Edinburgh was a delightful experience, but dreadfully cold. It was a coldness I had never ever experienced in my entire life. I was trying to explain to my mommy and Ames on the phone and I ended up just making strange me-in-pain noises to describe the cold. The city was covered in snow when we arrived, which is apparently unusual for the city. Nonetheless, I really liked the appearance of the city: the greyness of the high-steepled buildings, hills and valleys, blackened gothic and Victorian buildings, old cemeteries covered in moss, the seemingly never-ending lines of benches... Overall, the city was much more mellow than London, which I liked.
Highlights:
- Scotch Whiskey Tour: I had my first taste of Scotch. It was gross. However, I did learn a lot about the history of Scotch Whiskey and got a free souvenir Scotch glass out of it. We even went on a "ride" in a barrel that went about .00001 miles per hour through the visual history of the drink. It sort of reminded me of Pirates of the Carribean from Disneyland. I realized that I'm really scared of life-size figures. I always knew I was scared of people in costumes (i.e. bumble bee from Hometown Buffet, big red bird from Red Robin), but now I know that I'm scared of wax/plastic life-size figures. I was seriously scared on the ride and it was so slow... They had these figures in a couple of small museums in the city as well... no good.
- 3-Hour Tour: no, not the Gilligan one... a bike tour, actually. I had the time of my life cycling around Edinburgh and soaking in the atmosphere. Our tour guide led us to various sights while describing the history of Edinburgh. Although the cobblestone roads made for a bumpy ride for the bum, I felt quite happy riding a bike around in such a pretty place.
- Free Museum Bus: Okay, I understand this may not excite all, but bear with me here... They have this free bus that takes you to all the art museums in the city. So, one could just spend an entire day going to the five art museums in Edinburgh and travel for free! Well, I didn't go to all five, but I went to three. The museums were quite small and intimate, yet they had good exhibitions. The Dean Gallery was hosting a Warhol exhibition, but one had to pay to go in... I thought about it for a millisecond, but then realized that that's exactly what Warhol would have laughed at - people paying money to see his ordinary things or self-portraits that he turned into art by simply placing them in an "art space" (museum) - therefore, I resisted and thought, "I'm not going to fall for that Mr. Warhol. Oh no, you won't be laughing at me." So I thoroughly enjoyed the free exhibtions. :) The painting of the day was Picasso's "Mere et enfant" (Mother and Child) 1902. It literally took my breath away when I first saw it. Picasso did several, but look for the one where we see the back of the mother holding a child. This is the only picture online that I could find (it's tiny): http://www.tamu.edu/mocl/picasso/xthumbs/1902/xopp02-33.jpg
- Wee: People in Scotland say "wee" a lot. ("I was a wee lad." "You go wee up the road, then turn right." - but road pronounced rood)
- Grace-proof directions: People here and even in London give excellent, detailed directions.
- Pleasant Surprise Message: As we were walking back to our hostel from the Edinburgh Castle, we passed by a park which used to be a lake, so it looked a bit like a valley. The place was covered in snow. Ming and Brittany were ahead and they noticed some huge writing in the snow. They couldn't quite make it out, so Evelyn and I walked up to take a look. I realized that it was Korean: Ggoom eun yee-loo-uh-jin-dah = dreams come true. This made my day. :)
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