So tonight, we decided to go out. One of the girls upstairs had been told by a random guy that The Lizard was the place to be, so we got all excited for dancing and headed over there. First warning sign: there was a decent-sized line outside, full of girls whose choice of attire was clearly weather-inappro. Which is obviously what one expects from a line outside a "club", but we were fully sober and actually desirous of dancing, not skanking. Inside was a small, hot, sweaty, low-ceilinged, skanktastic mash of drunk seventeen-year-olds, all super-excited to finally move out of home and conceive babies on the dancefloor. Needless to say, our foray there did not last long.
We went in search of a pub for a beer, and ended up going to the place that Sandra (the room directly above mine) was going to play open mic at on Monday. Thankfully, the patrons were distinctly more dignified, and we caught the tail end of an old-man Blues band. They also had a glorious selection of European beer, and it got rather packed towards the end, so I think we determined that we like it and that we're going back.
Moral of the story: the British are known for their pubs for a reason.
During the day, I met a bunch of the other new Psychology PhD students, picked up my building swipe card and the key to our "office", claimed a desk for my own, and ate a LOT of free food. Pretending to be Islamic rocks.
Saturday, September 29, 2007
Thursday, September 27, 2007
The beginning, part II
The night before I left, quite honestly, I was more apprehensive than excited. I knew I would love it here as soon as I'd settled in a little, met a few people, and knew what I was doing. But it was that first week or so that concerned me.
Oh, how terribly foolish I was!
It's currently approaching midnight of my first full day here and I'm definitely in excited-mode. I spent the majority of the last couple of days unpacking all my worldly belongings and finding them all places in the little room I now call "home". More accurately, "home" is a four-girl flat: one of six similar flats in Stanley Smith House, a postgraduate residence. I say "similar" rather than "identical" because all the other flats are apparently all the same, but ours is bigger and more glorious because it's the wheelchair-accessible one... which makes me a little sad for everyone else because our place is tiny!
My building is in a sketchy little alleyway that the Madras College (it's a high school) kids frequent as a tucked-away place to get drunk and smoke. That being said, it's also splat in the middle of town, with nothing I have yet wanted to attend more than a seven minute walk away. St Andrews is ridiculously small, but considering its size, it has a decent number of shops, bars, etc.; actually, if you consider the fact that nobody from Queen's bothers to venture any further than Princess Street, it's not really that far off. Apparently what it's quite good for is "charity shops" - essentially second-hand stores. Just today, I was walking towards the Psychology building to see if my professor was in (he wasn't), and I fell in love with a coat in a charity shop window. It was this beautiful offwhite, knee-length, quilted thing with fur trim - practical, yet stylish. And wonder of wonders, it was my size! And a mere 25 pounds (or should I say "quid" - I'm planning on coming back with some obnoxious British slang in my vocabulary). I didn't want to walk into my prof's office with shopping, however, so I decided to pick it up on my way back. Ten minutes later, I'm coming up to the store and notice the coat is no longer on the mannequin... because someone had bought it! In those intervening ten minutes! Frick on an effing stick.
Other than pretty coats, I've been shopping for various things I actually need: groceries, another blanket (it's cold!), a lamp, dishes, etc. You may already know that I adore grocery shopping (almost as much as toothbrush shopping!) but it was even more exciting today. Everything is a tiny bit different: the layout of the store, the meat selection, the strangely packaged vegetables that come with cooking instructions, the availability of liquor in a grocery store - well, I got used to that one this summer in Europe. I think the best part is the fact that Indian food is so common here! Glory.
Now I'm going to tell you about my flatmates. Danielle is Chinese and rather quiet and I've barely seen her yet, although she does make a mean egg-tomato soup. Mohira is the building's RA. She's from Tajikistan, although from what I gather she's also lived in the USSR, USA, Kyrgyzstan, and Uzbekistan. She already did her Masters here so she answers all our inane questions about how to do things and get places. I was introduced to my final flatmate, Urvashi, when she accosted me on the street yesterday demanding to know whether I was Shilpa, and if so, where in India was I from and did I want to hang out later? She's from Delhi and one of her friends from home, Rithvik, is also here and hangs around our flat a lot because his residence is far away from downtown.
