A Year at St Andrews...

My alarm rang at 7 and when I sleepily looked out the window, it seemed foggy.  The thought of snow crossed my mind, but I was not too hopeful since the last few times, either it was just sleeting, or it would snow but none of it would settle.
When I actually got up to look out the window half an hour later, I saw that it was actually snowing! Praying that it would settle, I went down to shower. When I came back up to my room again, I looked out the window and saw that everything had turned white. It was a lovely start to the day.
I went to breakfast singing with delight, my prayers for another snow in St Andrews had finally been answered.

It continued to snow till about 3 in the evening. Which was fantastic because there ended up being enough snow for people to make snowmen and snow angels and to have snow fights and slide down slopes and all the other fun stuff.
I actually got to build a snowman right from scratch this time. It made me very happy as well. We named the snowman "Handy".
Here's Handy:

We couldn't decide if Handy was a guy or a girl.

Also, notice my nice new red coat.

I had class all morning, so I it wasn't until after lunch that I actually got to play in the snow. I joined in a snowball fight on the Wardlaw lawn and then I helped a friend build Handy. After that we went sledging down the slopes. Here's a video of me doing that:

In other news, the new semester has started and classes seem alright. It has been a very busy week with quite a few friends having their Birthdays and Birthday Parties. Tomorrow (Friday) is the Hall Ball. It's 1920s themed and I just finished making myself a sequinned and feathered head band to match my dress.

More pictures from this week coming soon!

This past weekend in St Andrews was the Christmassy weekend. We had the Christmas Dinner and Cabaret in Hall and there was also the Christmas Ball. A weekend that had much fun and excitement contained within its thin walls. I say thin walls because I had an essay due at 12 noon on Monday that I pulled an all-nighter for on Thursday and ran on caffeine for three days, which is a lot since I rarely ever have coffee now-a-days, it makes me so hyper and I cannot get a restful sleep with it. It did however help me to spurn out words for my paper without falling asleep.

But, back to the Christmassy stuff. The Christmas Dinner was lovely. It was a formal sit down dinner in our usual dining room which was decorated for the purpose. There were three Christmas trees and a nativity scene around the room.  There were tablecloths on the tables and christmassy napkins and a cracker in front of each person's plate. We also had a high table that night. A high table is a tradition where students get invited to sit at the wardens' table for dinner and get served by the wardens. Also when they enter, everyone has to stand up and wait for them to process in and take their seats before sitting down. high table occurs about a couple times each semester. The Christmas Dinner high table was extra special since it was, well, Christmas Dinner. For regular high tables, people get selected randomly, but for the Christmas one, they were specially nominated as people who had done the most for Hall over the semester. One of my academic brothers was on high table.

We had a three course meal. The appetizer was spiced vegetables in a pastry cup, the main dish was chicken and stuffing wrapped in bacon and the dessert was a blueberry sponge cake like thing. It all tasted lovely and we also had bottles of red and white wine on the table. It was nice to see everyone in their formals and gowns as well. A pretty sea of red, very christmassy. 

After the dinner, we had the Cabaret. Each floor/section of hall put on an act, including the wardens who did "A Uni Hall Christmas Carol". It was wonderful to see the talent and creativity on show. Us Wardlaw girls did a dance to the song "Santa Baby". I also learned that the boys in Uni Hall can dance really well and they enjoy doing it!  After the Cabaret, quite a few people went to the Bop. I, against my good sense went as well. Owing to the fact that I had been running purely on caffeine, the remnants of which were slowly running out of my system, I almost fell asleep on the dance floor. 

Saturday was rest-and-regain-my-senses day. We had an amazing brunch that morning, the Christmas Brunch. It consisted of everything we get at breakfast over the course of the three week rotation, all served on one day. Amazing! I only got up for brunch and went back to sleep for most of the rest of that day. 
 Sunday was a nice day, albeit a full one. We had the Wardlaw Christmas party in the afternoon and exchanged gifts secret santa style. There were mince pies to eat and mulled wine to drink and we played charades afterwards.

