Tea for Two

So this weekend I've decided to actually explore Glasgow. Sounds obvious right? After all, I'm going to school at the University of Glasgow. I LIVE in Glasgow. And yet... just from talked to the students here, even those who have been here for 2 or 3 years now, they don't know the city that well. Instead of getting to know Glasgow, they have simply up and left it. Neglecting the amazing, vivacious cultural center for other countries, other towns. After all, it will always be there for them. Except that they never do get around to exploring it..


So before I become one of those people, it's exploring time!!! Thus this weekend! I have walked about the main city center quite a bit, going to and from Celtic Connections concerts, shopping, clubbing, and having Photography class at the GSA (Glasgow School of Art). So that area of town I 'know' a bit now. But there is still so much to explore!


Today, my friend Shannon and I decided to hit up GoMA- the Glasgow Museum of Modern Art, the Willow Tea Room, and the GSA (despite having class there, it's not in the main building, which I haven't seen much of).


So first GoMa!! Here are some shots of the outside:

yes there is a traffic cone on his head. no idea why people don't take it down- I think it's just part of the statue's character now

GoMA!

Merchant City is the area all around GoMA- café and shops and such, fun to browse around in

The museum was free which is great, but not very big. There was an exhibit on the first floor of all these weird child-like things- the coolest by far was this balloon projection. At first you didn't really notice it, but once you did you couldn't stop staring... and then you discovered it was a projection...and that there were faces flickering in it sometimes. Weirdly cool.

My other favorite piece here Tropical Glasgow!! funky metal palm tree

Love stained glass windows- these were all over the building

The amazing ceiling/ railings

I thought this was hilarious :)

GoMA lobby- glass everywhere, like a mosaic

We explored the rest of the of the museum, including a cool exhibit of modern art on human rights and justice themes. Well, most of them were cool. Some was just weird modern art...

Then we went on to the Willow Tea Room, which is supposed to be pretty famous. It's designed by Rennie Mackintosh, a famous architectural and interior designer from Glasgow School of art. So everything, from the chairs to the railings is designed by him. Shannon and I had our 'afternoon tea' which is really this amazing tower of food:

Starting with the sandwiches on the bottom, then the AMAZING scones on top, and finally eating the desserts- lemon meringue  for me, chocolate cake for Shannon. We also had the Willow Tea Blend- I'm growing to be a fan of tea!

 So after a lovely afternoon tea, with so many good things (including cucumber sandwiches! This immediately made me think of The Importance of Being Earnest ... after Ernest/John has eaten all the sandwiches..."WHY ARE THERE NO CUCUMBER SANDWICHES LANE?? I ordered them especially for Aunt Augusta!" "I'm sorry sir, but there were no cucumbers in the market today. Everyone was out sir.") we headed out to visit the GSA.

It has also be designed by Rennie Mackintosh, and there is evidence of his touch everywhere from the exterior doors and windows to the moulding inside! So before I realized you weren't allowed to take pictures inside...

Outside the GSA

Inside! this sculpture above the staircase apparently incorporates the 3 things in the Scottish (glasgow?) coat of arms: a tree, bird and rose.

I ended my exploring by attempting to go to the Tenement House, a recreation of the tenements during Glasgow's industrial boom period. Unfortunately, when I walked there, I discovered it didn't open until March... so another time! Tonight, I get to explore a bit more of Glasgow's night life- checking out a club called O2 ABC0 hopefully it'll be fun!

I'm hoping to go to Glasgow "The Barras" a huge market, tomorrow, and maybe the science center and botanical gardens. A busy day ahead!!

Could do with more of those scones too...

Castle Conquerors!

One of the best ways I've found of connecting to other students here is by being in the International Society. You meet loads of people from all over the world, and then get to go to fun event and learn more about them and where they are from! This weekend, the International Society sponsored a trip to the port city of Oban and the Isle of Mull. Being unable to resist traveling anywhere, I naturally went along!


Buses. Buses while you are only 13 are fine, because you can actually fit in those seats. Now try doing the same thing, in the same size seats with 71 students who are all 20-something years old. Basically, nobody fits, and you all get nice an cozy to those sitting on either side of you!


I was the lucky soul sitting in the middle on the three person side, to my right a really cool Canadian named Ian, and to my left the German Martin who can walk for ages and not get tired. This is one thing I love about these trips, despite whatever travel conditions you might find yourself on, you get to know people so much better, and now, I have several new friends just from this one weekend!


The day didn't start out very promising because of this thing they call 'Fog' here. Only this fog is unlike anything I've seen in the US- It is a massive white out that descends upon you, only lifting to find another city or valley to target! In fact, just a few days ago was the most bizarre weather I've ever seen. I walked outside to see frost on the ground, but so thick it literally looked like a coating of snow! And then there was the fact that I was literally walking inside a cloud- but not just any cloud, a frozen cloud.


Water droplets literally hung in the air around me, cold and seeming to crystalize before my eyes.
According to the Glaswegians, THIS is fog. I don't think I'll ever view it the same back home...


