Juliacentralicious

Spain, Part 3: Madrid

2008-06-09T07:27:00.000-07:00

We arrived in Madrid at around ten at night. After a quick change in the station bathroom, we went to stare at the map in the Metro station. Fortunately, a nearby guy came and took pity on us, and told us where the good clubs were, and that if we bought a ten-trip pass, it was cheaper. So we followed his advice, and rode to Sol-- the city center. And it was, of course, packed. Throngs of people everywhere, just walking around. We finally found a club, and started dancing. And we didn't stop until they closed, at around 2.30. Fortunately, we were in Madrid-- there were still at least ten clubs nearby that were still open. So we moved on. Finally, at about 6.30, this one closed as well. Fortunately for us, in our wanderings, we had already found a chocolate cafe. Not like we could miss it now: the place was filled beyond its capacity. After a battle to secure seats and two cups of chocolate, we found out why: Spanish hot chocolate is a whole other matter entirely. It is amazing. It's like-- really rich pudding. The people at our table were a nice French couple, and they shared their churros with us.
So of course, once we found our hostel that afternoon, we napped. In fact, we napped until the next morning. To our dismay, we discovered that the Prado is closed on Mondays! Fortunately, the Park de Retiros is right next door. After wandering through it a bit, we stumbled across a sort of pool-- with boating! So we rowed around, until it started raining. After finally maneuvering to the dock again, we took flight to pick up our bullfighting tickets and try squid sandwiches. Then tapas. Then Burger King, because we were still hungry, but also running low on money. Finally we headed over to the bullfighting arena.
It was a regular circus: some protesters, some people who yelled at the protesters, some police who just stood around calmly. I won't go into the details of the fight-- there are pictures, and there is blood, so you are warned. The whole thing had the air of a football game: a band played, people cheered. It was very interesting to watch, though. I can certainly respect anyone who stands in the path of a charging bull. We even got to see one of the matadors get a little trampled before he managed to get away (and was then carried out of the stadium to deafening cheers).
And then our time in Madrid was almost over: a little more dancing, a little more hot chocolate, and we managed a train back home.

Pictures here.

Spain, Part 2: Alhambra

2008-06-09T05:57:00.000-07:00

So Alhambra is an old fortress in Granada, which is down in the south of Spain. We got to Granada early in the morning, and soon discovered that was not early enough: there were already lines (Alhambra only lets a set number of people inside every day, and most of the specific parts have assigned entrance times). But we still got in.
So we were restrained from going into most places until our specific times, but we could do others: Palacio Carlos V, which houses a museum of artifacts from Alhambra (though no pictures allowed, which means I didn't remember a whit of it); the mosque baths, the outer wall.
Then we got into Generalife. To get there, you pass a lot of ruins-- what used to be a market place, other traces of a city. Then you get to the gardens. Here's an analogy: If Disneyworld is the happiest place on earth, then the gardens of Generalife are the Disneyworld of beauty. I've never seen so many flowers-- and they're all perfect. Just piles of snapdragons, roses. Orange trees. Fountains and bright green reflecting pools with bright orange fish. The buildings were just a taste of what we'd see in the main palace, but they're all decorated with a mix of Spanish and Moorish-- I've never seen anything so elaborate. There are birds living within the carvings of the building. And from the walls, you can see the rest of Alhambra-- bits of white stone among the trees. It's so pretty there, it's almost too much.
From there, we did Alcazaba, which was the dungeon tower. Much more sparse, of course. Not a bit of decoration, but what a view! Once you get to the top of the main tower, you can see for miles-- the view just keeps going and going.
Finally, we had to wait in line to get into the main part: Palacios Nazaries. Now that is a palace. Just skip to the pictures, I won't even try.
Unfortunately, we had to rush a little to catch our train to Madrid-- but you could stay there for years (Washinton Irving actually did stay there awhile while it was still ruins--) and still not see everything.

Pictures here.

Spain, Part 1: Barcelona

2008-06-09T03:21:00.001-07:00

So Kayce had some days off after coming back, so we decided to do a whirlwind tour of Spain.
First stop was Barcelona. After a wise investment in some lockers at the station and a ten-use Metro pass, we were on our way to Parc Güell-- the one designed by Gaudi. Well, after walking about an extra mile from signs that wanted us to go in a big circle, and asking for directions, we made it to the park. Well, it was pretty, but there wasn't much to it. We climbed to the top of the hill, and were treated with an expansive, if foggy, view of the whole city. Also a rock bench that strangely resembled railroad spike. While we rested, an old man came up to us, offered to take our picture, and rambled on a bit about how he'd grown up in Barcelona and loved it so much. Then he told us to be sure not to miss the park designed by Gaudi-- on the other side of the hill. Of course. So we were on our way again. The first thing you can see of the park from above is the plaza-- home of the world's longest park bench, according to some other Americans we met there. It's full of tourists, artists, pickpockets (we were warned by one of the vendors, though we didn't have any problems), and even a saxophonist halfheartedly playing some old jazz standards. If you walk around a bit, you can see Gaudi's house. There are side tunnels and walkways that look like they've been created by dragons or volcanoes. Below the main plaza is a space with pillars and a sort of undersea feeling-- tentacles coming out of the ceiling, and all that. Then there's the front entrance, with the dragon, and a church that looks like it belongs in Candyland. It was packed with people. Gaudi was a genius, but it was like being in a completely different world.
After that, we went to the Church de Sagrada Familia, which Gaudi worked on for the last 40 years of his life, giving up everything else. It's been "in progress" for over 100 years now. There's no way to describe it: we walked out of the Metro station, disoriented in the light, turned around, and there it is. It's massive. Every inch is decorated. Inside, there's scaffolding everywhere, the whole center filled with workers listening to hip-hop. The pillars are designed like trees, are bright white. Out front, you could waste hours finding details in the stone. And it's full of tourists. But pretty impressive.
We walked the Gothic Quarter, down Las Ramblas, the main avenue. Lots of booths with souvenirs and postcards, and every type of street performer imaginable: magician with white bunny, silver Medusa, copper lady, zombie, Samurai in black paint who attacked passers-by, invisible man, skull in a box that barked at passing dogs, a couple Indians. It was pretty crazy.
Our last stop in the city was Labyrinth Park-- the oldest in Barcelona. And home to a hedge maze! So we got sufficiently lost, found the center. The park also has a fake cemetery-- something about balancing the beauty of the neoclassical with mortality. But a cool stop.
And then we got on our train-- ooh, a sleeper! Perhaps the smallest bed I've been on-- and headed down to Granada.

Pictures here.

Marburg

2008-06-02T01:55:00.000-07:00

(FYI, this entry is about three weeks behind what I'm actually doing. This is because I care enough to organize pictures and put them up at the same time. So there.)

So Marburg: city of the Grimm Brothers, Martin Luther, and a lot of steps. Now, due to the tourist center not offering English tours, the Julia experience was a bit more of the "Botanical Garden, castle, and a lot of steps" version.

But there is St Elizabeth's Church, which might be my favorite so far, on account of it being the most peaceful. There was also a wedding going on there, and I kept seeing the bride and groom all over the city later, getting pictures done. Oh, the tourists had a field day with that one.

The Botanical Gardens were lovely, of course, but reminded me how much Marburg is a college town (technically, the city is just one big university)-- students hanging out all over the place. The city itself is a bit of a trip to walk through, because you start out at McD's, and go up, and then you find yourself by a castle surrounded by old buildings. It was a lovely day trip. Pictures are, as usual, here.

An Accidental Adventure: Mühltal

2008-05-27T07:16:00.000-07:00

OK, so I thought I'd be clever and go visit the Frankenstein Castle on my own. There are sources on getting to it from the train station, and hey, I can walk. So I get off in Mühltal. I walk down to the town, and there's nothing. Can't even find any signs, except for the closet approximation: Frankenhausen. Well, it sounds about right, doesn't it? It was about 7 km away, so I reshouldered my bag and set off.

The path went through the town. Through huge fields, some of which I laid around in for awhile; deep gorgeous forest, some of which I laid around in for awhile. More fields, me feeling like I was lost and climbing onto bales of hay to get my bearings, climbing strange watchtower-like structures they've got all over the place.

Finally, I get to my destination-- except that, it turns out, Frankenhausen is a town. Definitely not the castle. Yeah, you can laugh if you saw that coming. And, of course, it's a town without a train station. So I had to walk all 7 km back to make sure I'd get home all right.

Oh, well. It was a very tiring, but certainly peaceful day. And pictures.

Strasbourg

2008-05-21T04:01:00.000-07:00

After Wittlich, Emily and I took a late weekend in Strasbourg. After getting only slightly lost on the autobahn system, we arrived, and proceeded to get slightly lost in Strasbourg-- a city of one ways and narrow cobblestone roads and dead ends (we actually had to drive over the city train tracks and over the sidewalk for a dozen yards before we could get into the parking garage!). The best part of Strasbourg, though, is the river.

Our first night, we wandered through Petit France, the old part of town, which includes a cathedral. The specialty of the region is tartes flambées-- a sort of very thin-crusted pizza, with créme fraîche and various toppings (we split a cheese and ham and mushroom as well as a vegetarian one that was covered with gobs of melted brie). Oh, wow.

The next morning, we picked up breakfast from the supermarket: bread, cheese, ham, juice, and champagne. We sat on a wall right by the river watching the tourist boats pass by. Then we did some more touristing-- hopscotch by the carousel, and looking at the astronomical clock in the cathedral. After a nap, we had some more tarte flambée, watched a movie, and walked around the city at night, checking out the bridges.

A final cool thing about Strasbourg: since it's pretty much on the border of France and Germany, it's a strange mix of the two countries. While I got to finally feel useful using my French, everybody seemed to speak German as well. The region is also famous for its cranes, and while we didn't see any nests, we did get to see one flying, which was pretty cool.

Pictures are up here.

Wittlich and Trier

2008-05-13T01:30:00.000-07:00

So a couple weeks ago I went up to visit Emily. She lives in Wittlich, a fairly small town a ways west of Frankfurt. We went to a Greek restaurant near her apartment, where the owner came to talk to us, and tried to convince us to stay longer. And May first is their labor day, so there was a cute little festival in the town square. Some sort of raffle, a guy doing balloon art, kids running around with labor party flags, and, of course, a stand selling bratwurst, and one selling beer. We just sat around enjoying the beautiful weather and the people watching.

On Friday, we went down to Trier, the oldest city in Germany. There are still some Roman ruins, the throne room of Constantine. We did most of our walking on Saturday, down the main market street. It was just lined with people selling jewelry and all sorts of things. There was a guy that made wire sculptures right there on the street (I'll put a picture of the one I got up-- only two euros!), right next to the guy carving wooden statues. A woman making wire jewelry, a guy making those wire hanging ornaments. And, of course, the ubiquitous gelato stands. Good times.

Heidelberg Cemetery

2008-05-12T06:21:00.000-07:00

This is between downtown and Robin's place. It's quite the interesting place-- first of all, because there are two different gravestone stores across the street (it reminds me of the line of bail bond businesses across the street from the LA jail). Also, graveyards in Germany are very much living places. It's common on Sundays for families to go out and tend the graves-- most are actually small garden plots, constantly evolving.

Pictures are here.

Heidelberg Castle

2008-05-07T07:41:00.000-07:00

It's been busy here!

So I've got the pictures from the castle up here. It is perhaps my favorite castle so far. This might be because there were birds singing constantly-- or because most of it's free, so it's like being in a gorgeous park you can just wander around. There's even a path that runs from an upper courtyard around the base of the outer wall, past a flock of sheep and back up to the castle. It goes through some great woods, this little path that I'd imagine not many people even find.

You have to pay to get into the Inner Courtyard-- that's where the Museum of Pharmacy is (which I spent way too much time in-- if anyone wants a picture of every single placard in it, then let me know), and the largest wine barrel in the world (or something like that-- if it's not, I won't believe it).

From almost every rampart, you could see all of the city. Plus, I got a picture of the elusive European squirrel-- definitely worth the 300-plus steps to get there!

The Botanical Garden, and pictures

2008-04-23T09:37:00.000-07:00

So if you go here, there are pictures of the view from Kayce's room (I did mention the balcony, right?) and some from my trip to the Botanical Gardens, which are ridiculously close.

The summary goes something like this:
-Dandelions are everywhere. Get used to it. But there's less mowing here, so more wildflowers just hanging out everywhere. It's almost too sweet.
-Green birds! I love these guys. They sound nice, too.
-The botanical garden is decently huge, with all the various types of environment. There were also people all over. Thank god there were a lot of benches.
-Sadly, I still haven't seen any squirrels, which, rumor has it, have pointed ears here.

