August: Home

It's months since I came home, and I've been holding out on doing this entry as I wasn't even sure I wanted to, but "Glasgow" hasn't ended for me yet, and I am sure it won't. I might be home in my own apartment, in my own bed (yay!), but I still miss Glasgow, a lot. Even more on days when it rains.

Week 15: "My heart's in the highlands..."

I have traveled Scotland far and wide, and I have managed to travel from one end of Great Britain to the other in just under a day.
I have experienced Scottish weather, and I have fallen in love with the country and lost my heart in the highlands.

Week 14 #3: 50 Shades of...

I was in Aberdeen this past Sunday. It rained. And it is probably the first time while being in Scotland that I have witnessed actual Scottish rain. And it doesn't rain vertically like it would anywhere else in the world. It rains horizontally. I'm not kidding you, and it feels like small bullets are thrown in our face. Also, umbrellas are not good for anything because they just get broken.

Week 14 #2: 101 to survival in Scotland

So, I've been in Scotland almost 14 weeks now, and while I have come to feel quite at home with Scottish society, it is also very, very different from Denmark where I come from. I thought I'd list those differences here:

Week 13 #3: Isle of dreams

I have had a friend visiting from Thursday until today, and we were exploring a bit of Glasgow and Scotland.
Friday we explored Glasgow Botanic Gardens, I will post an entry about that during the next week, and yesterday we went on a trip to Oban and Isle of Seil, aka isle of dreams. And sheep.

Week 12 #2: Inverness

I already stated after my trip to Dublin (link) that this week is going to particular busy. Today I was in Inverness with Gary and a couple of foreigners. I have gotten over my fear of going alone, and now the best thing about the trips is possibly all the new people I get to meet.
They're all really something, and scenery and sunshine aside, they might actually be one of the best things.

Week 11 #2: Nessie hunting

You can't go to Scotland and not have seen  Loch Ness. Something about that is just wrong, so of course I had to go to Loch Ness, and even though my mom proclaimed that I would never find Nessie, I still had to go and try.
Loch Ness is far away from Glasgow, although not as far as Inverness and Aberdeen, but still far enough.
We had a coffee break at the Green Welly, which I already knew because of my trip to Glencoe and Glenfinnan (link). After that we headed basically the same way as I did when I went to Glencoe. Up through Rannach Moor, past the Three Sisters and through Fort William, there still is no fort.
Deeper into the highlands we went, and we even passed by Ben* Nevis, the highest mountain in Scotland.

On the way to Loch Ness Gary told us a couple of stories. First there was one with a couple of questionable details, but the moral of the story was to not be greedy. This was exemplified by a man stealing a golden egg from a golden dragon, who then punished the man by teaching him a very golden lesson. He was basically turned into gold and added to a collection of golden humans who had once been too greedy as well.
Another story was about the three lochs that run from Fort William to Loch Ness basically. These three lochs are connected so Nessie is free to roam around. These lochs are Loch Eil, Loch Lochy (very creative name) and Loch Oich. Loch Oich is then connected to Loch Ness via Oich River and the Caledonian Canal. Loch Ness is then connected to the sea, so Nessie could be somewhere in Australia by now for all we know.

Week 11 #1: Edinburgh

Wednesday was spent in Edinburgh, walking approximately 21 km all around town. Up and down, although it mostly felt like up most of the way. I wanted to post this yesterday, but I was so tired after walking around in the fresh air all day I decided to get some shut eye in instead.

Week 9 + 10: Why we dislike Mel Gibson

So, obviously as you guys has seen this is yet another compilation of two weeks. It is so because I during week 9 mostly struggled with motivating myself to write an essay, and also finishing it while still procrastinating. However, I handed it in this Monday, but I didn't feel like I had to make an entire blog post about that, and also there were not any adventures. However, today I had adventures, and I have the pictures to prove it:

The fantastic view

Week 8: Harry Potter and frogs

"Life begins at the end of your comfort zone" - Neale Donald Walsch

It might be fair to assume that Neale Donald Walsch was a wise man, at least the above quote is spot on. There is a reason it's called a comfort zone.
I signed up for the trip to Glencoe and Glenfinnan two weeks ago, and I kept asking my friends if they had bought tickets to join up with me. They hadn't, and it occurred to me that I was actually going to go by myself. Now, arguably this is not that terrifying, but it felt like it was at the time.
Especially because I have run out of data on my phone, so there was no chance to spend too much time on Facebook and Instagram. However, instead of being scared I choose to the positive angle:
No excuse NOT to meet new people, and no distractions.
After my trip home, and regardless of how much Glasgow was just a quick-fix, I now have 6 weeks left here, and I have two choices. I can either wallow in how it didn't go as it should have and how I would rather be somewhere else, or I could start enjoying my time here and have fun. I decided to employ the latter tactic as I believe I have the power of change in my hands.

