Last of Bonnie Scotland

See! I am getting better! It has hardly even been a week. Albeit I didn't hardly have a week left. Exams are over, for better or for worse. Hours ago I wrote an essay that would have made the Wyoming and Colorado range nerds proud, although I am not entirely certain it is what they expected to hear over here, and as my soils professor informed me when I asked if American terminology and spelling was ok "it kind of defeats the idea of anonymous grading, but it is acceptable."

Yes, you heard me anonymous grading.... meaning my name has gone on not a single thing since I have been here. Although the majority of my class, let alone the teachers in the environmental science department have figured out that I am the only student in that year's courses with a student number beginning in 17... the rest are 14 and 15... I know this because grades get posted and before I even talk to anyone I hear "hey I saw you got X grade on that report" Politics stays a bit more anonymous since there are other international students in that course.

Note: The above was written on Wednesday, and then I got sidetracked.... the rest has been completed today.

I have also figured out what the teachers do during exam grading, which although funny, is rather disheartening. I have witnessed half the environmental science department professors, come running out of their office, exam in hand, to share really dumb things we wrote with other proffessors.

Both of the sports clubs I have been a part of since coming here had their last hoorah/Christmas party for the semester this last weekend. Lots of fun on all accounts, good food, good drink.... and then good byes. Two nights of mass group goodbyes were a little rough. And then running into all those people the rest the week made it worse because then you ended up saying like 5 goodbyes to some people, when the first one was hard enough. Also, the Christmas parties were just the start of a week long "hope to see you again" mentality. Sunday we were out with a friend from Germany, and then went to her house for final goodbyes and crepes on Tuesday. Wednesday was the last good byes for all of my environmental science classmates.

Tuesday was probably the best adventure I have been on in a while. Rather than studying, Wyoming, Minnesota, and I went to Campbell Castle which is outside of Dollar. Contrary to normal Wyoming and I adventures we actually knew exactly what busses we were supposed to get on. So, we get on the bus from the University to Tillicoultry, to find out the connecting bus only comes once every 3 hours or so.... and it would not be there for another hour and a half. En route to visitor information to find out if there was another way there, we see a sign that says Dollar is 3 miles away... walking is technically possible. So, when visitor information was singularly unhelpful as usual, we decide we are going to walk. Catch is, this is Scotland it is absolutly pouring rain. So, we have our 3 mile walk to Dollar, and then the castle is a half hours walk from Dollar.. There are 3 ways to get to the castle, follow the road like a car would, walk along a ridge, or straight up the glen (canyon) .... of course we choose straight up the canyon. :) Anyways, we get to the castle at which point we see construction parked infront of the entrance, but we have come so far we decided we would push past till someone told us to stop. The man working at the castle that day was both pleased and shocked. Because he "didn't expect anyone to come today, let alone to walk from Dollar, let alone walk up the glen.... let alone walk from TILLICOULTRY???" He was impressed enough that since the castle is kind of poorly lit on cloudy rainy days, he gave us the miner style head lamps to walk around the castle with, it was great. However, by the time we got back to Dollar to catch the bus back to Stirling, I think we would have been dryer had we just jumped in the river.... was kind of fitting sort of adventure for Wyoming and my last week in Scotland.

Thursday I went to Roslyn Chapel with Wyoming, followed by a cocktail party with a random assortment of mountaineers, sen no kai, and class mates. And when I say cocktail party I mean the gal hosting it had a collection of spirits that would rival many bars, and ability to make such an extensive list of cocktails it would definately rival most pubs. Yesterday was the last night for a bunch of us Americans. Which consisted of dinner and a movie followed by drinks and secret sharing at Kansas's house.

Today is my last full day in Scotland, I am still somewhat in denial that I am leaving. As is Minnesotta, who has described her plans for today as "stalking you 2 (Wyoming and I) until you have to leave." Which would probably terrify most normal people, but since Wyoming and I cant exactly be classed as normal at this point it seems to work for us.

