Arashiyama & Fushimi Inari: off the bucket list.

Kyoto was filled with even more hustle and bustle during my second week there, as the Gion Matsuri was fast approaching! Floats began being built on the streets in the weeks leading up to it, and one day we actually got to board one to see what it was like. All of them have different meanings and are very intricate, but sticking to tradition. none of them are actually powered. During the festival parade, the floats are pulled by various men, and when it comes to turning down streets, bamboo is laid on the floor and sprayed with water, before the wheels are slid along.

Sadly for us, by the time the parade came around, a typhoon had also made landfall in Japan. That didn't stop us from going, however I'm pretty sure it really put a dampener (excuse the pun) on the festival as a whole, since not nearly as many people came to watch.

Despite classes being as jam packed as ever, I managed to visit a fair few places that I'd wanted to go! Firstly, we had a day trip organised to Arashiyama, nearing the outskirts of Kyoto. We took the Torokko train one way alongside, then returned on a boat cruise along the Hozugawa river. It was such a relaxing experience, and while we were on the river a food boat even moored up to us that sold dango and fresh squid. Then we finally got to the famous bamboo groves of Arashiyama, and I got to experience something known in Japanese as komorebi. It can only be translated in English as the sunlight that filters through the trees, and to see that through the bamboo groves was pretty beautiful.

That day was super hot, so we decided to go to Fushimi Inari for sunset. It was actually pretty cool when we arrived, because there was a rainbow over the tori gates, then watching the sunset over the mountain was spectacular. The pictures really don't do it justice.

Another place I visited was Kiyomizu-dera, probably another of the most famous places in Kyoto. The views of Kyoto are stunning and when you visit the main hall, you feel in a weird way like you're floating on the mountainside. I went with Misa and Miho, who I was a buddy to when they went on exchange to Keele last year. They were so adorable, as they'd been to Universal Studies in Osaka the day before and bought me some Hello Kitty stuff since they knew I hadn't gone. They even took me to a Hello Kitty restaurant I didn't even know existed, and I have to say it was super adorable. Hello Kitty shaped pasta is my new favourite thing. Later that day I met up with my current buddy Aoi, who took me around the smaller lesser known streets in Gion to get a Kyoto special matcha parfait. 

Finally, we also visited Nijo Castle, which was completely different to all of the other temples and shrines in Kyoto. It was definitely more regal, and considering it was so close to our hotel, I'm surprised it took us so long to finally go there.

That evening, a lot of the exchange kids decided to have a farewell since we left for our homestay the day after. We went to Sakura bar, which served all you can eat izakaya snacks and we all had a ball. I'm really surprised by how well we all get on, and it was nice to finally spend time socially together rather than just in class. It was a little bittersweet to be leaving for our homestay too, since we knew we'd have less freedom and less time to get to know eachother, but let's be honest, the homestay was probably what the exchange was going to be all about!

The study abroad experience may have ended, but that doesn't mean it's not still with me!

In light of my impending travels, I figured I would make amends to my shocking blogging towards the last month of my semester at CSU so I am fully up to date. My trusty camera broke on the train back from San Francisco, so although there's not as many pictures, it's been fun-filled to say the least.

The last month was easily one of the best I had out there, as it was a time when we all grew closer since we knew our time left together was limited. I've mentioned "Team Commonwealth" before now, and a bunch of us from that group really bonded, As a result, we narrowed it down and began referring to ourselves as DELTA SIGMA WINE, or just Delta Sigs for short. This new 'fratority' consisted of myself, Leif, Caragh, Jack, Leni, Chrissie, Megan, Jonny, Robbie, Phil, Katy and Carly. We even took it upon ourselves to get some letters made, and we actually did convince a few Americans it was an International Sorority/Fraternity since there were that many of us with matching hoodies.
I couldn't make it to our original initiation ceremony (candle-lit and super inappropriate I might add), so mine was scheduled to be on the first night of our Winter Park ski-trip. We took the entire thing super serious, and there were "going to be punishments" if we wore our hoodies before that night...

The ski trip was an experience in itself. Day 1 started off with me, Caragh and Megan taking a lesson which seemed to go quite well. I definitely peaked too early, with my first wipe out happening when I was heading towards a ledge by a ski lift, then later in the day I got to the end of a run an had to get rescued by Leif after becoming entangled in a safety net.
Day 2 was even better. I got cocky and did my first huge flip early in the day that resulted me in smacking my head, both skis coming off and my goggles shifting to enclose my nose. At least when I fall, I fall. To top it all off, I managed to take a wrong turn and lose everyone, ended up at a dead end and my only option was to get a ski lift up another 2,000 feet. I wasn't amused since I had to make it to the bottom alone, while getting over taken by 4 year olds and almost having a mental breakdown. Never have I been so happy to see Leif's hat flapping in the breeze and getting myself onto flat ground. I mean I'm happy I went. but let's just say I would have happily had the entire weekend getting drunk in a hot tub and having a rowdy night in the hotel room like we did the night before.

