Officially done!
May 31, 2006 / 2:39 pm
Posted From: San Diego, CA
Well, it's fucking official now. I set out to Ireland over 4 months ago without a plan except to figure things out as I went along. I figured if all else failed I could put plane tickets home on my credit card and pay it off afterwards. Well.. today I got paid, and cleared my credit card. My crazy plan has officially WORKED, despite all skepticism, and today it has officially reached completion. Driving back from my bank, I cranked up the radio in celebration of my victory and in a miracle of propriety the song shouted at the top of my speakers lungs "Done! Done, and on to the next one!"
Woohoo!!
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Thuban (5/31/2006 3:02 pm)
WOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!! Congrats Noah, I knew if anyone could pull it off it would be you!
Andrew (6/7/2006 10:13 pm)
Sweet.
Armand (6/12/2006 4:31 pm)
Congrats dude..whats the next trip?? And you were in/are in SD??
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Back! In the USS... R?.. er.. uh.. A!
April 23, 2006 / 8:16 am
Posted From: Gee, I wonder.
Well... I was planning on not telling everyone so I could surprise them by showing up suddenly. But.. I ended up having to tell a few people, and a few others it seemed like it would be impossible to surprise. And plus, I realized that the people I want to surprise don't actually read this thing.
BUT.. just in case.. if you read this, please don't go announcing it to everyone (or anyone, if possible) that I'm back, because I might want to surprise one of those 'everyone' in the next week or so.
Anyhow.. I flew into New York the other day on Air India, and it was pretty crazy. Everyone was driving on the wrong side of the road! It was the warmest weather I've experienced in 3.5 months.. the cloudless sky was startling. I saw a baseball field and a skyscraper each for the first time in months.
Anyhow.. well, feel free to email me at irishrover@safe-mail.net if you want to get ahold of me.
Time for an anticlimactic ending. Maybe I'll write some inspirational conclusions about the trip later on..
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(4/23/2006 1:52 pm)
Hehehe. Air India.
Sarah Marks (4/28/2006 6:12 am)
HOLY SHIT YOUR BACK! YAY! LET US REJOICE!
Mike M (5/3/2006 3:35 pm)
Dude, I doubt you check this anymore, but give me a call tonight. We go sailing!!
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Leaving Edinburgh...
April 18, 2006 / 1:59 pm
Posted From: Edinburgh, Scotland
Well, I went on the bus tour of the highlands, today. All in all it was pretty good. My tour guide has been driving stuff (tours, city buses, chafeur stuff) for 40 years, and had some crazy stories. Having been doing stuff for so long, he also had lots of good info to spill out about everything. Quite fun. And yes, I saw a decent bit of the highlands, including Loch Ness. No, no Nessie sightings.
Anyhow.. well... I couldn't find any easy way of getting from Edinburgh to California, so... I've booked a flight on Air India for Thursday. I went with the vegitarian meal. Hope everything goes well.
Hopefully I'll see everyone again at some point.
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Ant Pat (4/18/2006 2:14 pm)
Those tour guides are quite the characters aren't they? In some ways its a good way to enjoy a lot of scenery without having to worry about staying on the wrong side of the road. Sounds like fun. xoxo
Seiben (4/18/2006 7:38 pm)
Just Photoshop it and sell it to the Enquirer.. :P That might even solve your problems getting home! ^_^
Seiben (4/18/2006 7:39 pm)
It, being a photo of Nessie, I should add. XD
Ant Pat (4/19/2006 1:36 pm)
I'm sure with your talented computer know-everything friends, a photo of Nessie would be a piece of cake! What a great fund raising idea!
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Haggis, Easter Picnic, Silverknowes, etc
April 17, 2006 / 3:17 am
Posted From: Edinburgh, Scotland
Synopsis: I ate haggis at the World's End pub, participated in a big, fun, American Easter picnic, and saw some nice scenery in some Edinburgh suburbs.
Well... I think I've seen what I can see in Edinburgh.
First of all, by the way, I did go to have some haggis at the World's End pub. Had some steak and ale pie there, too, actually. Myself and Jana and Nathan all went and split both 3 ways. It was all very good.. but.. the haggis was tiny!!! I guess the breakfast deal was not indicative of the rest of their meals, because the $12 "Haggis Chieftan" was a little well formed blob that looked as if it was made in a coffee mug that was turned upside down, making for a grand total of probably 3 or 4 ounzes of haggis. Oh well... it WAS really good, if not quite worth it, and not exactly traditionally served. I may try to buy some more somewhere else for cheaper sometime. Now I can officially say "Mmmmm, sheep innards."
Easter was pretty fun. I went to a big picnic with a lot of Jana's friends out in this big, crazy park called Beecraigs. It was a very.. American event. Burgers, hot dogs, soccer balls (although there was a rugby ball as well), an american football, frisbees, pasta salad, soda, lots of people, and even a couple dogs running around. I hadn't thrown a frisbee or kicked around a soccer ball in a long time; it was very cool. And the food was all very good as well. There was a great jungle gym about 30 feet tall made for adults and a cool zipline.. which, unfortunately, I never went on. It was a pretty sunny day for the most part, but, being Scotland, there were some bits of rain (where nearly 30 people all huddled underneath this relatively small cover over the picnic tables). Well, at one point someone decided that the rain had 'settled in' and wasn't going away and so it was decided to retired to someones house for more fun indoors. I looked at the sky and told Jana I thought it was going to clear up right as we were leaving. I guess maybe I should have been more vocal about it.. because indeed, 20 minutes later, when everything was finally packed up, the sun came out to stay for a while, and everyone was disappointed. But, alas, the decision to leave had already been made, so no zipline for me...
But.. we did go back to their house, and there was a soccer pitch (field) a few blocks away, so several of us went and played a game of half field soccer and enjoyed the sun, after a few games of Mafia were played at the house. Man, I am reeeeally out of shape. It didn't take long at all for me to be exhausted. Anyhow, then we came back from soccer and played MORE mafia. Without going into too many details here, the mafia playing was preeetty crazy, especially with 15 people in the first games, and some new, interesting rules introduced in the last game (that resulted in a prolonged argument about the rules, oi).
All in all, fun times.
So anyhow... I finally got up to the Scottish National Gallery the other day, and I finished seeing everything I wanted to see at the Royal Museum and Museum of Scotland.
I also spent a day busing out to this area called Silverknowes which had been explained to me as very pretty on several occasions, and was indeed quite nice. I walked along the Firth of Forth (a body of water attached to the North Sea) to an area called Crammond as well, which was also nice, and walked along a cool path by the River Almond. On the way back I saw a "castle" which was really just an Edwardian mansion. I don't know what Edwardian means yet, though.
So... like I said, I think I've seen all I need to see in Edinburgh. Tomorrow, I'm going on an all day bus tour of the highlands, which I'm really looking forward to. Then I think on Wednesday I'm going to head out.. heading south. We'll see what happens.
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Mom/Cat (4/17/2006 9:26 pm)
Good for you.. no chocolate? I hope you see some good things in England. I really enjoyed a boat ride out of London that took us to the International Date line. Is that right? Anyway, it was a nice ride. How is the money holding up?
Love,
Mom
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Arthur's Seat, St Bernard's Bar, etc
April 13, 2006 / 4:37 am
Posted From: Edinburgh, Scotland
Synopsis: I hiked up Arthur's seat, saw some traditional music, saw some more of the Royal Museum. Then I went to a local bar and chatted with some actual Scottish people (there's supposedly not many in Edinburgh).
Well, thanks for the ideas, folks, and thanks Sarah for the sentiment. I miss them, too.. perhaps I will be able to visit sometime soon.
