Oh, Edinburgh...

I LOVE Edinburgh! This past weekend was my second time to go and I loved it just as much as the first. I went probably six or seven years ago with my family. It was really fun to pass places and remember going there with Mom, Dad, Anna, and Lauren. We went with our wonderful little travel group and John and Colin.

We had a beautiful ride to Edinburgh on the train and passed all of the countryside and the water  (which Morgan thought was a lake, I told her was the Ocean, and the lady next to me corrected us and told us the North Sea...oops!) I loved being still to sleep, read, and look out the window. We stayed in ta perfect location, really near the train station and right off the Royal Mile. It was probably one of the nicest hostels I have ever seen (although I really haven't seen very many I guess!).

We wandered around the shops on the Royal Mile, listened to the bag pipes, and saw all of the wool and cashmere. I remembered that there were gardens near by to we headed that way and ended up walking on a path through a field next to the Castle. It was a BEAUTIFUL day!!

Seeing all of the fields and the wonderful sun made my heart happy! I love walking around beautiful countryside like this SO much!

 Because we had so much fun in the Princess Gardens we decided to walk to the Botanical Gardens...boy did we not know what we were getting ourselves into!!! Some people we met in the Park told us everyone knew where it was and could give us directions. We figured in that case it would be really close and easy to get to. After for walking around for a while in the direction we assumed we were supposed to go (the Botanics were off of our map so that wasn't very helpful), we stopped and asked a mail man how to get there. He told us to take a few turns and we'd be there, and then rolled down his window when he drove by to make sure we knew which turn to take. After another 20 minutes of walking, no gardens. A sweet old man saw us looking lost and came over to help us, telling us to go down the windy windy bridge and take a few turns. After that we still weren't there! By that point the weather had changed it started to rain.

We finally saw a sign pointing to the gardens. But now it was poring rain and we had come to a bus stop and decided it would be better to take the bus back than walk around the gardens and then walk an hour back in the rain. Sadly, we never made it to the gardens, but we had quite an adventure getting there!





That night we ate at the most wonderful restaurant ever, Monteiths!!! It was so nice and quaint and had great food! We loved it so much that we decided to make reservations and bring the guys back the next night.

Saturday was a very grey and raining day...not to mention freezing cold. After breakfast we decided to go tour the the Endiburgh Castle...bad idea! We waited in the rain to get a ticket for thirty minutes. Once we got inside the wind was blowing so hard we thought we were going to freeze. The castle and views are great on a sunny day, but there is not much of a change to see stuff inside the castle building away from the rain. After this we decided to take our sightseeing inside and go on the Scotch whisky tour. They told us all about the whisky from the different regions of Scotland and we got to smell the differences in them. The places was cool but I think whisky is nasty!!!

That night we went to the bank bar pub to celebrate Colin's 21st bday. They had a guitarist and we was playing all sorts of songs we would have at a band party! The second song he played was Brown Eyed Girl. Of course we loved and it all sang. After that a man came over and said that was his and his wife's song from 1970's and he couldn't believe we knew it...he thought it was so great that he bought all six of us a round. Turned out he was from Atlanta and had come over to play golf. Colin brought the place to life by trying to get literally EVERYONE in the pub to dance! It was so much fun to dance! We also met four older Scottish people who we talked to a lot that night! They were hilarious and dancing with all of us (while playing matchmaker with Liz)! haha such a fun night and wonderful memories!

Sunday we climbed Arthur's Seat. Again, I LOVED it! Beautiful views! John had bought a mini bagpipe and played it for us on the hill lol! Kaz, one of Colin's friends from UVA who is from Edinburgh invited us to her house for lunch. We had so much fun hanging out with her and her sister, and friend and the food was to die for!

That's the end of my long and wonderful weekend and back to London on the train I went!

My new friend, the London Tube...

I have quite a commute to work every day, an hour and thirty minutes each way! During my spare time during my ride (which I have tons of!) I counted the number of stops I have to go through on my way. This comes out to be a grand total of 22! (I travel from one black arrow to the other black arrow.) Thus, I have lots of time to listen to music, pray, read, and people watch every morning and afternoon. Lately, I have been having a hard time not dosing off to sleep!

Lots of kids ride the tube to school. It is really cute to see all of them getting on with their uniforms in the morning. i missed seeing them last week because they were on their version of "spring break." I was on the tube one afternoon earlier this week during my regular commute to work, when I heard two girls quizzing each other for a test. They were talking about the bombing of Birmingham, Alabama and the desegregation of the University of Alabama, and other civil rights events in the US. It was so surprised! Who would have thought that they would be learning about good ole Birmingham, AL all the way over here across the pond! After a little while, I talked to the girls and told them that I was from Birmingham. I think they were really surprised! Both were very sweet, one was in her 8th year and the other was in her 11th (they don't use grades).

My lovely surprise yesterday morning was that the chip in my Oyster travel card no longer works so I cannot get through the tube station. I have to have a new card mailed to me and then go through the confusing process of having my old card refunded and buying another travel plan for the new card and then getting reimbursed for my temporary card. Please pray that the process for getting a new card set up goes smoothly and quickly! 

