Norman/Glasgow

Today was interesting. Apparently the Commons has changed management two or three times since I moved out, and I am no longer in their records. They won't let me move in until they do a background check, which won't happen until monday, at the earliest. Until then, I'm homeless and sleeping on Katie's couch.

So... Glasgow. It is very much a working town- not nearly as picturesque as the capitol, but it was nice enough. My favorite part was the trip to the Glengoyne Whiskey Distillery. It's about 45 minutes north of the town; when I went, the countryside was gorgeous in the snow. I toured the works, which was really interesting. At the end, I tried single malt Scotch for the first time.


After I got back that night, I met up w/ Cliff for dinner. He is studying at Uni Glasgow, and it was his first day in country. We went out the Basement Bar afterword. Cliff was really funny- he kept getting up to chat with the dj or ask about good Glaswegian bands.

Bedford/Edinburgh

I made it to Katie's yesterday. The money is all the same size again, and everyone drives on the right side of the road. When I was waiting in line to get my passport checked, the man in front of me turned around and spontaneously started a conversation; it is good to be home.

But back to the story. I flew from Dublin to Edinburgh, my single favorite city on the trip. Edinburgh Castle is really cool; it costs like 10E to get in, but there is so much to see! From the Scottish crown jewels to the National War Memorial to the spectacular view out over the city.

On my second day in town, I caught the bus to Rosslyn Chapel (that's the one from The Da Vinci Code). You know how Tom Hanks walks into the crypt down that stairway w/ the Star of David? You can still see where the movie crew cleaned the wall to stick it on there. That's just about the only carving the chapel doesn't have, though. The place is full of weird, asymmetrical carvings of plants and people. The walls tell stories from the Bible and the Apocrypha, stories about the St. Clair family and Robert the Bruce, and there is a weird little murder story behind the three pillars in front of the alter. The strangest thing might be the Green Men, though. The chapel has about 100 carvings of faces w/ vines coming out of their mouths, and old Pagan symbol for nature and fertility.

I bought a copy of the Scotsman when I saw that the bus ride to Roslin was almost an hour each way. Page 3 was about halfway taken up by a story about a new type of tartan being introduced. You know you are in Scotland when...

Confession: I tried haggis, but it was in a vegetarian restaurant, so it was mostly peanuts. It was delicious, though. I also like Irn-Bru, which is basically extra-fizzy orange pop. It is pretty much the national drink of Scotland, the only country where the leading soft drink is not Coke or Pepsi.

Heathrow/Ireland

I am in Heathrow airport, waiting for the Lufthansa desk to open so that I can check in for my flight. It is 23:31 right now, so that will be in t-minus five hours. Since getting back to Hatfield, I have been busy with school stuff and preparing to return to OU, so I haven't had much chance to write about last week's trip.

The first stop was Belfast. I only stayed one night there, but it is not a big town, and I got to see pretty much everything I wanted to. I learned a lot about Irish history in the Ulster Museum, from St. Patrick all the way up to 'the Troubles' of the last few decades. Speaking of which, Belfast still bears the scars of the sectarian violence from about 1968 until just a couple of years ago. You can walk around and see memorials for people who died (which always include the religion of either the victims or their killers) and murals which are either Protestant and pro-English or Catholic and republican, depending on which part of town you are in. I climbed Cave Hill, up past Belfast Castle. The castle itself is not terribly impressive- they mostly use it for weddings and stuff. But the view from the hilltop is incredible. I could see Scotland, and I was told that on a clear day you spot Wales as well.

Dublin was also very cool. I walked past the house from James Joyce's short story The Dead on my way to the Guinness Storehouse. I saw Strongbow's tomb in Christ Church Cathedral, then the next day I saw this picture of his marriage to Aoife (the daughter of the king of Leinster) in the National Art Gallery. I also really liked just wandering around the city: Trinity College, St. Stephen's Green, and Irish-language street signs.