So, let's see... Well, yesterday I finally hiked up Arthur's Seat, which is this mountain (or maybe just a big hill) that sticks up rather obviously on one side of the city of Edinburgh, or the middle if you count the suburbs. I'm sure the name has some legendary significance but I don't know it yet. But, the top of it is basically one of the tallest points in Edinburgh (there are some other mountains around the outskirts that may count, but they don't have the same interesting shape). So after a relatively short hike I got some breathtaking views (I did, in fact, breathe while I was up there) of the city all around.
On my way to Arthur's Seat I also saw Calton Hill, which is this hill right at the end of one of the main drags (Princes Street) that is surprisingly quiet for being so close to the city center, and has several monuments on it. The Nelson monument, erected in dedication to Lord Admiral Nelson after the battle of Trafalgar (where he died), has a ball at the top which raises up a few minutes before 1, and then drops precisely at 1pm so that ships in the nearby harbour will have a visual reference by which to set their clocks. This was started to accompany the 1 oclock gun which is fired supposedly every day from Edinburgh castle but which decidedly did not fire the day I was there (maybe its only on weekdays).
So I was on my way up to Calton Hill about noonish. I stopped into the post office and another place or two... ended up getting right up near the hill at almost 1. I saw the ball raise up, and set myself at a good spot to view it dropping. The big clock on the top of the nearby town hall or whatever said that it was about 5 til. So I waited...
Without going into too much detail about the waiting part, I ended up spending most of the time staring at the ball until the big clock said it was 5 AFTER 1... I was perplexed, thinking that maybe it was going to disappoint me like the gun. So I started walking toward the hill, trying to keep my eye on the ball just in case. I got to the base of the hill and it still hadn't fallen.. the clock said 6 or 7 past, now. So I walked up the stairs to the path, and in doing so the ball was out of my sight for about 15 seconds. And when I got to the top, the ball was down. Go figure.
Oh well, supposedly it happens at 1 every weekday, so maybe I'll catch it some other time.. and it is, after all, only a big ball dropping.
Well, the views from Calton Hill were very nice as well, and much more easily accessible than those from Arthur's Seat, and the few monuments were interesting, too. For 3 british pounds you can hike up the Nelson monument to get even better views, but I decided against it. Unfortunately, they wouldn't take my American Maritime Museum card for admission.
Anyway, the day before that I finally finished off the Museum of Scotland, and saw some of the Royal Museum as well. At the Museum of Scotland I took a fun tour that had the theme of bagpipes and other musical instruments. It was very interesting and informative, and there was only 1 other guy on the tour so it was half tour and half chat, which was neat. It was interesting that the tour guide pointed out several errors in the museum displays as he gave the tour, and those were just regarding musical instruments. It makes me wonder what other errors there might be in the museum. Just details on particular items, mostly, though.
Anyhow.. I guess I've been going in a reverse chronology so far, but now I'll go back forward to last night. After Arthur's Seat I went back and saw some ore of the Royal Museum, and then came home and ate, and then later in the evening went out to a place called St Bernard's Bar. It's nearby to the flat I've been staying in, and usuallly on the way back from wherever I've been, so I've been eyeing it for a little bit now. Basically, I had this plot to go to some bar where there would likely be locals, and try to meet some actual Scottish people, since most of Jana's friends are other Americans or Africans, etc. And I had this particular place pegged as a good option.. usually when I looked in it wasn't too crowded, and it was generally an older crowd. Also, the bar, which was right next to two others, looked to be the most modest of them.. the least 'shmancy' if you will. Basically, it looked like a place that locals were likely to go, and in Ireland I'd found that old locals were usually pretty friendly and willing to chat with strangers.
So, last night I finally went, and I wasn't disappointed. There was a football (soccer) game on, so I was able to start talking to some of them about the game pretty easily, and it was a really good game to boot. And indeed, I was the only person there who wasn't a local regular. They were all just as friendly as I'd come to expect in Ireland, and I had a nice time talking with them, although it was quite difficult at times to understand what they were saying. After I had mentioned that I was low on money, in the context of saying that I was probably leaving soon, one guy even bought me a pint! And another guy shared a round of some home-made Bailey's type stuff (he had brought a bottle of it with him) with the last few of us that were left when the bar was about to close. It was pretty good.
The same guy had an idea for me to get some cash-in-hand work, saying that I should hang around a furniture store and offer my help to the vans that came to move the furniture. I don't know if I'm quite that interested, though. But in general, unfortunately, it seems that they're much more strict in the UK about under the table work, and especially in Edinburgh since it's a big city. But the bartender said that one of the other bartenders is leaving and that he'd talk to his boss for me at least. ::shrug::
Going back back again, I forgot to mention that on Monday night I went and saw some more traditional music at the same pub as last week. This week I was treated to a large gathering of musicians, including all kinds of instruments, and even this old guy who sang a tune every once in a while (I wish I could have understood the words).
Anyway.. I still don't quite know how I'm getting home, and the job I applied for back in the States still hasn't emailed me back (they said they'd get back within a couple days, but it's been 3, or 5 if you count the weekend). But I think that very soon I'm going to end up just hitching to Southampton and standing at the end of the pier with my thumb out and a cardboard sign that says 'North America.' When I told this plan (in not exactly those words) to one of the guys last night and told him that I was a sailor, he said he didn't think I'd have any problems with it. So, that's encouraging. But, for the moment, I'm going to continue not worrying about it... now, I'm going to try to finish off the Royal Museum, and if my stomach settles in the next couple hours, it will be haggis time! Hmm... I guess if my stomach is up to it, I'll be eating stomach.
Spock: Fascinating.
Oh yeah.... I almost forgot.. as of this morning I've been in Europe 3 months!!! WOOHOO!
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Mom/Cat (4/13/2006 10:31 am)
I think I'd vote for charging a ticket on the credit card and save more time for adventure. It is a long way to North America by ship...working. Do your hitching from the east coast and make your crossing easier. I know it is easy to spend time in Edinburgh with the great accommodations, but don't miss out on taking a train to the south of England. Congrats! on three months!!
Love you,
Mom
Ant Pat (4/16/2006 11:59 am)
I agree with Mom/Cat. If you charge your ticket back, then stay as long as you can. Sounds like things are going too well to just up and leave just yet. Think... Edinburgh...Sacramento... hmmm. love, Ant Pat
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Museums, Ceilidh, Church, still no way home..
April 10, 2006 / 4:55 am
Posted From: Edinburgh, Scotland
Synopsis: I've been doing some more museums, finally getting to the end of the Museum of Scotland. I've also been hanging out with Jana and her friends a bit, and even went to her church once, and happened to be there when a 'prophet' was there doing some 'readings.' Interesting but not 100% conclusive. I went to a slightly modern ceilidh. I still don't know how I'm getting back home, but my money is running out so it may be soon.
Well, it's been a little while.. about a week, actually, and it hasn't been completely action packed but there have been some moments.
First of all, I spent a chunk of this week working on the museum that I've been working on. I finally pretty much finished the Museum of Scotland the other day (all but one little section). I thought about it and figured out that it was the 5th day that I spent more than a couple hours there. Yeah, I'm a slow museum go-er. But once I got past the ancient pre-history, I moved a bit faster.
On Friday night I went to a ceilidh (pron: kay-lee), which was lots of fun. A ceilidh is a traditional celtic group dance, like a square dance or a hoe-down, basically. This particular one was good for me because they taught you all the dances beforehand and then often led you through it for the first couple rounds (all the dances involve doing a set of maneuvers over and over). Most of the time the dances quickly degenerated into a general scramble of everyone trying to keep up, get back on time with the dance, or keep from bumping into each other, but since everyone (but the ceilidh junkies that knew what they were doing) was in the same boat it was fun for everyone. In fairness, sometimes with a bit of concentration lots of people were able to keep up pretty well on the less complex dances.