However, despite the dreary start to the day, halfway to Oban the sun broke through, revealing the landscape around us. And it was incredible. The sunlight was falling sharply, casting deep shadows of ravines and streams cutting through the mountains. Tiny brooks slashed deep into the mountainside, gushing water before disappearing behind the next hill. Blue sky peacefully soared overhead, a contrast to the yellows and oranges of the mountains. To the left, green forest rippled across the valley, with fog still swirling mysteriously between groves, obscuring some areas before moving on to others.


My pathetic attempt to take a picture out the window did nothing to communicate the majesty of this setting- I couldn't tear my eyes away.

And then, back to the fog. Loch Lomond and Loch Awe were both solid masses of white and gray, where water became fog was impossible to tell. Along the way, we stopped at the town of Inverary, quaint and very foggy.

Inverary! 

War Memorial on the water front- you literally can't see the loch at atll

Down the road to Inverary Castle!

View into the Gardens of Inverary Castle (we couldn't actually go in, it was closed)

Inverary Castle in the mist... it made every seem magical

More Misty Castle views

People still live here, and I think they must have kids, judging by the trampoline I saw...

After this short stop, we finally arrived in Oban to check into the hostel, drop off our bags and set out to explore!! And so, two Dutch girls, a German, and an American (this would be me) explored the coast of Oban. We discovered the Dunollie Castle, a ruin atop the hill, and were amazed to discover that we could just go inside it. Leading to us exploring the ruins for quite some time, despite it being rather small.

The light came back, and the contrasting fog and light made the entire town look like a fairy tale, as though magic could happen at any moment. 

Oban's magic

Oban at Low Tide

A random, cool spiderweb

It has my name!!! 

This is Dunollie Castle, which we climbed up to

My Dutch friends, Charlotte & Anoek inside the castle

Swans of Oban

 I'm probably writing too much in this post. But a lot happened on this trip, and I really want to give you the feeling of being in Scotland! And this means... pubs! There was exactly one pub where everyone goes at night in Oban, and we just happened to find it. So it was fun night of hanging out with friends and locals and attempting to understand our bus driver's Glaswegian accent!

The next day meant the Isle of Mull, and we took the ferry to get over:

Duart Castle from the Ferry

Our Ferry in the background and the Isle of Mull

Unfortunately, everything is closed in January. EVERYTHING. Except for one pub. So we explored by walking!  It took nearly an hour and a half, but eventually we got to Duart Castle through walking on train tracks, and passing Tordsay Castle unintentionally along the way! 

The scenery was incredible. It made me finally realize that I am in Scotland. There were soaring castles, rolling green fields, distant mountains that touched the clouds, groves of trees and old farms with sheep and highland cattle. Looking out across it all, eating my lunch sitting atop a cannon next to a castle and looking out across the loch- this was Scotland- untouched nature with the occasional brazen castle, made by man in an attempt to tame this wild country. And it is beautiful.

Me walking down the tracks!

Tordsay Castle- still inhabited, can you imagine bring your friends home if you lived here?

Sheep!!

The first highland cattle I've seen- and a calf!

Duart Castle from below

Anoek & I in front of Duart

Needless to say, I'm quite enjoying myself. I'm exhausting from literally walking for hours, but so glad I got to see the Isle of Mull. We declared ourselves Castle Conquerors for finally making it to the Castle, and then finding away down the cliff to see the front! 

 


On to the next adventure

Oh right... I did come here to study

It's easy to forget that I actually came here to take classes. But here, on my second week, I actually realized that I had work to do! Weird.


Classes in Scotland work differently than back home at McDaniel College. The first big difference is size- McDaniel is tiny. The University of Glasgow on the other hand, has some 20,000 students to McDaniels -2,000. This means lectures are big, which is bizarre for me. For example, my Archaeology class has some 100 or so people in it (I can't really be sure, I'm awful at judging crowd sizes..), as does my French Language 2 class.


The schedule for classes is also different, back home we just have the set class times and there you go! Here, it's a bit trickier. You have set lecture times, where you sit with hundreds of others an take notes (luckily my professors for these are quite interesting!), and then you also have 'tutorials' or seminars. These are composed of smaller groups- maybe 15 students in each- plus a tutor, which may be your professor, or other, higher-up students. These times are scheduled separately and you pick one based on your schedule.


For picking these these times, we use this magical thing called Moodle. It's basically the equivalent of McDaniel's Blackboard, only... the guy who invented the name must have been a little tipsy at the time...


So now I have lectures, seminars AND, for French, a fortnightly Oral class to practice speaking.


[yes, over here, the word "Fortnight" is still used, meaning two weeks for all you who didn't have to take English Literature. I don't know about you, but to me, 'fortnight' is old school. As in Shakespeare old school]


So despite having this whole schedule set up, it didn't really hit me until this second week that yes, work is necessary! It's so easy to slip into the mind set of just having fun, hanging out with friends and going out ALL the time. Then I remember, it's called "Study" Abroad. Ah. The study part is in there, isn't it? So there are articles to read and worksheets to complete, grammar structures to review and essays topics to think about.


