Leeds, West Yorkshire

Living in York, sometimes you forget what a city life is. There is no big shopping mall and almost no traffic lights in the city centre. Even Starbucks has a traditional logo on it. To reduce worrying about being forgotten by the society, the fast way to bring you back to a city life is taking the 30-minute train to another city—Leeds, West Yorkshire.   

If you check ‘Things to do in Leeds’, ‘Top sights’ or ‘Attractions in Leeds’, Royal Armouries Museum is always on the top list.

As its name, it is a national museum which houses the National Collection of Arms and Armour. 

Although Royal Armouries Museum is not as big as I think, it is absolutely a great place for education. The museum arranges many programs and shows for kids during exhibitions. 

Another iconic building is ‘County Arcade’ which is featured by its gorgeous building with a huge stained glass roof and is exceptionally photogenic.

In fact, there are many arcades in Trinity Leeds area —a great place for shopping— and if you ask local people which one is ‘County Arcade’, they seem hard to distinguish it from all of the kinds (yes, I have tried to ask about 10 people). 

One specific building that is not on the top list but I really appreciate is Leeds Corn Exchange. The place once opened for trade in 1990 and today many speciality shops still run their business there.

You can duck into this building (the entrance is not so easy to find!!) and sip a cup of tea or coffee in a nostalgic and charming environment to avoid the crowd. Most interestingly, it has a historical outlook with the Victorian interior design built in 1864, while its website is very modern on the internet. 

By the way, Leeds Art Gallery and Leeds City museum are together next to Leeds City Hall, all of these places mentioned above are free to access and within easy reach from Leeds train station. Good! 

Leeds  西約克 城市生活

住在約克，有時你忘記了什麼是城市生活。市中心沒有大型購物中心，幾乎沒有交通號誌燈。即使星巴克也有一個傳統的標誌。為了減少被社會遺忘的擔憂，快速回到城市生活的方法是乘坐30分鐘的火車到另一個城市 - 西約克郡的利茲市。

如果您查看'利茲要做的事情'，'最佳景點'或'利茲景點'，皇家軍械博物館總是位列榜首。如同它的名字，它是一個國家博物館，收藏了全國武器和盔甲。儘管皇家軍械博物館並不像我想像的那麼大，但它絕對是一個教育的好地方。他們在展覽期間為孩子們安排了許多節目和表演。

另一個標誌性的建築是“縣長廊商場”，它的華麗建築擁有巨大的彩色玻璃屋頂，並且是非常上相的。事實上，Trinity Leeds地區- 這是一個購物的好地方 - 有很多拱廊, 如果你問當地人哪一個是“縣長廊商場”，他們似乎很難在所有種類中區分出來（是的，我曾嘗試過問約10人）。

一個不在排行榜上的特定建築，但我非常欣賞的是--利茲穀物交易所。 1990年曾經啟用來作貿易的地方，今天許多專賣店仍然在那裡經營業務。你可以進入這個建築（入口不容易找到!!），並在懷舊迷人的環境中啜飲一杯茶或咖啡，以避免人群。最有趣的是，它具有建於1864年的維多利亞式建築設計的歷史風貌，而其網站卻是非常現代喲。

還有,利茲美術館和利茲市博物館都在利茲市政廳旁邊，上述所有這些地方都可以免費參觀，並與利茲火車站近在咫尺。棒棒的!

A perfect day out in Castle Howard, North Yorkshire

To the British, Brideshead Revisited is a very famous TV drama, ranking as top 10 on the list of the 100 Greatest British TV Programmes. It is a story about a wealthy English Catholics who live in a palatial mansion, and Castle Howard in the glorious rural idyll of Yorkshire has been used to be iconic scenes. 

As Castle Howard is near North Yorkshire, I took one hour bus#181 from York City centre to visit it this Thursday. In fact, ‘Castle’ Howard is not a real castle which is typically built to against attack with thick walls but is a British country house with extensive and diverse gardens.

新增說明文字

This stately home is owned by the Howard family in 1566 and started to constructed and designed by the architect John Vanbrugh for the 3rd Earl of Carlisle in 1699. The site of Howard Castle was once the ruined Henderskelfe Castle and took over 100 years to complete all the buildings, spanning the lifetimes of three Earls.

The South Front

Castle Howard is John Vanbrugh’s masterstroke ranking as the building of Yorkshire's finest country house.

The main building is a Baroque structure with two symmetrical wings.

Inside the house, through the long and narrow hallways which are the key feature of this house, there are different types of room. All the decorations display how the Howard family lived their noble lives in the past. All the decorations display how the Howard family lived their noble lives in the past.