Then it was time to get ready for the Ball. I joined three other Wardlaw girls for this process and got my hair done by another one. We took prom style pictures just before we left as well. An actual Ball, and my! was it amazing. I wore my emerald green ball gown to it. It took place on a farm about a five minute drive away from St Andrews, and they had buses taking us back and forth as well. The place is called Kinkell farm and the dance took place in this huge barn which was spectacularly decorated. there was mistletoe at every doorway holly around the pillars and upside down Christmas trees hanging from the ceiling. We got free gingerbread and a glass of champagne when we arrived. We spent the rest of the night dancing to the songs of the different bands that played. Lots of people lots of music lots of fun and dancing! My feet felt like they were on fire at the end of the night, but it was all so worth it. (I miss the shoe I lost in Edinburgh)



So all in all, I had a great weekend. I got my essay (a bit haphazardly) done on Monday, printed it off at hall 20 minutes before it was due and then ran all the way across town to turn it in. 

Now I'm just waiting for our holidays to begin.

The weather has been very Scottish this past week. We've had frost, ice, and (now that its warmed up a bit) a good amount of rain, all with large portions of wind and cloud cover. Also, my assignments, papers and lab reports are piling up since  it's getting towards the end of the semester. Add all this together and I fluctuate between feeling lethargic and stressed and one only makes the other worse.
Basically, this means that I haven't felt like writing much. (And Mummy, while I know you'll say It's better that I concentrate on my studies, I really haven't been successful at getting work done.)

Let me start with my birthday, it was a fun birthday. I had a party in the Wardlaw common room and it was nice to be around a group of friends. I got a lot of cards and more chocolate than I can eat. One of my friends also made me a birthday cake  (technically, she made three) and it was quite delicious. We played a few games, danced a bit and all in all it was a good time.  That was Thursday. On Friday, I went to the bop and compared to usual bop nights, and ones I've had before, this one involved some harder partying (Well, it was my 21st birthday!) I had a great time with a bunch of friends and got home quite late. Lethargy reigned for the rest of that weekend.

Then it was time to buckle down and do some work, which as mentioned before, I have been utterly unsuccessful at. I have tried nonetheless and have kept trying since.

The Christmas Ball is coming up and since it is the cheapest open ball of the year, tickets are hard to get. They sold them on Monday and Wednesday of this week from 11:30 onwards with half on each day. Each person was limited to buying 4 tickets. On Monday I gave my money and details to my friends who i thought were in a good position in line, but turns out that it was harder than imagined and they didn't get tickets even after standing in line in the cold for two hours. On Wednesday they joined the queue at 9am. This was a good thing and we were happily rewarded with tickets! So, on December 14th, I'll be going to a ball!

Thats pretty much all that's been going on so far. The rain and wind are pounding on my window and the snow capped tops of hills in the distance are taunting me. I want some snow again, not rain!
It's not yet 4pm, but the light is fading, I haven't really seen the sun at all today.  More for the nightlife??? Nay, I should get to work.

Thanks for reading and comment if you feel like it!

This weekend held the most weird and interesting of St Andrews traditions. I have briefly mentioned academic families to you all. Raisin Weekend is a celebration of these families.  The tradition goes as such: third and fourth year students 'adopt' Freshers and Study Abroad students (JSAs and JYAs), to be their 'children'. Their job is basically to help their children get acquainted with university life.


The festivities of Raisin Weekend start off with Raisin Sunday. In the afternoon, Academic mothers hold tea parties for their children. In days gone by there used to be mainly food at these parties, but now a days there's more drink than food. In the evening, the children are entertained by their dads' parties. Where lots more drink is provided. The parties can go on for a long time and almost everyone is at a party on that day.

The next morning (Raisin Monday) the mothers dress their children up in (usually funny) costumes and send them to collect their raisin receipts from their dads. The raisin receipt used to be a piece of parchment which acknowledged that the dad had received a pound of raisins as a thank you gift from their children in Latin. Now a days its written on almost anything. This receipt has to be carried to St Salvators Quad, where a huge foam fight takes place.  The kids get covered in shaving foam and everyone is completely unrecognisable.


