In Search of a Battered Mars Bar

It was a cold and rainy night as I traversed the streets of Stirling.  My goal was the elusive, the magical BATTERED MARS BAR.  (Translation: Fried Milky-way.)  As I walked, the rain drumming on my umbrella, the water seeping through the holes in my shoes, I considered how I had arrived in this situation.

Each week, the staff at the ISS give us a suggestion of something Scottish to try. This weeks was the battered Mars Bar.  They also gave us a suggestion of a place to buy it from.  We had decided that it sounded delicous so on Wednesday we went out in search of it.  First we stopped at the suggested establishment.  It was closed.  We walked for a bit, had lunch and went grocery shopping, all the while stopping and asking different people where we could find a battered Mars Bar but with no success.  We had finally given up and were heading back to the bus stop when we noticed that the original chip shop was now open.     We went in, elated.  We could smell our prize wafting in the oily air.  We eagerly stood in line and when it was our turn, we asked for our Mars Bars.

"We don't do those anymore," said the man behind the counter.  Dejectedly, we headed back to the bus stop but we were determined to finish our quest at a later date.

And so we struck out once again into Stirling.  We first stopped in what appeared to be a Middle eastern pizza place.  We asked if they had battered Mars Bars and the guy said they didn't but they could fry them up for us if we bought them and brought them back.  We were elated.  We decided to see if we could find a convenience store that sold candy in the mall.  Little did we know, the mall closes at 5:30 on Friday nights.  Once again we hung our heads and went out into the rain.

As we headed up the street, we passed another fish and chips shop and went in.

"Do you do battered mars bars?" we asked.

"Yeah, we do, replied the Scottish guy behind the counter.

"Yes!"

"But we're out of Mars Bars," he continued.  "If you go get them and bring them back, we'll do them for you."

"Where can we get them?" we asked in desperation.

"Just up the street," he replied.  So we raced up the street to a little shop and bought our Mars Bars and then rushed back down the the chip shop.

As  Scottish guy #2 prepared our deep-fried delecacies, Scottish guy #1 asked us different question and figured out that we'd only been in Scotland a few days.  He asked if we'd tried haggis and we said we hadn't so he pulled out a deep fried haggis for us to try as well.

We took a few goofy pictures and then headed back out into the rain again because the chip shop didn't have anywhere to sit.  Eventually, we found ourselves sitting in the William Wallace pub.  Just picture in your heads what a Scottish pub should look like.  That is the Wallace pub.  We sat in the pub eating our haggis and Mars bars, drinking cider and listening to golf on the TV.  It was a very Scottish night.

Just head downhill

We went to St. Andrew's today.  Unfortunatly, I don't have any pictures because we got there and I went to take a picture of this beautiful street and realized that my camera had died.  Just google it.  There was a huge ruin of a cathedral and tons of old buildings but it really wasn't the coolest thing I did today.

After we got back, my roommate and I went out for a walk.  I had heard there was this old graveyard close to the school and I wanted to take some pictures of it for my photography class.  (I'll have to go back tomorrow because my camera wasn't done charging when we left.  It's ok though because it's about a 10 minute walk from here.)  We got to the graveyard and looked through the gate and realized that there was a bunch of people gathered there singing hymns.  We jumped back from the gate because it looked like a funeral was being held.  We were going to leave but I wanted to check out the other part of the wall and see if I could see in without anyone in side seeing me.  I went around to the other side where I saw a sign that said "Re-dedication ceremony Thursday 16th June 8:00pm."  It turns out that this graveyard and the ruins of the church inside had been closed for four years and we just happened to show up when they were reopening it.

We went in and wandered around for a bit until the ceremony was over.  Afterwards, a few very friendly Scottish people told us about the graves and gave us a brochure.  One of the gravestones was for a cobbler's wife.  One of the men there told us about all of the symbols of the grave stone and what they meant as well as the cobblers name.  This grave stone was probably from the middle-ages.

The graveyard was very cool but it wasn't the creepiest thing I saw tonight.  After walking to the graveyard, we walked up the hill.  One the hillside there is this giant kiln.  It's got three big chambers in it the size of small rooms.  The creepy thing about it that I can't figure out why you would put a kiln like that so high up a hill and so far away from everything else.  If anyone can explain this to me, please do.

After that we continued our walk up the hillside and to the sheep pastures at the top where you have a great view of the landscape.  We didn't get back until around 11 when it finally got dark.  I definitely plan on exploring the woods some more 

The Heart of Scotland

I have been in Scotland for about two days and I haven't heard nearly enough Scottish accents, probably because I have mostly been surrounded by Americans.

I arrived on Saturday and it was drizzling.  I think it would have seemed weird if it hadn't been.  The drive up to Stirling was very pretty except when we passed what looked like a landfill.  The were lots of sheep though (not in the landfill).  When we got to the university I realized that, unfortunately, Stirling and Eau Claire have something in common.  They are both surrounded by beautiful landscape that has been ruined by very ugly buildings.  The landscape is amazing as we are surrounded by huge hills on all sides.  Walking on campus is like walking in a park.  There are flowers everywhere and there are tons of bunnies and all kinds of birds that I haven't seen before.  There is also a loch with swans and a castle.

There is a hill that I can see from my bedroom window off to the west with a huge building on top of it.  I spent a lot of time looking at it on Saturday night and wondering what it was.  Turns out it is Stirling Castle.  Behind it, on another hill, is a wind farm.  From the common room window I have a clear view of the Wallace Monument over the loch.

So far, I've just been on a brief tour around the area but we did stop off at the oldest cathedral in Scotland. I'm planning on doing more exploring tomorrow.

Today was mostly about photography.  Our professor for that class is Canadian and absolutely batty.  Today's four hours of class were devoted to the history of photography.  It was pretty interesting stuff.  I didn't realize that the basics of the camera have been around basically since the 1600's.  The only thing that was missing was the photosensitive chemicals to hold the image on the paper.  The professor spent alot of time talking about how dangerous the chemicals are and how people have died from using the chemicals in poorly ventilated areas.  Then we go into her office that has black trash bags on the windows and we make shadow-grams of flowers and things and she developed them right there in the office.  She's really entertaining and really knows her subject but I have to wonder if the chemicals are starting to get to her.  Or maybe it's just an artist thing.  For homework we have to build a camera obscura which sounds like an interesting project.

I've got class tomorrow and then the traveling starts.  Thursday is a trip to St. Andrew's and Saturday I'm going up to Loch Ness!