Rotary Visits and Loch Ness Trip (Part 1)

Greetings Family and Friends –

Hope things are going well for all of you back in Texas! It’s been a while since I’ve posted lately, with classes and Rotary activities ramping up quite a bit. Things are going great, and two months have now passed since I left East Texas. The time has truly flown by, and I’m adjusting more every day to the Scottish way of life.

Here are several fascinating things that I’ve been up to lately:

Rotary Ceilidh
Attending Aberdeen Deeside’s Charity Ceilidh was so much fun! The band played Scottish folk music all night long, and learning the Scottish dances was a great laugh. Two of the Rotarian ladies even showed me some impressive moves on the dance floor!

Rotary Club Visits
Last week, the Aberdeen Balgownie Rotary Club invited me to speak at their meeting on Thursday night. The Balgownie Rotarians were a friendly group, and the presentation went well. After presenting and exchanging banners with the club, they kindly extended an open invitation for me to visit their meetings in the future.

This week I’ll also be traveling down to visit and speak at the Laurencekirk Rotary Club, which is located about 30 miles south of Aberdeen. It’s been great to meet so many friendly Rotarians here in Scotland, and I look forward to meeting even more during future club visits. Here are the Scottish Rotary Club banners that I’ve collected so far to bring back home:

Golf Lessons
My colleagues and I had our third golf lesson on Friday, and I’m really getting hooked on it. My flatmate and I have been putting in some extra time at the driving range, so hopefully we’ll be hitting the full course soon!

Trip to Loch Ness
On Saturday, my roommate (Nick), his friend (Sylvia), and I went for a highlands day trip to visit Loch Ness. Waking up early, we packed sack lunches and hit the road. Castle ruins were all along the road we took, and we visited one along the way called Glenbuchat.

Here’s a view of the castle:

The towers were quite intimidating:

Nice view from the castle window:

Steep spiral staircases!

Loch Ness Visit (Part 2)

After visiting Glenbuchat Castle, we drove up and down the steep hills. Here’s what the view looked like from a look-out point (another castle is visible towards the left of the valley):

As we traveled further Northwest, the rainy weather started moving in. Here’s a view of the clouds moving in with mountains in the background:

After four hours of driving we arrived in Inverness, a northern coastal city located about 15 minutes from Loch Ness. Loch Ness is famous for Nessie, the notorious sea monster who is said to inhabit the ancient body of water. We could tell we were getting close when we saw this Nessie statue outside of a gas station:

Loch Ness is one of many bodies of water created by the glaciers during the ice age. The word loch is essentially another word for a lake. However, I was quickly corrected by a Scottish friend when I accidentally called one a lake. Thus the name – Loch Ness. As we arrived at Loch Ness, a rainy haze was settling over the water:

I wanted to jump in so that I could say I’ve been swimming with Nessie, but the water was really cold:

Loch Ness Visit (Part 3)

After visiting Loch Ness and picking up a few souvenirs, we headed east and visited Culloden Battlefield. At this site, the Battle of Culloden took place in 1746 as a final clash between the Scottish Highland Jacobites and the Hanoverian British Army. Blue and red flags across the battlefield mark the positions taken by the opposing forces:

Next to the battlefield was a really old house with the thatch roof still intact. Apparently, this house is all that remains of a peaceful farming settlement that was all but wiped out during the battle:

On the way to our next stop, we stumbled upon this amazing bridge. Although we were at a poor angle for taking a picture, I’m relatively sure that this is the bridge that appears in the Harry Potter movies:

Next we visited the Clava Cairn, a pre-historic human burial chamber dated around 1,000 B.C. There were several single-chamber circular burial structures with an entrance oriented south west towards midwinter sunset. It was absolutely fascinating to visit this pre-historic site. Vertical stones like the one in this picture were positioned around the structure in a specific pattern:

After that, we drove to the northern coast to explore Fort George. Unfortunately, visiting hours were already over so we decided to start heading back to Aberdeen. The drive went quickly, and along the way we listened to an important football (soccer) match between Scotland and Italy. Scotland seemed to play well, but unfortunately Italy pulled ahead and won 2 - 1. The day-trip proved to be a great vacation from everyday life in the city.

