An update overdue...

Scotland!!
Last weekend we (Lacey, Melinda, Me) went up to Edinburgh, Scotland and I think that it might be the most beautiful city I have ever seen. Everything is old, made of stones, and looks like a palace or some other historically important building, even if it's just a restaurant or hostel, etc. (That's the old part; the new part of the city looks like London pretty much). The city is also right up against these mountains (small mountains, more like foothills, perhaps)...it's really beautiful. It's also REALLY cold. I was, however, very excited to be able to wear my Scotland jacket IN Scotland, as you can see:

We stayed on the Royal Mile, the street between Edinburgh castle and Holly Rood House, where everything is but also where everything that is is pretty touristy. But then again, there were bagpipes:
Being so high up on the cliff, there were lots of views of the castle from down below:

The castle was really neat. We took a guided tour (such a thick Scottish accent) and got to see the Crown Jewels (the crown, the scepter, and the sword) of Scotland, and also the stone that some king of Scotland sat on a very, very long time ago to be crowned, and it now sits under the coronation throne each time a new king or queen is coronated--including Queen Elizabeth II.

Saturday we took a bus trip around the highlands, saw Loch Ness and Castle Urquhart, saw the west and east coasts, saw a glimpse of the castle at which they filmed Monty Python, and, above all else, saw Hamish, the Heilan Coo:
I love him.
Otherwise, the highlands are extraordinarily beautiful--mountains ("bens"), lakes ("lochs"), valleys ("glens"), etc. I tried to take a few pictures, but unfortunately, a camera really can't capture it. Here, though, are some attempts; the first is with Melinda and Lacey, the girls I went to Scotland with:


On Sunday, we went to service at St. Giles Cathedral, which was actually fairly small as far as cathedrals go, but was extremely pretty. The choir sang and then walked around the room (the acoustics were INCREDIBLE). The stewards at the church were the only men in kilts we saw that were not just being touristy--that was sort of cool. They really do wear them. And it really is awesome. I didn't take pictures of the inside of the church--felt a bit weird about that, particularly because this is just a regular church for most people there. The stained glass was really incredible as well (better than that inside of Canterbury Cathedral).




(also, not of importance, but this is in fact a turtle pen:)
I bet Tippy would have gotten out of that one, too, right Mom and Dad? :)



I took a lot of pictures of Edinburgh trying to capture how beautiful it is and its buildings are, but again, fail. The next picture merely shows how light it is at 10:30 pm in Edinburgh, being so North. I think the sun rose before 4am, but I am not sure:
Sunday we walked around a while and failed at all attempts at inexpensive vegetarian haggis. we also got laughed at at a pub near the bus station for asking for it (I do understand there is "no such thing" as veggie haggis, but there's also not really such a thing as vegetarian chicken nuggets...so...), so we got fish and chips and waited for our overnight bus (blech) back to London. Where we sat behind three quite smelly European guys. In front of two quite loud British girls. Overnight. Great fun. Obviously we didn't sleep much, which made the next day a bit hard to get through, as you can see:



Otherwise, in London I have been seeing EVERYTHING. Museums, museums, walking around, museums. (They are all FREEEE!!) We went to the Museum of London, which had all these exhibits about London's history--prehistoric to present (though the recent portion is being rennovated, so anything post-Renaissance was closed).

We saw the remnants of a Roman wall:


Roman wall ruins can be found somewhat randomly around London. It's kind of strange; you look at a wall, and think to yourself, hm, that's out of place and a bit old-looking. And then the tour guide (who is always, inevitably with you, when you are on this program) tells you to "turn 'round" and see the Roman wall. Just sitting there, all 2000 years old and such.

We also saw ancient Roman coffins:

And (for you, Grandpa) an ancient Roman builder's yard:
With all the tools (which were quite impressive for 1st century AD, I think):



Other than seeing museums and falling asleep atop my lit book in Hyde park, I have been trying to explore London on foot now and then. Nicole and I took a little walk to the park in our neighborhood, which was quite beautiful. And there were peacocks!

And....
I thought that was amusing. And perhaps ineffective, since we saw a few dogs, um, not heeding the sign.

