First week in Edinburgh.

Howdy everyone! Welcome to my blog! I've never written a blog before, but after reading a few other people's, I think I get the gist of it.
So as you all know, I'm studying at the prestigious University of Edinburgh for the semester. It's a 400 year old university and has educated many of the UK's finest, including Charles Darwin and Alexander Graham Bell.
My study experience began last friday when I left home last week. Upon landing in Scotland on early Saturday morning (the plane had some mechanical issues at Newark, so we were 2 hours late,) me and a group of American students found the University of Edinburgh's student welcome committee which pointed us in the direction of the taxi queue. I shared a cab from the airport to the residence hall (aka Pollock Halls) with a nice guy from New York. The cab ride cost £18, which we split (we both weren't sure about the tipping policy in Scotland so we just each gave him £1 extra.)
After getting my room key, I roamed around the student housing area for a little while, trying to find the right dorm. I was assigned to live in Holland House, which, I discovered, was near the south end of the housing area. The dorm itself is simple. It's a bedroom with a bathroom. I took an amazing nap which lasted a few hours, and then unpacked. There didn't seem to be any students to be found, but they all showed up on Sunday.
Sunday was orientation for the international students! We were in a lecture hall and were introduced to various people from the university staff (head of liberal arts and science and the head of the international office). This was followed by a tour of campus, which was really helpful. After the tour, our tour guides (who were university students) led us to the reception/lunch/meet and greet. I met some really interesting people. Many of the other students are from east-coast schools, but I was able to find some midwesterners.
School started the following day. Before I could be an "official student" I had to go through the matriculation process. This basically meant registration. I had to meet with my DOS or Director Of Studies, who would be my advisor and my first step with any educational questions I'll ever have. I met with my DOS on early monday, his name is Lyn Collins. He's a very cliché British professor. He was very interested with the Iowa Caucus. My DOS looked over the classes I had chosen to take: Scottish History, European History, and Social History, and signed off on them.
The next few days were filled with getting my internet to work (thanks to mom for helping me from home:-D) I had to register my computer with the Resnet (the dorm internet provider) by sending them an E-mail. This made absolutely no sense but me and my mom were able to send an e-mail by having me tell my mom how to access my email over the phone to send the e mail. (it sounds really complicated but wasn't)
Everyday after class I'd go and explore. I found the Royal Mile (a famous street) and eventually made it over to Princess Street (the main shopping area.)
On Tuesday the international office had their weekly get together at Bannermanns pub. I went with a group of people from the dorms and socialized with other kids studying abroad, and met some cool scottish people.
By Wednesday I was getting a good idea of what was going on. I had picked out all of my tutorials (discussion groups for lecture) and had finally fully matriculated. On Thursday, I met up with international students and we watched Trainspotting at the International office, which was surprisingly good.
On friday, after my Scottish History course (which many exchange students take) me and some kids from Pollock halls went out to dinner and planned out some things that we wanted to do in Scotland. It was fun and we exchanged some ideas and formulated some excursions... Glasgow might be on the horizon for next weekend.
On Saturday I went on a school sponsored outing to Loch Lomond. I met some kids from Boston and we hiked the trails around the Loch. The weather was hazy and a bit foggy, but it was nice to be out of the city.
On Sunday, I woke up late and am doing some reading, one of my classes has us reading some exerpts from ancient books that are written in Middle Scot, which is really hard to read.
But anyway, I've got some other stuff to do before tomorrow! I hope to write again soon.

---

---