More on London

Oh yeah... Sunday morning we went to the markets in the East End, where bagels (spelled beigels?) could be procured at 20p each. Tasty, cheap, and delicious.

When it began to rain we dashed into a free admission art exhibition entitled "fake plastic love", by Stuart Semple. It was weird, lots of repeated images like Andy Warhol in landscapes inspired by Dali's later works, with modern pop culture icons and vague words in bold colors. A few were easily decrypted, but for the most part Cory and I were completely mystified.

As we left the exhibit, Cory said, "I think rain is the best thing that ever happened to this exhibit."

But don't take my word for it. You can see what we saw, as "Part One" of a two-gallery exhibit, at http://fakeplasticlove.co.uk/
The text after "enter" is what is written on the back of my map, and all eleven paintings can be seen under the "large paintings" tab. Indeed, they were large---bigger than most walls I've ever seen in my life. Some weird stuff.


Also in London yesterday was an NFL game, New York Giants vs. Miami Dolphins. A little bit weird too. As I stood in King's Cross, waiting in the queue to board our train, a lot of NFL jersey -wearing fans passed through in the other direction. The first one I found odd, the rest caused me to remember, "oh yes! That's right, there's American football here today."

Saturday night/Sunday morning, we set our clocks back an hour, so there is currently only a four-hour time difference between GMT and the east coast. Amazing how much brighter it was outside at 7:30 this morning!

London!

This weekend I went to go visit my friend Cory, who is currently studying at UCL. I took the train both ways, which was an exciting adventure in itself because---I've never really ridden a train before. So to go from Edinburgh's Waverley Station to King's Cross in London was amazing, even though it took five hours one way and 7.5 to come back.

Friday night I got in late, and we dropped off my stuff in Cory's room, then went walking down to the Thames to see the Parliament Building and Big Ben lit up. Also because we were there around midnight, we heard Big Ben ring! Which is does every 15 minutes, but all the same.

London was a little overwhelming. It just seemed so huge and so incredibly full of people... and yet, didn't have the skyscrapers I feel comfortable with in NYC or Chicago. It was British, but in a different way than Edinburgh, and there it's not just a question of scale but also of England and Scotland, north and south.

Saturday we got up early to head over to the National Gallery, where we looked at mostly 19th century paintings... Impressionism and Post-Impressionism, my favorite genres. Pizarro, Cezanne, Monet, Renoir, Seurat, Van Gogh, Morisot, Manet, Sisley, etc, etc. Popped into the National Portrait Gallery, where the portraits of past monarchs lost my interest but the "modern" portraits were extremely interesting to look at.

St. Paul's Cathedral was a shortish walk away, but expected 8.50 quid for student admission, which we were unwilling to pay no matter how cool the Whispering Wall might be. So then it was to the British Museum, housing a lot of historical exhibits. I forgot until I was inside that it had the Elgin Marbles and lots of Egyptian artefacts. They are particularly defensive about the Elgin Marbles, and I took a pamphlet explaining why the Museum hasn't returned the marbles to Greece to read on the train.

The Elgin Marbles actually took up an entire, gigantic hall... they were placed in the approximate location as at the Parthenon. Another hall held the mural-like friezes of an Assyrian palace, depicting a royal lion hunt and military conquests. The Egyptian exhibit was extensive and I wish my camera hadn't run out of batteries at that point... I do have mixed feelings towards Britain keeping all the artefacts, but I suppose that can't be helped.

In the evening we went to a choral concert that Cory was in, then wandered around London finding grocery stores still open.Only one seemed to be, and luckily it had the pumpkins we sought for jack-o-lanterns.

Now it's back to the reality of classes and cold weather (London is several degrees warmer than the rest of Britain, and especially the windiness of Edinburgh). I'm working on getting pictures up, so be patient!

A daughter's right is to obey.

Last night I went to see "The House of Bernarda Alba", by Federico Garcia Lorca, performed at Bedlam Theatre. It was especially interesting because all the characters were female, with two off-stage male characters (one of whom had just died). Also in this particular production, there were chairs on either side of the stage, so the audience could watch from three sides. Sarah and I sat up on Stage Left, which was a little intimidating actually because there is a lot of fighting and yelling in that family, and sometimes they were a few feet away. But I like plays that are done in that way, the blocking feels much more natural to me, even if certain lines of site are impossible.

It was a very good production, and a very good play in general... so I would recommend it, if you ever get the chance.

