Continued: Chocolate Testing

Well, I bought some more snack food to conduct research on. The first one was the control of the experiment - a Twix, a snack common to both England and USA. I ate it, of course, and there's no need to analyse that one because we all know what a Twix tastes like. So the next on my list is one I was going to review last time, but ate. That's right...

#3: "Whatchamacallit"

- First Impressions: A funny name.

- Findings: Omg! Wtf! This is a breakthrough! This is delicioso! This is phantasmagorical! The only way to truly describe it's flavour is that its... well, its... whatchamacallit... In fact, I had to read the description on the wrapper to figure it out: "Peanut flavour crisp, caramel, rich chocolatey coating"... Whatever it is - it's good.

- Observations: The first time I tried to review it, I realised I'd eaten it before I could say "whatchamacallit". Pretty good stuff!











That's it for now!

(P.S. Hmm. Maybe it was not "phantasmagorical":
Phantasmagorical
adjective: characterized by fantastic imagery and incongruous juxtapositions; "a great concourse of phantasmagoric shadows."

Well, I guess the fantastic imagery of the peanuts was incongrously juxtaposed with the caramel.)

(P.P.S I was going to review the donuts I ate last time, so I bought another pack, but I ate those too. Oops. At least I have an excuse to buy a third pack and eat those in the name of research).

Archaeology and bears

Yesterday was a tiring day hiking and doing archaeology. The team was: Me and Fran, a man named Dan - one of Fran's close colleagues - and another volunteer lady (much older and more experienced than me). Oh, and Dan's great big doggie: Cargo. Here’s Cargo:

Anyway, we went out to a site where they suspect there may have been some prehistoric settlements – they have to check out its historical significance, because there’s a huge new prison planned to be built on that site. We had to hike for ages, all the way up these steep hills, and through swamps and dense, thorny bush... There's this horrible spikey stuff called "Devil's club" which is everywhere. Here I am taking a rest in the grass:

When we finally got to where we were heading - a high point which looked out over a large area, a good possible location for any prehistoric houses – we used a shovel to dig a couple of holes called "test pits" to see if there was anything around indicating a settlement.…and I found something again! Just as we were about to give up and fill our pit back in (it was full of boring old rocks), I felt something chinking against my trowel. It was only just poking into the side of the pit; I thought it was just another big ole’ rock, but I wanted to get it out anyway. It took me about ten minutes of carefully digging around it - the whole time I was thinking "why am I bothering wasting my time digging a dumb rock out?!" But eventually I pulled it out and this is what I found:

Unfortunately I forgot to took a picture of it OUT of the hole... (Archaeologists take pictures of things while they’re still in the ground, and try not to disturb them until the last minute). We did take it back with us, but I didn't get another photo. It's actually about a foot long, obviously some kind of big tool. It had notches all down one edge, where it had been used to chip away at something. So it was exactly what we were all looking for.

But here’s what I think is the most interesting part about yesterday: we were right in the wilderness, unreachable by car – so we were in BEAR territory! Bears are incredibly dangerous, I have come to learn. There are stories all the time of people being killed by bears. They don’t attack viciously, only to protect their cubs, or if the bear is taken by surprise - bears usually avoid humans, but if you surprise one, it will attack. So the best way to defend yourself in the first place is to make sure they KNOW you’re there in the first place – that way they can mooch on by and avoid you. Ironically, this means calling the bear! All day, we had to yell “Yo, bear!” and “Helloooo bear!” at the top of our lungs, as we were moving through the forest.

Of course, we had to take other precautions. Dan carried a shotgun with him, and we all carried something of our own… Guns are actually not very good against bears because they will continue to attack even after they’ve been shot – and that’s if you manage to hit them in the first place: they can run at 40mph and you only really have around 2 seconds to react. So what WE carried (and I thought this was hilarious when I first heard of it) is “bear spray”! It’s actually just high strength pepper spray in a big can that can be released quickly – you can’t buy it in England because it’s considered a firearm!

It made me laugh because it reminded me of something funny I saw a while ago – an old 60s Batman fight scene with a shark. Batman asks Robin to hand him the “Shark-repellant Bat Spray”, which subsequently causes the shark to explode. I wonder if the bear spray would work the same way?

Here I am in the wilderness with all my tools, you can see the bear spray in a sort of leg holster:

Another eventful day! (Shopping, dinner with strangers, more shopping!)

