High heels, sunset, and (a lack of) white wine.

A very good morning to you!

As you might have noticed, I have decided to come up with some more interesting titles. They are a bit misleading, though. You’ll see.

Thanks for all your comments, and I decided to stick with the system of responding to derivations on the page they were derived (that is, I didn't think about a different way).

In any case, this is going to be another attempt at a relatively short update (hopefully succesful), and this time it is preceded by a bit of a preview of what you can expect. It includes some interesting progress on my part resulting in the announcement -of which I’m quite proud I might add- that I haven’t gotten lost at all in these past days! On the downside, some other unfortunate traits of my character relating to finding my way around were revealed. On the adventurous aspect I found myself hiking in high heels (Arthur’s Seat); and to keep in touch with non-Scottish culture we visited IKEA. Finally, I experimented with cooking.

Arthur’s Seat is the main peak of the group of hills which form most of Holyrood Park, a remarkably wild piece of highland landscape in the centre of the city of Edinburgh, about a mile to the east of Edinburgh Castle. The hill rises above the city to a height of 251 m and provides excellent panoramic views of the city. Many claim that its name is a derivation of a myriad of legends pertaining to King Arthur, such as the reference in Y Gododdin. However, it has also been claimed that the name is a corruption of the phrase “Archer’s Seat” on the supposition that the rock was a significant point of city defence in the Middle Ages. (source: wikipedia)

The picture below is taken (more or less) at the foot of Arthur’s Seat:


The climb began quite innocently, and even after a few minutes the view was worth taking a picture of:


The view was truly magnificent and at a certain point we got to a plateau (from left to right: Phil, Steffi, Lenka, Anna (henceforth Annavera), Anna, Peter, me, Anna – picture taken by Chiara):


The final bit to the top was quite rocky and we really had to climb a bit; however, it was definitely worth it! At the top of the Seat it was incredibly windy (when I figure out how to upload videos I will add some of them, but don’t get your hopes up yet) and the feeling of achievement was definitely present. The view was incredible:


And my favourite one, I think, capturing the stormy weather; even now, when I’m writing this entry, I feel the wind in my hair and the overwhelming sense of being so powerful and so small at the same time – the world is truly lying at your feet and the very air breathes of freedom. I love it!


Chiara shooting a group picture:


One of the group pictures:


The actual peak:


At the beginning of the hill leading to Arthur’s Seat people have built a small chapel (dating from the 15th century); unfortunately I haven’t remembered what it was about exactly but I might come back to it later. In any case, a picture of St Anthony’s Chapel:


The final picture of the trip to Arthur’s Seat shows proof of the fact that I walked up that hill on high heels.


As to my room, I know you must be incredibly curious, but I will let you stew for a little longer. Even though I bought bed linen, I am too lazy to take pictures right now, and the only ones I took don’t really show the colours faithfully (you will never guess the colour of the covers, though; it is entirely out of character). Moreover, my room needs that extra bit of cleaning before I can take proper pictures. However, I will not leave you with nothing; one of my flatmates is a very good cook, and here you can see Ana (Spain) cooking something delicious:


Due to the horrible food here in Scotland (UK really), I have been forced to cook. Interestingly enough I do not mind it as much as I might have thought; rather, I’m starting to experiment! The first time, I had baked potatoes (which turned out ok-ish, 5 out of 10), courgette (6.5), and chicken… the chicken fillets were quite expertly prepared, really. I put them in the frying pan and looked for something to give them any taste: in one of the kitchen cabinets I found a sifter reading “SPICE”, and I sprinkled the chicken generously in order to make it more spicy. You cannot fathom my surprise that the smell the powder emitted was sweet rather than spicy, though. It turned out to be cinnamon. Dinner was quite interesting, I can tell you!

However, after a recovery period of some days, I decided not to be put down by this slight set-back; undeterred by the fact that last time it had gone wrong partly because I had no recipe, this evening I again just made something which -theoretically- seemed like a tasty combination: a pasta with cream cheese with garlic, courgette, and mushrooms (I forgot to buy the white wine). It needs some improvement (pepper, onions) but the fundaments have been laid.

Last Wednesday I didn’t have any bed linen yet and some others also needed household items, and considering we have Swedes in our midst, it was not an odd decision to go to Ikea. The others were happy enough to allow me to figure out the route and I had looked up everything on googlemaps and made a nice note, which included street names and the like. I estimated the walk to take a bit over half an hour, say, 40 minutes. It was a sunny day and we set off after lunch:


On our way, we passed this cathedral; notice the brilliant azure colour of the sky.


After walking through the city for three quarters of an hour we found a meadow and you can see our enthusiasm to get some reprieve of stone and asphalt; as Annavera adequately commented ‘the cows were turned out to pasture.’


View from the meadow:


From left to right: Peter, Annavera, Chiara, and Anna:


However, the walk turned out to be quite a bit longer than 40 minutes; it was becoming dark and we still hadn’t reached our destination. It did offer opportunities for pictures, though:


Feeling quite despearte -and hungry- we were very relieved when Annavera was the first to spot the familiar blue and yellow of Ikea -- looking forward to some Swedish meatballs (kötbullar), she was sure she could read the “I” out of IKEA, until the moment we got closer…


For a moment we feared that the Edinburgh outlet of Ikea was still under construction! However, it turned out to be just some indistinct construction site.

It was becoming darker still..


Finally we arrived at our destination: IKEA!


The first thing we did was wolf down our meatballs and then shopped for everything (don’t worry, I won’t bore you with all the details, but I would like to mention I bought a tea ball); however, we took the bus home rather than walk back. Later, I found out the distance we had walked was just over 4.1 miles (which is over 6.5 km I think).

A random oddity I discovered in talking to an American: even though America is called "the United States of America" Washington D.C. isn’t a state and might technically be considered not to be a part of the US.

Finally, people have been telling me to have fun, which I take include going out and drinking. I ensure you I have had no lack of alcohol (actually, this is the first day in ages that I haven’t had a drop of alcohol in my body, and that’s just because I forgot to buy white wine for the sauce); however, the pictures resulting from those excesses will not be widely available -- additionally, I prefer pictures of landscapes on my blog. However, just to give you some impression; you cannot see my glass but the drinks we had that night included whiskey, red and white wine, and beer.


I feel this hasn’t been my best update ever, but it will have to do for now :) Maybe it feels this way, because the entry has so little (if any) phonology/linguistics in it. I will have to make up for that.

Tomorrow we’re off to Calton Hill and going to saunter along the coast (Edinburgh is situated by the sea). The trip to Glasgow has been postponed until further notice (for no particular reason).

Cheers,
Beata


“It has been suggested that TRISH [trisyllabic shortening] is a figment of linguists’ imaginations” – Lecturer at Edinburgh University