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10:02am 12/04/2006
  wooo hello all!!! nt that anyone reads this or anything!!
well so im backpacking europe for 3 weeks and so far its been going great!!! we started in brussels, belgium and stayed for 2 days... the city was kind f gross but you know it was exciting!! unfortunately i lost my pin and manakin pis souveneir!!

then it was off to amsterdam which was an adventure let me tell you, well i dont feel like spending a zillion hours typing so ill tell you when i get back!

then off to munich germany which was nothing to be excited about... i would def go back to germany buuuut maybe not munich!

then off to venice where the trip realllly started to pick up.... it was gorgeous!!! i have a few nice sketches and drawings and toooooons of pictures from here!!!

then off to florance where i am now!

sooooo i will be heading to rome in a few days and then up the coast of italy, france, and spain to barcelona. then off to madrid and ending up in paris for a couple days. then hopefullywe will be taking the chunnel back to london and the train back to scotland!!

so i will be seeing everyone in the first week of may and i will have A BILLION stories for you all!!! i cant wait this trip is fantastiv!!!

ciao!!!		  
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BACKPACK?   
06:42pm 02/04/2006
 
mood: excited
music: nothing
Wooo so long update I suppose…

The past couple weeks have been AWESOME… you know not having school aaaaand being in another country. Ive done some sketching, just pen stuff… too cold to paint or even work the pastels. Ive hung out with Elizabeth and kadie quite a bit, a couple people im going to miss IMMENSLY. Luckily Elizabeth is from the states and we’ll be roadtripping to see each other  Kadie on the other hand is from Scotland, and its sad to think I may never see her again!!

Anyway… more about that in three weeks haha… so ive been to north Berwick which is a fantastic beach outside of Edinburgh. The cutest most Scottish town lies on this water way as well as a golf course… let me tell you I found a few golf balls in the sand!!

Ive also done a scottish tour to loch ness which was pretty funny… our tour guide was HILARIOUS! Haha he was so Scottish. Apparently his “clan” was a rival to my “clan” so he scared me a little haha. Oh and Elizabeth and I saw THE Japanese man. Hes the same man who struck up a conversation with us about how ridiculous the prices are at the witchery one day by the castel. It just so happened he was on the same tour bus as us!! He made me sad tho, he travels alone a lot because he loves to travel. Everytime hes in Scotland he takes the same tour.

Oh and so all the Scottish kids talk about this place called the forrest café but none of the exchange kids knew what or where it was. So one day Elizabeth and I decided to make it a mission to find this so called “Forrest Café” so we did. AND IT WAS AMAZING. We walked in and the lights were low there were college kids just lounging around, a couple people on the computers they have, a couple relaxing on the couches, some drinking tea, some munching on nachos… the music was chill and it was great. The food was dirt cheap… huge portions… and delish!!! We found an empty couch and ate there, when halfway through our meal a girl throws in a dvd… The Evil Dead…. The movie was projected on a white wall which was directly in front of us. Eliz and I looked at each other and were like… stay? Yes! So we had front row couch seats to the movie. Fantastic. My favorite place in Scotland haha.

So as you all may know… or perhaps not know… I will be heading out for the crazy world of backpacking in just 7 hours. Hope, Elizabeth, and I have decided to tackle Europe for 21 days… 3 weeks.

We’re taking the 7am bus to Glasgow tomorrow morning, then flying to Brussels, Belgium where we booked a hostel for the night. Then we’re heading to Amsterdam, Germany, Austria, Venice, Bari Italy, Greece, back to Bari, Florence, Rome, Florence, Marseille, Nice, Barcelona, Madrid, Paris, London then back to Scotland. All this with one backpack and a shared duffle. Jeeze Laweeze!!

So if no one hears from me for 3 weeks… that’s why! After that, two days in Scotland to get all my film developed, then its home for a while. I say a while because you better believe im traveling again! Even thought its been very up and down emotionally, I think I can handle it now, and I think its my favorite thing of the moment… besides kyle of course 

Ok see you all in a month!		  
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snow AND hiking   
05:01pm 05/03/2006
 
music: alice in chains (oh reminds me of kyle)
SNOW!!!

So it finally snowed here in Edinburgh the other day!! It was great, i opened the door to go outside and there it was, fluffy white snow everywhere and it was snowing! i literaly ran outside and jumped about and smiled all the way to school! it was an odd feeling because the snow reminded me so much of NH and Boston and i realized just how much i really do like winter. you know it gets fusterating when its cold, but when theres snow... thats when winter is awesome!

so anyway, i went to the college and there was elizabeth, and we origionaly had a plan to go find the gardens and printmaking, but instead we went out and built a snowman. he was the most aawesome snowman known to man... he had a huge nose and carrot eyes, crayons for a mouth, and earing, old broccoli and twigs for hair, and we found a few of those orange city cones and surrounded him with them.

his name was fredwick. elizabeth made hot chocolate and we spent pretty much the whole morning and afternoon on him. at one point, hoodlem kids came by (prob 12 yrs) and asked if they could destroy him. we were like NO! and so they left and threw snowballs at cars, and this one cab driver got really andgry haha.

then elizabeth went back to make more hot chocolate and i ran to get a cone when another random kid came running by and kicked poor lil fredwick. but we repaired him... then some freelance photgrapher took a picture of me next to the snowman and we talked about how nice of a day it was and how he taught at the college for a while.

then hope and eliz came by and we whipped up some oatmeal raisin cookies... a recipe i found online which turned out to be very very good!