Hey again! Today was another busy day! It started out kinda late, I slept in a while, and Jack drove me to the little (but I guess big in Alaska terms) town of Palmer, where Fran works. Jack left to go to work, and Fran took me out for lunch in Palmer.

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Interestingly, Palmer is NOT a gold rush town (like most places round here!). It's actually the only Alaskan community that grew up around an agricultural, farming industry. But even then it's not boring! It is actually the "colony" town. It's not even a hundred years old, but in America, that's old, so its a historical town. Here's the story as I understand it: In the Great Depression, loads of people were unemployed, starving, poor, etc.... So President Roosevelt sent about 200 farming families from the state of Michigan to build a new life and community in Alaska - gave them loans and land to help get set up, etc. That was in 1935! Nowadays, there are still "colony kids" surviving - but they are obviously all in their 70s and 80s! This is Palmer station (no longer in use apart from tourist trips, I think) and a lot of the buildings round there look like this, because they're all from that era:

So after I had lunch with Fran, she had to go back to work, which gave me about 3 hours to wander around town, look at the shops, etc. It's actually a really small town for me, but it had some nice places. I didn't really get to look round the shops as much as I'd liked because I did one of my silly impulse things again... Can you guess? I doubt it, because it's not something I usually do...

.

...I had a haircut! Seriously, I NEVER have my hair cut in England, I haven't visited a hairdresser for years. It's mostly because hairdressers are often bitchy bimbos or chavs in England, and I feel judged every time I visit one. But I passed a hairdressers and figured "this is America. Everyone is friendly!" and then I thought "this is the perfect opportunity to get a haircut!". And I was right.. It was a bit expensive for a haircut no-one will even notice, but it was worth it just to have my hair cut by someone that's not trying to be Paris Hilton. I asked the hairdresser to take a picture afterwards, just in case anyone's interested. This is the result:

I know, nothing dramatic :-) But I had fun, they put me in one of those dryers that go over your head! XD

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Anyway, later on, while my aunt was at another meeting, I had a dinner date in Anchorage with a family I've never met before, and neither had Fran! Basically, a friend of Fran's knew a friend of hers that had a 16-year-old daughter who is visiting England next week, so she thought it might be good for us to hook up. So we did! It was kinda weird going out for dinner with someone you have never met before, but it worked out so well. The girl's name is Zoya, and she bought one of her friends along. They're all from Anchorage. Her mum (or "mom") paid for my dinner and everything, they were so nice. And the weird thing is we had enough in common - they had roughly the same sort of fashion sense as me, Zoya likes Muse, and so on... This is us with a fake bear (don't ask):

They seemed to understand my touristy desires so they didn't mind taking pictures of me next to dumb Alaska related objects/shops/animal statues. For example:

And there's PLENTY more where that came from. Trust me, I have been taking pictures of EVERYTHING (especially food) - and what you see here is just a pale reflection of what is on my SD card!

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So these girls (Zoya and Maddie) also understood my shopping needs. They fortunately have the same taste and budget as I, so they took me to this American mall, and (because we didn't have much time after dinner, Fran was due to finish her meeting) they directed me straight to the best stores:

So I bought 4 lovely lacey vest tops ($10 each - cheap!), 2 t-shirts, and a pair of cute denim hotpants! Okay, okay, I know that's really boring, hearing about my shopping purchases, but I get a kick out of it, so what the hell! I bought all that from American Eagle, which is a really cool store (better than Gap, cheaper than Abercrombie & Fitch)

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Don't worry, I won't be spending too much of my time or money clothes shopping, because I'm not going to be in Anchorage too often. In fact, I probably won't go again until Zoya gets back from her 2 week holiday in England, when I will be emailing her begging for her to take me shopping again! Heh. (Did I mention she drives!? She's 16 and she drives!)

If only making friends was so easy in England, I wouldn't be so worried about starting Uni in October...

We interrupt this chocolate broadcast...

Unfortunately the testing went wrong when a terrible "incident" occured. The next two chocolate bars on my research list were uncontrollably tasty in comparison with their predecessors, and they were consumed instantly. R.I.P Hershey's "Whatchamacallit" and "Skor" bars. (Oh, and I ate all the donuts I was going to review too)

However, do not fear, my friends, the chocolate research will continue at some point, I am here for three months and there are entire Wal-Marts full of tasty snacks for me to try.

