But when I be adjustin' the pitch an' yaw o' my polarizin' beam splitter, I be feelin' like a pirate on the open seas.
Yes, this is what happens to my brain after I spend too much time in lab. Imagine what'd happen if I became a researcher?
Which brings me to that PhD I keep aberrantly mentioning. I figure I ought to give you a briefing on what's going on in my head on that count, since you may be sitting there going, "Wait, is she staying? When did that happen?"
It hasn't, but it could, potentially. A couple weeks ago one of my professors sent out an e-mail listing open research topics in his group and inviting anyone who was interested in one of them to get in contact with him. One of the topics sounded really cool to me (actually, two did, but on talking to him in more detail, one sounded much cooler than the other), and I have spoken with him twice about it. Just informational, once about PhDs in the UK in general and how they're structured and what the funding opportunities and difficulties are, and the second time in much more detail about that project itself. So now the idea of staying here for a PhD has real substance because there's at least one specific research topic attached to it, and I'm looking around at both this and other options, as well as trying to figure out exactly what I do want.
Rather than give you the entire thought process, I'll highlight the main point I've been considering and would like prayed for, which is, whether or not I want to "settle down" so very far from my family and friends and home. I know that if I stayed here, I'd make it my home--it's what I did in Atlanta, it's just want I do. Gather a community around me, a surrogate family like my roommates at Tech, and make the place I live into the place I belong. HOWEVER. I also know I'm getting tired of this transient thing--I don't want to keep transplanting myself from school to school, job to job, family to family--eventually, I want to stay with or at least near one of these places where I establish myself. But I'm having a hard time with the idea that staying here for a while might mean being comfortable and settled here and staying "for good," and how far this "home" would take me from my home and Atlanta "home." I realize it's a far-distant, hypothetical consideration that I'm getting caught up on (and my Dad points out that whether or not I can even afford it is a more salient point at the moment), but it's made me think a lot about the nature of homes and families, and made me grieve a little bit for how the community I developed in Atlanta was by nature a transient one (at a university) that I might not be able to recapture even if I went back there right now, and encouraged me a little that there are some things I know for certain that I want in my life, like a family and a place that really is HOME for me. So just so you know, I love you all and consider you my home and family in both Jackson and Atlanta, and as I try to figure out what I want to do and where I want to go next, you are definitely in my mind and heart!
Sunday 12 December 2010
It's positively BALMY out here! It's gotta be, what, forty degrees?
Fahrenheit, people. (My Celcius people are thinking, "Yeah, Kaley, forty degrees is PRET-ty balmy alright. What Scotland are YOU living in?")
So there's been snow on the ground for about the past two weeks, and this past Friday I woke up to an abrupt thaw. Suddenly there was green grass again--patches of it, at least--and they grew throughout the day. There's still some ice on the ground in the places direct sunlight doesn't hit*, but the weirdest thing has been that my concept of temperature has been completely thrown off. I walked outside, saw ice both on the ground and on the pond near my building, and promptly pulled my hat off and opened my coat because I was so warm. The temperature can't have risen much above freezing, but compared to the past couple of weeks where there was this bitter chill that just cut straight through whatever I wore, it felt so nice!! I thought it felt nice! Me! I hate the cold! I can't even guess how cold it actually was outside because I know it had to be near freezing, but it felt so pleasant. Not warm, but warmER, crisp instead of bitter. I'm acclimating, and it's weird.
*However, I am NOT acclimating to this "short winter days" thing. Really, I never took that idea seriously before now. At home, our days get, what, an hour shorter? Two? Seriously, we're down to about 7 hours of daylight here. I can barely tell when the sun rises (I think it happens around 8-8:30) because it comes up at such a shallow angle that you don't know when or where it crossed the horizon unless you actually see it), and when I left my flat at 11:40 for church (noon service) this morning, the light quality and sun position looked about the way they do at home at about 9:30 in the morning. And it just starts setting from there. Walking home around 1:45 it looked like late afternoon, 4:30ish, and at 3:00 I was standing in the window trying to catch the last rays before it dipped below the trees. It's 4:00 and dusk, and by 4:30 it will be completely dark. My Zimbabwean friend and I (I admit it, it's even worse for her than for me) just walk around shaking our heads and really understanding the concept of hibernation for the first time.
So there's been snow on the ground for about the past two weeks, and this past Friday I woke up to an abrupt thaw. Suddenly there was green grass again--patches of it, at least--and they grew throughout the day. There's still some ice on the ground in the places direct sunlight doesn't hit*, but the weirdest thing has been that my concept of temperature has been completely thrown off. I walked outside, saw ice both on the ground and on the pond near my building, and promptly pulled my hat off and opened my coat because I was so warm. The temperature can't have risen much above freezing, but compared to the past couple of weeks where there was this bitter chill that just cut straight through whatever I wore, it felt so nice!! I thought it felt nice! Me! I hate the cold! I can't even guess how cold it actually was outside because I know it had to be near freezing, but it felt so pleasant. Not warm, but warmER, crisp instead of bitter. I'm acclimating, and it's weird.
*However, I am NOT acclimating to this "short winter days" thing. Really, I never took that idea seriously before now. At home, our days get, what, an hour shorter? Two? Seriously, we're down to about 7 hours of daylight here. I can barely tell when the sun rises (I think it happens around 8-8:30) because it comes up at such a shallow angle that you don't know when or where it crossed the horizon unless you actually see it), and when I left my flat at 11:40 for church (noon service) this morning, the light quality and sun position looked about the way they do at home at about 9:30 in the morning. And it just starts setting from there. Walking home around 1:45 it looked like late afternoon, 4:30ish, and at 3:00 I was standing in the window trying to catch the last rays before it dipped below the trees. It's 4:00 and dusk, and by 4:30 it will be completely dark. My Zimbabwean friend and I (I admit it, it's even worse for her than for me) just walk around shaking our heads and really understanding the concept of hibernation for the first time.
Because I've got some lard and I need to use it for something
Alex, what is "A good reason to bake pie?"
