Italy...the not so good.

After an amazing time in Florence we were apprehensive about Rome. Could it live up to the fun and food we had in Florence? In a nutshell, not at all. We arrived in Rome and immediately noticed all the graffiti and filth that Rome had. We didn't want to judge it too quickly, but so far we were not impressed. I had a terrible headache that lasted all day and could not find any advil because everything had closed by the time we got into Rome. I was hungry, tired, and did not feel well, so bad start for Rome. We managed to find a cute place to eat in town, but our hotel was a little further out of town than we would have liked. It was right next to the metro, but it was a 20 minute ride, and I just wasn't feeling it. But the next day was got even better. We had heard to take a tour of the Vatican city because it lasted 4 hours and they told you things you didn't know. So we were suckered into paying 40 euro and our expectations were high. Well it took an hour for them to give us our headsets, and sort out the money and take us wait to get into the museum and sort out the tickets. Then we began the tour and it started out pretty well, he told us all about the Sistine Chapel ceiling. It was a great story, but that is absolutely all I got out of it. Fifteen minutes later, I got lost in the Vatican City. Now i know you are asking yourself "how did that happen?" Well I'm glad you've asked. There were about 2,093,230,476 people in the Vatican Museum that day, as it was the day before Easter. Our tour guide was about 5'3" and we came to this part in the museum where you had to walk around this large basin. So you followed a stream of people and I had stopped for a second to take a picture. I assumed (never ever assume) my group had moved ahead. So i proceeded to walk quickly though the museum all the while texting Tom where he was. He said "Red marble boxes, my phone is about to run out of money." I had no idea where the red marble boxes were so I assumed they were still ahead of me somewhere. Again, Tom wasn't the best traveler because he had forgotten to top-up his phone. Annelise's phone had died, so needless to say this was going to be a tricky situation. I had realized i passed them. So I sat myself down outside the Sistine Chapel and sat. Ironically enough, I sat right next to the thinker. For 2 hours. I watched him think, as I thought to myself, Rome=fail. Two hours. Then I got a text saying "we're about to go into the cathedral where are you?" To which I replied "I am right by the thinker where I told you I was 2 hours ago. Have you been to the Sistine yet?" Well he texts back with this "Last text, meet us where we started this morning. This is my last text." Um, where we started? We started this thing many places...at the cafe? Where we met our tour guide? Where we started the tour? Which one of the 12 places are you referring to? So I decided to look where we started the tour. I told them (he could receive texts) that i was at the top of the escalators. Half hour later, no luck. The guard told me I had to leave that the museum was closing. So I thought to myself, how can I get money on Tom's phone? So I called Tom's roommate Martin (German guy really nice) and he picked up the phone in such a cheerful way saying "Hi Christine!" To which I almost cried, "Martin, I need help, I'm lost in the Vatican city, Tom has no money on his phone and I am getting kicked out of the museum. Can you pretty pretty please put money on his phone?" He sweetly obliged and I promised I would buy him a beer. I am basically brilliant though because I figured a way out...after I got lost and wasted 4 hours of my life sitting around...but let's skip over that. I finally found Annelise and Tom and we again turned to alcohol to get us through the night. The next day was actually okay, we toured the obvious colosseum, spanish steps and other hot spots. Ate lots of pasta and laughed at how much of a joke Rome had been. Oh and the next day, the day we left, our plane got delayed. Two and a half hours. Thanks Ryanair!