It's been quite cold recently. I finally caved and bought myself a wool coat. Bright red. Not perfect, but warm and close enough to what I wanted, so I'm happy with it.

Only 30% or so of students go on to uni, which sounds like a very low number to me. A lot more go on to college (like trade school) for more practical degrees.

Fire Regulations

So far I have noted a huge difference in the treatment of fire safety here. Fire exits are marked differently, typically a green sign with a running man and a directional arrow to point towards the exit, rather than the US red light "EXIT" signs from the ceiling. Long hallways, like my corridor, are split by a fire door halfway down, and most doors are hinged to close unless propped open. Furthermore, leaving a door propped open will result in a verbal warning from a warden here.

The fire alarms are tested once a week in public areas and are so sensitive that in the flats, even steam will set off the fire alarm unless the windows are opened to ventillate the air. On the other hand, I have no idea where the closest fire hydrants are... there are probably plenty and I just haven't noticed them.

Today I was in my maths lecture when we heard a very high-pitched whining. The professor paused in the middle of his explanation of Bessel functions, and said, "I assume that's just a drill. Well, we'll move on, shall we?" Wow.
He continued to talk about Bessel functions for a minute more, with no one in the lecture theatre paying attention. Finally, he put down his chalk and said, "well, okay, maybe we should participate in the drill too, so I'll leave this here for today. If you want a copy of the notes I'll leave them by the teaching office later this afternoon." The students took their collective time packing up before leaving, and we all stopped to pick up copies of the notes on our way out. The crowd of students, from our class and others, stood next to the building's front doors, which I am pretty sure is not a fire safety regulation. In fact, most of it was against regulations.

Recently I've been exploring all those words that are spelled differently between British and American English.
-"Fetal" gets turned into "foetal". A lot of double-vowels.
-grey
-colour, honour, neighbour, etc.
-realise, civilise, etc. Nothing has a "zed", pretty much.
Turning my language default to British English helps catch a lot of these.

-Oh, and "cell phones" are "mobiles", which I can't even pronounce properly.
-when you want to call someone, you phone them. I never remember that one.
-"well" can be used to mean "very". So, "He was well upset."

Last night I went to Laserquest (like Laser Tag) in a competition between Phys Soc and Maths Soc. We all were able to play two games... and while I was awful (ranked 15th out of 18 in both games) I had a lot of fun. The packs had sensors on the back, chest, shoulders, and lasergun, but were designed for use by people much larger than myself, so the too-broad shoulders clipped walls as I turned corners. I'd like to think that at least I didn't get in the way of my fellow team members, but I literally ran into so many that I'm not sure that's the case either... oh well. PhysSoc won anyway! And it was just an amazingly fun evening.

A lot of people have taken it upon themselves to educate me in terms of British comedy. Mostly this means watching old John Cleese sitcoms, along the lines of "Fawlty Towers".

Autumn in Edinburgh

Last Friday was the second-to-last match of the Rugby World Cup, so I was able to watch the entire Argentina vs. France game for bronze. I think I understood the entire match, which is great for it being only the third or so rugby game I've watched all the way through.

Saturday night was the final, England and South Africa. Walking around the streets in the afternoon was interesting, because many of the native Edinburgers were discussing the upcoming game, wearing their Scotland jerseys, stocking up on lager, etc. As you can imagine, most Scots were rooting for South Africa. But there's also enough English in this city that England flags were everywhere. I wasn't planning on watching the final, but I wound up at one of the pubs frequented by students where a huge crowd had amassed. The pub itself is small, but it has a large outdoor area with about forty picnic tables, all completely full of students, then a solid wall of extremely tall guys standing up at the edge. I stood behind a few of these men, and so could see about 10% of the large projection screen. Not very good for following the match.
South Africa won, to the chagrin of the England supporters, and the delight of everyone else. As soon as the match finished, the previously-empty sidewalks were flooded with fans, including my group. Not twenty seconds later, the sound of police and ambulance sirens drowned out the cheering. Not surprised that a rugby match involving England would end in violence.

I think the World Series is going on at home? I only hear vague snippets, mostly overhearing American students talking about it. With the rugby gone, I'm not sure what sport will fill the void. Football (soccer), I guess.