You may or may not remember my Thanksgiving escapades (if you don't, it's because they were just like everyone else's Thanksgiving escapades, e.g. FOOD), but in the process I made an apple pie and (tragically) only used half the lard I bought for the occasion. Which means I have the perfect opportunity to try my hand at mince pies, a Christmas tradition here that I've never tasted, let alone made. (In other Christmas tradition news, I found out what a Christmas pudding is. It's fruitcake. Apparently people actually eat them here instead of passing them around as some sort of seasonal practical joke. Maybe theirs are less...less...rocklike.) But mince pies, on the other hand, sound fantastic--they're basically a pie crust filled with a syrupy candied fruit and spice mixture, and I'm looking forward to trying them.
That was really the whole point of this post. I've been cooking a lot here and really enjoying it, but I find myself doing unusual things in the name of food. Like purchasing pure lard, or grinding cardamom seeds with the end of a rolling pin (or cutting up small pine trees with my kitchen implements, but I don't know if that one counts...). It's an adventure. The adventure hasn't led me to haggis yet, and though I'm a bit curious, I think overall I'm OK with that.
You may or may not remember my Thanksgiving escapades (if you don't, it's because they were just like everyone else's Thanksgiving escapades, e.g. FOOD), but in the process I made an apple pie and (tragically) only used half the lard I bought for the occasion. Which means I have the perfect opportunity to try my hand at mince pies, a Christmas tradition here that I've never tasted, let alone made. (In other Christmas tradition news, I found out what a Christmas pudding is. It's fruitcake. Apparently people actually eat them here instead of passing them around as some sort of seasonal practical joke. Maybe theirs are less...less...rocklike.) But mince pies, on the other hand, sound fantastic--they're basically a pie crust filled with a syrupy candied fruit and spice mixture, and I'm looking forward to trying them.
That was really the whole point of this post. I've been cooking a lot here and really enjoying it, but I find myself doing unusual things in the name of food. Like purchasing pure lard, or grinding cardamom seeds with the end of a rolling pin (or cutting up small pine trees with my kitchen implements, but I don't know if that one counts...). It's an adventure. The adventure hasn't led me to haggis yet, and though I'm a bit curious, I think overall I'm OK with that.
How to care for your live Christmas tree...hmm, presumably cutting up its trunk with a kitchen knife is not recommended
On the other hand, I discovered yet another use for those versatile, gigantic cleavers Chinese cooks use. I'll have to go buy myself one when I no longer live with a Chinese student I can borrow from.
So what, you ask, did the Christmas tree do to deserve such treatment? Well, it angered the Maser Laser Oscillator, clearly.
No, on Friday I went and picked up my first-ever real Christmas tree (my family has fake one older than I am), which I ordered from a charity for the homeless and picked up at my church. It's only 4 feet tall and shockingly light, so I carried it and a stand home without any trouble, only to discover that the base was just a teeny bit to big to fit in the stand. However, it had some knobs sticking out from the main trunk that if I could just shave off, it would fit...and out came B.'s kitchen knife. Turns out that sawing through a tree with a meat cleaver is actually pretty hard.
Eventually, though, I prevailed, and the tree is standing in its base. It felt a little ironic to go online after performing my impromptu tree surgery and google "how to care for a live Christmas tree." What I got was that it should be watered a little at the base and misted occasionally if the ornaments/lights allow. Which is why it is standing in a small pool of water in the stand. If this is miserably wrong and I'm going to breed mites or tree fungus in my kitchen, then please someone who's had a real tree before, tell me. But here it is! It makes me very happy.
So what, you ask, did the Christmas tree do to deserve such treatment? Well, it angered the Maser Laser Oscillator, clearly.
No, on Friday I went and picked up my first-ever real Christmas tree (my family has fake one older than I am), which I ordered from a charity for the homeless and picked up at my church. It's only 4 feet tall and shockingly light, so I carried it and a stand home without any trouble, only to discover that the base was just a teeny bit to big to fit in the stand. However, it had some knobs sticking out from the main trunk that if I could just shave off, it would fit...and out came B.'s kitchen knife. Turns out that sawing through a tree with a meat cleaver is actually pretty hard.
I am the Master Laser Oscillator. Fear my wattage.
Hi everyone! Now that my crazy week has passed and I'm in the home stretch, I have a lot of other stuff to worry about (like finals and that "PhD" thing), but none of it has a hard deadline, so I can write to you guys again! (For anyone who cares, the "master laser oscillator" was the topic of one of my big presentations Wednesday. It's actually the smallest in a series of 3 lasers used in some fancy detectors around the world, but it controls the other, bigger ones. Basically, it's a beast.) As much as all the work I/we had to get done over these few weeks has been difficult, I actually enjoyed what I was doing a lot of the time. (It still feels strange for me to say that about school, but I guess it's encouraging that I enjoy what I'm doing.) So much of what I did as an undergrad--no, all of what I did as an undergrad--was the physics of very limited, very fundamental, situations, so the thought process of building a system, thinking about how all the pieces fit together and affect each other and have to work together for a specific result, is new to me, and I discovered that I enjoy it very much. I also discovered that laser design is not my thing. Definitely not what I want to do my dissertation on over the summer, which is a good thing to find out now since we just had our first meeting about summer project selection this Friday. I'm less worried about that than I have been, although it sounds like it's going to be a lot of work and a big responsibility, since I'll effectively be a real employee of the company I'm doing the project with, in addition to being a student doing my dissertation. But I'll be making decisions about that over the next couple of weeks while I'm on *gasp* CHRISTMAS BREAK!! My Dad sent my Mom and Sammy's travel itinerary to me this morning, and I'm SO excited to see them and Erin in just a few weeks!! (Holy cow, I just realized Christmas Day is 2 weeks from yesterday...when did that happen?)
Heh, all the people reading this just jumped and said, "Agh! No! It can't be that close! How did it get here so fast?" I know how these things work.
But for discussions of Christmas, pirates, and an excess of lard (not necessarily together), I defer you to my subsequent vignettes.
Heh, all the people reading this just jumped and said, "Agh! No! It can't be that close! How did it get here so fast?" I know how these things work.
But for discussions of Christmas, pirates, and an excess of lard (not necessarily together), I defer you to my subsequent vignettes.
