Important relics the English have ripped off from the rest of the world... aka The British Museum

Hi everyone,

I’m sorry it’s been almost a week since I’ve posted anything. I’ve had some really late nights this past week trying to get some work done “after work” at the clinic, then spent Thursday evening at the British Museum and Friday night traveling to Dorset to spend the weekend at Willie Botterill’s house in the country.

The first week of the ages 10-14 intensive therapy program was, well, INTENSE. The families come each day from 10-3:30 pm, with an hour for lunch at 12:30. Other than that, there is one brief (maybe 10 minutes?) break in the morning and the rest of the time, both parents and kids are working like dogs. The kids practice fluency tools about 3-4 times per day for about 20 minutes; the rest of the time is spent learning about stuttering, communication, talking about how thoughts and feelings influence our behavior, and doing behavioral “experiments.” For instance, on Friday the kids brainstormed all the possible reactions they believe other people have when seeing them stutter. They then had to write down how it made them feel when other people did X (e.g., laugh at them, tease them, make fun of them, etc.), rate how strongly they felt that feeling, then rate how likely it would happen if they stuttered in front of someone. After they’d made these ratings, the other clinicians and I took them out in the neighborhood and WE stuttered to strangers (asking them where the nearest Tube stop was, where could we find a pharmacy, etc.) and the kids’ job was to watch to see what reactions we got. Afterwards, we checked out whether their predictions actually came true and how they felt about what they saw. It was pretty fun.

The parents group meets while the kids are meeting, and they discuss all kinds of things… Their worries for their children, what communication is actually about, how to give praise, how to deal when their kids have meltdowns… they also practiced stuttering with one another and had to go out and stutter to a stranger as well. Probably the neatest part of the parents group that I was able to witness was the parents discussing their thoughts, feelings, behavior, and physical responses when they see their child stutter, and developing the understanding of how their reactions influence how their child reacts in situations like that.

The kids’ regular speech therapists (from their home area) also spend 1 day with the groups, ½ the day with the parents and ½ the day with the kids, to observe what’s taking place. They stay afterwards for about an hour to discuss what they observed and figure out if there are any changes they need to make to the child’s therapy program when he/she returns to regular speech therapy. This week, each family will bring the siblings in to spend a day in the program as well. The clinicians do a family session with each family to teach the whole family how to do problem-solving and discuss any issues that might need to be talked about as a whole group.
It’s amazing to be a part of both of these groups. I’ve gotten lots of good therapy ideas that I can implement even in individual therapy with kids back at FSU, and I am beginning to feel more confident about working with parents as well.

We have one more week with this age group, then the teenager intensive group starts next week and runs for 2 weeks. The teens come on their own; parents only come in 1 day.

As I mentioned, Thursday evening I went to the British Museum. It has all kinds of artifacts, mostly ancient ones, from around the world. It’s been in continuous operation since 1753, and contains things like King George III’s library (the King who was in charge during the Revolutionary War). It’s divided into galleries by regions of the world: India, Africa, Egypt, Ancient Europe, Greece, the Americas, etc. The bottom line: it’s filled with stuff the British ripped off from these regions when they were going around conquering everyone. Even British citizens will tell you that it’s all been ripped off. They have quite a few priceless things in their collection, and it’s cool because they let you take pictures inside the museum. The pictures I took are posted here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/nedc/sets/72157606283577685/

Because I went in the evening, all the galleries weren’t open like they are in the daytime, so the only thing I didn’t get to see that I set out to see that night was the Lindow Man, a 2000 year old mummified dude that was preserved in a peat bog up until about 15 years ago. I guess he was so well-preserved that you can still see parts of his clothing and his red hair. That gallery was closed, unfortunately. However, I DID get to see the real Rosetta stone, the stone that allowed people to decipher hieroglyphs and another ancient language. I also saw loads of mummies and sarcophagi from Egypt, and these really important pieces of the Parthenon (an ancient Greek building built about 2500 years ago) called the Elgin Marbles. They are called that because Lord Elgin, in 1801-1805, brought them back to England and gave them to the Museum. They’re not really marbles (I actually thought they WERE the kind of marbles you played with but they must be extra-special-really-neat or something), they’re statues and carvings MADE of marble. Once again, I’m an idiot.

There’s a big stink now about Greece wanting these marbles back because their view is that the English ripped them off (which they did) and they should be located in Greece as part of their national heritage. It’s such a politically hot topic that the museum has a little brochure about it in the gallery where the marbles are on display, and although they are trying to be all politically correct about the whole stink, they are obviously biased. Here’s some information straight from the brochure:
1. Parthenon Sculptures in Athens: Recently the Greek authorities have continued the process of removing the sculptures from the Parthenon, work that began over 200 years ago. Nearly all of the sculptures have now been removed from the building. They are being transferred to the New Acropolis Museum, which is due to open in 2008. (Lisa’s comment: Pretty objective and factual, right?)
2. Parthenon Sculptures in London: The sculptures in London, sometimes known as the “Elgin Marbles,” have been on permanent public display here in the British Museum since 1817, free of charge. Here they are seen by a world audience of five million visitors a year and are actively studied and researched to promote worldwide understanding of ancient Greek culture. The Museum has published the results of this research extensively. (Lisa’s comment: Hello, like a world audience wouldn’t view them in Athens, study them, or results be published? Give me a break!).

