Hanging with the Glaswegians.

The journey is almost at an end, although there are still over 24 hours left before I finally reach Arkansas, and who knows what might happen!

This morning, I left Skye. It was heartbreaking, for a number of reasons, the beauty of the place and the kindness of the people among the forefront. Fortunately, my friends Lorna and Monique took the same train to Glasgow, so we had a lovely time buying each other tea at different points throughout the journey.

Last sunset on Skye

If you ever have to travel across the UK, or anywhere with landscape of note, for that matter, take an extra day and opt for the train. 

With Monique, from Switzerland

With Lorna, from Stirling

Goodbye, Sabhal Mor Ostaig! (The grouping of white buildings is the college)

I was lucky to meet up with one of my friends from Guildhall when I got to Glasgow! We walked a little around the West End, which is near Glasgow University and is a lovely, eclectic part of town. But the inevitable was bound to happen: rain. It rains pretty much every day in Glasgow. I had been warned about this; why I chose to leave my new waterproof and umbrella behind, I don’t know. As I write this blog entry, I am sipping a yummy G&T and in dry clothes, but about an hour ago I was completely soaked! And cold! If you ever go to Glasgow, BRING YOUR UMBRELLA AND UNDER NO CIRCUMSTANCES EVER LEAVE IT BEHIND. It was nice to see Katharine though. It’s hard to believe that Guildhall ended just over a week ago! As this entire trip has proven to turn out, it feels at once as if both as if a day and a year have passed.

I am in a Euro Hostel right now. I am in an eight person, female dorm. Hostel culture is definitely its own thing. You have to trust people to leave your stuff in a room with them. And to sleep in the same room as them!—which is not easy in the city. 

Glasgow Uni

Rain at the Botanical Gardens!

I refuse to believe that this Adventure is over just yet. I know it's not.
I know I am going to stay in touch with many of my friends from Guildhall. They are a talented group; watch for their names to one day be in lights. I mean it.
The foray into the Gaelic world-- it's a neat one. I want to stay a part of it. Go check it out. Take a short course.

Gle Mhath!

My internet has been a tad squirly, but I’ll try to give a brief rundown of the adventures I’ve had on Skye.

Here's an idea: become fluent in Gaelic (pronounced GA-lik for Scotland), get an MA in Gaelic Drama, act in Gaelic dramas, and go around Scotland teaching drama in Gaelic, thus promoting the culture and the language.

This course at Sabhal Mor Ostaig has been a delicious adventure, taking turns I would never have expected.

One of the best things about this course and the way this College is set up is how you get to just chill with people from the community. The Gaelic world is its own kind of subculture. It’s a tight-knit community, I have come to find, and I feel privileged to have been given the chance to visit.


We have taken a few day trips. One was to Eilean Donan Castle, often called the most picturesque castle in Scotland.

With Jacqueline, another member of the Acting course

Eilean Donan Castle

Eilean Donan


Wednesday, some of us took a boat to Knoydart, the most remote village in the British Isles. It is accessible only by foot or by an intense 14-mile hike.

The scenery here is so lovely, it is almost hard to realize that I am actually here, looking at it, boating amidst it, and walking in it. It’s almost like when you’re in a very dangerous situation and everything suddenly becomes distanced from you. I feel as if I am looking at giant postcards all the time.

On the boat on the way to Knoydart

Last night, we had a Celidh Dance, where the different groups presented things and there was country dancing. It was a hoot! Many of the students doing the short courses are actually 30s+, so this has been a neat change from my usual University experience, in that I wasn’t friends with just the twenty-some-odds, but rather everybody and anybody.



As far as the course has gone, it has been a challenge, not so much from the drama end of things, but from the language end. Fortunately, everybody here is very patient and kind and they want you to learn and succeed. While the course was bilingual, we worked in Gaelic texts, devising theatre based on Gaelic poems or “improvs” where we wrote our own Gaelic scripts. It was extra hard to memorize, because it is not pronounced the way it looks. I had to memorize sounds, with only a basic idea of what I was saying. This took up so much focus that I didn’t really focus as much on the acting end as I normally would, but I’m interested to see how this informed the theatre work anyhow; I will save you all the detailed theatrical analysis of it all.

When in Scotland, do as the Scots do: drink the national beverage: Whiskey!