When In Rome...

you gotta eat a lot of gelato. So I did! AJ and I went to Rome this past weekend (November 26-28). Another quick trip, as is the norm, but we managed to see a lot of things. We left Glasgow at 4pm from the international airport, landed in London Heathrow and had to transfer planes to get to Roma. Got to Rome around 10pm, took the train into the city and then walked from the termini to our hotel. Our hotel wasn't quite what we expected, the picture on the website was a little different than what it actually looked like, but it was still nice. We went to bed early as we had a lot of sightseeing to do the next day.

Our hotel. Its the one in the left hand side that says "Veneto Hotel". This is how they market it though.

Saturday we got up and headed out just after 9am. Our first stop was the Colosseum. It was incredible - we weren't even out of the metro station yet and it was right in front of us! Very overwhelming and beautiful. From there we walked up to the Arch of Constantine.

From here we walked down the road to the palatine.

And then stopped to marvel at the Monumento Nazionale a Vittorio Emanuele II (National Monument of Victor Emmanuel II).

We also saw the Pantheon.

Its under construction so we didn't get to see all of it. 

 

 

After that we crossed the river to the Piazza del Tribunali and took some more pictures.

Vatican from the Ponte Umberto

Palazzo di Guistizia

From here we walked up to Piazza del Popolo, where we got our first gelato of the day and got accosted by a guy selling flowers to people. He kept trying to make AJ buy me some roses and wouldn't leave us alone. We were trying to take pictures and he took my camera out of AJ's hand and pretty much forced us to let him take a picture of us. He then followed us around asking for money - after we had told him a million times we didn't want his stupid flowers, or him to take our picture. I finally gave him 1 euro to make him go away.

AJ and delicious gelato

Our 1 euro picture, with those stupid flowers. Also, our only proof we were in Rome at the same time.

From there we went to the Spanish Steps, where we sat for a while before climbing them and venturing to the Trevi fountain. We got more gelato at the Trevi Fountain and sat for a while, watching the sun go down and the lights in the fountain come on. All the good Trevi Fountain pictures are on AJ's camera, I will steal them from him one day.

After all this walking around and sightseeing we decided to call it a night and head back to the hotel and get ready for some supper. We got back to the hotel around 6 and promptly fell asleep. After a couple hour nap we got up and headed out in search of some amazing Italian cuisine, which we found a few blocks from our hotel down some slightly dodgy side street. The food was amazing, we both had pasta and tiramisu. Nom nom nom I love Italian food. After this we went back to our hotel and tried to get back to sleep as we had a busy day on Sunday.

Sunday morning we woke up, checked out of our hotel and headed to the Vatican. Its free entry on the last Sunday of the month so, lucky us, we got in for free. Unfortunately it was packed with people and was not a very enjoyable experience. We walked through the Vatican museum, went into the Sistine Chapel and into St. Peter's Basilica. It was all very beautiful, but I didn't take pictures - it just didn't feel right. There were many people snapping pictures everywhere and I couldn't figure out how they were really enjoying the artwork and the building if they were looking at it only through a camera lens.

St Peter's Basilica

  We made it back to our hotel from 2pm to collect our bag and head to the Termini to catch the train to the train station. We got to the airport a little later than we intended, but still managed to check in to our flight - only to find out it had been delayed 1.5 hours and that we would miss our London to Glasgow connection and would have to overnight in London. We got into London after our connecting flight had left and we got to stay in the Holiday Inn. We were up early today (Monday) to get to the airport for our 10am flight. We got to the airport just before 8 and spent the next hour and a bit queued trying to figure out why we couldn't check in and get our boarding passes. It turns out that British Airways' automated computer system canceled our flight reservation because we didn't make the connecting flight Sunday night (I have no idea how this makes sense, but go figure). Regardless, it all worked out and we got back into Glasgow just after 12pm today. It had snowed while we were away and it is beginning to look like Christmas around here!

One last week of praticum to do - 32 hours and 2 evaluations until I am done my degree. I am so excited! Many things to in the next couple of weeks - good thing I only have one more week of practicum to do, or I'd have to start actually doing stuff after I get home from work.

London Calling...

So it has been two very eventful weeks since I blogged last. Sorry to keep you all waiting for more information on my life, I know you have all been checking everyday to see if I have written anything new. I'll start waaaay back when, on November 5th.

When my mom and I were staying in the West End of Glasgow there was this very intriguing bar across the road from us which was a renovated church. We talked about going there for a drink many times over the course of the week she was here, but we never actually went. Before she left, she made me promise I would go with my friends to check it out, so I could tell her what it was like. On the 5th AJ, Julie and I headed to Oran Mor just for my mom.

AJ and I in Oran Mor. Notice the neat wall behind us.

AJ, Julie and I in the club part of Oran Mor

Oran Mor

The bar was really neat; it has a club in the basement and spaces that you can rent out for parties, weddings, etc. It also has this night called “A pie, a pint and a play” that I have heard good things about.

Saturday AJ and I went to Stirling, which is a town about 30 miles from Glasgow and is home to Stirling Castle (go figure!). We met Brittany Armstrong’s cousin, Blair, there as he lives in the area and offered to show us around. We walked up from the train station to the castle, and stopped for some lunch.

