Nashville Marathon 2014

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I finished the 2014 Nashville marathon in 5 hours and 12 minutes with my friend Guin Shaw.  What a lot of running.  My average pace was 11:50 minutes per mile, a little slow but I just wanted to make it.  I finished 7th in my age group, 106th male, and 212 overall.  The race ended with a half mile of downhill toward the river on Broadway, the strip of country music bars and neon signs.  It was such a rush to see the finish line and all my friends cheering. Thank you Guin for pushing me to keep running and not letting me walk.

Abroad

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In the spring of 2012, I studied at the University of Nottingham, England on an Alcoa College of Engineering Study Abroad Fellowship.  I studied abroad to challenge myself to learn in a system with different teaching methods, to expand my interpersonal skills, and to enrich my self-reliance.  The motivation and process of finding, studying, and learning course material was largely an independent effort.  Another key reason to study abroad was to take control of my education.  Independently completing the entire process, including the logistical arrangements, was very gratifying.  I met many wonderful friends who I still keep in touch with.  I kept track of all my travels on a Tumblr, pcaveneyuk.  Johann Wolfgang von Goethe beautifully summarizes this accomplishment, “Knowing is not enough; we must apply. Willing is not enough; we must do.”

Soest

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Friday began a short trip after finals before going home.  I took a train to Manchester, a plane to Frankfurt-Hahn, and a bus to Frankfurt, arriving at 2 am, dead tired & trying to find my nice hostel two blocks from the station and eerily located in the red light district.  It was not a problem & the police there were really nice.  (the european city centers I’ve seen are really alive with partiers, police, and normal people late at night.)  I found it no problem & the hostel was really nice and safe despite its location.  In the morning I met up with Thomas & his girlfriend & we drove to Soest (on the autobahn!).  I stayed with family friends who we met through an exchange program.  They were really great hosts & showed me all around North Rhine Westphalia.  We took a stroll around a nearby park and dam.  It holds important drinking water reserves.  The surrounding area is pretty & populated by small villages which look really quaint and charming to someone who’s never been far from a McDonalds or WalMart.  The city center is very old and many of the buildings are still classic half timber, which is cool.  The churches are made from a unique green sandstone, setting them apart from all the other churches I’ve seen.  We ate dinner at a restaurant serving traditional German food.  I had a schnitzel with mushrooms & I tried some local spiegel (white asparagus) with hollandaise sauce too.  The schnitzel had great flavor, and the spiegel was very soft & had a more subtle, gentle taste than green asparagus.  The beer is made in-house & is great.  It’s smooth, like Guinness, and the bubbles are not harsh.  It was all very filling.  (photos, more photos)