In the past week the weather has changed very suddenly. Trees have turned golden and now the sidewalks are full of crunchy leaves. The early mornings (anything before sunrise which is at about 8 AM) have temperatures hovering just above freezing. It's not the temperatures that are bad, really, it's the wind... Edinburgh has the fortunate nickname "The Windy City", and it is very true.
At the same time, the gardens I pass by on the way to KB are even more colorful than before. A lot of roses, especially, and some gardenias, hydrangeas, some flowering trees that look like azaleas... beautiful!

Also on Saturday I poked around the Archaeology section of the National Museum of Scotland, about a fifteen-minute walk from home. The museum is split into two huge buildings, and probably takes over a day to see everything---something I would like to do eventually, and it is entirely free, so. The Archaeology was extremely interesting, so even if I didn't have to write a short paper on my findings, I would still have enjoyed it. All the artefacts in the collection are from Scottish sites. In Britain, anything dug up must be reported to a government branch dedicated to preserving the cultural and material history, and artefacts belong to the nation as a whole (or maybe the Queen? not sure). A council decides where the artefacts should go after they are analyzed---a local, regional, educational, or national museum, usually, so that they are completely accessible to the public. As a result, the collections of Scottish archaeological finds are impressive, and this exhibit was very well done.

I feel that my Archaeology of Scotland class is teaching me more about Scotland's geography and climate than I would have otherwise learned. I know all about how the Ice Age shaped the Highlands, where waterways are, the quality of the soil in different places. Completely impractical knowledge for me, but fascinating.

physics and drinks

My physical maths professor has a very clear way of speaking and explaining things, and is on the whole very easy to follow. However, like most of the maths instructors I've ever had, he is very awkward about speaking in front of a group. His particular idiosyncracy: a tendency to repeat himself. "This solution is more complicated. How is it more complicated? Well, it's more complicated in the fact that..."

At the end of my Quantum lecture, our second turn-in assignment was due and we got our first hand-in back. Edinburgh has a good system in that students affix a barcode of their exam number to their work, so the graders don't know whose assignment they are grading and can't be biased, and the score can enter into the electronic records more easily. Unfortunately, it also means that when over a hundred papers are stacked together, it is next to impossible to locate your own. There is no good system for it... next time I need to remember to highlight the top corner. A little trick I developed: it's eye-catching and no one else does it.

Lastly, a note on beverages.

-Scottish people put milk in their tea. The English do too, but not as much. It's not so weird, I suppose, even though the majority of people I know might put sugar or lemon or occasionally a little milk, but never always milk. It's odd in that the action of not putting milk into tea is considered near-barbaric.
But I feel that way about most things... if I'm going to drink something, I'm going to drink it straight. Coffee and tea are bitter but that's part of the acquired taste.
-On that note, milk (and other dairy products) are relatively inexpensive to buy. It could be the large numbers of cattle in Britain. The price for a gallon of milk is about equivalent to our own.
-All the orange juice I've seen have been American imports... Tropicana, Minute Maid, etc. Somehow I thought that there would be some orange groves around in Spain that might be easier to import from but maybe Florida really is the closest available. At any rate, it would explain the poor quality of the bananas and oranges available from the dining hall (though the apples tend to be pretty good).


Rugby World Cup Finals are this weekend. Hope to watch both games.

Fire! Fire! Fire!

This week I haven't been sleeping very well at all. This can best be summarized by the happenings last night:
I intended to go to bed by 10, but stayed up to talk to a friend and went to bed around midnight---which is my fault and therefore acceptable.
I woke up at almost precisely four to the sound of the fire alarm. Again? I have enough experience with Holland House fire alarms that I knew to put on shoes, glasses, and a jacket before going out. Of course I was still cold, but it's the thought that counts.

There was confusion in the corridor---the main stairwell was full of what looked like thick smoke. Not good. So down we went the other stairwell, to behind the building, then trekked all the way around the building through frost-covered grass. While shuffling together like penguins in Antarctica we learned the cause: someone on the second (third) floor set off fire extinguishers in the stairwell.

The firemen came, and didn't bother rushing to the door, they knew it was no emergency just as we did. The head firefighter even announced to us: "If you have friends living somewhere else, I'd suggest you spend the rest of the night there. This is going to be a while."

We eventually were allowed to file into the common room on the ground floor even though the alarms were still going off, but at least it was warm. Around five we were allowed back upstairs, only we had to avoid the main stairwell. As the wardens let us out of the common room they asked if we knew who set off the extinguishers: if not, the several-hundred-pound damages would be split evenly among all the residents, same policy as for the previous fire alarms and all structural damages (ex: the windows of A Block's door have been broken several times now). That irks me, I'm pretty sure I was dead asleep last night. Well, for a while anyway. After that I tried to sleep for the two hours before breakfast... needless to say, it was a four-cups-of-coffee kind of morning.