Stirling from the Castle

Stirling Castle

AJ

Blair and AJ

Castle employee in costume

Elaborate kitchen display

After we toured around the castle for a while we headed back into town and grabbed a drink and a snack before parting ways. It was a nice day and I had fun doing something touristy. We also saw a bus filled with Canadian curlers – they waved at us. AJ figures that they may have heard us speak, could see my lululemon logo on my sweater, or just were being friendly and Canadian.

After a busy weekend I had another week of work – nothing too exciting happening there. I got to have a go at another ward – General Psychiatry instead of just addictions. It was different but a nice change of pace. I really enjoyed working with the clients as they seem more motivated and take their treatment a little more seriously. That being said the addictions side of things is also a lot more fun, and you can have a laugh with the clients as they don’t take themselves too seriously.

Friday (the 12th) came fast and it was Julie’s birthday! For her birthday weekend we (AJ, Julie and I) decided

 we would venture down to London and spend the weekend there to celebrate. We left Friday afternoon and

 took the train from Glasgow to Edinburgh and then from Edinburgh we went to London. It took us about 6

 hours to get there and then we took the tube from King’s Cross to Camden town, the part of London we 

were staying in. We dropped off our bags and went out in search of food – we ended up eating at a Thai 

buffet which was….interesting.  Everyone got something that was ridiculously spicy, because nothing was

 labelled. It’s a good thing none of us has food allergies. After the super spicy food we headed back to the

 hostel for some birthday drinks and headed up to bed. Saturday AJ and I went sightseeing around London

 – we went to Hyde Park, Buckingham Palace, Westminster Abbey, Trafalgar Square and Piccadilly Circus.

 We got back to the hostel around 5pm and got ready to go out and had some late lunch. We had tickets to a 

show, called Blood Brothers. The play was really well done – I recommend it to anyone! I was really surprised

 at how much I enjoyed it – not that I didn’t think I would enjoy it, but it exceeded my expectations by far.   

After the show we ended up going to a bar in Camden called the Purple Turtle, which played some great 90s

 music and kept us entertained most of the night. We didn't get back to the hostel until very late and had a hard

 time being up and functioning for our 10am check out time on Sunday. We spent the rest of Sunday

 sightseeing again. We went on a riverboat cruise down the Thames. Our train was supposed to leave at 5:25

 from Euston station and we would have gotten to Glasgow around 10pm but there was a signal failure outside 

of London somewhere so all the trains from Euston station were either cancelled or delayed and we wound up

 having to run for the train from King’s Cross station to Edinburgh, which left at 6:30 and was scheduled to 

get into Edinburgh at 11:27 pm with a connection to Glasgow at 11:30. We were 30 minutes late for our 

connection because the train was delayed so much, but luckily the train company provided all the Glasgow 

passengers a taxi back to Glasgow. I can only imagine how much that must have cost the company. We didn’t

 end up getting back to Glasgow until 2am, which is a little later than the 10pm arrival time we had originally. 

Julie and AJ, eating our Thai takeaway

Wellington Arch

Canadian War Memorial

It smelled like pee in here.

Westminster Abbey

Buckingham Palace

Canada gate in front of Buckingham Palace. It was the nicest one.

St. Paul's Cathedral

Trafalgar Square

London Eye

Big Ben

Tower Bridge

There you are – all caught up on my life to date! I’ll try not to wait so long in between posts next time.  

Halloween!

So this weekend was Halloween, which is a very big deal over here. Christy came up from Cannock (in England) to spend the weekend with AJ (and me). Friday night I met Christy and AJ at their hotel where we ordered pizza and visited and then we went to the movies. Saturday we all went into city center so that I could find some boots to wear with my Halloween costume and to find Julie a costume. We went back to the hotel and got ready to go to the club by watching the Rocky Horror Picture Show. We had tickets to a Club Noir Burlesque night at the O2Academy, which is close to the subway station I use.

The O2Academy

Christy, AJ and I were mounties for Halloween. We were worried that people wouldn't know what/who we were, but as we were leaving the hotel in our costumes we had some people go "look! Canadians! Where's your horse?". After that we figured some people would know what we were trying to be.

AJ and I at the bus stop at the end of the night

Christy and AJ at the hotel. Christy and I had the same costume.

 There were a lot of people coming up to us when we were at the club that would yell "DUE SOUTH!". Apparently the UK has a large Due South fan base. Someone asked if we kept wolves as pets and then asked if we'd ever seen a real polar bear.  We also met some fellow Canadians who were impressed with our costumes. All in all it was a pretty good night and the burlesque show was entertaining. We got home around 3 (I think? It was daylight savings time here, so maybe it was 2 - or 4) and we walked down to Sauchiehall Street to get chips n cheese, which is the quintessential post-club food here.

None of us slept very well, Christy was worried about the time change, but was reassured when she realized that "the BBC would tell her" what was going on. Sunday morning came much too early, but we were all awake by 9 and started getting ready for our half-day together. We went to another movie, this time we saw "The Kids are Alright". After the movie we went to Pizza Hut for brunch (?) and the dessert we ordered was a giant hunk of warm cookie dough with ice cream on top. It was delicious, but far too sweet. We all had stomach aches by the time we were done. We walked back to the hotel so Christy could get her car and from their we said good bye to her. Her visit here was much too fast and we were sad to see her go. Sunday night AJ came back to my place and we watched Paranormal Activity 2, just to do something festive.

Week 9 of practicum started today and I was supposed to move wards from Addictions to General, but didn't get a chance to today. Hopefully tomorrow will go better.