That’s all for now friends, but thanks for checking in and have a great week! Best wishes -

Golf Lessons and Scottish Holiday Celebrations

Greetings Friends –

Things have been going quite well here in Aberdeen, and I hope that life is good for all of you back in Texas. Here are a few things that have been happening on this end:

Golf Lessons

Last Friday, three classmates and I attended our first golf lesson at the Murcar Links Golf Club. It’s quite a beautiful course located along the coastline on the Northeast edge of the city. My colleagues and I are part of a pilot program sponsored by the graduate arts school at the University of Aberdeen.

Here's a view of the Murcar Links Course (notice the North Sea in the background):

Essentially, they’re sponsoring us to take weekly golf lessons from the club pro, and in January we’ll receive a free one-year membership to the club. Talk about being in the right place at the right time! :) The club pro, Gary, is an excellent instructor, and I’m so excited to learn to play in the country that invented golf. Amazing fun!

Guy Fawkes Night (a.k.a. Bonfire Night)

On Tuesday night, my flatmates and I went down to the beach to watch the fireworks in celebration of Guy Fawkes Night. Guy Fawkes Night (more commonly known as Bonfire Night) is an annual celebration on the evening of the 5th of November. It celebrates the foiling of the Gunpowder Plot of the 5th of November 1605 in which a number of conspirators, including Guy Fawkes, attempted to blow up the Houses of Parliament.

Surprisingly, the event is a big celebration in Scotland and England. Fraser, my Scottish roommate, shared his view that the Scottish celebrate because the plot nearly succeeded in destroying parliament. When we asked him why the British celebrate the holiday, he shared his view that they celebrate the fact that they stopped the attempt to blow up parliament.

Here are some of the fireworks:

And here’s a picture of my roommate and I trying figure out how to stay warm (yes, that's a scarf wrapped around my face):

If you’re interested in learning more about Guy Fawkes and the notorious plot to blow up the English Parliament, here’s a link with additional information: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guy_Fawkes

Upcoming Charity Ceilidh Event:

This Friday I’ll be attending the Aberdeen Deeside Rotary Club’s annual Charity Ceilidh. As mentioned in a previous blog entry, a Céilidh (pronounced "kay-lee") is a social event with Scottish highlands music and dancing.

The word céilidh is Irish and Scottish Gaelic for 'visit'.’ The traditional Scottish highlands music is provided by an assortment of fiddle, flute, tin whistle, accordion, and drums. In addition to raising money for local charities, dancing and celebrating at the event with local Rotarians should be great fun. I’ll keep you updated on how it goes.

That’s everything for now, friends. Please have a great week and stay in touch!

Aberdeen Deeside Club Visit

Hello Friends -

Hope all of you had a safe and fun Halloween yesterday. Similar to Halloween in America, children could be seen last night running up and down the streets in costumes as they trick-or-treated. Good fun!

Last night I visited my host club, the Aberdeen Deeside Rotary Club, for the second time. It was fun to visit and chat with many of the Rotarians that I met while volunteering at the children's disco. The guest speaker was quite interesting, and he spoke about a photography project on Scottish scenery that he spent six years producing. The pictures he showed during the presentation were breathtaking!

During the meeting, I proudly presented the Aberdeen Deeside club with a Kilgore Rotary banner and several City of Kilgore pins. They were happy to receive the banner and have given me an Aberdeen Deeside banner to give to the Kilgore Rotary Club. Here is a picture of me with the club president on the left (Quentin Tweedie) and my host sponsor on the right (Ian Reid):


The Deeside Rotarians have been incredibly kind, and I look forward to building a relationship with their club over the next 8 months.

Thanks to all of you for tuning in, and have a great week -

Rotaract Activities and Rotary Children's Disco

Greetings Everyone –

Hope things are going well back in Texas! Today is daylight savings time here in the UK, so for a few weeks the UK is only 5 hours ahead of East Texas time. Isn't it funny that we roll back the clocks on different dates?

A friend mentioned last week that they would like to hear more about the Rotary activities I’m doing here in Scotland. It was great to receive the feedback, and I’ll be sure to post more about Rotary activities in Scotland from now on. Please let me know about other things I can continue to improve on! :)

Over the past several weeks, I’ve been meeting with the Aberdeen Rotaract Club. For those of you who aren’t familiar with Rotaract, it’s essentially Rotary for college students. Rotaract clubs typically focus on charity activities, professional development, and social interaction.

Often, Rotaract clubs help out with activities that the local Rotary Clubs are sponsoring. Aberdeen Rotaract is particularly unique because it’s made up of students from the two rival universities in Aberdeen - Robert Gordon University and the University of Aberdeen. Even with the friendly rivalry, the Rotaract club seems to have a great time putting events together.

Aberdeen Rotaract Ceilidh Fundraiser

We’ve got several charity events on the calendar for the next few months, and I joined the planning committee for the winter charity Ceilidh (pronounced “caylee”).

The Ceilidh is a traditional Scottish highlands dance party where a “Ceilidh band” plays Scottish highland folk music. For each song, a performer calls the dances and provides instructions to people who don’t know the Scottish dance steps. Ceilidhs are quite popular this time of year, so we’re hoping to attract a good crowd to raise money for a local children’s charity.

The University of Aberdeen’s clubhouse venue has agreed to host the charity event free of charge, and we found a printer to donate tickets and fliers for the event. Now our big concern is finding a Ceilidh band to perform at the event on November 23. My sponsoring Rotary club, Aberdeen Deeside, is also putting on a charity Ceilidh on November 9, so I’ll get to learn the Scottish highland dances before we host our own event. Fun stuff!

Aberdeen Deeside’s Children’s Halloween Disco

Yesterday, the Aberdeen Deeside Rotary Club held their semi-annual Children’s Disco to raise money for the Juvenile Diabetes Research Fund. I went to help out with the event and had a blast!

The event was held for kids in Primary 5 – 7, which is the Scottish equivalent of grades 4 – 6 in US school systems. Most of the kids were 10 or 11 years-old. I helped run the coat-check room for most of the afternoon, which provided me with quite an entertaining view of the dance floor.

It was absolutely hilarious to watch the group of little boys gallivanting around, with the group of little girls always one step ahead of them. The DJ was great at entertaining and involving the kids, and they all seemed to have a blast. Here are some pictures of the kids having fun on the dance floor:

The Deeside Rotarians are really nice and were great to work with. Many of them worked quite hard to put on the event, and it was neat to learn the details on how the event was put together. It was also great to get to know several new Rotarians over the course of the afternoon.

Towards the end of the event, some of the Rotarian ladies even hit the dance floor to show the kids how dancing is really done. And man, they could dance! The kids had a great time at the event, and the Rotarians and I had a fun time raising money for the Juvenile Diabetes Research Fund.

This Wednesday I'll visit the Aberdeen Deeside meeting again and will present them with a Kilgore Rotary Club banner and City of Kilgore oil derrick pins. I'll keep you all updated on how the visit goes.

That's all for now, but take care and have a great week!

Weekend Roadtrip to Manchester (Part 1)

Greetings Friends –

Hope things have been going well for all of you back in East Texas! Everything is going great here in Scotland. Classes have been exciting and I’m getting to know more fellow students each week.

This past weekend I traveled to Manchester, England with my roommate (who’s name is also Nick) to pick up a car that he bought online. As soon as classes were finished on Friday, we caught a Ryanair flight from Aberdeen to Liverpool, England. Ryanair is a discount airline that offers cheap, direct flights all over Europe (similar to Southwest Airlines, but much more stripped down).

After arriving in Liverpool, we found a cab and negotiated a fare for the 30 minute drive to the car dealership in Manchester. The cab dropped us off at the dealership, and then we picked up Nick’s 2001 Volvo.

Driving around Manchester was absolutely hilarious! Because cars drive on the left side of the road in the UK, the steering wheel and driver’s seat is on the right side of the car. Neither one of us had ever driven like this before, and Nick was determined to learn. So, for the first 30 minutes of Nick driving, both of us were laughing/freaking out trying to keep the car on the correct side of the road while navigating traffic. It sounds random, but we couldn’t stop laughing because it was so strange driving on the left side of the road. We finally found a Travel Inn to stay at, so we dropped off our bags and headed downtown.

Maps showing local attractions were all over the place:


First, we walked around a park and found a statue of Queen Victoria:

Downtown Manchester was really amazing! The city center was alive with people, and there were lots of neat shops and attractions. Here’s a picture of some of the local shops (notice how different cabs look in England compared to the US:

After walking around downtown, we found the reconstructed remains of an ancient Roman fort.

Manchester apparently began as the original Roman fort that was built in 79 A.D.

After visiting the fort, we walked back to the car and headed back to the hotel. After taking a few wrong turns, we found our way back and headed in for a good night’s rest. The next morning, we woke up and headed out onto the highway towards Aberdeen.

To attach more pictures, I’ve continued in a second entry below.

- Have a great week!