Kayce's back to the states, so I'm doing all the major points of Heidelberg. I'm also abusing her bus pass and riding around in circles. Good times.

Germany!

2008-04-21T06:49:00.000-07:00

Well, that was intense. Thank god I've found a new home-away-from home: a bar/cafe. With internet. Thank you, Germany.

The plane rides were uneventful and long. I morbidly killed part of my soul by watching Alvin and the Chipmunks until I couldn't stand it any more. Frankfort is, I believe, one of the largest airports in Europe. However, I sailed through it. Have you ever tried to fly into the States? You know how long customs and the passport-stamping takes? I may have taken me five minutes. Even my cleverly evasive responses to how long I'd be in the country weren't even required. Nothing was, actually. And then the main train station is right next to the airport! So in a jiffy (OK, minus sweating in a long line, which made me doubt this so-called "efficiency" of Germans) I was on a train to Heidelberg.

Kayce collected me, and after a brief stop for groceries (bread, yogurt, diet Pepsi-- you know, the necessities), we dropped off my things, and despite my best efforts, I had a nice inadvertent nap. Which was good, because the game plan to stave off jet lag was to go out dancing that night. Despite my terror at asking/being asked to dance in a foreign language, well, the grapevine isn't kidding-- everyone speaks English. So I had some lovely dances, met a few people Kayce hangs with, and learned some German which I promptly forgot.

On Friday, Kayce and I walked around the city. A lot. (And I still managed to be lost today...) Then I hung out with Robin on base for the evening-- and though I'm in no way used to German culture yet, it was highly surreal to be in such an American-saturated environment. Weird.

The next day, it seemed like a good idea to train to Nurnberg, where Emily and Adriana were celebrating Adriana's birthday. We watched a football match in an Irish pub, hit the town, danced, ate lots of cheese in the middle of the night. Like you do.

Sadly, that's probably the most exciting it's been so far. I was asked for directions earlier today, which was cool but awkward. We spent an afternoon looking at everywhere we want to go and in general freaking out at how much there is to do in Europe. And after this, I need to go get more diet Pepsi. Eventually I'll set up my computer to handle internet at Kayce's. And I'll definitely have to figure out what the hell they gave me when I ordered "eine tasse Kaffee," because this is no American cup of joe.

Tschuss!
(Or, for those feeling extremely European, Tschussie! I'm not sure how to spell it, but yes, it sounds a little ridiculous.)

And Back to Hiatus

2007-10-08T15:15:00.001-07:00

Now I'm settled, and the travel blog goes once again into hibernation. Hello, Minneapolis.

Part Four: Custody Changes!

2007-10-08T15:13:00.000-07:00

I also spent some time with Cindy! We had a nice weekend (filled up on Green Wing—and if any of you have watched it: What was that ending about??), went out to a cute restaurant and so on.
Then there was the fateful day of the Move. Mike left that morning, so I spent the day hanging around (only slightly awkwardly) his house. His mom was very nice, kept taking me around the neighborhood on errands and buying me food. In the evening, I headed over to Cindy's to help begin to move, since they had both apartments for a few days, we could afford to be leisurely. Though it was not a luxury we actually took. The boys started lifting, we started cleaning, and about twelve hours later I found myself watching the sunrise in their new apartment, on my fifth or so beer, remnants of the kitchen half unpacked behind me.
Their new place is actually the entire second story of this fantastic house—half a block from the liquor store, a block from a pizza place, and about five blocks from a coffeeshop. I am in love with this apartment—big old fashioned windows fill the front room, which were kept open pretty much constantly, a steady stream of moderate traffic out front, just enough that it came across as more oceanic, less annoying. I spent the days reading beat literature and walking to the coffeeshop, and then we'd just hang out in the evenings listening to music and watching the traffic and people go by. Most relaxing apartment ever.

Part Three: How Else I Spent My Time

2007-10-08T15:12:00.000-07:00

The most interesting (read: surreal) part of this was meeting Mike's family and friends and family friends. I got vaguely girlfriend treatment: "Oh, so this is your first time out here meeting all the family and friends," and "Yes, we've heard about you."
We hung out with his friends, which was generally cool—there was a birthday party that needed attending, and a prodigious amount of HeroQuest (old school game, involving miniature figures and a dungeon board). Typical larks abounded, included trying to kill the wizard at all costs, and misusing the phrase "Zoltan, open the door." Bonus points to our party for surviving one level with about twelve various baddies, us with no weapons, the wizard opening all the doors, and us scattering in all directions for lack of a better plan. And we only lost our barbarian. (Perhaps it was funnier if you were there?) There were a couple nights where, I belive, we played until five in the morning. (Someone remind me that I need to find a group in Minneapolis!)
The weather must also be applauded: it was generally warm (hot!) and wonderful for exploring a new city, except for a couple nights of fantastic rain and storms—my, I have missed a good Midwest storm. It was glorious. Umbrellas were ignored, puddles were splashed in. I absolutely love running around in the rain.

Part Two: Food

2007-10-08T15:11:00.000-07:00

I'm not a foodie. This is perhaps why I occassionally felt quite stupid around Mike's family, because they quite definitely are. However, I ate better that week than I perhaps ever have in my life. And for that, I will commence name-dropping restaurants and gloating about how incredibly tasty it all was.
We went to Neha one night, a nice place downtown, with his family and some family friends. This is the best indication of how we ate: everyone got their own individual appetizers, plus entrees, plus desserts. Also two bottles of wine for the table. We operated on the "take two bites and pass your plate to the left" method, so that everyone could sample everything ordered. It was incredibly tasty, especially the duck that I got. Another example of how particular everyone is with food—two dishes were sent back, a steak for being too well cooked, and a fish for being too salty. Wow, that's all I can say.
Mike's mom took us to Manny's, a super old deli that's been around for ages, and has a divine pastrami on rye, as well as lots of friendly old people. Also had some of the best deep-dish pizza of my life, at a place called Lou Malnati's.
The best by far was a place called Joe's—but imagine the opposite of what a place called Joe's should be. Very upscale, very classy. Our waiter was more of a guide through dinner than simply a waiter (he recommended the corn by describing it as a "bowl of sunshine"—which is was), and joking with us (he applauded me after I managed to finish my dinner). Mike got king crab legs—which they took out of the shell for him, right at the table. I got bone-in rib-eye (over forty dollars, and this was the cheapest bone-in meat they had), which was as rare as possible and incredibly tasty. We had nice white wine. We got dessert, the much-recommended peanut butter pie, which our waiter supplemented with a complementary piece of banana cream pie. He was quite adamant that the only way to eat them was to get some of both on one fork and eat them together—and of course he was right. I don't even like banana cream pie, but this was amazing. I felt just like Elvis, but more pie, less fried sandwich. After we had left, standing out front waiting for valet to bring the car around, there were a couple homeless guys who passed by, offering to shine the shoes of Mike's dad. One was particularly insistent, pestering us more and more as we stood there. And (here is the illustration of just how fancy this place is) a bouncer for the restaurant—this big black dude—comes outside and tells him to move on, afterwards apologizing to us for the guy bothering us. Wow.

Chicago, Illinois: My New Favorite Place

2007-10-08T15:08:00.000-07:00

Part One: Culture
Oh my. I adore Chicago, I really do. It's high density, so much more than LA (not like that's hard), and even more so than Portland in some ways. Chicago is like a very shiny polished Portland.
Fortunately for me, Mike's family is a member of just about everything, so I was able to finagle my share of touristy trips. Did you know that the Chicago Zoo in Lincoln Park is free? Free. We spent some time walking around there—big kitties! They have a super-impressive monkey house—lots of gorillas and chimps and such, and of course all the cute little ones. Pretty impressive African exhibit as well. They have what appears to be a reckless attitude towards displaying the animals—the lion habitat doesn't actually have a cage, just a chasm that (I assume) he can't leap between him and you. Similarly, their spiders have nothing at all, only the zoo's assurance that since both food and water are delivered to the spiders at their current webs, they would have no desire to leave. But what if they just wanted to? They could.
We also hit up the Aquarium—which is also pretty impressive. They certainly do displays right here. We even caught a bit of the dolphin show (they leap! They swim on their backs with the trainers! They spin!). They had a special exhibit on lizards (featuring a Komodo, which explained why they had transformed the entrance line outside into the gaping maw of a lizard—which, thanks to the previously-mentioned membership, we didn't have to wait in). I do have an encouraging story from there, however. They have a large reef exhibit in what is like the basement—you have to take a special elevator to go down there, and when you're done, there's a long line to ride the elevator back up, especially since people didn't seem to realize that you have to actually press the button for the elevator to come. A museum usher (attendant? What are they called?) was walking down the line, yelling at us that we did indeed have to press said button, when some people ahead of us asked about stairs (it was, like I said, a very long line). The guy replies that there are indeed stairs, but it's a few flights up. He can, however, show us the door. We immediately jump out of line with them, followed by more and more people. It was wonderful—a whole score of Americans refusing to stand in line, choosing a few flights of stairs over laziness. It may not seem like much, but sometimes it's nice to see that people aren't as hopeless as you think.
There's also, of course, the Field Museum, home to Sue the T-rex (one of the best-preserved T-Rexs there is) and many other shiny exhibits (the shiniest, of course, being the gemstone collection). Pretty neat Egyptian exhibit, and of course the history of the earth (aka stuffstuffstuffDINOSAURSstuffMASSEXTINCTIONstuffstuff). It was also the setting for an awful movie called "The Relic," which we subsequently watched.
A couple days later, Mike's mom took us to the Garfield Conservatory, which used to be the largest conservatory in the US. It's still pretty damn impressive. They have art installations there, too, though I can't say I'm a fan of the mosaic-pudgy-woman-and-other-tackiness sculptures they had (I forever regret I missed the Chihuly installation). But the fern room was awesome—it's such a nice peaceful place, I wish we had brought sandwiches or something.
I also had Mike take me to Millenium Park later that day. It's this big beautiful park (of which Chicago has many), but the most awesome part about it is the Bean. A giant (much larger than I had imagined) chrome, super-shiny kidney bean shape. When we went, there was a wedding party getting pictures taken in front of it, and a cloud of tourists around it. You can get all sorts of fun skyline views reflected in it, and when you stand directly underneath it, it's like looking at yourself at the bottom of a very small, deep hole. Pretty damned sweet. They also have these fountains—two large upright rectangles made out of glass blocks, "facing" (it's a pun, see, because they have large, and I mean LARGE moving faces of light on them) each other over a flat area. There's water falling from the tops of them, and also sometimes from where the mouths are. I'll be honest—it's a bit creepy. There's also the Gehry outdoor concert venue thing. When we were passing by, there was some bluesy sort of group playing, almost rehearsing. Pretty chill.
There were the more mundane things of Chicago, as well. Trips downtown for errands involving Mike or his sister. Riding the El (which for me was beyond mundane—it's a train! But elevated.), which has some pretty good views of the city. I'll say again that I love how dense the city is—narrow streets, tall buildings, all that. It was great.

MinnesotaWisconsin: Drive, drive, drive

2007-10-08T15:07:00.001-07:00

It was flat, and it was rainy. It felt somewhat strange to see all that farmland, a little twinge of familiarity asserted itself. We arrived in Chicago late, and pretty promptly crashed.

South Dakota: Does Not Want Us

2007-09-19T18:29:00.000-07:00

We hit SD fairly early (mid afternoon) and figured to make it to Sioux Falls (the Easternmost city) by the time we wanted to stop. We figured wrong—very wrong.
Only twenty miles in, our new radio friend KSKY ("Ever since Goat got a tattoo of Satan on his calf, his daughter still cries when she sees 'Daddy's Evil Leg.'") informed us of a tornado warning (if you're not from the midwest, a "watch" means "ignore us and continue with your lives," a "warning" means "get the fuck to a basement"). Since it was only twenty or so miles down the highway from us, we pull over to a DQ to let it blow over. In the parking lot, we meet a family who had been coming from the east and whose car had been attacked by baseball-sized hail only six or so miles away—the windshield was shattered through in one place, and the rest looked like they had pissed off an entire baseball team. Seems like stopping when we did was a good idea.
As our Blizzards disappeared, the storm did not. Fortunately, one of my dad's good friends, David, lives only twenty miles away—behind us. However, with night drawing nigh and the storm still raging, we couldn't turn down free lodging, and after getting lost in the small town of Spearfish, David came to fetch us. Him and his wife Shelly are fantastically nice, gave us beers, and chatted with us before escorting us to the nearby hotel (their house is being renovated, and rather than let us sleep on the floor or couches, they actually paid to put us up in the hotel—provided I didn't tell my dad, which would set off a veritable war of polite retaliation—shh!)[If you're reading this, Mom, don't tell Dad. But I believe in journalistic responsibility to the truth]. I had a positively surreal experience with the familiar nostalgia of our first Perkins stop (Perkins was my Sharis before Sharis was my Sharis). The next morning, we met them for coffee and breakfast and then went merrily on our way.

