Graveyards, Castles, and a Cuppa Tea

I've just finished my second week of uni and here's what's been going on!

Yesterday, I decided to take a walk around town again, since the weather was so beautiful. I'm actually not sure what's been up with the weather because every day this week it has been sunny and it has only been raining at night. In any case, I am not complaining! I decided to walk through Greyfriar's Kirkyard and then around the base of the castle and then back through Prince's Street Gardens. It was a lovely walk and there were some nice photo ops!

In Greyfriar's Kirkyard, I found Tom Riddle's grave! This actually isn't a coincidence. The Elephant House, where JK Rowling worked on the Harry Potter books, is right next to the graveyard and this tombstone is supposed to have been the inspiration for Tom Riddle's name. Obviously, the spelling had to be changed a little so the letters could be rearranged to spell Lord Voldemort! I'm not sure whether "fun" is the best way to describe walking around a graveyard, but it's interesting.

From there, I walked down to Grassmarket and there was a small little farmer's market with other vendors selling macarons, fresh bread, jewelry, etc.

Also I found a sign that I had seen before on the internet. I think this is a brilliant marketing tactic!

Finally, I got to the base of the towering castle. I walked along the base of the rock the castle is built on and ended up at St. Cuthbert's graveyard. I promise I'm not weird, it was just the only way back to Prince's Street!

I haven't been to Prince's Street Gardens this close to West End before, but it was really nice. There were nice flowers an this magnificent fountain.

In other news, this week there has been a very important step in my assimilation into British culture. Before I came here, I hated the taste of tea. I referred to it as "dirt water," and I was perfectly happy to drink pretty much anything else. I tried green teas, black teas, and herbal teas, but I never found any that I liked. I think the problem was that I always tried to sweeten tea, because it seems like most people did. I have discovered that I actually do really like tea as long as there is nothing in it. In the course of the last week, I have gone from drinking no tea to drinking three cups of tea a day! It's quite a transformation. I have three different kinds of black tea and one type of green tea in my flat that I like. I also picked up three herbal teas yesterday, but I haven't had the chance to try them. It's been fun to try new teas and since it costs just as much to buy 40 tea bags as it costs to buy a cup of tea at a cafe, it's pretty affordable to try new teas.

In addition to trying tea this week, I have also been experimenting with biscuits (aka cookies, for all you Americans). I have tried two kinds, but there are so many kinds! In the grocery store, there is an entire aisle dedicated to tea and biscuits, so the selection was a little overwhelming at first. It might take me all four years to get around to trying them all!

In continuation of my gastronomical adventures, I decided I was going to attempt to cook "actual food." Last week I made French toast and stewed apples and it was the best thing I had eaten since moving here. So this week I decided to make risotto. I went to the store on Saturday and got the ingredients and then spent a few hours cooking. The risotto came out so well! I am so proud of myself. It wasn't actually that difficult or time-consuming, so I will probably be having that again sometime soon.

I also made some French bread, but it only turned out okay. I think I'm going to try a different recipe next time. The crust was really good, but the flavor was average. 

One trouble with cooking right now is that I don't have any measuring cups or measuring spoons, so when I made the risotto and the bread I just eye-balled the measurements. Luckily, it worked out okay this time!

This week I also went to my first Intermediate Scottish Country Dance lesson. It was really challenging because the teacher really wants us to have good technique, but I think that will be good for me. She also called out a lot of forms that I hadn't done in a while and didn't associate with those names, so it was a little stressful. She told us to do a "reflecting wheel" and "allemand" and I didn't remember what figures those names referred to, but as soon as we did them I knew what we were doing. I got to practice my strathspey, which is always a good thing to practice. At the end, we did an exercise where she just called out all the figures for the dance and they we just did the dance without running through it. It was hard, but that was my favorite part of the lesson! I think the intermediate class is going to be hard, but I will improve a lot!