Anyway, this particular ceilidh was very cool as well because of the unique band. They had a fiddle, yes, but then the rest of the band was comprised of the not-exactly-traditional combo of 2 guitars, a bass, and drums. So basically, the music rocked, which just made the whole thing more fun.
Anyhow... well, part of the reason I'm here in Edinburgh is to visit Jana, and most of the reason she's here is because she has been helping to organize the startup of this new church. So I thought it would make sense to at least go once and see for myself what she's been working on, here.
Well, I happened to go to Jana's church (well, the service actually takes place in a movie theatre that they rent, heh) on the day that they had a visiting pastor coming to speak in their church who supposedly has the 'spritual gift' of prophecy. He said that god talks to everyone, and that he listens and is able to interperet what god is telling him. Basically, he's one of those guys that points at people in the crowd and tells them personal things about themselves and tells them something vague about what's in store for them.
Well, he did several of what I'll call 'readings' throughout the day, and while I, as resident skeptic, can't say that anything was quite conclusive, I must, as an open minded skeptic, admit that some of the things he said were a bit uncanny.
Well, it was interesting, at the very least. Unfortunately, he didn't do a reading on me, hehe.
After church I utilized my all day bus pass (well, sortof) to go wandering around a bit. I say sortof because I didn't really go very far on the bus, but did some walking in a couple neighborhoods, which wasn't terribly eventful, but was nice, I guess. It actually snowed a few times throughout the afternoon, which was neat (and surprisingly not cold). The highlight of the afternoon was probably when I was walking through this wooded path that ran through the neighborhood, and at an intersection spotted a fox down the next path. The fox and I watched each other intently for about a minute, with the snow picturesquely falling between us, but then it dashed off when I smiled at it. Go figure.
At one point, though, when I was at the very far end of one of the bus routes, I found myself on a road which led to 2 main highways to go to other cities. The thought occurred to me that it would be fairly easy to hitch-hike to one of those cities from where I was, but unfortunately I had left all my stuff (and my passport) back at the flat. Nevertheless, the brief experience has rekindled my wanderlust a bit. I may end up having one last wreckless hitch-hiking adventure up north into the highlands or something.
Other than that, the last week I have done a fair amount of hanging out with Jana and meeting lots of her friends, which has been very cool. Most of them, of course, asked me the same questions over and over, so I might as well answer them here, as well..
'No, I don't know how long I'm staying, but my money is running out so it won't be too much longer. No, I don't know how I'm getting back; I've been looking into hitching a ride on a boat, but I may end up putting a ticket back on my credit card and working it off later.'
Incidentally, one of Jana's friends, who was visiting here for 2 days on her way to South Africa, told me that she has had success hitching rides to places on boats, and told me that there is at least one website that posts crew needs for yacht deliveries and that sort of thing, but that she also once just went down to a harbor and told some guy what she wanted to do and had him introduce her to lots of people at the harbor on another day.
I found one such website, but there weren't any promising leads. But I've been thinking that since I've had good luck being more whimsical than intentional, I might just pick a good sized port town, catch a bus, and just see what happens.
I emailed a cruise ship company last week to try to work my way across but for some reason they haven't emailed me back. Oh well.
Well.... we'll see. For now I will just worry about getting up to Calton hill (which has a couple monuments, an unfinished replica of the parthenon, and some good views) and getting over to the World's End pub in the next few days. The haggis is six pounds fifty pence ($12), by the way, but unfortunately no one wants to split it with me. I think I'll get the full haggis meal instead of the breakfast combo, so I can get the traditional neeps and tatties with it.
And yes, it has been nice to have been traveling light. When I flew over to Scotland I was .5kg (1 lb) under the baggage weight limit. After that I would have had to pay about $5 for every lb that I was over the limit.
Oh yeah, and by the way, I don't recall if I mentioned this before but I found out that the non-smoking law is just in Scotland. It's very interesting how England and Scotland are somehow both the same country and yet different countries at the same time. I haven't figured it out just yet.
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Mike M as in Marlatt (4/10/2006 3:39 pm)
You know, I've heard about crazy people who have rowed across oceans.
Zach as in Zach (4/11/2006 2:00 am)
Dude, you could be the first guy to ever swim across the atlantic ocean!
Noah (4/11/2006 2:30 am)
Hmmm... yeah.... that's it! I'll do both! I'll swim the atlantic with a rowboat tied to me!
Seiben, as in Seiben (4/12/2006 9:15 pm)
There's an idea. You'll save a bundle! :D
Sarah Marks (4/13/2006 12:18 am)
Safe travels to ya. I miss our late night meals/chats. I've finally caught up on this journal of yours so hopefully I'll be able to keep better track of how you are doing.
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Castles, castles, castles, and music.
April 4, 2006 / 4:22 am
Posted From: Edinburgh, Scotland
Synopsis: On Saturday a few of us went driving around, seeing 3.5 historical sights for free (the ferry out to the 4th was busted). On Sunday I saw a very, very, very crowded Edinburgh castle and made a poor imitation of the Scottish food 'stovies.' And on Monday I wandered through some book stores and saw some nice traditional/folk music.
Well, it has been an interesting weekend (I'll include Monday in that). First off, on Saturday we did, in fact, go off on our crazy trip to try to see as much history in a day as possible. Well, I'd consider it a success, even though we didn't get to too many places.
We started off going to Loch Leven castle, which was neat partly because we actually had to take a ferry out to it, since it's on an island in the middle of a loch (lake).
We took some fun pictures and poked around, and then quickly headed off again.
The plan originally was to go back towards Edinburgh to a town called Crammond, because although unrelated to free history weekend, there was a crane-in going on that many of us were interested in seeing. I think they take some boats out of the water for the winter, or something, and on Saturday they used a big crane to lift the boats and move them back into the water. Supposedly. We didn't actually get to it, because we were running later than we thought we would and it was decided to continue on to more castles instead of risking getting there too late and missing it altogether.
Next we went to Stirling castle, which was also perched up on top of a big, crazy rock like Edinburgh castle is. It was pretty neat, and very big, and I wish we weren't in a hurry because there was a lot to see and read. The one problem, though, was that there wer TONS of people there, seeing as it was free that day. So everything was crowded and several traffic jams developed at bottlenecks.
Next we went to some abbey. I don't recall the name of it, and it doesn't matter much, because we didn't actually get to see it, really. We got all the way to the site of it, and we were looking forward to another boat ride, since this one was also on an island, only to discover that they were having technical problems with the boats and that we couldn't go. We even saw some of the people coming back that were apparently stranded out in the water when their boat broke down. We discussed borrowing the little rowboat that was parked nearby but decided to move on, instead.
The next place we went to was Dumbarton castle, which, coincidentally, was also up on a big rock thing, although this time it was kindof built around the sides of it instead of just up on top (since it didn't have a conveniently flat top, I guess). By the time we had poked around Dumbarton it was already 6:something I think, so we didn't have time for any more castles and headed home. Svetlana (who was driving) was heading somewhere else to meet up with her boyfriend, so she dropped us at a train station and we got a nice train ride back into Edinburgh.
I was quite tired so I passed on trying to go to a pub and just made a phone call or two instead.
On Sunday I went to Edinburgh castle (don't worry, I made it there; I just waited til it was free, hehe). Edinburgh castle was pretty neat, but it was about 5 times more crowded than Stirling castle had been! Most places that had a door to go through ended up with a queue (line) to get in, including the Scotland royal what have yous (Crown, Sceptre, Sword that used to signify the Scottish royalty) which had a line all day that was over an hour wait. Even this tiny little chapel, which despite being the oldest building in the castle grounds wasn't very interesting, had a line to get in at some points. Part of this, I think, may be due to the fact that if people see other people somewhere, the sheep think they should go there, too.
