Time has been flying over here is Asia! We are back in Korea after 8 days in Tokyo, and sadly, Travis is back to work. Christmas was yesterday, and Travis' birthday is tomorrow, then New Years is next week. There is just a lot going on!
It was very strange not being home for Christmas. I think this was the first year ever I haven't been home. Travis and I kept things pretty low key here. We had a pizza for dinner on Christmas Eve, then opened our pajamas. It is a Tufte tradition to open pajamas on Christmas Eve, and even though I am not at home, I didn't want to miss out.
On Christmas day, we woke up and opened presents in the morning. Travis's mom sent a lovely package full of presents, with collaboration from my mom and Travis's grandma. I'm pretty sure my mom made and filled stockings to send. They were great! I missed the orange Santa usually includes in my stocking, but they probably would not have travelled well. I got a lovely Pandora ring from my family, plus a cute owl plushie and owl PJs from Travis's. I also got a ton of good American candy! Travis's family also gave us our tickets to Tokyo as a Christmas gift, which was just lovely.
We had a nice dinner at a little restaurant last night. I'll have to ask Travis exactly what we had. It was a big, pancake like thing with kimchi, some battered meats and vegetables and a pretty good Korean rice wine.
I was able to get all of our pictures together from the trip today. We took a ton! I don't have my camera charger, I actually think I left it in MN, but Travis did a nice job documenting. He also has a really nice point and shoot camera with 12x zoom so we got some nice shots. Nothing on what Randi would have done, though!
My last days in Edinburgh were quite interesting. The MBA office threw us a wonderful Winter party on December 8, my last paper was due on December 10, then I left for Korea on December 13. I also had to somehow fit in holiday shopping as well. I think I missed the holiday shipping deadline, so apologies to friends and family at home. It should be there soon.
My phone was also stolen the night of the party, so I had to stop at the police station to file a report. Thanks to wonderful Google technology, I have a photo of the girl who took it, along with the GPS coordinates of where it was taken. I haven't heard much from the police yet, but hopefully they will be able to get it back.
I will do a proper post on Japan and Korea so far tomorrow. I have to get out and enjoy some of the Seoul sights right now.
I am missing everyone at home and at school, but am having a great time. I hope everyone had as wonderful of a holiday as I did!
Here are some photos of the Winter party and a few of our little Christmas:
Cassie and I playing with the party poppers
Daniele, Diego (my neighbor) and Kieran
Andrew, one of our programme managers
Travis wore his Christmas sweater to work on Christmas Eve
Our present pile! The little tree Travis got was overwhelmed.
With our tree
Trav opening his pajamas
Showing off my awesome pjs. I also had a Christmas sweater. :-)
Since tomorrow would make it an entire month since updating the blog, I decided I had better get on it tonight! As you can imagine, it has been a busy month. At my last post, I had just celebrated Halloween, and had just started classes. Classes are now finished, including finals, and we are in the middle of our business simulation.
Classes went pretty good. I think my finals turned out alright as well, which is always a good thing. For the Simulation, we are split into teams and use a software program to simulate running a computer manufacturing company. It is going well so far. My group is going back and forth for the top spot with one other team. It is interesting, but I will just be glad when we are officially done with school.
There have also been many non school activities as well. On 4 November a large group went to the Scotland v. New Zealand rugby match. The New Zealand All Blacks are the best team in the world, so it was pretty neat to watch them play. They also perform a traditional Haka before each match, which was neat to see. I sat next to Evan, a Greek exchange student, and he made friends with some Greek fans sitting behind us. The shared home made biscuits and smoked salmon with us, which was delicious. Scotland actually scored a few tries, which was neat and unexpected. They even led for a bit! After the match, we ate at Illegal Jacks, an incredibly poor Scottish Chipotle substitute. Here are a few pictures:
A view from my seat. Isn't the city backdrop neat?
Performing the Haka.
Our portion of the group.
There has also been an individual activity going on: Paper Mario. This is one of my favorite video game series. Though Nintendo products are region locked, I was able to download it directly to my DS. I have played it whenever I have spare time, and it has been very fun.