Sunday 28 November 2010
She put on another sweater, and then spontaneously combusted
...It could happen. It happened to a guy in England once, and I breathed a sigh of relief then because at least I didn't live in a place that ever got so cold that I needed 10 wool sweaters at a time. Heh. But just so everyone's clear (I'm sure this is going to shock you all),
It's cold here.
Yesterday a long-predicted cold front came in, and for the first night and morning it snowed. The pictures I tried to take didn't turn out, but the coolest thing I've seen for a long time was a brief snow sunshower on Saturday. But then the snow turned to sleet, and the sleet is supposedly going to stick around for a week, so my world is currently icy, slushy, and damp. And cold. The combination of a busy few weeks of classes with darkness and bad weather is not something I'm looking forward to, and these will be 3 BUSY weeks of classes.
All my big projects have managed to converge onto Wednesday, Dec. 8. I'll have two group projects and two homework assignments due that day, and a formal lab report and computer simulation project not far behind. That's the second-to-last week of school, so at least the last week will be easy, I guess? But I'm definitely beginning to feel the stress from it.
However, I'm also starting to feel real anticipation for Christmas--I went Christmas shopping on Saturday and wrapped all my gifts this morning. I love wrapping Christmas presents. Always have. I need to come up with a few more, but my Mom just gave me an idea for one, and hey, this means I get to go Christmas shopping again. And some interesting things have been happening in the "What are you going to do after this?" department. I had a talk with one of my professors about PhD projects available in his group, and one of them really caught my interest. I'm going to be talking more with him about it, and talking to other professors in the department about their research, just trying to get an idea of whether staying is something I'd be interested in. If I do want to apply for a PhD, I would need to make that decision soon, since the funding applications are mostly due by the end of January, so I'm starting to think and pray a lot about what I want to do, considering not only the research and the resources but (the big question), do I really want to stay in Scotland for 3 more years? And I'm not a hundred percent sure that I do. So, that's me for the past few (and next few) weeks. But after that, it'll be Christmas!
It's cold here.
Yesterday a long-predicted cold front came in, and for the first night and morning it snowed. The pictures I tried to take didn't turn out, but the coolest thing I've seen for a long time was a brief snow sunshower on Saturday. But then the snow turned to sleet, and the sleet is supposedly going to stick around for a week, so my world is currently icy, slushy, and damp. And cold. The combination of a busy few weeks of classes with darkness and bad weather is not something I'm looking forward to, and these will be 3 BUSY weeks of classes.
All my big projects have managed to converge onto Wednesday, Dec. 8. I'll have two group projects and two homework assignments due that day, and a formal lab report and computer simulation project not far behind. That's the second-to-last week of school, so at least the last week will be easy, I guess? But I'm definitely beginning to feel the stress from it.
However, I'm also starting to feel real anticipation for Christmas--I went Christmas shopping on Saturday and wrapped all my gifts this morning. I love wrapping Christmas presents. Always have. I need to come up with a few more, but my Mom just gave me an idea for one, and hey, this means I get to go Christmas shopping again. And some interesting things have been happening in the "What are you going to do after this?" department. I had a talk with one of my professors about PhD projects available in his group, and one of them really caught my interest. I'm going to be talking more with him about it, and talking to other professors in the department about their research, just trying to get an idea of whether staying is something I'd be interested in. If I do want to apply for a PhD, I would need to make that decision soon, since the funding applications are mostly due by the end of January, so I'm starting to think and pray a lot about what I want to do, considering not only the research and the resources but (the big question), do I really want to stay in Scotland for 3 more years? And I'm not a hundred percent sure that I do. So, that's me for the past few (and next few) weeks. But after that, it'll be Christmas!
Saturday 20 November 2010
Re-gifting Dessert
And I don't mean last year's fruitcake, or the can of salmon the FPC youth passed around at the White Elephant Parties. Anyways. Last night A. made a traditional Cypriot cake, only the recipe she was using had her put in 7 tsp of baking powder. We were all skeptical (A. included), but she went with it, and needless to say, the cake came out rather bowl-shaped and bitter. You actually don't taste the bitter baking powder until the after-taste, and the cake itself has a really nice flavor. The traditional version is made with rose extract, which A. couldn't find here, but if the vanilla version tastes so nice, I'm curious about the real version. But on to the re-gifting part. Tonight I'm making the remaining half or so into bread pudding to see whether or not a mound of chocolate, sugar and cinnamon can obliterate the baking powder. Based on the taste I just had (it's not quite set yet, as I now know), it's working. Cadbury Drinking Chocolate covers a multitude of sins.
S, J, E: yes. Cadbury Drinking Chocolate. Don't worry. You're getting some.
S, J, E: yes. Cadbury Drinking Chocolate. Don't worry. You're getting some.
Sunday 14 November 2010
Hey Matt, who are you?
No offense intended at all, but this blog has a follower named Matt with no picture, and I know more than one. Which one are you? Just wondering! Thanks!
Friday 5 November 2010
About Those Pictures
Well. You may notice that this post used to contain two links to awful, disorganized Photobucket albums that I hate. So today I noticed a little note at the bottom of one of my Facebook albums saying "Share this album with anyone by using this link!" Meaning you don't have to be a FB user to look at the album if I provide the right link to access it. I didn't know I could do that. (Jen and Sarah are smacking their foreheads right now, going, "Why doesn't she ask us these things?") So here they are. All the pictures I've taken since I arrived. Organized. Captioned. In order. In cute little albums. Enjoy!
Plus, this means I never have to go on Photobucket again! Hooraaaaaaayy!
The Somewhat-Less-Than-Epic Voyage
Walkthrough Part 1
Walkthrough Part 2
Highlands Trip
Thanksgiving
Plus, this means I never have to go on Photobucket again! Hooraaaaaaayy!
The Somewhat-Less-Than-Epic Voyage
Walkthrough Part 1
Walkthrough Part 2
Highlands Trip
Thanksgiving
Monday 1 November 2010
Midterms
I can't think of anything more depressing than walking out of lab at 5:30 into pitch darkness and rain. Actually, I take that back. It would have been more depressing if it had been raining harder. But on the other hand, I went to Christmas Choir tonight and discovered that the classical piece I thought was dead boring when I listened to it on YouTube is actually broodingly, hauntingly beautiful, and now that I'm home, I'm going to download the rest of my pictures, stretch, shower, and then, it's hot chocolate time.
