like a rolling stone

Reading week, in a word, was fantastic. I really was working too hard and needed some time to catch up on my studies. And by that, I mean I traveled!

I took the opportunity to fly to Cardiff and visit my friend Hannah in Wales! Well, I flew in late Friday night, and we actually got up early Saturday and drove to London (about 2 hours) in her fiance Dai's company car - turns out that we had several friends from our summer in Konstanz, Germany that happened to be in London that weekend! It was an unexpected little reunion in a big city. Tons of fun. Went to the famous Harrods department store, saw a B-team comedian who thieved us out of five pounds, and of course, we went to a few pubs!

Seeing as I flew into Cardiff, I did want to see a bit of Wales as well. Hannah and Dai (the two making faces in front of St Fagans Castle below..) took off a couple days of work and were the best tour guides and hosts I could have asked for! We did a whirlwind shopping tour of Neath, a storybook castle experience at Castell Coch, and spent a day wandering about the historical village of St Fagans. They introduced me to cheese on toast (delicious!), Welsh cakes (divine with a cup of tea), Bradford pickle (questionable..), and Jaffa cakes (addicting)- I must say, we really ate far too well while I was in Wales!

After Wales, unfortunately I had to come back to St Andrews for a case study on modeling global climate change. As interesting as that was, I was off again soon thereafter...

First stop was the Scottish Deer Centre down the road from St Andrews! One of the most random, strange experiences of my life, but a valuable learning experience. By that, I mean I discovered my underlying fear of feeding wild deer pellets out of my hand. I know, it's a strange fear, but I'm not afraid to admit it. Stuart and I saw an abundance of deer, birds of prey, and apparently one of the largest Highland cows....who was also incredibly intimidating. Some biologist I am, huh?

The next day my friend Jane was en route from Morocco to Edinburgh to visit me, so I took the opportunity to spend the day in Edinburgh with Stuart. I finally made it to the famous castle atop the volcano, and even made it in time to see the 1:00 cannon shot. Nearly jumped out of my skin, but it was worth it. Headed from there to walk around the city a bit and see the Scottish Parliament building and Queen's residence. The Scottish Parliament was an unexpectedly ugly modern building. Apparently it has little "contemplation pods" sticking out of the building at each MSP's office. The building also uses solar panels as part of the sustainability strategy - I don't think the designer realized this was being built in not-so-sunny Scotland.

From there, we met Jane at the airport and headed on back to St Andrews! As her hostess, I had big plans to make sure Jane did everything Scottish and see as much as she could of this wonderful place. We started by initiating the day with a full Scottish breakfast (egg, blood sausage, haggis, beans, toast, tomato) then we hit up the Cathedral ruins and St Andrews Castle. After picking up a healthy serving of Scotch pies and Fisher & Donaldson fudge donuts, we headed towards the Old Course and West Sands for a Chariots of Fire reenactment. Then of course, went to the nearby Anstruther for the famous fish and chips on the harbor. Met up with the gang later at a pub for some Scottish beer drinking, then topped off our evening with your standard fried mars bar. Could not have packed more of Scotland into one day if you ask me!

Followed this up with a two-day road trip up north to the Isle of Skye. It was an interesting 6 hour drive there in the car with Steve and his guy friends - never a dull moment, shall we say! We enjoyed the consistency of west coast cold, rainy weather the entire time, but it was an incredibly beautiful place all the same. We chased sheep, hiked to cliff edges and waterfalls, drove unpaved roads, saw many-a-castles, watched Scotland football with locals, slept in a smelly hostel, and nearly ran out of gas on windy roads far removed from civilization. It was in intense couple of days!

After Jane left and the excitement of Reading Week was over, things calmed down a bit. And necessarily so. Although, with Christmas spirit in the air, I made sure I saw the St Andrews Christmas lights festival! It was a fun-filled event with all of St Andrews in the town center counting down to switch on the lights, followed by a walking tour down to the pier for a fireworks display. Despite the cold, it was a really nice Christmas tradition to be a part of.