THEN eliz came back and we made a DELISH dish of pasta and a creamy white sauce with mushrooms. we rock at cooking by the way!

then SATURDYA

i went out with brian... first to his flat where his roomates cooked a rockin jacketed baked potatoe... it was really well done. then we played asshole and drank wine for a couple hours before heading out to the Big Cheese, which is a club inside edinburgh univeristy. HA IT WAS GREAT! clubs here seem to be SO much better than at home because at home its all about grinding and creepy old men following you around, here you just dance with your group of friends and its all great fun... soooo long story will be cut short... i got quite merry and ended up having a great time... the music was sooo great... totally 70's 80's and 90's cheesy pop (the kind you know all the words too) haha.

so i went to sleep at like almost 3 with the world spinning and woke up for 9 becuase hope and eliz came by. we hung out for a bit then walked over to arthurs seat and climed it. it's no mountain but it was a nice hard walk up and the view from the top is absolutely stunning. we went on a perfect day let me tell you, cleat blue skies, nice weather, and oh i just cant even find the words... absolutely great. and plus there was a 75 year old man up there who told us about the war and how to get down and something about two really fat ladies. haha you should have seen what he was wearing and he carried with him two ski poles haha!!

then we walked back here and it was like 1ish and we prepared our sunday brunch as usual... today it was pancakes made with scottish liquid black sugar and topped with maple flavored scottish syrup... mmmmmmmmm!! best pancakes known to man!

then i made some pizza dough and took a nap. when i woke i bought some stuff and kadie and shona and i dressed the dough i made earlier and cooked 3 pizzas topped with: 4 different cheeses most i cant remember the names of, tomatoe, green pepper, fresh corriander leaves, spices, onion, sausage, fresh olives, garlic, mushrooms, pine nuts, and tuna. HOLLA GOOD PIZZZZZA!

ha sooooo i think ill go to bed now, ive been on for 2 hours (talking to kyle) and i think this is costing me a pretty pence! im thinking i love cooking, i love hiking, i love talking to kyle, and i love sundays. then end... oh and p.s. i love YOU!!		  
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Kyle and more...   
04:44pm 02/03/2006
 
mood: bouncy
music: well still the typing
So I separated the London entry from this entry because london happened so long ago that i felt like it needed a separate entry...

WOOOOO SO KYLE VISITED MEEEE!!! That really made my life let me tell yoU! so the whole week before he came, just after getting back from london... i had to whip out a 5 color silkscreen packet of a project so my week was basically dedicated to that. but theeeeennnnnnnnnnn

i woke up at quarter to 7 wednesday morning wide awake and completely excited because that was the day kyle would be arriving. so i met him at the airport and naturally i started bawling my eyes out because im lame and cry too much... but i couldnt help it... seeing his face again was the best thing i could ask for.

anyway so i brought him to the flat where he slept for 3 hours and i went to the school to buy cakes from shona's monster cake sale which i will have to tell everyone about when i get back. oh and i presented my project which went over VERY well. it was the best day of my life. so then i cooked him dinner and it was deliscious... you know traditional scottish meals...

so then the next day we took a bus to inverness which is a 4 and a half hour trip away to the highlands. Once there we rented a car... now they told me they would be giving me an automatic and that they would pick us up from the bus station... NONE OF THAT HAPPENED. when i called them the lady told me there was no one to pick us up and that they didnt have any automatics. so we rabbed a cab and the driver was the coolest guy EVER!! he made fun of how the americans were rediculous and even gave us a receipt to get a refund from the car rentals.

so then we get inside and i find out the cost of the car was going to be £20 more than anticipated and not only that but we were stuck with a manual (standard). So Kyle hadnt driven a standard in 6 years and i NEVER have soooooo we were like uhhh we need to practice. i stalled more than you can imagine... which meant kyle had to drive us out of the city.... and that was scary because he hadnt been here to observe the fact that THEY DRIVE ON THE OTHER SIDE OF THE ROAD. so it was scary but the greatest adventure ever anyway... so he did it and he did AMAZING!! \

so then we found the bed and breakfast and it was THE COOLEST THING EVER.... let me tell you, when they say 4 star award winning.... they pretty much mean it. our bedroom windows over looked a fantastic view of pure scotland country side farmland. it was amazing. the bedroom was large and decorated beautifully and the bathroom was cleeaner than if it was brand new and the shower was warm and they even had a tea kettle in the bedroom.

