Long-awaited tour of Dalkeith House!!

I think this is just going to be easiest if I post pictures and say what they are. Let me know if you have any questions about anything!

This is a crappy view of the field right in front of the palace. I took pictures at dusk, so the outdoor ones didn't turn out great. You can see to the left all the construction stuff for the roof.

Here is the front of the palace. You can see all the scaffolding. It used to be so much prettier without all that. Hopefully when I come back (which I will!!) I will be able to see it with it all off.

This is the servery where our meals are served (duh) and where we prepare our own food on weekends.

I snatched this picture from the Wisconsin in Scotland website. This is how the palace should look. Isn't it just beautiful?

This is the marble hall. We don't do much here besides wait for crappy dinner to be served. The statue is of the Duke of Wellington. It is pretty cool. Leah always calls him "Dukey" and says hi to him when walking by.

This is the dining room. Pretty self-explanatory. The walls are lined with pictures of previous groups, from the first one in 1986. Some pictures have spilled out of the room, though, because there is not enough space.

The marble hall looking the other way. There are a couple people that constantly, or so it seems, play the piano. It gets so annoying! P put a sign on it once that said it was out of order, but that only delayed the inevitable. There is nothing worse than hearing mediocre piano playing almost constantly.

This is Willie's Cafe, a place to hang out and eat or watch movies or TV. Unfortunately, cable doesn't work in there right now. Not that I have tried to watch any TV really.

This is my windowsill, with all my books and school stuff on it. It is currently not this clean.

Here is a view of the room. Misty (our other roommate) has the first bed, then D on the left and Leah on the right. I am tucked way back in the corner. I really like it, but sometimes people don't know I am in the room because they can't see me.

This is the entrance hallway. Nothing too exciting here.

This is the area outside the computer lab and library. Leah has to clean this area, along with the computer lab.

This is the ballroom. They put springs in the floor to make it easier to dance, but now that they have chandeliers downstairs, we can't really dance anymore. Darn electricity.

The library. My library.

Infamous ping pong room. I played my first game of Beer Pong here last weekend. My team won! Not that drinking games are healthy or anything...

The pool room. When we first got here, this was broken so we never went in here. Now it is fixed, and we have played a couple games. Leah beat me twice, but only because I shot myself in the foot by screwing up the 8 ball. (Or in British pool, the black ball. There are no solids and stripes, just red and yellow, and you can put the ball anywhere on a scratch).

My bed! It only looks this good about once in a blue moon. I guess some things never change.

My little vanity. Mom, having this only makes me want one even more at home. I just love it!

I will also say something here about my host family. They are Paul and Mindy Quigley, and they are really great. P (Peter) is also with me to see them. They have a little girl named Alice who is just about the sweetest thing ever. She is less than 3, I believe. They first had us over a couple weeks ago, and I failed to post on it. Mindy made a great dinner for us, which consisted of Salmon, couscous, green beans and apple tart. It was hands down the best thing I have eaten since I have been here.

Paul is originally from northern England, and Mindy is from the states. They met while they were both going to school in North Carolina. Paul is a American History professor at the University of Edinburgh. They just moved to Scotland last year.

They also took us to the zoo last Sunday, and that was really fun. I have not uploaded the pictures to my computer yet, so I will do that soon, but probably not until after my 10 day break!

Besides that, school has really picked up over the past few weeks. I have had two papers and two tests, so I have really kept busy. We have gone out in Edinburgh a couple nights, and continue to hit up the pubs and Kebab Mahal in town here.

I actually got lost coming back from Edinburgh last Saturday, and called John at 3:30 in the morning for help. I got on the wrong night bus. I needed to be on the N3, but got on the N31 because the 1 was not flipped all the way up. When John answered, he was actually with Patty and Nat (Patty is our director, and Nat is her girlfriend). They helped me through it, and I eventually got a cab back to Dalkeith. It was so scary, because I was with another student, Aaron, who was really drunk and it was the most stressful thing in the world. I am glad I decided to take the night off from drinking or things would have gotten really bad.

John had me check in with him when I got home, and I'm glad he did because I don't think I even realised how scared/worried I had been. I just started crying as soon as I walked into his office, and he stayed up pretty late (this was all happening after I got home at 4am) talking to me, which was really nice. I contend that this was my worst night of my trip so far, but I figure one out of a month and a half isn't bad. I should have never gone out. I just wanted to sit at home and watch the Wild season opener. It all reminded me of a show called How I Met Your Mother (which is super funny) and one of the episodes is themed around "nothing good ever happens after 2am." That is exactly how my night was!

So now just a quick note about my ten day. I am going to Barcelona, Spain for 5 days with Jesse, Leah and D. After that, D and I are going to Rome, Italy for three days. We will end our trip with a few days in Paris, France. I am so excited!! This will be my first really long independent trip, so I hope it is fun. I am procrastinating a little bit, D and I don't have hostels yet in Rome and Paris, but I am sure everything will fall into place. So that is all the latest news! I will post again after my vacation! Hasta luego, amigos!