Okay, here's the rest of my Scotland trip and I am working on getting the Germany stuff up so look for that in the next couple days too!
I guess I’ll just pick up where I left off…
12 Saturday
We woke up pretty early and I showered in a wonderfully hot shower. Then we went for out “typical” hostel breakfast of toast, cereal, and tea. While we were there we saw the creepy men from the night before but we basically just avoided their table and they left us alone. Jamye, Annie and I then went into town on the shuttle (boy was it freezing we got in the van and all the windows totally frosted over so we couldn’t really see the sights as we were driving by, bummer). We decided to go to the “most photographed spot” in Edinburgh according to my tour book so we started hiking in that direction. Before we arrived in Edinburgh we knew that it was going to be cold, rainy and very very windy… thank goodness it was only cold and breezy, but even that was pretty unbearable. After a ½ hour hike around we finally came around to the street that we wanted to be at and much to my dismay it actually wasn’t anything very special at all. But, we decided that it still was pretty and just moved on from there. Along the way we came across a cemetery, I really like cemeteries, Sarah Hunter, that’s all your fault once again! Anyways, we went in it and it was huge it went on for days and days but I only allowed myself to stay for a little while, one of the biggest tombs we say dated back to the 1600’s, pretty crazy! We then decided that we would go up to the castle and have a look around there. It was quite a hike to get up there because it basically is the high road (also called Old Town) in Edinburgh (but not the highest point, we did that later). Once we got up there we found out that it was 9GBP to get in and we didn’t really think that it was worth it to go in so we decided to walk down the main strip instead. There were tons of shops and little hole in the wall place and it was so great to walk down the cobblestone road. We were all getting pretty hungry so we stopped at a jacket potato shop where I had the largest potato of my life. I didn’t even eat ½ of the potato and I was totally stuffed! We then continued to walk down the main street again and we came to this really cool looking building at the end of the street it looked very modern and was mostly silver with light oak accents. We finally figured out that it was the parliament building, what a totally awesome government building! We then got to the end of the street where the palace for all the royalty was (I think that is was called the Hollyrood House or something along those lines… I should probably figure that out and get my facts straight… ehh I’ll do it later). Anyways, it was closed so we decided to take a hike in the “park” that was off to the right of the palace, one of our books said that you could have a great view of Edinburgh up there so we started our hike. We thought that we were going to die! It was so cold and we were climbing up hill with the wind whipping around the rocks trying to knock us over. I felt like I was Frodo Baggins trying to climb the cliffs with Sam and Gollum, seriously it even looked similar. We finally got to the top of the path (which was still 100 feet below the top of the rocks) and we were happy to find that there was a decent view from up there we spent a while just walking around the flatland/hillish stuff until it was almost dark. It was so calming to be up there above everything and we had a great time watching 4 kids run around the rocks and through the tall dying grass. Before it got to dark (it was only 3pm and the sun was already ¾ set) we decided to head back down, which was a much better trek than our initial ascent. For this walk I felt like Maximus in Gladiator as he is walking through the wheat after he dies, it was very peaceful but still freezing cold. It made me really want to watch Gladiator. Once we got down we headed back for the city and on the way we passed the parliament building again and all along the side of the building there were different quotes by famous people and there was a passage from Psalm 19, it was really cool to see that on the side of a government building (definitely not something you would see in America). I needed to find a bank to get some cash so we went over to new town and Annie really needed to sit and take a breather so Jamye and Annie stayed at Costa Coffee while I tried to go get money. It was quite an adventure finding the cash machine because the directions that two different people gave me were wrong and when I finally asked a guy in one of the shops where it was I found out that I had been going to wrong way. That was a little annoying but I finally got the money and we went back to old town so that I could buy some things that I had my eye on throughout the day. Around 6:30 we went to where the shuttle for our hostel was supposed to come pick us up. Unfortunately there were a ton of people already waiting because the shuttle was running behind so 45 minutes later we were finally on our way back to the hostel. Once we got there I was officially hungry and bought a pizza from the little shop and cooked