the next mornings food was UNBELIEVABLE. they started us off with fresh fruit and muffins and juice and tea and tost and then brought out the meals which were fit for like 3 families. and it was all piping hott and professional quality... it was delish. the dining room itself was really really neat and it overlooked the garden in front of the house. the peoplethere were SO NICE as well!!

so we stayed in forres like an hour away from inverness, and we checked out brodie castle and did some hiking. we managed to find a golf course so kyle could take so pics. he taught me how to drive a standard too!!! our car by the way was the cutest most awesoime car ever ad i wish they had it in the states!!! it was so small and gas efficient and had the cutest nose and ahhh it was a hott car!! oooo and kyle tried fish and chips which is completely scottish and seemed like he like it... minus how rediculously fried it was haha!

so then we came back to edinburgh and i just showed him around the city and he took some pictures and went to a museum and up to the castle and hung out in the flat and it was overall a really really good time. and so sad when he left :(

annnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnd so far thats all ive been up to... except today. now our bathtub is pretty nasty and theres so much crap and grime in the drain that it gets kicked up when you take showers which causes clogging. so finally it got so bad that it just stopped draining all together... sooooo i figured id try helping out and clear some of the grime away by poking round with an old scrubber toothbrush. well it got stuck in the bathtub drain. soooo i spent like 2 hours today before class trying everything i possibly could to remove the toothbrush from the drain. well there was no hope. its still there. so i left a note to the roomates and tonight i will be spending all night trying to remove it. GHAAA!!! theres a fricken toothbush stuck in our bathrub.

ok thats the deal, sorry its taking me so long to update... AND YES THE POSTLE SERVICE SUCKS..... i didnt get packages from my massart friends or from my nana :( grrrrrrr.
well i have tons of work to do... you know still double majoring... but this time its like double full time AHHH hehe but things are going great as youve read. plus its sunny today... thats always nice!!

ok off to get some stuff done then to the gym... its almost bathing suit weather and if i keep making shortbread like this then ill never be able to go to the beach!!!

cheers!!!		  
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This is the REAL entry about London...   
04:30pm 02/03/2006
 
mood: bouncy
music: the clicking of typing
OK SORRY EVERYOOOONNNEEE!!

the last update was cut short because i had something to do... but heres how it goes

so i went to london that weekend and it was sweet... i left off saying how random the trip was and how we didnt have a place to stay... so pretty much we were wandering around london. So we found a place sometime in the afternoon and then went off to the portabella market which is a HUGE amazing market that sold everything from fresh breads to fruit to jewelry to antiques and tourist stuff and vintige clothes... you name it they sold it... i saw pearls there and my friends made me buy them... only after i called my mom!

then we napped for like 3 hours since the bus ride was soooooo long and no one slept! then we went out and about and found some dinner. you know we did the london thing throughout the whole trip... walked around and saw stuff and took pics and such. which jjust reminded me that i forgot to pick up film 2 weeks ago. damn. anyway so this one night we decided it would be fun to go to a comedy show so we called the place ahead of time for directions. we ended up being 45 minutes late and thought the show would be over by now, but we decided since we came all that way we should check it out anyway.

So we walked in and the leader man was like OH THERE THEY ARE! THE AMERICANS ARE HERE! and we were like uhhhhhhh... and then he told us to grab a seat while he rounds up the others.
So he does and we were like uh whats going on? and he said that no one else showed up so they decided to wait for us to get here!!! so long story short, we had an entire comedy show just for the three of us... and they did it for free for us AND even bought us a round of beers. pretty much that was the most amazing time of my entire time in britian!!!

so rockin. we did more of the london thing and then one night we were looking for a place to eat... we decided to check out the soho area because elizabeths roomate told us to go there and so did the coatcheck man in tate modern. so we did and as we were walking around we came upon a crowd and we wanted to know whats up. so as we were walking closer we noticed tons of paparazzi and people shouting famous peoples names!!! so we were like uuuuuhhh.... and the weasle that i am managed to get right up close and see all that was going on... IT WAS A RED CARPET PREMIER OF CASANOVA! oh yeah that was cool!! i was sooo close to kelly osborne hahahaha.

anywaaaay so thats the gist of london... one day we did do 13 hours of straight walking with 20 minutes down for lunch. that was an intense day... i think that was the premier day too haha!!

so london is a cool city... altho its very new york... someplace cool to visit but i wouldnt want to live there!!


ok so we borded the bus at 11 or something tuesday night and arrived back in edinburgh around 730am on wednesday... so i washed my face and walked over to grassmarket and went to life drawing class... all three of us did and it was hilarious because we had just come back from london and none of us were even late. hahaha that was great!!!		  
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top o the mornin to ya!   
09:01am 15/02/2006
  woooo just got back from London!!! so that was one crazy awesome trip let me tell you!!