Packing is going poorly as usual. Since I am in denial its really hard to pack, because I'm not going anywhere, and if I'm not going anywhere then I dont have to pack... right? That and trying to fit all the stuff I have aquired back into 2 suitcases is not working so particularly well, especially with weight restrictions... boo.. Alaska, Wyoming, and I start our trek home by leaving for the Edinburgh airport tonight at 7:45. And providing the weather in the states clears up long enough Wyoming and I should be home by 9pm Mountain time, Sunday!!! And yes I am still trying to send postcards, but that might be what keeps me occupied in the airport overnight.

Anyways, this is the last posting that will be done from Scotland. I will get back on and put up more pictures sometime after I get home. See you all soon!!

Head in the Skye

Ok I officially suck at this. I seem to be getting worse at keeping caught up rather than better as I keep promising. But I believe I have a lot more interesting things to talk about than hospitals this time.

Picture of the fencing girls all dressed up. Me, Red, Wyoming, Blondie, Somebody's Girlfriend, and New York



The other night there was a plan for a nice quiet evening, involving me, Wyoming, and some Ben and Jerry's.... which resulted in fencers at mine until nearly 4am.... so much for plans... but we did get the B&J's and... an amazingly decent picture



Osprey showing us how much he loves us after he found out we weren't going to be back next semester



Yes, I know, I am in a skirt in TWO pictures here... this is the Christmas Ceilidh (Scottish dancing/party thing for those who don't remember) This is all the Sen No Kai group that ended up at it.



To give you some idea how intense Ceilidhs get when people know what they are doing.... just picture if hands slipped here.....



Sen No Kai in Cambusbarron, way more intense than the Uni club, but way fun... here is proof that I get my butt kicked in Cambusbarron, as well as proof that I have to still work on falling so I am less likely to break my arm.



This is at the start of the adventure to Skye. This is a river just outside of Dunkeld.



This is Wyoming attempting to skip stones in Loch Ness ... what can I say, we were trying to provoke an appearance out of Nessie



Kilt Rock... The rock in the distance there supposedly looks like a kilt... we are right by the ocean here, there are dinosaur tracks in the vicinity and lots of other cool things.

These are especially for Brandon, lots of the random stone shapes at Fairy Glen, the spiral in the middle is legit, everything else in view is not, but some are entertaining.

The "Fairy Castle" at Fairy Glen.... this place was beautiful, and slightly eerie, and definitely reverent.

Wyoming and I at the Haakan (named after a Norweigan King), and yes we some how ended up matching that day.

Hamish the Heilan' Coo (Highland cow obviously). Very touristy stop on the way back from Skye, however it has been one of my only photo opportunities for the local non baa-ing livestock

Ok as I said before I am horrible at this game, and if you just saw how long it took me to get those pictures up there correctly you would realize I am no better at that game either. Anyways where on earth shall I begin??? The beginning would probably be appropriate but I am not entirely certain I can remember that far back. So anyways, since I last wrote.... the 22nd... yeesh, you guys really should have yelled at me to write somewhere in there... because when I wait this long I have to clarify the events with dates which really just makes my job harder.

Anyways from the 22nd to the 26th was filled mostly with playing catch up on things that were supposed to happen the week before, practicals, practical reports, essays, etc. The 27th of course was Thanksgiving, here it was Thursday. I had my last class on the 24th, so it was like I was on vacation, but yet I was sitting in a computer lab with a project group all afternoon on Thursday. I did get a Thanksgiving dinner, we went to Texas's house for a "Scottish Texan Thanksgiving" as he called it, Haggis and beer was involved.... I was the bringer of the salad and salad dressing since I am one of the fortunate few to be in possession of real ranch dressing.

Friday the 28th there was great intentions to have a nice quiet early evening. Wyoming and I were going to celebrate having made meager progress on our project reports via a movie and some ice cream. Fencers, however, wanted us to come out, and when they found out we wouldn't, and where we were, they came to us. This was a lot of fun, but it resulted in fencers being at mine until 3:30 in the morning.

