Where the water is blue and the people are new, to another island in another life.

Welp, here I am. Wow. To narrate my journey thus far, though it's only been a little more than two days since departure, would be WAY too tedious, but just know that, true to form, Kelsey and I have had some fun, goofy times and we arrived on The University of Aberdeen's campus at about 1 in the afternoon on Friday.

We decided that we wanted to do a little exploring today so we asked my flatmates how to take a bus. They thought it was the strangest thing that we had never taken one before, but we thought it was a pretty big deal. After our (double-decker) bus ride, we spent about an hour and a half walking around downtown Aberdeen. It was great. To be in a big city in a foreign country with absolutely no agenda. We just wandered around and found this...
Kirk of St. Nicholas. Picture it covered in snow. It was gorgeous. Our time downtown was a good reminder of why I am here.

This morning I got my first dose of culture shock/homesickness. Sensory overload kind of. It was short lived though, because I remembered that I had hardly even been here a day and the way things are now is not how they will be forever. I will learn my way around, I will get used to the toilet that flushes like a raging typhoon (hah, once it went for about 6 minutes... I used a different one after that incident), and I will love it. And even in wishing I could see the faces of the people I love back at home, I know this is where I am supposed to be. I've never once felt uncomfortable at Hope, not even as a freshman. I'm lucky in that way but I think it's about time I lived life outside my element. It's good. I have a good feeling about this semester.

Also, I just like the way they do things here. The streets are old and bumpy and narrow, but they make them work. Once our double-decker beast of a machine met a tiny little roller skate of an automobile, but the little guy just backed up and let us through. In the US that charming, time worn street would be expanded and repaved so that we spoiled brats can avoid the trouble of practicing a little courtesy and cooperation. Old things are beautiful things. They've seen a lot.



"We should just make up words and tell them that's what you say in America... do you have a whoopie in here? A chair?" -Kelsey Hawkins

(I can't imagine this trip without her. She makes me brave. And she makes me laugh.)