started off with us (hope, eliz, and i) randomly going to buy our bus tix. we were then off on a 9 hour bus trip (without a bathroom) to the land of london. we each packed one bag plus my camera and plus hopes purse. we seriously backpakced it for 4 days!!! So we left around 10pm on friday night and arrived in london at 630 saturday morning. sleeping didnt happen due to one freakishly loud snoreer and tiny seats with no leg room or place to stick youre head. but who cared? we were going to london!!!!

soooo we get there and its dark out and cold and we have no idea what we're doing... we never even booked a hostel		  
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chocolate is my new life   
09:33am 03/02/2006
 
mood: sleepy
music: hot hot chocolat- The polar express
woooo lets talk about the other day SHHHHAAAAALLLL WE?

the otherday the 4 of us went to prince's street and to some church and i drew the castle in the distance and that was fun, we even found the train, or the track and the train drove by and it was THE MOST EXCITING TIME EER. ook jk

so then elizabeth and i went back to my place and we made a spaghetti dinner with garlic bread and such then we baked walnut and banana muffins, then we made a loaf of chocolate bread. all in all it took about 6 hours AND WAS FUN haha the bread is so good i can t even begin to tell you. fresh ut of the oven and the chocolate just melted in your mouth ghad it was good!

then i talked to kyle for 2.5 hours, went to bed at 2 woke up and came to class for 930 and found out IT WAS CANCELLED WOOOO!! p.s. im going to london for the weekend next weekend!!!

peace outttt time to eat some chocolate bread!		  
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musician   
08:51pm 01/02/2006
 
mood: peaceful
music: Beck- guerrilito girl
ok soooo we just had our card club.

firstly, the janitor was busy watching his music video and then didnt understand that we wanted the key for the wee red bar.

secondly, there was an annoying buzz in the wee red bar so i walked over to a lighted box because that seemed to be the source.
well upon reaching it... the alarm went off.
THE ALARM WENT OFF.

we didnt know what to do for about a minute when a musician walked around the corner and asked "what?" and not really know how to respond to that very odd question we responded with "um, do you know how to turn off this alarm?" and he, probably puzzed and not able to concentrate over the loud beeping also responded with "no, im just a musician, im a nobody," and with that he was on is way. but he'll be back.

thirdly, the janitor didnt seem to care that the alarm was going off and after finishing up reading off the website he had now moved on to, he told me what to do.

so, back at the rannch ellizabeth was crouched on the floor blocking her ears in an attempt to block out the horrible noise around us. as i was approaching her the musician had come back and said, "hard to think with that noise huh?' and i said "yes" and dropped my hat.

so then i couldnt figure out how to shut the alarm off so i just kept hitting the number 1 because i thought that might solve somthing. well it did i guess because the alarm turned off.

by this time is was 10 past 8, so as you can imagine a 10 minute alarm is a little nausiating. no one had showed up yet so eliz and i broke out the cards and some crisps and played our little hearts out. we discovered a dying plant and a palm tree painting.

so then randomly a couple of other janitors came waltzing in... these were the table guys whom eliz and i had cheery conversation about where the tables should go in the illustration room just 30 minutes previous. they came in asking us what we broke, and when we said nothing we just set off the alarm, they walked out. that was that.

well more time passed AND TONS OF PEOPLE CAME IN AND IT WAS ONE CRAZY CARD CLUB WITH CAKE AND ICECREAM. actually no. noone came so we packed up our stuff and left.

but now we know that people here dont stay at school past 5 so our next meeting will be at 430.

the end... i think mail te postcards, then try and hook up internet in the apartment, then do stuff till 130 then call kyle then go to bed then sleep in then come to class then go to the gym then go to bed.		  
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bubble and squeak?   
07:41pm 01/02/2006
  woooo so we had a brief to make a book cover for two books.. well we had to choose one... so i chose the biography about curry. IT WAS SO FUN TO DO i didnt finish it since we only had two days to do it, but most people didnt either and it had a very good review!!! ill post pictures someday!

so we went to an indian food restaurant because you know, had to do research for curry... and it wassss delish!! three of us... dan, elizabeth and i bought a cookbook toghether so we're going to send it back and forth to each other to keep in touch!! p.s. ever since this project curry seems to be everywhere!! did you know that here they put curry on their chips (fries)? it tastes pretty decent.... one day dan put yogurt in his extra curry and ate it. it was just as good haha.

so in just a few minutes elizabeth and i will be off to our card club that we invented. i dont think people will come becuase we didnt really advertise, but thats ok since we're both kind of tired anyway.

p.s. did you know that bubble and squeak is a scottish dish made from left over potatoes and cabbage fried together. its an old dish typically used to get rid of leftovers. haha just thought youd like to know!!

cheers!		  
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weekend, whered you go?   
09:47am 30/01/2006
 
mood: cheerful
music: wheres my mp3 player?
wooo so this was a good weekend!! lets go through it, shall we?

friday:

11am off to the ZOOOO!! grabbed a bus and hung out with the animals at the most amazing zoo ive ever been (minus bush gardens) and the views from the place are FAB!!! plus it was so hilly my legs were sore later!