Life is good.
Life is good.
Sunday 31 October 2010
Happy Halloween!
Hi all,
First, a general announcement: the UK's Daylight Savings Time ended last night, so currently I have fallen back and you haven't, and the time difference between me and MS is temporarily 5 hours; between me and Atl. it is 4 hours. Next Sunday (Nov. 7) you'll fall back, and we'll be on the usual 6 hr/5 hr lag again.
That having been said, I need to apologize for my remissness in updating this blog--I know this is the only way I have to keep in touch with a lot of people, esp. at church, and I haven't been doing a very good job of it. So, first things first, I'm going to start downloading the pictures for that town tour I promised you, what, a month ago?
Part of my slowness in updating is that not a lot is happening. Despite the exotic location (made more exotic by those palm trees...), I am, in fact, at school, and 90% of what I do is classes, lab, and homework. This is almost exactly the halfway point of my semester (can you believe it?!), so while we don't have midterms (about 90% of my grade in each class is the final exam), I do have graded homework assignments, labs, essays, and a talk to prepare over Reading Week, the "vacation" week that starts Nov. 8. I am under no illusions that this week will be a vacation.
The weekend before, however, will be, because my flatmates and I are going on a tour of the western highlands! We'll be making a loop from Edinburgh northwest to the coast near the Isle of Skye and then back (Google "Eilean Donan Castle" if you want to see the part I'm really excited about). I'm looking forward to it, though I hope that in the future I'll be able to take more self-guided trips rather than bus tours. But still. FUN! Pictures will be taken, though whether I'll ever get around to posting them here remains to be seen...
...Photobucket is working on the other albums...I still have an hour before I have to get ready for church; maybe they'll be downloaded by then...
But anyways. As for how I'm doing here, I think I'm alright. I go through days/moments where I feel really stressed with work and just generally not having time for anything, and then times when I feel like it's all manageable, but that's just typical school, I think. I also go through random spurts of homesickness, usually focused on a craving for something mundane like looseleaf paper (they don't sell it here!) or a muffin from Broadstreet. Or less mundane things like Jason cookouts, my family, the barn, RUF or Hapkido. Skype is a Godsend; I think without it I'd be a lot worse off as far as homesickness is concerned.
A lot of the trouble I am having (if you can call it "trouble") is in trying to find my place here, so to speak, to figure out what I can do and how I can contribute. Part of what frustrates me is that I've stopped taking the Aikido class. I don't like dropping things; I like being committed and working hard to improve at things that I find difficult. But when I realized that I was having to convince myself to get up and go to each and every class, I realized it was probably not something I ought to be devoting my time to, even if I wanted myself to want to go. Instead, I run to get some physical activity. Those of you at Tech, especially in my Hapkido class, are gaping right now because you know how passionately I HATE running. Well...I'll just say it's different when you have cool weather and a place like this to run in. I NEED to take some pictures of the Lade Braes walking trail for you all. It's beautiful, and it at least provides a reliable distraction from the utter misery of running itself.
But more than that, I've been struggling to figure out how to participate at my church and the Christian Union. I don't like being just an "attender" in my church or ministry; I like to be a contributing member of the community, and I've been thinking and praying a lot about how I can do that when I'm here for so little time. I had a great conversation with the leader of my small group about this. What she said and some of the other things I've been thinking about have kind of changed the focus of my thoughts from "creating a role for myself," which is hard when you won't be here to carry out any responsibilities, to doing things that put the community in a position to grow even after I've left, which I can do. And rather than give all of you a blow-by-blow of everything that goes on in my head on this topic, I'll stop here and go get ready for (appropriately enough) church, which starts at noon.
Photobucket had to start over and my faith in its ability to finish in the next half hour is small, so I'll be posting links to the various albums as they come available. But please, e-mail me if you would like and tell me how you're doing! I can guarantee that I'll read e-mails, while I may miss a comment on one of my posts. I'd love to hear from everyone, so please do write! Bye for now!
First, a general announcement: the UK's Daylight Savings Time ended last night, so currently I have fallen back and you haven't, and the time difference between me and MS is temporarily 5 hours; between me and Atl. it is 4 hours. Next Sunday (Nov. 7) you'll fall back, and we'll be on the usual 6 hr/5 hr lag again.
That having been said, I need to apologize for my remissness in updating this blog--I know this is the only way I have to keep in touch with a lot of people, esp. at church, and I haven't been doing a very good job of it. So, first things first, I'm going to start downloading the pictures for that town tour I promised you, what, a month ago?
Part of my slowness in updating is that not a lot is happening. Despite the exotic location (made more exotic by those palm trees...), I am, in fact, at school, and 90% of what I do is classes, lab, and homework. This is almost exactly the halfway point of my semester (can you believe it?!), so while we don't have midterms (about 90% of my grade in each class is the final exam), I do have graded homework assignments, labs, essays, and a talk to prepare over Reading Week, the "vacation" week that starts Nov. 8. I am under no illusions that this week will be a vacation.
The weekend before, however, will be, because my flatmates and I are going on a tour of the western highlands! We'll be making a loop from Edinburgh northwest to the coast near the Isle of Skye and then back (Google "Eilean Donan Castle" if you want to see the part I'm really excited about). I'm looking forward to it, though I hope that in the future I'll be able to take more self-guided trips rather than bus tours. But still. FUN! Pictures will be taken, though whether I'll ever get around to posting them here remains to be seen...
...Photobucket is working on the other albums...I still have an hour before I have to get ready for church; maybe they'll be downloaded by then...
But anyways. As for how I'm doing here, I think I'm alright. I go through days/moments where I feel really stressed with work and just generally not having time for anything, and then times when I feel like it's all manageable, but that's just typical school, I think. I also go through random spurts of homesickness, usually focused on a craving for something mundane like looseleaf paper (they don't sell it here!) or a muffin from Broadstreet. Or less mundane things like Jason cookouts, my family, the barn, RUF or Hapkido. Skype is a Godsend; I think without it I'd be a lot worse off as far as homesickness is concerned.
