I have just added two new galleries. The first one is the few pictures I took before my camera died at the Edinburgh Zoo.The other album is filled with the many pictures from my Edinburgh Castle visit. Check them out! 
Archive for February, 2008
As part of my Scottish culture course we are able to go on a few trips throughout the semester. Our first one was today at Edinburgh Castle. There is not much I can say about how beautiful everything was. I have more than made up for the lack of words in the over sixty pictures I have posted from the trip. The views were breathtaking and the history of the places just was overwhelming. From the great hall to the war memorial to the royal¬†jewels. Unfortunately I was not allowed to take pictures of the crown and the rest of the gems but take my word for it… they were spectacular. Be sure to look at this photo gallery. The images speak for themselves.¬†
This weekend has been packed full of fun. Friday I went shopping with a few friends downtown. The first stop was the Edinburgh Woolen Store. It has been so cold here that I had wanted to buy a scarf. There were so many to choose from… unfortunately many of them were pink or purple or very bright. Not quite my style. I found a very nice black and white cashmere one. It makes all the difference when the wind is howling at a nice calm 40 mph. It has been so strong at times that you cant move any further forward and it just pushes you back. Its nuts. Saturday was an afternoon trip to the Edinburgh zoo. It is situated on the side of a hill outside of town and overlooks the city. There was everything from six different species of monkeys to hippos to deer (like Ive never seen one of those) to my favorite… penguins! There were hundreds of penguins. We ended up closing the park and found us all by ourselves alone in the middle of the penguin exhibit. Ooops! That night I went to the cinemas and saw Definitely, Maybe. It was of course a chick flick but a decent one. Now I’m sure your asking yourself… what exciting thing did he do Sunday? Well today I am doing laundry and studying as electrifying as that sounds. I am looking forward to my London trip this upcoming weekend. I will be flying down Thursday night out of Edinburgh and meeting a few friends there. We are planning to take in some of the sights and go see the show Wicked. I am so excited. I will be sure to post all the details when I get back next Sunday.¬†
So far I have noticed that a few of my loyal readers have posted comments on the blog. I have added a new guestbook feature in hopes of readers posting more comments. I love viewing them and it makes me excited to think that there are returning visitors to my blog. If you get the inkling to write something, be sure to check out the new guestbook page. Thanks! 
By popular demand (my mother) I have been asked to post these two funny little stories. They both demonstrate some interesting cultural differences between the US and Scotland.
Short Story #1 – Before I came on my trip I received many publications from Napier about my housing situation including many rules and regulations that were different between the US and Scotland. I opened the housing lease and a pamphlet fell out that said “Don’t forget to buy a TV license”. I said to my family… I need a license to watch TV??? What am I getting myself into? Sure enough, this past week I just got a letter in the mail telling me that I was being investigated by the UK government for not owning a TV license at my place of residence. It was very official looking and described exactly what the rules were and that if I did not buy a license I would be fined 1,000 pounds! Come to find out after looking into the law more carefully, the license is merely the cost of connecting to the cable jack in my room. It stands in place of having to pay a Comcast or other cable company. I called the TV licensing department and informed them that I did not have a TV and they said they would drop the investigation. The part you should know is that every student at Napier received one of these letters and we all get to be lucky enough to call and dispute the investigation. Crazy!
Short Story #2 – During orientation week we had a housing meeting where we had to sign our lease and collect our keys. During the presentation we got the normal… don’t play with fire extinguishers, don’t tamper with smoke detectors etc. etc. The next slide was titled “Unacceptable Behaviors”. One of the bullet points of the slide said… Don’t be anti-social… you will be fined heavily!! At this point I’m thinking you have got to be kidding me. Every American student in the room looked at each other as if to say this has got to be a joke. There is no way they can fine you for being in your room alone and not socializing. So one brave soul raises his hand and asked… would you please define antisocial behavior? The woman giving the lecture looked at him funny and replied that antisocial behavior is being loud and disruptive when you were drunk or having a party at 3AM when other residents were trying to sleep. All of the Americans at one time went Oh! Again the woman looked puzzled and asked what we thought antisocial was. Someone shouted out what the American meaning of antisocial was. We all had a good laugh at that one and still from day to day will say to a fellow roommate who has been in their room a while to not be antisocial or we might have to fine them heavily!
This weekend has been full of great events. As the title gives away I went to my first ceilidh on Friday. A ceilidh is a scottish dance that is very similar to line square dancing. Mary and I went together along with many of her friends. There was a live band that consisted of an electric guitar, fiddle and drum kit and of course all of the guys had kilts on! There was one young guy who taught each dance to us and would then walk us through the steps as we danced to the music. After much twirling, jumping, kicking and shouting we would have to break for water every two songs. It was so much fun filled with lots of laughter. 