Surprisingly, South Dakota is actually one of the more interesting states. We made it to Wall (home of the famous Wall Drug—the mother of all tourist traps), where we wasted an appropriate amount of time with stupid photo ops and browsing the endless gift shop. From there, we decided to plunge into the Badlands (after missing the first turn for it, which meant that when we finally did drive them, we went backwards yet again).
The Badlands are perhaps one of my favorite places (other than Wyoming, of course). This was the place, years ago, where I first decided that I was actually the reincarnation of a mountain goat. While I happened to be wearing flip flops this time (and jeans, and no hat—really, a spur-of-the-moment trip to the Badlands is a bad idea), there was significantly less cavorting on the ridges, it was still fun. There are some gorgeous spots there—one path leads through a sort of cedar-filled glen, and the views are always spectacular. I even found a rock peak so high and narrow that even I felt a bit mortal. It was quite refreshing to stand so surrounded by nothing. And—we even saw a herd of goats.

That night we made it to Sioux Falls—and if my memory serves correctly, it was supremely boring.

Wyoming: Pepsi is Proudly Made There

2007-09-16T11:54:00.000-07:00

The plan was to cut up north about midway through the state to hit Thermopolis, which is home to the dinosaur center, and then to continue east. As a result, we ended up on the smaller roads, which were positively gorgeous. There was just so much space. Positively breathtaking (and no, I didn't actually take any pictures. You have the internet, go google it or something). A moment of silence for how much I loved Wyoming.

Sometime in the early afternoon, we were barely into the state, and damn tired. We were grouchy and neither of us wanted to drive, so I decided that it was naptime. The state park we found wanted to charge us to get in, so instead we found a comfy extra-wide shoulder on the road by the highway and took forty winks. I awoke maybe half an hour later (after much fiddling with the windows and trying to ignore the roaring semis) to a highway patrolman knocking at my window. Crap. I frantically checked for posted signs against roadside naps while handing over my license. He assured me he was just checking to make sure we were OK, but then commandeered my license and sat in his car for a good five minutes with it. Finally he returns with a small slip of blue paper—why? Why a ticket??— He goes on to explain that he's checked the small box that states it is not a citation, and he has also meticulously filled in the comment box at the bottom—"Driver was asleep beside the road, I stopped to make sure they were OK." Even more endearing, he shows me the HP dispatch number on the back, and encourages me to call them if I have any problems while I'm in the state. Aww.
We stopped for dinner at this buffet in close to the middle of nowhere, whose best trait was that we arrived on "Steak and Steak" night. And they were willing to cook it as rare as possible (read: cold in the middle). It was super tasty, and yes, I'm glad to have re-embraced my carnivorism. We got to Thermopolis late—pulled through thanks to a local radio station having listeners call in with ghost stories— and began the search for a motel. Most were booked, and some were expensive, but we pulled into this adorable ghetto one right as another truck did, and were greeted by a woman searching for "Montana," her dog, which turned out to be a yipper much to small for her name. Lucky us, we got the last room after the truck. And then, due to the further annoyance of us having to find an ATM (the woman wouldn't accept checks from out of state, and didn't have a credit card machine), she cut twenty bucks off our rate. Sweet. But then again, the room had a stove but no fridge, and I ended up having to go back to the car to rescue the glass I got from the Thirsty Lion (all the way back from Brewfest with Ivy) since there weren't even cups in the room. Also, our "free wifi" was courtesy of Taco John's, located in the parking lot.

The next morning was the Dinosaur museum! It was right outside the town ("Dinosaur lovers drink at Corkey's"), so we got there early (for us). Pretty impressive stuff—they had a massive Supersaurus, as well as a T-Rex, set up to look like it was taking down a Triceratops. Also a lab with observation windows, dino eggs, and some other skeletons as well. Overall, pretty cool place. Plus, I found a tiny T-Rex necklace charm in the gift shop, so there.

And finally we left Wyoming (sadly). On the way out, I had another brush with the highway patrol—this time less amiable. Turns out going fifteen over the limit isn't actually a good thing. But after another nail-bitingly long deprivation of my license, I was informed that this was a warning and I should watch my speed. Did I mention I love Wyoming? A final thanks to the radio stations that pulled us through: The Fox, The Wolf, The Eagle, The Hawk, and a veritable menagerie of other wildlife. Honestly, would a little creativity hurt?

Utah: Not Enough Mormons

2007-09-14T09:30:00.000-07:00

The first part of Utah is flat, and I mean Flat. Sure, there are mountains surrounding you in the distance, but the immediate landscape is so flat that it's almost obscene. They don't call them salt flats for nothing. In honor of being in the Bonneville Flats, and the Kenny Loggins on the radio, I opened all my windows and floored the gas. We only made it up to 90 mph (oh my poor car).
Utah takes only a few hours to pass through. We stopped in Salt Lake City for food, and were disappointed that we weren't attacked by crazed zealots. At least there was Sonic.

Nevada: Gambling!

2007-09-14T09:25:00.000-07:00

We ended up in Reno in the afternoon, and commenced our walking tour of the Littlest Big City—that is to say, we hit up every casino along the main strip. More accurately, I lost (at least) a dollar at The Silverado, something Irish-themed, something pretending to be fancy, the usual mix of everywhere. On the other hand, Mike netted about thirty bucks from our casino tour, which he promptly exchanged for a bottle of rum. The moral? Go to Reno, get free rum.
I can't say that I liked Reno as much as Vegas, it's much too sad. While Vegas is simply a moral vacuum, Reno is more like a gravity well of people. The waitresses are older, or look like they used to be cute, and the people seem older too. On the other hand, the lure of absurdly loud carpets and somewhat over-the-top decorations (the Silverado had a surprisingly large dome inside, filled with a steampunk-esque "mining" contraption) is hard to resist. Even better, they still had older relics of slot machines tucked away in some places, the kind that actually accepts coins and spits them out back at you! (While the video slots are all shiny, and the voucher system is certainly easier to use, there's nothing better than the real—not artificial!—sound of coins hitting metal.)
We made it to the other side of Nevada that night—stopping in the town of Lovelock (the town motto, oh so cleverly, was something about locking up your love there). At a gas station which, inevitably, had three slot machines.
Also of note was when we drove through the town of Battle Mountain, as well as passing the sign for Deeth Starr Valley (!), which gave us no end of amusement.
That night we stayed at the Red Garter in Wendover, on the border of Utah. Wendover is a beautiful oasis of last-stop gambling and gas stations, nothing like the high density of the more popular gambling destinations, but then again, the sign outside our building proudly proclaimed that it was, indeed, a "Casino!"

California: Cue OC Theme Song

2007-09-14T09:14:00.000-07:00

It's about a ten-hour drive from Portland to Oakland, where Justin, my first couch to sleep on, lives. I can't say that it was entirely eventful, though there's a nice freedom in taking a long trip on one's own. I prefer it all windows down, music (provided by either tapes from Goodwill or the local country station) blasting, pushing the speed limit, cruise control and seeing just how long my car will go straight with my hands off the wheel.
I stopped at the Rogue River rest stop (by far the prettiest), and cursed myself for not taking the Medford Dairy Queen stop, as Northern California seems to have none.
I got to the Oakland area on schedule, and was only moderately lost in the Maze (the entanglement of multiple highways including the 880 and 580, some of the ones I required).
I found Justin, and we immediately departed for poker night at his friend's house. While Texas Hold 'Em isn't my strong suit (excuse the pun), I did decently enough, though it wouldn't have mattered since Justin was bankrolling my night. After, I got a mini tour of the area (Berkeley, and lots of fog), and then we chatted like schoolgirls until late.

Going to Santa Barbara should have been brutal on so little sleep, but, as I was still operating alone, I had a long breakfast at Denny's with a book about fighting giant ants, and I was ready for the day. It was more uneventfulness (Pismo Beach for ice cream by the ocean, and sand irrevocably in my hair), and then SB. Lexie and I had fancy schmancy cocktails and went shopping, and I felt more girly than I have in months.

The worst leg was going to San Diego, was it was dark, and I had to brave the LA drivers. But thankfully, Laura was waiting up for my with a plate of fries and Brown Sauce—and after checking in with the parents, I was down for the count.

San Diego
San Diego was more of the same: we went shopping, went out with her friends, went to the beach. It was fun, good to see my sister, though we will never see eye-to-eye on cell phone etiquette.

Los Angeles
Los Angeles was full of good Mexican food (I figured I had to get my fill before the Midwest), and in general seeing everybody. Maggie and I went to Santa Monica, which was full of people-watching and the most un-charismatic magician ever. We could actually hear him complaining into his microphone about the crowd and how dumb they were. We did an outing to 107 as well, though it was full of hipsters (surprising for a weekday). And thank god for Chano's.

Up and Out
We stopped by Lexie's to drop off Mike's car, wasted time hanging out, and didn't even make it to Sacramento the first night. But the next day we pushed into Nevada, stopping by in the Donner Pass area to eat lunch (cause the Donner Party, get it? Eh?) and buy more tapes at a little music store in the middle of nowhere.

Portland and Roscoe

2007-09-08T14:13:00.000-07:00

For my last day in Portland, Kayce and I indulged in a little thievery. Dad's prized rhinoceros, Roscoe, the 150 pound, five foot long and three foot high, Aluminum statue, had been begging to be let loose all summer. So we obliged.
We ended up dragging him down McLoughlin (the Statue of Liberty, the Bomber Restaurant, and that Totem Pole) in her truck, and then headed to the zoo. There, he made the day of a handful of children whose parents jumped on the learning opportunity ("What's that, honey? A rhinoceros! Do you remember seeing his family inside?") and was generally petted and loved all around (though we never even made it past the admissions). Sadly, the zoo has no sense of humor, and we were informed by an entirely too serious security guard that we would have to leave and take Roscoe with us.
To cheer ourselves up after such a downer, we headed downtown. Parking was a challenge, so we ended up having to carry him two blocks to get to the front of Powell's, which drew our fair share of amused looks and the admiration of the Greenpeace canvassers. From there, we got him down to the waterfront (by now, lifting him in and out of the truck was becoming more of a challenge, though thanks to the grace of Darrin we weren't entirely sapped), where he stopped by the Smallest Park in the World, and then frolicked in the fountain.
Before heading home, we made a last stop at Voodoo Doughnuts, where the girl working the counter was not only kind enough to let us take him into their very small quarters, but also fished through the doughnuts to find those with the largest holes, that would most easily fit onto his horn.
Roscoe was then returned to the garage—just in time, since Dad was getting suspicious (when my mom finally told him that he wasn't allowed to go in, his first response was to ask, "Did somebody hit Roscoe?"). Let me just say that it is very hard to keep a straight face when you're standing by a metal rhino with doughnuts on its horn and waiting for someone to notice.
When he finally did, he flipped through the Polaroids slowly, until finally commenting, "These look like Polaroids." "That would be because they are," I replied. "Well then how did you do it?"
Finally we convinced him that it was real, and now we are the heroes of our neighborhood.

There was a Sharis run, cut short by overzealous mom-ing that led to a curfew, and then the next morning, bright and early, I loaded up the car and headed out.

Me vs. My Mom

2007-07-04T13:38:00.000-07:00

So I was doing the crossword a few days ago, and came across the clue: "——— wide net."
Easy, I think. "World." Duh. The internets, right?

After a few minutes, it becomes clear to me that this is not right, so I yell to my mom, "What is 'blank wide net'?" And in no seconds flat, she responds with "Cast a!"

..."Cast a wide net?" I...didn't even know that was a phrase...Internets?

I think it's clear which generation the crossword writers belong to.

My childhood comes back to haunt me, 15 years later.

2007-06-07T20:58:00.000-07:00

I went to the same school from kindergarten to third grade. During that time, we had a music teacher, "Mr. D." Now, while he taught us many great songs, there was one that I had forgotten until today. Perhaps you recognize it?

Strange, I don't remember us learning quite all these lyrics when I was little.

On the fires at Griffith Park:

2007-05-12T11:09:00.000-07:00

"It's like watching a bonfire, except that you feel sorry for all the animals."