Earlier tonight, Mohira and Urvashi ran into the girls from the flat right above ours who they met the night before I got here, and they came back to our place to drink a couple of cocktails and watch Friends. So, I hung out with them as well which was cool although I can't remember their names for the life of me. They seem like solid people and I think we're going out to "The Lizard" tomorrow, whatever that is. They're from the Philippines, Holland, and Toronto. Seriously, the international-ness of this school is completely ridiculous!
And that is the very beginning of me in Scotland.
Oh, how terribly foolish I was!
It's currently approaching midnight of my first full day here and I'm definitely in excited-mode. I spent the majority of the last couple of days unpacking all my worldly belongings and finding them all places in the little room I now call "home". More accurately, "home" is a four-girl flat: one of six similar flats in Stanley Smith House, a postgraduate residence. I say "similar" rather than "identical" because all the other flats are apparently all the same, but ours is bigger and more glorious because it's the wheelchair-accessible one... which makes me a little sad for everyone else because our place is tiny!
My building is in a sketchy little alleyway that the Madras College (it's a high school) kids frequent as a tucked-away place to get drunk and smoke. That being said, it's also splat in the middle of town, with nothing I have yet wanted to attend more than a seven minute walk away. St Andrews is ridiculously small, but considering its size, it has a decent number of shops, bars, etc.; actually, if you consider the fact that nobody from Queen's bothers to venture any further than Princess Street, it's not really that far off. Apparently what it's quite good for is "charity shops" - essentially second-hand stores. Just today, I was walking towards the Psychology building to see if my professor was in (he wasn't), and I fell in love with a coat in a charity shop window. It was this beautiful offwhite, knee-length, quilted thing with fur trim - practical, yet stylish. And wonder of wonders, it was my size! And a mere 25 pounds (or should I say "quid" - I'm planning on coming back with some obnoxious British slang in my vocabulary). I didn't want to walk into my prof's office with shopping, however, so I decided to pick it up on my way back. Ten minutes later, I'm coming up to the store and notice the coat is no longer on the mannequin... because someone had bought it! In those intervening ten minutes! Frick on an effing stick.
Other than pretty coats, I've been shopping for various things I actually need: groceries, another blanket (it's cold!), a lamp, dishes, etc. You may already know that I adore grocery shopping (almost as much as toothbrush shopping!) but it was even more exciting today. Everything is a tiny bit different: the layout of the store, the meat selection, the strangely packaged vegetables that come with cooking instructions, the availability of liquor in a grocery store - well, I got used to that one this summer in Europe. I think the best part is the fact that Indian food is so common here! Glory.
Now I'm going to tell you about my flatmates. Danielle is Chinese and rather quiet and I've barely seen her yet, although she does make a mean egg-tomato soup. Mohira is the building's RA. She's from Tajikistan, although from what I gather she's also lived in the USSR, USA, Kyrgyzstan, and Uzbekistan. She already did her Masters here so she answers all our inane questions about how to do things and get places. I was introduced to my final flatmate, Urvashi, when she accosted me on the street yesterday demanding to know whether I was Shilpa, and if so, where in India was I from and did I want to hang out later? She's from Delhi and one of her friends from home, Rithvik, is also here and hangs around our flat a lot because his residence is far away from downtown.
Earlier tonight, Mohira and Urvashi ran into the girls from the flat right above ours who they met the night before I got here, and they came back to our place to drink a couple of cocktails and watch Friends. So, I hung out with them as well which was cool although I can't remember their names for the life of me. They seem like solid people and I think we're going out to "The Lizard" tomorrow, whatever that is. They're from the Philippines, Holland, and Toronto. Seriously, the international-ness of this school is completely ridiculous!
And that is the very beginning of me in Scotland.
The beginning
I have arrived.
I am in my new bed in my new flat. And I am so incredibly tired. Almost too tired to sleep.
Almost.
I am in my new bed in my new flat. And I am so incredibly tired. Almost too tired to sleep.
Almost.
Tuesday, September 25, 2007
Bermuda
So I know I'm supposed to be writing about Scotland, and probably having some sort of preflight emotional musing moments, but I'm saving those for tomorrow. I got back from Bermuda this afternoon, and I want to briefly talk about it while it's fresh.
