Timetable 2009/10: MSc Human Evolution and Behavior

"i had begun to believe my blackened toenails
were on path to decay when, in truth
they had begun the gradual process of
CRYSTALLIZATION.
i am he who walks on wind scorned feet with toenails of
AMETHYST AND ROSE QUARTZ.
my path now crystal clear..."
-Saul Williams

My course list:

-Paleoanthropology
-Variation and Evolution of the Human Skull
-Statistics (ungraded, thank goodness)
-Primate Socioecology
-Primate Evolution and Environments
-Advanced Human Evolution
-Research Methodology (ungraded)
-Dental Anthropology (audit)

Other fun one-time lectures I will be required to attend:

-Human Population History: A Microevolutionary Analysis of Craniometric Variation
-Hunting, Meat-Eating and Self-Medication in Wild Bonobos
-The Political Ecology of Human-Elephant Conflict in Laikipia, Kenya
-Creationism in Europe
-Out of Africa Revisited
-Bears in the Living Room: Trophy Hunting and the Transformation of Human-Animal Relations
-Paternal Care of Offspring in Humans: Some Ultimate and Proximate Factors

Borough Market and Muswell Hill

"When each day is the same as the next, it's because people fail to recognize the good things that happen in their lives every day that the sun rises." - Paulo Coelho

Saturday morning, Emma, Kaytee (both roommates), Sam (Em's boyfriend), Rich (friend) and I hopped the tube down to London Bridge for the Borough Market. The Market runs Thursday through Satuday every week and hosts an amazing assortment of food and drink vendors. Delicious food and drinks included frsesh cheese, cheese, and did I mention CHEESE, meats (exotic meat, too!), jams, vegetables, fruit, chocolates, pastries, mushrooms, olives, fish, shell fish, breads, BEER (including Rouge from Oregon and Tusker from Tanzania), wines, pate, pasta, smoothies.............the list goes on forever.

The market was packed with people and spread out in three main market areas. Each little section of the market had its own feel and there was somewhat of a theme in vendors in each area...somewhat! The Jubilee market was under this huge glass covering,though the sides were open. The metal structure of the canopy was green and looked awesome with all the red and yellow tent covers of the vendors beneath. The Middle Market was inside in the same way Pike Place is. Finally the Green Market was pretty well open, but partly fell under thundering train tracks. Bordering the market is the Southwark Cathedral which was closed, but whose grounds served as an excellent and very beautiful spot to eat the snacks you just bought. Not that you really had to buy snacks as vendors offered an assortment of delicious samples. Grazing on samples acted as breakfast and lunch for us, in fact.

Emma, Kaytee, Sam and I had plans in the evening to cook dinner together and spent time at Sam's house in Muswell Hill (near Crouch End where I live). Throughout the day we picked up little goodies for our meal. On the list of our purchases: goat cheese, drunk cheese (cheese soaked in wine), MORE goat cheese, mushroom pate, hummus, salami, chorizo, and a mystery purchase by Sam. Highlights in the tasting area included: a hot chocolate drink (super thick, rich, melted chocolate...not at all like anything I had had before), flavored olive oils and balsamic vinegars, too many cheeses to count, wine, foie gras, sangria, and salsa.

After a few hours at the market, Kaytee, Em, Sam and I rushed back to Muswell Hill in time to feed Sam's chickens (yes, Sam has chickens!) before they went to bed at dusk. Once the chickens were full, Sam reveal to us his mystery contribution to our meal.....stuffed duck wrapped in Bacon. Since the duck had to cook a while the four of us popped our first bottle of wine and played Clue, which they call Cluedo here. Weird.

Dinner was aaaaaaamaaaaazing. Each bite was totally worth all the hard work that went into it. By hard work, I mean walking around the market all day being forced to accept delicious free samples. Dinner was not only delicious but rather hilarious as Sam graced us with a multitude of really excellent impersonations the highlight probably being Kermit the Frog and Miss Piggy.

This morning, after all crashing at Sam's, we had a small tour of Muswell Hill before heading back home to Crouch End, only a five minute bus ride south.

Priory Park

"The secret is here in the present. If you pay attention to the present, you can improve upon it. And, if you improve on the present, what comes later will also be better. Forget about the future, and live each day according to the teachings, confident that god loves his children. Each day, in itself, brings with it an eternity." - Paulo Coelho

Sitting in the grass at Priory Park. The quiet is unexpected and a relief after the constant hum of city on pavement. The buzz is still there, just farther away and thus more noticeable yet more of a relief. I can feel the sun on my skin for the first time since I arrived in London, my new home, one week and one day ago. Like a sun flower, I turn my face to soak in energy from the one true source.

As I sit, I try to connect myself to the source, the spirit, the universe...to ground myself in it. I find myself so easily swept into the human created stress of city life. These moments alone serve to bring me back, back to the recognition that all things are one, that if we focus on the present the future will care for itself, that our mind is part of one, not its own, being.

Sitting here, I see life I could not see busily, distractedly walking London streets. A squirrel plays in the tree above, jumping from branch to branch. A bee hovers over the grass. Two ants climb up my calf, an Everest for them. Children in strollers (buggies). "Uh oh, a squirrel and a cat! Do cats like squirrels, Mum?" A little boy in a floppy sun hat peering at his mom inquisitively, adorable, childish, British accent asking the question. I look for the cat, but don't see it. The squirrel now digs in the grass.

The park is beautiful: rolling green rises, paths stocked with benches, an old marble fountain from 1880. The whole park is surrounded by hedges and fences, insulators of the peace. Oak trees scatter the lawns. City noises are muffled and irrelevant here in my sunny patch. A spider hanging from his thread falls in front of my face. I lift my pen to lower him to a blade of grass.

The skies are so clear, so blue, that I am glad I don't have my camera as it would never do this day justice. Two birds communicate, one in chirps, one in clicks. As I tune my ears to the birds' frequency, I hear more calls now. They come from all around me. The squirrel still rustles behind me searching for food as the seated man before me rustles his plastic lunch sack for his midday meal. A white haired woman clutches her days shopping as she walks the path before me. The park must separate her house from the grocery. She walks with purpose, not to enjoy the scenery, yet she does not appear wholly unappreciative.

Just now, a long skirted woman, coffee in hand, stoops to collect leaves of red and brown matching her outfit and died hair. The red-brown of the fallen leaves and the woman's aura, contrast well with the still green grass and trees. Fall is perfect. Always an ending in fall, but also a clensing in some way. Like the trees, I try to clear myself so that I may nourish and grow again. If you do not empty yourself constantly, there is no room to take in the new, the present, the now. So here in the fall we have this opportunity to follow nature's lead, to clean and clear ourselves and sit attentively in the now, full observers, full participants, our eyes open, our ears scanning all frequencies, taking in, but never holding in.