If I Had a Time Machine . . .

I would:

1. Sit in on one of C.S. Lewis's lectures at Oxford

2. Attend the 1851 London Exhibition at the Crystal Palace

3. Attend the Paris Exhibition in 1889 at the Palais des Machines, when the Eiffel Tower was built

4. Sneak into a meeting of the Inklings

5. Find out how Napoleon really died

6. Ditto Jim Thompson

7. Visit Jane Austen before she was a famous author to verify that Tom Lefroy was not actually her lover so I can watch Becoming Jane and laugh

8. Attend the first production of Peter Pan

9. See the Beatles perform, in the early days, when they were still cute

10. Go to the Paris Salon in 1865 and introduce myself to Manet

11. Meet Jean-Francois Millet, Vincent Van Gogh, Johannes Vermeer, Sandro Boticelli, Louis Sullivan

12. Visit Cluny III (the abbey) while it was still standing

13. Witness the miracle of the loaves and the fishes

14. Watch the original olympics in Ancient Greece

15. Check out the Sphinx back in the days he had a nose

16. Attend a real Victorian tea party where you get to wear the cool hats

17. Go to the first viewing of La Sortie de l'usine Lumiere a Lyon and see the reactions on people's faces

18. Attend a Jane Austen-era ball

19. Visit Thailand when Ayutthaya was the capital, before it was invaded

20. Meet Gilbert and Sullivan, see the premiere of Pirates of Penzance

21. Ask Elizabeth Gaskell how she was planning on ending Wives and Daughters.

An Inkling for Hot Beverages

My literary hero is C.S. Lewis. He is without a doubt, my favourite author, my favourite book of all time is his (The Silver Chair), and just as a person I find him fascinating. If I had a time machine, the first thing I would do is attend one of his lectures at Oxford.

For those who do not research Lewis in their spare time, or have not read Here, There Be Dragons, Lewis is a member of "The Inklings," a literary group of writers and editors at Oxford who read to critique each other's work, make fun of work they did not like, and see who could write the worst. They often met in a nearby pub called the The Eagle and Child. If I ever get that time machine, another thing I will do is attend an Inklings meeting, although that could be difficult, being a girl.

Last week was reading week, and my best friend and cousin Mikyla came to visit. We are kindred spirits based not only on the fact that we have been shoved together since birth, but also because we have the common dream of becoming published authors. When we get together, our conversations often revolve around our work and new character exercises we have learned. Because we are both aspiring fantasy writers, we feel a connection to the Inklings, or at least, we want to be like them. So while Kya was in town, we tried our own version of an Inkling meeting.

We didn't go to a pub, we went to a coffee shop and drank tea. For a couple hours we took over the couch and discussed dragons and fairytale adaptations. We even got some decent work done. We have decided that in our budding version of the Inklings, Kya is Tolkein, I am Lewis, and Janine is Charles Williams. These are the original members of the group.

We are still working out a few things, like a cooler place to meet than a chain coffee shop, and our own name that is not copying our heroes, but we were still very pleased with ourselves. After all, I will probably never get that time machine. I may as well just do my best to be like my hero rather than pin my hopes on science to create a way for me to meet him.

The Weekend of E and T

The Sweethearts Dance was just over a week ago. The Sunday before, there was a pitiful number of guys who had actually gotten around to inviting someone, even worse than usual due to hardly any advertising, and some girls were getting antsy.

It was under these circumstances that the girls of the Foothills Ward Choir gathered together before the tenors and basses arrived for rehearsal to comment on how disappointed they were in the lack of boys planning ahead. Of course, they were all careful to say, "Not that I really mind, I don't care if I go to Sweethearts," when everyone knew they really did care whether or not they went.

However, the girls of FWC are, if nothing else, good at preparing for the worst, and decided during this whinefest that instead of going to Sweethearts, they would honour an old girlpower tradition and celebrate passover.

No, they are not converting to Judaism, this passover has nothing in common with the real one other than the name. Our passover is a celebration of all the girls who have been passed over for Sweethearts, and how they don't need dates to feel complete, although that would certainly help. This particular passover party would honour another scorned women tradition by the consumption of large quantities of chocolate in the shape of fondue. So it was with merry hearts (and the provision that they all may cancel based on the behaviour of certain boys) that these girls made plans for Friday night.