Italy...the good times

So for spring break Annelise and I packed out bags and headed for the sunny sights of ltaly. Annelise and I, along with another guy Tom, headed to Florence to visit my friend Lizzie who was studying there. We flew into Piza and took a train to Florence. Landing in Pisa was a little bit of a cultural shock. It was the first time people didn’t speak English as my the first language, and more importantly, it was hot and sunny. We had a little difficulty figuring out how to get from Pisa to Florence. We were told to take a train from the airport to Florence, but um there was none that we could find. We went up the window and asked the man how to get to Florence. He said sure, two tickets to Firenze. To which we replied no we need to get to Florence. Right, Firenze, 12 euro please. We coughed up the money even though we had no idea what was going on. We asked where to go and he simply pointed to the other side of th airport and said “ok ciao ciao.” I tried to ask what time the train left but he simply said, “ciao, ciao!” and beckoned the next person forward. We eventually made it onto the train and into Florence. Total time of travel: 9 hours. Total time of loving to travel: none. Once into Florence Lizzie met us at the train station. And walked us to her beautiful apartment. Seriously, beautiful. She lived right next to this famous bridge called the Pont de Vecchio. There wasn’t enough room for Tom to stay in Lizzie’s flat so he had to stay at a hostel. Now most people would write down their hostel information…well Tom did not, no number, address or directions…Tom wasn’t the most travel savvy person as Annelise and I learned through out the trip. But we figured it out and all went to bed. Our first day in Florence Lizzie showed us all around. We saw the Duomo, the U’Fitzi, and ate lots and lots of gelato, yum. Italy wins hands down for the best food (and wine…) We walked around and shopped. And shopped. Italy has these really fun markets where they sell everything from clothes and jewelry to disco balls. I know…who buys disco balls in 2009? I ended up falling in love with a leather bag at one stand and bought it as an early birthday present to myself…among lots of other early birthday presents. Annelise and I would often go shopping and invite Tom along, to which he kindly refused and Annelise and I were able to spend quality girl time together. We went to this one café which looked really cute. We couldn’t really understand the menu so I just ordered a lemonade and Annelise ordered a coffee. When we got the bill, we saw the total was 14.50 euro. I kindly told the waiter this wasn’t our bill, but oh yes it was. My lemonade was 6.50, Annelise’s coffee was 4.00 and the chager to sit in? 4 euro. So yep my lemonade was 8.50….that’s like 11 dollars for a lemonade, and it wasn’t even alcoholic! What is that?? Besides that we had few hitches in Florence. When we decided to go to Venice, we bought tickets for 37 euro (one way) and the ticket saleswoman said there was standing room only left. Great. 45 dollars to stand/sit on the floor for 3 hours…sweet. But Venice turned out to be worth it. It was gorgeous with the rivers and boats and little streets. There wasn’t much to see there but it was just a cool place to be. We wandered around, ate pizza and basked in the sun. That night we decided to go to a really cool bar that had a Beatles cover band playing. We had a lot of fun bopping to the music and singing along with our obnoxious American accents. However, we stayed out late and paid for it the next morning when we went to Sienna and did not really feel up to walking the many hills Sienna had to offer. We had this map which showed us cool places to visit. So we followed the recommended roads on sort of a trail and at one point the map told us to go down this hill. When I say hill I mean shear cliff, or so it seemed after 4 hours of sleep and a minor hangover. Annelise turned to me halfway down the hill and said, “I feel like we are going to have to go up this steep incline when we get to the next road.” Little surprise, she was right. Although going up, I swear it was twice as steep. Note to self: do not go down a large incline road, simply say no. When we go to the site it was closed. Of course. It was a church and it was not even that cool. Awesome. After Sienna we only had one more day in Italy, which we spent going to the U’Fitzi. It seemed like a good idea to be all cultured. Now for what reason I thought I would enjoy a museum is lost on me but we decided to give it a try. Well we stood in line for two and a half hours. No joke. And once we got inside we really had no idea what we were looking at. All that seemed to be there was marble statues with lots of male genitalia, and the same religious art over and over again. So Annelise made it through that museum in about 35 minutes. We were laughing the whole way through questioning what in heck we were thinking. Needless to say we grabbed some 1 euro boxed wine on the way home to try to erase the memory of the wasted day. We did love Florence though, it was a very cute town with lots to do (okay mostly shopping) and great food, but it was time to go to Rome. We had been in Florence for about a week, and although we were excited for Rome, we sort of wanted to stay in Florence or go back to Scotland. We were homesick for the land of green!

