die falsche Mary Scott

Sunday, 16th December: 

Sunday, 16th December:

I’m sitting on packed bags – one of them weighing 22kg and the other 23kg, making my brain hurt with the possibility of it being too much. I’m not sure what I would do, if they tell me if it is too much (officially, I am allowed 23kg, but my scale might be wrong, you never know when you are as suspicious as myself). Another thing that is on my mind are my lovely plants. I so hope that they won’t tell me to throw them away, but online it only says you are not allowed knives and such in your hand baggage, and I don’t think my plants could hurt anybody; but you never know.

Anyway, my last hours in Glasgow. Isn’t it ironic, that I spend them worrying about the weight of my bags, just as I worried when I arrived about not being able to do anything? I guess, it just shows that it all works out in the end.

So, back to my stories about life in Glasgow. I met up with my hiking friend on Friday and yesterday evening. On Friday, we visited Edinburgh again, this time for the Christmas market. I took several beautiful pictures and since I still have some hours, I will spend my time choosing the best one. The lighting was just spectacular. But with her, I also seem to be walking around in parts of the city, that I normally would not have visited and so we found cute little streets with the typical brick buildings left and right and Christmas lights in the middle. Yesterday, we just met up to watch a movie and I watched “Love, actually” for the first time – I can’t believe, I’ve never seen it before. I gave some of my things to her, like my pillows for example, and we talked for hours on end. She only left at two thirty and I was sad to see her go, because she really grew on me. I hope to see her again for New Years.

I guess this is the thing that I am most proud of here. That I let go of my social fears and started real friendships in a place that was so unfamiliar just three months ago. I said this to Estelle today over breakfast, when she asked me what I liked the most over here. So, yeah, I am most grateful for the people I got to meet.

The thing I am most proud of is the bravery to read my poetry to strangers at an Open Mic Event – but I guess that goes without saying.

One thing that rather annoyed me was part of university life, because the instructions stayed unclear a lot of the times. They said to look at a document that gave a structure and then said the structure was wrong, and since that influenced my grade it was a bit unnerving, but yeah… I guess that is also just me getting used to a different system than the one I was used to for three years.

I have a good last day here. The weather is simply amazing! Typically, Glaswegian, I could say, since the sky was this blue so often during my time here. I said goodbye to Estelle around ten am, so I that left me with six hours before I will leave my flat (I still have 3 and a half). I took the time to go for another walk along my most favourite river: the Kelvin. I started out in the Botanic Gardens, strolling through the glass houses, but then I walked my usual steps back to the apartment.

I packed up everything by now, I said that already, I think. I am so glad my Dutch friend will be here in about 30 minutes and distract me from my misery of waiting. I generally think that I am a patient person, but now right now I’m not.

These are my last few hours in Glasgow, shortly before the flight, and I say the same thing I said before leaving for the exchange: “what’s life without a little risk?” and whatever comes my way, I will manage. In this sense, au revoir

Mary

Sunday, 16th December:

Thursday, 13th December:

On Monday, I wrote some last postcards and felt the sudden desire to see Glasgow Cathedral again, so as soon as I felt a little bit better on Tuesday, I set out to go there. While crossing the street just before the cathedral, I remembered the museum that is situated on the corner, so very spontaneously, I paid a visit. It’s about the religious life in Glasgow and shows the art of the different confessions. After the museum, the windows in the cathedral seemed even grander.

In the evening, Estelle came over and we continued our bible study with a cup of tea.

Yesterday, I met up with my Dutch friend for a cup of hot chocolate and the Christmas markets. We also went into the Gallery of Modern Art near George Square, but neither of us understood any of the pictures displayed. On the Christmas market on St. Enoch Square, she showed me a book about Harold the Haggis, which was just hilarious, and I bought myself a Crêpe with Nutella and banana. After that, I felt in the mood for some live poetry, so I went to the Open Mic Event in the Union. And guess what: without any nervousness this time, I presented my poetry again.

I’ve come a long way here. Before this trip, I would have never dreamed of presenting anything I wrote. It helped of course, that the people I wrote about, were not in the audience, but it was such a non-judging community that I felt entirely save to read my most personal English poems. I don’t write much in English, to be honest, but that was no problem whatsoever. In fact, everyone was really interested to hear me read on of my German ones as well, so I did. I read one that I wrote shortly before I got here; one that is my personal favourite. They loved it so much, that they asked me to read two more after the break, so I did.