after the zoo we all went to thorton's on prince's street for some chocolate (ive only been there 3 times...oops!)

then off to the ART SHOW! yay and i was in it!!! so that was cool, it was a really well done show minus the fact they didnt have food, just beer. so elizabeth and i watched the animations which were really really good, at least compared to massart so far. there was also some really nice costume designs and fashion design pieces, and the jewelry was pretty cool. the illustrations, not so much in my opinion, and i couldnt care less for the photos, but i took a few pics so i should ut them up... oh and people kept standing by my piece and looking at it and pausing it was a good feeling!!

after this, elizabeth and i went to the last drop with dan, pia, johanna, lila, and some guy i didnt know and there was a dinner special... anything £5.95 or less was really only $3.50!! woooo!!! and we taught johanna how to play egyptian rat screw... and if we finished the game she would hae beaten us!!

after thhhhaaat, elizabeth and i went to dans and we watched Gregory's Girl, a scottish film by bill forsyth which was sooooo good, so far im liking my scottish cinema class and the movies we've been watching!!

saturday:

BEACH! well we were supposed to go at 11 but Hope was late as usual so we left at noon, ANNOYING! but whatever, we got there and the rain stopped and the sun came out, so we had ourseles a picninc which was nice and we sketched for a while! it was calming, relaxing and just overall good! from there we decided to take the 3 hour walk home um and we didnt know how to get back hahahaha it was an adventure let me tell you! we ended up on the highway and had to ask directions from a couple of carsalsmen who were laughing at us!!

so we walked, and walked, and got directions,a nd walked and finally after like 2 and a half hours we managed to get to holyrood house which meant we found our way back to the royal mile!!! so we walked along that for a while checking out some shops along the way and entering a random crappy museum. we also found the best hot chocolate ive ever tasted in my entire life!!!!! it was seriously the best in every whay... and their chocolates were so fancy nd had pictures on them... so i got the scotland chocolate!!


sunday:

WOKE UP AT 630 because i went to work at Ottakers, a bookstore that my flatmate Shona works at. they were doing inventory and needed extra people so i worked from 8-4 and made £40!!! that was nice. theeeen Kadie and i made dinner.... she made a sauce with sausage, ricotta cheese, fresh peppers, mushrooms and spices and we made pasta i cant remember what it was called tho ahha and oh man it was good... oh yeah and garlic bread.

soooo today is monday and my plan goes as follows:

talk by some woman
lunch
project?
find a conerter for plug
project?
try hooking up internet
dinnah
googletalk if internet didnt work

there was no reason for me to write that except that now i feel like some thoughts are organized!! wooot! ok miss yaaaaaah!!		  
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haaaaaggggggggisss   
05:52pm 26/01/2006
  last night was burns night, in honour of robert burns a poet from scotland. anyway my roomate and i made haggis and mash and mashed turnip and carrots. it was delish. i dont feel like updating right now haha.  
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08:38pm 23/01/2006
  so i shouldnt be so negative huh! well i had a bout with homesickness and i tend to get rather grouchy in such situations, so now that im alll good heres an update...

well i cooked fish for the fist time ever... AND IT WAS DELISH!! salmon fillets with onions, tarragon, lemon juice, and bacon fried in butter and topped with a double cream. with it i had SCONES that i made!! they were rich fruit scones with saltanas and oh man are they delish as well... i also attempted naan bread but i messed up haha... i didnt realize you had to warm the milk to activate the yeast, i just assumed milk was milk! it was still edible and pretty good, although rather dense and heavy haha oh well now i know!!

i also played cards in a couple pubs with elizabeth and hope which was pretty fun, eliz showed me this new game called egyptian rat screw which was pretty fun.

today elizabeth and i got to the school early... even tho we didnt have to be here... i love how people tell the exchange kids NOTHING haha and then hope showed up. i visited the lauristen library again which is nice, its no massart library but its decent. i then tried to go to the public library but they wouldnt give me a card without proof of my address and a signature somewhere with it. so then i went to the grassmarket library which is another school brary and they had some good stuff there too..

whew was that tremedously interesting.

THEN elizabeth and i decided to start a club... the card club hahaha we reserved the wee red bar WHICH by the way... is a BAR in the school!!!! so anyway we reserved the room and we;re going to have chips and soda and stuff and at least we know the exchange kids will come play haha but we're hoping to make scottish friends this way! wooo!!

ok so ive gotta get 3 more post cards to get and theyre out!

ta!		  
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and today i feeeeeeel.... blah.   
04:11pm 20/01/2006
 
mood: aggravated
hmmm ok update... a little pessimistic so if youre looking for a good time, dont read this.