The last few weeks were pretty hectic with finals coming up, but the entirety of Delta Sig spent so much time together revising, making forts and final visits to Sundance and various other food joints. That just made leaving this mad bunch so much harder, because we actually felt like a little family. We even took Christmas pictures because we're just that weird.
I couldn't have been happier to have gained such good friends, in Leif and Caragh especially. Having them back at Keele this semester helped so much with the "re-intergration" into life back at home. Even though the 12 of us have been split up for the past few months, worldwide skype dates are always on the cards, no matter how hard it is to organize. I'm so excited that during my trip this summer, I get to reunite with Chrissie, Leni and Katy when I go to Australia, and once I'm back home for third year, then entire English division of Delta Sig will be back on home soil ready for a tour of hometowns and unis. So with that, I think this proves that it didn't matter who I met or when I did, but the fact we all managed to find people equally as weird as ourselves during our time at CSU, and that made the entire experience all the more amazing. Watch out world, you never know where Delta Sig will make an appearance next!

Californiaaaaa

This post has taken me FOREVER to get round to finishing, so although it's a little late, please forgive this poor student with tons of work and appreciate the effort I went to to get this done :)

Last week was Thanksgiving break, and boy it was needed. I honestly don't think without it I'd have been able to cope with the last three weeks of school in the run up to Christmas.
A few weeks back Caragh and I had a little discussion of what our plans would be, so after a lot of pondering we decided we were going to get the Amtrak California Zephyr from Denver to San Francisco.  It was a little bitter sweet actually. My initial idea was to go to on Washington D.C. and for Aisling to fly over from back home and join me. Due to our change in plans, it wouldn't really have been worth it for her to spend all that money to just come for a few days. However, I've always wanted to go to San Francisco and it was one of the only cities I haven't been to yet that I really wanted to go during Thanksgiving. So although Ash's visit didn't work out, it's not that long until I'm back home anyway.

The first day of Thanksgiving break was actually Caragh's birthday, so we decided to spend the day exploring Denver before we got the train on Sunday. We visited a (very tiny) German market, and did the typical tourist thing of getting pictures at the mile high sign on the Capitol building. Maybe it was the time of year, but I actually wasn't too impressed with the amount of things to do in Denver. It's definitely one of those cities that the bar scene helps a lot. I also have a bad impression on the place since it was there I realized that my trusty Pooh Bear was still sat on my bed at CSU and wouldn't be making the trip to San Francisco with me.
Our day perked up when we headed to the Cheesecake Factory for dinner, one of the only birthday requests Caragh had from day one of the trip planning. The portions were huge, so we got garlic bread and split garlic noodles... failing to remember we were going to be spending 32 hours on a train and would probably be stinking the place out with garlic. Oh well. Disaster struck when it came to cheesecake ordering time, as after a 5 minute long decision making process, Caragh's choice of lemon meringue was sold out. Back to the drawing board she went, while in the meantime I was secretly plotting with our waiter for a little birthday surprise. The great combination of my accent and Caragh's impending approach led to him thinking her name was "mcaragh", thank god he checked with me on that one afterwards! After finally joining me in a piece of key lime cheesecake, I was rewarded with a look of death as hers was brought by singing waiters complete with a candle. What can I say, I had to embarrass her in some way!

The train journey really dragged since there was a rock slide in Rocky Mountain National Park, so we had to detour through before Wyoming before making it to Salt Lake City. It was a very welcomed change of scenery when we woke up to desert in Nevada, however that got boring quickly too, so it was exciting to near the end of our trip. It was a shame that because of our delay we didn't get to see San Francisco for the first time in the daylight, but both Caragh and I have never been so excited to see city lights for a long time! We spent our first evening at Pier 39 and instantly fell in love with the place.