Funnily enough, they said my character changed completely when I started reading my German poems. The style, I guess, has a lot to do with it, but maybe it is true, that you have a different character in different languages.

After I had finished, the girls in the corner said, they want to learn German now and a guy, that had previously called German harsh, apologised for his earlier opinion. “Next time, I hear German poetry, I’m gonna think of you”, he said as we said goodbye. So, I guess, I can write that down as an achievement, right Carter?

Mary

Monday, 10th December:

Monday, 10th December:

So, my period hit, and I spent most of the last two days in my bed listening to my favourite podcast and watching a wonderful tv-show by BBC about Jane Austen’s “Emma”. The “Pride and Prejudice” show is next.

I had planned to go to Edinburgh today, as I think I mentioned, but I had to postpone that. As everyone does, I regret when I am unable to do things simply because of my health. And I often feel like I am wasting time when I recover. But that thinking is complete poop, if you don’t mind me saying that. It doesn’t matter how much time my body needs to recover or whether I recover from a cold or my monthly problem: I deserve to take all the time that I need to be well again.

And until then, nothing much interesting is happening, but I get to listen to my body and do whatever is best for myself. Today – maybe the first time ever – I decided immediately after waking up to stay home. Normally I take ages, convincing myself, if I just push my body hard enough, I will eventually make it through the day. I will get up, however horrible I feel, put myself into the shower and tell myself, that I am making my sickness up. Then I will stumble out of my house feeling like poop, but today, I did no such thing. I took myself seriously, texted my hiking friend, and instantly felt a tiny bit better in the sense of not discrediting myself. Plus, I should mention, she sent a really kind and understanding text as an answer.

By now, my pills are entirely working, and I get to enjoy my tv-shows fully. I am full of hope that tomorrow I will be running out and about again, ready for my last days here in Glasgow.

Sorry, if this post seems a little inappropriate… like something I should not speak about, but this is part of any kind of journey of mine (and any other woman’s as well), so I didn’t want to hush it up.

Hope, you are feeling a lot better than I am,

Mary

Friday, 7th December:

Friday, 7th December:

So, I planned and planned and then life happened. On Monday, Tuesday and Thursday in fact I strolled through the different second-hand shops Glasgow has to offer. I might have been in every single one of them, and in most of the ones on Byres Road I went more than once. I bought two comfy knitted sweaters and once cotton one plus two lovely skirts. I also found several books, but not the one I had searched for (Jane Eyre was not available in any of the 20 shops that I went into, not even in the specific bookshops, so I guess, it is too good to be given to a charity shop and I have to buy it in a normal bookstore). I also found some nice Christmas presents.

I discovered the cinema room in my building. I always knew that it was there, but until Tuesday, I had never walked inside. It is furnished with several extravagant couches and has a huge screen. My language friend and I watched a half German, half French movie and another English one there and it was just great. I can’t believe I never went there before.

I met up with Estelle as well, several times in fact and we plan to go get some delicious breakfast on both of the upcoming Sundays, just to treat ourselves. And we managed to wash today, so from now on all my dirty clothes will just wander into my suitcase and the journey is soon to begin.

Before, I plan to go one last time to Edinburgh this year. My hiking friend said she wants to accompany me, so we will probably go on Monday. If the weather is on our side, we will go hiking in Dumbarton on Friday, so I pray for a rain free day.

Today it rained so much, that I was completely drenched after walking home from my friend Lou’s place which is near my university, so a good thirty-minute walk away from my home. I stopped minding the rain when it pours. I kind of like the feeling, but I have to say, the feeling of being able to snuggle into my covers is even better.

I haven’t really decided what I want to do tomorrow just yet. It is supposed to rain as much as today, so going outside is probably not such a good idea. I thought about going to the Kelvingrove Gallery and look at the exhibition of World War I paintings there… but there is also the medieval society meeting up so as usual there are decisions to be made. And I decided to make them tomorrow.

I’m gonna convince myself to get up and do the dishes now.