My Raisin Weekend was fun. My mum's party was interesting, we had a lot of people there since it had hers and all four of her flatmates' kids. We played a few drinking games until everyone was too disorganised to play anything any more. Then there was just music and socialising. I went on to my dad's party in the evening and I had fun over there as well. Our hall was full of people having parties all over the place and it was noise and mess everywhere. I actually got to bed pretty early that night.

Monday Morning I woke up to go over to my mum's so she could dress me up. I was dressed up as a sheep and since one of our sisters wasn't able to come, my mum felt like her duck costume was going to go to waste and so I ended up having the head of a duck as well. A morphed sheep-duck is what I became. My other sister was dressed as a caterpillar. I went over to my dad's to collect my raisin receipt, but there was no answer when my sister and I knocked on his door. So we went to the foam fight without our receipt. That made me sad. Some of my friends had a tumble dryer as their receipt, some others had a pole with bottles attached to it, there was one who had a bust of Beethoven, and another who had a glove filled with canned food.

I made my way to the quad, and saw ton of people waiting outside with police keeping order all around. When I entered the quad with my sister, everyone was covered in foam. My sister and I locked arms and held our cans of shaving foam at the ready.  Within a minute of stepping inside, we were ambushed by two guys who covered us in foam. Then we went around spreading foam on anyone who didn't seem to be covered in enough. We saw our friends and covered them in foam as well. Then it was time to leave.

Exiting Sallies Quad on Raisin Monday

I'm away from the US, but somehow I don't think I can ever truly be away. The US is everywhere in the world, on TV and in the newspapers.  Sadly, when you're actually in the US the existence of this outside world is barely noticed or acknowledged.  

 The US Presidential election took place yesterday and well, if you have an internet connection you knew about it. St Andrews has a lot of American students, so yesterday there were all night parties at various places to watch the election unfold.  Even outside of St Andrews, there was a lot of talk and hype around the US election. Newspapers had large articles about the race in the weeks leading up to it, and television coverage was widespread.

One of my friends here had her birthday yesterday, so we went out to a pub for a while and then came back to hall and turned on the TV to watch the election. The BBC was covering it here. It was a little past midnight here before the first states had counted their votes and there were cheers when Obama won a state.

I didn't stay up all night. I was too tired for that, so I went to bed at two. I was not feeling too well however, and woke up at half four because I couldn't sleep. A  friend of mine sent me a text saying "Obama won" at about 4:35. Since I was still too ill to go back to sleep I made myself a cup of tea and turned on my computer to watch a few clips of the speeches from Obama and McCain. It was quite moving to see it all. Most people over here are happy because they wanted Obama to win. This goes for both the US citizens as well as the non-US citizens out here. 

I was never truly interested in American politics, largely because I am not an American citizen as yet. But I have been reading about the presidential race while I've been in St Andrews. Maybe it's the fact that I'm here and the people here are interested in politics or maybe it's the very nature of this election, which going by the numbers, seems to have brought a lot more people out to vote and seems to have reached a lot of people.

It somehow feels like America has won back a bit of respect from the rest of the world, by electing Barack Obama as President,  the first African-American to hold that high office. It truly is a momentous time in history. It is hard to imagine that just half a century ago, blacks in America did not have the same rights as whites, and now today, Barack Obama is President. The American people have proved that they can see beyond colour and race, and the face of America has changed. The world will see a new America and one in which, as Obama said "all things are possible."

Maybe it won't be so bad to be a US citizen after all.

EDIT: The UK papers a day later.

I know this entry is a bit delayed, but I was too tired on Sunday and busy on Monday and well.... anyway, Halloween...

Yes, for those of you wondering, it is celebrated here. Kids do dress up and go trick-or-treating, and jack-o'lanterns are made as well.