In other news, I sneeze after eating dark chocolate (but only if I haven't already been eating it). Emily sneezes if she touches a certain spot on her forehead. The human body is a strange thing.

Speaking of Omniscience...

2007-05-07T19:09:00.000-07:00

Jane Magazine, for those interested, has a highly accurate horoscope. The proof? For April, it urged me to go to a function I would not normally go to around the 9th, as it would lead to a "torrid" affair-- and, magically, I met a new boy! It was also correct for Pieces to avoid a man in a "mock neck sweater" on a specific day, and a few other details.

So for this month?
I'll be sure to take a short trip around the 24th, and "fight with my sweetheart" on the 31st. Make sure to check yours, or who knows what you may miss out on!

Size Categorization, Librarian-Style

2007-05-03T15:38:00.000-07:00

There exists, in the Grand Library Book Depository, a class of books beyond mere "oversized" volumes. These are the "SUPER OVERSIZED." That's right, the library uses "super" as a valid label. It's official.

It may also interest you to know that the largest volume in the entire library is an Atlas of the Cat's Brain. (One could argue that it is, in fact, a box containing a few volumes. But you wouldn't want the distinction of "largest book at all of USC, possibly the world" to be, well, binders of "People's World," would you?)

Old Testament God: Vengeance Through the Mail

2007-04-30T13:57:00.000-07:00

Yesterday, at Emily and Adriana's, they picked up their mail to find an envelope asking to "bless whoever opens this letter." Naturally, we all took turns pulling the papers out and stuffing them back in.
Inside was a prayer rug-- a large piece of paper with Jesus printed on it, that had been "soaked in prayer." According to instructions, we had to stare at him until his eyes opened, then touch the rug to our knees. After, we were free to fill out the "prayer checklist" included, and if we mailed everything back, well, it would all come true.

I am torn between cynicism, a warm fuzzy feeling that an organization out there would spend their money to send this sort of thing to everyone they possible can, and a vague sense of apprehension that we accidentally ripped the prayer rug and If the chain is broken and it isn't sent to five people in two days then you will have bad luck with love forever trust me it happened to a guy I knew he didn't send it on and the next day his cat died OMG and this girl was hit by a car so srsly guys send it on!!!

A Moment of Zen

2007-04-28T18:50:00.000-07:00

Yesterday at the library, I spent almost half an hour reassembling a pile of loose post-its back into a single coherent stack. It was like my own personal battle against entropy, and even though I could have spent that time, say, marking off which books were present or out of order, it still felt good. I highly recommend it, if you happen to have a large pile of loose post-its.

Pictures, slowly but surely

2006-12-16T05:25:00.000-08:00

More pictures in the Random People file, as well as the trip with my parents to Thirlestane castle.

Glasgow and the Highlands!

2006-12-16T03:27:00.000-08:00

After a whole term of putting it off, Jasmine, Erika and I finally put our plans for a Highland tour into action.
Though first things first-- I had a fancy dinner on Friday, which was oh so tasty, then met Mairead on Saturday, after yet another trip to the Christmas fair, to make our boxwar costumes. We spent the evening constructing some pretty amazing boxes (hers was Pac-Man, and mine was Ms. Pac-man). Then we went down to the train station (wearing the boxes, I might add), and caught the next one to Glasgow.
They had held off the wars until we arrived, since Mairead knew the promoter, so we got there, did some final fixes, and then it was on-- music started, we danced like crazy, only slightly hampered by, well, all the boxes. Since our costumes had lots of newspaper, the floor ended up one giant soft newspaper pile, something like a leaf pile, loads of fun to jump in.
Then Mairead and her boyfriend had to leave around 1am, but I was meeting the girls in Glasgow in the morning, so we made arrangements for me to go to her friend's flat, and stay the night. I had a couple hours at the place to myself, which was interesting, having never gone to a concert (more of a techno rave thing, actually) alone before. Danced, met some people, the usual. Finally, after it was over and there was some confusion as to who was going where, a small group of us arrived at her flat. Sat on the couch for hours, chatting a bit, listening to music, resisting the urge to fall asleep. Eventually, about four or five of us on the couch all drifted off, and our lovely hostess threw some duvets on us. Then, an hour later, my alarm went off, and I was up and trekking through the early dark Glaswegian rain to the bus station.
Met up with the girls, we had breakfast, and got a bus to Inverness. We got there, checked into the hostel, walked around a bit. There were historical buildings, a very nice chippy (there always is), a Christmas bridge, a graveyard, then groceries (Cheerios, hot cocoa, malted milk)-- and with that, we had a nice dinner. Hung out watching Forrest Gump in the lounge, and finally hit the hay. Next morning up early and caught a bus to Loch Ness. Went to Urquhart Castle, right on the loch, and indulged in some tourism. Even the cheesy film (though I must say, the castle had possibly the best exhibit I've been to). Ran around the ruins, oohed at the loch, then caught a bus to Dornie. Arrived at Eilean Donan castle! (Where Highlander was filmed!) Ran around it, yelled "there can be only one!" about fifteen times. Tried to survive the rain and wind.
Unfortunately, our goal of Skye was out of reach, as, due to weather, there were no ferries to the island that day. So we found the only hotel in Dornie, and settled in for a night of dinner, and TV, hanging out. The next morning, we caught a bus back to Glasgow, and made it home in one piece.

Once home, we had out last Chocsoc meeting at the Crags, which was more sadness, of course.
Cindy came in on Wednesday-- we've been a whirlwind of Christmas shopping and productivity. Thursday night I had my last ceilidh class (more sadness!), and last night was the New Scotland Christmas party-- some crazy late night dancing, hanging out in the kitchen, getting emails and enjoying that I have connections I can use to get Christmas gifts. Stayed late, said my goodbyes.
And today-- more of the same, I suppose.
Home in four days!

Finals, and trying to survive them.

2006-12-07T08:45:00.000-08:00

Twelve days, and it's starting to get frantic(er).
I went to the opera on Saturday, which was rather nice-- the singing was average, but the music was good, and I liked the set. Costumes left something to be desired. And the acting was good.
Sunday I had my last gaming session, which spawned a Nerf fight over the cake/pie cheesecake debate, the usual silliness.
Tuesday, Mairead and I made cookies-- holiday butter ones, to be precise, complete with decorations and a flour fight. Also Irn Bru (soda of Scotland) and trying some bacon-flavoured crisps (them and their meat-flavoured crisps, it's oh so strange!). Then on Wednesday we delivered them to library denizens, feeling only slightly demoralized when people kept assuming that we were selling them or representing a group.
There was a final this morning, and two essays due tomorrow. So for all intents and purposes, except for turning them in-- consider me done. Thank god.

A visit from the crazy Americans

2006-12-03T07:10:00.000-08:00

A mere two days after I returned from London, Emily and Shauna came in to visit!
Unfortunately, instead of allowing themselves to become jet-lagged, they became nocturnal, which meant, of course, that I was nocturnal.
We did the usual exploration of the city-- the Royal Mile, Princes Street. The very best part was the German Christmas Fair-- little booths selling mulled wine, or crafts, or, more importantly, chocolate. We befriended Jesse, the chocolate man, and spent hours at the booth, as he gave us a continuous stream of free chocolate samples and banter. I don't know if I'll ever get into another Shakespearian quote war, replacing key words with chocolate-themed ones.
We also made it down to the Calton Cemetery on a nice evening, and up to Calton Hill-- the cemetery was suitably beautiful and creepy, and the monument on the hill gave some spectacular views of the city.
Sadly, they were only around for an extended weekend, and soon life returned to normal. I went to Boxwars with a friend from my poetry class-- a concert where, for the last band, people put on costumes made of cardboard boxes they'd made. It was quite amusing to watch-- people certainly went all out for it.
It's been tame here-- finals are looming (already have one essay finished, one more, plus an exam), and after that, it's home. The usual freak-out about going everywhere and doing everything has come and gone.
Sixteen days left until I get home-- can that even be right?

The Country Mouse visits the Town Mouse

2006-11-24T07:22:00.000-08:00

Don't laugh, but Edinburgh has softened me. Imagine: a city where you can walk (pretty much) anywhere, not only because the distance is short enough, but also because it's safe enough! I have never felt so small-town as when I went to visit Erin in London last weekend.
The weekend started out well-- I went to ceilidh class on Thursday night, then ran straight to the bus station for the eight-hour ride (unfortunately, they had turned off our personal lights, so I had to finish Kidnapped by ambient light, which was a challenge). I arrived in London around 7am on Friday-- surprisingly refreshed and ready for the day, though the coffee helped ("white coffee" here-- when just specifying "with milk" isn't cool enough). I hung out at the station, and Erin (the angel that she is) made her way over to collect me at that ungodly hour. We got me a weekend Tube pass and I was all set to be overwhelmed by the sheer amount of people.
I dropped my things off at her place, and we set off adventuring. We started in Hyde Park, strolling around-- the leaves were all yellow, the grass was still green, and the pigeons were too jaded to fly away when I ran at them. We had a run-in with some magical squirrels of magic, who, after years of being fed, climbed up our legs and ate M&Ms out of our hands. We then walked up and down the same street trying to find Herrods before finally giving up and taking the bus. Herrods is the same breed as Jenners-- super expensive and high-class in every way. There is an entire section of Christmas things, including a pet store-- kittens and bunnies (sadly no puppies) within the store! Rooms of chocolates and seafood and butchers better than any grocery store could hope to be (we had some of their salmon sandwiches and we in heaven). Then we decided to catch Casino Royale at one of the massive cinemas, since, hey, we're in Britain after all. Without giving an entire review, the movie was incredible, and Daniel Craig was perhaps the best Bond ever. We spent the entire Tube ride home waxing poetic about our love for him. Then it was a dinner in, chilling with some TV and girl time to round out the day.
Saturday I got up early to attempt to buy some discounted tickets for a West End show. I navigated the Tube by myself, even got to be third in line for the choice kiosk, before being informed, five minutes before they opened (after a 45 minute wait with a book and the cold wind) that they had no tickets for my first choice show for that night. On to another kiosk, with a significantly longer line, but I finally obtained tickets for Avenue Q that night. I returned triumphant. Then Erin took me around to the markets: Camden, Portobello (and yes, we sang the song from Bedknobs and Broomsticks there). Street musicians with cute dogs and antique shops abounded, the sort of place where I would like to go back early in the morning and spent hours wandering around. We stopped by Erin's favorite tea shop, and then headed home for some food before I had my show.
If you haven't heard of Avenue Q, it's a musical with puppets-- the cute twist is that it's a Sesame Street aesthetic, but addressing adult issues, like sex and purpose in life. So yes, it was funny, but it actually managed to pull off some surprisingly poignant scenes, considering that it was a puppet singing about wasting time on love. I thought it was just fantastic, despite the horrible balcony seats.
On Sunday, I got up early again, and made a pilgrimage to Westminster, the geek in me wanting to read Wordsworth's poem in the morning. I failed when I arrived to discover that I had lost my copy of the poem. But I wandered the area still, the bridge, Big Ben, Parliament, Westminster Abbey. It was rather nice in the morning, peaceful despite the already-noisy traffic. I arrived back in time for us to leave to catch the Changing of the Guard. (Thank god for Erin's college student knowledge of the city! She always knew where to stand for the best view, best picture) So we saw that, Buckingham, took the traditional picture with a guard.
On the way to the Tower, we stopped by a pub for lunch-- bangers and mash with Guinness-- though I got carded (do I look seventeen??), and then she dropped me off for my tourist fun. The guided tours, given by the Beefeaters, are highly amusing, and then there's the halls of weapons, architecture, the Bloody Tower, and Crown Jewels to ogle at. Then it was home again, some more downtime.
Monday it was up (slightly) early to go to the Tate Modern. Great galleries of modern stuff-- some great Dalis-- and exhibits on surrealism and dream, though not particularly organised well. The highlight, however, was the installation. It was SLIDES. As in, the playground ones. There was one from each level-- and there are five levels to that museum! (Though we only rode the ones from the third and fifth.) It was a blast, you got canvas to slide down on, and a protective helmet on the fifth-level one, though they flew off halfway down. It was the most fun I've had in a museum-- god bless art!
Then we quickly crossed off the other things on my list: Paddington station (only because we learned a Scottish country dance tangentially related to the bear, and I felt I had to pop in), Trafalgar Square (it's hard to climb those lions when it's wet and rainy!), and of course ogling all the Christmas lights. Then it was home again, and after some down time, I departed, caught my bus and ended up home in time for a shower before my class.
Now I've got Shauna and Emily here, but that's going to be another matter entirely.