Friday night rolled around, and we all went to passover. Good times were had, chocolate and hot cheese were consumed, a raucous game of charades was played, and girl power music was pumped through the house. I also had a great visit with one or two of the girls I am closer with on boys we may or may not be interested in, depending on if they ask us out or not. I left at the end of the evening feeling happy and high on estrogen.

Saturday afternoon, I got a text from my friend Robin, you know the one who always comes to all our parties, no matter how pathetic they are. He was trying to get a group of people together to play lasertag that night, and even offered to pick me up. Before my older sisters can start asking questions, NO. This was NOT a date. I payed for myself, we were not paired off, and it wasn't even really planned in advance. He just gave me a ride.

However, after Robin picked me up, I discovered that "group of people" had a new meaning; me, Robin, and our friend McKay. Plus there were supposed to be more guys, but they cancelled. I was the only girl who had planned to come. As if that wasn't enough testosterone, a bachelor party was also present at laserquest. So the night after my girl power passover party, I found myself out with two guy friends shooting guns with more guys celebrating being male. How interesting.

On the way home the guys talked about guns and quading, and then when they realized that there was, in fact, a female in the car, jokingly started talking about Barbies.

Most people in their twenties like to have a healthy mixture of testosterone and estrogen at their social gatherings, especially if they are in the Mormon YSA scene. I on the other hand, apparently keep them divided by having girls night on Friday, and tagging along to guys night Saturday.

It's an Addiction

This past Thursday I had a midterm in one of my art history classes. The exam was on modern architecture, and I spent much of the day before and morning of memorizing the dates, architects and locations of various important buildings around the world. Rob, my professor, is a teacher I have written exams with before, and he always follows the same format; a week before the exam, he will post a powerpoint with a variety of slides from lecture. They'll vary in different topics we discuss, and his students are expected to remember everyone. In the exam, he will choose a handful of those slides (this exam used 4 out of 14), ask you to name the details, and then write a small paper on it, which he usually likes to be around two and a bit pages.

It can be daunting, trying to memorize the details of that many slides when you know you will have to use so little, but by lunchtime Thursday, I was actually having a riot with it. My mom quizzed me and I was actually excited when I recited the use of catenaries in Gaudi's Sagrada Familia. I looked through the slides trying to guess which images he would use, but more for which ones I thought would be more fun to write about then to focus my studying.

Exam time rolled around, and when Rob put the first slide up, I started doing a little happy dance in my chair. This had been one of my top preferences for the exam. The following three were equally as pleasing. I was the last person out of the exam, not because I was slow but because I was having so much fun writing that exam, I didn't want it to end.

Before you write me off as a total geek, let me explain. Actually, the explanation will make me sound like more of a dork, so just write me off anyway. I get the strangest buzz from writing art history exams. It's like a sugar rush, or what I imagine caffeine highs would be like. After a bad week I left that exam feeling energized and excited. The whole world seemed more beautiful, and I just wanted to sing out loud and write about the artistry of terra cotta skyscrapers forever.

If only there were actual careers in art history. Then I could be this happy all the time.

I'm a Fairytale Princess . . . Quite Literally

This past November when I returned from my trip to Provo, I walked into my room and found an unexpected surprise; my bed had grown one full mattress. Supposing this to be a mistake, I called up the stairs to my Mom and asked why my bed had grown taller in the past five days. Her answer was that the extra mattress had needed to be put in storage, seeing as it had no box spring, and, as there was no space in the furnace room, the place my parents had allotted for stowing it was my bed.

I was a trifle surprised, but thought it would be fun. It may even be more comfortable, despite the fact my bed was now taller then my desk.

Then I went to sleep.

At some unseemly hour of the morning I woke up with the sensation that I was floating. As I came back to the world, I realized this was not entirely due to dreams but rather, because the top mattress had shifted to hang precariously off the edge of the other. Apparently that glossy fabric they cover mattresses with isn't too stable when it's rubbing against itself.

Since then I have kept a chair right next to my bed to prevent it from sliding. It also serves as a stepping stool as I'm too short to sit on my bed without having to jump up onto it. Most mornings, evenings, and other times when I feel like sitting on my bed, I come at a bit of a run so I can get up on it. I never do this when others are around though, my bed is funny enough as it is, and even by myself, my messy room provides many hazards, so yes, I climb a chair to get onto my bed.