mass art is the best school ever. edinburgh college of art sucks. the teachers dont show up half the time, you have to pay for silkscreen, and anything printmaking, you have to pay to print stuff off computers, and its expensive, color costs more, the cafe never has sadwhiches, only hot meals smeared in gravy, the printmaking is only open from 9-5, an overdue book is £1 each day, you have to watch out for "short loan" books which only loan for 2 days THATS IT, the school closes by 5pm on fridays saturdays and sundays which is annoying on fridays because some of us would like to use the internet, there is no free gym, the cheapest gym is a half hour walk away, you can only exit certain parts of the building after 8pm or else you will set off the alarms, you cant get into the school after 8pm because they lock the doors, on weekends you cant get in after 4... and i think you cant even get into the school till 2pm, our studio spaces are really small and not private, there is VERY minimal storage space, there are no water bubblers, no elevators, no printers in the illustration studio and only 2 computers, the school building is more rndown than massart, there have been no fliers for clubs or student activities, and thats all i can think of right now. oh and i have to watch my time BECAUSE THE SCHOOL CLOSES EARLY ON FRIDAYS.

other than the school, im still very happy with this city and my scottish cinema class. i like both of my roomates even tho we dont have heat every day.

today i went to the scottish museum and it was verrrry nice, i didnt see any paintings tho unfortunately, but i did see the history of scotland which was pretty cool.

this weekend i plan on making bread for the firstime ever and make a scottish dinner, i plan on hiking arthur's seat and taking pictures around the city. i want to come home tho, im missing eeryone.

i still havvent sent out the postcards because i spent so much time on my book, and they didnt even like it. i spent so much time on it and they ended up chosing projects that looked like they took no time to do because im catching the drift that art is much different here than at home. even in illustration, they much prefer the abstract and the quick sketch over something "finished". am i not meant to be an artist?

ok i gotta go, almost time for that stupid security guard to come in and kick me out, and i have to lug stuff home if i want to do art after 5. i wish i was back in boston, or everyone was here...		  
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Castle of Edinburgh   
10:55am 16/01/2006
 
mood: peaceful
wooo went to the castle the other day!! it was pretty cool... minus the faact that it was 100% touristy... but i should have expected that. it felt mega cool to be standing inside castle walls and looking down on the city. it felt so weird knowing how old that stone structre was!! the wr museum was really well done in my opinion, there were so many old things people used in the war and it was cool to read the journals and see the old photos. the view was another really well done part. i did not like, however, how they painted some of the walls white. i wish it was left stone... but other than that... a must seeeeee!!

excerpt from my frommer's:

"11th century, malcom III (canmore) this saxon queen, later invenerated as st margaret, founded cattle here. The only fragment left of their origional pile- in fact, the oldest structure in Edinburgh is `st Margaret's chapel (which was painted white) built in the Norman style, the oblong structure dating principally from the 12th century. After centuries of destruction demolitions, and upheavals, the buildings that stand today are basically those that resulted from the castles rold as a military garrison in the past 300 years or so. And much of the displays are devoted to military history. The catstle vaults served as a prison for foreign soldiers in the 18th century and these great sorerooms housed hundreds of napoleonic soldiers in the 9th century. Some prisoners made wall carvings still seen today. Among the batteries of armaments that protected the castle is the medeival seige cannn, Mons Meg, which weighs 5 tons. (that was oretty cool to see)"

1st set of postcards will be sent out tomorrow
2nd set sometime later this week :)		  
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your face is scotland   
12:52pm 13/01/2006
 
mood: chipper
music: chevelle
i didnt feel like reading my last entry so i dont remember where i left off in my writing, so if i repeat ummm then dont read it haha.

oh yeah and by the way instead of umm its emm

I turned in my first assignment for illustration, nothing really hapened with it, no one really talked about anyones work which was kind of annoying, but whateever. so we got our 2 week assignment which is family. we have to make a book about a family and it can be ANYTHING... i think i rememeber writing this... whateever. so i'm doing the jenkins family, because we are crazy as anyone who has been to a jenkins outing will know. its about the hunt for food and yes, beats plays a very important roll. its probably going to be about 15 pages of rough line drawing printed in silkscreen with one or two flat colors. speaking of which i really should be working on that right now...

ive also had my scottish cinema class which is AMAZING i love it!! im in there with 3 other exchange students which is nice becuse ive established a friendship with them so the class is very comfortable!! we had to write a script for a movie about scotland or have somethign to do with scotland. heres my group's movie:

my groups was about how the main character (sean
connery) was eating lots of haggis in a castle when he spills all over
his kilt. he then calls for his servent locklin and tells him to get
another one...locklin comes back and says that sean has soiled all of
his kilts and there are none left (the scene behind him is a pile of
rotten dirty kilts) so sean conery is now standing naked outside the
castle with haggis in his beard and greasy hair and whisky all over
him. he then ventures down the castle slope... the edinburgh castle
which is right in the city, to all the modern shops in search of a
kilt. the story ends whith sean all fusterated and with out a kilt,
he is seen shaving a sheep and making a kitlt on his own from the
sheep wool!!

i was nominated to present it to the class and the whole lecture hall
was laughing, it was soooooo funny!!!

