In love..

So, I've officially fallen in love with Scotland.  Here's how it happened....

It all started with a train ride to Glasgow on Friday night and a lovely evening with the relatives:

We started the day off on a trip to see my first castle since I've arrived: Dumbarton Castle 

(this is only the first of many more castles to come - so prepare yourself) 

v The Gunpowder Magazine (building).  As was explained to me: it's surrounded by a wall and built away from the rest of the castle JUST incase it blows up.  Safety first!

Hey mom dad and sa, does this bring back any airport memories?? 

The best picture of the day :)  Glasgow in the distant background

Next on the agenda was tea and scones at The Hill House.  Yum!  

Charles Mackintosh was a famous architect and artist, and we visited one of his beautiful houses.   There was no photography allowed and a member of staff in every room making sure of this, so I couldn't even sneak a picture :(  The rooms were so detailed in every corner - little purple and pink stained glass bits built into every piece of furniture.  

"You'll take the high road and I'll take the low road..." Loch Lomond! Sooo beautiful.

Driving through the Highlands + passing sheep and Highland cows + listening to bagpipe music = the moment I realized I love this place <3

Sunday morning we were off on another adventure... Mission: To locate and conquer Stirling Castle.

"So, where is the castle again?" Off to a bad start..

Aiming for the Wallace monument, oh no!

In the castle kitchen: "Why thank you,  don't mind if I do!"

Canada and Spain ruling Stirling... it was a good few minutes.

 ^ These are 4 of 7 tapestires which tell the story of The Hunt of the Unicorn.  They are being recreated from the originals (from 1500) and we were lucky enough to meet one of the weavers and watch her work on it. Along with a team of other weavers, she is working on a 12 year project and the final tapestry will be done next year.  Each one takes 4 years to complete!

Speaking of unicorns... here's one with a golden horn on top of The Great Hall.  I wonder why they were so obsessed with Unicorns back then. 

Friends in the look-out towers representing Spain, France, and Canada x 2! 

Moral of the story: it was an amazing weekend.  Every time I go to visit somewhere, the weather is always gorgeous which makes for good pictures. 

I know it doesn't look like it... but I'm also making it to all my classes and doing homework in-between, lol, I just don't take pictures of these things..  I've managed to find my way around Stirling, the library, and other buildings on campus.  It got to the point where I was getting used to the fact that I usually had no idea what was going on.  My strategy? 1) Watch what other people are doing and follow along in the most unsuspicious way possible (while also managing to avoid being creepy).  2) Use the "I'm an international student" card for excuses... it works.  With these two tips, anyone can survive here.  

Well, I need some sleep and you need to get back to whatever you were doing before you ended up looking at this post.  Cheers!

Fooood

Greetings! Last night I went to the International Food night at the school.  We had to bring a food from our country for everyone to try and this was my contribution:

Now before you start asking what muffins have to do with Canada... let me ask you what you would have brought... think about it.... does your answer involve maple syrup by any chance?? I knew I had to bring something that incorporated maple syrup somehow, and I wasn't about to bring soggy, cold pancakes... so maple syrup pecan muffins it was!  

(The icing sugar represents snow :)

I didn't take a picture of it but I tried my first bit of haggis since I've been here. Yay! I actually didn't mind it, but it's the type of food that you can only have once and a while and in small quantities at that. It's got an interesting spicy taste, but I liked it.  

Poutine from Canada, mmm.

My blonde-haired, blue-eyed, German friends.

As you can see, I wore my Canada sweater and a few other Canadians came up to say hi (the ones that brought the poutine) lol.  I met a girl from Toronto and a guy from BC.  It turned out that the girl and I knew someone in common - a friend of hers that I lived across the hall from in first year res.  It's a small world!  So all those times you get sick of hearing "Oh, you're from Canada! Do you know John?"... there's the odd time that you actually do know who they're talking about.  

I also got stopped by another guy on the way home who was Canadian too.  There is a good number of us here!

Success: none left!

On an unrelated note... I made a Scottish friend! They have a program here called the Buddy Program and international students can sign up to get paired up with a student that goes to the school so they can show them around and such.  We finally met today for lunch and she is very nice.  Sometimes it's hard to understand what she's saying because of her accent, but we get along well. I had to explain to her what a snow day was because she didn't know... so sad.

To make life EVEN better... Glee also started yesterday! I got a big poster to put in my room just in time. I'm not obsessed...

And to finish off, here are some other random pictures:

^ The tiny bar fridge and freezer the 6 of us have to share. 

Poundland, the equivalent of Dollarama! ^

v Double-decker city bus to get into Stirling

Talk to you again soon, cheers!

Destination: Monument

Yesterday a few flatmates, fellow exchangies and I ventured up to the National Wallace Monument; it was spectacular!  

On our way to conquer the monument...

In the gift shope: INSAKILT! "From a beach towel to a kilt in an instant" 

I think this is an amazing idea.

Stirling Castle

 

The man himself... and his sword. The sword is 5 feet 6 inches in total and weighs 6 lbs.  How does one carry this huge thing while running around in battle is what I want to know.

Ok, this one is especially for you mom, because I know how much you liked it.

This is the strangest and creepiest thing... it's a statue of a man with a white face and then they project a video of a moving face onto it so that it looks like it's talking. It is supposed to be Wallace at his trial before his execution.

Some of the amazing things that Scots take credit for.  

A great view of the 'uni' and the hills close by.  I find it amazing that the farmland goes up all the way to the base of these huge hills; all of a sudden they appear out of nowhere.

Also, all the little white dots at the bottom are sheep! On my list of things to do before I leave is to pet a sheep.

The crown of the monument that wasn't put on until a few years after the rest of it was built.

As would be expected... they ran out of money.

I took a video of me walking down these stairs but  I can't seem to upload it here - which is maybe a good thing because it made me dizzy while watching it.  Anyway, 246 steps in total - a good cardio workout.

Look who we met as we were about to leave: William Wallace himself!

In other news... I still have yet to make any scottish friends. I know, shocking! All the orientation events that have been coordinated are geared towards the international students, so naturally, those are the only people that go to them.  When classes pick up a bit and once I start playing sports I'm sure I'll meet more poeple.  I'll keep you posted :)

Off to bed, cheers!