Trip series No.1: ITALIA

Mi-November, my first trip of the 2011 end of the year trip series started in Italy.

Italy has been one of the countries for my next destination list.

So to reward myself of the completion of my master degree, I took a plane for 9 day-trip to Italy.

I had so many cities that I wanted to visit in the country, it was hard to choose only some for 9 days.

But I chose the following 4 cities:

①Torino : I asked a favor to a friend from the same school of master living there

Alps from the plane on the way to Torino

An Italian passenger sitting next to me who travels quite frequently told me that he had never seen the Alps as clear and beautiful as this time!

Lucky☆

He gave me lots of information about Turin where he is from and recommended places to visit in the cities that I will visit.

On the whole way to Turin, we had also good discussions about tourism, environmental problems,  English education in Japan and Italy, etc...

Plus, he was kind enough to take me on his car from the airport to the Turin city centre where I was going to meet my friend.

The first contact and impression of Italian was great!

My friend in fact lives in Asti, about one hour from Turin by car, in an enormous country house.

I stayed there for 4 days.

Every morning, since she had to go to Turin for her work during the morning, we left together to Turin at 8am.

While she was working, I exploited the city.

This is fake tap!

The church in Asti

A community band?!

Some shops sell these little dolls representing the birth of Jesus with the traditional clothes of different countries.

In fact the year 2011 was the 150th anniversary for the unity of Italy.

The first capital of Italy was indeed Torino!

There are many posters and flags for the celebration in the town (Unfortunately most of the festive events have done in the summer).

 My friend was very kind to spend her afternoon with me every day after her work.

I had a great time with her family by discussing many things in a mixed language of English, French and Italian. What is more, her mum's home made meals with local products were so delicious including her tiramisu !!!

 Tricyle, which we cannot find easily in the UK and Japan!

②Bologna

I had to spend one afternoon before arriving in Rome.

At first, I wanted to pass Florence.

However, some friends told me that one afternoon will be too short to visit Florence while I have heard of Bologna just because a very well known Japanese football player, Nakata has played in Bologna.

Plus, when I looked for the information about the city, I found out that there would be a chocolate festival from the day when I pass there.

Hmmm, chocolate everywhere with people's big and happy smile:)

 These are all made in chocolate!

Many museums in Bologna are free or with little charge (1-3 euros).

③The Italian capital, Rome where another friend from the master school lives

In this city, there are buildings and churches from Roman and Greek eras everywhere,

There is also Vatican City, the smallest country in the world within the city,

There is of course the Pope living there...

For me, the atmosphere of the city was a very unique and strange in certain sense.

Piazza Venezia

Monumento Nazionale a Vittorio Emanuele II

There are always two guardians protecting the monument with the golden wall behind 356 days a year.

 Palatine Hill

 Colosseum

You can try these Roman style clothes outside the Colosseum.

Pantheon

There are a large number of fountains in the city.

Each has the unique characteristic with different size and sculpture.

Sunset from the top of the Spanish Steps

This friend was also so kind and took care of me so much by taking me to the great tour of Rome with amazing knowledge of Roman and art history.

She also cooked often for me at home.

This night, she was making carbonara.

④Naples (Napoli)

I had only one day, precisely maybe full one afternoon in Naples but I noticed the great difference in the atmosphere and the appearance of people living there, compared to those in other northern cities that I have visited.

In fact, I could feel the atmosphere of Africa there.

For example, there are rubbish everywhere and people drive motorcycle without helmet, sometimes even little boys about 10 years old...

Unfortunately, my camera's battery died on the second day in Rome.

Stupidly I did not bring my battery charger so no photo after the day...

But instead, I saved all the memory in my brain well.

I appreciated so much the architecture, the atmosphere and food of each city.

I also had great discussions about different culture, religions, customs, (e.g. the origin of Japanese people's name), etc... with my friends, their friends and families, and the receptionists of a hostel in Naples who were foreign students at Napoli univerisity.

It was very refreshing and fun trip!

END

Finally this day has come...

For the last one year, this master course took most of my time, stressed me out and made me cry several times.

BUT it allowed me to understand the development and environmental issues from much wider perspectives.

And 3rd October, I went back to Norwich again to make this academic year to an end by printing and submitting my dissertation by myself.

It has been five months since I have vaguely decided the theme of my dissertation and the methodology of the primary data collection in May.

So many thanks to my sincere supervisor with his precise and kind advice and directions, my internship supervisor with her generous understanding of my busy circumstances and other people particularly within the ODI who helped me to get contact with key actors for my research.