Mummy and Daddy Come to Scotland

Let me preface this blog with the fact that I have an exam Saturday (as in two days) so instead of figuring out why the political value of sport has never been higher, I have decided to procrastinate. Mom and dad: Of course I already know the answer and have a well prepared outline.
Speaking of my mom and dad, I have to say seeing them made me homesick and happy all at once. I forgot how nice it is to eat meals consisting of more than toast and butter noodles, as well as being able to order something besides the cheapest thing off the menu (garlic bread). So it was a like being on even more of a vacation than I already was. My parents stayed at this really pretty old building that used to be a high school but is now a hotel. While it is beautiful, it was also on the way to the castle. Translation= hotel was uphill. Everytime I went to meet my parents I would be huffing by the time I knocked on their room. I looked great I'm sure for seeing them for the first time in 2 months. But they welcomed me in red faced and all and instead of giving me some salad and water, they brought me some kraft mac n' cheese. Of course I was more than happy to have my beloved blue box of good flavor, but I'm beginning to think that perhaps scientists are on to something when they say to eat healthy...who knew? So I took my parents out to dinner (well they took me out, but it was my choice of restaurant...) at a really traditional scottish restaurant. It was really cute and we immediately ordered beer and wine and appetizers. I have to say I have really started to love the soups here. My parents were clearly exhausted and jet lagged so after a quick bite I sent them on the way and trekked down the immense mountain to the bus. Now if you know me, you know I love sleep. However, I know my parents like to get up early so me being the considerate daughter that I am, I called my parents at 10 am. Well, for the first time ever, they were asleep. Apparently jet lag lasts more the 4 hours. Shocking. So I let them get back to bed and I happily followed suit. We had a ton of fun eating, shopping, more eating, my dad drinking while my mom and I went shopping. I took them to the Stirling castle, to which my dad replied, "is there a steak and beer there?" So were not your historical family, whatchya gonna do?
The highlight of the trip was when we decided to go on an 8 hour car trip around Scotland. So we set off in the car, Mom, Dad, Kacey and myself, to see all scotland has to offer. Now, if you do not know the rules of the scotland, you are not alone, neither does my dad...our driver. Just kidding! He did a really good job, besides going the wrong way in a roundabout (almost died), hitting a sharp curb, and not listening to the GPS navigator ("Please exit the roundabout. Exit the roundabout now. EXIT THE ROUNDABOUT!"). But I cannot do better so I cannot complain. I cannot explain the breath-taking mountains, valleys, sheep, streams, and Lochs that we passed on the car ride. It really made me appreciate the views and landscapes. The car ride was exciting, but I feel like it may be a while before I hop back in a car for 8 hours in a foreign country.
For the last night, my parents pulled out all the stops. My dad surprised me by buying an early birthday present since I will not be able to see them on my birthday. He picked out a beautiful necklace with silver flowers that are only found in scotland. I was crying because my dad had picked it out for me, his little girl. I really thought it was beautiful, but I guess my dad didn't know that right before I left, my mom bought me a cross necklace that I love (yeah...we kind of kept that one a secret...) So we decided we would look for a ring together the next morning. I am currently wearing the rings we picked out together and they constantly remind me of my two loves: Scotland and my family. Saying goodbye to my parents was incredibly difficult. I am so happy they got to share Scotland with me and got to see how happy I am here. After entertaining all my friends and family, it was time for me to be entertained...off to Italy for SPRING BREAK!

Girls Week!