By breakfast the smoke had settled into dust coating the stairs. It actually looked like snow, with several pairs of tracks going through. Disgusting, and not healthy I am sure.

The ladies at the charity shop today were talking about the suddenly-freezing temperatures here in Edinburgh, so I told them about my 4 AM foray into the cold in my pajamas. Their reaction can be summed as: "I'm guessing some blokes got pissed last night."

I am reminded why I dislike first-year dorms.

Tutorials

I have mentioned tutorials a few times now. Well, so far this week I have gone to four tutorials, one for each class. As a taste of what we do, I will summarize them, below:

Archaeology: we looked at aerial photographs copied out of a book to discuss the landmarkings. Mostly the tutor talked and we listened. We also got to look at a few maps. On these, if an artefact was found in a particular site, it was actually labelled on the map! There were several small circles labeled "cairn" or "fort", usually at the top of a hill, and there was even a square shape marked "Roman fort" and a point for "broch (remains of)".

Musical Acoustics: The tutor talked about each of the frequency spectrograms seen here. Then we watched two you tube videos, because they were relevant(?).
Beatboxing Flute, "Inspector Gadget" theme We watched the full 3:30.
Mozart played on wine bottles A much shorter piece, but no less impressive.
I could have done all of those things from home.

Physical Mathematics: I really didn't understand the problem set before, because we didn't have the material yet in lecture, but I quickly discovered I could do the math without having learned the concepts yet. I finished the PS in tutorial, not something I would have done in an hour on my own time.

Quantum Mechanics: Did not understand how to do the PS at all. I struggled to exchange coordinates for about 20 minutes on one problem, gave up, asked the tutors for help, played with the numbers for the next hour, and finally got it. The rest of the problems came much easier after I understood what I was doing.... I think.
Again, I would not have completed that problem set in two hours on my own time, nor without the tutors' help.

Crannog Center

Today was a full-day Archaeology of Scotland field trip to the Scottish Crannog Centre on Loch Tay. A crannog is a circular structure built up on stilts along the shore of a lake. There are some remains found in Switzerland, and many many many in Scottish lochs. Loch Tay, in particular, there have been 18 remains of these crannogs found. And because the remains are underwater (especially in cold, dark lochs) very little decays.

So this particular crannog was built based on one crannog excavated in the same loch, and there were many artefacts found that would not normally make it, like textiles with their original colors and a butter dish with bits of butter still on. But mostly, the crannog itself was impressive. There was a raised bridge/dock/thing to get out to the structure, built on piers with just logs as a path... logs which were not lashed at all on the edges, so it was a little bouncy and unstable. Inside, which was quite roomy, the floor was the same but had a fern/weed covering, like hay might be used, and the thatched roof was incredibly high---to keep snow from sticking, and to allow the passage of smoke out.

On the shore was a small exhibition of Iron Age technology, including three kinds of lathes. The coolest one had a foot petal attached to a small tree on either side. When pushed down, the connecting ropes pulled down the trees, which in turn set the lathe spinning, so both hands could be used to scrape the wood. Other technology included using bows to spin sticks and grind down a hole in the center of a stone, to then use as a weight in weaving, fishing, or spinning wool. And a bow could also be used to start a bit of wood smouldering from friction. We were also showed a fungus that grows on the side of trees. A little chip from the fungus will burn for a full day, slow and steady, and can be used to start a campfire when on the move.

You might notice that I changed the picture links to the right-hand side. Whenever I update photos, I will change the date, so you can just glance over and see if how lazy I've been about picture taking. I will also note in my blog when I add photos, so go on over and have a look, I took a few at the crannog today.

The only problem with the field trip today was that it took about three hours to drive there, we spent about two on-site, and it was another 2-3 driving back. A lot of transportation time for a little bit of crannog time.

However, the fact we got to talk to the lead archaeologist of the project, and ask him questions about the work he did, was so cool!

Couldn't be bothered.

Yesterday at CHSS I steamed things for close to three hours, with frequent breaks for coffee, biscuits, and refilling the hot water supply. If I actually worked retail, I would have been upset at steaming clothing for such a long time, but as it's volunteer work I find I don't mind. A lot of things are like that. (Also, steaming trousers or skirts is fine, but I dislike steaming blouses/shirts. A lot.)