Saturday and Sunday there was the Sen No Kai grading... I got my yellow belt! Yay!!! Which was of course followed up Sunday by the pub, and then Joe's house for cake and other mischief, including playing in his yard, in our gis and sweatshirts, Nicky and I still look like Joe and Chris tossed us in the mud. Monday and Tuesday were mostly more project report writing, followed up by karate and pubs in the evening. Tuesday wouldn't normally be a Sen No Kai day, but I got invited to join Chris in Cambusbarron, which is a town not too far from here, unless you get lost.... which I did. As I have since found out Cambusbarron should be a 25 minute leisurely stroll from the bus stop in town. That day it took me a 1 hour power walk... I have NO idea how I got that lost. Anyways, that club has a much different outlook, and much different style than the Uni club, but it was tons of fun. And yes for those of you keeping track that was 5 days of Karate since Thursday, and something nearing 20 hours... and NO I couldn't hardly move on Wednesday.

Wednesday the 3rd was the Extreme Sports Christmas Ceilidh... which although Sen No Kai is not an extreme sport, half of the club is in Mountaineering which is considered to be one, so we were all invited, and several of my classmates invited me as well. This is I believe a record 4th time in a skirt for me this semester. This ceilidh was probably the most fun one I have been to, first of all due to the boy-girl ratio being much more reasonable, and second of all the majority of the people there had some idea what was going on.

Friday, Wyoming and I had an early start to the morning. We were headed off to join a tour group to see the Isle of Skye as well as many other very classic Scottish landmarks we hadn't made it to yet. The catch was that this tour left at 8 Friday morning... from Edinburgh.... which meant we had to be on the 6:30 am train to Edinburgh.... which meant we had to walk to the train station at 5:30 since buses don't start running from the Uni to town until much later. The tour was amazing, and well worth our money. It got off to a rough start when the gentleman behind Wyoming and I puked within 15 minutes of the bus taking off, however he was courteous enough to keep everything to himself, and so all was forgiven. That is what the hostel/tour company gets I suppose for hosting pub crawls the night before the tours. For 59 pounds, we got to see Culloden Battlefield, Inverness, Loch Ness, Isle of Skye, Portree, nearly saw Ben Nevis, saw Ft. William, Fairy Glen, and many other well known places, as well as others that were really cool that we never would have even heard of let alone gone to on our own. That seems like a lot, but another MacBackpackers pub crawl goer chose to sleep in rather than join the gentleman behind us and puke on the bus.... so he bought a train ticket and joined us in Skye... Just getting to Skye and back under those circumstances would have been more money than Wyoming and I spent on the tour, food, and lodging for the weekend. Not to mention all of the other locations that were included, as well as other perks, such as hot chocolate, and the local knowledge, history, mythology and Scottish music we got to hear along the way.

Since returning from Skye, I have had two exams, the first of which being nicer then I thought it would be after only 1 day of studying, the second of which being much more horrid than I thought it would be. My problem with the world is my brain has been trained to remember at best one paragraph on a subject, and here you have to write whole essays. Much more intimidating than you think it might be. However, the worst freak out I have had this week has not been over exams as it has been for many, it was when I was studying on Monday, and looked at a calendar, and realized 2 weeks from then I would be at home. Not entirely sure I am ready for that yet. Tonight was one of the last hurrah celebrations for several of the international students and Americans that I have befriended over here. Once again, not sure I am ready for things to come to an end.

For those of you wondering what the next few weeks look like, here is a Reader's Digest version. Tomorrow - Fencing Do

Saturday - Sen No Kai Do

Wednesday - Last exam

Hopefully throw in some post card writing, souvenir shopping and packing in there somewhere. Still need to see things like Loch Lomond and Campbell Castle, and definitely have to figure out the packing situation.... You have nooooo idea how much stuff I have acquired, ok maybe not that much but when your world has to fit in 2 suitcases.... its definitely a lot.

Saturday afternoon Wyoming, and my flatmate Alaska are going to head to Edinburgh to spend the night in the airport. We fly out by 9am on the 21st, get back to Denver 9pmish Wyoming time.

Once again any souvenir requests speak now or forever hold your peace. If you want to make plans for when I am back you probably have to wait till after the New Year, as I believe family has me commandeered until then. Any other general questions comments requests or just plain hello's I would LOVE to hear from you!!!! Miss you guys, and as shocking as it may seem, see you soon!!!