A Lot to a Little

Wow, I've been having way more trouble finding time to write than I thought I would. I don't know how much I can remember from the past few days, but I'll try to fit in all the interesting parts.

So on Friday, we all visited the Wallace Monument, which is a tower built on top of Abbey Craig (a really big hill). You can see it from pretty much anywhere in Stirling. There's actually a really good view of it from campus because it's just a short walk from the base of the hill to the university entrance. The monument opened in 1869, so there's no elevator, just a narrow spiral staircase with various little rooms on the way up (one of them had some busts of famous Scots, and there was one of the poet Robert Burns donated by Andrew Carnegie, who we all know was devoutly Scottish, ie. CMU's team the Tartans). But the view at the top is really great, and you can see the whole university campus from there. Actually it seems like most of Scotland's highlights are great views, haha.

This is pretty accurately what it looks like in person. It's really striking how it sticks out above the trees.

On a side note, our host families packed us lunch every day we lived with them, and for some reason, I'm really fascinated by the concept of putting butter on sandwiches. Everyone here seems to put a combination of butter and meat or butter and cheese on their sandwiches. It's not that I've never heard of buttering your sandwich, but literally everyone in my orientation group was given a butter-sandwich by their host parents for lunch, so it's apparently a really common thing.  I'm sure some of you don't find this odd at all, but  I personally just found it surprising because I've rarely encountered it at home, and I feel like all of the health nuts I know would find it disgusting. I was alright with it though. It's just one of those little cultural things I hadn't expected.

After looking at the monument, we walked to the University of Stirling and looked around. The campus isn't very big, but it's a little more spread out than Denison. I found my dorm room, which is virtually a closet, but it didn't seem quite as small once I put all my stuff in it (it's much easier to unpack two suitcases compared to a entire car full of stuff for college). And there's a sink right in the room, which is convenient for getting ready in the morning. The kitchen isn't too far away (although it's messier than even the kitchens I've seen at Denison), and the bathrooms are interesting because they're split up into several one-room deals down the hall. Like there is one room with just a toilet and sink, then another room a few doors down with two showers, and then a third with a bath tub. There are about three of each of these units per floor. I'm a little worried about having to wait in line for a shower in the morning, but we'll see how that works out.

My main concern turned out to be the noise issue. I've been saying that I'm living in the Scottish Shorney because the freshmen are SO LOUD, and the noise resonates. The weird thing is that the sound is only bad on my side of the hall. My friend across the hall doesn't have nearly the same problem, and I suspect that's because the building is a C-shape, so the rooms with windows facing the inside of the C get the echo effect.
Also, the walls are cinder block, and something about cinder block carries sound like no other, as I learned during my time in Kappa Sigma. Yet the important difference is that Kappa Sig is generally a very quiet place with no parties, whereas this is freshman housing.
Anyway, the result of this was that I couldn't sleep until about 2am the other night because of the constant yelling and music. I couldn't even focus on reading or any other activities, it was so bad. I know that supposedly it's only like that on weekends, but there are still things like Wasted Wednesday and Thirsty Thursday, and I don't want to take my chances. Partying just isn't my scene, and I want to be able to sleep and study in my room whenever. Tomorrow, I'm going to try talking to residential services and see if I can convince them to let me move. I would most like to live in the off-campus apartments (which are supposedly very quiet and which I didn't have the foresight to sign up for the in the first place), but even a room on the other side of the same building would be better.

Although they're loud, there are nice people here. I ran into some full-time students who live in my building, and they invited me to come to lunch with them and then to go into town, where we visited a few charity shops, a bookstore that was like a British Barnes & Noble, Primark which is basically Forever 21, Marks and Spencer which is a little like a Super Target, and a cool candy store that sells both British and American candy (for a high price, might I add). We ran into this guy on the street who tried to sell us a "monk rock" CD, and he had some bizarre sales pitch with weird compliments, and he said I looked like Jennifer Aniston. Dude has clearly never seen Jennifer Aniston. But he was hilarious, so we all enjoyed that.
I actually spent the whole afternoon with this group of students, and they were surprisingly inclusive and actually talked to me and took me to fun places rather than just leaving me tagging along the whole time. I really appreciated that. If I do end up moving, I hope they don't think it's because of them, because they're really nice and I like them a lot, even though they're crazy freshmen. ;)

Anyway, if I move, I'm going to have to lug some extra some stuff with me because my friend's host mom took us to the British home store and Sainsbury's in town to get some basic groceries and room stuff. I bought some beans, soup, bread, apples, and milk, as well as a couple wall decorations and some really nice but cheap dishes and silverware. I also found Skippy peanut butter, which was exciting. And yes, I do have to mention peanut butter in every single post.

It's that important.

So moving on to today, I was comparatively less active than I've been throughout the past week. I got up at 10am and went to get lunch at the Starbucks on campus (which is something nice that we don't have at Denison), and I got some water which is only about 35 pence at the student grocery store. All bottled water should be that cheap. Actually everything there is surprisingly cheap, and that's also where I got an Ethernet cord for 1.50. The internet on campus is weird because there's wifi in places like the student union, but in the dorms you have to use an Ethernet connection. I've been struggling with trying to use the campus network, until today when I finally got a hold of an IT guy who told me that my computer has been automatically directing me to the wrong network on the log-in screen. So he typed in the right one, and everything was fine. Ugh, such a big hassle for such a tiny problem.

After that, I tried going on a campus tour, but the guides didn't show up. So hopefully I already know where everything I need to find is. Then I did some mandatory orientation presentation and waited in line for way too long to get my student ID card. While in line, I met some girls from Norway, which I want to note is my second favorite accent (next to Scottish and tied with Swedish and Finnish). I also headed over to the fitness center to sign up for a discounted membership, which for some reason I can't activate until I show up at the gym for some induction thing at 8:30 at night. Um, okay.
So I think everything is as ready as it can be for now. I've spent the rest of the day trying to relax in my room and watch some movies. But I feel kind of antisocial because I suddenly don't have anything to do but sit in my room. I figure I'll start doing more once I start rugby and maybe find some other clubs. I got an email saying that the rugby team's first practice is on the 18th, so that will give me time to get new cleats (which I need anyway) and shorts and spandex.

It's kind of loud right now at 9pm, and people aren't even partying. I think part of the reason for that is that there are no RA's here, so there's nobody to tell anyone to shut up, and the porter downstairs probably doesn't hear it or particularly care anyway.

One of the girls on my hall invited me to come with her and the rest of the international students on my floor to a club. I might go just to be social, considering that I probably won't be able to sleep anyway, but it's also possible that I will be too tired to do anything by the time they leave (I'm guessing that will be at 11). If it gets too crazy, I'll catch a taxi back to campus. I have their number in my phone. Always be prepared.

Le Song of Today (because it's the first time I've had an afternoon to relax):