Every little girl dreams of being a fairytale princess. I am one; the Princess and the Pea. Although, if you were to ask me, she slept so fitfully not because of the pea, but because of the shifting mattress. That, or the sheer inconvenience of not being able to flop down on your bed.

PS - Please do not leave any frozen, dried or fresh vegetables under my mattresses.

Chiang Mai and Other Highlights

As Janine keeps reminding me, it has been far too long since my last post. I have delayed because I wanted to post something about Thailand. One can hardly go across the world for three weeks without writing something about it, but how do you sum up three weeks in Asia in a blog post? Where would I even begin?

That combined with the fact that I am extremely lazy is how nearly two weeks have gone by since we returned and I am just now sitting down to record some highlights. For the sake of keeping me from sitting here all day writing, I have chosen a few memorable experiences, based around my favourite place; Chiang Mai.

For those who don't know, Chiang Mai is in northwest Thailand. It is considered in some respects the northern capital, and is a city absolutely filled with wats (temples). From the time my family first went to Thailand four years ago, I have wanted to see Chiang Mai. Finally, I convinced them. There is something so exciting about that many temples in a jungle.

Best New Year's Ever

I am one of those people who is not a fan of New Year's Eve. I always find that there's so much build up to that one night that when it arrives, it almost always comes out as mediocre. So when we arrived in Chiang Mai in the evening of December 31, I was not anticipating much excitement. But because we were there for only a few days my dad, Janine and I decided we had to go out. The cab driver to our hotel suggested we go to the east entrance to the wall of the old city, where ther's usually a big party. Apparently it's the equivalent of Times Square here in Thailand.

There were food stalls selling friend rice and pad thai, there were musicians, the Thai equivalents of the Spice Girls and Backstreet Boys performing (the Thai Backstreet Boys sang Michael Buble), and best of all, there were these lanterns going up in the air, made of rice paper and bamboo rings. You light a circle of wax held up in the centre of the ring, let the bag fill with hot air, and let it off into the sky. There were so many they looked like golden stars. Janine and I did one, and while doing so, Neen got hit in the head with a lantern someone had let go of too early. Thankfully, she only got wax in her hair.

In Canada, you could never do this, but in Thailand no one's so fussy about safety regulations and avoiding lawsuits, so after the countdown that was part in Thai, part in English, part in other languages people there may have been speaking, the fireworks exploded right over our heads. We were so close we were hit by falling ash.The whole evening was just so exciting, so unlike any New Year's I have ever had before.

Thrill! Fun! Safe!

New Year's Day we went on an excursion called Jungle Flight, where we rode zip lines between rubber trees as a fast way to explore the jungle. The longest line we rode was the length of three football fields, and we also rapelled down 40 metres.

I loved it far more then I thought I would. There was something so liberating about sailing through the jungle from tree to tree. We even tried some tricks, as simple as no hands, moving on to riding backwards or Superman style, and even repelling face first. These were of course nothing to the acrobatic moves of our guides Jack and OC, but we tried.

The Man With the Panda Parasol

Okay, this is kind of silly, but when my parents first took us to Thailand when I was 17, they showed us this video on the country beforehand they got fromt he library. In the video's section on Chiang Mai, there was a shot of a bunch of artisans in a row painting parasols. Since then, I have wanted to see someone painting a parasol, and the last trip, I came up short. Outside one of the larger wats in Chiang Mai, there was a huge artisan fair in celebration on New Year's. Sitting among the stalls was a man painting a panda on a parasol. I was so excited I took several pictures of the man, and luxuriated in the moment much more then rational people would.

Crossing Off My Bucket List

On Sunday afternoon our family decided to take a trip to Doi Suthep, a wat on a "mountain." Originally the plan was to ride bikes up, but the thought of that much uphill for that long in that heat became less and less appealing. So we settled for close enough by renting motor scooters and riding those up. We looked like a family biker gang.

I am actually petrified of scooters. I only drove one once when we rented it at the beach at my dad's insistence. So when we rented only three scooters, I was the natural choice for one of the people to ride in the back. On the way up, I rode with my brother, and as we drove up the winding road, we spontaneously burst into "Jesus Wants Me for a Sunbeam" in high and low pitched voices. When we had completed our impromptu recital, we both reflected on how we had just sung a primary song while riding up a mountain in the jungle on a scooter. Huzzah! We could cross that item off our bucket lists! What a great moment that was.