So Kaytee and Kathryn, two of my best friends from the good ol' champaign urbana, came to visit me for their spring break. One word to sum up our time together, out of control, by one word I meant phrase I guess. Last year Kaytee and I got to visit Kathryn in Belgium for our spring break, so it was only natural to do a repeat. The entire week we did what girls did best, gossiped, shop and drank wine, went through a few too many bottles but when in Scotland...As lovely as my little town of Stirling is, emphasis on the little, we decided to make a few adventures out of a few cities. Our first trip? Glasgow. Shopping center of Scotland. We explored the boutiques of Glasgow and became depressed after we realized we could not afford the things most of the stores sold. Literally it was being like going to Disneyworld and not being able to ride the rides. Very tragic indeed. So what did we do? Drank and ate our feelings. Mostly drank. We went to this really cute restaurant located on the top floor of an indoor, swanky mall. The restaurant was recommended to us and it was apparently the place to go if you want to be "seen." So we indulged in some top class dining, and enjoyed wine by the glass. I cannot tell you what we talked about for three hours, but there never seemed to be a dull moment during that dinner. One minor detail I have forgotten to mention thus far: Kaytee, Kathryn, and I all shared my room, or should I say box. My room is plenty big for me, but for three of us? oh man, we did lots of snuggling. So we woke up the next day and explored around Stirling. Did more shopping, watched a Rugby game (I love Rugby) and saw the Stirling Bridge up close and personal. It's the bridge that William Wallace stopped the English at...you know no big deal. I also showed them the castle on my campus, no big. We laid low that night and taught the boys upstairs how to play our favorite card game...NERTZ! They were also very impressed that we knew how to shuffle. They called the shuffling a trick and demanded we teach them. Now they like to show off. The day after we awoke fresh and ready for Edinburgh. Well I was fresh and rosy, they were tired and jet lagged. But we attacked Edinburgh with enthusiasm. Edinburgh is truly beautiful and I absolutely love it there. So much history and I am a sucker for the souvenir shops. I sent them on the underground city tour, but decided to get a lot of my shopping out of the way for allllll my the people who miss me back home. I told them it wasn't scary and they would enjoy it. Well, I guess I am very brave, they were freaked out. Who knew, I'm unscarable. Note: I refuse to watch scary movies...If i do I need a nightlight and JJ next to me. But we enjoyed our time in Edinburgh and I got to show somebody around for a change, usually I'm the one who is lost and being showed around. Our final adventure of the trip was a visit to St. Andrew's. We wanted to see the coast and touch the North Sea (Did not know we were surrounded by the North Sea.) The bus ride was a little long but we got there and loooved it. St. Andrew's is beautiful. I know I say that pretty much about every city, but this place had a beach, castle ruins, green golf courses and a very cute downtown. The one complaint: the Wind. I seriously could have been knocked over or carried away with the wind. I had to walk backwards in order to breathe. My dad would probably insert here how he golfed in that weather and scored very well. Moving right along, we walked on the beach, proceeded to get sand everywhere that wasn't covered by clothing (in shoes, hair, ears...ickk) and then touched the North Sea! Yay! We walked around, snapped some epic photos, froze our bums off, spent more money, drank some beers, had delicious soup, and then hopped on a bus back to my dear Stirling. Unfortunately, my two loves had to leave really early the next morning, so we stayed in and ate some pizza and had a final Nertz session with the boys. I cannot tell you how much fun we had and how good it was to see KK and KT. It made me a but homesick, but luckily the next day I had more visitors! (Told you I've been busy) My mommy and Daddy came to see me in bonny Scotland! The girls week came to a sad end, but luckily I had family time to look forward to.

London...Part Two!

