retrospective Edinburgh

This is sort of a retro post from when I was on the train back to London from Edinburgh and while I was on the crags, which is why the tense doesn't work for my being in a place where I could actually post anything on the internet. And also why it happened about a week ago.
___

So I went out looking for a cafe to continue working on my peacebuilding paper in, but instead I ended up climbing Calton Hill, walking past the Holyroodhouse Palace, and now I'm climbing some moor or something. And I don't have water and a matpakke. I don't have my camera. I have my computer. Ridiculous.

I also don't have my coat along, and it's pretty chilly just sitting here. Ooo.

And I think someone just took a picture of me using my computer to take pictures.



Update:
I was climbing a crag. Salisbury Crags to be specific. I did it again today with Ashley, and we took lots of pictures of each other.* We had the super tourist day, taking pictures with stuff and things and locations. I finally bought some patches for my pop's backpack. Still need to get him the Norwegian patch, and maybe something for Denmark and Finland, seeing as I was there and interacted with the cities at least a little bit.** It was a good day and all, but climbing the crags, going up Royal Mile and ending up at the Castle for a bit more upness was a tiring day. Also, I don't recommend the castle unless one is really obsessed with war museums and crowns. It's an £9 or £11 entrance fee, so something about $20 to walk round an old military installation and look down on the city. And if you really want to climb something and look down on the city, I would recommend the comparatively cheap – because they are free – crags. As a side note/trip, there is a "museum" of weaving right by the entrance/exit to the castle which is one part informative to 4 parts "buy something Scottish!" Not that I disapprove of buying something Scottish. I bought scarves somewhere else, because it was a bit chilly and they were nice. But I rebelled from the absolutely touristy by buying a dreadful pink (looks nice, but it's rather vibrant) and a more neutrally toned number that is also not a "traditional" Scottish plaid.

Now I'm on the train back home, with three Scottish boys drinking Miller that one of them opened with his teeth. As an observation, I finally managed to open a bottle with a lighter the other day, but it was a pain in the ass. I am intrigued by the Scottish boys, because they are all wearing kilts right now, and some 'I'm so proud to be a Scotsman' t-shirts. Kilts and accents can make even slightly homely boys with unfortunate bottle-opening habits something like attractive. Of course, they are too young, but still. They have kilts on. Ah, bottle man seems to open everything with his teeth. Now he's opening their bag of sandwiches with his teeth.

*Ashley is a random hostel friend. Edinburgh was really good to me for random hostel friends, and while I would really like to go back to Edinburgh and see how they are doing there, they having been settling into the city for a few months of wage earning, I don't know if it will happen. Sadly, because I was very charmed by the city.
**My blue backpack is a loaner, because I haven't had a rucksack in years and while I knew I would need one to travel with, I didn't want to buy one when I prefer destroying my shoulder with a messenger bag for daily use. Patches was his request for letting me use it.

Shoegazing

The show last night was billed as "Andrew Bird full band show", and after listening to things about SxSW I thought that “full band” might mean that the new guitarist, Jeremy Ylvisaker, might be along. But no. Full band meant Dosh. But Dosh does mean band. I was standing 6 to 8 feet away from Mr. Bird for the concert, and in a perfect position to see what both of them were doing and where Mr. Dosh was looking. The man has to pay a particular amount of attention to what Mr. Bird is doing at any moment. When Dosh is playing by himself he is completely concentrated on what he alone is doing. It doesn't seem that he particularly notes his audience and he doesn't have anyone else to match himself to. When he is playing with Mr. Bird, his is still entirely focused on the music, but then he's watching Bird's shoes, literally, timing his own samples to those of the leader. Bird seems to remain almost entirely internally focused, but being to the side of the stage and very close rather than in the audience center, it was hard to tell if he was actually looking into the crowd or out over their heads.

Another note, one could really tell what had been in the line up for a while, and what was newly added with the new album. Bird forgot his lyrics to Heretics and probably cut the song short and had seemed to repeat a chorus of Armchair Apocrypha until he remembered where he was in the song. However, he is so charming that his audience cheers him enthusiastically even when he's very obviously screwed up. That is charisma. But while Bird is trying to remember his lyrics Mr. Dosh is not just matching his drumming to the front man, but his various samples recorded as the song began. Mr. Bird is brilliant, but Mr. Dosh is truly amazing.

Also, while I would have loved to buy the new album, and even would have paid up to $5 over the store price, I couldn't see my way clear to paying over twice the American charge. I was... shocked. I was shocked to see a CD selling for £15.

springtime fantasies

It's gotten warm here, and the past few days have been the sort of sunny days that seduce one to think of what summer might be like, and in my case, where I might be.* With the whole idea that I am graduating (barring any crazy events) this semester, well, that's all a little unclear. It's been my plan to go back to Madison for the summer, sleep on friends couches or find some cheap sublet, and see if I can find a job to earn some moving cash with. This is presuming that the jokes about me finding a Norwegian husband and not going home don't pan out. I'd like to point out that these are not my jokes and have come from various Norwegian and American sources. Just for the record.

So even if I do go to Madison for the summer, I'm going to be trying to figure out where I'm going after that. I have no intention, at this point, of staying in Madison past August. Not that I don't love the city. I do. I'm just not sure I want to marry it. I mean, anything more than one last summer fling with the lakes and bike paths, it seems too much like a commitment. I'm not ready to give up my options in other hometowns. My best girl from back in Charlotte has suggested that we both move to NYC together, and I'm intrigued by the suggestion. I have connections there and maybe I could get a suggestion on where I could find a steady paycheck that would cover rent. But I still have a wild dream of checking out the west coast. The farthest west I've been is just over the great dividing river into Minneapolis. I'd like to see what my chances would be like in San Francisco. Google maps and I have been plotting a course across the country by car, stopping off at my far too distant from each other friends' new home cities. But if I've learned nothing else from my time abroad (and there are doubts about my language skills and methods of planning) it is that I can cross an ocean with a couple of duffels and have something like a home before long. Granted, my dorm came furnished, but I'd have to fight my mum's kitties to get my futon back anyway, so why not take a couple duffels across the country by plane and buy a new bed out west? Because I'd miss seeing those friends living in the diaspora and seeing all that land.