An example of this occurred at Stirling castle. We discovered a disabled toilet that wasn't nearby the other toilets, and one of our group had to use it. So the rest of us waited outside in this little, empty space on the side of one of the exhibit halls. Sooooo many people walked over and then saw the sign for toilets and walked away. Almost everyone at least looked our direction because it looked like we were lining up for something. Well, when we went back from the area and loitered outside of it instead, NO ONE even glanced in that direction! They just continued walking the same way everyone else was walking.
So anyway.. Edinburgh castle was crowded. And it's too bad, because there were 2 entire museums inside it's grounds. I briefly walked through one, the war museum (which didn't seem very interesting, actually), and later when I discovered that I had seen pretty much everything to see in the Castle (well, I did spend an entire day at it), I walked slowly through the Royal Scots Regiment museum and read a lot of stuff. Primarily it discussed every military engagement the British have been in for the last 350 years, as context for telling how this regiment (or brigade, or whatever) was involved. I never realized before how much war there has been since 1650!! Man, the British are as bad, if not worse, than the States when it comes to running around all over the world killing people and oppressing the locals. I guess they've had more years as a superpower to wrack up the count. But seriously, there has been so much war, it's disgusting... I mean, there was one period called 'the long peace' in the exhibit, which was a period of about 20 years. And during that time there was still some minor campaigning. And with all of the things that Britain was involved in, France and Germany and Spain and Russia were involved in a lot of them as well.
Anyhow... this post is getting long so I'll stop ranting, now. But I did get to see about everything in Edinburgh castle for free. I guess I may go back sometime to look at the crown jewels and the museums in less crowded circumstances (and less free circumstances), but maybe not.
Sunday night I made a ghetto, American version of stovies. Basically it turned out to be mashed potatos with cooked ground beef and onions mixed in. So.. not especially Scottish. BUT it is really good, and I made a whole lot of it, so it's Tuesday now and there's still some left.
Yesterday, Monday, I took a break from museums to take a look at several bookstores that I had passed by, always on my way to somewhere else so I hadn't been in them before. This was also part of wandering towards the river so as to check out the port there (to see if I might be able to catch a ride back to the States on a boat). It turns out that the little traffic at the port is only small fishing boats, so there's not really any options there, but I did check out the Newhaven Heritage Museum while there, which was neat, and I noticed a bar which said that they were having live folk music that evening. So in the evening I went back and got to listen to some nice music. The place was nearly empty, so when these folks sitting near the band left, the floutist looked around to see if anyone was left and said hello. I walked over to where the others had been sitting, saying that I thought I'd get a better seat, and she invited me to sit at the table there with her and the other musicians, which was neat. We ended up getting to talk with them a bit, and I got to ask them some questions about the differences between Irish and Scottish traditional music. Apparently it's much less appreciated in Scotland, which is too bad.
Well, I'm going to go do some internet searching for a boat to hitch back to North America on, and write up my resume for a boat job back in the States I'm going to apply for. Until next time..
Oh yeah, I almost forgot to mention that while we were driving around between castles I got to see a lot of scenery, too, which was really great. Would have been worth the time even without the castles. Except we almost got into a car crash when the driver and navigator were reduced to spouting drivel by the sight of several adorable, tiny, baby lambs in a field by the road.
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Mom/Cat (4/4/2006 4:54 pm)
Castles are grand! I can't remember the name of the big one Patricia and I visited, but it had amazing panoramic views atop a rock. While you are checking on boat jobs, check on a cruise line. We watched a program telling about the advantages of that kind of work. Combined with your restaurant experience, you would be quite an asset. Just a thought... We went away for the weekend so I wasn't able to tell you sooner that I can't remember the family names for the Black Watch. I'd suggest giving Grandma Helen a call, but she is unpredictable in the "being pleasant" department. Glad you are still having a great time. Have you made it to the "Edge of the World" yet? Love you, Mom and Ken
Ant Pat (4/4/2006 8:54 pm)
Yes, the Pub Mom Cat mentioned had a "hearty" breakfast that we shared and were stuffed afterward... highly recommended. Also, it is very old, it was the edge of Edinburgh at one time, so it is not only quaint but steeped in history. Just don't ask for ice. Have you noticed that they think Americans are daft for wanting ice cubes in their drinks and dole them out one at at time? The breakfast we had included everyting, including haggis, bacon, potatoes, eggs, toast, God, there was more but I can't remember or have blocked the rest. MomCat do you remember anything else? Perhaps a scary sausage or two. I think I'll check my notes to see if the name of the pub is correct. (Just for you, sweetie.) I must be hungry, I'm making an old Irish dish myself right now, Broccoli Cheese quiche. LOL. I'm really glad you're seeing every castle you can. I wish I would have seen more. I do hope you see the city from underground. They may call it a ghost tour, but if you can get past the silly title, it's very interesting to see the old city underneath the newer city.I think you'd enjoy it. Take care, I'm going to check my trip notebook and make sure MomCat has that pub name right, just so you wont miss a grand experience. (Not that I don't trust her), but things may have changes since the year 2000, the price of the breakfast special may have gone up a couple of pounds, but still it was a really good deal, especially if you have someone with whom to share the gigantic portions. Noah, I'm really proud of you and your commitment to having a really good time and being a good world citizen. Keep up the good. Love you. xoxox - The Ant.
Ant Pat (4/5/2006 4:34 pm)
Ant Pat (4/5/2006 4:31 pm)
I just did something really odd, I posted this on your old BLOG, somewhere around 3/18. Very odd. What I wanted to say in the now is this: MomCat and I ate at "the World's End Pub" at the end of the "Royal Mile", that's where we had the wonderful meals that were so big we had to share them. We also ended up a Loch Lomond, the one mentioned in the sad song about lost love. In my notes I have something underlined, and MomCat will laugh if she reads this. It reads: "Remember this: Whole time, LUGGAGE WAS HELL" LOL You were smart to travel light. Love you, The Ant
Mark (AKA Seiben) (4/6/2006 3:29 pm)
dOOd
I think I'm first of the simmers to actually make a comment, but having just spent the better part of two hours reading thru your blog entries, I must say I'm impressed with how you progressed so far.
Glad to know everything's going so well. Times like these, makes me kind of want to travel somewhere too.. meh.. But I have time. Anyways, hope you enjoy the rest of Scotland, I've always wondered what haggis tastes like, heh. And I'm sure everyone's still thinking about you over at STSF.
Cheers!
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More museums, homeless shelter
March 31, 2006 / 9:24 am
Posted From: Edinburgh, Scotland
Synopsis: I'm slowly making my way through all the museums that Edinburgh has to offer, and will be seeing a lot of historical sights for free this weekend. I had an interesting time volunteering at a homeless shelter yesterday evening where I learned about some good Scottish dishes.
Well, I've been continuing to plod along through the Museum of Scotland. Today was my third excursion there, and I finally finished the ground floor, and even got through most of the first floor as well! I'm spending less time looking at every excruciating detail as the years get later, since more recent history is a bit more intuitive. Also, there's more of it, so it's easier to put together a picture, whereas there is so little prehistory to go on, you really have to strain your eyes to see even a hint of what was going on. I figure I might be able to finish the Scottish museum in another day.. then on to the Royal museum and the national gallery and the Scottish war museum.
But I AM enjoying the museum and learning a lot, and I'm looking forward to more.
Speaking of which, this weekend will be exciting, as it is a Historic Scotland (that's Scotlands governmental sort of history bureau that owns the castles and what have you) free weekend. Now that I don't have a car I wouldn't generally be able to take advantage of it, but Jana and a couple of her friends, one of whom DOES have a car, are also interested, so tomorrow we are going to cruise around the general Edinburgh region and see a bunch of sites for free. Then on Sunday I'll probably finally go to Edinburgh castle, which delightfully NOT cost 12 pounds. That's about $22! If I have extra time, there's another castle within easy bus range from Edinburgh, but seeing as how there's supposed to be a museum inside the castle grounds themselves (which incidentally is devoted to the Black Watch regiment (or clan or something), which I may have some geneological roots in).. I don't see myself spending less than the entire day, heh.