Today I did a lot of odd jobs. I combed the bookshelves looking for a replacement book for a boxed set of Wilson Smith (?) novels. I took some items out from the front (culling?). I spent a long time choosing outfits for the mannequins, and I did up the front window! Again, something I would not have enjoyed quite so much had I been paid.

It's nice working in that shop. The women are definitely genuinely Scottish. They say a lot of very Scottish things, and especially on the phone I can't understand them nearly so well. I think they tone it down when talking to me, and I have to censor my own Americanisms out because mostly I've had to rephrase when I do use them.
-to ken is to know, as in "You ken what I mean."
-a hen is a familiar word for a woman. It can be used as a term of endearment, today I was told, "Would you like a cuppa, my hen?". Or you can have a night out with the hens, with the girlfriends.

Also, the Assistant Manager yesterday asked me if I had a favorite pub. That was a little awkward, I don't think that question would be asked back home by a supervisor so much older.

-Braces are suspenders. Suspenders are garters. Garters are used for knee socks.
...Important information when you want the men's product used to hold up trousers. Don't ask a group of guys if they have suspenders you can borrow, only those familiar with the American usage won't snigger/act offended.
-"Consolidants" are adhesives? I think?
-the famous Egyptian pharoah Tutankamun is pronounced "too-tank-ham-OON"
-status as "state-us"

Scottish soil is extremely acidic and breaks artefacts down rapidly, so it is difficult to find remains of the past. There are exceptions to this, of course, most notably peat bogs. It is taken for granted that everyone in the class has firsthand experience with peat bogs.
I am learning more about the Scottish climate through Archaeology class than I ever expected. Don't think it rivals what I know about VA, but it's still quite a bit.

Other common words: pile (a lot of stuff), bit (thingy, or in "wee bit"), ehm (umm), squiggly (especially "squiggly bits"), squashed, ace (good).

One of my favorite phrases: "Can't be bothered." It means "I just don't want to, I don't feel like it."
"I was meant to do my maths work, but I couldn't be bothered."
"She couldn't be bothered to eat dinner with me."
This phrase is going to stick.

Tour Guide

This weekend my friend Sarah, who is also American, was visited by her cousin, who is English. He had never been to Edinburgh before, so we took him out to see the city, or at least parts we were familiar with.

On Sunday night we wanted to see the Rugby World Cup match between Scotland and Argentina. Of course no one really has a TV--there is a television tax in the UK, and it's cumbersome to begin with--and the TV in the common room was in use for a football match. Where do you go to catch an important sports game? The nearest pub, of course. There is one right across the street from our dorm complex that clearly caters to students, plus it has the biggest TV of any of the pubs I've seen yet.

Sadly, Scotland lost by the margin of one score (19-13, a try is 5 and a successful dropkick is another 2, to make it a 20-19 win), but I still very much enjoyed the game. After it ended the place cleared out but we stayed on a little, and were fortunate enough to catch an American football game! SD Chargers and Denver Broncos, teams I don't really care about, but it was still amazing to see an NFL feed from CBS played on Sky Sports.

Apparently Edinburgh has an American football team, comprised of guys from all the city's universities, U. Edinburgh, Heriot Watt, Napier, possibly one or two others. That's how small the interest is, but I'm still impressed there's enough to create a team.

I also had the opportunity to explain to my guy friends the basic rules of American football using analogies to rugby rules. How cool is that.

Notes on Maths

Math is one of those things that is luckily universal, we all use the same Arabic numerals and Greek symbols. So when there are differences in my maths class, I am always surprised. Can you tell I am avoiding doing my maths problem set right now.

Also, no fear, I don't expect non-science-y people to be bothered by these words.

I have already mentioned the word "maths" and how Fourier is pronounced "furrier" rather than the (correct) French way. Cosine, shortened to "cos", is usually said in America in a similar way to "coast" without the T, but here it's "cosh" rhymes with "posh". Confusing because there is another trigonometic function called the hyperbolic cosine shortened to "cosh" which is said in that same, rhymes-with-posh, way in America... but I don't know what they would call it here.

When we are working in groups in Tutorials, and I explain how I solved a set of functions, usually I get blank stares. Not because the math I use is any different or because my peers are slow, but because of the different phrases used. As an example, "divided by" or "over", like "3/8 is three over eight" is more usually said "three upon eight" but I can never remember to said it that way.