So that's really the update on Reading Week and thereafter - more news to come soon on travels to Paris before I head to Chicago for Christmas!

i feel the earth move, under my feet

It's been a while since I last updated, but things have been just as crazy as ever on this side of the pond! Another couple of action-packed weeks have passed, and I keep wondering if things will ever slow down a bit. You know, it's tough living a life like this...traveling every weekend, so many social obligations (sigh).

Anyway, we'll start with two weekends ago. I spent Saturday on a road trip with Emily, Sayaka, and Emily's friend Jeremy up to the famous Loch Ness. We saw the monster herself a few times, and Emily even got in and rode on Nessie's back for a bit. They say you have to watch out though - the monster's famous for stealing American dollars. No, but really, it was a beautiful drive up the coast of the lake to Inverness. The mix of rain and sun could have been terrible weather, but the three rainbows we saw over the course of the trip made up for it! Inverness was right at the top of the loch, and it was a really cute small town with a pink castle as it's focal point. After lunch in Inverness, we headed down the other side of the Loch to the Urquhart Castle which we had heard good things about. It lived up to its reputation and ended up being a really beautiful set of ruins. Apparently, it had been "repeatedly sacked, damaged, and rebuilt over the centuries" according to the Lonely Planet guide - it certainly looked the part!

Now that it gets dark about 4:30pm here, the drive back was quite a long 3.5 hours. It was raining the whole time and we got a wee bit lost coming back through the city of Perth... needless to say, we ended up making it home with only a minor jaunt onto the wrong side of the road. I slept very well that night after such a long day!

Sunday we spent at a football match in Dundee with Ferg and Tom. Really amazing match actually! By the end of the game, we were all huge Dundee United fans! Decked out in all black and tangerine (not orange) scarves and shirts, we had a great time cheering against the Glasgow Rangers. Best part was the old Scottish man behind me shouting ridiculous insults the entire game whilst his 7 year-old grandson next to him repeatedly cried "Dirty wanker!" It seems football is quite the family oriented activity! I posted a video you can check out from when Dundee United scored a goal - really not a high quality film, but it definitely captures the excitement of the moment!



I spent the past weekend in Dublin, which was incredibly fun as well! I know I say that about every place I go, but really it was. Irish boys are absurdly friendly and I went with a group of six American girls... so we got quite a bit of attention, including a marriage proposal and an strange offer to stick my finger up someone's nose. Now that's the sign of a solid weekend right there.

In Dublin, we made sure to hit up the Guinness Storehouse where we saw eight floors of Guinness history in a building the shape of a pint glass. My goodness, My Guinness was ingrained in our heads by the time we reached the chic bar at the top floor with an incredible city view.

We also found a traditional Irish band playing in a pub in Temple Bar, and spent the evening out in the most famous area of Dublin (...also the most expensive!). We went shopping on Grafton street (which is a nice change from tiny St Andrews), visited the Jameson Whiskey distillery, and I even bumped into two friends from Germany while strolling about Trinity College! It is definitely a small world!

Dublin was incredibly fun, and I returned back to St Andrews to put my nose to the grindstone and get some work done for classes. Lucky for me, "Reading Week" is next week, which gives me time to go visit my friend Hannah in Wales and be a tour guide for Jane when she comes to visit St Andrews! Ahem, I mean I'll be studying. All week. All the time.

Cheers for now...

here, there, and everywhere

It's been another busy week on this side of the pond. I've been getting an education on wine and cheese with the Wine & Cheese society (appropriately named). At an event at The Scores Hotel, we sampled about 9 different wines alongside brie and crackers. It was fabulously fun, and we had some really good wines! Although I can't really say I'm now a wine connoisseur, or even that I remember the name of one wine we had that night. We're really taking advantage of the opportunity to join a society that centers around an activity that Emory would probably never have supported!