A lot of the trouble I am having (if you can call it "trouble") is in trying to find my place here, so to speak, to figure out what I can do and how I can contribute. Part of what frustrates me is that I've stopped taking the Aikido class. I don't like dropping things; I like being committed and working hard to improve at things that I find difficult. But when I realized that I was having to convince myself to get up and go to each and every class, I realized it was probably not something I ought to be devoting my time to, even if I wanted myself to want to go. Instead, I run to get some physical activity. Those of you at Tech, especially in my Hapkido class, are gaping right now because you know how passionately I HATE running. Well...I'll just say it's different when you have cool weather and a place like this to run in. I NEED to take some pictures of the Lade Braes walking trail for you all. It's beautiful, and it at least provides a reliable distraction from the utter misery of running itself.
But more than that, I've been struggling to figure out how to participate at my church and the Christian Union. I don't like being just an "attender" in my church or ministry; I like to be a contributing member of the community, and I've been thinking and praying a lot about how I can do that when I'm here for so little time. I had a great conversation with the leader of my small group about this. What she said and some of the other things I've been thinking about have kind of changed the focus of my thoughts from "creating a role for myself," which is hard when you won't be here to carry out any responsibilities, to doing things that put the community in a position to grow even after I've left, which I can do. And rather than give all of you a blow-by-blow of everything that goes on in my head on this topic, I'll stop here and go get ready for (appropriately enough) church, which starts at noon.
Photobucket had to start over and my faith in its ability to finish in the next half hour is small, so I'll be posting links to the various albums as they come available. But please, e-mail me if you would like and tell me how you're doing! I can guarantee that I'll read e-mails, while I may miss a comment on one of my posts. I'd love to hear from everyone, so please do write! Bye for now!
Wednesday 13 October 2010
Weird Stuff
The good, the bad, the funny, and the irritating of being in the country, town, school and building that I am.
1. Tea time during lab. I love that I'm living in the midst of an entire culture that enshrines my enjoyment of afternoon tea. If we don't take a tea break, our instructor takes one without us. This is the same man who took a "wee shufti" at my optical setup to make sure it was aligned correctly.
2. Digestive biscuits. A digestive biscuit is the British answer to a graham cracker, only slightly more fibrous. They are mildly sweet and generally crushed up to make pie and cheesecake crusts. The name, however, is not good marketing, at least in my opinion.
3. Palm trees. I realize we're at the beach and all, but does Arctic Circle count for nothing?
4. Waiting in line to enter the gym. I have to say, I was a fan of the CRC and its, what, 100-person training floor?
5. Listening to an Englishman and a Scot talk football. They were very good-natured about it, but it was still hilarious.
6. $3 dental floss. Thanks for breaking my flossing habit for me, Scotland.
7. Real mugs in coffee shops. The ladies at church even serve the after-service coffee and tea in real china teacups.
8. The lesser-known Britishisms. For example, I learned today that to Brits, "pants" are underwear. The denim things on my legs are trousers. Soft drinks are "fizzy juice."
9. Chinese lessons. This isn't a Scotland thing; it's a "my flatmates are awesome" thing. We've been giving each other nightly language lessons (during tea time...have I mentioned that I love this custom?), and B. has been teaching us helpful Chinese phrases such as "Thank you," "Good morning," and "I'm sorry, I don't speak Chinese." We requested that last one.
10. People who don't move on the sidewalk. When you're walking with a big group that takes up the whole sidewalk and someone comes up in the other direction, what do you do? You all shuffle around and make room for that person to pass so they don't have to tempt fate running in the street, right? Because it's rude to take up an entire public walkway. This is apparently not the custom in Scotland, and it's beginning to be quite irritating.
1. Tea time during lab. I love that I'm living in the midst of an entire culture that enshrines my enjoyment of afternoon tea. If we don't take a tea break, our instructor takes one without us. This is the same man who took a "wee shufti" at my optical setup to make sure it was aligned correctly.
2. Digestive biscuits. A digestive biscuit is the British answer to a graham cracker, only slightly more fibrous. They are mildly sweet and generally crushed up to make pie and cheesecake crusts. The name, however, is not good marketing, at least in my opinion.
3. Palm trees. I realize we're at the beach and all, but does Arctic Circle count for nothing?
4. Waiting in line to enter the gym. I have to say, I was a fan of the CRC and its, what, 100-person training floor?
5. Listening to an Englishman and a Scot talk football. They were very good-natured about it, but it was still hilarious.
6. $3 dental floss. Thanks for breaking my flossing habit for me, Scotland.
7. Real mugs in coffee shops. The ladies at church even serve the after-service coffee and tea in real china teacups.
8. The lesser-known Britishisms. For example, I learned today that to Brits, "pants" are underwear. The denim things on my legs are trousers. Soft drinks are "fizzy juice."
9. Chinese lessons. This isn't a Scotland thing; it's a "my flatmates are awesome" thing. We've been giving each other nightly language lessons (during tea time...have I mentioned that I love this custom?), and B. has been teaching us helpful Chinese phrases such as "Thank you," "Good morning," and "I'm sorry, I don't speak Chinese." We requested that last one.
10. People who don't move on the sidewalk. When you're walking with a big group that takes up the whole sidewalk and someone comes up in the other direction, what do you do? You all shuffle around and make room for that person to pass so they don't have to tempt fate running in the street, right? Because it's rude to take up an entire public walkway. This is apparently not the custom in Scotland, and it's beginning to be quite irritating.
Saturday 9 October 2010
Look-Alikes
Just for fun, anytime I see someone who looks enough like somebody I know that I do a double-take, I'm putting their name on this list here. (I always do this...I see MS people in Atl. and Atl. people in MS all the time.) So far I've seen doubles of:
Dorothy Felker
Biz Felker
Emily Heine
Jennifer Gordon
Peter Scheidt
Matt Mullininx--this guy is really uncanny. I keep seeing him and I double-take every time.
Ms. Ursula
Dorothy Felker
Biz Felker
Emily Heine
Jennifer Gordon
Peter Scheidt
Matt Mullininx--this guy is really uncanny. I keep seeing him and I double-take every time.