The next day we did so much! We got up bright and early to try and get Alcatraz tickets, but it turned out people had been queuing since 4:45am and there were none left. Off we went on a little adventure walking the streets of San Fran... you know it's too early when even Chinatown isn't open. That first day we walked to Union Square, Chinatown, back to the Pier 39 in the day and were at the Golden Gate Bridge by noon. The views were so amazing when we walked a long it, and you really noticed what a strange city San Francisco actually looks like. It's strange to have such skyscrapers mixing in with what looks similar to a Greek town with houses perched on hill sides.
Afterwards we went to Lombard Street, the "crookedest street" which my roomie Liv had recommended to me. We were definitely grateful for the Colorado altitude when we got there, talk about steep hills! It was a shame because of the plants all the pictures I took you couldn't actually see how crazy Lombard Street was, but I'm sure you get the idea. We went to Fisherman's Wharf in the afternoon and headed back a little early since we were walked out and had a busy day ahead.
We decided if we were getting up early for Alcatraz tickets, we were getting up early. Major props to Caragh for going along with me on that one since she knew Alcatraz was a bucket list thing for me. So there we were, first in the line at 4:30am. I'm pretty sure she'll back me up when I say I had a cheesy grin on my face all morning during the tour and I'm soooooo glad I finally got to go! We did more walking around Chinatown (it was actually open) and I got my fix off my all time favourite spicy eggplant :D Sadly, the place with the best egg tarts in the city was shut due to vacation, very inconsiderate, but we visited the shop where fortune cookies where actually invented, hidden away in a back alley and smelling glorious.

The next day was Thanksgiving, and since we'd done pretty much all the tourist traps, we decided to take a day to relax. We headed to Golden Gate Park with the intention of spending the day looking around, however that changed when we realized not only how big the place was, but how badly signposted things were inside. Instead we headed for the beach and had a makeshift picnic while watching those Cali waves. Needless to say, typical clumsy me got caught in one of said waves, so while we waited for my jean to dry, we got to watch the sunset.

 Friday we did some Black Friday shopping upon the realization we were heading back soon, needed one last final break from work and hunting for something hilarious to buy Leif as a present. All in all, I loved San Francisco more than I thought I would and had the best first Thanksgiving I could have asked for. Also, after 10 full days Caragh and I didn't murder each other which is always a bonus.

What a way to start the week! Hospital visits and patriotic British vibes.

In my last post, I told you all how I had a little drama to write about. Apparently that drama also caused me to lose my memory for the week after, since I've just spent 20 minutes trying to remember what I did that week and am none the wiser.

Monday night I came back from my weekly Chi O meeting with the intention of an early night... that wasn't the case. I came home to find my poor roomie Liv crying, having a panic attack and struggling to breathe while lying in bed. Cue me having to call the medical team, which resulted in  three cops, three RA's and three paramedics flooding into my room and kicking me out while they checked her vitals.
Next thing I know, Liv was being taken to Poudre Valley Hospital. Thankfully, we managed to rally people together and Katie, Kate, Whitney, Ben, Adam and I all hopped in the car to join her. My first impression of a FoCo hospital was an interesting one, with a metal detector at the entrance and security asking me if I was carrying a knife. Everyone left around 11 and I stayed with Liv until she got discharged. Turns out she has a viral infection that came upon her all of a sudden, so thankfully she's okay now, nothing some roomie love couldn't fix!

Friday night was the Downtown Holiday Lighting Ceremony, so a few members of Team Commonwealth took a nice stroll up to Old Town to see the switch on. It was very picturesque, and the American vibe was amplified by the CSU Marching Band playing while cookies and cider were being passed around. Later Caragh and I went to chill with Jack, Leni, Chrissie and some of the others to watch The Inbetweeners 2. No better time to watch an English comedy set in Australia with natives. Even funnier when the Americans in the room didn't have a clue what was being said, what we were laughing at, or what was going on in general!


In other news, after Janny P searching high and low for Union Jack fabric back home, Caragh and I finally went to get our letters made. We decided we wanted matching letters for Chi Omega and Kappa Alpha Theta which are our sororities, and they actually look pretty good!

Continuing with the theme, Saturday was the World Unity Fair, which Leif had signed us up for. It was held in the LSC ballroom for the young people of Fort Collins and had stands representing various countries and cultures. We greatly misjudged how much of a big deal this was, so after a panicked meet up in the library we'd managed to figure out what we could do with what we had. That night I proceeded to cut out 17 pictures of the Queen for out games of "Spot the Queen" and "Pin The Crown on the Queen". I spent the next morning cutting out bunting online which is currently decorating my bed and proving to be more trouble than it's worth!
Considering we spent a total of around a dollar in printing to make the stand, we did pretty well. There was English money, landmarks, food, and of course Harry Potter. After the Vietnamese kindly lent us an extension cord, music was blaring too. However dodgy the taste might have been... S Club 7, 5ive and Steps mega mixes may or may not have been danced to throughout the day.
The highlight was the fact we had tea with biscuits and scones with strawberry jam next door. This caused issues for the Americans being too thick to distinguish between biscuits and cookies, but it played to our advantage since there was some left for us!
After a successful day, Leif, Jack, Jonny, Megan and I chilled out and played Cards Against Humanity for the first time. It got pretty rowdy, as can be expected for us lot, which resulted in a 4 hour breakfast/dinner recovery period in the dining hall on Sunday morning discussing DELTA SIGMA WINE, Team Commonwealth's new FRATORITY. More on that soon!