The dinning room

The drawing room

The Reading room

The Chapel is decorated with work by Pre-Raphaelite artists such as William Morris

There are several parks outside the house and the map says that farmland makes up over 6,000 acres of the Castle Howard Estate (13,000 acres). Therefore, I did not spend too much time indoors; instead, it is better to take a long walk to see the surrounding garden and grounds. As I stepped out, the most attracting is Atlas Fountain behind the house within the centre of an English landscape park. There is also a beautiful lake on each side of the castle. 

Atlas Fountain

Temple of the four winds.

There is also a beautiful lake on each side of the castle.

Lake in the North

Lake in the South

Lake in the South

A day out in Castle Howard, I indulged myself in fresh air, nature, and showy yellow, beige and white daffodils everywhere. 

 

It is really a nice place to take a long walk, while time passed too fast, and the estate is too large to stroll through all the area. 

對於很多英國人來說，Brideshead Revisited是一部非常有名的電視劇，在100個最偉大的英國電視節目名單中排名前10。 這是一個富有的英國天主教徒生活在富麗堂皇的豪宅中的故事，而城堡Howard在約克郡美麗的農村田園詩中,被用來作為標誌性的場景。

由於Howard城堡位於北約克郡附近，本週四我從約克市中心乘坐了一小時181路巴士前往參觀。 事實上，Howard “城堡”並不是一座真正為了防止厚厚的牆壁而建造的城堡，而是英國的一座擁有廣泛多樣花園的鄉村別墅。

這座莊嚴的房子於1566年由Howard家族擁有，並於1699年由建築師約翰·凡布魯（John Vanbrugh）為卡萊爾3世伯爵建造和設計。Howard城堡的遺址曾經是被毀壞的亨德斯凱爾夫城堡，花了100年的時間完成所有建築，跨越三個伯爵的壽命。

Howard城堡是John Vanbrugh的主要作品，是約克郡最好的鄉間別墅的建築。主樓是巴洛克式建築，有兩個對稱的側翼。在房子內部，通過這個房子的主要特點-狹長的走廊，有幾個功能不同的房間。 所有的裝飾品都展示了霍華德家族過去如何過著高尚的生活。

在房子外面有幾個公園，地圖上說光農地就占所有面積(1,3000英畝)中的6,000英畝。所以我沒有在室內花太多時間，反而最好是長時間散步去看周圍的花園和庭院。我一走出去, 最吸引人的是阿特拉斯噴泉，它位於房子後面的英國風景公園中心。城堡兩側還各有一個美麗的湖泊。

在Howard城堡度過一天，我沉浸在清新的空氣，大自然，到處都是艷麗的黃色，米色和白色水仙花。 這是一個很好的散步的好地方，而時間過得太快了，房地產太大了，實在無法漫步整個地區。

Pergamon Museum: romance, civilization, and Iron Germany

Everyone might agree that Europe has the most glorious museums in the world such as Louvre Pyramid, Paris; British Natural History Museum, National Gallery, and British Museum, London. Last year, I travelled to Netherland where is famous for museums everywhere. A museum card brought me to visit over 10 museums with different themes, including Vincent Willem van Gogh, diamond, church, movie, tulip, etc. within 2 days in Amsterdam.  

However, there is a common problem for those most visited museums in the world, that is, they have been crowded all the seasons of the year. Consequently, you feel somewhat distracted or cannot even move your feet toward the artwork or wall paintings, Mona Lisa in Louvre Pyramid exemplifies this. So, the most visited museum could be a very impressive one but not your favourite or memorable one. 

Mona Lisa in Louvre Pyramid

Among all the museums I ever visited, although the number is never large enough. I especially prefer Pergamon Museum in Berlin, Germany. 

I visited this museum in Springtime several years ago, there are not so many people at that time. As I stayed in Berlin for one week, I took a slow pace to explore the Capital of Germany.

When I stepped on the top floor of my hotel, the first image for me is to ask why they still need to raise a war since this country is so spacious and has few people living here, expressing the message to me that there is no need to compete for resources. However, this feelings is merely from my personal view, and the reason behind the war is not my focus here.

Let me back to Pergamon Museum. This museum is built along the riverside, its iron-gray colour represents what a Germany is: strong, durable and solid; to some extent cold-blooded and hard-hearted in terms of the self-discipline people.

Unlike British Museum of the kind collect a various range of national trophies, Pergamon Museum houses three most impressive themes: the Antikensammlung, the Vorderasiatisches Museum, and the Museum für Islamische Kunst, making it become so special to me. 

The Babylonian Empire was defeated by the Persians

I still remember when I walked in the reconstructed processional street of Babylon to discover another world with a great historical and mysterious Sumerian and Assyrian civilization, everything unfolds with mystery and romance.

As we know, the term Babylon (Βαβυλών), ‘gate of god’, is the name of an ancient city, it has another meaning—‘confusion’ in the Bible. It was home to the earliest known civilisation--the Sumerian civilisation, which arose in the fertile Tigris-Euphrates river valley of southern Iraq. 