Ms. Ursula
Scottish soap is nice...if you like smelling like tea and roast lamb
Well, the scent of my bath soap is "thyme and bergamot," thyme being one of the herbs you typically put on lamb, and bergamot being the main spice in Earl Grey tea, so yes, my soap does, in fact, smell stereotypically Scottish. Lamb and tea. Sarah (roommate from Tech, for those who don't know) warned me that European soaps smell weird. Observation verified.
In other news, I have a fourth roommate! May I introduce A., who is an Art History PhD student from Cyprus, meaning I now have two roommates who speak Greek. She just arrived yesterday evening, and K. and I were royally confused when we realized the voice we heard speaking Greek on a phone was NOT coming from I's room but from the (supposedly) unoccupied Room 4. It turns out that her advisor gave her a few extra weeks' vacation, and since she has no need to be here for classes, she just stayed home a little longer. Makes sense. But it puts our theory that the room was actually inhabited by a glimmery Stephanie-Meyer-esque vampire to a rather anticlimactic end.
In OTHER other news, I realize I haven't given you the promised St. Andrews walkthrough yet. My roommates and Annie are not surprised by this; everyone else, welcome to the way I do the internet: eventually. Really, though, last Sunday I walked half the town before church taking pictures; I plan to cover the second half and the beach tomorrow so I can give you a completed walkthrough tomorrow night.
I've been going out of my way to get my work done on Friday and Saturday so I can have all of Sunday to rest and worship. It's something I never tried very hard to do at Tech, but I'm really making an effort this year (at least so far this year), and I have to say I enjoyed closing my books at about 2 this afternoon and being done with school for the rest of the weekend. I'm going to enjoy not having all that hanging over my head Sundays. I plan to spend a lot of tomorrow out walking on the beach, to which I haven't been yet. (Yes, the camera is coming with me.) Oh! And I have to indulge a romanticized mental image momentarily. I've picked up an instrument that is slightly more portable than the piano. It's the tin whistle, aka the penny whistle. If you're familiar with Lord of the Rings, this is the instrument that opens the piece "Concerning Hobbits" at the beginning of Fellowship of the Ring. If you don't know it, just google...ah, heck, this is a blog, I'll just attach the link here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_1cTuUwZILg
Yay, technology. Anyways. Picture, if you will, a windswept beach; waves breaking against an iron-grey sky; and me, in a tartan skirt if you wish, playing rustic Celtic melodies in the open air. *sigh* I love Scotland. And now it's time for me to go drink some tea. I bet I smell more like bergamot than it does.
In other news, I have a fourth roommate! May I introduce A., who is an Art History PhD student from Cyprus, meaning I now have two roommates who speak Greek. She just arrived yesterday evening, and K. and I were royally confused when we realized the voice we heard speaking Greek on a phone was NOT coming from I's room but from the (supposedly) unoccupied Room 4. It turns out that her advisor gave her a few extra weeks' vacation, and since she has no need to be here for classes, she just stayed home a little longer. Makes sense. But it puts our theory that the room was actually inhabited by a glimmery Stephanie-Meyer-esque vampire to a rather anticlimactic end.
In OTHER other news, I realize I haven't given you the promised St. Andrews walkthrough yet. My roommates and Annie are not surprised by this; everyone else, welcome to the way I do the internet: eventually. Really, though, last Sunday I walked half the town before church taking pictures; I plan to cover the second half and the beach tomorrow so I can give you a completed walkthrough tomorrow night.
I've been going out of my way to get my work done on Friday and Saturday so I can have all of Sunday to rest and worship. It's something I never tried very hard to do at Tech, but I'm really making an effort this year (at least so far this year), and I have to say I enjoyed closing my books at about 2 this afternoon and being done with school for the rest of the weekend. I'm going to enjoy not having all that hanging over my head Sundays. I plan to spend a lot of tomorrow out walking on the beach, to which I haven't been yet. (Yes, the camera is coming with me.) Oh! And I have to indulge a romanticized mental image momentarily. I've picked up an instrument that is slightly more portable than the piano. It's the tin whistle, aka the penny whistle. If you're familiar with Lord of the Rings, this is the instrument that opens the piece "Concerning Hobbits" at the beginning of Fellowship of the Ring. If you don't know it, just google...ah, heck, this is a blog, I'll just attach the link here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_1cTuUwZILg
Yay, technology. Anyways. Picture, if you will, a windswept beach; waves breaking against an iron-grey sky; and me, in a tartan skirt if you wish, playing rustic Celtic melodies in the open air. *sigh* I love Scotland. And now it's time for me to go drink some tea. I bet I smell more like bergamot than it does.
Wednesday 29 September 2010
The Upside of Being Sick
...would be that I have time to sit down and write this thing, on account of staying home from my evening activities. So hello from St. Andrews, everyone! This blog is my first attempt to keep up with all my different worlds at once--Tech, home, Hapkido, church(es), the barn, JA, everybody. So welcome to the show, y'all. (I was so proud of myself, I dropped a "y'all" to Scottish people last night.) My task for the evening is to get you up to speed on the saga of my trip from MS to St. Andrews about two weeks ago and on my settling-in process since then. Be glad you're getting the edited version. (Some of you got it in full by e-mail...)
(Pictures only cover up to my arrival in St. Andrews, so sorry about that. More on the town soon.)
When my Dad and I booked our plane tickets, there was this little volcano thingy exploding in Iceland, and a cloud of ash was obstructing air travel in the UK, so we booked to the south, flying into Charles de Gaulle Airport in Paris, then Chunneling to London, taking a train to Edinburgh, and bussing to St. Andrews. Right. On the plane, we basically skipped the night of Sept. 14--I could reasonable believe my watch until about 1 am (no luck sleeping), but by 2, the sun was rising, it was 9 Paris time, and they were serving breakfast. Watching the sun rise in fast motion ahead of us was pretty cool, but unfortunately all my attempts at taking a picture of it failed. We were (or at least I was) in a stupor for most of the following day, but I remember enjoying the garretted windows on the buildings on the grimy downtown streets we drove through to get to the Seine and our hotel. It may have been a grimy downtown street, but it was still Paris. This is a partial view from our hotel:
I intended this picture to be an intelligence test: which side of our hotel was Notre Dame on? The trick was to notice that the writing on all the signs on the Notre Dame side is backwards, meaning that you are looking at a reflection; however, as you can tell (or, more to the point, can't tell), the street sign is illegible. *shrug* Oh, well. We were a block from Notre Dame. Here it is again. I like this picture.