Parents' Week-- as if it were still a Uni-organized event

2006-11-12T07:29:00.000-08:00

Well, that was exciting.
The parents arrived early on Friday (that's two Fridays ago, actually). It was good to see them, really it was.
The definite highlight of them being there was Saturday, when we bussed it down to Lauder, to see Thirlestane, the clan Maitland's (of which my grandma is a part) castle. On the bus ride down, my mother regressed into a teenage girl, and insisted on taking a picture of me and my dad-- on the bus. Oh, the excitement. Then we weren't sure where in Lauder to get off, so we took the first stop, which was a bit of a mistake. The woman in the gas station told us to walk to the first left turn in the town. Of course, there are none! An entire town with no left turns off the main street-- that is, until we're practically walking back into the countryside, and, to the left, we espy a rather grand-looking building. The castle! Now, our left turn is even further down the road, and then backtracks going up to the castle. However, as far as super-long driveways go, it was beautiful-- passing by lots of fields, and a paddock-- in which I made a horsey friend (well, at least an acquaintance who tolerated me stroking his nose despite my lack of treats. The castle is rather impressive-- a massive central part, with two large wings going off on either side. It was closed for the season, but since we were related, and willing to pay for a private tour, we were the exception. It was cold and windy, and we waffled around a bit before the caretaker found us and let us in the (quite impressive) front doors.
Inside, Ian (the caretaker/main administrator) introduced us to Douglas, our tour guide (it turns out that he is retired, and does these tours because he WANTS to.) We started in the entrance room, which was wonderfully full of weapons-- a few Scottish longswords, but lots of exotics from military tours, including what looked like a couple crossbows-- which Douglas informed us were actually used to shoot rocks for hunting.
We then went through various lower rooms-- a billiards room (according to Douglas, "billiards was more of a ladies game, and from the records, it appears they were better than the men-- most likely because the men were usually drunk"), a photography room (including loads of antique cameras), library (Douglas talked on about how mostly they just liked the look of books, they didn't actually read them. There were hundreds of books about Parliamentary debates, but I had to look hard for the poetry.), and a room with the family Bible (it was, I kid you not, larger than my torso, written in Old English, but convenient: "At least you wouldn't have to be in the same room to make out the words.").
Then upstairs! Up the only clockwise spiral staircase in the castle (mostly, spiral staircases are anti-clockwise. The clockwise ones are thought to have perhaps been used as an advantage for left-handed swordsmen (that's you and me, Andy)-- but of course, no one's sure.) Upstairs they had the more impressive rooms-- most of the ceilings had extensive plasterwork (one thing the castle's famous for)-- wreaths, flowers, even eagles, literal statues coming out of the ceiling (apparently horsehair was an important ingredient in helping this all keep its shape). There was the Duke's room, with the usual massive bed, though this one wasn't original to the castle-- apparently a woman had quite recently sent it to the castle with a note: "I found this in my attic, please take it." Also a room in which they think Bonnie Prince Charles stayed. A music room, a drawing room. The usual opulence.
Then, Douglas opened up a bit of wall, to a staircase up, with the caution-- "stay close, and don't wander off." The reason? The ceiling may fall on our heads. We got to walk around the upper levels then-- dusty rooms in bad need of renovation, filled with piles of old stuff-- typewriters, shoes, boxes, rocks (which appealed to my dad, at least). There was one with a huge hole in the wall, leading to a giant cavity, which Douglas pointed out as the reason most people thought that these castles had secret passages-- when in reality it was just sloppy remodeling with walls covering over bits of rooms. There was also a room deeper in this mess which had its own ghost-- though, supposedly, it didn't come out when it was too cold (which it was-- did I mention the cold? No central heat. Douglas had shown up for the tour in a hat and gloves, which he joked was never a good sign). We went up to the top floor, where the servants' rooms were-- you could actually see where all the bell pulls led to-- more floor missing parts, narrow hallways, and such.
Finally we made our way back down to the normal floors-- a hall of portraits, and the nursery section, with toys you could play with! Finally down again to the main floor, with quick stops in the laundry room and kitchen. Then we shook hands with Ian, and he told us to feel free to wander the grounds a bit, which we did. There was a large lawn/garden area behind the castle, which was beautiful. We took some nice pictures, looked over the low wall in the back (there was a steep drop off behind it, for defensive purposes, to see the enemy coming-- though despite the massively thick walls, the design for defense, the castle had never been attacked, since apparently they were THAT powerful.)
Finally it was cold enough for us to ponder the trek back to town-- though fortunately Ian gave us a lift. We killed some time in the town, though there's not much to do in Lauder. Finally we got the bus back. My parents being all tuckered out, we watched some X factor with kebab, and then I headed out to a ceilidh (which was rather fun.
The parents and I spent the rest of their week with more subdued activities-- Mom and I went to Jenner's, we walked the Royal Mile a few times, I showed them campus. We went to the National Galleries as well-- a day well spent. We started in the normal one, the usual old paintings (good, but nothing that struck me with any real force, and some rather poor exhibition of them). Then we moved along to the second half, a more contemporary take, but a bit too new-- pretty experimental stuff. Then, we moved along to the Dean Gallery-- more modern stuff, but way out in the boonies (think cab or shuttle far). The usual stuff was there-- Magritte, Miro, Picasso, Duchamp. In small quantities, but still a couple recognizable ones. Upstairs was an exhibit of Scottish modern paintings-- now, there were some real stunning pieces there. Finally we emerged, and discovered we had about 45 minutes to kill before the next shuttle. This was the perfect opportunity to take advantage of the huge lawn behind the museum, a significant portion of which was covered in perfect yellow leaves. After, my parents complimented my cartwheel abilities.
After that, the day was not over! For it was Bonfire Night (aka Guy Fawkes Day) and we had plans with the flatmates to go to the top of Arthur's Seat and watch the city-wide explosions. Hiking up there was probably not a good idea in the dark, of course (and sadly, the parents left us halfway up). But we made it to the very top, and huddled together in the gale-force winds. We managed to light some sparklers after maybe 15 minutes of attempts, but it was worth it. Finally we tried the way down (it was even more dark, of course), and ended up coming down the wrong side-- way North, instead of the West side. So there was a nice walk through the city before grabbing Papa John's and having a nice girl's night dinner together.
The parents' last day, we went to Holyroodhouse Palace (you know, where the queen stays when she's here. Of course). It was rather fun-- we amused ourselves with the audio tour, were sufficiently in awe of the Abbey ruins adjoining the palace. And thus the parents were gone. It was fun, and I was very happy to see them, and we had lots of good long talks, there was a nice dinner with my dad.

In other news, not so much-- essay due tomorrow, which I believe is done, Chocsoc meeting, the usual.
One more thing-- if you're reading this, I'm more likely than not going to get you a Christmas present/souvenir from Scotland. The season is upon us, so if anyone has any specific requests, let me know asap. Otherwise all you get is canned haggis.

Halloween: not just a single day anymore!

2006-11-01T06:09:00.000-08:00

Last week, after recovering from the Cadbury outing, was started with a lunch out with a girl from my poetry class on Tuesday-- if this doesn't seem like anything exciting, I will explain that I typically don't make friends in any of my classes. I'm not sure why-- but in general, I don't hang out with people I have classes with. So it's rather nice to have finally made a connection in a class. We've made it a weekly thing, so yesterday we went to a cafe called Chocolate Soup. It has perhaps the best hot chocolate in existence, not to mention massive cups of it.
On Wednesday, New Scotland had a Halloween ceilidh. It was the usual loads of fun, dancing to live music and even sandwiches! Lots of dancing and silly conversations ensued. After, us hardcore late-stayers helped the band carry the equipment to their car because-- big surprise-- it was raining. And I mean a proper rain. It was actually rather lovely-- after about ten feet into my walk home, I realized there was no way I would be even close to dry, so I managed to amuse myself singing and jumping in all the puddles, which netted me the admiration of some random guy, the only other person walking out that late. Very cool.
Thursday I had ceilidh class-- two nights in a row may be fun, but it is definitely too much. Oh well. I'd do it all again.
It was a pretty stressful weekend, actually-- the application for the advanced English class I need to take was due on Friday, after short notice, so I had to put that together, and then I had an essay for Scottish History due on Monday (now, all my classes are pass/fail, and this is technically a Fresher's level class, but that didn't make me stress out and less).
Fortunately, I was also busy with Halloween preparations! Now, mom had the brilliant idea, before I left, that I could go as Kaylee (from Firefly). This seemed like a great idea, especially when I met one of the gamers who had been planning on going as Jayne anyway-- I already had part of my crew! But the costume itself was an adventure: first I had many many attempts to find a jumpsuit at any of the thrift stores in the area. (A side story: In the States, we have Goodwill. Red, White, and Blue. And so on. Here, they name the stores after the charity they support-- so it's normal to say things like "I'm going to go check out cancer research today," or "Let's stop by pets without vets and see what they have." But no one really refers to them by name, since there's a couple blocks on South Clerk that have, between them, maybe seven of these stores. So people tend to just go down the line, walking into every single one. On my expeditions, I would keep running into the same people at every store. The line then ends at Armstrong's, a proper vintage store, which is rather amazing. It was here, of all places, I finally found my ugly-as-sin jumpsuit.)
Anyway-- I had a jumpsuit, and dyed my hair (temporarily!) darker. Then it also seemed like a good idea to try to alter the ugly-as-sin jumpsuit. Unfortunately, I have neither seam ripper nor sewing machine. So, when I post pictures, keep in mind that everything I did (sleeves off, legs widened, waist and hips and torso and some legs taken in, and a bit of an attached belt), I did with a pocketknife and a needle and thread. So be duly impressed. So last night, I was finally able to enjoy the fruits of my labors-- we all got ready (Dorothy, an evil angel, and a devil) and hung out and ran around the city a bit (but not too much, surprisingly) and had loads of fun. Truly, a great holiday.
And now, it's workworkwork to try to get ahead in school things, and later on I get to sign up for USC classes! (So far, it looks like Poetry, Fiction, Contemporary Poetry, and Classical Arabian Literature in Translation-- guess which is the one I'm taking to fill a requirement?)

More photos!

2006-10-28T14:38:00.000-07:00

These are the pictures from my tourist day with Jessie (yes, I know it was awhile ago)-- specifically, pictures of Edinburgh Castle. (They've uploaded in reverse order, so you start at the end of our adventures and move backwards through time until you find yourself outside the castle.)

A Pilgrimage to My Own Personal Mecca-- Cadbury World!

