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GLASGOW 1
The bus ride started off well. There was a disabled seat, so I took that with the intent that if it was required I could shift. But it had amply leg room so I thought I’d be fine stretched out over a couple of seats and more leg room then there is… (insert some witty analogy). The trip however was horrible. The bus started filling pretty quickly and had a few stops on the way out of Glasgow, I pretty soon realized that I was going to have to share the two seats that I’d taken over so shifted to one side, and someone took the other seat. And just to make it worse, this wasn’t just anyone. It was a black guy. Of all the people!!. (No, no I didn’t mean that just sounding racist sounded really funny in my own head.)
The trip was supposed to take an hour and 20 but it took just under three. Traffic was incredible we were stuck crawling for almost an hour. Then we hit on junction and it was a free ride all the way into Glasgow.
At the station I met Andrew, the Glaswegian I worked with in Austria. I didn’t recognize him at first, he’d cut his hair and he even looked thinner. Plus he was busy on his phone which only afforded my a cursery glance and a nod. After standing there for 2 minutes looking like a nob while he finished his call we headed towards his student union.
At the student union Andrew signed me in and we climbed the tow flights up to the bar. The student union here is huge, it used to be the biggest in the UK un till Leeds recently trumped it. We sat in here for a while chatting. Andrew had lost his Austria voice and was speaking in his thick Glaswegian accent. I could hardly understand him. It’s incredible how thick his accent is.
We parted there soon after. I was supposed to be meeting Vanessa, the girl I’d met on the crawl in London, somewhere in town, but the delayed bus put a pause on that. So I had to get myself out to her friends place, as her floor was already being occupied by a couple of her other friends.
Andrew walked me to the subway and we parted there, that plus a short cab ride had me where I was supposed to meet Vanessa. The cabbie wasn’t exactly sure where the building was that I was supposed to be going to was so was crawling along looking for it. Mean while the meter was ticking up slowly so I told him to just pull over and I got out.
I rang Vanessa, she said to wait there she was coming out the front. Evidently I was in the wrong spot I walked out to the centre of the road and she couldn’t see me. We agreed to walk to the closest main road, which we both knew and I walked the 100 m up to that, met Vanessa and then walked back past where I’d called her to her friends place.
Where I was staying is like a student dorm from back home, everyone has there own rooms and share a common eating area slash rec room. I dropped my stuff in the friends room and went to the kitchen. Every one was sitting around having some drinks and eating. They’d already cooked dinner which was fantastic, so I was shown to the food and my eyes lit up.
Dinner was some burrito things, there was some chicken some cheese and some rice done up. Not feeling to creative I just filled up a couple of Burritos with everything in front of me and sat at the table.
The friend I was staying with’s name is Jillian, she’s a crack up, from San deigo, and sounds very very Californian, using many cliché euphemisms I’d expect from a yank. “I know, right?” “oh Em Gee” and ‘totally’ being amongst her favourite yankiee words. I dunno though, writing them down on paper hardly describes the way they came out. It was all about how she vocalized them. It was “like totally the funniest thing ev-er”. haha
Also dining with us were vanessas other Californian friends. A couple who whe goes to school with. They’ve been traveling around for 3 months as they couldn’t find jobs in the states. Mate and Deseree (I think that’s how you spell it) god knows how matts been traveling around with his girlfriend for 3 months, she’s great, don’t get me wrong but I couldn’t do it.
We sat around laughing for a while while I ate. Soon after however Vanessa, Matt and Deseree had to leave to go back to Vanessa’s to get changed. the plan was hitting the town in Glasgow for the night.
I finished my dinner, and a heap of the cheap Rum they’d bought from Tesco’s, with Jillian and one of her other friends, Lindsey, got changed and we were ready to hit the town.
Jillian called up one of her friends and convinced her to come out too. A local girl called clare, she had to work the next day so she wasn’t drinking but she was driving which prooved to be very, very handy.