While the geography of the remains of the city are now in Iraq, where is notorious for terrorism and warfare, when it comes to Babylon, the most interesting thing for me is about a Japanese comic book named:Crest of the Royal Family (Nile’s daughter), a story about an American young girl who loved archaeology and how she crossed through 3,000 years to fall in love with an ancient Egypt prince. The backdrop of this romantic comic book is presented in Egypt and other ancient countries such as Assyria and Babylonia, and many characterisers are vivid and attractive, making it one of the best-selling manga ever.

Source: Crest of the Royal Family

There is also a war in this comic book. As the beautiful, wise American girl from the mysterious future West was so precious as gold, the Assyrian prince and Hittite (a strong neighbour country next to Egypt) prince were all surprised with this blonde-haired Carol, and attempted to take her out of the Egypt prince; as a result, love has become a real war full of competition and conspiracy. By the way, don’t forget about men do fight for women in human history such as the Trojan War, imaginably, a war fighting for dignity and face, rather than the women.  

Prince イズミル (source and copyright: Crest of the Royal Family)

(source and copyright: Crest of the Royal Family)

(source and copyright: Crest of the Royal Family)

每個人都會同意，歐洲擁有世界上最榮華的博物館，如巴黎的盧浮宮金字塔;英國的自然歷史博物館，國家美術館和倫敦大英博物館。去年，我到了各處都有博物館的荷蘭旅行。一張博物館卡就讓我在2天內在阿姆斯特丹參觀了10個以上不同主題的博物館：梵谷，鑽石，教堂，電影，鬱金香等等。

然而，世界上訪問次數最多的博物館都存在一個共同的問題，那就是，它們一年四季都很擁擠。因此，你覺得有點分心或甚至不能移動你的腳走向藝術品或壁畫，盧浮宮金字塔的蒙娜麗莎就是這方面的例證。所以，參觀人數最多的博物館可能是一個非常令人印象深刻的博物館，但不是您最喜歡或難忘的博物館。

在我參觀過的所有博物館中，雖然數量從來都不夠大。我特別喜歡德國柏林的佩加蒙博物館。幾年前，我在春天時訪問了那裡，當時沒有那麼多人。因我在柏林待了一周, 我放慢步調地探索德國的首都。當我踏上旅館的頂層時，對我來說，第一個印像就是要問為什麼他們仍然需要發動戰爭，因為這個國家非常寬敞，人口很少，向我表達的信息是沒有必要競爭資源。但是，這種感覺僅僅是出於我個人的觀點，戰爭背後的原因並不是我這文章關注的焦點。

讓我回到佩加蒙博物館。這座博物館建在河邊，它的鐵灰色代表了德國的特點：強壯, 耐用,堅固;從自律的民族性來看,在某種程度上是冷血和堅強的。與大英博物館收藏各種各樣的國家戰利品不同，佩加蒙博物館收藏了3個令人印象深刻的主題：Antikensammlung，Vorderasiatisches博物館和伊斯蘭藝術博物館，使它變得如此特別。

我仍然記得，當我走進重建的巴比倫通道去發現另一個有著偉大的歷史和神秘的蘇美和亞述文明的世界時，一切都隨著神秘和浪漫而展開。

我們知道，巴比倫（Babylon，Βαβυλών）這個詞是'上帝之門'，是古代城市的名字，它有另一個意思 - 聖經中的'混淆'。這裡是最早的已知文明蘇美文明的起源，這種文明起源於伊拉克南部肥沃的底格里斯 - 幼發拉底河流域。

雖然城市遺蹟的地理位置現在在伊拉克，那裡因恐怖主義和戰爭而臭名昭著，但談到巴比倫時，對我來說最有意思的是一本日本漫畫書，名叫：《尼羅河女兒》原名《王家的紋章》,故事講述了一位美國年輕女孩熱愛考古學，如何穿越了3000年愛上了一位古埃及王子。這部浪漫漫畫的背景是在埃及和其他古老的國家，如亞述和巴比倫，並且許多人物形像生動而富有吸引力，使它成了有史以來最暢銷的漫畫之一。

這部漫畫中,也有一場戰爭。因為來自神秘未來西方的美麗聰慧的美國女孩像黃金一樣珍貴，亞述王子和西台（埃及旁邊的一個強大的鄰國:又稱比泰多）王子都對這位金髮的卡羅爾驚為天人，並企圖把她從埃及王子身邊奪走;結果，愛成了充滿競爭和陰謀的真正戰爭。順便一提，不要忘記男人曾在人類歷史上為女性而戰，比如特洛伊戰爭，可以想像的,這是一場爭奪尊嚴和面子,多於女性的戰爭。