I have arrived

Hello everyone. apologies for the lack of posting lately, but I have been extremely busy, as you can imagine would be the case when a girl packs up and moves to a different country for three months, registers in a new university, gets to know the lay of the land, makes some new friends, and breathes a little. It has almost been one entire week that I have been in Scotland, and because of this way to much has happened that I cannot post it all, but I'll try to cover the basics.

It all started off as I should've expected it to start off.

I have a curse. This curse is the curse of move in day to college. Let me tell you about it.

Move in day freshman year goes as follows: Jess wakes up with one side of her face being the size of a bowling ball due to an infection post wisdom teeth removal. While packing her belongings, the electricity goes out in the house for many hours and does not come back on. After packing up the vehicle with all her belongings and getting in the car to drive to Michigan, the car decides to die. After repacking a new vehicle, the Chicago-land area decides to take part in a massive monsoon thus highways are extremely flooded which causes quite a bit of traffic.

Move in day sophmore year isn't quite as bad. However, the person that my roommate and I bought our loft from jipped us so we didn't receive all the pieces of the loft. While my loving mother did her best to put it together or find kind young men to put it together, she had a bit of a meltdown in thinking that I would have no where to sleep.

Move in day junior year (to Scotland) is by far the best. Jess and Ella hop on their plane from Amsterdam to Heathrow without a problem. 5:00 AM they're at the airport and on their way. Upon arrival in Heathrow they realize they don't have much time to get to their second flight. They decide to walk rather quickly. When they get to their next destination, customs, they realize the line is EXTREMELY long. They try to ask a incredibly kind airport worker who incredibly kindly declines them the ability to go in a quicker line because they're "just" students. They miss their next plan by 10 minutes. 3 hours later they are on the next plane to Aberdeen. Because the time of their arrival just magically decided to coincide with a lunch outing that the whole group and group director were going on, they had to fend for themselves for the rest of the day until the following day when we would met the group for campus tour, etc. But alls well that ends well. They hopped in a taxi, got to campus, got to their flats (however Jess was in a temporary flat for a few days as hers wasn't ready), walked downtown which the distance was unknown to the two of them, and got some food. Quite the eventful day!

I am finally settled in my new room. It's nice and cozy and I like it. There's a big window that gets lots of sun and since it has been so nice out lately I have been able to keep it open to get a wonderful breeze. It has only rained one day since I have been here, which really contradicts my expectations! However, I have been reminded that this will definitely not last. Our group took an excursion to the ruins of Arbroath Alley which was founded in 1178 by King William for a group of monks. The ancient stone walls were breathtaking and it was so cool being able to walk around and see where the monks slept, lived, etc.

On Sunday some friends and I decided we wanted to go to church. We didn't know anything about any churches around, but we heard that there would be churches outside our central building who would walk with us to their separate churches. We didn't know which one to choose since we didn't know anything about them but we chose one called New Life International Church. It ended up being a wonderful time with wonderful music, a great message, and even soup and bread and cookies after. We actually got to talking to some of the people our age and there is an age 18+ retreated in two weekends that we are going to go on! I forget where in Scotland it is, but they all said it's extremely beautiful and just a great time.

The Christian Union here at the uni is quite awesome. They hosted an international meal last night and there were TONS of people there and tons of delicious food. My friends from my program and I decided that we wouldn't talk much with each other, but would really make our best effort to meet new people. I met some amazing new friends and I'm really excited to get to know them better! Yesterday I met someone from Palatine and someone from Elmhurst which is SO close to Park Ridge, which is crazy. I also met an amazing lady named Tracy who is a practicing doc here in Aberdeen and she has 2 little boys aged 2 and 5 so hopefully I will get to play with them in the park soon.

This post is getting way too long, but those are some cool things that have happened lately! Here's the low-down on my flatmates. I have 2 from Scotland- Lauren and Camilla (she actually lived in South Africa til she was 7), one from Ireland- Bri, one from Hungary/France- Nikole, and one from Germany- Jana. I haven't talked with them all very much since we never all seem to be in the flat at the same time, but have had some good conversation with Nikole and Jana. Nikole loves salsa so I'm going to take classes with her and also help her with her English and she's going to help me with Spanish because she can speak many languages! Jana is really sweet and she just moved in yesterday, so I'm excited to talk more with her. It's extremely strange not living with good friends, but I really think it will be a good experience.

One more thing.. I finally got to register for classes today! I am taking "Literature, History, and Thought: 1848 - 9/11", "Romans, Celts, Druids, and Warriors", "Moral Philosophy", and "Psychology for Neuroscience and Sports Studies". I am so excited about all my courses. They all sound interesting and will all end up transferring as credits back at Hope and will help me meet my requirements from gen. eds. and my psych minor!

Everything here in Aberdeen is really good. I can't wait to begin classes next Monday and also for my trip to Isle of Skye this weekend. I am going to continue to meet new people, figure out Aberdeen, and trust God. Life has been so good and I am thankful for it every second of the day.

I love you all!

(pictures will hopefully be posted soon)