oh and i went to a pub with the exchange students... we went to "the last drop" the name has to do with the section of town it is in, a section that once was a hanging place. the place was soooo cool let me tell you! i got a pint of tenets beer which i think is like one of the cheapest you can get, but my troomate told me i hae to try that since im here... it was like £2.40 so thats not bad. we all played jenga in the pub and it was sooooo fun!!!

last night i went to the pleasency which is the gym. its £2 abytime you want to go and we took the karate workout class and it was soooooo fun hahaha there were like 40 people in the room and the instructor had a microphone and she was so funny and energetic and cracking jokes the whole time haha, and now i am sore!!

but yeah so that s been the past couple days, ive got postcards and am writing them sloweluy and should be sending the first batch out tomorrow, the next batch should be by tuesday, and if you dont get one like a week frm tuesday and want one let me know.

ok its finally time to start working on my illustration!!

cheers!		  
     Post
 
   
03:50pm 10/01/2006
 
mood: bouncy
hey everyone!

so its been five days since ive been in scotland, and let me tell you IT IS SO HARD not to have internet!!! or it was, now i have it when im at the school. so here's whats been up for 5 days... it will be a long one, so bear with me or just dont read it haha!

PART 1 The Flights:

Ok so the first flight was great! I was pretty nervous at first, you know being on a plane all by myself!! but i ended up sitting next to a guy from finland who helped me feel better! I think his name was john, but im not so sure haha he was with his girlfriend and sister visiting his brother who just moved to boston for a job. he has jumped out of airplanes 14 times, so you know we talked about that for a while! My flight had a tv screen on each seat that offered movies and games and music and it was so cool haha... i played trivia twice for like an hour each and let me tell you i was really bad haha. I aslo watched home alone... now this was a 7 hour flight and i didnt sleep...
So then i landed in amsterdam and i was so scared i would miss my flight, but it took me like 5 min to get there and i ended up walking around... there was a museum in the airport so i hung out there and it was pretty interesting, the art was of the 1600's - 1800's dutch.
The next flight was pretty good, it was a short trip hour and a half and i sat in the wrong seat, but the plane started crowding in so the girl was fine with it and took my seat. so i was sitting next to a scottish man and his scottish father and they were pretty cool. they talked my ear off about scotland and edinburgh.

PART 2 Mrs. Orr
So we hired a guide for 2 days to help me with getting situated in this new country. She is probably the nicest lady EVER! She picked me up and dropped me off at the flat where Kadie and her boyfriend Richard were. So I met them and was off again with mrs. orr to the grocery store. I ended up back at the flat around 430 scotland time and 1130am hometime the next day which means if i woke up at 8am on the 5th and it was 1130am on the 6th, i was awake for over 27 hours!!!
anyway that was a rough night. i woke up at 3am wide awake, becaus enow 3am has been 11 hours of sleep. i had no internet and no way to call home so i just walked around the place, and did nothing really for like an hour and a half when i forced myself back to sleep. i slept really late.

Part 3 The apartment and roomies
Let me tell you a little bit about the "flat". It is so cold i dont even know why we have a refridgerator. There is no heat in the place from 11 ant night until 5pm the next evening. that means, all weekend i froze. i was wearing 2 sweaters and i had to go buy slippers because the place isnt carpeted and i wear my heat and mittens while im there. i think its probably about as cool as it is outside, maybe a little warmer from being indoors and body heat ect... but its frigid. plus theres the most awful draft from the BAY windows i have which are huge and over looks some of the city... and i can even see the castle in the distance. I am on the 4th floor, so i get a good workout which is nice. I have my own bedroom and its HUGE which is also nice. eleni also left tons of movies and book that she said i could use, i havent yet but theyre there. and her guitar!!
The bathroom is another story. The toilet doesnt flush all the time which is annoying so you just have to leave the unflushed tp in there till the next person comes along, it all usually goes down after like 4 flushes. the shower has VERY LITTLE water pressure... but its warm which is such a relief... and you turn it on in the most interesting way! theres a pull string next to the bathroom door that when pulled turns on a red light, when this is on you then go to the shower head and press the start/stop button and the water comes out. i love it, every shower should be like that!
The kitchen is much muuuuch larger than my apartment at home, but the fridge is soooo small i could hardly fit all my groceries in it, never mins the other two people who live there.
They have a hampster and his name is pinfolf and i gave him kisses.
The roomies are both very nice, Kadie once took me about the city to saint giles cathedral, price's street, parts of the royal mile, a chocolate shop, a vintage store, a shoe store, her fav clothing store, and general shops in the area. she also called me up at the flat one night when she knew i was all alone and invited me to her boyfriend's flat where her friends were watching a movie... or about to. it was so nice, she was so nice. her friends were really funny and one of them kept thinking i was from new jersey! Just today i walked to school with shona who is the other roomate and is taking a two week elective in illustration so she is in my class. we walked to school together today which was nice because i was lost for two hours last night... ill get to that later...