Anyhow, last night I took yet another trip off the beaten tourist path. I spent the early afternoon looking into places for the free weekend thing, and then went over to hang out with Jana. While at her place, her friend Svetlana called and said that people were needed to fill in helping at a homeless shelter that evening, and asked if we were interested. Well, we were, so we went to Svetlana's church that evening to help set up and get a bit of a brief on what to expect (I'll bet some of you thought the title meant I had stayed in a homeless shelter, hehe). I cut up some rolls and helped butter some of them, I poured milk into jugs. A lot of the work had already been done (food had been made beforehand and brought in to heat up) so there wasn't a terrible amount for us to do.
Eventually some people started showing up, and we just had to tell them what their food options were and then fetch a plate of whatever they preferred.
Nothing was too spectacular about the experience but it was interesting, anyhow. I was introduced to a bit of Scottish food, though, that we were serving and hence I got to try a little of. First is something called 'mince' I think. I didn't get too much of an impression of it, but it had the texture of a sort of Scottish chili, basically consisting of meat and carrots and onions and stuff. I dunno, I only had a wee bit of it. The other stuff, though, that was new was something called 'stovies.' This stuff is great. It's basically meat and potatos mushed up together into a, well.. a mush. Another key to the recipe is that onions be involved, as well as salt and pepper and often nutmeg. Can you tell I looked up some recipes later? As Nathan pointed out, it doesn't just taste good, but it's just a great concept. It's a full meal mixed together into one hearty mush. Well, some of the more shmancy recipes called for layers and not mush, but the stuff we were serving was mush. And good mush, at that. Definately, to use a bit of Wilson terminology, bachelor chow. Nathan and I have the ingredients already and plan on trying to make some in the coming week.
Anyhow, other than that I didn't really take any Scottish cultural experiences away from the evening. When I had a spare moment I went out to hang out with some of the homeless people there and ended up learning a couple words of Polish. ::shrug::
I had a good time in general, though. It was kindof funny that a couple people thought it was a big deal that I was spending an evening volunteering when I was traveling, on vacation. I kept thinking that it was much more interesting than anything I would have ended up doing that evening, anyhow. And it's not like I was sacrificing one of only 3 nights or anything.. I'll soon be coming up on 3 months abroad.
Well, speaking of cultural experiences, this evening I think I'll try to make it to a pub and see if I can run into any locals and then try to get some sleep so I will be awake for seeing several historical sights tomorrow (as well as a big crane putting boats back into the water after being out all winter, apparently).
Oh yeah, and one last thing; I thought Lucky Number Sleven was a pretty good movie.
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Ant Pat (4/2/2006 8:07 pm)
The only thing missing in the Bachelor Chow recipe is a mobile carrying device, such as bread or a sporan. I've heard that was the original intent of the sporan, to carry food for the day, not just to jazz up the kilt. The first documented 'fast food'. Maybe you have a spare pocket you can fill with mince or stovies. What a silly idea. I think you should try to see Edinburgh Castle, high cost or not, you might regret not seeing it more later than paying a high price for it now. Just my opinion. You're doing a fine job of seeing what you want to see, so who am I to offer suggestions anyway? Have fun.
Love, Ant Pat
your brother (4/10/2006 4:25 pm)
It took me a minute to realize that you weren't talking about me when you said Nathan. I haven't read this thing in a while.
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More photos! Side story about a game of British monopoly.
March 29, 2006 / 2:16 am
Posted From: Edinburgh, Scotland
Okay, well, I decided to put up some more pictures, finally. Hope you enjoy them. I would tell Andrew to make all the photos accessible from the same page and put a link to it on the main page, but he has fallen off the face of the earth (he's stuck in Fresno).
Okay, in addition to the photos, this is just a complete side tangent that doesn't really have any baring on my trip, and doesn't really have anything to do with Ireland or Scotland. No one really needs to read it.
But I wanted to mention the monopoly game we played the other day, because I wanted to brag about my tactics. I'll try to make this short..
So right at the start of the game I did really well really quickly, actually. No one had quite realized the power of getting all 3 of a color yet and I was able to make some early trades to get all the light blue spaces, and before anyone had circled the board twice, I had 4 houses on each of them. I had hotels a turn or two after that, while no one else on the board even had all 3 of anything. Of course, people landed on one of my hotels about 3 times the entire game and that's not an exaggeration. My lack of income lead to my later tactics, in a way.
So anyway, not too long after my quick hotels, Nathan got all 3 reds and started putting houses on them. Between the two of them, Jana and Svetlana had all the greens and later all of the yellows, but despite the fact that they were being thick as thieves and charging each other 1 pound (oh yeah, this was the British version of monopoly - it was weird!) for rents and stuff, Svetlana was too tricksy for her own good and they never fully allied. So the game was dominated by Nathan and his reds pretty quickly, since no one landed on the property of the only challenger. When Maia landed on one of them and owed Nathan over a thousand quid, she ended up giving him Boardwalk and Park Place (Park Lane and Mayfair) for rent since she had to go home anyhow.
Long story short, eventually Nathan had several monopolies, Jana finally got the greens, and Svetlana ended up with the yellows and 2 of the oranges (I had the third).
I realized that I wasn't going to win unless somehow the 4 of us allied against Nathan, so I tried to think if there was another way to go about things. So when Jana landed on Nathan and owed him 1050, but didn't have any money or houses, I paid her debt in exchange for immunity from rent on her greens. Then I convinced Svetlana that we needed some agreement against Nathan and gave her the last orange and immunity to my hotels in exchange for immunity to her properties. Then I ended up owing Nathan 1k and traded him all 3 blues WITH hotels in exchange for the debt and immunity from his properties (which he mostly took because he wanted to get on with the game, admittedly). This left me without property of any sort, but also with immunity to every property on the board except Ruth's railroads and utilities. I was hoping that Go would fund my occasional nights rent in railway stations and that I could just cruise around the board carefree. Incidentally, Ruth was rather lackadaisical about the whole thing, and when I landed on her railroads with no money she let me off the hook. So all I had to worry about was the occasional taxes.
The game was a lot less stressful once I retired, and I realized that I had turned my playing piece into my actual life, just kindof cruising around visiting all sorts of places without too much to worry about.
I wasn't rich, but I felt that I had beaten the game, if not my opponents.
Okay, anyhow, end tangent.
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Noah (3/29/2006 2:58 am)
P.S. Mmmmm, sheep entrails (well, I hope). Did I mention I've already had black pudding, which is made from blood?
Ken Johnson (3/29/2006 6:16 am)
Pudding from blood??? You are a more brave man than I! It sounds like your adventure is more interesting every day. It is great reading about it.
Later,
Ken
Dad (3/29/2006 9:07 am)
Hi Noah. Nancy and I were in Florida visiting Drew so we missed your Sunday phone call (darn). I would have loved talking with you again so call back or let me know the phone number where you're at and I'll call you (at a decent hour). Your short time in Scotland appears to have gone very well (I'm just now catching up on your postings). Great to hear about the castles, museums, and that Edinburgh still rocks. Also nice photos!
I remember the casle on the hill in Edinburgh when I was there decades ago. I was only in the city for a day or so before heading up to Inverness and Loch Ness (yes I did look for Nessie). It's great to hear that all continues to go according to your non-plan plan. Continued gook luck and good cheer. Nancy says hello and is glad all is going well and you're having a great time I look forward to your new postings. Talk to you soon(?) Love Dad
PS Rabbit Proof Fence was a very good movie. Also speaking of zombies, have you seen Shawn of the Dead?