2006-10-23T09:53:00.000-07:00

So the Chocolate Society has a yearly trip to Cadbury World, in Birmingham. Initially, of course I was planning to go, but then Natalie (flatmate, the only other girl I knew in the society) ended up not going, and, not wanting to go alone with a bunch of strangers, as well as having the price rise with every week that I was unsure, I opted out. What was even more disappointing was that soon after, I befriended Jasmine, an American girl in one of my classes, who was going on the trip, and she kept telling me that I should have signed up to go.
Then heaven intervened: last minute, the President of the society was unable to go, and then were selling her ticket for cheap-- Jasmine told Alan I wanted to go, and I found myself suddenly with a weekend trip on my hands.
This had an unfortunate collision with Erin being in town for the weekend-- so I hooked up with her Friday night, and we went to the 3 Sisters for a drink. We ended up hanging out for awhile, much to the detriment of my sleep schedule, but it was nice to see her. Hopefully I'll make it down to London to see her soon.
Less than four hours of sleep later, I dragged myself out of bed, packed my things, and stumbled to the train station, ending up there about half an hour early, though Jasmine and Erica were already there. So we waited-- Peter and Becky (keep in mind that I really only knew Jasmine at the time) showed up as well. 6.30, the meeting time, comes and goes, and Alan, the organizer, is still not there with our tickets. Finally, five minutes before the train leaves, he shows up and we get up, very relieved.
The train ride down was uneventful-- we got a table, read, napped, or listened to music/Billy Connolly standup. So we arrived in Birmingham, and grabbed a quick lunch, which was fairly uneventful, though it was nice that we all hit it off right off the bat. In fact, while I was expecting more than six of us, it was nice it turned out that way.
The first part of Cadbury World is a series of educational bits-- you walk through what seems to be the Rainforest Cafe (with Aztecs, of course), that has little signs telling you about chocolate's history. Then you stand in a theater bit and watch four video puppet scenes about chocolate going to Europe. Then they keep us corralled in a waiting area designed like a Victorian street. Then another video-projected-onto-a-set dealie about the Cadbury history. Then it gets more fun: another seemingly-innocuous theater, to explain how to make chocolate-- except someone along the line decided that it would be a good idea for the actual theater to mimic the process that the video explained-- including red heat lamps, shaking benches, ominous giant rollers, puffs of air, and so on.
Finally the part we were there for-- walking through the packaging plant! Conveyor belts of chocolate bars zipped tantalizingly by, safely behind large sheets of plexiglass. We tried to butter up the workers to bring us chocolate, but they would have none of it, sadly. But oh, did it smell good there! After that, we rode Cadabra (think of a poor man's "It's A Small World After All," but with cocoa beans inhabiting it. Also minus the music)-- which was more fun than it should have been, perhaps simply because we were all getting along so well. Then the demonstration area-- we got to pour chocolate into molds, and watch them do all the fancy stuff, though mostly we just queued for the station where you could drop your own nougat filling into a small vat of melted chocolate and then fish it out again-- this time it was worth the wait, as the guy in charge let us take a few at a time since we were so excited about it. Chocolate war paint was put into effect (and kept until after dinner). We ended up in "Purple Planet"-- silly games, basically. The most fun was had on the pressure-sensitive video floor, which cycled through things like squares of chocolate you could jump on to break, or puddles of melted chocolate to jump in. Finally, we watched a montage of all the Cadbury commercials, through the decades-- including the one that was once banned for being too sexual. And finally we ran through the Cadbury shop, buying misshapes in large amounts for super cheap.
Once they kicked us out (to close, not because we were troublemakers!), we sought dinner, which came in the form of a giant Chinese buffet. After, we stopped by Hard Rock for the "traditional" margaritas, and decided to go back to the hotel fairly early since we weren't really up for staying out too late, though we did all hang out in our hotel room pretty late, talking and getting to know each other, which was pretty fun.
Sunday we were up, and had a nice breakfast and then somehow someone thought it was a good idea, when all of us were riding up in the elevator, to all jump at the same time-- so it decided to stop and return us to the ground floor, which was interesting. Finally we were checked out, with most of a day to waste in Birmingham. First stop was Borders, then a delicious Japanese noodle restaurant-- during which Alan introduced us all to Top Trumps, a most addicting card game-- so after lunch, we all had to go back to Borders to buy our own decks. Then we wasted some time in the mall and the Apple store. Then we packed off to the train station-- played more Top Trumps waiting for the train (I told you, addictive). Then, a snag: when we tried to board our train, it was full. I mean FULL. Apparently it's a law here that they can't NOT sell you a ticket for any one train (plus so many open tickets), so despite our seat reservations, we didn't fit on the train, and they had to give us tickets for the next train. Unfortunately, this meant that once we ended up in Newcastle, we had missed the last bus to Edinburgh. Well, the company was required to get us where were going, so they got us a taxi-- and it's about two to three hours home. (The final fare was around 280 pounds!) But it was OK-- we all fit into a seven-seater, and the driver took us to a chippy shop so we could get food (with the meter running, of course)-- we all ate horribly smelly food (curry and chips, garlic bread, chips and cheese) and fell asleep until finally we were dumped unceremoniously in front of Waverly station-- thank god it's a two minute walk from my flat.

And that was the weekend. I've come out of it with a baby-sized bag of chocolate, a new favorite game, and a few more friends. Overall, rather good, I say.

Fresher's Weekend with New Scotland, aka a weekend retreat with the Scottish dancers

2006-10-16T10:11:00.000-07:00

Friday:
The bus leaves at 6 in the evening. I sit with Janni (cute Swedish girl, sister of Sanne, a girl I already knew from previous classes), and we chat a bunch. The middle of the bus starts singing folk songs. We stopped at Dunkirk for dinner (fish and chips, how traditional), or, for the back of the bus, drinks. Then the back of the bus starts singing. Much hilarity ensues, and after getting slightly lost, we pull into the resort place. Immediately everyone piles off the bus in an attempt to race to the best room to claim it. This fails because it's pitch black outside, and no one knows how to get to the different cabins, let alone which are ours. Also, we have to take care to avoid the pond in the center of the place. Finally, beds are claimed (about ten people in our room alone-- forty-ish total on the trip), and within ten minutes, a pillow fight has broken out in our room. Much giggling occurs, and only minor injuries.
Then, right off the bat, we have a ceilidh. We have hours of folk dancing and skipping around the room and in general getting sweaty and tired and having loads of fun. There was the usual amount of people running into each other, etc. Then they ended the ceilidh and started the disco bit-- let me just say that there was a whole room full of people doing the macarena. EVERYONE. It was fabulous. This was all punctuated by "getting to know you" games-- nothing like sitting on a person's lap to get to know them better.
The night petered out, with about six of us-- mostly people I had known before the retreat-- lying on the floor hanging out and talking. Finally we get to bed around 4.30.

Saturday:
I woke up around 7, as the first people began to stir. Thanks to my ability to just get the heck up (that and I was too cold in bed), I was spared the early-morning wakeup from Yoshimi bursting into the room playing the bagpipes. Breakfast was uneventful, and then we had a ceilidh class/dance. Much fun (and a great was to wake up!) Then we had tea, round 1. After this was, I believe, more ceilidh dancing. Then tea, round 2 (during which they played some tango. Amber said something along the lines of, "somebody tango!" and since Toby was fortunately nearby, we had the floor to ourselves. It was rather awesome). Then there was a Step Dancing class (think Scottish tap), which was fun (yay for noisy dancing!), and lunch. After lunch we broke into our pre-decided teams to a "mystery challenge"-- making a kite! Fun with garbage bags and tape ensued, and then everyone trooped off to go fly them at the loch. We hadn't realized that it was actually two miles there-- but we had the most gorgeous march there, which included vistas of the mountains and blueberries growing alone the road.
There was, of course, no wind at the loch. So we bummed around awhile-- some of us waded a little bit (holy mackerel, was that cold!), splashed around. Then the wind picked up and we ran around like idiots for awhile-- one kite got stuck in a tree, one spiraled madly out of control, ours stayed aloft but merely hovered close to the ground, occasionally attacking people. Finally we headed back.
For the afternoon, we had signed up for either Greek dancing or Improv, though a lot of people just took naps. Since Greek dancing was so full, I magnanimously went to the improv workshop. Let's just say that there was silliness-- some weird obsession with monkeys and people rolling around on the floor, sometimes combined. It was a blast. But we had to cut it short to go get all costumed-up for dinner. ::insert usual montage of readiness:: My costume-- "Dead Heiress" (the theme was "Mystery and Magic)-- didn't require much anyway. Dress, tiara, cake gel icing applied to fake bullet wound on forehead (which caused a disturbing number of people to attempt to lick my face). Dinner was exceedingly amusing, thanks to incredible lasagna (one of the girls cooked ALL of our meals, and was in general amazing), and attempts to discuss etiquette with spoons on our noses. Also there was massive amounts of berry crumble, and my ongoing struggle to finish it, which became a matter of utmost importance for my entire table.
After dinner was cleared, we (big surprise) had a ceilidh! Folk dancing in silly costumes is the best thing ever. Also more silly bonding games (balloons, dancing, and apple-bobbing, which I managed to avoid). Then-- chocolate fountains! (One dark, one milk. Amazing.) Finally, at midnight, the dancing was called to an end, for the bonfire. The bonfire was had in a stone structure with a fireplace, so we all crammed onto the benches, and sang a raucous mix of childhood and folk songs. By 2am, the weak were again weeded out, and the remainder had a nice mellow sing along with guitar and quiet folk songs as the fire died. I was in bed by 4.30 again, though this time not the last.

Sunday:
Up to the sounds of bagpipes and pots and pans! Took a cold shower and hung out waiting for breakfast. We enjoyed leftover berry crumble with cream (so good!), and more random singing, of the perky morning type. Finished waking up to the Highland dancing class (quite the workout!), and then packed our things together. Wandered off to the woods with Anna and Ru-Huey, where we frolicked among the pine trees and moss, explored a strange little lean-to cut into the stream bank, looking for four leaf clovers, and jumped up and down in what could have possibly been a fairy ring.
The bus ride home was uneventful, with one stop again in Dunkirk for more tea (caffeine!), and then home.

It was a really incredible trip, I can't say that enough. There was just so much that we did, so many people that I got to know, it's surreal. No sense of time about it, that's for sure. I am exceedingly happy I did that.

Back to Friday:
I had haggis! It is tasty and doesn't taste at all like stomach. That is all. :)

Finally--

2006-10-10T16:45:00.000-07:00

Pictures are up!
Go to here, and I've put up pictures of (both of) my climbs to Arthur's Seat, St. Giles Cathedral, some random leftover pictures from my tourist day, and a couple others that I just have. There will be more coming-- of the castle and my coastal adventure-- hopefully.

Also, photobucket wouldn't let me put them in any particular order, so know that they're all jumbled.
Enjoy!

(Part of) the West Coast of Scotland-- a couple towns

2006-10-10T07:03:00.000-07:00

1. Out, and Oban
There's nothing like sitting on a train, heading West and watching the sun rise over Glasgow. That said, I hope I never see it again, though I saw I believe every sunrise this weekend. So yes, it was quite lovely on the way out, and I slept through most of it.
I arrived in Oban, a coastal town (pretty small, kinda like one of those Oregon beach cities), and of course it was raining. I mean RAINING. All afternoon. I still explored a bit, found the hostel, climbed up to McCaig's Tower (this big round dark granite structure, based off the colliseum, on the top of a hill). It was rather lovely, and the rain managed to let up long enough for me to enjoy it some. I sought refuge in a pub for dinner (goal accomplished: having bangers and mash, and eating 2 sausages. Woo, gluttony!), then went back, intending to crash at the hostel.
Of course, that didn't happen-- once it got to be night (and I mean pitch-black-sky night), the rain stopped. So I decided to walk around more-- hanging out by the docks, walking through town. I stopped by a local pub by chance, where I met Shauna the waitress and Boyd the teacher. They were really nice-- Shauna kept telling me not to go to the other pub, because it was a rought place-- and introduced me to some of their friends as well. It was a rather nice meeting people sort of night.

2. Isle of Mull
The next morning, I'm up bright and early, and head over to catch the ferry to Mull. It's a nice 45-minute ride, lots of sights to see. This time I stayed mostly awake for it. We land at the ferry port, which of course has nothing to do-- the plan was to get a bus to the Southern port so I could spend the day at Iona. I spot a bus, and say, "I need to get to Iona." The driver replies, "Seven pounds." (Pay attention to the dialogue, this is important.) I get on the bus, and we drive out. About five minutes in, he goes, "So, we're heading North to Tobermory" (the main city of the island). Hm, this isn't right. Then he goes on to mention that all trips to Iona were cancelled due to weather problems. Better, but still like a surprise trip-- yay, the complete wrong direction! Oh well. So no Iona, which was sad. The bus ride was rather exciting-- we saw seals. From the bus! Also lots of rainbows. I walked around Tobermory-- setting of the BBC children's show Balamory (famous for the brightly-colored buildings on the waterfront). At the edge of town, there was a path going up into some woods, so of course I follow it. It was really gorgeous, following the coast. At one point, I took a really overgrown path down to the beach, which, despite all the thorns, was worth it. The beach was all rocks, and I even got a little bit of sun as I sat there. Then I explored the creepy shed nearby (an old sleeping bag in a corner, and a magazine with the "missing persons" page ripped out, I kid you not). After the shed, I scrambled back up with as much dignity as I could muster, and ran into a girl who had been on the bus up with me.
We spent the rest of the afternoon exploring more, taking trails up to the suburbs, through some more woods, into the center of a gold course, and to a farm, munching on the wild blackberries growing everywhere. Finally she had to go catch the bus back, so I went to hang out at the hostel until they'd let me check in (not until 5, how strange is that?) I basically stayed in that night-- Tobermory is even smaller than Oban, minus the pubs. Oh well, seeing as I had to get up early to catch the first bus and ferry back.

3. Oban. Again.
Ah, nothing like waking up ridiculously early, catching a half hour bus ride, a 45-minute ferry ride, and then finding out that the train won't leave until hours later, since you've just barely missed the first one. So I had an opportunity to explore Oban some more. Fortunately, there was this old old castle a bit out of town that I hiked to-- now, let me say this as a separate sentence, so you see how cool it was. I sheltered from the rain in an abandoned castle. Eh? It was pretty awesome. Nothing like ivy-covered ruins (with a second story that you could still climb to) to stop the rain, and to watch rainbows from.
So I slowly slowly headed back to the train station, stopping along the way to sit at about every bench I see, and then get a chippy roll (I would like to marry the man who invented french fries on a bun with brown sauce-- it's perfect). Finally, the train took me back home.