*This might also be why the housing managers decided to wax our hallways. This seems a little mad to me, as we are all still tracking the sand used to make walkways walkable inside on our sneakers and the floor wax stinks. However, my dorm mate and I discovered that our giant freeze - for storing the deer carcasses from our nonexistent hunting trips - is really pretty light when we moved it back out into the hall this evening.

Gerber Daisies

They are pretty, but mundane. They are found on kitchen tables and bureaus in probably any city with a flower shop, from LA to Tokyo, taking the circuitous route. The number and the gardener's bucket might indicate that this is indeed at a flower shop. Behind me is the glory of Borough Market in Southwark, and more particularly, the bread stand from which I would later buy a tasty hot crossed bun. Given the temperature, it was in fact a rather chilly bun, but still filled with delightful bits of candied fruit, and marked with a frosting cross. It would be my first breakfast in England. In my few days there, I missed out on nearly all the traditional foods excepting beer, though even then I was getting a bit away from the common. I had a Sam Smith cherry ale. Friday was probably my most pleasant day in England, Saturday the most useful, and Sunday the most tiring. The trip was interesting, surprising, and trying. Much walking was involved.

This trip should have been in the company of friends. The only reason that I went at this time was because it would be with the other Americans here. I had already bought my plane and concert tickets for late March and that troubadour of Chi-town Andrew Bird. Is the latest variation on Bird's band worth a trip to London in time and tickets? Well, perhaps if it is your first visit and you can combine it with the joys of exploration. But, I reasoned, traveling with friends can also be worth it, so I'll go for both.* The problem with this arises thusly. Of the American five, three chose to fly through Frankfurt, because the extra time traveling actually allowed them a cheaper flight. I and my traveling companion did not feel that the extended trip was worth it, and paid the slightly higher fare for a direct flight. On Thursday, as the day before, it was snowing. The first flight for the three was delayed. This would not have been so great a problem if it hadn't been delayed by something greater than 6 hours including a bus from the airport from which they were scheduled to depart to the large airport in Oslo. Upon arrival in Frankfurt these thrifty travelers learned that it would cost them $100 to have their tickets changed so that they could take another flight to London as their booked flight had taken off without them.

Cut to my dormmate and I, taking the bus from Bø to Sandfjord. Only then did one of them call us to announce that their flight, which had been scheduled to take off over 12 hours earlier in the day, had been delayed so long that they would not be going on to London and they had canceled our hostel booking.** We arrived at Stansted after 2300, with the kind offer from my companion's cousin that we would sleep at her place. In fact, we were able to do this for two nights, and while my dormmate went up to a quaint small town for Saturday night and Sunday, I was able to find a cheap hostel in the suburbs to see me through the night.

End arrival stress. Stay tuned for the continuation detailing some of what was actually done on the journey.


*I did try to persuade people to go to a non-English speaking country for the group trip, because then one can rely on someone else when they are tired of being confused. Ironic, isn't it?
**Some consideration should be given that the one kind enough to call and inform us of this had run out of minutes on her mobile phone, and made the expensive long distance call to inform us of the happenings.

barista boys

sexy in any nationality, or perhaps I'm just attracted to people who can provide me with hot caffeine. While I did get lucky today, the only things I scored were a free latté from a Norwegian friend, and 25.50 kroner in redeemed Pant that someone forgot to take the receipt for. Sweet. That's like 4 bucks.

bargain

Give or take, this year the dollar has equaled about 6.5 kroner. There have been better years to travel here, based on the exchange rate. A few years back it was 1:9, something that we exchange students view as mythical as the legends of St Olaf. Of course, King Olaf became a saint because his hair and nails continued to grow after his death, of which the only remarkable thing would be why they kept the body hanging around long enough that they noticed. But we all obsessively watch the exchange rate because we're all relatively poor.* Norway is an expensive country, and we need all the advantages we can get if we are going to go play sometimes. So this makes the few bargains very exciting. Finding good food for cheap is crazy goodness because I might be able to forgo a beer, but I still need to eat dinner. Or in this case, lunch.

Lunch frequently means bread for Norwegians, and thus it means bread for me. 4 kroner bread from Rema 1000. I don't mean buns. I mean a loaf of bread. I never spent that much time in the really cheap groceries back home, but I don't remember there being fresh bread available. This is a 750 g loaf of crusty, whole-wheat bread for about 60 cents. Insane. I'm not going to claim that it is the finest bread ever, and it lacks the excitement of multi-grains and other such goodies. I'm just saying that it is quality bread for less than a dollar shown here in kjempenorsk style.

• Everything in a Norwegian dorm comes from Ikea. Bread knife, cutting board, dishes, and probably the toaster.
• An ostehøvel, the Norwegian invention for perfect, thinly sliced cheese.
• Very hot tea, served not in a mug but in a glass. This isn't always done, but if you can't hold it in your hand for five seconds, your beverage is probably too hot to drink anyway.
• The nøkkelost – "key cheese" with cumin and cloves – is a Dutch variety, but is of course made by Norway's dairy monopoly, Tine.

*This is relative to the Norwegians. Relative to the Eastern European and Spanish students the cost of living isn't quite as extreme. But we are college students and mostly we're kinda poor back home too.