Mary

Sunday, 2nd December:

Sunday, 2nd December:

So, I went on a bus tour again – and again, it was really amazing. This time we spent less time on the bus, however. Instead, we hiked through Argyll-Forest and listened to fairy tales about how a witch had murdered a whole village simply because she was bored. I took again about 200 pictures, but this time I focussed on the landscape. The forest was green. Every few steps I had to stop and stare; and I kept repeating myself, telling my friend how green everything was. We also went to see a ruin of a castle and the town Dunoon. The ruin was overgrown with ivy that was green as well as red. The town was kind of cute and directly at the Clyde. It renewed my fondness of the Clyde. In Dunoon it is extremely wide and we had a beautiful view over the river on Argyll-Forrest from the harbour.

I was rather sick at the beginning this week, but after Wednesday it went away. On Friday, I met up with my French friend from the Language Café. Him and some friends were getting together for raclette and nice as he is, he invited me as well. To be honest, it was a bit awkward at first, because I felt too shy to say much, but I felt better after a bit and started to feel comfortable. I found out, that the French eat their raclette differently than we do. They simply put a piece of cheese in one of these pans and then pour the melted cheese over the vegetables. It tastes amazing.

In the evening, I had planned to meet up with Estelle, but she had to cancel. I met up with my hiking friend then, who had bought (free) tickets for some kind of party in the Hunterian Museum in Glasgow University. It was St. Andrew Day on Friday, but we missed the parade – and it turns out that the party was not on that night either, so we simply sat down on wonderful stairs and chatted about life.

Today was relaxed, which was nice after all the exercise yesterday. I went, as usual, to Church again, but I declined the invitation to lunch. I met up instead with my Dutch friend, eating pancakes. They were amazingly delicious.

I planned lots of stuff for the next two weeks – so maybe my last week will be as booked solid as my first two weeks, but with a lot more meeting up with friends.

Mary

Sunday, 25th November: 

So, that was our walk on top of the mountain. I’m glad, we lost our way and just randomly walked somewhere else.

Sunday, 25th November:

On Friday, I held a presentation in my class about Disease and Society. It worked better than I thought it might, and I didn’t even fall over my words while talking.

With that weight off my shoulders I got ill again. I guess my throat just calmed itself because of my visitors, but as soon as my friend, Carter, left on Thursday, my throat decided to be itchy again. For the presentation my voice came back, but as soon as it was over, it left me again. I rested a lot over the weekend, but yesterday I was invited to visit a friend from the language Café and no throat-weirdness would have persuaded me to call the meet-up off. I prohibited myself to speak for the whole day, so, when I met him in the evening, I could talk.

Now, my voice is weird again (of course) and it sounds wonderfully horrific when I have to cough. Still, I have arranged to meet up with friends, one of them being Lou, to look at the Christmas market on George Square. The weather is extremely beautiful right now. I have a view on the clear blue sky, and I am really looking forward to not sitting on my bed anymore.

Besides, I have only three more weeks to be here. I want to live them and not sleep them away.

Mary

Sunday, 25th November:

Sunday, 25th November:

My dear friend, Carter, left me on Thursday. With her, I got to go hiking in Dumbarton. Originally, I had thought that one should better not hike in November, because the weather wouldn’t allow it or because it simply would be too cold. But it was really wonderful.

On our way up, we walked by a little café in a grand house, and we stopped, even though neither of us was tired, to eat a scone. To be honest, that was the first scone I have ever eaten. I know, my mother loves them, but I always thought it was weird to eat it for some reason. I ignored my old prejudices and ordered a scone then and there and damn, that was a sound choice.

We had looked up a circular route before starting our walk, but we somehow missed our turn left and continued right up a mountain. There we weren’t quite sure where we were, but two guys were there as well, and we got into talking with them. They helped us find our way back through Milton I think, and we had a nice chat full of rolled up “r”s in “sorrys” and laughter.

Carter also went to second-hand shops with me and made me try out dresses I would have never dared to touch. Don’t get me wrong, it looked horrible, but it was fun anyway. But we also spend a lot of time just chatting. We tend to do that a lot whenever we meet.

Wait, I almost forgot: Carter made me take the subway! I had thought, when I got back, I would be able to say, I never even needed the subway, but Carter would not have that. Now, I know how cute that little worm is and what nice people take the subway on a Monday evening.