I also had my first taste of Korean food. Two of my friends decided I needed to try it before I left. It was absolutely delicious! I have had it three times since. I will report back once I try the real deal.
My delicious Korean treat. It was like a wafer cookie with vanilla cream filling.
One of the highlights of my trip/life was going to the Proclaimers concert. The Proclaimers are a Scottish band consisting of two brothers. You will likely remember them because of this song:
They actually have many other hits. They of course played I'm Gonna Be (500 Miles), but also my favorite There's a Touch. I got my ticket from a Gumtree seller. He was surprising his wife and family with a trip to Scotland, and they had a spare. He is Scottish, but lives in Sweden. He was very nice. I sat next to his Swedish son during the concert, and joined their group for a drink after. It was a really great night, and certainly one of the best since I have been here. Here are a few pictures from the concert:
My ticket. I ended up with a great seat!
From my seat.
The security man let me sneak closer to grab a few more picures
I was sadly in school for proper Thanksgiving, but some friends invited the Americans in the class over for Thanksgiving on the Saturday after. I had by first adventure in cooking with my micro-oven. After a short learning curve (apparently you leave the glass plate in so things still rotate), I was baking in my microwave! I made an apple pie and green bean casserole. I made the usual apple, but it turned out very tart due to the British apple sauce I used. I still liked it, however. I found some "shortcrust" in the refrigerator section, and used that as my crust. It turned out great. I also finally found ground turkey at the big Sainsburys grocery store, so that was a great find. I also got ingredients to make Grandma's Hamburger (Turkey) Hot Dish, so I had that on actual Thanksgiving. Apparently condensed soup is not a thing here. It all comes ready-made. I had to do some improvising! Here is my pie and casserole:
It burned a little bit before I figured out it needed to rotate.
The 29th was Light Night, the night where the Winter Wonderland opens on Princes Street and the Christmas lights get turned on. Cassie and I wondered down to check things out. It was so nice to see all the lights and the Christmas market. We had some yummy gluwein and wondered around. It was really busy, so we didn't stick around too long. Along with the official opening of the Wonderland, there was a parade, a show, and the tree was lit on the Mound.
For some reason this creepy Santa was there.
Finals week was really intense. We had four written finals, which is much more than the one we had last semester. The only day we didn't have one was Tuesday. Understandably, we were relieved on Friday evening! Directly from the final, almost the entire MBA group went to the Christmas market for mulled beer and drinks. We ended up staying out all night. An exchange student hosted a farewell party on Saturday night, and we again stayed out pretty late. It was very much needed, and it was really nice to spend time with everyone before we go our separate ways for the holidays.
My housing continues to be a nightmare. On Sunday night, the power went out in the entire complex. I was incredibly unlucky and had four loads of laundry in at the time. I had to drag soaking went laundry back to my room in the dark. If that wasn't bad enough, we had a fire alarm that sent us out into the snow in the middle of the night. I was able to finish my laundry Monday night, but I am still very eager to get out of this place!
Our MBA Winter party is Saturday. I am really looking forward to it. It is at quite a nice restaurant, and should be a good night. We all start to disperse starting early next week. I have to turn in a paper on Monday, unless I finish it earlier, and am going to Postsecret Live on Wednesday night. I leave for Korea on Thursday morning, and Travis and I will be in Japan on Saturday! I am also hoping to visit a friend in Thailand over break as well.
I am really looking forward to my vacation, and am also so excited to see Travis. It's been 10 months!! I am a little sad I will not be back at home to see the rest of my family and friends, however. I'll just have to have many grand adventures to make up for it.
Lastly, I got my first real taste of home since being home in September: a package from Mom! We had about a million issues with customs, but it finally arrived. It was a good one, too. If you need to mail anything overseas, please check the Customs/Border Agency website for the receiving country before stating any value. They will get you on import fees! Here are all my goodies:
Fancy the penguin with my package!
All my stuff! It was awesome! A surprising amount was in there.
I opened the Christmas presents that were included. Thanks Brothers! And Mom and Dad!
Mom included a Great Team Card. These are from Target, and are basically used for recognition purposes. I thought it was really cute!
The GTC is now hanging out with Bullseye.
I promise I will do a much better job staying on top of my blogging next month!