Anyone know how to rotate pictures on blogspot?
Overall, I liked Paris; even though I was overwhelmed not knowing the language (and Dad had a hard time lip-reading a language entirely composed of vowels), I caught a sense of excitement that I think I would have really liked had I had more time to explore and slightly better language skills. We spent our one morning there visiting the Catacombs and the Eiffel Tower (which we did not climb), then walked back from there along the Seine through the Louvre Gardens and back to the N.D. area. Favorite picture from that walk: Ile de France. Our hotel was a few blocks down on the far right bank.
In the afternoon we took the Chunnel train to London. I have no pictures of that. It's just a long subway ride. (Sorry, but no fish swimming past the windows. Actually, I'm not sorry. Fish in the tunnels would be a very bad thing.) We didn't see much of London, either--it was night when we arrived, and we only spent an hour or two there the next morning before catching our train to Edinburgh at King's Cross. Regretfully, I have no Platform 9 3/4 picture, as we were late for our train to begin with.
Epic fail, I know.
Rest assured, this situation will be amended--even if I don't get back to London before Christmas, I've been plotting with Mom and Sam to go see a musical in the West End while they're here, so it will at least happen then.
Another fail, sadly: I have no more good pictures right now. My attempts to take pictures from the train were unsuccessful, and I want to reserve my pictures of St. Andrews until I can give you a proper walking tour (and in another post, as this one is already pretty long). I will give you one picture of my room, though:
Not a bad little apartment-style room. The right-hand door there is into the hall, and the left is my bathroom. There are 4 of us on this hall sharing a common kitchen/living room, each with their own bedroom and bathroom. There actually should be a fifth, but she's never shown up and we have no idea who or where she is. I won't post my flatmates' names on the blog for privacy reasons, but I'll call them by their initials, K., B., and I. K. is from Glasgow and doing Museum Studies (all postgrads, by the way); B. is Chinese and studying international business, and I. is a Greek C.S. major. (Sorry, that's "Computer Science," for non-denizens of the Tech bubble.) They're all very nice, and we live well together (we have similar habits as far as bathing and cleaning up after ourselves are concerned).
So...what have I been doing here. I've been in classes since Monday, and for those who don't know, my programme is called "Photonics and Optoelectronic Devices" (POED), which means that I study any technology in which light and electricity interact. In other words, lasers, X-ray machines, light and motion sensors, and the computer screen you're staring at right now. I think my classes are going to be interesting. Lasers is promising, though I'm expecting to do a lot of background reading to keep myself up to speed in it. I don't think I'm going to have to worry about my Displays class; admittedly, I've only gone to one lecture so far, but the tutorial (= practice problems) sheet for the class included a review of divergence and cross-products, so I think I'm OK as far as the math is concerned. However, I think that that class is some kind of academic cancer, because even though it is a Tues.-Thurs. class, it has managed to metastasize to an assortment of Monday mornings and Friday afternoons as well. My entire schedule is a hodge-podge of weirdness like that. I actually have 12 separate tables plotted in Excel, one for each week, which I will post here for your viewing entertainment, if you care and I can figure it out. It'll also give you an idea of when I'm most likely to be available online. The time change, by the way, is that I'm 5 hours ahead of Eastern Time Zone and 6 ahead of Central. The UK does Daylight Savings Time, too, so the difference won't change when you set your clocks back.
Finally, while my brain is on the subject of "contact," I want to make sure you all have my mailing address. Please note: this will only be valid until about Jan. 10; after that, I'll be in Edinburgh. So don't try to mail me anything from, say, Christmas onward. But anyways. My address is:
DRA/FS 0905 David Russell Apartments
Buchanan Gardens
St. Andrews, Fife KY16 9LY
Scotland
In other news, I've joined the Aikido class here, and oddly, it is the single most foreign-feeling place I've encountered on campus. I can't figure out what's so strange about it--maybe changing art, mindset, teaching style, and teaching culture all at once is just a shock to my system. I like it because their HEAVY emphasis is on relaxation and flow, which are my weak spots--everyone who does Hapkido with me knows that I tense and panic as soon as the technique gets a little dynamic. So I like having the chance to work intensely on that, though perhaps "playing to my weakness," so to speak, is another part of what feels so weird.
From the most foreign-feeling place to the one place where I've felt at home...I found the Christian Union here (there's only one), and it's WONDERFUL. These people...really get community, and they really get the idea of living in and engaging with your society with enthusiasm and purpose. The group is several hundred strong, so I got a little lost in the sea at the large group meetings; however, they sing many of the same songs I was familiar with at RUF, and as trivial as that sounds as a similarity, when they started playing "In Christ Alone," I felt really at home for the first time since arriving. But earlier tonight I met with the group that lives in my area and we had a great time getting to know each other and having very productive conversations during our Bible study (Mark 1:1-15). It amazes me how solid this group is for the way it's organized: there are no campus ministers, interns, etc.--it's entirely student-led and organized. There is a parent organization, the UCCF, and they bring guest speakers to teach at large group and things like that, but it's the upperclassmen students who do all that. I've been impressed by their passion, and by their solidity in the gospel and in their understanding of the CU's role on the campus of St. Andrews, to serve and reach out to all students. The whole group works closely with a lot of the area churches, and the small group I mentioned does programs and service projects for our residence area--very focused on equipping the members to reach out to the campus and the city around them. It's a great group to be getting involved in, and I'm really looking forward to it.
The only thing that really puts a damper on any of it is my transience during this program: I'm going to be leaving for Edinburgh in about 3 1/2 months, just when (I suspect) I'll be starting to get my footing--starting to carve out a niche for myself in my various organizations, establish a routine, have a handful of close friendships developing. It's frustrating that I know my time is limited, and I'm trying to balance realism in what I can do (i.e., don't run for Secretary of the Aikido Club if you're leaving after 1 semester) with intentionality in pursuing involvement and relationships.
