Bonnie Scotland!

My adventures getting to Scotland were a little interesting. In the airport, they almost didn't let me get on the plane. Awesome. The lady checking passports said that I would first have to go to the alien office in France to be able to travel out of Germany. Now, I'm no scientist, but wouldn't I have to first get on a plane to France to get to this alien office that I truly didn't have to go to in order to get the "correct" visa. Was a little bit ridiculous. I was going to say to her, "Would it help if my associate, Mr. Five Euro, had a conversation with you?" but I'm not sure that would have helped my situation. Oh well. Finally got on a plane and was off to Edinburgh...again, pronounced Edinburah, not Edinberg.

The bus ride from the airport to the bus transfer station and then that bus ride to St. Andrews was pretty uneventful, but if anything, absolutely gorgeous. The hillside of Scotland was breathtaking and I had arrived on a very sunny day for Scotland. It was one of those days where the sun casts shadows of the clouds on the ground. Just wonderful. I was even able to successfully take some pictures from the bus, which made me think that I should totally work for National Geographic. I would have the best of two worls - traveling and taking pictures. I could do that. I think I could.

In any case, there are a few things about Scotland that I noticed right away. As I was looking out of the bus window, I looked down at a woman in her car. First of all, she was drinking something from McDonalds...sigh...but then grabbing for something infront of her. The steering wheel. But wait, she was sitting on the right side of the car. Oh my gosh - do the other people know about this?.... Wait a tick...

They drive on the other side of the road!!! When I realized the no one else was panicked about this, I remained calm, but there was a period of time when I thought maybe I should let someone know.

There are a lot of other things that the UK doesn't actually paticipate in..such as the Euro or the seasonal time changes. I didn't countries were saying no to that. I think the US should rebel too. Sigh.

In any case, I finally arrived in St. Andrews. I was looking at the local map in the bus station to get myself acquainted with the city and a gentleman came up to me and said,

"Gibber jabber blarney blunder."
"Um, excuse me?"
"Aye! Gibber jabber blarnez blunder!"
"I'm sorry, I can't understand you."
At this point, someone came up to the both of us and traslated for me. "He's asking you if you need some help."

"Yeah! I need some freakin' help! I need a translator!" Wow...I was NOT prepared the language barrier in my native language. Wow.

Finally got to my hostel and was greeted by a friendly staff member. The place is painted real nice, it feels clean and generally was feeling good at that point. I hadn't taken a shower since a few days before that, so I decided a nice long hot shower would feel reallllly good.

The shower was awful. First of all, there's a shower within a stall much like a toilet stall so that you can have a little privacy while showering, undress, etc. However, the door opens in and I had to *fwoop* suck it in to close the door. Awesome. The floor was made of fake wood floorboards and the nails were coming out of the floor. The water was warm, but the drain was clogged, so I had to turn off the water halfway through my shower out of fear that the shower would flood out of the stall not only all over the bathroom, but all over my nice clean clothes. Awesome.

Have officially decided to wait it out until Dublin to shower again. I will not remind you of what day that is but lets just say I might be a little more French in my BO for the next couple of days.

However, St. Andrews has made up for the questionable stay here. As a small town, I found myself very easily acquainted and feeling like it's nearly impossible to get lost. The town feels very midieval in it's architecture and there are a lot of quaint tourist shops that remind me of my wonderful hometown of Eagle River. It is a city populated majoritily (word?) by students, so it is a very friendly town. I smiled at a woman today and she smiled back. A good feeling in comparison to the dagger eyes I would have gotten from the usual Parisians.

Monday night, Bryan and I had dinner together in his kitchen and it was good to see where he's living, knowing he's safe. We had an amazing stir fry with rice and a honey chicken sauce (naturally without the chicken) and it...was...good. I left around 8:30 and with a long days travel behind me, I felt tired by 10 or 10:30 so I went to bed.

....for just a little while. A drunken Scot rolled into the hostel room and passed out in his bed only to commence the most horrible snoring I have ever heard. It was awful. This was about 1 am. His girlfriend came in a little later, yelling at him for waking up the entire room...I think it might have been her doing that though moreso than him. Oh well. Needless to say, my first night sleeping here was a little rough, but the hostel is still okay in my eyes.

Had been feeling really homesick for Paris and French in general yesterday and I think God heard my prayers because as I was cooking dinner at the hostel, a French family walked in. So I got to 'parler' a little 'francais'. Awesome. Also, a girl I had met at the Cologne airport, who was taking the same flight walked into the hostel yesterday as well, so I'm feeling both a small world feeling and very grateful to have had a familiar face. Her name is Hendrickje and she's from Germany. She speaks English very very well and French as well. She's living in Paris this semester, so she said we should get together once we return to the States. Very awesome!

Last night was fantastic. I went to a Scottish pub with Hendrickje, Bryan and a bunch of his friends. They were all really really nice. I had a dark beer (not bad, but very heavy) and then Bryan and I had some gooooood whiskey. I chewed it to get the most taste from it, and I was breathing fire. It was really good though. After the pub, his friends and I (Bryan left early because he needed to get up early in the morning) went to a place call KFB and I had my first deep fried snickers bar. Basically....it was heaven. I've never had a deep fried anything (to my recollection) but I'm pretty sure the amazingness is something I would have remembered experiencing. FAAAAntastic. I arrived back at the hostel to find everzone else in bed, sleeping...and the room was silent....no snoring. Sigh of relief.

Today I plan to go to the Botanical gardens and climb the tower. Should be a relatively cheap day, which I'm definitely excited for. Tomorrow I will be leaving really early to get to Edinburgh for the morning and spend a little time there before getting on my plane for Dublin. People I've met in the hostel have been telling me that I'm going to love Dublin, it's a great city. I sure hope they're right...

Peace!
Molly