We've also been getting an education on British pop culture lately. Hanging out at Ferg and Tom's flat in town, I've gotten to appreciate a show called Neighbours. I have no idea why an Australian soap-opera is so stunningly popular here in Scotland. Much less why the same episode is played twice a day at 1:40 and 5:35. I decided that the show is really no good unless you watch it with several people and make ridiculous commentary throughout.

The biggest news is that I went to London last weekend! Really fun time and I saw loads of the city in just two days....which may have been crazy. I stayed with the former Bobby Jonesers (and identical twins), David and Gordon. They were incredible hosts and walked all over London with me. The best part was that they were a wealth of knowledge on all the useless little historical facts you could ever want to know about London.

I started my trip by actually getting on the wrong train. Typical. I was early to the station, and just walked on the train that pulled up. Suddenly I realized it was definitely not a sleeper train. Turned around as the doors were closing (in slow motion), saying "noooooo" ...but it was too late. After much worrying, I soon figured out that the train I was on was heading to Edinburgh and that the sleeper would stop in Edinburgh as well. The conductor was very forgiving and didn't charge me extra, saying "I knew you were in the wrong place when you got on the train!" Unfortunate that I played the dumb American card, but it got me where I needed to go this time!

Once in London, David, Gordon and I embarked on a whirlwind tour of a city that was larger than I had ever imagined. From Buckingham palace to Big Ben and the Houses of Parliament, I saw it all. Tower of London, the Eye, wacky street performers, the Gherkin, Trafalgar Square, Picadilly Circus, and more. We spent Saturday night watching the Rugby World Cup finals, England v. South Africa. Unfortunately England lost. But it was still fun to be surrounded by crazy England fans. Interesting fact: one of the main cheers for the England Rugby team is "Swing Low, Sweet Chariot" because it was sung when the first black player on the team scored three tries to win a 1988 game against Ireland.

Afterwards we had a lot of fun at an engagement party for a friend of the twins. I'm pretty sure everyone I met was entirely confused about why I was there, seeing as I knew neither of the happy couple. The next day was spent touring more of the city, visiting the Tate Modern art museum, and we also met up with another former scholar, Derek, for lunch at a place on the Thames river. Speaking of the Thames, I've never seen a dirtier-looking river in my life..

After the excitement of traveling all weekend, I actually spent the week doing some studying and had some work to do. I know - shocking! On Thursday, we had another cricket social - Pub Cricket - which compensated for this busy week. I also discovered this week that my favorite shop in St Andrews is The Christmas Shop. They sell Christmas ornaments and decorations all year long! The minute you walk in the door, it smells like Christmas too. Absolutely amazing.

Well I'm off to Loch Ness tomorrow, and going to a soccer game in Dundee on Sunday. Should be another full weekend once again! Cheers!

let your soul and spirit fly into the mystic

So Cricket - I'm officially a member! I was initiated this week, and it was absolutely ridiculous to say the least. We went on a pub crawl, and all the newbies wore white. Let me put it this way...there were lots of drinks and lots of dares. I convinced a random guy at the bar that I was one of the girls that took the incriminating photos of Hugh Grant with the St Andrews girls. He bought it and asked me to autograph his arm. All I know is that I was scrubbing off lots of permanent marker the next morning...definitely a turtleneck day.

On a very different note, the English beat the French in the semi-finals of the Rugby world cup. Pretty amazing, although I don't recall watching it exactly - it was more about socializing than sport for me. Rugby is beyond me even more so than American football. I didn't really know who to root for. My English roots on the Lyman side made me think I should root for England, but my Scottish friends would have made me into haggis if I did.