¬†On Sunday I traveled to Glasgow taking my first train ride of the trip towards the west coast of Scotland . We passed hundreds of sheep, hilly pastures and lots of green. We passed under the city and then arrived in this a beautiful train station in the heart of Glasgow. It is home to a beautiful museum, good food and lots and lots of shopping. The museum had everything from mummies, to stuffed lions, and tigers and bears (Oh my!), to a life size WWII British fighter plane hanging from the ceiling to paintings from Monet and Van Gogh. We spent many hours there until we all were starving and went for lunch where I finally had my first fish and chips of the trip! Lastly we enjoyed much of the shopping that the city had to offer including a visit to the local Apple Mac store. If you know me well, you know I was like a kid in a candy shop having to touch everything there. I was able to play with the new MacBook Air which is the world’s thinest notebook. It was so neat! Eventually we all crashed and decided to take the train back around 1800 at which time I slept the entire way. Mind you I was made to meet up with my friends by 0830 at the train station to leave. A long day but full of fun and adventure!¬†
Next weekend I will be traveling to St. Andrews… finally! Thank you to all of my loyal readers. I hope you have been enjoying the blog and pictures thus far. Its hard to believe I am going into my fourth week here! Time is flying by. The best part is that I am enjoying every day here. I’ve been finding already, that it is fun for me to read some of my first posts to this blog and to think about how much I have done in such little time.¬†As the Scots say… Cheers! ¬†
Finally I have done it. For weeks I have been staring at the small mountain in the middle of the city, better known as Arthur’s Seat. It is a great little climb with two options… Take the nice slow sloping route or take the route that is the ultimate¬†stair-master¬†and is meant to give you a coronary. Well I chose to take the hard one. It was a beautiful clear day and I could see for miles. From the top you can look west at the city center with the castle jumping out of it. A little to the left you can make out the meadows and at the end of the meadows is my flat. I made sure to take one pic from my flat looking at the mountain and one from the top of the mountain looking back at my house. Edinburgh is actually right on the east coast of Scotland which gives you a great view of the ocean and all the way up the coastline toward St. Andrews. It was a great workout and I hope to do it at least once every two weeks. Its a short hike only taking 20 minutes to climb (with a few picture breaks). Check out my pictures in the new gallery¬†Hike Up Arthur’s Seat.¬†
After waking up at 11:00 today, I looked out my window and saw what looked like a beautiful day. My local friends we right, just because ten minutes ago it was sunny does not mean it will stay that way. The fog has rolled in and I can barely see out my window. I cant complain however. The weather has been very nice for the most part though extremely windy as you can probably tell by looking at some of my pictures. Every day has its periods of sunny but for the most part its partly cloudy with a chance of rain. It is worse than New England in terms of weather changing. One minute you will look outside to a nice calm day, twenty minutes later the wind is gusting at 50 mph and the trees are creaking back and forth outside my window and finally another half hour will pass and the sun is back out. O that Scotland weather. 
I have added another gallery titled Campus Pictures. In it is a compilation of pictures that I have and will continue to take of the different campuses of Napier University. All the campuses are so vastly different. I am stationed at Merchiston campus which is a high rise building that overlooks the entire city out towards the mountains that surround it. In it is a 500 computer lab which takes up an entire wing along with dozens of little network rooms and computer labs scattered throughout the building. Now you know why this is my home. I also have classes at Craiglochart campus which is a very new age building with a large domed lecture room on the front. I have put pictures looking at it from the outside and looking out the windows from the inside… both of which are great. The other large campus is Craighouse. This campus is much older¬† and is made up of many different little castles scattered across a hillside. On a nice day, I hope to take some pictures of it. Looking out one of the windows of Merchiston you can see Craighouse and its pointed towers and old style architecture sitting so quaintly on the hill. Finally the school owns many old churches across town which have been turned into lecture buildings. I have not yet been in any of them but I hear they are beautiful with all the stained glass windows and high cathedral ceilings.
Good news. I have finally chosen my class schedule for the semester. It is a great lineup that will provide a very wide variety of classes. To start off the beginning of the week, I have Applied Cisco Networks on monday mornings. This course is a great combination of lecture and hands on. Usually 1 hour of lecture and two hours of practical. Ill be able to play with all the gear and will come out of the class prepared to get my CCNP certification. (Cisco Certified Network Professional). This is a test that I can take when I come back to the states that is a very valuable certification to have since I am going into the computer field! My second class, also on Monday, is a little more laid back. It is the Study of Wine! We are doing everything from learning to taste wine, to understand how it is made to being able to go into a wine shop and pick of the best bottle for the best price. Get this. My final is the professor giving us three meals that we will have to try, and then name a wine that would best pair with that meal. Its such a fun class. Its also fun, because many of the other international students are taking it with me. The third class is Scottish Culture. This course is intended for international students to get to know the culture better. We will be going on field trips around the country, having many guest lecturers and I have been told there are a bunch of surprises we have to wait to find out. My final class is another computer network class that is going to teach basic networking skills needed for the computer world. Overall my classes sound amazing! I cant wait to finally get into the swing of things over the next couple of weeks. I will be sure to post all the fun details!