But despite all this... we have plenty of time still for fun! So this semester will be an interesting mix of knowing when to go out and when you actually do need to stay in and study.

Sometimes you can do both though- like going out for breakfast crêpes! This one is Nutella & banana (my favorite) and hot chocolate from this place call "Crêpe à Croissant" 

My roommate on the left and friend from Australia on the right- it was a delicious way to start the week!

This is Ashton Lane, right next to our Uni, it's basically a street of fun pubs! The lights overhead are my favorite part though. 

This is at the end of University Avenue where you find the main campus, the sign says  "Glasgow: Scotland with Style"

As a study abroad student, I want to always be meeting people and cementing friendships, because I know that is what I will truly carry home with me- the relationship and memories- not studying for courses. However, me being the perfectionist and Honors program nerd that I am, you can count on me still being in the library or in my flat working away!


Guess I'll find that balance between work and play eventually, in the mean time- I'm going out to a free concert. Cheers! :)

Snowy Castles & Haggis

Orientation was this week- and I've gotta say, it was a little bizarre actually being an 'international student' myself. International students are always the people coming to my school, those who are NOT from the US.

But here- I'm an American International! 

Orientation is basically the same wherever you happen to be in the world, you get a lot of information- in a very small block of time! So they covered all the basics: Student Support, the Library (there are PIANOS on the 4th floor!? I'm pretty excited about that), Sport & Recreation Services (aka, the Gym) and Student Unions.

Actually, there is one bit there not the same at all- unions. At the University of Glasgow, there are two student unions: Glasgow University Union (GUU) and Queen Margaret Union (QM). As far as I can tell, they bascially do the same things- social events for students like club and trivia nights, discounts at certain places- and they are free! So now comes the question of which one to join, and does it matter? Well apparently it does matter to just be in one- which one, eh seems rather arbitrary. So I'm going for the QM, we'll see how that goes!

University of Glasgow in the snow! So Beautiful

Last Friday night, I also had my second run-in with Haggis- in fact, it was a haggis party. What's haggis?? You really don't want to know is the basic answer to that. Let's just say it involves at lot of sheep parts... but despite that rather gross association, it's pretty good! I had it first in Edinburgh, just a bite off of a friend's haggis & chips (fries for you Americans), and then this Friday again. They were both pretty good, but I liked the second, homemade one better. Looking more appetizing probably helped there as well. So I have been Britishized- having tried both fish & chips and haggis!

There are loads of international students here, and so I have the fantastic opportunity to literally meet people from around the globe. So far the list o' countries of students here is:
Scotland (duh.)
Norway
Finland
Poland
Estonia
Netherlands
France
Belgium
Germany
Itlay
Canada
China
Hong-Kong
Japan
Australia
Ireland
England
Pakistan
Turkey
Singapore 
USA

And I'm sure there is more! That's what makes everything so interesting! You get to constantly talk with people from different cultures. That was perhaps one of my favorite experiences of the week- going over to a flat and being the only American, surrounded by others! Memorizing everyone's names on the other hand is going to take a bit of practice... assuming I can pronounce their names.

While my Canadian roommate and I missed the bus tour of Glasgow (oops.), we explored the city some more on our own taking the Underground/Subway into the city center. This is another thing I love about Europe- PUBLIC TRANSPORTATION!!! Why isn't it this good in the US?? I can get around so easy using trains, subways and buses, and it's all pretty cheap too. Ah well, thoughts for the future. If we could only invent teleporting, we wouldn't have this issue (c'mon people, it's 2011! this should have been done by now!).

So we meandered around the city a bit getting some errands done and getting a bit lost, but it was all part of the adventure. We ended up buying groceries there to take back to our flat- you want cheap groceries, TESCO is your best friend. You can pretty much get anything there really cheaply I've discovered! 

Glasgow, unlike Edinburgh, is built like a grid, so finding your way back is pretty easy- though it may mean climbing a 60˚ hill (how do cars park on that??). The city also lights up a night- literally, there are beautiful lights strung everywhere.

This is getting to be a rather long post, so the last bit I'll mention is the snow!! Friday night and Saturday we got some beautiful snowfall, about an inch! This made going back to Edinburgh for a day trip amazing- the castle was absolutely gorgeous (I'll be putting up pictures on McDaniel's Flickr)! Snow seems to make everything prettier. We got to see the Elephant house where JK Rowling wrote the first Harry Potter, had lunch in a delicious place called 'Chocolate Soup' (first real soup and delicious fresh-made bread, THEN a hot café mocha- yum), took castle pictures and then finished up by briefly touring the National Galleries of Scotland which are full of famous artwork.

Edinburgh Castle in the snow!

The gates of Holyrood House in Edinburgh (which means Holy Cross House)

Outside Holyrood House

Jumping pictures!! Me in front of Edinburgh Castle

The only problem with snow and Glasgow, is that it eventually turns to sleet and slush. And then freezes... so this morning walking about was a bit tricky. I think the beauty was worth it though.