Honestly, I don't know much more about  what people all around Scotland do for Halloween, but I do an awful lot about what St Andrews did. There were parties galore. Since it was a Friday night, there was the Bop as well. Uni Hall had its customary party vodka bar, and there was much dancing.  It was also the night of the James Bond film release and there was a special event for that at the cinema, it was black tie, with martinis and popcorn served.  A few of my friends attended that.

I went to the Uni Hall party, dressed as Flora- The Goddess of Flowers. It was a little bit of a cop out as I had been Flora two years ago, and some of you may remember my stories from that Halloween (wink, wink).  The thing about the costumes here is that girls tended to dress up scary, as opposed to cute or  sexy or pretty like they do in America. There were a lot of vampires and witches among the girls, and the Joker from The Dark Knight was the predominant choice among the guys. Fake blood, face paint, white powder, dark eyeshadow and black eyeliner were all significantly used among both girls and guys. There was one guy who painted himself red and stuck a note on his chest that read "Why the Irish need sun cream". It was quite a laugh. There was a girl who was "a molested Snow White", in the pretty snow with dress, but with fake blood all over her arms and knees. Slightly disturbing, but still, pretty innovative.

I enjoyed myself at the party, and later against my better judgement decided to go to the Bop. Not that I really lost anything by going, but I felt like I should have used that night to relax a bit, and maybe have done some work the next day. But I went, and partied it up even more out there. There were more crazy costumes at the Bop and it was a lot of fun dancing. I stayed till the end, and I came back quite late that night and chatted with a few friends online, before finally going to bed.

Pictures form Halloween are up in My Pictures now. 

 I feel like I've been posting less and less lately. I suppose that's because things are getting to the point where they aren't that new and exciting anymore. On one hand that's a good thing, as it means I've settled in and adjusted to life over here, on the other hand I don't feel as inspired to write about things anymore.

The weather here has been atrociously windy this week. I almost got blown away twice. It has also been raining, well drizzling would be a better way to describe it. It has only rained heavily a couple times since I've been here. It is pointless carrying an umbrella because of the wind, I really don't need any help with getting blown away.  Most of the time when it drizzles, the sun is out as well, this means that there is plenty of opportunity to spot a rainbow. I have only seen one pretty rainbow so far, but I'm sure I will see more in time.

On Wednesday, the Cinema here had a special showing of The Dark Knight at 11pm. I had not yet seen that movie although I had heard a lot about it. From what I'd heard, I felt like it was a movie best seen on the big screen and watching it after it came out on DVD would not be as good. So, having made sure I'd completed my assignments, I set off to watch the movie with a bunch of friends. It was a small adventure getting there because we were half afraid that they would be sold out. The movie was great and I thoroughly enjoyed it. I got back to my room at about 2 am and stayed up for a while before going to bed. The next morning, I was sleepy and tired through my 9 am lecture. After the lecture, I went straight back to my room and took a nap.

Friday was a fun night as well. I really did not intend to go out, but I found a bunch of people who were, and so I figured I might as well. We pre-gamed in one of the girls' rooms and headed to the Bop at 11. The theme was "school disco". Boys came dressed in school shirts and ties that were tied loosely around open collars. One of my friends, a guy, had straightened his collar length black hair and looked so much like a young Severus Snape in his outfit. Most girls wore short pleated skirts and shirts and loosely tied ties as well. A lot of girls did their hair up in two ponytails. Obviously, it's not the kind of stuff you'd wear to school, it's more the kind of thing you would wear if you were a rebel and would get into trouble for. But we're in Uni now, so we can do whatever we want, which I think is the spirit of the Bop.

Yesterday,  one of my friends threw a small dinner party. She had found a recipe for Pumpkin Risotto and was eager to cook it. She invited a few friends and held the event in our lovely common room. We dressed up for the party and had a great time with the food and wine. I went to bed fairly early for a Saturday night, but it was only because wine makes me terribly sleepy. I even forgot that the time  had "fallen back" in the night and I went down to breakfast an hour early this morning. I didn't figure it out until I had a conversation with another girl in the computer room (where I was waiting for the dining hall to open) and reminded me.

So, that was my week. Like I said, not terribly interesting any more. Next weekend is Halloween however, so I may have spoken too soon. We shall see...