So that was the long long weekend. Only one missed class (though I'll be skipping my afternoon one today because I'm just tired and don't want to deal with a boring lecture), some slightly muddy boots, and a big rip in my favorite jeans were the cost (non-monetary, that is). Also, being damp for about twenty-four solid hours in Oban. Time to do laundry and get back into the swing of things.

An uneventful week, supplemented by comments on the food here

2006-10-06T04:31:00.000-07:00

Like the title says-- I went to classes, ran errands, the usual. I skipped out on some society meetings, but replaced them with fun things like going clubbing with the flatmates (never have I been so conscious of my age, but I make an excellent "Designated Walker"). On Wednesday I attempted to go for the traditional study at a coffeehouse-- first choice being Elephant House (of the Harry Potter fame), of course. But I arrived, only to discover that they close at 7! The girl pointed me in the direction of a different place-- the Forest Cafe, which turns out to be possibly the best coffeehouse I've been to. Cheap coffee, the required pasticcio of second-hand couches and tables. For the first half of the night, there was a guy playing vintage blues records, and then they had live blues music. It was rather nice, though perhaps a tiny bit too contrived. Still a very good place to study, though.
To update the Study-Group-of-Evil-transformed-to-Study-Group-of-Wonder situation, the new study group continues to be wonderful. Any time you spend an hour discussing stories about getting curry thrown in people's faces, and state that the poet is "playing us like a cheap fiddle," you know it's a good group. I also had Ceilidh class last night, where I was able to sign up for the Fresher's Weekend in the highlands-- thank god, because 1) it sounds like lots of fun, and 2) there were a few threats about dire consequences if I didn't go.
And that was my week. Perhaps boring, but now I will commence to ramble on about the culinary delights of this fair city. Of course, the big one that I had forgotten to mention when I went weeks ago was the chippy shop! Baskets of steak fries with brown sauce, eaten with tiny wooden forks. You just can't go wrong. I was also introduced to kebab pizza (pretty big here, apparently-- there are some blocks with two or three kebab places on them). It's decent-- but nothing special or exciting. My new personal favorite is bangers and mash (sausage and mashed potatoes). Monster Mash has a beautiful system-- chose one of each (also gravy) out of maybe three to five choices of each. It's just wonderful.
As an afterthought: Did I mention that our flat has a cleaner? How kind of the Uni, you may think, to provide this for us. However, it has just gotten to the point of silliness-- we've had problems (well, Natalie has) with running into him in pajamas or a towel, and at this particular moment I would really like to get some lunch, but he's mopping the floor. So not only is the floor wet, but now I just feel silly.
Right, well, off to plan this weekend (nothing's set yet, so I won't go into what I plan on doing, but let's say that all the flatmates will be gone, so I will be taking a weekend trip away somewhere)--
Over and out.

In which everything magically works out!

2006-10-01T02:25:00.000-07:00

First of all, I would like to point out the fact that I am writing this on Firefox (instead of Safari)-- an experiment I tried for kicks, but then soon discovered that for some unfathomable reason, my internet runs about ten times faster! So I am infinitely relieved that it no longer takes ten minutes to open a single page (though now I have to watch out and not waste all my time online).
Secondly, I had my wonderful/terrible Scottish Poetry class on Tuesday. You're allowed to change your classes until the end of the second week, so we had maybe four new kids in the class. The teachers looks at us, and says, "Well, now our system is messed up. We'll just have to re-do the groups." And fortunately, I was sitting by different people in the room, so I was given a brand-new group! And this group is infinitely better-- directly after class, I went to the library to pick up the complete works by the authors for the week, and ran into a guy from my group doing the same thing! At our discussion, we ended up discussing the material for an extra hour. And they were nice as well. So that's problem number two that has been sucessfully overcome.
Other than that, I've settled into more of a routine-- there's lots of reading for my classes, so I've started reading in the random minutes of the day (while cooking dinner, which I not only have to do about every night, but am also getting better at; grabbing a coffee at the Elephant House-- where JK Rowling wrote part of Harry Potter). I've got the ceilidh class and gaming society, which are always good, and we went bowling with chocsoc this week.
One last highlight: I had finally reconnected with the girl from my plane ride over, and we went on a "Tourist Day" of the city yesterday. Started at Arthur's Seat (with a mini picnic this time, and some celebratory cider), walked the Royal Mile (including St. Giles' Cathedral), and ended up at the Edinburgh Castle. Lost of beautiful views, archetecture, and history. The castle is very impressive-- I had forgetten that it's almost more of a miniature city than just a big fortress. There was even a wedding going on in the chapel! Also we got to see the crown jewels (the second-oldest set in Europe, and rather impressive) and the Stone of Destiny, on which almost all the kings of Scotland have been crowned. As a side note, despite our desire to skip the long story and go ogle the shiny things, they had a remarkably well-made exhibit leading up to the goods. Hopefully more tourist days will follow, and pictures will certainly be posted.
That's all for now-- I've got to type up some poetry notes before I head off to gaming for the day!

Day in the North part of the city, night in the South

2006-09-24T07:00:00.000-07:00

Yesterday, I walked more than I ever thought possible. First, Laura and I went to Princes street, in the New side of the city, on a quest for a microwave. Princes street, being on the new side, is the commercial base for the city-- I got my first taste of just how expensice yet tempting British stores are. Also I realized just how trendy tights and leggings are here, which is rather surreal. And I did manage to find not-so-pricey shoes, which was nice.
I can't say that I'm a fan of walking in the daytime here. In the States, it is very subtly ingrained in us to walk on the right side of whatever you happen to be walking on. Here, not so much. In fact, not at all. When I mentioned this to Laura, she replied, "What, like you're in elementary school?" So it is quite the challenge to navigate around the people, especially if you are carrying a microwave about a mile home.
Last night, I took an inadvertent walking tour of the South part of the city. In other words, I got hopelessly lost. The goal was to get to a girl's house at which the New Scotland (aka the Scottish Dancing) Society was having a little party. From our flat, it was about two miles away (did I mention that everyone walks everywhere here? Two miles, being hella far in LA or even Portland, is nothing here, and no matter how lost I got, I barely even considered flagging down a cab). Forty-five minutes after leaving, I called Laura to find out where I was-- still two miles away. Over an hour later, I'm in the correct neighborhood, but completely sick and tired of walking and carrying a bottle of wine all over the city. Just as I'm about to find a nice park and open the bottle to celebrate my complete lack of knowing where I am, I recognize a street name. Success! I arrived at the party two hours after I had left my flat, but fortunately Anna (the Society president, who had insisted I come) was there as were many other friendly people who made me feel like the walk was worth it.

As far as the more quotidian parts of life here, Scottish History, though taught for the first part by an American (oh, the irony), is turning out to be good. The Tango Society is also good, despite a frustrating insistance that they don't need to teach me specific moves, because once I can really follow or lead, they'll "just happen." And, of course, the Ceilidh class is loads of fun. It's been raining all of today, which means that every time I go out, I have to change clothes when I come back in. As expected, I suppose. And now to waste the rest of the day curled up with some tea and the Muppet Show.

Preliminary Classes Impressions and Societies Doings

2006-09-20T13:51:00.000-07:00

Chocsoc had our first real meeting on Tuesday night-- the official business? Making chocolate houses! They gave us packages of chocolate cookies, and Nutella. Our table created, in honor of Talk Like A Pirate Day, "Pirates of the Coco-bean." It was rather lovely, and you should go to the Chocsoc website to go check it out when they post pictures, and also because you should vote for it. Though in all fairness, we DID win! Hah. Also, I had quite the ordeal locating peanut butter in this city-- not like it's a purely American thing, it's just that they were sold out everywhere, which was odd.
Also, I had a couple tango classes tonight-- the teacher is quite good, and there are some really fantastic dancers there. I'm at that awkward space right between beginner and intermediate, but learning a lot and getting better, which is all I need.
As for classes, well, it's still hard to tell. Scottish History so far has consisted of a class where we show up, fill out a contact form, and leave. It's my year one class, meaning that it'll be the easiest and the largest. Also, Natalie, my flatmate, is in it with me. Should be a good one.
Ancient History is my second-year class, so a little bit smaller, a little harder. But the professors are nothing if not well-organized, and the syllabus looks amazing. (Covering Egyptian, Biblical, and Ancient Greek and Roman history.)
Modern and Contemporary Scottish Poetry is the most inspiring class, in many ways. The teacher is amazing. He dove right into it at the first lecture, and he knows his stuff really well. He had a Scot read the poems written in Scots so that we could hear how the rhyme and rhythm depend on the specific accent, which was incredible. And in the middle of class, he offered us tea, and we had a few minutes to have some.
Sadly, the classmates aren't so great. Let's just say that I'm used to a higher level of preparation, knowledge of poetics, and politeness from people that I associate with. This may be a problem, but I won't complain that much.
It's looking to be a good, if a little bit busy, semester.

Finally, Fresher's Week is over

2006-09-18T15:55:00.000-07:00

Now life can get back to normal, thank god.
On Friday I caught a Historic Tour of Edinburgh from the ISC, which was a surprisingly good tour—we went down the Royal Mile, and the Grassmarket, and such. I learned many historic things, took some pictures, had a fun time scampering around the city. Then I popped by the afternoon swing taster class (well, technically I popped in right as the class ended, so I could catch the dancing). I'm unimpressed—the teachers weren't very good, they looked really silly doing their "let's impress the class with what they could learn" routine, and the club members were loose leads, though they can bal a bit. I think it'll be a pass on the swing, sadly.
We tried going out to a club that night, which was just about the same as every other club or dance so far—slow start, then the dancing picks up and hormones start raging. Bah to that. Though the music was pretty good.
Saturday I did almost nothing. So there. It was lovely. We tried going to a supposed student event with fajitas, but there were none to be had, and no one else there, so we went to the Three Sisters pub and just hung out for a while before giving up and going home.
Sunday was quite exciting—we had the Chocolate Treasure Hunt! Teams of four (Team Raging Awesome was strangely enough me and three other Americans I had met before) romping around the city following bizzarely obscure rhyming clues and in general being grateful that I had gone on that historic tour earlier, since we were actually able to find some of the places. Though we didn't win, or even get close. There was still free chocolate at the end, and Natalie and I joined so that we can capitalize on that "weekly chocolate" bit.
After that, I went over to the GEAS meeting—the roleplaying group. I meant to just watch a game and figure out how it all worked, so they shuttled me over to a group just starting to play "Best Friends"—a game based on how high school girls can be best friends but secretly hate each other. Then I got talked into playing. We had quite a blast, being the loudest group there. I ended up joining, since it really was so much fun, and then I joined them at their pub (every society has a sponsor pub, apparently, where they get a discount on drinks— and I mean every single society). We had quite a blast, discussing Firefly, Star Wars, and all sorts of other geeky things.
Today I didn't do too much— Uni holiday and all that. I stopping by a salsa class with the other US swinger, but it was a pretty bad class and overpriced. Then I hit up a pub quiz with the 50 Things Society, which is apparently what people do here. Many, many obscure difficult questions about everything. It was decent fun, but nothing too exciting. Sadly, our team got second to last place. Ouch.
Now it's bedtime— class tomorrow, as well as the chocsoc meeting!