Week 4 + 5: The barber experience

I feel like I should probably make an update. I know I didn't get to update last week, but the past two weeks have been somewhat uneventful. I fell sick again after the trip to St. Andrews and Dundee and had to spend some days recovering from that.
Also, I did my first presentation for a class. I was rather nervous about that, but we did well regardless of nervousness.

This week I went to visit the GP's office (doctor) with Seher as she had fallen sick, and I also went to experience the real barber's experience. I went to Rebel Rebel near Central Station, and let me tell you, it is quite different from Denmark. In Denmark I would usually find 3 chairs in a hairdresser (called barber over here), but at Rebel Rebel there were many, many more. The lady cutting my hair told me they had had a DJ in the night before, and I almost fell out of my very comfortable chair. The music was already louder than I would ever expect it to be in a Danish barber shop, and the fact that they had DJ's coming in here was amazing.
The atmosphere was completely amazing as well, and I would definitely come back there another time if I need my hair cut another time while in Glasgow.

Today I have been working on an essay I need to hand in a week and half, and I have been working out. I'll try to explore a bit in the coming week.

Week 3: Towns and cities

There are words in my head and stories in my hands:

The week has been as I guess it will be from now on. Modules on Tuesday, Bodyattack on Wednesday resulting in a broken body all through Thursday, Friday, Saturday and today. Thursday I had more modules and I could barely walk down stairs. Friday I did school work for a presentation on Tuesday and had dinner with a couple of girls. Yesterday I relaxed, and today, in honor of my three weeks in Glasgow I went on a tour to St. Andrews and Dundee.
It's Valentine's Weekend (yes, there is such a thing). I'm not going to dwell too much on Valentine's because it'll simply make me angry; instead I chose to go on a tour and have fun and be happy.
I ordered the trip as an impromptu decision Thursday - what else would I have done today? Honestly, I have no idea.

It was a day of tales, myths, a lot of walking, sunshine and beautiful, cute towns.

St. Andrews

 

Where I was supposed to go...

As some of you may know I was supposed to leave for Shippensburg tomorrow morning. I was supposed to fly out of Billund very early in the morning, but with only a week to go my trip to Shippensburg got cancelled, sadly because I was unable to attend, breaking my dreams and wasting months of preparation.
Needless to say that I was heartbroken and thrown for a loop. Suddenly I had nowhere to live, and my dreams were literally breaking in my hands.
For two days I looked like something the cat had dragged in, and I didn't know whether to laugh or to cry. I was trying to get a hold of where I was going now and slowly accepting that me going abroad was not part of that path.
On Friday last week I received a call from the study abroad office telling me that they would try to get me into Surrey, London.
I told them to do it, because I didn't want to give up this dream of going abroad unless all options had been exhausted.
They told me that they would know definitively Monday or Tuesday.

Monday I received a mail saying that Surrey didn't accept more students. I had been trying so hard not to get my hopes up, but at that point it was evident to me that I actually really wanted to go with all of my heart, so I was saddened again, but the office had told me they were still trying.
Tuesday morning I received a mail with the headline "URGENT". Curious as I am I opened the mail, containing an application form!!!
Naturally I filled out the application form, and this is written on the assumption that I have already been accepted into Glasgow Caledonian. I don't know for sure, but I hope with all of my heart, and every piece of my being.

It has been a hectic week, and words can only begin to describe how awful it actually was. I don't know if I'm accepted yet,  I just assume I am. I don't have any plane tickets yet, because I don't want to buy them before I am accepted, and I have no place to live in Glasgow, but I am assuming knowingly that things will be all right in the end.
The time I spent preparing for Shippensburg is obviously wasted, but I am going to leave the list on the blog anyhow, because some exchange student might want to check it out one day, and most importantly, I don't want to forget, because I think it is important not to forget the excessive preparation-work load on exchange student.