it in one of the many ovens that we had in our kitchen. The more I was in the hostel the more I loved it, you could do anything you wanted in the kitchen and the shop had a lot of really great stuff for cooking. There was a small group of us just sitting and talking while I ate (the other girls were still full from their potatoes) and that when Jamye commented that my face looked swollen. I went to go check it out and sure enough I had bigger checks that were kind of blotchy and my normally well defined jaw line was basically gone. I had no idea what had happened, I just figured that I got a little bit of sun poisoning. I felt alright so we all went to see what movie was playing, and you’ll never believe this but it was Gladiator! Isn’t that totally insane? So we all watched that and once that was finished we asked them to put on Erin Brockavich (sp?). As the movie played I felt myself getting hotter so after the movie I called home and asked Dr. Mom if I was going to die. She said I wouldn’t die but she didn’t know what was going on so I took some drugs and hung out in the room. It was really hard for me to be in there for very long because there was so much talk about marriage I thought that I was going to barf, alright not really but I had heard enough for a little while about getting engaged and when weddings were going to be. I decided that the famous “ring by spring” is quickly turning into “ring by Christmas,” so sad. Paul called at that point and I was most pleased to be preoccupied by our conversation rather than the girls’. I went to bed pretty late but once I finally fell asleep I had a good nights sleep.
13 Sunday
I woke up around 8:30 and showered, ate, and packed up my stuff to checkout. Once we were checked out the girls and I decided to go down to the water which was out the back side of our hostel. None of us had been down there yet so we didn’t know what to expect but it was absolutely amazing. We walked down to the water that was about 50 yards away and I got to touch the freezing North Sea. The water was pretty calm and there were some rocks that we climbed around on. Before we were all totally frozen to the bone because of the beach breeze we went back up to the hostel and got a ride into town. We didn’t really have too much more to do there so we walked around and did a little bit more shopping before catching our train back home. The train ride was wonderful and so beautiful, most of the trip the sun was in my eyes but it felt so good! I saw tons of miniature horses and was really frustrated that every time I tried to take a picture there wouldn’t be any close enough for me to take a picture of. It was relatively peaceful in our carriage because the reservations that we got were in the “quite carriage” so that people could sleep if they wanted to.
I had to be at a concert at Barbican Hall that evening so we had planned to get back in plenty of time for me to go home, change, eat, and be on my way again. But things got rather interesting on our carriage about 10 minutes before we came into the station. Earlier there were two men who were checking tickets (for real checking tickets not just the normal asking to see it and then move on) and they were being very specific in what kind of tickets people were supposed to have. The three of us were fine but I guess there were several gentlemen a few carriages down who didn’t have a ticket. A man and one of the ticket people came through our carriage and the next thing I hear is the ticket man yelling at the man (who ducked into the toilet at the end of the carriage) to come out at once or he would lock him in there until the train got into the station. There was quite a commotion for a few minutes and then the other ticket man came through and jokingly told all of us who were paying attention to what was going on that we should “always remember to have a ticket.” As we approached the station an announcement was made that no one was allowed off the carriage until the transport police were on the platform. Luckily it was only a couple if minutes that we had to wait on the train but we were already quite late in arriving because of the whole ordeal. I rushed home (well as fast as public transportation would allow) and ran to my room and changed faster than I think that I ever had before and ran back out. There was a ton of traffic but I made it onto a bus that was a ways down the street and ate the sandwich that I had bought earlier. I got to the concert hall 5 minutes before it started (that was a miracle because the tube took 10 minutes less than it normally would have).
The concert was phenomenal, it was a tribute to Tschaikovski including Romeo and Juliet. It was great to be one of about 30 teenagers there out of 2000, everyone else was at least 40, many over 60 and quite a few native Russians there. It was a great evening and I was so thankful I made it. I think that he might be my favorite composer but I don’t know if I can really make that bold of a statement. I came home and went to bed after a rather exhausting day but very excited about everything that had happened.
That's all for now folks!

So, I suck... I know... things here are a little crazy right now.