This past weekend we stayed in London. Our uni had a festival to celebrate everyone being done with their exams (except us, obviously, though I think a three-week course on Victorian literature doesn't call for quite the release that does a semester of physics, chemistry, aeronautics, string theory, etc....). They had DJs, cheap drinks, and fun abounding. We all danced in a very fun, 1990s kind of way, and it was bliss. We met three very nice, nerdy French guys (one less nerdy, but still nice). They were dancing near us and asked if we were English; we said no; they asked, so we wouldn't mind if they spoke bad English then? And of course we didn't, so we became friends with Sebastien, Battiste, and Alex. We also met a British guy who knew one of them. The night was much dancing and almost no drinks but with everyone just dancing around, looking ridiculous, not seeming to mind much. Quite a concept, this having space between people dancing. In Europe, of all places :)

Saturday was Nicole's birthday; we went to the Tate Modern; it was alright. I think there was less early modern stuff than I expected (some Picasso, but not THAT much, not much expressionist stuff, etc), though I did see that statue of a man running that is in my art book in Humanities Class.

Sunday to Camden Market, a place much recommended by Brits. It was fun (I didn't experience the full market; I don't think I walked long enough); I bargained for the first time on a few crappily made dresses (here the exchange rate worked for me, being a good excuse to say, no, 13 pounds is good for those two dresses; that's a lot of dollars, you know). I'd like to go back and see the rest of it, since I only saw the part with clothes, jewelry, bags, etc. And pashminas--oh, the pashminas. And how they abound in this city. Cheap; multitudes of colors; ubiquitous.
I also went to Regent's Park to read Mrs. Dalloway (and eat an overpriced egg mayonnaise sandwich--sucks to their ubiquitous veg option--and take a nap, and talk to a quite pleasant and quite talkative older Englishman).
Sunday evening was the football (the good kind) game between Germany and Spain. Sadly, Germany lost, but it was still fun to watch. Actually I was a little disappointed in how they played. But all the same. I appreciate the passion and politics that goes into the sport of very, very few that I can actually get into. Sunday evening we saw one of our French friends and talked to him a bit, and (hope of hopes!) made a local friend. It's not that we are so lonely, but that the program, for all its beneficial qualities, does have the tendency to isolate us very completely from any and all Britons. We take classes in their union building (where no one really is except downstairs or outside, never up in the building this time of year) with only ourselves, live in one building together, etc. Many have really taken to, um, secluding themselves in large, loud groups of Americans; this is (shockingly) not the best way to learn about the local culture. But anyway! A British guy asked what was up with all the Americans (perhaps for this I am grateful, then, that they were so loud and obvious?) around; there seemed to be a sudden influx at this time of year.

Today I went to the British Museum after class, and, I still kind of can't believe it myself...I saw what remains (in London, a portion of it is in Greece) of the pediment of the Parthenon. I saw a lot of the rest of the reliefs from the Parthenon, but its obvious triangular shape, Aphrodite leaning, Helios rising, Dionysus sitting...I couldn't believe I was actually looking at it. Incredible. I didn't have a ton of time there (and many of the Greek and Roman rooms were closed! :( I think Diskobolos is there, but was in a room that was closed! Ridiculous!), so I saw the Greek stuff and a lot of Egyptian stuff, which was really neat but I don't know anything about ancient Egypt, nor ancient Assyria, which I also saw. Their stuff was really, really well preserved, and much of it was older than the stuff from the Acropolis (thanks, probably, to the Parthenon being used for gun powder storage more than anything else).
I saw the Rosetta Stone, as well, which still (sorry) was not as incredible as the pediment, but probably because hieroglyphics mean a bit less to me than does the Parthenon. It is pretty cool though. I actually missed it the first time I walked around the Egypt portion, and then, oh, there it is: dark, not that large, three languages of the same text, this gray rock key.

As a notice, posting pictures takes just short of FOREVER and is keeping me from posting very often, so I might not be including many, but I will try to get some other way that either doesn't take as long, or post them on flickr or something, hopefully to make it as complicated as possible. Sound good?