So after Lizzie had left, it was up to my brothers and I to do what we do best, be tourists and blend with the locals (aka drink.) We started off our day of extreme tourism by going to Abbey Road, where the Beatles wrote many of their songs. We looked around, snapped a few photos, and then tried to recreate the famous album cover from the Abbey Road album. So we propped the camera on a ledge and put it on timer so that all three of us could be in the picture. Well, let me tell you, it’s difficult to try to get the timing down of when no cars, bikes, people and walking right in the middle of the road. We must have looked like complete idiots (tourists) because after attempting the shot about 7 times, a man came up to us and told us he had been watching us for the past twenty minutes. So not only did we feel like dummys, we looked like them and had an audience…super! But we managed to get a decent picture and is in the running for the Dodge 2009 Christmas card (we will send one out this year…hopefully.) side note: sort of weird but “I want to hold your hand” just came on my itunes…freaky. Anyways, after the Beatles excursion, we went to Madame Toussads! Who doesn’t want to pay to pose with their favorite actor? (In my case I got to pose with Prince William, aka my future husband) there were a ton of people there so I felt a little odd going posing with the majority of the wax figures. Everybody sort of watches how you pose with the figures…for example, they had made a Saddam Hussein model and I don’t particularly like that fella so I gave him a piece of my mind. Then a man and woman came around the corner and they appeared to be from the Middle East and immediately turned in the other direction. Oops. But at least Saddam now knows how I feel about him. We managed to find our way through the museum pretty well, but one thing that I thought was hilarious was the torture room/haunted house. They showed many detailed mannequins being tortured (gak) and then you could get in line for this “chamber of torture” (cue creepy music.) I was all for it…but both of my strong, manly brothers somehow didn’t feel up to it. There I said it, Will and Steve were scared! I told them I would protect them from the scary monsters but neither of them were having it. So we skipped the queue and finished the museum unscared. The final excursion of the day was to a pub and back to bed. We had to rest up for our final excursion…St. Paddy’s Day!
St. Patrick’s day was an all day event of fun. (If you are bothered by drinking at noon, probably not your idea of fun.) We decided to do our own “pub paddy’s crawl.” We went to about 8 or 9 pubs through out the entire day and had a few pints. The best thing was this one owner of about 5 pubs was giving out coupons for free Guinness. (You don’t even need to go to the ‘factory’ first!) So we, by we I mean my two brothers, enjoyed some Guinness. Trust me it tastes like tar and coffee that was mixed in a garbage can. No none for me thank you. We ended at our favorite bar called the Three Tons where we had met a bartender, Narie, earlier in the week. After that we were in the mood for McDonald’s where Steve proceeded to speak French to the worker. “Est-ce que je peux…a McChicken, Large Fry, another McChicken, a cheeseburger and a large coke?” Then he proceeded to give a thumbs up to everyone on the street. Oh man, we had too much fun…or alcohol.
It was really hard to say goodbye to my brothers the next day. I really had a lot of fun with them, and it made me a tiny bit homesick to say goodbye. But what made me happy was that the day after, my really good friends, Kaytee and Kathryn, were coming to visit me in Scotland! So we said goodbye, teary eyed (me), and went our separate ways. Me back to Scotland and them to Paris…yes I was worried to leave them by themselves in Paris. I navigated through Heathrow by myself, only having an hour until my plane left (most anxiety filled underground ride I had back to the airport because oh there was an “emergency in the next vehicle” so I had to wait about 30 minutes until they cleared that up.) But I managed, fingernails intensely short, and hopped on the plane back to my love Scotland.

London...Part One

Well I have no excuses for not writing in about a month except for the fact that I literally have not had more than one day to myself for the last 3 weeks. I am not even kidding the past few weeks I have entertained, traveled and entertained some more...but I have returned with lost of stories to share about my misadventures in Scotland and beyond.