Wednesday and Thursday, just about as long as days can get

2006-09-14T17:02:00.000-07:00

I am currently in the process of making Emily's Cuban Black Bean Soup, which we all know is a semester tradition. (If you can't tell from the time difference, this first bit is pasted in from earlier). However, I had to go to Tesco (the further grocery store) to even find black beans (and no bulk bags, either), and since we don't have a massive soup pot, I'm doing two batches at once. Also my peanut butter is tasteless. Hello, culture shock. Since I'm not willing to leave the kitchen (we have finicky smoke detectors and I'd rather not force everyone outside in the rain), I'm banished here for at least an hour.
I will admit that Tuesday was uneventful. I went to my advisor meeting (the first of many, actually), went on a campus tour, and probably took a nap. We went to the "Skool Disco" Fresher's party, but left early and crashed, which is just as well.
Now, Wednesday was quite a day. Advisor meeting number two occurred, at which nothing at all was accomplished. Then I ventured to the Societies Fair. UEd has over 200 societies (read: clubs), depending on which source you look at. This does not include clubs (read: sports). And I can safely say that each and every one of those societies could soundly whip every club at USC (and, according to my other US flatmate, every club at Carolina as well). Each booth was elaborate, having at least a very nice poster. Most had sweeties they handed out with fliers, and some had special incentives for joining right away (the Russian Club would give you a shot of vodka). Also, just about every club is only £3 to join for the whole year. And gives you loads of things—even the English Language club has a 20% pub discount you get with membership, plus organizing lectures and discussions.
If you're curious, I am on the mailing list for the following societies: English Language, English Literature, Archaeology, Scottish Dance, Tango, Swing, Ballroom, Poker, Scifi, 50 Things to do in Edinburgh Before You Leave, Chocolate (includes chocolate every week and a discounted trip to the Cadbury factory), Create (as in crafts and writing), and Philosophy. There may be more, to be honest. Yes, I know I have to narrow them down, but this is insane. They're just all too good for words.
After my flurry of joinery, Elizabeth, Natalie and I decided to join the ISC (International Students Center) trip to Arthur's Seat, basically a very big hill that is in the middle of the city. There was a massive group, but it was literally blocks away from campus. The hike up was a bit tiring (would have been infinitely better with a picnic), but from the top you had the most incredible view. The weather was perfect, too, just windy enough to counter all the sweat we had worked up.
I had enough time, on return, to have a sandwich before going to the prelim creative writing workshop of createsoc, in George Park, in the middle of campus. I give it a tepid review, maybe or maybe not worth actually joining (half pretentious, half shy and quiet students). But amusing at least (kept me away from my still-hauntingly slow internet, which I have also discovered will make my music on itunes skip and slow down if I try to load any pages. Really now.)
And finally, I went on the "Ghosts and Ghouls" tour, one of the city tours included in our Fresher's pack. The guide took us to a few places and described some gruesome deaths that had occurred, more cheese than scare, and then we went into some catacombs, which were entirely too well-lit for my taste, though apparently some people were afraid. Go figure. Sadly, no ghostly encounters, even though I tried to tempt the misogynistic ghost by standing blatantly in his corner.
A final bonus point for me: this morning I got up early and got my schedule ironed out (that's advisor visit number three, not including that I still have to email my Director of Studies to notify him of my new classes)—I'll be taking Scottish History, Modern and Contemporary Scottish Poetry, and Ancient History: Past and Present in the Ancient World. Top class choices, but sacrificing any possibilities of a three-day weekend, so I'm hoping I don't regret this (or that I'm at least able to skip once in a while.
This has been another frightfully long post, brought to you by the insanity of events that is Fresher's week. I promise they'll get shorter once classes start (unless, of course, I join all these societies, in which case I'll be doing exciting and note-worthy things each and every day). Later.

An addendum:
Afternoon of dance! If you were curious, I made a kickass Cuban Black Bean soup with my limited resources. Then off to the Ballroom taster lesson. As usual, I'm tepid towards ballroom. If it comes down to it, I probably won't take it. Stupid routines.
The tango lesson was wonderful. The instructor has a policy about everyone learning to lead and follow, which is a very smart move. And I met Andy's British doppleganger! I swear to god, he looks similar, and even used to have long hair! We grabbed some pretty good curry after (nothing like the stuff from LA though), and I managed to get home to dry off marginally before the ceilidh.
Now, the ceilidh was brilliant. A ceilidh (pronounced key-lee) is a big social Scottish dance. All sorts of reels and country dancing (theirs, not ours) and such. Most require a partner, though most people just ask strangers, since you may or may not rotate partners during the dance. The caller (for lack of a better word) tells you what formation you should be in (big circle, groups of four couples, etc), runs through the dance about twice with everyone, and then the band takes off. There are loads of fiddle and accordion. Most dances include the polka. Only half (if that) of the dancers actually know the dance. Everyone sweats buckets and runs into everyone else and has one hell of a time. (It even kept me from swing dancing!) Highly recommended.
Jesus, this is long. Again, sorry. Time for me to crash.

The first weekend at University

2006-09-12T06:29:00.000-07:00

The flights over were uneventful, thank god. From Atlanta to Edinburgh was a good deal of fun, though—a good chunk of the back of the plane was us student airfares, most going to U of Ed, so we had a lot of fun, pissed off a lot of people trying to sleep. Hopefully, once my internet is working, I can reconnect with the girl in front of me. We arrived at 9.45 am, and had to drag our luggage onto a double decker bus, to ride to the city center, and then figure out cabs to our flats. Yes, I do regret just a little using the ghetto-fabulous brown suitcase, but not that much. I got help carrying it, and it wasn't all that heavy.
So finally I got checked into my flat (I was the first one, seeing as it was still pretty early). It's pretty nice. We get rooms to ourselves, a decent kitchen (an electric kettle but no microwave, go figure. Now I have to figure out another way to prepare frozen veggies), two toilets and one shower. Not bad. Four other girls, who trickled in over the day—two Scots, a German, and another American. None are bad, though the German keeps to herself. The rest of us get along.
This week is, apparently, Fresher's week, the importance of which they had failed to impress upon me. I had to go buy a Fresher's pack yesterday, and I am literally triple-booked every day—city trips, club activities, free foods, Fresher parties, and so on. Saturday night was the first of these—a big shindig at one of the student union-type places, though the queue was rediculously long, and they actually just ended up walking a group of us to a nearby pub instead. Us girls hung out and met a few people, then went home early, got a glass of wine, and enjoyed a supremely good British comedy on DVD.
Sunday we ran errands (doorstops, groceries, and so on), and went to a massively misplanned BBQ for the neighboring building and us. After, Elizabeth (our other American), and Alice (a Scot I met at the BBQ) went on a coffee crawl ("the non-alcoholic pub crawl alternative" from the Fresher's week events). We went to the café where JK Rowling says she wrote parts of Harry Potter, but ended up just walking past the rest since some were closed and others were too crowded. It was just as well, since we had to dash to get home to get ready for the beach party. This time we stuck with the line, and after an hour, were admitted into a different student union-type building. It's a bit strange that UEd considers me a Fresher, like the rest of the international students-- I feel almost like I'm back in high school with some of these people. But they're all nice at least.
Yesterday was pretty wonderful, actually. Went out for some more errands (registration, student card, advisor meeting signup—though in all fairness, they hadn't told me that I needed to register, so that caught me off guard) and ran into Alice. We had lunch, and I agreed to walk with her to find the King's buildings, a secondary part of campus. Little did we realize from the poor maps that they were abour two and a half miles away. So we did some inadvertant sight-seeing, but it was a nice walk. Then, despite having just walked five miles, I decided to drop into the Scottish dancing class, just to see what it was like. I managed to then be roped in for two and a half hours of wild hopping dancing (if you dance, think shag, but about twice as bad). It was great fun, though, and so hopefully I can take that up—we did Ceilidh, Country, and Highlander, two of which are social and one solo. Also, I found a girl interested in learning swing, and made friends with one of the girls in the club. So we'll see.
There was another big Fresher party last night, but we all opted out and went to bed early. Sad, huh. But I had to get up early today to take a campus tour and get more groceries, and later today I've got my advisor meeting, and then either another Fresher party, if I can take it, or some sort of pub night.
If the internet doesn't improve, I don't know how often I'll update, so emails would be more likely to be answered (though of course that's not very fast yet, either).
love,
Julia

Home again, finally

2006-08-08T12:15:00.000-07:00

In a nutshell: my things got stolen, my whole flight schedule got pushed back a couple days, everything went crazy, and I've finally gotten home to Portland.

Now I can sink back into oblivion until I get to leave for Scotland, which is uncomfortably close.

A list of things I have done in the past week:

2006-07-21T09:40:00.000-07:00

-Eaten cuy (guinea pig! Deep fried is the traditional way to make it, and it is delicious. Like a cross between dark meat of chicken and duck. Lots of little bones, though...)
-Played in the traditional futbol match we have versus some of the guys that help us on the dig. They beat us only slightly badly, but it was lots of fun, for sure.
-Watched the local match (Acari vs Nasca). Futbol here is quite the event. It´s a big dirt field in a stadium sort of thing (though the walls are low-- at one point, the ball went out of the staduim and had to be retrieved), and the spectators will heckle any player, no matter what team they´re on. It was hilarious.
-Mastered the hamate (it´s a carpal bone. For the record, if you need one of them identified or sided, I will rock it). Seriously, we´ve spent a lot of time in the lab cleaning and IDing bones, which is a blast. The field isn´t so exciting-- lots of clean sand in our unit, a few artifacts and an infant´s hand.
-Today was a lab day, to help set up the museum of local artifacts that Lidio is starting here. Not much happening, really, hence more internet. But I´ll probably go get ice cream from the new love of my life, this adorable man and his wife, who practice English on me, and indulge my attempts at Spanish. Plus, he sells the best ice cream ever.
-Oh, right, and last night we celebrated Kyra´s birthday, so there was lots of food, and lots of dancing and singing. It was pretty fun.

That´s all-- only a few days left down here, until we go to Lima and I head home!!

Not much sunburn, but many bones and small children

2006-07-15T15:09:00.000-07:00

The title says most of it.I´m braving the dial-up, which is treating me OK (knock on wood). We had a skeleton in our unit, which we got to remove yesterday, which was exciting.
Earlier today we hiked up Monte Grande Alto (a really big giveaway that it would be a tough hike-- I mean, it´s called really big high mountain...) I´ve made friends with Daniella, a five-year-old who lives across the street from us. I´m completely beat every day from hiking, digging, hiking back, and then playing with the kids, who insist on being picked up and swung around like maniacs.
There´s also been car fun-- we drive to the site in a van and a truck, and the cool kids take the truck since the fresh air is spectacular. Except the day it ran out of gas and we had to hitch a ride on a dump truck carrying copper ore. Pretty awesome stuff.
Anyway, I´ve had enough of this slowness, off to buy a calling card (watch me be able to navigate town alone now!) and such. Later.

Week 1

2006-07-08T08:56:00.000-07:00

These keyboards are driving me insane! I´m in Nasca now, a bigger town about 3 hours away from the small town of Acari where we stay and work. Acari was a 13-hour bus ride from Lima, for reference. Turns out I´ve been pronouncing it wrong-- it´s Ah-cu-ree, with the emphasis on the first syllable.
We get up around 7 every day, have breakfast, and drive an hour to the site of Amato. We have a 4 by 4 meter unit that we work in groups of three. When it gets to be around 1 or 2, we drive back for lunch, then have a lab in the afternoon, and spend time washing off pottery and things we found. This site is rediculous-- there´s a looted cemetary to the North, where you literally walk across a field of bones.
We´re staying in a hostel run by Rosa and Angel, who are wonderful. Rosa cooks all our meals, which are huge and delicious. Some nights Lidio gives a lecture in the evening before dinner, at which he provides snacks-- which is how classes should be taught, I feel. There are maybe 20 of us total, all girls except for Craig. The girls are all super nice, (Craig too), and everyone´s been super nice and helpful.
Plus, I got to play with skeletons to help me learn to ID bones.
I know this is horribly short, but I´ve gotta run-- we´re going to go grab lunch before taking a plane over the Nasca lines. I´ll drop a line next week when we get back here.
Much love, Julia

Oh dear god, the internet is in Spanish

2006-07-01T21:57:00.000-07:00

Tada, I made it to Peru safe and sound. The rundown goes as such-- catch the 2am flight, watch them kick extra people off since they overbooked, catch some sleep, waste about five hours in San Salvador (sleeping on the floor is totally boho), than one more flight and I´m finally in.
I found Lido very easily, and we had a nice slow taxi drive to the hostel, an adorable little place (I´ll get pictures tomorrow morning). Then we had a death'defying taxi ride (eep) to a restaurant where the rest of the gang was having dinner (I´ve never been so glad to see a roasted chicken in my life. Did I mention that the airlines didn´t feed me, and I actually failed at getting myself a sandwich?)
Anyway, dinner was fun, everyone seems really nice. After, a bunch of us went to the little cafe across the street to hang out, and I get to realize just how out of my league I am. I´m not worried, since the whole point is to learn, after all, but it´s still a bit intimidating.
Then I managed a shower (probably my last real satisfying one for a month), and am torn between going once again across the street, or going to bed, since we have to get up at 6.30 tomorrow. If you know me at all, you know what I´ll end up doing.
Later.

Something new.

2006-06-27T19:52:00.000-07:00

Tomorrow, at an obscenely early hour, I will depart from Portland to LA, and from there I will fly to Peru for a month.

Soon after my return, I will leave for a semester to Scotland.

This will be my first priority for updating and news, for those motivated enough to visit it.
Now I'd better go start packing.