Went on a day trip up the east coast of Scotland on Sunday. I had a lovely Scottish gentlemen show me around, so I had an excellent tour guide as well! Stuart and I drove up to Stonehaven, stopping at the Dunnottar castle, the medieval fortress obviously most notable as the site where Hamlet with Mel Gibson was filmed (that's me...squishing the castle to the right). We visited the Stonehaven harbor on the North Sea, saw the oldest building in Stonehaven, and I even learned that Robert William Thomson - the inventor of the pneumatic tyre - was born there. Scotland seems to pride itself on its inventors of interesting objects like bicycles, telephones, ATMs, logarithms, radar, and cloned sheep. Not important, but fun fact for the day.

Finished the trip with a drive through the Cairngorm and Grampian mountains past towns that all started with B's. Banchory, Ballater, Braemar, Blairgowrie...stopped by the Royal Lochnagar Distillery (one of 423 Scottish distilleries, according to an unreliable source), and drove past one of the queen's many residences. In all, we saw really beautiful countryside with rolling hills and farms, rich fall foliage in forests of birch trees, and of course hit some rain through the curvy roads between sloping peaks. Really wonderful trip! Good music, good sights, and good company.

I'm also slowly learning some new words for things. For instance, a "lorry" is a big trailer truck. The hood of the car is called a "bonnet", and the trunk is the "boot". Also - pants? Not the same thing. Trousers are pants, and pants actually means underwear. I got a few laughs for that one. And suspenders are actually "braces" - suspenders are really those lingerie accessories which hold up women's stockings. Also, a "chav" is a term for a person of low intelligence who wears Burberry. Whatever that means. French fries are chips, and potato chips are crisps. Cookies are biscuits, and biscuits are scones. You don't study math, you study maths. "Neeps and tatties" are rutabagas and potatoes, which is usually served with haggis (which is not a small furry animal as they will lead you to believe, but actually a mixture of sheep organs with oatmeal and spices inside the animal's stomach).

Anyway, there's always lots going on here and I'm learning something new everyday! The MRes course is keeping me pretty (un)busy so far, so there's definitely plenty of time for experiencing Scotland.

dancing in the moonlight

So now that classes have begun, things seem to be in full swing here at St Andrews! I'm beginning with a Basic Math/Stats/Computer programming class all rolled into one....it's really as delightful as it sounds. I actually only have one or two classes to attend every day so I really have a lot of free time to sort of do whatever I want. It's a strange feeling after being one of those ever-busy Emory students. I went for the most incredible run down the East Sands one afternoon, and it definitely in my top five runs of all time. Amazing.

All this free time gives me time to do all those typical Scottish things you're supposed to experience while here. For instance, the fried mars bar. It's exactly that - a fried candy bar. We took a trip to the nearest joint that will fry anything (surprise, it's called the Fry Bar) and decided to try one out for ourselves. The boys loved it (as evidence by their approving faces in the photo)...in my opinion it leaves a little something to be desired. I guess it's an acquired taste?

I joined the women's cricket team! It's great fun to swing the paddle at the ball, provided the bowler doesn't toss you a googly, hit the wicket and knock off the bails before you can run back. Don't ask me what that means yet, I'm still learning how to manage making contact between the paddle and the shot-put-like ball they whirl at you! Don't worry, mom, we wear helmets and padding. And anyway, I was in need of some girl friends after hanging out with the boys so much.

This weekend was exciting - I went on an ecology study hike in Glen Clova, Scotland with all the students in my masters program. It was incredible and absolutely insanely beautiful! We hiked up a 3,000-foot peak to an arctic alpine environment where we were literally couldn't see more than 10 feet in front of us with the thick fog that surrounded the mountaintop. We saw herds of red deer, the endangered golden eagle, hares, and sheep - lots of sheep. I got a lot of flack from all the Scots in the group for getting so excited about sheep. I told them I had this urge to go hug a sheep. I mean, they look incredibly soft and well, so hug-able.