So about a month ago now...I got to see my brothers and a good friend from home (Lizzie) in London! I took about 5 days off of school, eh hem, I mean none if your name is mom or dad...and flew into london to meet them all. We had decided that Lizzie would meet me at my arrival gate since she arrived first and then together we would find my brothers at their gate. Well here's a shocker, I get off my plane and cannot find Lizzie. So I call her, but surprise it doesn't connect. So I decide to find my brothers and then figure out what to do about finding Lizzie. Now keep in mind Heathrow is perhaps the largest airport in the world and is currently undergoing construction...sweet. I literally am walking in circles trying to find terminal 3. circles. I ask a few of the late night workers (we landed at ten o'clock local time) but none can seem to point me in quite the right direction. Finally I approach a bunch of construction workers, all male between the ages of 20 and 40, where I can find terminal 3...they sort of smirk and tell me to follow the signs to terminal 2, and then just keep walking...a long time. So I figure I have a lot of ground to cover in a little time, like 15 minutes. Now if you have been keeping up with my blogs you will understand that working out is not quite my thing (bleep test. enough said.) But I manage to find my way just as the boys are entering the arrival gate. Then we think to call my dad and have him call lizzie and voila she appears in the elevator in front of us...yay. So all four people are off to our hotel in London. We managed on the underground and found our hotel without a hitch (that's because I'm a genius and decided to print out turn by turn directions to get to our hotel.)
The next day we decided to get up early (like 10 am) and go explore. We stumbled onto Big Ben, Westminster Abbey and the Eye all within about twenty minutes. It was weird to get off the metro and see all these sights literally right in front of you. It's as if I didn't believe they existed outside of movies, but guess what...Big Ben isn't just from a movie. The parliment building was extremely pretty and perhaps my favorite part of London. Really, the White House does not even come close in comparison. Like honestly who decided to make a white house and have that be the center of politics? There are plenty of white houses in America, but there is only one Parliment building in all the UK that is so cool. Anyway enough of that complaining...We ate a traditional English pub for lunch, I had a bowl of chips (fries) and will and steve had a pint of Stella with some fish n' chips. They clearly have no problem adjusting to the traditional english ways. After lunch we walked around London for a bit and hit up Harrod's. One of the biggest department stores I've ever seen. It is like two city blocks and you literally could get lost in it. It was really cool but the thing I had a problem with was the pricetag of the items. A t-shirt cost around 65 pounds. Uh, thanks my hanes cotton tees from target work just fine thanks. So besides being able to say I went to Harrod's, I didn't think it was all that great. So we went to a pub and called it a night.
The next day again filled with touristy things to do note: I am a great tourist by now. We actually went into the eye and got to see the entire city of london. I kept singing the BBMak song while I was in the eye, "Until you're back here baby..." because it was filmed in the eye. But apparently I was the only one who knew this because nobody seemed to agree with me and I kept getting odd looks. After the eye we decided to go to the tower of London. This is where Anne Boleyn got beheaded. well and other things obviously happened there as well, but that was what I thought was the coolest. There was also a torture museum in the Tower, and I think I am glad we don't use that kind of thing anymore. The things they did were definitely not what I would want to do in my free time. I am already tall enough for a girl so no thank you I do not want to be stretched out. After these two big tourist spots Lizzie and I felt that we needed some girl shop time. So we hit the shops...only to discover that everything was closed. I guess that is a good thing because my bank account is looking a little dismal these days. So instead we went to a cupcake shop and had a double chocolate frosted cupcake. Almost as good as shopping just with a few more calories. Finally we met the boys for dinner and had a few pints before we had to say goodbye to Lizzie. Her flight was at 6 am so she had to get on the bus at 3 am. That was probably not fun. With Lizzie gone, the boys and I had to continue on our adventures.

Dublin Day Two

The next day was well worth the trip to Dublin and the disappointing Guinness tour. We went to this tiny town called Howth that was recommended to us by a fellow hosteller. It was on the Irish coast and only a 20 minute train ride. It was such a cute little town and the views were amazing. We hiked up a cliff and walked around taking in the smell of sea air. It was pretty much a scene from a movie, in that it was picturesque. The sea was a deep blue, the grass was green, flowers were beginning to bloom, and there were sea lions in the water! Yes sea lions. They were too cute. They would surface for a little bit, look at you in case you had some food for them, and when you didn’t throw them any fish they would slowly sink back beneath the water. They pretty much reminded me of my dogs. They would just stare at you, just in case you had food. We continued to walk around the cliffs for a while because it was way better than the actual city of Dublin. I would highly recommend seeing this little town. We were all exhausted so we decided to head back and take what I call the best power nap ever. I didn’t want to get up. Ever. But we dragged ourselves out of bed to grab dinner at a very traditional Irish restaurant. I hade roasted chicken and chips...chips...yummm. When we returned home, we found out that we got new roommates Yay! They were also french, but way cooler than our first roommates. They actually talked to us and later serenaded us with spice girls renditions. The nightlife in Dublin is pretty crazy, the Irish definitely live up to their stereotypes of being really into their drinking. There was a bar on every corner each promising the best ale and whiskey in Ireland. We had a good time socializing with the locals, as were learned they were much friendlier with a little ale in them. The next day came around bright and early when we had to get up at 6 am to make a 10 flight. By the time we were on our way back to Stirling we were all so slap happy that all we had to do was look at one another and burst into fits of laughter. We were all crying at one point or another because of what somebody else said. The group of girls I’ve met here are all so funny and sweet and we always have a great time together. Even at the Guinness factory.