England: where people compliment eachother's umbrellas.

It's a beautifully rainy day in England!
Saturdays are so nice, because it's the one day we can sleep in, since brunch isn't until 11am. It's good to feel rested for once.
This past week, the lecturer was John Allan, and he spoke on Ecclesiastes and also on "Facing the Modern World". I really enjoyed the Ecclesiastes study....
Last night was "Social night" where we could sign up for any of the different events they had...most of my roommates went to play laser tag in Morecambe, but I decided to stay at the castle. I started working on one of the assignments, but ended up falling asleep. HAHA Once my roomies got back, we spent forever searching the castle for food....the food here does NOT fill you up at all, so basically every night we are hungry. We tried calling to order pizza, but they wouldn't deliver at 11pm. Sad day. We found someone who gave us a plate of cookies, and then i remembered i had an apple, so Sarah, Chase, and I hung out in the kitchen and split the apple. haha good times.
Well, right now I'm in the prep room, and someone has been playing Christmas music, which makes me really excited for Christmas, but also really homesick. :'(
Today, I'm not really up to much...just relaxing around here, probably doing some homework, and then tonight my roomies and i are going to watch a movie and order pizza! :)

fluorescent//raindrops

ah, i love the rain!
I just want to write about a happy moment I had yesterday...
So...yesterday it was raining...and i mean legit raining, not the misty stuff we usually have. I decided to go on a walk around the loop. So I set off in my zebra-striped wellies and did not bring an umbrella (umbrellas are for wimps). I jumped in every puddle I saw, and then stopped at a bridge. It was beautiful to watch the raindrops fall onto the glassy surface before becoming the water flowing down the little stream. I just stayed on the bridge and thought/prayed/sang, and then all of a sudden, across the foggy, English countryside came a train!
I don't know...it was just one of those moments where I sat back and thought, "Wow...here I am in England, in the rain, on an adorable bridge, surrounded by pastures full of sheep and stone walls, and now a cute little train is passing!" It made me so happy.
I was definitely soaking wet by the time I made it back to the castle, but it was SO worth it.
go puddle-jumping sometime...without an umbrella.

Today is a beautiful day in England!
It feels like an autumn day in Minnesota, which makes me miss home and want to go to the apple orchard! :)
Today is Friday, which means WORK DAY! Half the students went to lectures, and the other half did work duties around the castle. I was in lectures last Friday, so i worked this week.
My job was to clean the conference hall rooms and bathrooms, just the sinks and mirrors and countertops. It is way more time-consuming than it seems, and took me from 9am-12:30 pm! haha
At least it's done.
Now my room is doing laundry, since Friday is our designated laundry day. I've never done laundry before, so this is interesting. ;) We are doing about 6 loads and are running out of detergent, so we're trying to stretch it and see how far we can make it last. HAHA
Tonight the girls in my room and I are ordering pizza from Carnforth and are going to have a movie night. I really love the girls in my room...we get along very well.
Last night was testimony night, where they drew names out of a bucket to see who would give their testimonies...I was prepared, but happy that mine was NOT called. :)
Off to do laundry, read the Old Testament, and try to read the book we need to write a report on.
love you! sarai

ps: san salvador is in central america.

*teatime*

I am so sorry it has taken me so long since i last updated this! We have limited internet time, and it is very slow because everyone goes on at once.
here is the schedule of my days here (not weekends):
6am-get up for a hot shower where the water does NOT run out.
7:30am-breakfast
9am-1pm-lectures
1pm-lunch
*freetime until dinner*
5:45-dinner
7-9pm-lectures
9pm-tea and coffee in the dining hall

my roommates and i have been having movie nights lately and end up getting to bed anywhere from midnight to 2am. :) Too bad we get along so well and have so much fun, otherwise we might get more sleep!
random stuff about school:
*the food is pretty bland here...we find ourselves craving mcdonalds...
*this morning, my shower actually ran out of water after about 2 minutes. i am learning to take VERY quick showers
*my room decided not to use our door anymore,,,instead we only enter our room through the window...it makes us feel more sneaky
*we like playing cards during free time, but i have noticed that only the German guys have a problem playing with my pink cards...they won't do it!
*we are reading through the old Testament while we are here...we had to be up to Genesis 42 by the end of the first week.
*inside jokes our room has: "carol! carol!" cochino!! crooossss the jordan! haha. ask if you want to know.
*today, 2 roommates and i were taking pictures after church, and were chased by a HUGE bee. you should have seen us all running around in our heels and screaming! haha
*here are some terms that are different in England:
-ping-pong is called "table tennis"
-soccer is "football"
-football is "american football"
-trash is "rubbish"
-getting in line is "queue-ing up"
-the letter Z is "zed"
*we have 6 lectures a day...it gets quite long sometimes.
*people from over here are CRAZY about soccer...it's ridiculous. haha

well, i don't know what else you want to know right now! Tell me if there is anything you were wondering or anything like that. Oh, it's raining here again right now! :) The rain here is really light, like a drizzle and sometimes just like a mist. I really want a thunderstorm!
love you all and miss you every day.
<3 sarai