On the way down, I rode with Janine. Apparently neither of my siblings like riding with me on the back so they switched off. On the way down we had to drive through the lanes of terrible traffic and Janine did not like it all. So much so, she even wrote a song about it to sing as we rode, called "Riding a Scooter in Town." In it's most popular form, it followed the melody of "I'm Just a Little Black Raincloud," and used every word we could think of that rhymed with "all." Another great moment.

The Daddy Daughter Wat Tour

The Saturday we were in Chiang Mai the family was tired and went back to the hotel for a nap after a morning of shopping. Daddy and I decided it would be more fun to go see some wats and take pictures. So we rented a scooter and rode around to different ones that interested us and took pictures. Wat Phra Sing was where I saw the Man With the Panda Parasol, and Dad got equally giddy about a bamboo mug because it reminded him of one he had attempted to carve on his mission.

There was plenty going on because of New Year's, and I was so excited by all the different bots (buildings in a temple). Seriously, I love Asian architecture. Dad seemed to think it was fun to take pictures of me taking pictures, so I now have several pictures of myself squinting at my viewfinder. Delightful.

You Say You Wanna Revolution . . .

We went to Beijing for three days on our way to Thailand, and while there, I really wanted to Tiananmen Square, mostly because "The Lone Rebel" is one of my favourite photographs. So Daddy, Neen and I went. While there, Janine had the sudden desire to sing "Revolution" by the Beatles. It caught on and we all felt slightly rebellious and wary of communist soldiers, but we sang anyway.

Luging Down One of the Seven World Wonders

Naturally we had to go to the Great Wall. We went to a spot called MuTianYu, hiked along quite a ways, I took lots of pictures and then we had to get down. You ride a chairlift up to the wall, but on the way down, you have the option to ride these little toboggans down a metal luge track. It was definitely a highlight of the Great Wall, and now I can say I rode a toboggan down from the Great Wall. YIPPEE!

The Mandarin Oriental

As a special treat, Mom, Janine and I went to the Mandarin Oriental for tea while in Bangkok. FYI - the Mandarin Oriental is a very nice, fancy, old hotel. I like tea, I love dressing up, and pretending to be posh is one of my passions, so I was so excited. We made ourselves all pretty, took our designer knockoff bags from Beijing, and went for tea.

The room where the tea is held is called the Author's Lounge. Throughout history lots of famous writer's have sat in that room and had tea while they write. I felt the strong desire to have my pen and notebook while sitting there, but the tea itself was enough to keep me entertained. I had a delicious rooibos, and the sandwiches and cakes were also scrumptious. Plus they were so very attentive, the room felt like we were in a Victorian movie, and there was an acoustic guitar playing while we had tea. I loved it.

If I were going to make a pie in the sky kind of goal, it would be to return to the Mandarin Oriental and have tea after I'm published and really belong in the Author's Lounge. In that dream, I would bring my notebook.

Beach Bumming

I preferred other days more, but I can hardly skip over the whole week we spent at Koh Lanta. Mostly I just loved sitting at the beach with my nose in a book or writing, and jumping in to the sea everyday. I also loved eating very fresh fish, seeing monkeys, and deep sea fishing. It was great to have a week of relaxing in the middle of all that sightseeing, and I got some great sunset shots over the beach.

Well, there you have it, my Thai blog. Seeing as uploading photos is such a pain here, I'll be making a facebook album in a little while. Look for more photos there, unless you're not on facebook, in which case, well, enjoy those I included.

Learning With My Eyes Closed

Some of you may remember reading my complaints about a certain professor I affectionately nicknamed Dr. Doom in September. If you don't, you doubtless remember me going on and on about how much I hate his class every Tuesday and Thursday except for the week I ran away to Utah. Or you may have been among the few who realized how many different excuses I came up with to not go. It's amazing how often my alarm clock can not work on certain mornings.

If you're none of the above, let me provide a quick recap. Dr. Doom (or more accurately, Dr. Dube) is my professor for a class called Communities and Societies. MRU has decided this is an important class for me to take as a degree student because high schools no longer do their job and don't prepare kids to learn at a university level, so my school has taken the task upon themselves with their new General Education program, where kids get to take high school english, social, and science again. Either that or learn about the 60s, which I know is vitally important to my overall education and helped me dodge the impending disaster of what would have happened if I did not know everything that happened at Woodstock.

