Aberdeen Update (a Long Time Coming)

I know it’s been a while so I’m sorry about that. The week after Dunnottar was fairly quiet. We had a movie night which was nice. I saw American Beauty for the first time. It was a bizarre film but it was really good. We also watched Titanic because the theme of the evening was sort of sappy, girly movies.

Classes have also been going well. I’ve got some assignments coming up but that’ll be fine. I also bit the bullet and got my books. They’re all sitting above me at the moment, glaring at me. There are only seven of them though so they’re not too intimidating. Yes, they don’t frighten me! But I need to get some more from the library for assignments so soon my core texts will have some friends.

This weekend was really nice. Saturday was my Glasgow day. It took about three hours to get there and the trip was gorgeous. We went through Perthshire so I actually got to see real snow! I didn’t want to be in it because I wasn’t prepared at all but it was nice to see. Amanda met me at the station and we went back to her residence to drop things off. Then we went for a little walk to the cathedral which is basically just down the road. It was absolutely beautiful. There were four different areas that you could go too. One of them was an area in the back which had a lower ceiling and was just filled with columns. It was really, really beautiful. And I got another mini-tour by just asking about the stained glass windows. Fun fact: only six are from before 1935 and they’re only from the Victorian era. They’re all beautiful though. Entry was also free. I spent 80p on postcards but that was all. After the cathedral we went to the Necropolis. It was just so interesting because there are various levels and they are just covered in some of the most elaborate tombstones. There’s also one mausoleum which is really impressive. After our visit there we went downtown. We didn’t spend too much time though because we had to go back and get ready for dinner. We met her two friends who had come in from St. Andrews as well. The place we went for dinner was called the Landsdown (or some variation of that spelling) and it was really cool. The food was also fantastic. I had pasta with an alfredo sauce of goat’s cheese and spinach. And then they brought a cake out with candles which was cute. After dinner I went back to her place and crashed because I was exhausted. I had less than six hours of sleep two nights in a row so I was gone. My bus was also at 7:40am on Sunday so I needed to be semi-conscious for that.

On Sunday evening we went to a pub called O’Neills. It’s a little Irish place and they have live music every Sunday. They also have the best fish and chips. Or at least they are the best I’ve had since I’ve been in Europe. It’s a Guinness batter so it’s amazing and just really, really crispy. By the end of the night there was a massive group of us too so it was fun.

Today Holly, Rhianna and I went to Banchory. It’s a little town about an hour outside Aberdeen right on the river Dee. We didn’t spend too long there but we went for a walk along the river and then had an amazing dinner. I had haggis for the first time and it was actually delicious! I was kind of shocked. It wasn’t too big so Holly and I still have to have our full-sized haggis but it was a brilliant introduction.

Well, that’s all the news for now. There’s a ceilidh tomorrow night and then this weekend we’re probably going to go and have another castle adventure. For pictures, unfortunately I can’t get anything to work except Facebook. So they are all up there right now though I know that doesn’t work for everybody. If you can’t see them and want to send me an email and I will send you the URLs for each of them.

From Scotland with love,

Haley