After a day of hiking, we hit the hiker's pub at the bottom of the mountain. I had a good pint of cider with everyone and three of our professors - they're all fabulously quirky and intelligent middle-aged scientists, so it was good fun. After a day full of hiking, I had a quick turnaround from my boots to high heels and a gown for the Opening Ball. It is one of supposedly many black-tie balls that happen at St Andrews, so I donned my green dress, took many-a-picture with the girls on the hall, and headed to St Salvador's quad. We were greeted by charming British boys in kilts who handed all the girls roses and a glass of champagne upon arrival. It was a night of drinks, dancing, and lots of crazy fun memories. Ask Steve for a little more exciting story of his ball experience - because I like giving away endings, I'll tell you it involves him in boxers and his tux bowtie.

To finish off the busy weekend, we did our first road trip in the Bobby Jones Volkswagen to visit Edinburgh. It's only about an hour away, and it was great to get away and visit a little bit bigger of a city than quaint little St Andrews. We saw the famous castle which is apparently the inspiration for L. Frank Baum's Emerald City in The Wizard of Oz, had a great meal at a little pub on The Royal Mile, and just wandered the city streets for a bit.

All in all, another busy week gone by - lots of new experiences, lots of good pictures, lots of fun!

I say hello, you say goodbye

So we made it! I said my goodbyes, boarded the plane, and here I am at St Andrews! Well, it wasn't quite that easy... add in some missing luggage, shockingly cold weather, and jet lag and then maybe you'll get a better picture of our arrival here. The first day we all must have been up for 36 straight hours, so it sees more of a daze than anything else. I recall being dropped off at our rooms, doing a whirlwind driving tour of the town where we all slipped in and out of consciousness, and I'm pretty sure I ate a sandwich at some point.

The next days were filled with all of those things you do to get settled in a new place - you know, all the important tasks like getting your cell phone and accessing the internet. Ah, whatever did they worry about back in the day without the text messages and facebooks? I just don't know.

We had our first beer at The Raisin, basically the first pub we ran into on Market Street. Robbie, Steve and I had a ceremonious cheers with three pints of Tennents (a Scottish beer of a debatable quality..) and followed our crowd of "Freshers" (freshmen) from pub to pub. At a pub right on the beach we were unfortunately recommended to have a John Smith, the working man's beer. Well, let's just say it tastes more like milk than beer.

Academics-wise, we've all been figuring out our courses and meeting with advisors. My MRes Environmental Bio program seems wonderful - there's only about 15 students and we all got to know each other with an afternoon at the pub after the first meeting! We're quite a motley crew, but everyone is incredibly friendly and fascinating. I'm the only American of the bunch, and I quite like it that way.

Although my walk to Gatty marine lab is about 30 minutes from where we live, I really can't complain - it's an absolutely beautiful walk through town, past the cathedral, and all along the North Sea - really quite incredible, especially after spending four years in land-locked Atlanta. I'll have to remember this when making the trek in the cold winter months...

Today was actually the first day I could get away without wearing a sweater under my jacket - and the sun came out! It made for a really beautiful walk out on the Old Course. Steve and Andrew hit some balls on the driving range, and after we made sure to have the quintessential Bobby Jones shot on the course. Classic.

So it seems the first week of St Andrews has blown by quickly, filled with new pubs, new people, and signing up for every possible activity at the Societies and Sports Fayres. I'm no jock, but I'm pretty sure I committed myself to women's rugby, cricket, sailing, windsurfing, volleyball, riding, ultimate frisbee, and korfball. I don't even know what korfball is.

Classes start on Monday, but more importantly, next week commences driving lessons! Once we have mastered the other side of the road, we shall be off on many adventures to the wee corners of Scotland. Stay tuned.

she was an american girl

This blog will be an excellent way for you all to keep in touch with the things I'll be doing, the places I'll be heading, and the people I'll be meeting next year at St Andrews and beyond. It will also be a wonderful venue for me to post updates and photos instead of composing those mass e-mails that just clog your mailbox and get prematurely deleted...

I can't begin to describe how excited I am to head out on my UK adventure this September. Expect to see many-a-post here of interesting stories, travels and more in the future!