In Dr. Doom's class, we read books about people who are supposedly trodden upon in society, and discuss them in class. Or at least, that's the theory. Dr. Doom does most of the talking himself.

My first class I wandered in completely naive, and left thoroughly depressed. I had just sat there for an hour and a half while my professor told the class precisely what he thought of the feminist movement. Many of his opinions led me to day dreams of storming out or simply standing up and throwing my shoe at him. As a girl whose dream in life is to be at stay-at-home mom and has no problem with the term mankind being used to refer to all people, I felt like I was under attack. How could I endure this twice a week for a whole semester? I left that class and desperately looked for a way out, but unless I wanted to drop the class and not replace it, I would be stuck with Dr. Doom until December.

Naturally it did not take me long to dislike Dr. Doom. I disagreed with just about everything he said, and everything he made me read. On my midterm, I was asked to write a letter to my daughter in the future, and tell her in this letter some of the values discussed in the feminist book we were reading. All I wanted to do was write in big block, capital letters, "I WOULD NEVER WANT ME DAUGHTER TO READ THIS BOOK!" Thankfully, I did not risk my GPA over this silly question, but it made me even more sulky.

After what felt like an eternity, we moved on from the feminist book, and started another winner, The Poisonwood Bible. This book actually sounded quite interesting, it's about a Baptist family that moves to the Congo so their father, a reverend, can preach to the locals. This was in the 60s, that decade I took a whole class on.

I started the book with high hopes, but they quickly died. From my own religious perspective, I found the book frustrating because I saw exactly what this chauvinistic, close-minded reverend was doing wrong to drive away the natives and let his family fall apart. I've always liked to read to be entertained, and I did not find The Poisonwood Bible entertaining. As a result, more internal frustration was channelled at Dr. Doom.

By the third and last book, I was ready to give up. This one was called True Notebooks, and was the memoir of a writer who taught a writing class at Central Juvenile Hall in Los Angeles. Brilliant, I thought. Another story about somebody inspiring under priveleged kids with football, ballroom dance, tiddly winks, etc. When would this class be over?

Right after the annoucement of the third book came, I recieved some more distressing news. Since last spring my family had been planning a trip to Thailand over Christmas, and the flight was booked right in the middle of exams for me and my sister. All semester long we had been praying that our exam schedules would allow us to go on our holiday, and Janine's lined up perfectly, with her last exam the day before we were to leave. My first was that same day, followed by one a week later, and Dr. Doom's
a few hours after my flight was supposed to leave. Needless to say, I was not very happy again.

I approached Dr. Doom with trepidation. His opinions and the fact that he was a huge guy who swore frequently in his lectures made me slightly afraid of him, and I was terrified he would start cussing me out as soon as made my request to take the exam early. What he did was just as startling; he smiled.

After hearing just the first part of my carefully worded request he grinned, said he'd love to help and would check with his head of department right away. Then he preceded to ask me politely about my trip.

I was completely flabbergasted. Was this really the villainous monster I had constructed in my mind? I was surprised I actually liked this man. He arranged to move my exam, and quite suddenly, Dr. Dube was a nicer man. Or maybe it wasn't so sudden, maybe I just stopped being such a snob. Either way, I opened True Notebooks with an open mind.

To say I loved it may be an exaggeration, but I most definitely enjoyed it. I didn't even have to force myself to read it. The author's purpose was not to show how these kids (several of which were being charged with murder) could change their lives by writing poetry, it was to show the social conflict between reaching out to young, violent offenders and dehumanizing them so one doesn't have to feel pity for the lives they'll spend in prison. The writer went in with certain ideas of the kids he teaches, and the book chronicles his journey as he realizes who they really are.

No, the book is not trying to teach us to pity murderers, the author himself loves the boys he teaches but is disappointed and heart broken when he learns more about the crimes that got them where they were. He seeks to humanize them, and show people who they really are. The mission of his class is not to change the kids lives, its to give them some good memories. According to the author, everyone deserves at least a few good memories, even violent, seventeen year old gang members getting life sentences. For once, I was reading a book for the purpose of exploring new ideas, and not just to be entertained. I was surprised how much I liked it.

I felt like this book in someway reflected my outlook at the beginning of the class. I let one moment, one fact really determine how I treated Dr. Dube's class, and didn't really learn to appreciate him, or his class until the end.

So thanks to Dr. Dube. You'll likely never see this page, but thank you for helping me stop learning with my eyes closed.