Chi Olympics and Big/Little reveal.

This past week has been filled with Chi O events and the ball seems to be rolling, in more ways than one.

Our philanthropy event, Chi Olympics was this past Sunday, which consisted of various inflatables and obstacle courses. Almost 50 teams signed up, with the funds raise going to Make A Wish foundation. The little girl who we were raising money for, Alexis, actually attended the event and we were raising money for her to go to Disney World.
The IM fields were filled with a variety of inflatables (jousting, bouncy castle and hamster balls, hence by pun earlier) and other games like shot put and tug of war.
I was a team coach, and my team were a lot of fun to work with even though we stood no chance of winning. I didn't manage to take pictures at the actual event because we were too busy running it, but I did get one of the token super-American banner we had.

For the rest of the week, we began the process of choosing our "big", someone who is assigned to us and who becomes my role model during my time in the sorority. Apparently the bond between big and little is very special, and is often a lifetime bond.
Every day for four days I had to collect gifts from my big, in an attempt to guess who she was from any hints she left me. It's really nice since I got mason jars from her that spell C-H-I-O and my first pair of letters, things I'll be able to take home. Which I appreciate a lot more than a girl in my pledge class who got a fish.

One day 2 there was the traditional giving of hand-me-down Chi O clothing as some way of showing the continued sisterhood. I conveniently got a "Potter" one, which was obviously a nod to my British-ness.
I had no idea who my big would be, so on reveal day everyone was given t-shirts by their big, and they were all lined up in the garden wearing sweatshirts. On the count of three they all took off their sweatshirts and we had to find our big by our corresponding t-shirts.
I was so happy, since my big is Sarah. I've got along with her really well ever since recruitment, and it's nice since she is studying abroad at Swansea next semester. Goes to prove Chi O can go international when we have a big/little reunion once I'm back home!

It's all fun and games until the cops arrive, apparently.

I actually wrote this last Monday intending to get something up before my midterms, but obviously that didn't happen. I've now learnt the error in my ways regarding the very unreliable CSU wifi, which is also a hassle when you're trying to watch Netflix. So here's my 'flashback' post, written while I sit in Caragh's room having a 2000's music flashback session to complete the theme.

Last weekend actually started off in a pretty chill fashion, with Caragh and I going on yet another date for froyo (that girl is obsessed). After a night of more snuggling, we woke up Saturday and decided we'd be going to the football game at Hughes Stadium that afternoon.
Off I went to the liquor store, so at 11:30am I was roaming the streets of Fort Collins with 3.5 litres of vodka smuggled into my backpack, in the hope I didn't encounter the bike police. Once I got back Leif, Caragh and I hurriedly transferred this into our new sunscreen flasks to take to the game. After all, who would question three British kids taking sunscreen to an outdoor event? Clever I know.

The game was what is known as an orange out, where people wear orange to honour the "Aggie era" of CSU. This was before the ram was adopted as an official mascot, and currently the most recognizable reference to this era is the "A" located on the mountain side above Hughes Stadium. Every year the freshman class hike to the "A" and re-paint it,but we never got the chance to go cause it clashed with plans we already had.

We met the Australians there, and in all honesty I don't think any of us paid attention to any of the game. All I know is that the Rams won, cue my loud chanting of "I said I'm proud, to be, a CSU rammm".

We headed back, raided the dining centre for scran and all headed for naps to help ourselves prepare for the night ahead. Worst idea ever. It definitely sped up whatever hangover was going to hit us the next day. We all felt very grim, but being the troopers we are, we headed to Leif's room for round 2. This was when the drama for the evening started...

We headed to a block party not too far away from campus. When we arrived the cul-de-sac was crammed with a tleast 300 students,and if I'm honest, it wasn't any fun. We tried to scout alcohol, but with no music and everyone surrounding us acting like idiots, Caragh, Leif, Jack and I decided we'd leave.
Talk about perfect timing. Once we crossed the street and reached campus, a convoy of police cars came hurtling around the corner, sirens blaring, in an attempt to control the party. As many of my friends/family know since they saw the news articles, this did result in a riot, which apparently is becoming a common thing with CSU students and parties. My favourite article the next day described how "rambunctious students wreck havoc, citizens tomato plant destroyed". Needless to say, we left with very smug grins on our faces knowing we weren't involved in the riot, and the closest claim to fame we have is we were actually there.