norwich once more.

[An interesting fact about the Norwich Rail Station, which is a GORGEOUS Victorian building: it is older than the established state of Arizona! When you think about things in terms of how young America is compared to the ancient histories of England, it is bewildering, in such a lovely way...]

From Tucson to Cambridge

Two years ago, I began what would become a life-changing journey from Tucson, Arizona, United States to Norwich, Norfolk, United Kingdom. I had no idea in those early days (when I actually kept up my blog) that I would soon not only coming back to visit my fiance (yep, Liam, my English boyfriend, and I are now engaged!), but I would be coming back to stay.

It has been a good chunk of time since A Desert Rose Abroad was updated. From the above, I'm sure you can see that quite a lot has happened. When I returned to America after a pretty epic month-long tour of Europe, there was no question that I wanted to go back to England for good. I had not only fallen in love with the country, but also with one of its countrymen, and the UK had so much to offer me. I would need pages and pages to bring this blog up to speed, but suffice to say I have now come back to England and I am pleased as punch to be here.

After a lot of discussion with both Liam and my dear Mum, I made the decision to go back to school here in the UK. I am now a Master's (Post-Graduate, in English terms) student at Anglia Ruskin. ARU is unfortunately not in Norwich, or even Norfolk, but don't get me wrong, I am not going to have a cry about it. Instead, I'm getting an opportunity to live in one of the most beautiful cities in the world: Cambridge. And luckily, Cambridge happens to be only a scant hour's train ride away from Norwich, so weekends are available for Liam and me to travel back and forth to see one another (it sure beats being 5,331 miles apart!).

So... here I am! I have been here for the past three weeks, settling back in and getting acquainted with my new city and re-acquainted with Norwich. I'm afraid I won't have any photos yet to share as I have lost my camera battery charger, but as soon as I have one, you betcha' there will be an epic photo post!