Mary.

Wednesday, 21st November:

Saturday, 17th November

Too much is happening; I can’t keep up.

By now my next visitor (and the last) is here, but so far, I have not gotten around to talk about my last visitor and the stuff we did yet; so, I am going to talk about that now.

My second visitor, let’s call her Emma, came around on the 10th November, and since that was a Saturday as well, we looked at the Christmas market in Glasgow and the town in general. She confronted me with the idea of doing a bus tour rather early and I agreed to it thinking that it might be important to her. I say “confronted” because I was not too keen on it. Firstly, it was unfamiliar, a situation I had never been in so far, since I have never been on any kind of bus tour. Secondly, I was down with a cold (as I have mentioned, I guess). One entire day away from any kind of cafés or places to rest in general seemed like the wrong decision. And thirdly, going up Loch Lomond, along Glenco, through Fort William, up to Loch Ness and even Inverness seemed maybe a bit much for just one day.

Well, I tend to give in to my visitors. They get to say what we do and what we don’t, so we booked to bus tour; and I don’t regret it one bit.

Yes, it was a bit much; but for that day and with that company it was (I might even say) perfect. Emma and I talked a lot, but we had the right amount of no talking going on as well. We took around 500 pictures (and I am not exaggerating, that is the correct number). I would love to be able to say, that most pictures included the landscape, but really, we just took pictures of each other and us together. I don’t think I ever took this number of selfies (in my entire life before), and I don’t think I will ever be able to top that number again. We had a blast, I can assure you.

The tour started in Glasgow central on the 11th November at around eight. This is important information, because it means, we missed out on the 100 years end of WWI celebrations and it shows, how early I had to get up. The tour started well with a lot of jokes by our driver. Our first stop was at Loch Lomond, with the dusk hanging deep over the lake. This is where the picture obsession started. I am still not sure, what kind of picture I will upload, but I don’t want to break with the habit of picture-text-picture, so from all those 500 I will have to find the one perfect shot, that I want to share with you. The lake, at any rate, looked magical; you might just have to believe my word on that account.

The next stop was at the three sisters at Glencoe. The tips of the mountains were invisible behind the mist and you could take the perfect desktop screenshots there. With our clothing, Emma and I completely fitted into the landscape around us.

Because of our impeccable timekeeping (as our driver liked to repeat), we stopped again before reaching Loch Ness, near an antique looking bridge, that was actually closed off by a barrier tape, because parts of it collapsed. We climbed atop of it anyway and got an incredible view of the river Moriston beneath it. The bridge itself, as half collapsed as it was, looked amazing as well.

At Loch Ness, Emma and I chose option number one, the old (and ruined) castle of Urquhart. Neither Emma nor I knew anything about the castle; and we didn’t really learn anything about it even though we spend an hour there. Our hour was well invested in posing in front of castle walls and the huge lake behind us. Oh, and I also bought the cutest beanie.

We boarded a Loch Ness Cruiser there, that took us over the lake and back into the bus. On the way back, I fell asleep while a record about the Jacobites and the battle of Culloden was playing. I don’t really remember falling asleep, but suddenly there was a huge jump in the story from the start of the gathering of the troops and then to the end talking about the failed revolution and the destruction of the highland culture.

The whole trip was so relaxing and exciting at the same time, that that amount of sleep was enough to keep me up to go to a restaurant with Emma in the evening as well. I have thought about going on another bus tour soon to Oban, now that I have tried it out. There is a tour organisation explicitly for students, so I might go there with my friend from lectures.

With Emma I went to Edinburgh on Monday, looking at different things, like the university and the elephant house; completely ignoring everything that I had looked at with the guys. I got back in time to go to Uni and we had an easy relaxing last day together eating half-priced food and drinking half-priced cocktails (‘cause this is what can happen to you if you go out on a Monday).

After Emma left, I immediately dived into uni work (and that might have been the wrong decision, because the whole day I felt sick). I got enough done, however, to meet up with my lovely Dutch friend the day after and skype with one of the guys from last week when I got back as well.

And on Thursday, my next friend came to visit.

Aber das ist eine andere Geschichte,

Mary

Thursday, 8th November,