Meanwhile, it was a sunny day yesterday, so Jack took me out for a drive when he came home from work, so we could see the mountains, and also so we could have something to eat (after I ate the Whatchamacallit bar and the Skor bar and the donuts, I forgot to have lunch). Some views:

Anyway, on our drive we looked out for a store to buy a sandwich for me. We stopped at this kooky, tiny store - one of those places that's in the middle of no-where, that has just one gas pump outside. But it was such a small store they didn't have sandwiches, so we carried on driving. Then, we saw this place:

Looked just about right for food! So we went in to the store, and a big fat friendly lady shooed us into the (empty) cafe, which looked like this:

They were extremely friendly there. The young guy who served us was sort of cute because he looked like Elijah Wood. But then I noticed his shirt said "World's Greatest Dad" so that put me off. Anyway, the food was so cheap. In fact, everything is cheap here compared to England (at least, it is cheap when you're using money earnt back home) Things look like they're the same price as they would be in the UK, but then you realise there's a dollar sign. I mean, a Subway in England costs about £4. Here, it's about $4. That's pretty much half!

So this place had hamburgers and other such meals for about $5. We were both hungry so we ordered. I ordered a "child size" hamburger because the other choices sounded too big for me. Can I just repeat that: CHILD SIZE. SIZED FOR CHILDREN. Here is what they call "Child Size":

O. M. G... Anyway, this hugely fat guy toddled in, and I could tell right away that he's a real redneck type. He had this drawling accent and he seemed to just reek of low intelligence. (In a good way) He didn't actually want to order, he was just waiting for his son to buy some ice cream, I think. When the guy asked him if he wanted to order, he just goes "Naaah! Ah jus' wanna watch this here gal eat thayut burger!" (Sorry, I couldn't sneak a picture of him)

Well, I finished a lot of the meal, considering its little ol' me. They gave us a "to-go" box to take home what we left (Jack and I both left tonnes of these chips).

So that was yesterday!
(Oh yeah, and Jack had reindeer sausage in his meal! Yeeugh!)

Chocolate Testing

#1: "3 Muskateers"

- First Impressions: This claims to have a "Whipped up, Fluffy Chocolate-on-Chocolate Taste", and sells itself on being a "lighter" option (with 45% less fat than the average leading chocolate brand, etc etc).

- Findings: From the picture on the front, I was expecting it to be pretty much identical to the English Milky Way bar (light and fluffy, etc). In a way, I was right. But, this is American, and I would say that it is certainly not a "light" option snack. It's like Milky Way on steroids.

-Observations: There were two bars in the wrapper, and I could only just finish one.




#2: "Butterfinger Crisp"

- First Impressions: This thing is a wafery chocolate bar, I'm sure there's an English equivalent but I can't think of one (its nothing like kit-kat, it's softer).

-Findings: It was very nice, especially the first bite. I thought "yummm" as it melted in my mouth. But after the second bite it started to become just as sickly as the 3 Muskateers bar, and I gave up less than a quarter of the way in.

-Observations: I noticed that the sweet goo between the wafer was orange coloured, although not orange flavoured. Interesting. Also, one small bar (only 50 grams!) contains 45% of your recommended daily allowance of fat. Nice.





That's all I could handle this afternoon folks! (And I am usually capable of eating a truckload of chocolate at once, though this IS America, and this IS American chocolate...)

Watch out for the rest later!

Another update!

Today I didn't do that much because I caught up on a lot of sleep (i.e. I stayed in bed really late). Fran had to go out and do something for work, so Jack took me out for lunch at Subway. It's true what they say about America, EVERYTHING is drive-thru. All the fast food places are; there are drive-thru sandwich places, there are even drive-thru espresso places EVERYWHERE, even in the middle of nowhere.

Anyway, I bought a big selection of American chocolate/snack food to test out. It was over $10 worth so I actually had to explain to the lady in the shop that I wasn't just being a piggy, but that I was English, and it was purely for cultural cuisine research purposes. I will be photographing each one along with my verdict, so watch out for that soon :-) (Also, the ones I like are the ones I will be buying more of to bring back for guys back home, especially my mum!)

After our lunch we had a little drive around to see some of the local sights (fishing spots, kooky local buildings, bashed up ancient cars, etc) and this is what I found!!!! Not a moose, but still awesome:



A reindeer farm! ^_^

(PS: Calm down guys! I have only seen one moose so far and they're not always around in the summer! I might not see one for a while, but if I do, I'll be sure to post a picture :-)

Here I am!

