Week 1

Hello all,

     It has been just over a week since we left the US and it has been an exhausting and very busy week. We first arrived at Glasgow to be greater by a very nice immigration agent who after finding out our cats were arriving a week later told us of a women who snuck a cat into her purse and was caught. He went on to explain that the cat went to quarantine and the women was fined and detained for most of the day. After getting through customs we we used the University shuttle system to get to Campus. Once we arrived on campus, and picked our jaws up off the ground from the picturesque views and buildings, we completed our Visa check-in process and collected our Student ID cards. We then asked some friendly staff to contact us taxi to take us to the hotel. While waiting for our taxi we told the visa supervisor of our cats flying in next week. This immediately brought up in his mind the story from just the previous day of a student who tried to smuggle a kitten into the country. We all gossiped about it till our taxi arrived to take us to a nearby village called East Kilbride.
     We arrived at our hotel 4 hours early electing to just wait in the lounge when they informed us that a room was ready and we moved in straight away. We were extremely fortunate and took advantage of the showers and the king size bed. The rest of our first day in Scotland was taken up with sleep and a venture to the Hotel Bar to eat dinner before retreating for an early night.
    Our second day in Scotland had us starting at the East Kilbride shopping center. We were on the hunt for sim cards, which quickly turned to a hunt for cell phones to put said sim cards into. We met a fellow Expat named Bruce who moved to Scotland 6 years ago from Wisconsin and he helped us fined cell phones, and we eventually set up the internet for our flat with him as well. Wanting something quick for lunch we went to the food court at the shopping center and ordered two spuds. The restaurant had very interesting potato toppings such as, Tuna and Corn, Cheese and Pickles, and a few other not so appeasing combinations. We asked for just butter and cheese on ours and they really must have thought we loved it cause that was pretty much all that was in there. The restaurant scoops out the majority of the potato to put the filling in. So after our lighter than expected light lunch we went to the bus stop and jumped on the bus to go back to the hotel.
   After resting for a bit in the afternoon of day 2 we travelled to Glasgow to meet our new Landlord and the current tenant we had met through Reddit. We looked at the apartment, which we loved, and then signed some papers and paid the deposit and we had a flat. Grant (previous tenant) let us come along that evening to a pub with some of his friends to try and introduce us to the city. We had a great time and arrived back at the hotel a little later than we thought we would.
   Over the course of the next few days we moved into the flat, opened our bank accounts, met with directors of our graduate programs, and finally welcomed the cats to Glasgow. The cats seem to have traveled just fine although they were very hungry when we got them home. They seem excited to be here and both really love the view out of the apartment windows. They even got a little internet fame with their pictures being posted on the intake companies webpage.
   Finally, this week is the start of our courses for our MLitt programs. We both have classes at various times throughout the week, but are really excited for them to begin. We are also quickly meeting fellow students in our programs and we hope to get a chance to hangout with them outside of course work. I am hoping that my next post will be able to include photos, but so far we have not had much time to take the camera out to snap some good photos. Also I am hoping to tie a bit of food blogging into this since we have such an assortment of flavors right outside our door. Talk to everyone soon.

Mia Culpa

Hello everyone! So it has been far too long since this blog has been updated. I can throw plenty of excuses out as to why we quit posting and how busy we got but I see no point in pointing fingers and declaring who quite writing and posting photos. So to make up for this travesty we will be starting this blog up again since we are now moving to Glasgow. It has been a crazy process and we are still in the middle of the move (typing this on my phone at gate A18 in Philadelphia.) so any ways to serve our penance for dropping the ball last time we are gone for a full year, and I am making it my goal to do at least 1 update a week. If I can do more I will, but at least 1 a week is mandatory. So I hope everyone is ready to see pictures and read stories of all the adventures we have in Glasgow, Scotland. Until my next update I hope everyone has a great week and talk to you all soon! 

The Leepers