Noah (3/29/2006 9:41 am)
Thanks for the good wishes, Dad; I'll try to call again soon.
It's funny but I actually ate the black pudding before I knew what it was. Despite the name, it is sortof like a sausage, with oats for bulk, and so when I was served little fried slices of something relatively solid when I was absolutely starving (having vomited all the day before - this was during that fishing trip), I didn't even ask.
Anyhow, it's really only a small percentage blood.
And yes, I've seen Shawn of the Dead and liked it a lot.
Yes, my zombie instincts are still sharp as ever. Europe has sharpened my senses, not destroyed, not dulled them. Dang, I don't think anyone that would get that reference reads this thing.
Oh well.. off to 'the cinema' to watch 'a film.'
Armand (3/29/2006 6:48 pm)
if it a’nt scotish its crap..
Hey Noah Glad you are well on you adventure across the pond. I like the pictures esp. the Farming Noah dol er.. action figure, with improved Kale picking grip. The picture you are taking makes me want to go and storm a castle or plan a ambush on some rouge trolls.. LOL
Mom/Cat (3/29/2006 9:05 pm)
Curiously, I heard on NPR the other morning that a circus went through the area of Loch Ness and that the elephants took a trek into the water... accounting for the sightings of the Loch Ness Monster. And the reason it can't be found ... the circus went on to another town. I look forward to hearing about the Highlands! Love, Mom
Zach (3/30/2006 9:27 pm)
gg Noah... gg
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Baking cookies with Americans, Museum of Scotland
March 28, 2006 / 11:47 am
Posted From: Edinburgh, Scotland
Synopsis: see post title.
Don't want to spend too much time on Nathan's computer at the moment, so I'll just put a quick update for now.
Well, I'm still in Edinburgh, and it still rocks.
Yesterday was spent having lots of fun hanging out with Jana and some of her friends. After much deliberation (and wearing of multiple hats), we decided to bake cookies and play board games, so we had some crazy adventures gathering supplies at the supermarket and proceeded to Ruth's house (Jana's friend Svetlana is staying with Ruth, who is an actual Scot) and proceeded with the plan. Much fun (and many very good, albeit slightly different than normal cookies) had by all. Ruth's parents actually invited us all to dinner as well, which was cool, and it was kindof funny because even though we were having dinner at a Scottish family's house, the Americans actually outnumbered the Scots at one point. Jana and myself are obviously American, but so is Nathan who came along, as well as Svetlana who is actually from San Francisco, and Ruth's brother's girlfriend was over who is from Auburn. Jana had to leave just before dinner to babysit, but it was statistically interesting, anyhow.
Today I finally got out to the Museum of Scotland, which was really cool. I happened to walk in about 5 minutes before a 'highlights' tour was going on, so I took that first. And then I went back down to the bottom floor afterwards to work my way back up (it's laid out chronologically going upwards). It's a decent sized place, though, and really good, and I'm a very slow museum goer (I like to read most of the little placcards and stuff), so I only got through most of the ground floor (the 2nd floor from the bottom is called the 'first floor' in the UK/Ireland) in the 3 hours after the tour. The great thing is, though.. it's free! So tomorrow I'm going back for more. And this is just the Museum of Scotland.. it's also attached to the Royal Museum which has stuff about the UK in general.. and then there's also the Scottish War Museum and the National Galleries.. all of which are free!! So I have several days of museuming ahead of me to be sure.
Anyhow, I've found that a lot of the funny terminology in Scotland is indeed the same as in Ireland, but there's new and different terminology here, as well. Perhaps some of it I just never encountered in Ireland, but some is distinctly different.
For instance.. in Ireland, soda is called minerals, but in Scotland it's fizzy juice, or fizzy drink.
I also am looking forward to having some 'neeps and tatties.' Which are apparently mashed turnips and mashed potatos, common side dishes when eating haggis, which don't worry, I will have some of before I leave.
Okay, well, I guess that's it for now, without going into more detail. I'm sure I'll have more to talk about soon, though. Cheers!
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Ant Pat (3/28/2006 7:11 pm)
Neeps and taties sound good actually. Weren't there the "Knights who say Neep", Or am I on the wrong track. ;)
Mike M as in Marlatt (3/28/2006 9:41 pm)
Not to discourage your courageous eating habits, but you know haggis is basically sheep entrails right?
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Scotland!!!
March 26, 2006 / 4:33 am
Posted From: Edinburgh, Scotland
Synopsis: Zombies may take over Ireland. I've now gotten rid of my car and made my way to Edinburgh, Scotland, where I already have a place to stay and have already done a bit of exploring in this beautiful (but crazy) city.
One final conclusion about Ireland... If there were ever to be an uprising of zombies, Ireland would be utterly devastated. All the graveyards are like right in the middle of these small towns, where the graves probably outnumber the population. When the zombies erupted out of the ground, they would be close enough to the city centers that unless someone saw it within a few minutes, the populous would be overrun.
Anyhow.. So the other day I set out from the farm, probably for good (but who knows). I went to the post office and payed an asbolutely unreal amount of money to send some no-longer-needed Ireland stuff and some souvenirs back to the States. A box about a foot and a half cubed, guess how much it cost to send.... nope, too low... nope, still too low.... okay, well it was less than that but now you're just being silly. It cost me 80 euros!!! That's almost a hundred dollars!! To send a few books and several articles of clothing..... sheesh! And then the poster that I sent cost another 20 euros! For a poster! I would have tried to figure something else out to do if I hadn't been really on my way out and so basically had nothing to do with them..
So anyway, I then drove into Cork 100 euros poorer to meet up with Caitlyn. After somehow missing each other walking around the 100 foot wide bus station, I called her on a payphone and left a voicemail saying that if I didn't spot her soon I'd head to the hostel she was staying at. And then I luckily spotted her right as she was leaving the bus station, presumeably to go back to the hostel.
She had said she wanted to get used to the car, so she wanted to give me a lift to Limerick, which was cool cuz then I didn't have to worry about the bus. I drove us out of the city (since it's already confusing enough finding your way around the city without it being your first time driving on the left) and then officially transfered the helm to her. We walked around Limerick a bit but didn't see much because the Castle was like 9 euros admission and she had to get back to Cork at some point, anyhow.
Interestingly enough, there is only 1 hostel in Limerick, which is strange because it's like the 3rd largest city in Ireland or something. And that hostel was full of students, so my only option was to take the bus up the road a ways to a little town called Sixmilebridge, where there was a hostel which seemed to know that it was lots of peoples only option because it was the most expensive hostel I've stayed in.
The next morning I caught the bus into the airport (which was once again crawling with US Army troops), bringing things full circle. The first Irish 'soil' I touched was in Shannon airport, on layover before continuing to Dublin, and here I was leaving out of the same airport. I guess leaving from the same airport you flew into doesn't sound particularly epic, but it was an interesting coincidence given the circumstances of my trip. I was sitting around preparing to leave Ireland, and all around me were things I recognized from my first hour in Ireland. I thought it was interesting, at least.
So.. I had a relatively short flight over to Glasgow Prestwick airport, and I think for the first time ever I didn't really get nervous at all about flying (usually I get at least a little bit nervous, though not much). Things went very smoothly.. it took me about 5 seconds to get my checked bag (I saw it as I was approaching and just aimed for a portion of the conveyor belt a few seconds ahead of it, taking those few seconds to squeeze through the crowd), caught the train to Glasgow city. As soon as I walked out of the train station there was a bus just leaving for the other train station, which I caught. When I got to the other train station there was a train for Edinburgh (that's apparently how its spelled on the map sitting right here at least) just about to leave. When I got to Edinbugh Waverly station, I used the restroom and came out right as Jana was arriving to meet me.
