Day Four: Scottish Culture

 Today Daniel and I handed out leaf lets from 11:00am to 12:30pm and then met up with the other SNP interns and workers at St. Andrew's square while they were having lunch (we really like working with them).  Daniel and I kept folding leaflets.  We are such hard workers.... and we had already eaten. It was another beautiful day so we kept handing out leaflets after lunch and finished around 4:30pm. 

Then we went back to the apartment and made dinner (spaghetti... again).  We've decided that we don't like our salad dressing.  It's supposed to be Caesar but it tastes like and has the texture of mayo.... it was cheap. 

And again, I know I posted pictures a little while ago of the flat but let me try and emphasize how little the place is. The picture below shows Daniel doing the dishes.  Next to him you can see our washer and fridge.  We haven't figured out how to dry our clothes since we don't have a dryer and we have nothing to hang our clothes on in the apartment. 

 The next picture is our bedroom.  This is what really makes the flat feel so small.  The bed is a double but only has a twin blanket.  Daniel and I wake up multiple times a night just to put covers back on us... we will most likely have to invest in a bigger blanket.  There are no drawers and there isn't a closet either, so all of our clothes are in the baskets and Daniel's nice clothes are hung up in the utilities closet where there is conveniently a bar. Also, the end of the bed that you can't see is right next to a wall with a hole in it--the last tenant probably kicked it in when he was sleeping haha.  To summarize: there is nothing else but a bed, bright blue wall paper and a rock picture (that has fallen off and hit me in the head before).

 Here is the living room.  It came with a lot of books and a few DVD's... many of which Daniel and I will not be watching. haha

And the bathroom.... we have to turn on a switch to get the hot water to work (all of which is tinted slightly yellow)

Over all, we get wireless internet and cable, have a bed to sleep in, a kitchen to keep our food and a place to do our business. We are happy to call it home. Oh and lets not forget the fact that it's right in the middle of the city of Edinburgh, SCOTLAND. :-)

Now for the touring stuff

After dinner Daniel and I hit up St. Giles Cathedral.  It's 900 years old! This sounds really awful, but you had to pay two pounds to have a "photography pass" and we didn't want to pay it (yes.. we are that cheap)... so I snuck a few pictures of the inside--I cheated in church.  Yikes.

Daniel : St. Giles Cathedral



Mandi: St. Giles Cathedral (posed haha)



Above is one of my illegal pictures of the inside.  The architecture is beautiful and the stained glass windows tell stories of Christ's life as well as other Bible stories. Stunning.  However, I think the coolest thing about this cathedral is that while it pays tribute to Christ's life, it also pays tribute to the knights from the 12th century to the "knights" / soldiers of the 21st.  It was refreshing to see that-- especially when compared to a lot of other cathedrals that simply worship the priests and bishops of the sect even more so than the Savior. 

Another room to note with in the cathedral is the Thistle Chapel.  It's only 100 years old, but it's beautiful. It's a room for the royalty and 16 honored knights to meet together.  Each knight has to earn their seat ( it's not passed down within the family) and then the crests of the family rest above their seat when they pass on.  Daniel and I tried to find the Baird crest... but we didn't see it. :-(   We may have to do something awesome so we can represent the name.

Outside the Cathedral was a bagpiper... so we got our picture with him.  The bagpipes are surprisingly really loud so we didn't get too close.

 A booklet of information on the Baird Clan.  Daniel is very proud.

 SCOTTISH CULTURE:

The SNP advocates introduced us to a few "very scottish" things. 
1.  Irn Bru.  It tastes like bubblegum, is very artifically colored, and is supposed to be great for a hangover.  It was alright. haha I don't think I'd ever choose to buy it.  But Shirly-Ann (MSP- member of Scottish Parliament) says that besides Whisky, this is their second national drink. 

Daniel really loves it I guess....

2.  Tunnocks Chocolate Mallow.  It's a tea cake that is a marshmallow covered in chocolate ontop of a crispy cake--except the marshmallow is more creamy textured (but still fluffy) and the chocolate has a hazelnut flavor to it.  I loved it.  They are very very sweet though. 



And that was our day in a nut shell.

CHEERS! (Daniel loves saying that by the way)