Jeanette arrived a few days ago (actually it was Friday, it seems like it was yesterday) and we have been going nonstop since she arrive. All the Biolans went to Ely Cathedral and Cambridge for our BBST course which was really awesome. Sunday we went to church, I took Jeanette to see Parlaiment, Big Ben, London Eye, went to the aquarium and then heard an organ recital in Westminster Abby. I was going to show here the lions in Trafalgars Square but that didn't work out too well because they were having a snowboarding competition there. Who does that? honestly there was a half-pipe of snow in the middle of Trafalgars Square... Londoners are crazy people! We tried to eat in Chinatown but I got a little turned around so we ate at a random icecream parlour/Italian place. Monday, I went to class and the British Library; Jeanette went to the Tower of London with Sarah, another Biolan, and then we met up for dinner in Chinatown. Today I went to class and then went on an adventure to get a printer cartridge (they are soooo expensive here!); then we went to Buckingham Palace, walked through St James Park (I love it there!), tried to get in St. Paul's but it was closed and then we tried to go to a church that I was told "never closes" (b/c it's a church with no roof and there's a garden in it) but it was closed too, lameness. Anyways, we then went to Trafalgars Square again to see the lions with a much better result; although there was still snow melting everywhere. We then ate at Garfunkles (which still has one of the greatest desserts I have found since I've been here) and came back to Roehampton, we watched Count of Monte Cristo while I did my laundry [with a small break to talk to Paul (:] and then we just hung out. And now I'm here, in the computer lab but I will be going to bed now. Tomorrow is going to be a long day, but I get to go to Germany (and drink it up!, oh wait, contract...)! Yea!!!! So until next time, have an astounding day and I'll let you know how Scotland and Germany were when I get back. Cheers!

Once again I am here for the weekly update...
Actually before that... thank you all for the comments; you have no idea how encouraging they are to me! Mark, I love you, you’re an awesome brother and I really appreciate knowing that you are keeping tabs on me! Okay, so my past week...
8 Tuesday: Class... blah blah... Went to the British Library again. It was actually quite productive, some of my sources came in and they were so amazingly helpful! Exactly what I was looking for (isn't it great when life works that way?) Anyways, that night I went to the Bar for the Pulp Fiction Quiz night. It was only a quid to get in if you dressed up so I sort of cheated and dressed up as Stella Pritcher from Italian Job... in other words, I wore jeans and a black zippie with my hair pulled back in a ponytail... I tell you, it's hard to look like people in the movies! Hehe... Basically what happens is you get into groups and then you are asked a bunch of different questions regarding movies and whoever got the most right wins some money! Sadly, the Charlie's Angels (my group... the girls were the angels) didn't win anything. Throughout the night people got up and sang karaoke and the night ended with a Pulp Fiction dance off... Good times.
9 Wednesday: You know what I have no idea what I did in the morning, I know that I spent about 5 hours in the British library... more sources, more writing, more happiness! I got back and was in great mood... I read my Bible the whole way back, good times... that is until I walked into the hall and the girls were panic stricken wondering where I was. I knew that I needed to be back for Sierra's "Almost Famous" party at 9pm but evidently we were supposed to go to Hard Rock before that... yea I don't think that I was there for that conversation! Anyway, I felt really terrible about having them worry. To say the least they have my cell number now so that they can call me (we should have exchanged that a long time ago). We ended up eating pizza and then we all got dressed up as rock stars, or at least as close as we could get... my converse are at home... it made me miss them. We took groupie pictures and then watched Almost Famous. It's basically one of Sierra's favoritist movies in the world so she set up her room with a ton of candles (shh, don't tell anyone!) and we had great punch stuff and digestives (they're cookies... nothing gross).