For those of you who don't know, by the way, Jana is a friend of mine from high school who has been living in Edinburgh for some months now.
I can't help but recall what Sharon said to me when I was staying with her and Brian back in Donegal when I'd been in Ireland for only 2 weeks (only 2 weeks! ha!). She said I had a habit of landing on my feet.
Well, Jana had talked to a friend of hers (named Nathan) and gotten me a place to stay in Edinburgh. It seems that his flatmate has gone back to the States (Nathan is from N. Carolina) for a month, and so I've basically been given Bruce's (that's his flatmate) room for as much of the month as I want, as long as I pitch in for food if I stay more than a few days. Bruce left his keys behind for me to use and everything! How cool is that... (so I guess in this instance I landed on Jana's feet? Er...) So... it seems that I'll be staying in Edinburgh for at least a couple weeks, maybe a bit more. Although Jana has 5 consecutive days off next week so we may try to go off and see the highlands or something. We'll see..
So the first evening I just spent settling in and catching up with Jana. We spent a goodly amount of time comparing strange European terminology and colloquialism. It seems, not surprisingly, that most of them are shared between Ireland and Scotland.
The next day, which is now yesterday, I slept in a bit and then set out walking randomly around Edinburgh. It's an absolutely gorgeous city so far, though mostly I was walking around New Town. Edinburgh has kindof 2 major sections, Old Town, which is older, containing the castle (which is absolutely the most epic castle I've seen so far, perched on this giant unassaultable crag) and lots of older, gothic architecture. New Town, obviously, is the newer part of town, although that's just relative because much of it is 200 years old. The architecture is more Georgian in New Town, and also very interesting.
There were some little lanes that looked seriously out of a fairy tale, with different odd, steepled houses pointing this way and that. I'll try to get some pictures at some point, because it's hard to describe what I mean. Edinburgh is also very crazy in its layout.. it's sometimes called the city on 7 hills or something like that. And so sometimes you have different vertical levels of streets. Last night we were walking along this perfectly normal looking street, and Jana says "We're on a bridge right now." I'm like "... huh?" The street looks normal.. there's storefronts on the sides of the street, which means there are big buildings there, so I don't have any clue how those buildings could be propped up on a bridge. Well, she directed me to look at a break between the buildings, and sure enough we were on a bridge. The storefronts were actually on something like the 7th floor of the buildings!! I was amazed to find that I was actually a fair distance in the air. There was a perpendicular street below us which would look to intersect our street on a map, but in fact was quite inaccessable. This particular instance was actually in Old Town, which Jana showed me a bit of. We went to this crazy place called the Forest cafe or something like that. I am quite certain that aliens scooped up the entire establishment from Berkeley and dropped it into the middle of Edinburgh. It's this crazy, volunteer run, hippy, artsy vegetarian cafe, which chandeliers made from bits of random plastic and stuff, and pieces of electronics on the walls, and murals and bulletin boards with yoga advertisements, and a crazy exhibition room which at the time had some installment where if you made noise it would produce a bubble projected on the wall, and you could then move around and a camera would sense your movement allowing you to pop the bubbles (which would then produce the sound that created the bubble from the speakers).
I finally got back to Nathan's place in the evening, feeling like an absolute eejit (Irish lingo for idiot) after spending ages trying to find the front door of his building, going aroung trying my keys in every door on the street (except, of course, it turns out that I never even went far enough down the street to get to his section of it). Luckily Jana was still up so I gave her a ring and I was able to avoid sleeping in the lobby of another apartment building that I discovered is opened by one of Bruce's keys.
We watched a movie called Rabbit Proof Fence, which was alright. If you don't watch it I'd definately recommend at least reading about the epic journey that it portrays, and the crazy treatment of Austrlian aborigones (sp?) that was actually going on as late as 1970.
Today, if I get off my tuccus, I will probably try to go see the couple big museums that are in town which are delightfully free, and wait til next weekend to see the Castle, since I hear that it's some sort of crazy free history weekend, where all the historical sites in Scotland will be free admission (I may have to hire a car and take advantage of this).
I'm also very excited that today is the first day that a law will be going into effect in the UK banning smoking in public places like the same law in Ireland or California. This means that I'll actually be able to go into pubs in Scotland without suffocating (I went into one in Northern Ireland once and barely lasted 15 minutes).
And on one last note, it seems that Nathan has some crazy deal set up where he has a phone that, as I understand it, connects through the internet to a service in the states, which A: gives him a U.S. phone number that rings here in Edinburgh, and B: gives him unlimited calls to anywhere in North America for like $20/month. So I will try to call some people at some point, but I don't want to make any garuntees because the time zone difference does still make it difficult to coordinate (plus he's already mad at his flatmate for yacking on the phone all the time, so I don't want to do too much of that).
The other day when I was in the airport about to leave Ireland, I wanted to use up what was left of my Ireland-only calling card, but it was 1am in the States so I didn't have many options without waking people up.
Okay, well, that's it for now, I suppose. It seems like I'll be able to use the internet on Nathan's computer now and again, so I will try to keep in touch. Hope everyone is doing well!
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Ant Pat (3/26/2006 5:43 am)
My heart is beating so fast! I actually can see what you're talking about having seen it myself! I like the strange little alley ways between buildings that I think they call a "close" (?) that take you to a different level. They are narrow and seem ancient. There is one that is apparently so haunted it is closed off As your friend about that. That Castle is indeed impressive! I just remembered when I was at work, if I went on live web cams early enough it would still be daytime and there was an Edinburgh cam that would slowly sweep around from the Castle over to the bill steep looking hill and back again. It would make me long to be there. I also went on a 'haunted basement tour' (your mom didn't go) because it was late and I was still not sleepy and I was feeling tourist-y. It was actually really interesting to see the city from the underside, whether or not you wanted to play along with the ghost stories. Have fun there, it's a lovely place, and you can try out shots of whiskey in one of the store. I remember you mom doing so, and the look on her face as she tried to mentally decide whether or not to spit it out or swallow it. She swallowed it (lady that she is) and announced it tasted like dirt. Being in AA, I didn't have the pleasure. You're going to have so much fun! I' so jealous and happy for you! Love, The Ant
Mike M as in Marlatt (3/26/2006 9:38 am)
Wow, Noah. This seems like the start of a whole new adventure as much as it does the continuation of the first.
Thanks for the messages by the way. Sorry I didn't answer my phone. I'll remember to leave it turned on at night (but I've slept through smoke alarms before, so no guarantee I guess).
Nothing too exciting is going on around here, except I have to run out to breakfast just now. Have fun and tell Jana I said Hi.
Mike again (3/26/2006 9:39 am)
After you come back, we'll have to develop a seminar on defending against zombies and take it on a world tour, starting in Ireland.
Mom/Cat (3/26/2006 12:23 pm)
It was great talking to you today. Nice to hear that the adventure continues. Remember in soccer you were always in a state of perpetual fall, but managing to stay on your feet? Obvously, your luck continues, but it helps to have your mom be Scottish and Irish.. and English and Welsh...Celtic, with all the good luck that goes with it. Charmed, as some people say. We didn't get to go very far north into the highlands, so I hope you make it. That is where the true Scotland is, they say. As for that free taste of Scotch... I'd pass. It tasted disgusting.. like dirt and fuel at the same time. The gent said, "ah, yes, a nice peaty flavor and"... something that made me think of gasoline. I was right--peat is dirt! totally disgusting. I suppose the aged stuff is better, but why bother. Great news about the no smoking. That will make a big difference. Patricia and I avoided a lot of places because of the stench of extreme, ancient smoke. Glad you are having a good time and have friends to share it with! Take good care. Love you, Mom and Ken
Zach (3/26/2006 9:23 pm)
Its good your zombie survival instincts haven't dulled while in Ireland
Ant Pat (3/27/2006 11:54 am)
I didn't know you had zombie survival instincts! Interesting. Very helpful.
