Saturday the 24th

The 24^th-Saturday- This weekend was awesome! It started at 10:15am on Saturday, when I got up. At noon, I went to lunch. Lunch is only from noon to 1:30 or 2. After that, I went to the sports “fayre.” I signed up for: touch rugby, trampoline, polo, archery, canoe, in line hockey, cricket, squash, rugby, and netball. I think netball is like basketball with no backboard and you play with a soccer ball. I was there for a very short time, like less than 30 minutes. When I came back to my room, I did not feel like being alone anymore, so I called my friend, Elizabeth. We met in town a little after 2. I felt so bad that I was late. I would have been even later if I did not take a taxi. I waited for the bus for a while and it never came. I got the same taxi driver from last night. Once in town, Elizabeth and I walked around aimlessly for a while. We went to the medieval history building to see if my class location was up- it was not. Then we walked around some more. We got ice cream; I got mint chocolate. It tasted more like peppermint. I also got some nice high heel dress shoes for the opening ball on October 8^th. I found 2 nice pairs I like in Rogerson’s shoe store. I asked to try on a 9, and then said that that was a US size. The lady was very nice and said that was a 7 in UK sizes. The pair I bought was a size 5! I tried on every half size from 7 to 4.5! I got the pair that was not pointy; they were closer to a size 7, I guess it was a different shoe company. I always want pointy shoes, but I just thought of a witch the whole time I was wearing them. After the shoes, which the lady made a joke about shrinking feet, we went to the textbook store in the union to ask about our classes. They have a booklist for the classes there. However, not my class, and the other class I am taking has 5 books, 3 of which are over 1000 pages I would say. We both decided not to buy the books at that time. It was nice to talk to someone about getting organized at the University of St. Andrews. This whole “uni” is so disorganized to us, not to the UK students. We parted ways because we ran out of things to do. The bus was very very late to go back to DRA. I still think that guy jinxed it yesterday. It was more than 20 minutes late. Then I realized, by the time I got back I would have to go back into town to get dinner, since dinner is not served on the weekends in DRA. So, I went to Tesco and got some pasta, sauce and avocados from South Africa. The line at Tesco is always super line. It takes more than 10 minutes to check out-always. When I got back I made myself some pasta with chicken carbonara sauce and avocados. I ate it in my room. When everyone else got back, they had no plans for dinner, but I did not want it to be like the first night again. Later, Jonathon was making his dinner. I sat with him in the kitchen and kept him company. He wanted to hear some of my blog, so, I read him a few sections for Word, because there is no wireless internet here (although they are putting it in as we speak). After that, I showed pictures of the US on my computer to Jonathon. I thought it was really cool that he wanted to see them and learn about the US, my other flatmates don’t. Then around 8:15, I walked to the Sports Centre. It was dark out and very scary, there were not many people out. I took the long way because the short cut is called “rape alley.” I don’t care that it is because it is next to a rape seed field, it is still called rape alley. I paid 3 pounds to use the gym. I could not find the in-line hockey club though, or the place where to sports fayre took place earlier. It was a really small gym on the inside, with an even smaller workout room- then again, I am comparing it to KU. It was about the size of one you would find in a hotel. Then by chance as I was asking the front desk again, where it was, because there was badminton on the only place big enough to play hockey, I ran into the team captain from earlier. Apparently if you go though the locker rooms, there is another little area. That is where I entered for the Faye and where the gear was. (The big gym has 2 entrances to the inside of the building, on opposite sides of the locker rooms). There was one other girl there when I arrived. She was so happy to see another girl. I got rollerblades on and found a right and left handed glove and a long stick. It was not too hard to play with this equipment. It went from 9-10:30pm. At first we just shot around, and then we did the standard warm up drill with 2 pucks- which was an adventure since you usually need at least 8. We scrimmaged the rest of the time, more than an hour. I put on a helmet, with no cage, for this part. We switched up the teams, by pulling sticks, 3 times. I scored 3 goals and had one assist. All the goals were either rebounds or someone passing it to me in front of the net. The assist was a 2 on 0, and I back handed back to the jerk. Everyone was excited when I scored and got the assist, except one jerk. He thought he was the shit; everyone was very nice and welcoming. The jerk is from New Jersey and went to boarding school in Boston where he played ice hockey. He was one of the few from the US. I tried to talk to him, but it was like pulling teeth. Anyway, it was really fun, especially since all the guys were okay; I was not overly bad or good. There were a few people that had never skated or played. There were about 4 girls. I did meet someone named Jon, I think (pronounced y-on) from Sweden. I thought that was really cool. He was not that great at hockey, as I stereotypically thought of Swedeners. So, apparently, we have practice once a week and in late October we start playing other universities in Scotland! After hockey, I walked back though rape alley by myself. I was going to go back the street way, and walk with the first girl there for the really creepy, dark, residential street, with no traffic and a cat on it, before we had to split up to go to other dorms, but, then another very nice girl, from shanghai, said she had to go to Albany park, which I thought was right next to DRA. Then before the start of rape alley, we realized that it was the other direction. I was thinking of Fife Park. So, I talked to my mom on the way back and it was not so bad, there were like 3 people on the path. On the right of the path is a field, which I saw a huge farm equipment machine with its lights on working, and on the left is a huge hedge and behind the hedge are playing fields. I got back around 10:50, Naomi was here. At 12:30 ish Douglas and Faye came back, which to me seems to be an earlier to come back for partying.  But they usually are back by 1. I went to bed around 1:20am.

Today, I also found on isaint (it is like Enroll and Pay for KU, it is administration stuff) my class schedule for the Castle class, which I already know the part posted. I also found on MMS (module management system), it is like Blackboard, readings for both my classes and a class “booklet” for the other class I am taking. It looks like lots of reading. Each week has about 4-6 “essential readings” and 8-10 “recommended readings!” Also, the discussions happen after the class, but are about the week before. However, there is no class the week before Christmas break, so my last class would be December 5^th. I think that is because there is one class in the next semester to go other the 3 hour exam results from this semester. There are also two 2,500 word essays this semester. I just keep telling myself that you get all the information the first day, so the first day is always overwhelming. But, things spread out.