10 Thursday: I would really prefer to forget that this day even happened at all... but alas... it happened. I woke up and went to class, before I left I tried to find my Student Oyster Card (it's my travel card that gives me a 30% discount on transportation... I bought it two days ago and it was good for a month). I went to lecture without it and came back and totally tore apart my room… but of course, it wasn’t there. I knew that I lost it either on campus or on the bus right before campus so after calling a bunch of places and looking and asking around campus I decided to report it as lost/stolen. When you do that they refund you some of the money back but if your card is found there’s no way to reactivate it. I was okay with that since I didn’t know where it was… I was pretty upset at this point; there were a ton of things that I needed to do around town and particularly at the British Library. So I finally made my way there late that afternoon and when I left I called the bus company again and they had my pass! I was totally excited, because it wasn’t just my bus pass that was gone, it also was my Roehampton ID card and a couple other important cards. So, I spent the entire day beating myself to find out that really my cards were in good hands. Now to deal with the repercussions of reporting my card as stolen… I come to find out that I need to reapply all over again! Unfortunately, it take 3 weeks to process the application, I’m only here for 5, which means it’s not worth it. I can home around 9pm after getting my pass and wanted to crash… talk about an emotional rollercoaster… I haven’t even told you the half of it! However, once I finally got home I needed to do laundry because I was leaving for Scotland the next day. I tried to do that and couldn’t anywhere close by because everything was locked so I had to take a hike to do it. Meanwhile I am supposed to be in Annie’s room planning when we were going to leave for Scotland… oh just recalling it all is making me stressed… I finally got to Annie’s at 11pm, having just started my laundry. They had already planned everything (praise the Lord!) So I basically got the summary and what time we needed to leave. I went and checked my email while I was waiting for my laundry and heard from Vanessa which was great! Once my laundry was done (around 2am… grrr) I called Paul while I packed and he can attest to my totally delirium at that point. I finally made it to bed around three. What a long day… it just wouldn’t end…
11 Friday: You know it’s funny; Annie, Jamye, and I have been planning on going to Scotland this weekend for about a month. By the grace of God is was the exact weekend that I really needed to get away and have a vacation from London (I know many of you think that I have been on vacation the whole time, but it’s different when you live there and explore instead of visiting and exploring… does that make sense?) Anyways, we got to the train station and stood in the queue for forever, while there I had one of my not so brilliant moments. Since we were in the train station I knew that there shouldn’t be any smoking, and yet I got this huge whiff of smoke. I looked at the girls and said, “whoever is smoking needs to be taken out and shot” Jamye got this horrified look on her face and she grabs my face and say, “she’s standing right behind you” Yup, true story, the woman took one last swig of her cigarette, blew it in our direction and put it out. I nearly died… note to self, don’t do that again. Once on the train I felt a bit safer, nobody came and attacked me which was good. We had a long train ride (really it was only 5.5 hours but it felt like all day!) We left at 1 and got there around 5:30 and it was already pitch black outside. We made our way outside to the shuttle that our hostel ran. While we were waiting 4 Biolans came walking us. It turns out that we were staying at the same hostel! We got to the hostel and asked to be put in a room with then so we were in an 8 bed room with 7 of us Biolans. We definitely stayed up too late because of that but that’s okay. It was great! Our hostel was so cool it had a movie room, a TV room, you could buy internet time and our beds were really comfy with privacy curtain across each bed. I was very please especially because it was the cheapest hostel that we’ve stayed at thus far. We went into the kitchen/dining area and played some spoons. While there these polish men (who were drunk) came and tried to talk to us but they only knew maybe 50 words in English and they had no regard for personal space. Finally, we gave up trying to play, they were creeping us out too much. So we went to bed around 2am after a fun night of cards and chatting.
Alright, so it’s late, I’m tired and I have to get up early… I hate to stop right in the middle of my trip to Scotland but hey just see as a teaser… something to wet your appetite for later. I will write again when I can, hasta!

Hello my dear friends and family!
I just wanted to give you all a quick update on my now not-so-exciting life. Reality has finally hit and I am facing the fact that I do have work to do while I am here (what a thought considering I am in school) and that this work is not going to get done on its own! Sad but true... Anyways, my week...