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On the road again...
March 22, 2006 / 3:20 pm
Posted From: barely still at the farm
Synopsis: Tomorrow I'll be giving my car to a friend (who may or may not pay me later) and heading out of town. First to Limerick, and then to Scotland Friday morning. Conclusions of Ireland.. it's a quaint place, but may be changing in the not too distant future.
Well, the end to my ready and free internet access is nigh. Tomorrow morning (it's almost 11pm as I write this) I shall be finally getting back on the road, and then shortly after I will be returning to my original pedestrian state. There was some brief dramatic confusion for a day or two as there were 3 or 4 possibilities of people who might possibly want to buy it.. I won't go into the gritty details, but basically I've decided not to chance taking the car to the UK to try to sell it. Unfortunately, though, my friend who was going to buy it if she got her job still doesn't know if she got the job, yet.. So I'm going to just give her the car (I think she's going to give me a little bit but she can't afford much right now so I'm essentially just giving it to her) and the deal is that if she gets the job she can send me a check or something for it, and if she doesn't get the job, well.. oh well. Maybe she'll pay me for it sometime later down the line if she sells it or does get a job. Maybe not.
At this point, I'm just glad to be getting it off my hands (when she heard how expensive gas was, here, she almost decided not to take it, even for free!) and going with the simplest option of taking the flight I already have for Scotland.
I'm over it already, and actually somewhat excited to be back on my feet again.
So, point being.. after this post I may not have very reliable internet again for a while, and I won't have a car any more, but it's all good.
Spent the last few days weeding a poly tunnel and today I got a pleasant diversion planting another field of potatos. Which involves sitting on the back of this tractor attachment and just dropping a seed potato into the little hole about once a second. It sounds boring but it's really somewhat entertaining, because you have to try to keep the pace going and so it's a challenge to actually grab the potatos that fast. Wheeee...
So anyhow, the plan is to spend tomorrow in a certain city..
I will be going to a place
Where I will have a smile on my face
because it has a name
that has gone down in fame
for poetry, that is the case
Hey, I was going off the top of my head, here.. gimme a break. Okay, here's another limerick that I wrote about 8 years ago when I saw a lecture on the Sociobiology of the Pronghorned Antellope at Humboldt States preview day (wow, has it really been 8 years?).
There exists an antellope species
There are horns that are pronged on these beasties
All that they do is mate,
eat, war, and defacate
The mothers have to eat their youngs fesces.
Thank you, thank you.
Okay, anyhow... the plan after Limerick is to head to the airport the following morning, fly to Glasgow, then take the train to actual Glasgow (Ryan Air flys to a freight airport outside the city), and on to Edinbourgh (sp?), where I will meet up with Jana. Luckily, Jana has a friend who will be letting me stay at his flat for at least a little bit, so I will be in Edinwhatever for a few days at the very least, and hopefully longer (this friend has a flatmate who is leaving for a month, so who knows).
Anywho.. yeah, that's what I ended up deciding was that if I wasn't ready to go back, I wouldn't go back. I thought for a little bit that maybe I was ready to go back.. but then I talked with Jana and we were talking about options for having some fun adventures seeing Scotland, and I quickly changed my mind back.
I'm not quite gone yet, but since I will probably have to pay for internet when I'm close to actually leaving Ireland, I'll throw out a couple conclusions that I've been thinking about..
First of all, if I had to describe Ireland in one word... well, first of all I'd probably complain about only getting one word, saying that Ireland was far too interesting and varied to describe in one word. But since you're twisting my arm about it, that one word would be: quaint. Even the largest cities have a quaint feel to them, but much of the country is filled with quaint farms with little cottages and farmhouses and what have you. And yet, its a genuine quaintness, not just a bunch of crap bought from Hallmark, so you don't get sick of it..
Another conclusion is something that a friend of mine told me before I even came here. In fact, when I first concieved of the idea of this trip I think he recommended that I go to Ireland instead of somewhere else because of this. Ireland is changing.
First and most obvious would be the economy.. Ireland has been named the 'Celtic Tiger' (which is really sortof dumb because there are no tigers in Ireland and I don't believe there ever have been.. and tigers aren't really common in anywhere that the Celts were ever really big in, as I understand it) because their economy has been booming the last 10 years. One third of all houses in all of Ireland have been built in the last 10 years. There are dozens of cranes in the air all over Dublin, more being built all the time.And the economy is expected to continue growing.. although some of the locals are skeptical, citing things like tons of houses being built without anyone to live in them.
Also, and I hate to say this, but.. I fear for Ireland's charm. The first time I bought gas here, I got really confused (and so did the person behind the counter) because I went to pay and she said that it wasn't reading anything. In Ireland, you actually pump your gas first and then go pay for however much you took. They trust you in that manner almost anywhere you go in the whole country. But now, in Cork they are starting to implement the pay first system like we have in the States.. With the economy booming, lots of immigrants have been coming to Ireland, and (according to Caroline's reckoning, which makes sens) many of them aren't finding the jobs they thought they would get and are taking advantage of the trust here. More and more in recent years people have been filling up the tanks of their stolen cars and then jetting, causing some small shops to close down their gas pumps completely instead of bother paying for new equipment.
In Moville where I stayed for a week, only in the last few years there had been an increase in crime.. kids breaking into peoples houses and stealing things, which would have been unheard of 10 years ago.
Also, you have things like the construction of a new 'viewing center' at the cliffs of Moher. As Ireland's economy grows and more people come here, the loosely regulated tourist attractions are going to start getting swamped, I think. Some already are, during the summer, but still.. I think it's possible that the quiet that Ireland has going for it may be comprimised.
And lastly, it looks like the remnants of the quaint, old culture of Ireland may be dying out. Kids in Ireland don't want to take up the traditional fishing ways anymore, etc.
Now, putting it all that way might make things seem rather drastic, so for the record Ireland won't be completely different in a year or two or anything. And it will probably be a long time before any of the tiny quaint towns that are all over the place really change significantly.
But the little signs add up, and I guess I just have a feeling. But this German traveler I met who has been to Ireland several times told me he had seen it change noticeably in only the last 8 years or so, so it's not just me.
Anyways.... enough rambling about that. Maybe I'm full of it, but those are some of my thoughts at least.
Well.. free internet is great, but I have to get packing! Everything I have needs to fit on my back again tomorrow, and I also have to make sure I'm within Ryan Air's stupid baggage standards. Hopefully I'll actually get some sleep tonight, as well.
Goodnight!
Show 4 Comments Hide Comments
Mom/Cat (3/22/2006 5:34 pm)
God bless you on your journey! Enjoy!!!
Ant Pat (3/23/2006 2:29 am)
Noah, you have a good heart, giving your friend the car whether or not she can pay. I hope this builds up your already good karma for the next part of your trip. To Limerick you say, well, I can't resist:
There was a Princess of Baroda
Who built an immoral pagoda
The walls of the halls
Were festooned with the balls
Of the fools who had dared to bestrode her
I cannot believe I just wrote that. My only excuse is I was 'forced' to go to Disneyland tonight, and my brain was altered. Enjoy yourself, you should be proud. You've been a good traveler, been helpful, thoughtful, and given us all quite a vicarious treat. And made us all jealous. Good on you! Love,
The Ant
Ant Pat (3/23/2006 2:31 am)
Sorry, the last line of the limerick should have been:
of the tools of the fools who bestrode her
Sarah Marks (4/11/2006 6:43 pm)
http://www.air-hitch.org/