Bye Bye Scotland, Hola Spain!

My last few days in Edinburgh were pretty uneventful. The city is small and you can pretty much do all of the touristy stuff in about 2-3 days.

On Tuesday, Lara and I signed up for a one-day tour to the Highlands and Loch Ness. For your reference, NEVER use Scotline Tours. Most of the time was spent on the bus, and other than Loch Ness, everything else on our itinerary were only drive by's. Our monotonous bus driver/tour guide rambled on and on and would point out famous landmarks occasionally. "There's the famous Sterling Castle, but you can't really see it because it's hidden behind a wall of trees. Blah. Blah. Blah." He had quite a thick accent so I couldn't understand a lot of what he said anyways. The couple of stops we made were all at visitor centers which brought back bad memories of the Chinese tour I was on earlier during my trip. Lunch was at some small town called Spean Bridge where the only restaurant option was a fish and chip place that also served Chinese chicken and Tikka Masala. You can imagine what the food tasted like. Loch Ness would've been exciting if anything had been done with the place. Other than the legend of the monster, it really is just a lake. There's also Urqhart Castle which is not really that significant of a castle when you realize that there are lots of other ruined castles all over Scotland. What salvaged the day was the Nessie beer we drank on the boat ride on Loch Ness and eating at Saigon Saigon for the 4th time during my time in Scotland.

The last couple of days were spent hanging out, doing some job hunting for when school starts, and a bit of shopping. I loved being able to visit Lara but Scotland itself is quite a depressing place. The old buildings quickly lose their novelty and you soon realize it's a city lacking in life and energy. The weather was always rainy/cloudy while I was there as well which really set in the glumness of the place. The Highlands are essentially uninhabited as well as the land in Scotland is owned by only a handful of families. These families forced most of the inhabitants to leave during the Clearance since raising cattle and sheep was thought to be more profitable. Even though we drove around for almost 8 hours, it was 8 hours of driving through almost wilderness.

My suggestion for if you ever visit Scotland (unless you're spending time with an awesome friend like Lara), is to spend no more than 3 days in the country. Edinburgh and North Berwick are the only 2 places that are really worth seeing as well as Sterling Castle, though I never got a chance to go inside since this was one of the drive by's. Also, eat at Saigon Saigon, a very delicious Chinese restaurant near the central train station. You're not missing out much by staying away from the local cuisine of fish and chips, haggis, and deep fried candy bars. Lastly, come during festival season which is during the month of August. Edinburgh is supposed to be more poppin during that time.

Well, I made it to Madrid in one piece. Though the taxi ride was a bit pricey, my hostel well made up for it. Only 10 euros a night, I got my own room, bathroom, kitchen, and laundry machine! That's amazeballs! For more expensive, I could probably only get a shared room at some janky hostel.

Unfortunately due to poor planning, I will be leaving Madrid soon for Barcelona. I'm not going to complain, however, since I get to spend an extra couple days in Barcelona. :D

Edinburgh

I have a feeling I'll be updating less and less as this trip progresses - partly from laziness and partly from laziness. Haha.

The past few days has been spent quite splendidly - monstering Asian food with Lara (since she doesn't have anyone to eat Asian food with), watching Hana Yori Dango, and of course, touring Edinburgh. It's probably one of the oldest cities I've visited thus far considering new town is made up of buildings from the 1600s. It's also one of the most haunted cities in the world filled with old cemeteries, the underground city which was built over, and sites where flogging and beheadings took place. I was quite scared while on the Mary Kings Close tour even though it's not actually supposed to be scary so I think I may pass on the ghost tours. I don't do well with sudden noises and movements and I can imagine there are probably people on those tours dressed as zombies who jump out at you at random moments.

So far, I've visited the history museum (free), St. Giles, hiked up Arthur's seat, strolled the Royal Mile, attended a Scottish Christian church service, and visited North Berwick which is a seaside town about half an hour away from Edinburgh. It's amazing how much history lies within Scotland, especially being from California, a state that really is barely over 100 years old. Almost every building here is made of stone, looks castle-like, and is probably at least a few centuries old.

The coolest thing I've seen while in Edinburgh is Mary Kings Close. Closes are tiny alleyways/roads that ran through Edinburgh centuries ago, and most of them have now been filled up to make room for newer structures that were built above them. Mary Kings Close is about what's left of the old streets of Edinburgh, and within these streets, people once lived, traded, and suffered the Black Plague so as you can tell, there are supposed hauntings still. I don't believe in ghosts really but it was creepy to walk through dark tunnels through homes of people that probably died on the very cobblestones I was walking about on.

I've also attended a number of films being presented in the film festival. Apparently catching doos (pidgeons) is a sport up in Glasgow. Also, Chinese takeaway (delivery/take out) is very popular in Scotland. They refer to it as "getting a Chinese" that does sound slightly racist. Tonight, Lara and I will be watching a film about prostitution in Guangzhou. Awesome since my parents are from Guangzhou...I'm sure I can discuss that topic with them once I've seen the movie.

I knew that certain words existed in the UK that aren't used in the States, but I have learned a couple of new words that I now know not to use since while normal in the States, are highly inappropriate in Scotland. One if fanny pack. Fanny means vagina here so I definitely made a mistake when talking about my fanny...Another is the word pants. Pants here means panties so when I told Lara my pants were wet after we had just gotten out of the rain, let's just say those around me who heard probably think I'm a dirty slut. Haha.

Now for some pictures: