Highlands in the sun (hip hip) - Part I

When you're ooon a hooooolidayyyyyyy.....

Hi guys! Wow, I haven't posted in more than 6 months... a bad girl I am indeed :( The reason, you might have guessed, is that I have been sooo busy with the second semester of my master's course (but I won't bore you with studies in this blog update) and I only finished my exams a couple of weeks ago =)

So, in order to celebrate a well-deserved 2-week break before the start of my summer project (which I should actually be working on now, instead of posting here), I ventured away from the safe streets of the Glasgow West End and went to the Highlands (or kinda). Twice.

The first time was with 3 friends from uni (from left to right, Clare, Amanda and Daryl), who introduced me with Loch Lomond and typically Scottish picnics (sun -> wind -> food -> rain -> hail ("grêle") -> dessert-in-the-car -> sun). I think Scottish weather deserves a post of its own, so I will spare you more remarks on that topic for now ;)

The second time was with friends from London town (I still don't get where this expression comes from or what nuances it brings, but I like it ;-)). Well, actually they're friends from Paris, but they moved to London when I was in Slough (London suburbs) and 2 out of 3 are still there.

Let us introduce them :

- Sabrina (aka Sab), one of my best friends and whom I've known since high school, currently finishing her master's in European law at prestigious College d'Europe in Bruges (Dutch-speaking part of Belgium). She wasn't meant to join us at first, as she had an oral presentation on the Monday, but it was cancelled at the very last minute (on the Friday), so she went on a Eurostar to London and went with the guys. And also doomed us for the whole week-end as we had to squeeze in a tiny car ^_^

- Alexis (aka Al), Sab's boyfriend, who has a secret passion for plages arrières (rear board thingy that you put on top of your junk in a car boot), also a computer programmer for Customs and Revenues during the day.

- David (aka Moumou), Al's other secret lover and our lovely driver (the only one with a driving licence), who does not wish me to reveal his employer's name, for fear readers might want to kill him, but the gist of it is that he does super-smart things related to software and finance.

- and, last but not least, Nils (aka many things), my lovely boyfriend, and who helped a lot with the choice of locations (since he'd already been in the Highlands) and, more importantly, replaced Al as the front seat owner for our own safety and to accommodate Al's love affair with his beloved plage arrière. Oh, and he's an associate researcher in the computing science department at Glasgow Uni and the reason why I moved to Glasgow in the first place :).

David rented a (tiny ;)) car and left London with Al and Sab on the Friday night, they stayed in a hotel in Manchester, woke up far too late on the Saturday and finally arrived at our place in Glasgow around 5pm. There, it was discussed to go camping that very night, but every single site in the area was fully booked, so Nils and I cooked them the traditional Scottish dish 'haggis, neeps and tatties' (aka haggis, nipples and titties) and showed them around Glasgow West End and my university instead. I think they loved it ;)

Ashton Lane, the streets with all the pubs next to the uni (and a cool Guiness façade)

The tower of the University of Glasgow, which looks more like a cathedral than a university (but I have my lectures in the ugly modern buildins anyway :D)

The view of the city and the Kelvingrove Museum from the top of the hill (where the university is)

That's it for now... I will tell you more about it later, or this post will be far too big ^_^ (that, and I don't remember all the names of the places we went to)

A Whole New World (... a fantastic new point of view!)

Hi guys! Haven't blogged for a while, so I hope you've had time to recover from last note :)

First of all, I'd like to wish all of you a Happy New Year! I probably have already done it, though.

Since the STaG nights theatre festival finished, I've actually had only little free time: deadlines for my course started piling up, and the pace was just crazy, up until the last minute of the term. Fortunately, we didn't have any exams in the first semester (which means we'll have them all after the second semester), but instead we had thousands of assignments. The lecturers always say that you "should not spend too much time on them", but obviously every one does, and I'm happy to announce that we've all passed or geekiness test with awards :) Spending the night in the lab or planning a sleepness night or which lectures are the most worth skipping to finish an assignment is now part of our daily routine :o).

However, I had a very good Christmas break: went back to France and saw most of my friends there (I had 3 weeks off, which was great, although I was supposed to be studying for yet other assignments, which would have spared me 2 unnecessarily hectic weeks when I went back to Glasgow :)).

I hope you too had a great holiday period :o)

Now, I'm studying more, but it is still not exactly enough =). Anyway, I really enjoy (most of) what I am doing, and I'd actually like to do another master's in computing next year, when I go back to Paris.

Well, that's it, I believe :D I'll keep this one 'short', hoping that maybe you'll thank be for this effort by getting me a very nice present %D

xx

XL

PS: Most of you probably missed the previous note, as I didn't post it on facebook. Just look at the pictures, and read the paragraphs below the second picture (on the 'devise piece') if you're intrigued by them ;-))