But above all, I appreciate so much all the people (from the Tanzanian Government, Norwegian embassy, NGOs and research institutes) who accepted to participate in my research through the questionnaire or interview although they are always so busy with their tight working schedule and they have never met me before and even now physically.

Without their participation by sharing their field experience and information, this dissertation could not be completed as it is.

Of course, the whole process was not easy such as the determination of the narrowed topic, the literature review, primary data collection and the dissertation writing.

However, I learned so much through the research such as the discursive and perspective gap between national officials and people working with communities, various actors who try to influence the decision-making at national level, the difference in their political power, etc.

Also I was so "satisfied" when I finally understood the theory (that I used) after having analysed my primary data and found the coherence and consistency between the theory and my results.

The evaluation result will come out by the beginning of December.

Let's see how wide the gap of "satisfaction" in the quality of the dissertation between myself and three evaluators (two from my University, one from outside).

Now, it is the time to stop or at least take a long break from studying because since my undergraduate, I have not stopped taking some courses until now!

I will not change my attitude of learning something everyday but I would like to focus on rather professional experience and practice than academic one.

After the submission of my dissertation, I celebrated the moment/day with another course mate who suffered much more than me with her dissertation but managed to submit it on the same day and other friends who still live in Norwich.

We had lots of chats about this academic year.

Once it is done, I miss it (a little bit) but if someone asked me to do it again, I would definitely say no thank you without a second of hesitation :p

And as a reward to myself and souvenir from UEA, I bought this.

I do not have enough courage to wear this outside the house which many English students, especially undergraduates do so even with their school name or club name on.

So I will use it to keep me warm inside of my flat to survive this winter :)

Now (after a decent break), I need to start job hunting...

It seems like very very hard to find a job in this domain within the UK among the Brits...

So Me as a foreigner with few experience, how it is going to be !?

However, all my friends living in Japan have experienced this moment already 3-4 years ago and now they are working well as part of Japanese society.

I cannot live by avoiding this hurdle of life as a human being!

I will do my best with the spirit of "Nothing ventured, nothing gained" !!!

Return, well, the real arrival of the summer

1st of October.

The temperature of the day: 26 degrees.

So sunny day!

The summer is back!

Well, I should say, the summer finally came!

This is because this year, the UK had the coolest, well, coldest summer since 1993.

I don’t remember of sweating unless I did some physical exercise

But since last week, no clouds, no rain but only sunshine everyday!

Especially this weekend was the peak :)

The beach nearby our house was packed with families, couples and foreigners who took their holidays later than others but probably had much better beach vacation.

(Photo from a British newspaper Guardian)

We did not want to join them… we preferred to go somewhere rather quiet to enjoy this weather.

So we went to Seven Sisters, about one hour from the centre of Brighton.

The scenery from the bus along side the beach on the way was wonderful.

We passed several small villages and hills.

Then we got off the bus at the national park of Seven Sisters.

Look this immense view!

So excited to see the cliffs but first,

We had sandwich lunch nearby a stream then let’s hike!

Although it was after the main holiday season, there were quite many foreign tourists as well as Brits.

But they (including us) are nothing within this spacious nature.

There are sheep/lamp everywhere free ranged.

No bins, but no wastes on the ground either!

Today, the beach is not our destination so climb a hill and…

Here we are!

These cliffs are or rather were one of the most popular spots for suicide.

No fence of protection anywhere….

No surveillance either…(But apparently there are some volunteers walking around for check.

The area is called “Seven sisters” because there are seven hills and they look like seven girls…

Hmmmm, this sounds really cheesy to me…

It is really high with 90 degree-wall!

Every year, 30−40cm of the wall are eroded.

Here is the proof

This part may not be there next year…

We continued walking on these hills, about 4 of them then gradually my legs started feeling shaking..

So we wanted to take a bus for the return but the area where we decided so was about 2km far from the main road.

Although the area was a touristic spot, it was only accessible by car….so we had to walk further.

Anyway, we had a great sportive day.

To enjoy more this wonderful weather, we wanted to do “the summer” thing, BBQ next day.

But, all over the town, there was no more disposal BBQ kits available…All sellout!

We have to wait till next summer for BBQ on the beach :(

Break :D

There have been so many things going on like internship, wedding, moving...

But I have been touching little by little my dissertation.

Finally by the end of last week, I finished my draft.

On Sunday night, I sent it to my supervisor to get some comments on.

A friend who wrote a dissertation under his supervision told me that it took a week to get teh feedback.

