Sushi... Yeah, made from scratch

This past week my flat and the flat across the hall got together and had a sushi night. Not only am I a huge fan of sushi, but we were making it from scratch and that was very exciting. One of the members who lived in the flat across the hall is a member in the UEA Japanese society. Sometime this semester they had sushi night and he learned how to make it from scratch. I am very glad that I was able to make sushi, cause I see myself in the future making sushi some nights back in the U.S. The quality of the sushi was not only great, but it only took about 5-10 minutes to make a roll with 8 pieces; talk about a deal. Check out some pictures from sushi night:

Ben, Amy, Becca, Guy, Alessio, Chyna, Gaiane, and Holly. Joe and I are out of the camera shot

Some of the ingredients used to make the sushi. 

One roll I made with salmon, egg, and cucumber. 

My late night snack edition of a California roll. Egg, cucumber, shrimp. Was just missing the avocado. Very tasty and good. It would have been a little better if I had wasabi for the soy sauce. Guess that will have to be next time. 

UEA Basketball

UEA Men's Basketball Team

The UEA Basketball team is a very international team. We are almost an even split of American players and non-American players. From the back row, left to right: we have Andy and Pete who are both from the UK, Greg an American and Dickinson Grad, Simon and James both from the UK, Bill from China's biggest basketball city, and Ben from Germany. On the bottom row from left to right we have Lee and Wen both from the same city in China as Bill, Me, Coach, Dwight an American representing West Philadelphia, Sean an American from Clementon, and Abi who's from London.

3-pointer from the corner

Foul shot

Our season so far has been slightly up and down. We have played very well together as a team, but struggle at times due to our lack of organized practice. We typically play games twice a week, Wednesday and Saturdays, and have practice on Sundays and Fridays. Friday's practice is the only practice that coach attends. He cannot make all of the commitments, even games on Wednesdays, due to his teaching job, and residence is about an hour away. This past Wednesday we played the best team in BUCS and lost by two. We compete in two separate leagues, BUCS and The English National League. The competition in the National League is much better than the competition in BUCS; typically the teams have bigger, more talented, but much older players. The game photos above are from a National League game against Bedford. As you can maybe tell from the photo the players are much older, late twenties, some in early thirties. Although the BUCS leagues is slightly less competitive than the National League, the players are all at University, and the game tends to have a much higher tempo and more athletic plays from the competition. Overall, both leagues are a lot of fun. I have had to miss some BUCS games due to class conflicts on Wednesdays, the National League games will not be missed since they are the more valuable games and on Saturdays. 

London Round I

This past Monday I went to London for a few hours, as I had some business to take care of at the U.S. Embassy. Once I was done at the embassy I had about two hours to walk around the city and check out some sites. This was really my first impression of London and I liked it a lot as a city. I thought it was a modern city with a lot of culture and history filling the streets; however, everything is unreasonably expensive, in particular the cabs. Since I only had about two hours, I didn't get to see much of what I wanted, or really check any sights out for an extended period of time. Here are some pictures I took while I was there:

U.S. Embassy

Marlborough Head Pub - great English food. I got Bangers and Mash, sausages and mashed potatoes in a gravy like sauce. Probably 3-4 blocks away from the embassy.

Queen Victoria Memorial outside of Buckingham Palace

Buckingham Palace

Educational experience outside the palace

Royal Guards

Great Posture

Queen Elizabeth statue

Art to right of Queen Elizabeth

Art to left of Queen Elizabeth

Cool art below King George VI

Government building with London Eye in background

Random guard

Big Ben

Memorial for the Women of WWII

More Big Ben

Coastal Erosion in Norfolk

Erosion north and east of Norwich, in communities boarding the North Sea is problematic. Today as a class we traveled to the communities of Happisburg and Sea Palling and learned about erosion and the problems associated with it. Happisburg, a community just north of Sea Palling, has been trying to build barriers through a seawall. By doing this they are directly effecting the erosion at Sea Palling, just south. Sea Palling has tried to mitigate the effects by creating off shore breakwaters. After the educational experience at each location we had some time to check out the beach and explore.