Monday, All Hallows Day, Day of the Dead (in Spain), and Halloween whichever you prefer. I actually didn't celebrate it, so it doesn't really matter to me. Thinking back though I think that this is the only year that I haven't done anything, kinda depressing hun? Eh, I'm over it. Basically this was my first real experience with Roehampton's library. I spent the majority of the day looking up stuff and figuring out that despite what people say, this library is not very helpful. I don't ever what to hear complaints about Biola's library because all I have to say is at least they don't still check out books by hand at Biola. Maybe you are catching my drift a little bit but if not let me help you a bit further. The idea of hooking up your computer to the internet while in the library is evidently the unpardonable sin, I was scolded once... it wasn't very fun. I almost got excited though when he said that i could connect to the wireless internet in the library (now your talking my language) but, oh wait, it doesn't work. Hmmm... Oh well, once again, I've gotten over it and just moved on. I basically spent the rest of my day reading what articles I could get a hold of and finally around 9 pm I had had enough, so I went and got ice cream. I didn't really realize how much energy I had until I met up with Annie and her Dad to walk to the pizza place (I know I said I got ice cream, but it was on sale at the pizza place) and I couldn't stop myself form skipping and talking a mile a minute. This is what happens when you're used to going out every day and walking all the time and then just stopping and staying inside all day. Not a good option. Anyways, had ice cream, it was good, I went to bed a happy camper (after working out in my room because I still had so much energy).
Tuesday I actually don't remember what happened, which means I spent the day actually working on stuff. The life of a good student...
Wednesday, I did more of the same. Things didn't really get interesting until by Bible class that night. We talked about the book we had read earlier in the semester about integrating the arts and Christianity and how it wasn't sinful to not have an explicit Christian message in order to consider yourself a Christian artist. Good times. Then we talked about a study that was conducted by an organization here in London about agnostics and what their views of Christians and Christianity were. It was a very interesting discussion and we were able to talk about the similarities and differences between here and America. Basically, both countries are not happy with Christians because we are intolerant (which is really, you don't believe what I believe therefore, you are intolerant) hypocritical (but only because we actually profess to a moral code, if you don't profess to have morals then you can't be hypocritical) and other such issues. (We talked about these things in greater detain than I am doing here, please don't think that this is the end all be all to the two things I just brought up) The areas that were different were actually quite interesting and encouraging in many cases. Londoners tended to bring up more intellectual issues about the Bible being inaccurate and Science disproving Chirstianity whereas in America I don't think that these are brought up quite as mucha s they used to thanks to recent surges of apologetics in these areas. There's tons more that we talked about and if your interesting in more details then just ask.
THursday, was much the same, research, research, research... but that night was so much fun! Sierra and I got dressed up and made our way to Royal Albert Hall to see the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra play Broadway hits. We arrive about 10 minutes late, oh the joys of public transport, and made our way to the very top of the theatre to our restricted view seats. And they definitely were restricted! There were 4 singers, all extremely talented and a great orchestra. At the interval Sierra and I moved down to some empty seats that we had spotted and enjoyed the rest of the concert about 20 feet away from the stage. We heard everything from Guys and Dolls, to Phantom, to LeMiz, to Cabaret... and to end the evening they played a medley of songs from Mama Mia and everybody got up and started dancing, including the brass players! It was so cool to see everybody getting up and moving about, swaying their arms and singing at the top of their lungs, probably not something you see often at Royal Albert Hall. Anyways, it was an amazing night and I loved every moment of it.
Friday, I spent most of the day... wait for it... in the library! Yes, it's true, more research, perhaps someday I will actually be able to start writing my papers instead of reading other people's papers. When I couldn't take it any longer, and the quazi-wireless internet quit working for who knows how many times I finally went back to my room. That night the girls and I watched two movies, Wedding Date (cute, girly, set in London-which was funny, good ending) and Breakfast Club (that was my first time seeing it and it was totally different than I expected it to be, very deep psychological things going on the whole time - and here I thought that I was watching a movie to get my mind off of psychology...).