Richard described Bermuda as Croatia meets Italy, but on the ridiculously picturesque taxi ride from the airport to his home, I already disagreed. After some deliberation, I've decided that - to the best of my experience - Bermuda most closely resembles Jersey meets Grand Cayman (or some other similar Caribbean island). It is incredibly lush, but also very small-town proper. Colours are intense: vibrant green foliage, gloriously swimmable turquoise water, silly-bright buildings with starkly whitewashed roofs. The people are distinctly divided into the chill islandy locals and the stuffy somewhat rich white folk, and the shops and pubs have this feeling of not-quite-England. The roads are those deliciously narrow, windy ones with short stone walls on either side - usually either spilling over with greenery or revealing some pretty, watery scene - that are best enjoyed on scooter (which we did). You can probably guess for yourself which of those qualities are shared with Jersey, and which with Grand Cayman; they're fairly equally represented, I think.
The vacation itself was glorious. We played in the waves, went out for dinners and drinks, scooted all over the island on Heather Four, cuddled more than I ever thought physically possible, and generally got saturated in sunshine and saltwater and pinkish sand. One noteworthy event was when we rented a kayak and paddled under a bridge, around an island, and into a little rock-sheltered cove (seeing a sunken sailboat, some flying fish, and a giant red crab the size of a human face on the way). From the shore of the cove, we snorkeled through gargantuan schools of little electric blue fish and saw other pretty aquatic life, including these adorably curious little black and white and yellow striped fellows, who would dart inquisitively closer as we approached instead of swimming away. And on the way back, the water level had risen a good bit and we had to lie down flat on our kayak to make it under the bridge! Another good episode was when I was sunbathing on a little beach, alone because Richard was at the office, and a random fellow who worked at the nearby resort talked to me for ten minutes and then casually proposed to me.
In the end, Bermuda is a lovely island paradise, but not one I'd normally be likely to visit over and over; it's a little too glossy for my tastes, but that's where the boyfriend lives, for now. It was definitely a sweet ending to a ridiculous summer. More on that tomorrow.
Richard described Bermuda as Croatia meets Italy, but on the ridiculously picturesque taxi ride from the airport to his home, I already disagreed. After some deliberation, I've decided that - to the best of my experience - Bermuda most closely resembles Jersey meets Grand Cayman (or some other similar Caribbean island). It is incredibly lush, but also very small-town proper. Colours are intense: vibrant green foliage, gloriously swimmable turquoise water, silly-bright buildings with starkly whitewashed roofs. The people are distinctly divided into the chill islandy locals and the stuffy somewhat rich white folk, and the shops and pubs have this feeling of not-quite-England. The roads are those deliciously narrow, windy ones with short stone walls on either side - usually either spilling over with greenery or revealing some pretty, watery scene - that are best enjoyed on scooter (which we did). You can probably guess for yourself which of those qualities are shared with Jersey, and which with Grand Cayman; they're fairly equally represented, I think.
The vacation itself was glorious. We played in the waves, went out for dinners and drinks, scooted all over the island on Heather Four, cuddled more than I ever thought physically possible, and generally got saturated in sunshine and saltwater and pinkish sand. One noteworthy event was when we rented a kayak and paddled under a bridge, around an island, and into a little rock-sheltered cove (seeing a sunken sailboat, some flying fish, and a giant red crab the size of a human face on the way). From the shore of the cove, we snorkeled through gargantuan schools of little electric blue fish and saw other pretty aquatic life, including these adorably curious little black and white and yellow striped fellows, who would dart inquisitively closer as we approached instead of swimming away. And on the way back, the water level had risen a good bit and we had to lie down flat on our kayak to make it under the bridge! Another good episode was when I was sunbathing on a little beach, alone because Richard was at the office, and a random fellow who worked at the nearby resort talked to me for ten minutes and then casually proposed to me.
In the end, Bermuda is a lovely island paradise, but not one I'd normally be likely to visit over and over; it's a little too glossy for my tastes, but that's where the boyfriend lives, for now. It was definitely a sweet ending to a ridiculous summer. More on that tomorrow.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)