the end. or just the beginning?

“We shall not cease from exploration

and at the end of all our exploring

will be to arrive where we started

and know the place for the first time.”

T.S. Eliot

4:14 PM and pitch black outside my library window

(We're really far north. Which equals not much sunlight during these winter months)

Apologies for the lack of posts lately, but now as I sit in the library working on research for an essay that isn't due for 2.5 weeks I feel obligated to update...

Edinburgh:

tastie tatties.

backed potato + lots of different toppings to choose from ( I chose chicken tikka-

they are curry crazy over here and I like it).

looks gross, tastes unbelievably delicious.

what I saw outside the bus on our way to Scotland vs. Fiji rugby game.

friends at said rugby game.

crazy men.

hostel living.

where J.K. Rowling wrote..

table she sat at. with view of Edinburgh castle.

I love Edinburgh lots.

London:

Big Ben.

Buckingham Palace.

crazy awesome bird we saw while walking through St. James Park.

best life choice.

Wonderful place- Tate Modern.

Traveling. Seeing. It's all really cool. But it's not these pictures that matter. Sure they represent small fragments of things that hit my optical nerves, but in the large scheme of things they don't compare to what in actuality is of importance.  *I'm not disregarding pictures*  I am obviously a LOVER of photos! Capturing beauty that is fleeting and transforming it into a permanent object (a photograph).  Bringing attention to others sights that are so often overlooked. How they tell stories.  I have deep love for photographs... and taking them. But what I'm trying to get at is what is MOST important.  It's the time spent with friends exploring. It's the talking, listening, responding, silence, amazement, confusion and understanding that matters. The things that will have affected me most from my time abroad will not be these pictures. It will be everything mentioned above.

I think one reason why I haven't posted much lately is because words have seem to become really unsatisfying lately. Everything is still processing.. verbalizing takes lots of effort.

 I'm not ready to be torn from this place where I am just learning how to j-walk without fear of death, where I am now learning to be a culinary success in the kitchen, where I finally know my way around the city, where I am building relationships....  However, the holidays beckon me and I can't wait to be embraced by my family and friends back home in 3 short weeks. Excited for Christmas music in my living room, and being in a HOUSE with maybe a couch or three, laying by a fireplace...  Bittersweet.

This weekend Ella and I are off to York to visit our good friend Molly. We've been planning to visit each other while we're both in the UK since.... February of last year? She came to Aberdeen in October now it's our turn to see the place she's being calling home for the past few months... can't wait :)

sending ALL my love to my adventure-followers,
Jess



(no clue why the spacing is being weird on this post!..sorry bout that)

Side note

If you watched my Ben Nevis video on Youtube, hope you enjoyed it! I have heard good reviews. We like it lots as well, thanks :)

If you want to really be inspired to be a superhero, look at this video : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sgl9PDEOdeU&feature=related

Every year they have a race up the mountain.... and I think it is so cool.

pretty soon I will update you about real life. but I'm swamped at the moment and this is just brief procrastination, a real post would be major procrastination.

talk to you all soon.

trying to catch time as it is slipping away (...one more month =/ )

The best I can do.

I could type pages and pages of how waterfalls flew down the mountain side like streamers being let loose from above or try my hardest to verbalize the feeling I experienced being on that summit. . . but my words could never suffice. There is a small link on the left side of my blog a little ways down that says My Youtube Page.  Click it.  Watch "Ben Nevis"  That's the best I can do to re-tell (via internet) the events of this past Saturday.   

The words that flooded my mind the entire time:

i thank you God for most this amazing by E. E. Cummings

i thank You God for most this amazing

day:for the leaping greenly spirits of trees

and a blue true dream of sky;and for everything

wich is natural which is infinite which is yes

(i who have died am alive again today,

and this is the sun's birthday;this is the birth

day of life and love and wings:and of the gay

great happening illimitably earth)

how should tasting touching hearing seeing

breathing any-lifted from the no

of all nothing-human merely being

doubt unimaginable You?

(now the ears of my ears awake and

now the eyes of my eyes are opened)

Off to visit our neighbors.

This past weekend, four friends and I decided to do a little island hopin.  We went to Ireland. It was a trip I will never forget...

We made it to Dublin with no problem at all.  The one hour flight was over before I could finish a chapter of my book.  The bus ride to Galway was a bit longer, but it was completely worth it when we got there.  Perfect weather allowed us to enjoy our drinks from the most famous pub in Galway, The Quays (a recommendation from my Irish flat-mate), outside on the streets where we were able to take in all the people, shops, and night culture.  

Saturday we explored the town.  We went in the shops, ate delicious crepes, walked the dock by the sea, visited a market, and went to the Galway Halloween Festival (which included a re-make of MJ's Thriller video). 

         

  

Saturday night, Halloween, was great. There was a party at our hostel with lots of free snacks and drinks.  We played games with other travelers and met people from Australia, Finland, and all over-even a Michigander (who worked at the hostel). After that, we went back outside.  We heard there was some more of the festival activities, but we didn't really know what.  As we were walking down the streets, we somehow got swept up into this MASSIVE parade! There were people with these huge orange masks on, hundreds of different costumes, musicians, and just people dancing down the streets.  We joined them.  We danced for what seemed like hours and just had the best time ever.  As it was happening, I couldn't really believe I was dancing down the streets of Ireland in a halloween parade.  It was so good.

Now begins the series of not-so-fortunate events...

It all began with a curious look given to me by the man with a braid in his beard who asked me where the rest of my details were on my boarding pass as I handed it to him before entering the gates to walk to the plane.  I replied, 'what details?'  'Right here', he said, as he pointed to a few lines on my boarding pass that I didn't give a second thought to.  As a confused expression formed on my face, he started talking to the other Ryanair worker who was scanning the other line's boarding passes. After being told that I was missing some crucial information on my boarding pass that I really should have, the other worker told my braided beard friend that he should just let me go. As I again showed my boarding pass to the lovely flight attendant at the door of the plane and received no such scolding, I sat down and got situated on the plane.  When my other friends sat down and Andy told us that one of the flight attendants took his ticket, we were a bit confused.  We talked about the fact that we were missing the so-called 'crucial' information on our boarding pass from Aberdeen to Dublin, but absolutely no one said anything to us about it.

Just after we had fastened our seat belts and got comfortable after concluding that it was just a strange thing that happened, a lady with a too-tight bun and painted on smile said, 'You five need to come with me and talk to our captain.' I don't even know what I was thinking at that point.  We went up, were told we had to get off the plane, tried to argue a bit about the fact that this situation was being handled in two completely different ways since no one in Aberdeen told us it was a problem, being told that was their fault and they could all be fired, we got dropped off in the middle of the runway. We were let back in to the airport by a man in a bright orange vest that usually handles the luggage.  We wandered around the deserted hallways, talked to as many people as we could about the situation, ended up spending way too many euros on internet usage in the airport and way too many euros buying a new plane ticket and bus ticket for the next day.  

The following pictures document our airport camp sites for that evening as we had about 14 hours to kill until our next flight....

Truth of the matter is- the night was spent with a lot of reading, writing, good conversation, card playing (with guys from Finland that we met in the hostel who coincidentally had a flight at 1 AM that morning), i-pod listening, and humor.  Julie and I formed a new language and laughed at pretty much everything.

As I mentioned earlier, this is a trip I will NEVER forget.  Mostly for unbelievably wonderful reasons and a little because of some silly events that went down in the Dublin airport...