Saturday was a day of rest, from school work that is, we had another class fieldtrip to go on. Oh, and Happy Guy Fawkes day! We went to a gallery and saw the largest exhibition on Edvard Munch that is know to exist, very interesting artist, troubled within his soul, more psychology, I can never avoid it. Then the best part of our day, Nigel (our prof) took us to Starbucks! We were given £5 to spend and all of us took full advantage of it! Venti decaf toffee nut latte, and a berry scone, ahh so good to have a small taste of home that didn't come directly out of my pocket! Then we went to the National Portrait Gallery and saw an exhibition on Self-portraits, it was interesting to see how famous artists used their individual techniques to create a piece that represented themselves. Also, I went through a small portion of the rest of the gallery which was really cool because basically the entire gallery is British history told through portraits. I need to go back there, I spent almost an hour there and I only made it through the first 100-150 years. Crazyness! Then we went to STOMP, holy cow, it was absolutely amazing. Go and see it! I was totally impressed with their style, uniqueness of instrument choice (all everyday items that you would find around the house) and the amamzing way that they got the audience involved without saying one word. By the end all of us in the theatre were doing STOMPlike things, it was so much fun! After that the girls and I went to Hard Rock to have dinner and the original, but the wait was forever and a day so we resigned ourselves to having fish and chips. We then made our way to Shakespear's Globe theatre where there were street performers acting out the history of Guy Fawkes day. Basically, he was a guys who tried to blow up the Parlament Building on 5 Nov 1605, luckily, the 'Gunpowder plot' (as it is not termed) was found out just before it happened and everyone lived happily ever after... except Guy Fawkes who was lynched. Hmmm... So anyways, now Nov 5th is a day of celebration with fireworks thoughout the city. we watched fireworks go off from either side of the Millenium Bridge (and on the bridge itself too) which is over the Thames. The fireworks were so close and so incredibly loud, it made me miss Disneyland and 4th of July. I don't care whether or not it is scientifically possible or not, sound carries differently in this country. Every thing was so much louder, we could see fireworks going off from miles away and still here the explosion as if it were right above our heads. Then we went home, and had an interesting experience trying to get a bottle of Diet Coke (one of the old school kinds) to open on the Tube. It all ended with one of the guys who was sitting across from us getting up and knocking off the top while it was up against a ledge. It as absolute brilliance, I guess if comes from drinking beer so much, I will have to try it next time I have a bottle. The rest of the night was spent having a splendid conversation with Paul through Skype (which is totally amamzing by the way, you should try it sometime!). Finally I went to bed and was happy.
Sunday I didn't get up for church on time but ended up going (I was only about 15 minutes late) anyways, I was tired, but glad I went. I came home and attempted to read but feel asleep. I woke up an hour later decided to eat, since I hadn't all day, and procceded to fall back asleep and then I woke up and read a page and fell basck asleep until 6pm. I think that my body was trying to tell me something! After that whole thing I went to the library, did more research, ate, talked to my parents (it was really good to talk with them briefly) and then went to bed.
Monday (a.k.a. today sort of, it was when I started writing), went to class, nothing too exciting. Then I decided to venture out to the British Library... if you don't know anything about this library then you should Goggle it, this place was insane! You have to get a reading pass, which is basically your library card, but you can't check anything out. You go to whatever room you are speciallizing in and in there are a billion reference books for you are (the one I was in was Social Sciences) then you go on the computer and request whatever else you want to look at. If they have it on site it will be delievered to your reading room in about 70 minutes! Can you believe that! Most of the items are not stored on site so they take anywhere from 48 hours to a week to get there. Oh, and another thing, whatever you want to take into the reading room has to be put into a see through plastic bag that they provide and all your other stuff has to be checked into the cloakroom. This place is hard core, I felt like I was trying to find classified documents or soemthing. I will have to make many trips back there because they actually everything that I had been unable to find else where... so for the next few days I get to go back and see what has arrived and if it is of any use to my research. Fun times, and totally overwhelming. I came back home, ate and did more reading and now here I am typing at 1 am in the computer lab. I think that I am going to go to bed now. So, goodnight! If any part of this doesn't makes sense then get over it... haha just kidding, well sort-of, basically you can attribute it to the time of day that I am writing. Alright, I'm really going to bed now. Peace.