So I 'have to' take a week break :)

Also, the summer, well even (maybe) autumn is going away already so I needed to enjoy some good time in Brighton!

So, first to get to know better the town where I live, I followed Ben by bicycle when he had to go to his university (University of Sussex) for his induction week.

It takes about 30 minutes.

That day, it was very nice day with mild wind so it was great cycling day.

Sussex uni is in fact the university where I was first thinking to go for my master because it has a very famous research department, IDS (Institute of Development studies).

So for the first time, I went till the front of the building (but no courage to get in...)

Ben just started his teacher training at the university.

It seems like this year is the 50th anniversary of the university.

We had lunch on the glass before his class started.

Then I exploited the campus while waiting for him.

The campus was quite quiet probably because other courses have not started yet (normally from the end of the month or early next month).

The library seemed bigger and nicer than the one at UEA...

In the evening of my 2nd break day, wow, I received already the feedback from my supervisor...:0

Yes, I could continue my 'forced' break but as I saw over 30 comments on my draft, I could not live without looking at them.

So my break was done within 2 days...

The long run restarted with uncertain goal line...

Moving

Our moving to Brighton took two steps.

1st: on 6th August from Lincoln to Brighton (4 hours +α by car)

We brought all stuff of Ben and mine that I used at the uni dormitory such as housewares.

Besides, we got two bicycles: Mine, given by Ben's dad; His, a new hybrid (mixing city cycle&mountain bike).

On the way, we stopped at IKEA to buy extra needs.

Although we rent a quite big van, finally it was quite full.

IKEA is too good. I like its simple design with the good variety but it took sooo long time to choose everything we needed...

We left Lincoln around noon and finally arrived at our new place in Brighton around 9pm...(of course including breaks and meals.

The moving did not stop there. We had to bring up all the stuff to 2nd floor...like sofa...

When we finished it, we were dead tired...

Off to bed without touching any of the stuff at that night. zzz...

But from the morning of the next day, we started unpacking.

By the end of the day, we finished it pretty much all.

But this was yet the 1st step.

Because at that time, I was still living in London for my internship.

2nd step: 23rd August

After our wedding, the route was again from Lincoln to Brighton but this time passing by my temporary house in London to get all my stuff.

Finally all our stuff got into our new place.

Our collaboration made a nice interior design in one part, Japanese style, one African and another British, hmmm, which means whatever..

We are both quite happy with the design☆

This is going to be our place at least for a next year.

Hearing the seagulls outside is really a sign of being nearby a beach☆

Why not once a month or two fresh fish&chips nearby beach :)

Look this huge fish! @ Banker, one of best F&C restaurants/shops in Brighton and even in the country (the shop was one of the finalists for the F&C competition in 2010 and 2011).

Also afternoon tea at home (for me, this is not for 'afternoon' but a proper lunch because it is big!)

With Ben's special scones♥

I cannot buy anymore already made scones :D

Brighton

Late July, I went to Brighton to see my, well our new place. It takes only one hour by train from London.

It is a one-room studio on 2nd floor of an ordinary house in a very quiet residential area. But it is well furnished and has roof windows!

It takes only about 10 minutes walk to the beach and about 15 minutes to the center of the city.

We will share the front door with the landlady who lives in the two floors below us. She seemed very kind. She is ceramic object creator and I quite like her style.

Ben made a great choice. I really liked its location and the interior as well☆
After meeting her, we headed to the beach. The weather was not too bad for a walk on seaside so I was so excited!
Right now, it is the middle of summer holidays so there are so many tourists yet it is not as hot as Japan or elsewhere (about max 23 degrees during the day) so there was few people swimming.

They rather enjoy the sun and the atmosphere of "summer vacation near/on the beach" West Pier was constructed in 1866 but closed in 1975 and burned in 2003.
Now there is another pier, "Brighton Pier" to attract tourists for coin games, snack food, restaurants, etc...

There are not only many tourists but also seagulls. They are not scared of humans.

As soon as they see the left over on a table at open terrace restaurants, they fight each other to get food...
This was happening just next to our table of a fish & chips shop.

Royal Pavilion is located in the middle of the town center. It was built by the order of the King of the Wales George IV in 18th century who used Brighton as his holiday house. For his taste, it was designed in Indian style outside and Chinese style inside.
We saw a guy making “origami” at the corner of a main street.
It was quite well done so Ben bought a flower for me although the guy did not care how much we put in the coin box and was just concentrated on making more.
Next topic will be moving to the lovely apartment in this lovely city!