Instead of "zero" or "oh" the number 0 is "naught". Right. Fortunately, unlike other places, I think a million is still 1,000,000. A vector (one- or multi-dimensional direction) I have always seen written with an arrow over the symbol, or emboldened in texts, but here it is much more common to write the arrow under the symbol. Something I have never before seen.
Another thing I'd never seen: If showing the integral of a function, usually it looks like S f(x) dx. (S is meant to be the integrand.) More often I see S dx f(x), which is fine, but confusing.
And when writing an exponential, rather than the natural e with its power written smaller above it, or e^(2*pi*x), it is written exp(2*pi*x).

More things have "unity". Also the phrase "normal modes" is used quite frequently and I'm not exactly sure to what it refers, but it's not the same as "nodes" nor as "mode of freedom", another concept with which I am familiar.

And of course there are spelling differences like normalise. You want me to do what to that function?

Speaking of which, I will get back to my homework now.

Chest Heart and Stroke Scotland

Most of you know that I've consistently volunteered once a week for about the past seven years, give or take. Every time I go to a new place for a long period of time I'm okay at first but then I just have to find a volunteer organization to involve myself with, or else I go crazy.

I waited for about a month this time before it was time. Okay, actually three weeks. Last week I looked through the U.Edinburgh volunteering site, and mostly there were too many options. I looked at the broad topics and picked an area to work with: volunteering at charity shops.

There are so many charity shops on this side of Edinburgh. I can think of at least six along a ten block stretch of the same street. They are everywhere. I chose the one nearest to where I live, incidentally, but also the one I could identify the most with: Chest, Heart, and Stroke Scotland. CHSS.

I dropped by on my way home from class last week, emailed references and got responses by the weekend, then stopped in again early this week. I talked to Michelle, the lady who coordinates volunteers?, and set today as a good first day to work a few hours. As I never worked in a shop before I didn't know quite what to expect, but, rather like library work, I think it appeals to my organized nature. I pulled clothes from the racks that had been out longest, sorted through the stacks to find suitable replacements in the same sizes and learned how to tag them, and was taught how to steam clothes.

Also I was given free tea, coffee, and biscuits (yummy shortbread!).
Also apparently I get a 25% discount on the already-thrify prices. I didn't even know that until I was heading out the door this afternoon.

Next week I'm going in twice, which will hopefully be a permanent fixture of my schedule, unless I find I don't like it. But if I do decide I like it, then they do the background check, to make sure I'm not a charity shop serial killer maybe, I don't know.

What I want to do is learn to work the till eventually, after they trust me enough/I trust myself with British currency.

I'm not so keen on the banks here.

Phrases I keep forgetting about, like:
-"I'm not keen on ___" (say, "maths", or "that chippie", or "that boy")
-"How are we meant to know that?" ("How are we supposed to know that?")
-"sweet corn" is normal, yellow corn. And it's not sweet.
-"pudding" means general dessert
-"artefact" bugs me a lot in Archaeology
-Posh. Preppy, or perhaps better as "yuppy", high-class.
-"nick", not steal.

ATMs are mostly called CashPoints, but they recognize what an ATM is.
Not so when I asked about wire transfers at the bank. I tried to explain the concept to the bank teller, which is difficult: a. without using the words "wire" or "transfer", and b. when you don't actually understand how it works.
For those of you keeping track at home, I do have a bank account now. Yay!

This weekend I finished a scarf of green variegated yarn. Because the yarn was a lower weight than I would have liked, the knitting was looser, so I decided I'd need to wrap the scarf around my neck more times.
As a result, the scarf is easily longer than I am. Maybe seven feet long?
I have started on cabled armwarmers in a light aqua color. I'll come back to my cardigan sometime soon, maybe after this.

Wearing a William&Mary sweatshirt is a fast way to find all the East Cost Americans in one's daily travels. One girl, another student I think, stared at me in awe on the pavement (sidewalk). An older man, I think now a permanent UK resident, told me he used to live in Stafford.
I'm not sure how the Scots feel about it, since that monarch pair were the ones BPC was trying to oust.
Also, a "college" here is what we might think of as a technical or trade school, like a two-year programme rather than a four-year university degree.
So "College of William & Mary" means something entirely different, I am sure.

I miss a lot of things about home. Things I didn't expect to miss so much: tacos/fajitas/other spicy foods/ethnic foods beyond just Indian, driving my car, the UVA physics department, proper salads. At least they occasionally serve pancakes at breakfast.