Happisburg

Happisburg Cliffs 

More Cliffts

Professor and some of the group

Sean and I fighting on seawall

Sea Palling breakwater

Professor explaining Sea Palling

In the offshore breakwater

UEA/Dickinson Courses

So far my three UEA classes - Introduction to Social Anthropology and Development, Development of Sub-Saharan Africa, and Corporate Finance - have gone very well. Introduction to Social Anthropology looks at different aspects of societies and the impact they have on their culture, and how development should be approached based on what the societies value. The major project for this class is a essay on an ethnography I am reading - Death Without Weeping: The Violence of Everyday Live in Brazil. This ethnography looks at the hardships that people in Bom Jesus Brazil have to overcome; in particular, the relationship between mothers and their children.

Development of Sub-Saharan Africa is somewhat similar to the introduction of social anthropology because it looks at various factors that have affected the development of Sub-Saharan Africa. The main topics we have discussed so far have been British and French Colonialism in Africa and the different methods that have been used affecting the countries today. For this class I also have a big essay, but in this essay I need to pick a key reason why economic performance has been poor in Africa since there is a general agreement that economic growth is needed to reduce poverty in sub-Saharan Africa. This essay is the most interesting to me because I will be able to combine my economics background and internship experience from last summer where I looked at African Development Corridors and Regional Economic Communities. To this point, I believe that I will approach this essay through the RECs and Development Corridors, but I have a lot research to conduct before I finalize my thoughts.

My final UEA class, Corporate Finance, has also gone very smooth to this point. In this class we have looked at corporate structure and the different factors that influence CEOs, their management, and their income. For this class my essay is to evaluate the effects of CEO fame (awards) and fortune (pay) on firm value. I have the most time to write this essay, and I am grateful for that because I have a lot of research I need to complete before i can develop a solid argument for this paper. For this class I also have a presentation at the end of the semester, but I have not looked at my topic yet, or met with my group since it is in the final week of the semester.

For our Dickinson class, Science of Sustainability, we are reading Why We Disagree About Climate Change and are learning about various forms of sustainable energy. Last week in class we watched Al Gore's film "An Inconvenient Truth," and had a class discussion. This week we are going to look at Wind Energy in the UK by taking a trip to Sea palling, Hapisburg. I am pretty excited for this trip because, besides the educational value associated with it, this trip is going to let me see another part of the UK that I have never been to. For this class I also have to make a presentation on Geothermal Energy. I have not put any thoughts together yet, or looked at the requirements, but think it will be a good topic to learn about.

BrIdGiNg ThE gAp

This weeks premier went pretty smooth. There were some minor technical difficulties, but like any form of adversity, we found a way to overcome. We, the DJs, would like to thank everyone for all the love we received. As the questions and requests poured in, we tried to answer the ones that were most appropriate, we apologize for not playing all of the requests, and not answering all the questions. Tune in next week, same time to have your request or question answered.

DJ Seany D

DJ Money Mic

DJ Mars McPluto

Mic and Mars

Seany D

Mars singing about Kobe

Seany D and Mic

Again we would like to thank all of our listeners for the love we received tonight. We are preparing for a new and exciting show next week. Any suggested topics can be emailed to mjaron5@gmail.com or texted into the studio.

Work Hard, Play Hard

On Thursday and Saturday nights the majority of campus goes out to either a club in town, or the student run club on campus, the LCR. Each night has different events/themes where the majority of people in the club are dressed up for that night. The LCR has had nights including Jocks v. Geeks, Australian Beach Party, and the Pirate LCR. All of these themes have been a lot of fun, we have enjoyed dressing up, and enjoyed breaking it down on the dance floor. 

Some of the British guys from nearby flats

Sean and I dancing at Mercy

Sam and I doing the John Wall at Mercy

Sean, Milli, Amy, and Me at Jocks v. Geeks LCR night

Week Three

My third week in Norwich started off with a one the best meals I have here. My Chinese friends from the basketball team made Mikey and I authentic Chinese food. Not only is Chinese food my favorite food, but it was great to have Chinese food that wasn't Americanized. Lee, on the right in the picture was the primary cook. He made a great meal: two types of chicken wings, fried rice, steamed vegetables, beef stew, and lettuce. It was plenty of food, and Mikey and I gladly did the dishes for the cook.

Wenn, Mikey, Me, Lee

Some of the food, nothing really left

This past weekend included trips to Morrisons, the local grocery store, and the train station to purchase a train ticket to London. On February 7th I will be traveling to London for the day to take care of some paperwork and business. I am excited for this trip because I will have a few hours to kill after my appointment and before my return train to walk around the city, take pictures, and view sites. 

Tomorrow night is the kick off premier for our radio show "Bridging the Gap," make sure to tune in at 5:30pm EST!