Well, I've managed to find a wireless internet connection buzzing around in the air - even though we're in the middle of nowhere... It's pretty weak and it keeps going off, so I will try and get something posted quickly! :-)

Okay, well I finally arrived, obviously. The flight from Houston to Minneapolis was great, I even filmed take-off and landing on video to watch later on. The flight from Minneapolis to Anchorage was not so great, it was about 6 or 7 hours and it was very boring. But this is what I saw out of the plane window as I was approaching landing in Anchorage:


















Awesome or what? Anyway, here's another one. This is the FIRST shop I saw as I arrived in Anchorage airport:


So anyway, yesterday was my first real day here and it was pretty action packed considering.

We went to Fran's archaelogical site, where they are excavating a "gold assayer"'s house from a gold rush town. The assayer is the man who tells people the value of the gold, and he would also extract gold from things like quartz. They use chemicals, so we generally have to wear gloves in case we find a crucible with mercury all over it or something. Anyway, I had a find! I found a huge piece of ceramic, the same ceramic that made the crucibles we kept finding everywhere, but this was far too chunky to be a crucible. It was all in bits so we had to pack it up carefully for reconstruction later on. Here are some pics:













So there's the artifact all wrapped up and labelled, there's the picture of it in the ground so we know what position it was in, and there's me with my find :-) Okay, I know it might look like a crumbly old bit of rock but when you see it you can see how shiny the glaze is and you know it's ceramic :-)

So that was the site. Later on in the evening we went up the mountains to "celebrate" the solstice. Interestingly, the idea of "celebrating" the solsitice is ridiculous to everyone who lives here. They hate the solstice, because it means that from now on, it will start getting darker. It starts incrementally at first, getting darker by a few seconds every day, but later on they start losing 20 minutes a day, until the winter where it is dark almost all of the time. But at the moment it is so weird! It is day ALL the time! It is day all night! It is twilight around 2am for a while, but then it's day again!

We had a meal on the mountain, Jack bought a small gas burner and we had hot dogs (yum) That picture was taken at about 11 at night, and yes, it looks like day! We came home before midnight though, I was so tired.
























(I look huge because I'm wearing about 15 layers of clothing, it was cold!) Anyway, that's pretty much it for now. I will leave you with some pictures of the very American food I ate on my way here:

The packet of Cheez-It Snack Mix was so massive I still have loads left. Basically, in my 40-or-so hours of travelling to Anchorage, I became a junk food addict. But its okay, Fran and Jack make good food. (Although I did have pancakes with maple syrup yesterday for breakfast, and I'm hoping for waffles today ^_^)





Hope to update again soon!

Love Rebekah

The horrors of flying (alone!)

Well, today was ridiculous!

Got up at 3am, had a shower, left home with Mum and Ryan at 4am. Arried at Heathrow some time around 7, to catch my first flight to Houston at 11pm.

Then I found out it was delayed, which meant I would miss my connecting flight from Houston to Alaska. They told me I'd be put up in a hotel in Houston, which I didn't mind at first. I spent hours waiting around in Heathrow and I even got pally with the Continental airlines staff, who invited me behind their desk for smoothies. Everyone was very helpful, which was surprising, for England.

When I got on the plane at last, I had a pretty good seat, by the window. I thought "awesome, a nice view". Then a fat man and his fat wife sat next to me and made me feel claustrophobic, so I moved to an aisle seat. The flight was just so dull and boring (10 hours) that I even watched Ant Bully on the in-flight "entertainment" screen. Now, I'm not scared of flying but the landing was terrible. Yes, it was bumpy, but that wasn't the problem. The problem was that we were flying much higher than a usual flight, and we lost altitude very quickly in landing. It seemed like I was the only one affected though - everyone else seemed fine, but I had tears coming out of my eyes with pain. It felt like all my teeth were falling out and my ears were trying to implode my brain.

Finally got off the bloody plane (feeling groggy, tired, and in pain, made worse by the fact I have a cold) and had to wait AGES to go through Passport and Border control. Above the queuing area there was this TV screen with some kind of brainwashing subliminal messages of extrememly happy people (children, people enjoing food and sports, etc). At the same time, there was this exciting, dramatic, emotional music playing. I think the best way to describe it would be "Disney" music. And that's at border control! Americans are insane. (Talking of insane, the in-flight screen thing showed a presentation about how great Houston is. It says it has great cuisine. When it said that, it showed a clip of a tiny little toddler eating this massive burger... yup, great cuisine).

