Thursday, January 6, 2011

The Day is Finally Here

I leave today to spend 5 months in Edinburgh, Scotland. A lot of people have asked me, why Scotland? To be honest, I don't really know, it just sort of happened. I knew I definitely wanted to study abroad, but at the beginning of my search Scotland wasn't even on my radar. And then, just like that, everything fell into place. I talked to several people who had been to Scotland and loved it, so I started to investigate it. Around that same time I learned that my great grandfather was born in Scotland and that I still have relatives who live there. That was pretty cool to find out. Then I found that Gordon had a connection with the University of Edinburgh, and the rest was history. The University of Edinburgh was established in 1583, pretty hard to believe! It's located in the heart of Edinburgh, Scotland's capital. In terms of size, it has 28,000 students, I guess that's a few more faces than Gordon's 2000. I will be taking 3 classes while I'm over there, as of right now they are Visualizing Scotland, Democracy in Comparative Perspectives, and Politics of the Welfare State.


I'm already signed up for a pizza night the first night I'm there put on by the International Student Center so I'll hopefully meet some people there and experience what Scottish pizza is like, I can only imagine. After that they are taking the group on a pub crawl where we'll get to stop at some of the most popular pubs and get a tour of the city. I'll probably be running on about an hour or two of sleep at the time, but when in Rome...


I have mixed emotions about leaving, I'm so excited to go but of course am sad to leave home. It's definitely bittersweet. I'm excited to live in the city, to meet new friends, to become a regular at great pubs and cafes, to explore as much as I can, and to see what God has in store for me. Maybe I'll even pick up an accent. At the same time I'm going to miss the good old US of A. I'll miss my family, friends, American food, my couch, cats, and many more things . I will be out of my comfort zone for a while, which I'm sure will be tough.


Good last breakfast state side!


Of course a snowstorm on the day I have to go

I'll do my best to update this as regularly as I can with what I'm doing and pictures. I'm hoping to get to travel to a bunch of places in Europe while I'm there to the delight of my parents, right? Anyway, please keep me in your prayers and email/facebook/skype me all the time!!

Talk to you from the other side of the Atlantic,

Katie

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