Day 131
Thursday Dec10
1300(Dec13)
Man it looks cold out side. As were driving past sheep I can see their breath condensing as they exhale.
We ended up getting up at some time closer to 1. I was still on a metaphorical high from the night before and didn’t take much convincing to decide to goo up to stirling with Jillian and Lindsey who also joined us. Stirling is the place where the Scots beat the Brittish in brave heart. I was pretty sure Mel gibson was going to meet us at the train station so that justified the trip.
The plan was to meet up with a few guys from a bar that the girls regularly go to, they were cooking a big Scottish feed, I definitely wasn‘t complaining. I figured they were also students living in stirling. However it turned out that they were all middle aged guys, most of whom were over 40 years old.
On paper it sounds terrible. All these 20 year old american girls hanging out with all these guys twice their age. But it wasn’t like that at all. I mean one of them even brought his wife along. We were picked up by one of the Guys called Andy. also in the car was one of his daughters, a girl called Stacey, he dropped us off at the castle and went home to cook.
The castle looked awesome. It seemed so much more authentic then windsor castle. And by the time we got there it was pretty much dark anyway and it looked awesome with the lights all shining up on the walls.
First we went to the Military museum. The main Scottish Regiment is stationed here so the museum which seems to compliment most military bases was also there. The museam was ok. But kinda typical, full of paintings of officers and men in shiny knew clothes and perfectly clean weapons. Didn’t feel very real. However the girls being history students took forever. By this time the night before was catching up with me and I headed out side to catch some fresh air.
We cabbed back to Andy’s where he was furious cooking up a storm. I was introduced to a couple, Tom and Val, married for 7 years longer then I’d been alive. We sat around talking having a few beers for a while, conversation was odd. Nice guys but not real bright, Tom’s a taxi driver and his world views were very interesting, quite colorful and really quite frustrating, it was the kind of discussion that didn’t progress, he’d say X + Y equals Z and I’d say but what if X + Y equaled W and he’d go straight back to his original comment of X + Y equals Z and conversation would not progress unless some body else was in the room.
Dom, an American Expat had brought Jenny up from Glasgow and when they arrived we sat down to eat. The food was great, an entrée of soup and a main being a beef stew. I then finished off both Lindsey’s and Jill’s food. It was good.
Eventually the 4 of us guys retired to the lounge room, leaving the girls turned problematic. They were so loud, you could hear the conversation cresendo advance al the way untill they’d all stop talking, mind you they’d only stop talking because you cant laugh loud enough to wake the dead and talk at the same time.
Next we drove to the Pub. This is where the girls met these guys. Every Monday and Thursday they go to this Irish pub called Jinty’s. there’s a guy who plays every week and they like his music. Through him they met all the locals.
The drive over was hard. I was so tired and was often nodding off. I didn’t feel too much more awake at the bar either. But the music was good fun. All the girls dancing round terribly with harmless old men singing at the top of there voices made for a good atmosphere.
Vanessa, Matt and Deseree turned up soon too which was good. The singer finished up at 1130 and we all trickled down to a bar nearby, this place was called Amore ore, or more amour, or something similar to these words.
1530(Dec16)
Due to my power cable for my computer cable dieing I missed a few days of catching up on the Diary. Hopefully I don’t miss anything. The bullet points should be suffice.
1615(Decc22)
I just realized I’d missed a spot in my diary. It shouldn’t be too much of a problem though. It was fairly uneventfull
We found a spot at a table at Mora amore and matt grabbed a drink. We were all so tired and eventually we were saved by Jillian who was ready to go home. I just wanted to curl up in my sleeping bag.
We walked back home with Jenny, the Little religious nut from Conneticut who goes hunting with her dad who owns a gun company. Cliché yeah. She gave us a little speal, definitely not preaching but still absolutely ridiculous. I really didn’t feel like argueing. It would have been pointless.
We got home and I was asleep before my head hit the pillow. And it hit the pillow hard!!
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