I've come to look for America!
So, it's been a few days since I posted but things have been happening anyway! I am currently sitting in Maryland, just outside Washington DC, in this huge posh house that nevertheless has one of the slowest computers and crappiest keyboards I've seen in a long time. By huge, I mean HUGE. My room, the guest room (there may be more than one) comes with an ensuite that is literally the size of my bedroom at the Madhouse. The room itself is bigger. It has a king size bed. Also, there's some kind of amphora in the bathroom. I don't know what it's meant to do yet...
The dining room has a crystal chandelier, and the tv is quite possible wider than I am tall! I'm staying with a cousin of my mother's, who is a lawyer in Washington DC, so I guess he must be making a lot of money.
Anyway, when I last left you I was on my way to Amish Country. The drive took about 3 hours, and had virtually no scenery. They put up walls along the highway, presumably to block noise and stop people trying to cross. We took the New Jersey Turnpike part of the way, which prompted me to put on some Simon and Garfunkel :)
We arrived in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania around lunchtime and checked out some of the local attractions. It's all pretty rural, and there's little villages along the main road out of Lancaster city. In one of them we found the cutest little store you've ever seen! It was quite big actually, and was done up inside like a little village - with individual rooms being 'houses' of various kinds, and all the items making up the mise-en-scene were actually for sale. I took some pics :) It was run by an Amish guy too. We also went on a tour of an Amish house (no longer lived in, obviously) where we learned a lot of interesting information. Apparently they Amish are actually originally from Germany, but they're called Dutch because people didn't understand what they meant by 'Deutsch'. They have a lot of peculiarities of dress, and they don't use 'electric' (no one ever called it electricity, it was always 'electric'). Instead the power everything with gas. This is somehow different, and therefore ok. Even when they use gas to generate 'electric'. However, they seem to have no problem using electric outside the home, such as when working for non-Amish. Some of them even have cellphones! They usually ride around in horse-drawn buggies, and you can tell by the colour of the buggy whether the people are Amish or Mennonite, which is a related sect. The Mennonites are apparently more lenient though.
The B&B we stayed at was very quaint and pretty, but I didn't take pics. It was like this cottagey place, with different themed rooms and all sorts of knick knacks all over the place. Old-fashioned in a kinda picturesqe way, I thought it was just lovely! That night we went to see Fantastic Mr Fox, which was hilarious and I definitely recommend. In the morning we walked around an Amish farm which was no longer working, but still had all the buildings etc preserved. Did you know, tobacco is one of the major cash crops farmed by the Amish? I've never seen raw unrolled tobacco before - it's very leafy. We also got to take a ride in a genuine Amish buggy! Very exciting :) We went ticky-touring around the countryside with an Amish guy and got to visit an actual working farm. It had a lot of cows, and some of the hugest mules I've ever seen! Not that I've ever really seen a mule before, but usually they're supposed to be halfway between a horse and a donkey. These mules were larger than a Clydesdale! They must have some enormous horses and/or donkeys. The cows were very bony. Apparently they're just like that though.
You remember I mentioned the little villages along the main road? Well, they had some pretty strange names. One of them was called Bird-in-hand, but the best one was the one called Intercourse :D I'm not kidding, there's actually a village called Intercourse! You can bet they make good money selling souvenirs :P
So then we went back to NY, and that was Amish country. I picked up some postcards and Amish memorabilia (hehe, Intercourse lol!)
Nothing much happened on Friday night or Saturday, except I read a lot. And then on Saturday night it snowed!!! It was so exciting!!! I actually ran outside and frollicked :D I've never had it snow on me before - like actual snow, actually falling from the sky! We were going to go ice skating at an outside rink, but then it started raining and the snow turned to sleet, which is wet sloppy rainy snow. So instead we watched Dr Strangelove and made pizza :)
The dining room has a crystal chandelier, and the tv is quite possible wider than I am tall! I'm staying with a cousin of my mother's, who is a lawyer in Washington DC, so I guess he must be making a lot of money.
Anyway, when I last left you I was on my way to Amish Country. The drive took about 3 hours, and had virtually no scenery. They put up walls along the highway, presumably to block noise and stop people trying to cross. We took the New Jersey Turnpike part of the way, which prompted me to put on some Simon and Garfunkel :)
We arrived in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania around lunchtime and checked out some of the local attractions. It's all pretty rural, and there's little villages along the main road out of Lancaster city. In one of them we found the cutest little store you've ever seen! It was quite big actually, and was done up inside like a little village - with individual rooms being 'houses' of various kinds, and all the items making up the mise-en-scene were actually for sale. I took some pics :) It was run by an Amish guy too. We also went on a tour of an Amish house (no longer lived in, obviously) where we learned a lot of interesting information. Apparently they Amish are actually originally from Germany, but they're called Dutch because people didn't understand what they meant by 'Deutsch'. They have a lot of peculiarities of dress, and they don't use 'electric' (no one ever called it electricity, it was always 'electric'). Instead the power everything with gas. This is somehow different, and therefore ok. Even when they use gas to generate 'electric'. However, they seem to have no problem using electric outside the home, such as when working for non-Amish. Some of them even have cellphones! They usually ride around in horse-drawn buggies, and you can tell by the colour of the buggy whether the people are Amish or Mennonite, which is a related sect. The Mennonites are apparently more lenient though.
The B&B we stayed at was very quaint and pretty, but I didn't take pics. It was like this cottagey place, with different themed rooms and all sorts of knick knacks all over the place. Old-fashioned in a kinda picturesqe way, I thought it was just lovely! That night we went to see Fantastic Mr Fox, which was hilarious and I definitely recommend. In the morning we walked around an Amish farm which was no longer working, but still had all the buildings etc preserved. Did you know, tobacco is one of the major cash crops farmed by the Amish? I've never seen raw unrolled tobacco before - it's very leafy. We also got to take a ride in a genuine Amish buggy! Very exciting :) We went ticky-touring around the countryside with an Amish guy and got to visit an actual working farm. It had a lot of cows, and some of the hugest mules I've ever seen! Not that I've ever really seen a mule before, but usually they're supposed to be halfway between a horse and a donkey. These mules were larger than a Clydesdale! They must have some enormous horses and/or donkeys. The cows were very bony. Apparently they're just like that though.
You remember I mentioned the little villages along the main road? Well, they had some pretty strange names. One of them was called Bird-in-hand, but the best one was the one called Intercourse :D I'm not kidding, there's actually a village called Intercourse! You can bet they make good money selling souvenirs :P
So then we went back to NY, and that was Amish country. I picked up some postcards and Amish memorabilia (hehe, Intercourse lol!)
Nothing much happened on Friday night or Saturday, except I read a lot. And then on Saturday night it snowed!!! It was so exciting!!! I actually ran outside and frollicked :D I've never had it snow on me before - like actual snow, actually falling from the sky! We were going to go ice skating at an outside rink, but then it started raining and the snow turned to sleet, which is wet sloppy rainy snow. So instead we watched Dr Strangelove and made pizza :)