part 4 The Country
So this country is really as beautiful as they say it is. There is so much green here! you would think it being january there would be snow and it would be sooooo cold, but really it is warmer than at home, i almost didnt need a coat today (if it wasnt raining) and the bark of trees is green and the meadows are also green. it s beautiful. i have not yet been up to the castle, but i have an excellent view of it from my studio. I did go up arthur's seat which is in a park which is in the middle of the city...BUT you feel like you are in the country and not in a city over there. it s absolutely stunning. when i get batteries for my camera i wil l take pictures and post some of them. There are also a couple of parks in my area, the big one is the meadows which is just a huuuuge park, kind of like the fens at home, except its still green! Ive also been around the city and on prince's street, the city is scarier here, but i think thats because im new, and the cars drive on the other side of the road.

part 5 mrs orr continued
Oh so i just thought of this! on day mrs orr took me to her house after we had gone to salinsbury again (which is a grocery store) her flat is what i should have said. there we had a real traditional tea party! well it wasnt a tea party we were just having tea but to me it was so fancy! we had little finger sandwhiches and scones with jam and butter and of cours the tea. i absolutely loved it. oh yes and interesting fact, i had 5 cups of tea in the 2 days i was there!

part 6 other things i can think of
So ive had a taste of scottish food which has been nice. their food tends to feel better in my belly then traditioonal american food, not that american food has felt bad... i think scotish food feels a little lighter. well the portions are definately muuuuch lighter here. For dinner one night kadie made a vegetable crumbe which was pretty good.. but what was delishoiuus was shona's pancakes. they were really thin pancakes that do not get topped with maple syrup... one of the oppings i had was fresh squeezed lemon juice and sugar, then i rolled it up and ate it. the other topping i had was a sweet thick syrup stuff which was also pretty good.
For lunch yesterday, the exchange students and i went out looking for a place to eat. we decided we wanted fish and chips!! we found a shop and the meal ended up to £3.85 which is like 7 bucks us. oh man it was GOOD let me tell you! really greasy though!

part 7 classssssss
So class started yesterday, the illustration exchange kids went to illustration and were put in a class with people who were doing a two week elective in illustration and were people from another major. I found out that illustration has free use of the printmaking facility which you better believe im totally going to take advantage of!! our first assignment is family, we have to make a book illustrating a family... and im going to do the jenkins family... so cousins... send me your pics through email!! i;m thinking of doing silkscreen and illustrating how my family handles going out to eat. because its craziness if you ask me! class structure is WAY different here! today we came in for 10am and didnt start till 1030, i bet it lasted no longer than an hour. we then went to lunch and basically that was it! well we exchange students didnt knot that s o we stayed behind and talked to the teacher for a while. tomorrow we have to be here at 915 to be walked over to life drawing, then talk to our teacher and we pretty much have the rest of the day to do work or whatever!!

hmmm so thats all i can think of right now, my fingers are getting tired of typing this!! but hey if anyone wants to send a letter here is my address:

11 (4F1) Montpelier
Edinburgh
E H10 4LZ

if anyone has a phone card they want to use up... call me at:
0131 228 3484 i think theres another code you have to punch in.

as for postcards, i should pick some up sometime this week or this weekend and i should be sending them out this weekend sometime, so expect them in 2 weeks id say. if you want one and i didnt send you one, email me at kerryjenks@gmail.com or get google talk.

oh some interesting facts:

chips in scotland are actually french fries
crisps are the equivilent to american chips
quid is slang for a pound (refering to money)
to have tea in the afternoon is to have tea
to have tea in the evening is to eat dinner (with tea)
they say the word "rubbish" a lot
the 'f' word is used frequently in publication
they only have 5 t.v. channels (my flat gets 3)

hmmm i know theres more but thats all i can think of for now!! ok from now on the entries wont be so long!! but ok i miss everyone hopefully ill hear from you all one way or another... email is best if used at kerryjenks@gmail.com!!

byeee!!		  
     Read 5 - Post
 
   
08:29am 15/12/2005
 
mood: excited
Hey whoever reads this heres whats up:

My flight has been booked! I will leave Thursday Jan 5th from Boston at 615 pm and will arrive in Amsterdam Friday the 6th at 715am, from there i will connect to Edinburgh and will arrive there at 945.

Hopefully I will be getting a guide who will lead me through the country and take me to my apartment!!

Classes start Jan 9th.

Coming home, Leave Edinburgh Friday April 28th, arrive Manchester England810am. Leave Manchester at 10 and arrive in Boston 1205pm.

I will be gone for over 3 months so if anyone wants to visit, come on down!!

Also... Pearl and I were thinking about having everyone togehter one night since shes leaving for new york around the same time.. dont remember details of this, but will let everyone know when i do...		  
     Read 2 - Post
 
Scotland   
08:01pm 22/11/2005
 
mood: excited
music: Celtic Moods
First journal enrty!! news.... I'M GOING TO SCOTLAND!		  
     Post
 
 
kerry_jenkins
 
 

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