Stompin' at the Stowe, and a Not-So-easyJet

Having slept for perhaps 4 hours the night before, I was out cold for the entirety of our bus ride from jolly old London to the Stowe School in Buckingham. Just a few hours before, we’d been singing Puttin’ on the Ritz at Ronnie Scott’s, the jazz club we’d visited two days ago (the performance, by the way, was a lot of fun). That made it all the more surreal to wake up to the sight of Stowe’s stately façade.

Since I hadn’t the slightest idea what to expect, my first thought was that I was in the midst of some BBC-special-induced dream. It dawned on me soon enough, however, that the Stowe School -- what I had imagined as an urban, brick music school of some sort -- was actually an immense, prestigious, and, what’s more, extremely beautiful institution.


I would be lying if I said I wasn’t a little intimidated: in my t-shirt and jeans, I felt more than a little underdressed compared to the smartly uniformed students walking about. Still, we received a very warm welcome, and we were soon whisked away to the south portico, where we enjoyed a delightful champagne lunch and looked out onto the vista before us, which was, just like everything else about Stowe, as grand and impressive as could be.

We proceeded to stroll around the grounds for an hour, thinking about what exactly Harvard life would be like if the Yard were replaced by Stowe's lakes and meadows. It would certainly be a bit of a change from the Harvard I know.

Among the many other impressive structures housed by the sprawling grounds was a little Chinese house, standing just where you’d least suspect it.



Incongruous though it was, the Oriental flourishes on the walls and the Chinese characters on the sides of the building (clearly written by someone entirely unacquainted with the writing system) made the stop one of my favorites on the tour.


Also, it was extremely gratifying to me to see a real live specimen of a so-called “folly,” a distinctly British architectural idea that I thought I’d only ever encounter in Agatha Christie novels (to those of you who‘ve read them, you’ll know which one I’m talking about!).

Our next stop was a master class for one of Stowe’s a capella groups. We had a few suggestions for them after their renditions of Don’t Stop Believing and Mack the Knife, but overall, they sounded great. A little while later, it was time for our real performances -- the venue was an august marble hall, whose acoustics were some of the best I’ve ever had the pleasure of singing in. After two 45 minute sets, however, it certainly was a welcome relief to get to dinner … and what a dinner it was! Chicken liver pate with crostini, tender beef fillets with a mushroom leek cream sauce, and a lemon tart with fresh passion fruit. The guests, all decked out in their best dress, were also a sight to behold. I myself discussed with my neighbor the poetry of Hopkins as well as the intricacies of afternoon tea. I sure did feel cultured, I can tell you.

After all was said and done, I think it’s safe to say that we all walked away from the Stowe School quite satisfied. And, to top it all off, the school gave us each our own rooms in a nearby hotel: a luxury of luxuries. SG told me today that he pondered for quite some time last night whether he should sleep on the double or single bed, since most of our rooms had one of each. If that were the hardest decision we ever had to make on this tour, I can’t say I would be too terribly upset.

But, as it’s turned out today, tour can’t remain quite as easy as all that. We woke up at 7AM this morning to catch an 11:30 flight from London’s Gatwick airport to Dusseldorf, Germany, where the plan was to catch a train to Luxembourg. Before we got to the airport, there were some faint stirrings of the misfortunes to come -- Brett warned us that our airline, easyJet, had some strict luggage policies. I was ever so slightly worried, but I thought, oh well, at the very worst we’d have to pay a few more pounds. Hah. A few. As it turns out, easyJet is the most inappropriately-named airline in recent memory. Or in distant memory. Or ever. First of all, their check-in area was a disorganized mob, a throng of impatient passengers milling about rather than standing in an orderly line. But that, alone, wouldn’t be so bad if it weren’t for the airline’s absurd luggage policy. Besides charging 10 pounds for each kilogram of checked baggage above 20 kilograms, they allow only one carry-on item. In other words, Dins with two carry-on bags and a 50+ pound check-in bag were going to have to pay 20 or 30 pounds for the overweight check-in bag, plus 18 pounds to check an extra bag, plus 10 pounds for each kilogram that extra bag weighed. That could easily add up to 100 pounds or more, which is certainly more than three times the price of the plane ticket. Furthermore, the manager we spoke to refused to give us any help whatsoever, saying that there was nothing he could do. And, to put the icing on the easyJet cake, they chose to capitalize only the J in easyJet, an affront that I strongly believe was targeted directly at me. So, all in all, I hereby wish a plague upon all that is easyJet.

In any case, the six of us who could get on the flight without incurring any luggage charges made it on, and the other six found that it would actually be cheaper to buy new tickets to Amsterdam than to fly with us to Dusseldorf, silly as that may be. So at this moment, six Dins are staying the night in the wilds of Amsterdam while six of us have successfully made it to Luxembourg.

For the end of the story, I can only tell the Dusseldorf side, but we arrived safely in Germany and explored the city immediately around the train station, sampling the local Turkish food (mmm…. schwarma) and potato pancakes (mmm…. grease and applesauce). All that was left was to board the train to Luxembourg, which we did in style. Sitting in first-class seats and watching the German countryside pass by, illuminated by the evening light, is truly an experience unlike any other. There, I took what was certainly one of the most contented (and, after the stresses of the morning, I think well-deserved) nap I’ve taken in quite some time. And thus, finished with our first little trial by fire, we Dins lay ourselves down to sleep. Somewhere out there, our counterparts in Amsterdam are probably getting ready to do the same. I will say, despite our run-in with the patent evil that is easyJet, the day was an enjoyable one. Without a few of these little excitements, what kind of adventure would this tour be, anyway?