I’m going back to the Museum this coming Thursday; they have a special exhibition opening called Hadrian: The Empire, about Hadrian, one of the most famous and violent Roman emperors. It’s going to be such a big and special exhibition that you have to buy a ticket with a timed entrance to even be able to get into it. I’m also going to try to see the African and Asian galleries, neither of which I had time to see last week. Plus, I spent about 2 hours at the museum and at some point, it becomes sort of overwhelming. There’s only so much plunder you can take in at one time.

Also on tap for sightseeing this coming week: The National Gallery, which is the premier art gallery in the country (that’s Wednesday night), and the Victoria & Albert museum Friday night. The V&A has a bunch of textiles and things – clothing, tapestries, etc. from ancient times through today. There’s a special exhibition going on right now of the costumes the Supremes wore when they performed in the 60s that I’ve heard is really cool that I’m going to try to see. Then Saturday, I plan to go to the Tower of London, where you can see the Crown Jewels and the place where they used to chop people’s heads off and torture folks back in medieval times. Sounds gross but also fascinating. I really like all the history here, and you get such an appreciation of how people in Europe have preserved their history and value old buildings and things vs. how in America we think it’s great to rip old stuff down and build something new and shiny in its place. Sunday may be the day I go to Kensington Palace, or I might just hang out and do laundry, etc.

I have to say, I really am enjoying living here much more than I anticipated. I actually think I could live here full-time and would love to work at the Centre. However, there are things I miss a ton about home (besides Ned, Lindsey, Kaitlyn, Zoey, and all my friends/family). I miss caffeine-free Diet Coke. You can get Diet Coke here, but not caffeine-free. In fact, I haven’t seen any caffeine-free sodas at all. I miss ice machines. Fiercely miss them. And I really miss someone to have dinner with. Every day all the clinicians eat lunch together which is nice, but having dinner by myself every night is getting old. I also miss the Bravo, TLC, and A&E channels. TV here leaves a lot to be desired.

Ok, here it is, my British update for this blog:

-- This week I finally was brave enough to ride the bus instead of taking the Tube everywhere. The first one I rode was a regular sort of bus, but the second one I rode was a double-decker. I sat up top and took pictures of people below me.

-- Men here don’t typically wear wedding rings, and an overwhelming number of women wear just a simple gold band. I’ve only met maybe 3 women so far who have any sort of diamond in their ring. The simple gold band goes for anyone, no matter what their income or social status.

-- The computer keyboards have similar keys but in different places. The letter keys are all in the same place, but the number 2 has quotation marks “ instead of the @ sign. Also, the # symbol is on the regular keyboard (where the quotation mark should be) vs. on the number 3. In my opinion, this is messed up. It also makes using the computers at the clinic to check my email because my password has the # sign in it and I always forget that it’s not on the 3, then get irritated that I can’t get logged in and start getting pissed at FSU for the email system being down or messed up. It takes me about 5 minutes to remember it’s me not using the right keys.

-- They have loads of different types of radio programs on – soap operas, talk shows, etc. that are different than from what we’d have in America. The kind of stuff you’d expect to see on TV vs. hear on the radio.

-- New words:

* Taking a Mickey Michael = making fun of someone. Most of the time they just say, “taking the mickey out of someone” or “taking a mickey.” That was very confusing when I first heard the parents and kids using the term.

* Chuffed = pleased. The parents were talking about one of the kids talking to a stranger on the Tube and how chuffed she was with herself afterwards. The weird thing is, that once I heard the parents use the term, then I noticed the kids and clinicians using it too. I guess it surprised me because I’d been here 3 weeks and hadn’t heard anyone use that word until about Wednesday of this last week. I really like this word.

* Crotty = crappy or nasty-looking. “That fruit looks a bit crotty, doesn’t it?”

* They pronounce “issue” as “iss-you,” without the /sh/ in it. They also pronounce “schedule” as “shed-yule,” without the /k/ sound. Their calendars are “diaries,” including appointment schedules – “Let’s check the diary to see when they are shed-yuled to come in.” I also heard some people this week saying “CON-tri-bute” instead of “con-TRIB-ute.” Not everyone pronounces it this way, but it seems that people from Wales especially say it this way.

I’m finding that some of the English expressions/vocabulary are creeping into my speech. The other day I said, “All right, then” as I was ending a conversation at the clinic, and I’ve also started saying things are “brilliant.” I don’t even think about it. It’s funny to me that I would have picked this stuff up so quickly, vs. never saying “might could” even though I’ve lived in the South for 6 years now!

I love the way the British are so specific with their language (no one uses words like “things” or “stuff”) and how they don’t drop word endings (they say “working” instead of “workin’”). And they don’t really use slang as much as we do, “So he was like…, then I was like…” I’m going to try to work on being more specific and getting rid of some of the slang myself, just because it sounds so much nicer.

As I mentioned earlier, I’m in Dorset this weekend at Willie Botterill’s country house (i.e., MANSION – it has 13 bedrooms and 10 bathrooms). I’m going to write a separate blog about it, probably on Monday or Tuesday, because it’s a whole set of pictures and stories in and of itself.

All right, then!

Love,
Lisa