This week has been an interesting one. I'll start off from last weekend.

Last weekend was lovely. On Saturday we had a bunch of Uni Hall Alumni visiting us. The Uni Hall Choir (of which I am a part of) and Uni Hall Ensemble put up a cabaret for the Alumni in the evening. We also got the privilege of being able to talk and mingle with the Alumni over drinks in the afternoon. It was fun to talk to them. Most of them were women, as Uni Hall was built (in 1896) as a female student residence hall, the first one in Scotland and remained a women's hall for a long time. Now, however, it is mixed.  They told us tales of what Hall was like when it was women only, how they were only allowed to have male visitors in their rooms during the early evening and sometimes had to be chaperoned as well. All these rules were strictly enforced by the wardens. It was nice to hear these women talk about what they did when they were young and lived in hall and interesting to think that they once occupied the rooms we're now using.
Later that evening I went over to a birthday party. One of the other EAPers celebrated her birthday with a movie night. We had to go outside to light the candles on her birthday cake for her to blow out, in order to avoid setting off the fire alarms. It was the first time since being in St Andrews that all seven of us on EAP were together. Later, we watched the old version of The Producers and it was all in all a good night.
On Sunday, we had our Uni Hall photograph. We all wore black and white, and those of us who had them, wore the red gowns as well. It was cool to see the flocks of students going around town in their gowns. Makes me wonder what it was like when students were required to wear them all the time. Sunday evening, My academic Mum and her flatmates and all their children had dinner together at Zizzi's and Italian restaurant. I ordered pizza and would have not done that had I known how hard it was to cut a pizza with a fork and knife. After dinner we all went back to their flat for some Sangria that my mum had made.  Oh, and this means I also have a picture of my academic family from my mum's side. We're a lot smaller than my dad's family, but still awesome.
Here:

The girl in the white is my academic mum, and weirdly enough, she's a few months younger than me.

So, that was last weekend-- fun, magical, delightful. Then came Monday, and Monday sucked. I really won't go into the details here, but lets just say that I was upset and it ruined my mood for the first half of the week. And the rest of the week didnt really get better. It was all a bunch of small, seemingly meaningless incidents coming together in unfortunate ways and I felt like fate was conspiring against me. But at last, Friday arrived, and I decided that it was the right time to party. We had our first free vodka bar of the year (barring the freshers week events) and it was lovely. The theme was "Plastic Fantastic" and we had to make fancy dress outfits out of plastic. I have to say that the guys were a lot more creative than the girls in the whole, because most girls resorted to black bin bag dresses. Of course that wasn't all bad, as a group of girls from Wardlaw created the most amazing black and yellow dresses, that looked like designer prom dresses.  I made my dress an hour before the event out of a blue and white shower curtain.  After the vodka bar in hall we all made our way to teh Union and the Bop. We had quite a lot of fun over there before we decided to call it a night.

So the past few days really have been a roller coaster, and I guess I have to take it as it comes. I have no doubt that I will be upset again at some point through the year, but I also have no doubt that I will have some amazingly magical moments as well.

Freshers Week at St Andrews was very interesting. The hall I'm staying in is called University Hall and it happens to be the hall that has the most number of social events and the freshers week hall schedule left no doubt about that. And at most events, especially the evening ones, drinks flow more freely than water (our hall is the only one with free drinks bars), so it has most definitely been interesting.  We've had an event every afternoon and every evening. The evening once are usually just large parties, with music, dancing, and drinks. The afternoon events were mostly smaller scale getting to know people things. We had ice-breaker games one afternoon, tea parties (albeit with drinks) on another, crazy golf on the putting green, a photo scavenger hunt and a few others. 

The first evening I was here, there was a "Wild Wild West" themed party. We had Ceilidh Dancing the next night, Miss Becca and a few other bands playing the following night, a "Club Tropicana" themed party the night after that, and then my favourites: Boobsoc vs. AGV pub crawl and the Friday Night Bop.

All Dressed up for Tribal Bop