I am sure that my adventures in the tube will only continue!

I survived Amsterdam...

The weekend was quite the adventure beginning with leaving our place at 5:45 am for our flight. I had stayed up late the night before finishing a paper, so I fell asleep before the safety presentation and didn't wake up again until after we landed!

We spent the first afternoon in Amsterdam wandering around the canals and different squares. We did wander through the red light district just to say we had been. It was kind of similar to Bourbon street until you got the the actual red light zones. Very interesting to say the least! Then late we went on a boat tour of all of the canals and it was beautiful to see the sights. 

I stayed in my first hostel ever! The four of us girls actually stayed in the "hotel" part of the hostel in a private room but I figure that still counts right? Saturday morning came a lot earlier than expected, especially when the pigeons who had landed on the window sill of our open window and started cooing at 6 morning and scared me and Emily half to death. The stairs in those dutch buildings are something else! The stairs up to our room seemed more like a crooked ladder. They were incredibly steep and hardly wide enough to put your whole foot on!

We toured the Heineken beer factory. The factory tour was great with lots of entertainment and even a simulated ride... and beer tasting of course! While we were at Heineken we meet a guy working there who was from Philly and talked to him for a bit. Later that afternoon we were walking down the street and someone called out "hey girls!" We turned around and saw him at a pub with his friends, small world!

The highlight of the trip was our bike tour through the city. Amsterdam is a huge bike city. There are more bikes in Amsterdam than there are people! They even have a huge bike parking deck next to the train station.

Our bike tour guide was the epitome of what you would image when you think of someone from Amsterdam. Born and raised in Amsterdam, she was unashamed to talk about anything and everything Amsterdam related, and was complete with dread locks, scraggly teeth, and blew bubbles in the air as we peddled down the street. We went all over the city on our tour. Sadly, I didn't end up with many pictures because my biking skill are not quite at that level of multitasking yet.

We rounded out the weekend on the rainy Sunday (which I had brought no rain gear for and was completely unprepared) by taking the trolley every. We went to a well known pancake place (really more like crepes) and had a wonderful brunch. We had to scrap the original plan of going to she the flower market due to the rain. However, we did go to Van Gogh Museum which was really cool. Thanks to Emily we spotted Kristen Wiig while we were there!

Thank you to my Uncle Chap who gave me lots of wonderful tips for the weekend! They were so helpful!

Here are some pictures from the weekend:

Then it was back to London, which for now is Home sweet home!

So far...

So much has happened during my first week in that I feel overwhelmed trying to decide what to write about! So,  I am just going to list some funny/random things that have gone on this past week:

1. The are NO coathangers in London! I don't know what the problem is, but NO ONE in London can tell you where to buy coat hangers. We went from store to store asking person by person and three days later we finally found some in a house appliance store in "india town." Even Argos, the store where you order everything from the computer catalog and then they bring it from the back, didn't have any! You'd think that they might want to hang up their clothes over here across the pond like we do!

2. I am so thankful for our wonderful Auburn group! Everyone is so different and so much fun! I can't believe I did not know these people just a week ago!

 (only part of the group of about 22)

3. The city is beautiful! London is so full of character and is much cleaner than NY.




4. London Pubs! I have had a great time haning out with our Auburn group in pubs around London. We have met some really funny locals as well. It has definately been an adventure worth having! I can't wait for more funny stories from this one!

5. Liz and I are roommates! I am so glad that we are getting to live together for the summer. We have already had quite a few adventures. Yesterday morning we blew up an outlet (I'm still not sure how we managed to do it). The whole room went black: all of the power went out and the outlet and plug are now covered in soot. Tonight we cooked a very yummy dinner. Thankfully there were no mishaps with this experience!

6. It has not really rained once since we got here! Besides sprinkling one late afternoon it has been great weather!

7. Our housing is wonderful! Despite all of its quirks (like terribly complicated internet service at the beginning, employees who don't speak english, etc). All of our group is on the same hall, the area is super safe (in the financial district) with great resteraunts near by, and an undergroup stop just around the corner. Could not have asked for any better! (Plus there are some great weekend markets just around the corner with cute, unique things...haven't decided if the is a good thing yet or not, particularly for my wallet.)

8. I have gotten to talk to a friend in Cairo (Azeem!). Who would have ever thought I would be in London skyping a friend in Cairo? And they are ony one hour ahead of London. Crazy!

9. Went to church in Westimenster Abbey this morning! So beautiful.

This has been a long and really random list that leaves out so many good things but hopefully you were able to learn something about my past week :)

I can't believe that tomorrow I will have been here for a week! I'll be up bright and early to go to my first day of work. Say a prayer for me!

London Week 1 Photos...

Click here to go to my online photo album of Week 1 in London!

Arrived...

This is the view that I woke up to from my room window this morning. 

Hello London!

Internship Placement...

I was finally placed and have found out where I will be interning for the summer! And it is...

In the Human Resource department of

Yay! I'm not quite sure what all this means I will be doing yet, but the other students who have interned there had great reviews. I do know that it means I will have quite a commute to London's Zone 4. Can't wait to find out more when I get there!

So, do you think this means they'd upgrade my plane ticket?!