Well, this was quite a long post, with only three little pictures of Paris to make up for it. I have more little anecdotes to tell, and I do want to give you a good photographic tour of St. Andrews, but those will have to wait until another time. Until then, then!
(Pictures only cover up to my arrival in St. Andrews, so sorry about that. More on the town soon.)
When my Dad and I booked our plane tickets, there was this little volcano thingy exploding in Iceland, and a cloud of ash was obstructing air travel in the UK, so we booked to the south, flying into Charles de Gaulle Airport in Paris, then Chunneling to London, taking a train to Edinburgh, and bussing to St. Andrews. Right. On the plane, we basically skipped the night of Sept. 14--I could reasonable believe my watch until about 1 am (no luck sleeping), but by 2, the sun was rising, it was 9 Paris time, and they were serving breakfast. Watching the sun rise in fast motion ahead of us was pretty cool, but unfortunately all my attempts at taking a picture of it failed. We were (or at least I was) in a stupor for most of the following day, but I remember enjoying the garretted windows on the buildings on the grimy downtown streets we drove through to get to the Seine and our hotel. It may have been a grimy downtown street, but it was still Paris. This is a partial view from our hotel:
Overall, I liked Paris; even though I was overwhelmed not knowing the language (and Dad had a hard time lip-reading a language entirely composed of vowels), I caught a sense of excitement that I think I would have really liked had I had more time to explore and slightly better language skills. We spent our one morning there visiting the Catacombs and the Eiffel Tower (which we did not climb), then walked back from there along the Seine through the Louvre Gardens and back to the N.D. area. Favorite picture from that walk: Ile de France. Our hotel was a few blocks down on the far right bank.
Epic fail, I know.
Rest assured, this situation will be amended--even if I don't get back to London before Christmas, I've been plotting with Mom and Sam to go see a musical in the West End while they're here, so it will at least happen then.
Another fail, sadly: I have no more good pictures right now. My attempts to take pictures from the train were unsuccessful, and I want to reserve my pictures of St. Andrews until I can give you a proper walking tour (and in another post, as this one is already pretty long). I will give you one picture of my room, though:
So...what have I been doing here. I've been in classes since Monday, and for those who don't know, my programme is called "Photonics and Optoelectronic Devices" (POED), which means that I study any technology in which light and electricity interact. In other words, lasers, X-ray machines, light and motion sensors, and the computer screen you're staring at right now. I think my classes are going to be interesting. Lasers is promising, though I'm expecting to do a lot of background reading to keep myself up to speed in it. I don't think I'm going to have to worry about my Displays class; admittedly, I've only gone to one lecture so far, but the tutorial (= practice problems) sheet for the class included a review of divergence and cross-products, so I think I'm OK as far as the math is concerned. However, I think that that class is some kind of academic cancer, because even though it is a Tues.-Thurs. class, it has managed to metastasize to an assortment of Monday mornings and Friday afternoons as well. My entire schedule is a hodge-podge of weirdness like that. I actually have 12 separate tables plotted in Excel, one for each week, which I will post here for your viewing entertainment, if you care and I can figure it out. It'll also give you an idea of when I'm most likely to be available online. The time change, by the way, is that I'm 5 hours ahead of Eastern Time Zone and 6 ahead of Central. The UK does Daylight Savings Time, too, so the difference won't change when you set your clocks back.
Finally, while my brain is on the subject of "contact," I want to make sure you all have my mailing address. Please note: this will only be valid until about Jan. 10; after that, I'll be in Edinburgh. So don't try to mail me anything from, say, Christmas onward. But anyways. My address is:
DRA/FS 0905 David Russell Apartments
Buchanan Gardens
St. Andrews, Fife KY16 9LY
Scotland
In other news, I've joined the Aikido class here, and oddly, it is the single most foreign-feeling place I've encountered on campus. I can't figure out what's so strange about it--maybe changing art, mindset, teaching style, and teaching culture all at once is just a shock to my system. I like it because their HEAVY emphasis is on relaxation and flow, which are my weak spots--everyone who does Hapkido with me knows that I tense and panic as soon as the technique gets a little dynamic. So I like having the chance to work intensely on that, though perhaps "playing to my weakness," so to speak, is another part of what feels so weird.
From the most foreign-feeling place to the one place where I've felt at home...I found the Christian Union here (there's only one), and it's WONDERFUL. These people...really get community, and they really get the idea of living in and engaging with your society with enthusiasm and purpose. The group is several hundred strong, so I got a little lost in the sea at the large group meetings; however, they sing many of the same songs I was familiar with at RUF, and as trivial as that sounds as a similarity, when they started playing "In Christ Alone," I felt really at home for the first time since arriving. But earlier tonight I met with the group that lives in my area and we had a great time getting to know each other and having very productive conversations during our Bible study (Mark 1:1-15). It amazes me how solid this group is for the way it's organized: there are no campus ministers, interns, etc.--it's entirely student-led and organized. There is a parent organization, the UCCF, and they bring guest speakers to teach at large group and things like that, but it's the upperclassmen students who do all that. I've been impressed by their passion, and by their solidity in the gospel and in their understanding of the CU's role on the campus of St. Andrews, to serve and reach out to all students. The whole group works closely with a lot of the area churches, and the small group I mentioned does programs and service projects for our residence area--very focused on equipping the members to reach out to the campus and the city around them. It's a great group to be getting involved in, and I'm really looking forward to it.
The only thing that really puts a damper on any of it is my transience during this program: I'm going to be leaving for Edinburgh in about 3 1/2 months, just when (I suspect) I'll be starting to get my footing--starting to carve out a niche for myself in my various organizations, establish a routine, have a handful of close friendships developing. It's frustrating that I know my time is limited, and I'm trying to balance realism in what I can do (i.e., don't run for Secretary of the Aikido Club if you're leaving after 1 semester) with intentionality in pursuing involvement and relationships.
Well, this was quite a long post, with only three little pictures of Paris to make up for it. I have more little anecdotes to tell, and I do want to give you a good photographic tour of St. Andrews, but those will have to wait until another time. Until then, then!
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