Anyway, AFTER border control, customs, and baggage reclaim, I went into the room that sorts out connecting flights and there were literally hundreds of other people waiting, and they're all from different places like Mexico, Honduras, Nigeria, etc. There were only 2 continental staff so I had to wait for about an hour. At this point I hadn't slept for hours OR had a drink since I got off the plane. No-one explained anything too me and I felt totally lost.

I also couldn't understand that while the staff in England were more helpful than expected, here in Texas the staff didn't seem to care. I was crying right there and they just didn't care. Now, I'm finally safe and sound in a hotel, but I do have to get up at about 5am tomorrow to catch an early flight to Minneapolis. That's right, you heard me, Minneapolis, Minnesota. Not Anchorage, not Alaska, Minneapolis. And then I have to change flights AGAIN for Alaska! It's ridiculous - if there are any more delays it will be so stupid. There were delays at Houston today because they had a massive storm (and by the way, it's boiling hot here even though it's night time).

I came out of the airport with some new boarding passes and a ticket for the hotel and a meal, and I was also still in tears.

Then, I finally met the REAL Americans. For a while I lost faith, because I saw how apathetic the American Continental workers were compared to the friendly English (friendly English, that is probably an oxymoron). But as soon as I came outside, there were a squad of lovely Americans right there to help me. One phoned up the hotel to make sure the right shuttle bus was coming for me. Another took my suitcases and put them in the back of the bus. Another one lent me his mobile phone to call my aunt and tell her what was going on. (This one was a particularly good example of a kind-hearted American, he even gave this old lady $12 because the airport only gave the old-lady's daughter one, and forgot her. The man didnt even know her!)



At dinner I hung out with this man and his friend - a woman, but not his wife, he has a wife but the woman he was with was part of his team helping orphans in Uganda. Then the man paid again for dinner (it came to more than the vouchers Continental gave us).

FRIENDLY TEXANS--->

This is crazy. This hotel, it's nuts. Its called the Days Hotel and it's HUGE. I look out my window and I can see the planes, but the room is a huge double room, it has huge corridoors and thousands of rooms. It had a really nice restaurant with a salad bar, which I opted for. I also opted for a "starter": potato skins (you know, the ones with cheese). Anyway, when you order those in England you get like one smallish potato cut in half. Here, they gave me the equivalent of three large jacket potatoes. Starters?! Everything you ever heard about Texas is true, and I've not even been here 12 hours yet. PROOF: the TV is on in my room and they're talking about the new "Cookie Diet".



I could talk about a lot more random things which happened today but I have been awake for well over 30 hours and I have to get up at 5am for my flight tomorrow.

<-----My room for one night!

Goodnight!

(one more thing - everyone is Mexican here)

Well, it's not long now!

Finished my bloody English Literature exams today - so that's one A-Level down! 2 to go though, I still have a Religious Studies exam on Monday and an English exam on the Wednesday.

<<<-------- My suitcase! All packed and full of goodies, with added stickers and ribbons and things to identify it on the conveyer belt!

I'm meeting my Nan on Tuesday, I have to go to Lewes to hand in my Student Finance blah. I wouldn't have to go to Lewes normally, but because they ask for your passport along with the loan application, and because I NEED my passport this month (^_^) I have to go the County Hall just to show them my passport and prove I'm not an illegal immigrant, etc. So I thought I'd go on the train and meet my nan on the way, that way at least I get to see someone I haven't seen for a long time, which surely relieves the boredom of the whole thing.

Anyway, that's all very uninteresting.

What IS interesting is that I am packed and ready to go to Alaska!

I'll be flying on a Boeing 777, which is one of the biggest jet planes in the world. It carries about 300 people! Surely, out of all those people, there must be someone on the plane I can socialise with and talk to, to make the hours pass.

My flight leaves Heathrow at 11.15am, so I have to leave home at about 4 or 5am to make sure I get the flight (in case of traffic jams, alien invasion, etc). That flight is 10 hours. It arrives at Houston, Texas at about 3.35pm there, and my connecting flight leaves at 5.30, so I only have an hour and 55 minutes to get on the flight! After that, it stops at Seattle for at least an hour, and finally gets to Anchorage at 11.26pm...

I'm really getting excited now. I'ts the furthest I've even been away from home (8,000 miles) and the first flight I've taken alone (and its a pretty long and complicated flight, which is daunting yet exciting). But Rebekah Wheatley loves her adventure and excitement so bring it on!

Woohoo! This summer's going to be great! Spain too, in September!


Bye for now, I'm going to be spending a lot of time revising this week.