Christmassy!

Lemon verbena survived! It needs to be re-potted and trimmed though, it hasn’t grown one bit
Not sure what this plant is, it’s been on the terrace for quite some time and has stayed roughly the same size. It also needs to be weeded. This weed, although pretty when it blooms (lots of tiny white flowers) is the most annoying thing to deal with because the wind carries the seeds into all the other plant pots.

Bamboo pile that needs to be sanitized, sanded, washed and then built into something. I was thinking either as a seed nursery/ way to direct rain water? Ideas?

This is the basil plant from the summer, apparently my family has been living off of the leaves for months … as you can see. The tiny buds you see are dried flowers that have to be picked in order to extract the basil seeds on the inside.
This is an aubergine plant grown from seed, unfortunately covered in white aphids but a little bit of (natural!) detergent and water seems to be doing the trick.
 My favourite strawberry plant didn’t make it ._.Annnnnnd … here’s a death glare from my cat, Sparkle! That’s all for now, will take a wider shot of the terrace later.

Jetlag has treated me well so far. Went to bed at 1am last night, and though I woke up a few times in the night, slept okay until about 8am. I hadn’t planned on doing much today really, just small admin things like planning my next few days in New York, getting a prepaid SIM, walking about the area in which I’m staying. Instead, I woke up and was greeted by a beautiful day so I figured why not go to the Statue of Liberty?

beautiful view from my window (not really - but look how clear the sky was!)

I was initially worried about finding my way around an unfamiliar city, especially without 3G access from my phone which meant no google maps. So before setting out I took a few screen shots of a map of new york featuring the sites I would like to visit, and figured I’d take it from there.

Grand Central Station!

The interior of the station. Thankfully you can

Getting to Battery Park was a breeze. Walked from the hostel to Grand Central Station (admittedly I did walk in the wrong direction for a bit). Hopped on the 5 train and even though my train terminated randomly, and then I was told to get on a train I normally wouldn’t have taken. But even though this kind of thing happened, it was announced so many times on the train it wasn’t difficult at all for me to figure out what was going on. Also I figured if I hop on the wrong train it’s not the end of the world. So I got over my fear of the New York subway system pretty quickly.

Battery Park!

Had brunch at Starbucks. I suppose New York is probably one of the few places you can go travelling to and not feel guilty for taking the easy option and going to Starbucks. I mean Starbucks would be considered local food in New York. Right? I mean they have one on every street corner. Yes? Right? Okay, not feeling guilty for that one. Also the hot chocolate was miles nicer than one that you would get in the UK, and a bagel with cream cheese is delicious. You will not make me feel guilty!

So then hopped onto a ferry to Liberty Island. It cost $13 return which I think is pretty cheap. Sadly the Statue of Liberty is closed for the next year for renovations so you only get to walk around the statue, and you can’t enter the museum or observation deck and whatever they’ve got going on inside it. So because of that I spent about an hour on the island. It’s pretty tiny so I’m going to say about a third of the time spent on Liberty Island was spent in the gift shop.

Pretty self explanatory photo I think. (Statue of Liberty)

And again! (very obviously from the ferry - get out of my way bitch!)

I decided not to go to Ellis Island. Missed out on a huge opportunity to learn a bit about the history of New York city, but figured that, as someone who isn’t American, it would mean a lot less to me. This I definitely feel guilty about, but I already had my heart set on visiting the Empire State Building before the day was up.

Horrible photograph of the Empire State Building. Would you be able to tell it was the ESB without this caption?

I actually only thought I would be seeing the Statue of Liberty today, so didn’t write down any directions of anything as to how to get to the Empire State Building from there, or anywhere really. But my handy screenshot told me it was around West 34th Street, and I saw the number 6 train stopped at 33rd Street, so did what I could to get there and then ambled about until I found it.

The lobby of the Empire State Building. Beautiful!

The interior of the Empire State Building is absolutely stunning. Such a wonderful example of Art Deco design and decoration. An adult ticket to the 86th floor observation deck is quite expensive (well, $22), so I opted against going to the 102nd floor, which was an extra $15 and I figure probably got about the same view.

View was stunning, and it was such a clear day. The shame about these observation decks is I feel you probably couldn’t really tell one city from the next. I don’t mean that in a horrible way, it’s always nice to get a 360 degree view of a city, but the resulting photographs leave a lot to be desired.

The view - you might just be able to make out the Chrysler building here.

Also I felt a bit sad because I realised there are absolutely no photos of me visiting a place and it is SO AWKWARD self pic-ing with a SLR by yourself. So I tried my best with what else I had (iphone). For those of you worried that I only took photos of my travels with my iphone, yes I did actually bring both my Canon (digital) and Nikon (film), but for some reason I’m still obsessed with Instagram so that’s what I’m showing you in this post.

trying the best with what I got (not just a statement about this photograph, but of life in general)

I then strolled back to the hostel which was a lovely walk. All in all though I am absolutely knackered but need to make sure I stay up to get over the jetlag.

Sun setting over New York! LOOK IT'S A VERY FAINT IMAGE OF THE CHRYSLER BUILDING

The only evidence I can offer right now to say I am in New York

So in the last 20 or so hours I’ve left Edinburgh, say around Schiphol airport in Amsterdam for 6 hours (including an over 2 hour delay), had my card blocked then reactivated, and finally arrived in New York city.

Took my first yellow cab! But was far too tired to mark the occasion with a photograph. In fact, as of yet I have my taken any photos of actual New York. It is 1am though, so expect some tomorrow.

But here are the three photos I managed to take while attempting to preserve phone battery.

What I left in Edinburgh! Snow!

Sunset over Schiphol Airport, Amsterdam

It’s all a bit hideous right now and Anne’s posts from the old blog are for some reason listed as being written by me. Hopefully that will change once I have some free time on my hands and can edit each and every post.

But as it stands just now Anne and I are both ending our semester/terms at our respective university. Anne will be heading back to Hong Kong soon, and I will be spending my holdiays in New York City and California.

I’m going to try and get back into blogging daily. Especially when in New York, so hopefully watch this space! (And hopefully this space will get a lot better looking shortly)

Here’s a link to the recipe if you get bored, smitten kitchen. I follow it pretty much more or less, actually, I just make a titchy bit more.

not very appetising but gosh was it yummy - raspberry and blackberry mush.

mush goes on the base!

crumbs on top, now ready to go into the oven

finished! and holding its shape very well

Well after Anne strongly hinted, I thought I’d write about our weekend in Edinburgh. Though I technically think Anne should be writing this entry since I, you know, live in Edinburgh? Nothing we did was new to me.

OH WELL.

Hi. 

Friday 28th October

After spending the entire day helping out at an East Asian art conference, I emerged from the Student Union, blinking at the glaring light of day, to pick up Anne from a Costas near the Edinburgh train station. (I think that was quite a poetic sentence)

It was quite a nice day and you can see that Autumn has arrived in full swing.

look at those colours!

On our way back to my flat, after having a quick browse in Top Shop, we bought some salmon and Wensleydale cheese (with cranberries! – my favourite) for dinner, picked up Ace Ventura: Pet Detective, and Ace Ventura: When Nature Calls on DVD from the local film rental shop place thing. Quite a quiet night, we had our dinner, watched the films and stuffed our faces with cheese. Sudden realisations and epiphanies were that I definitely did not understand a lot of the jokes in the Ace Ventura films when I was younger, and When Nature Calls is so much better than Pet Detective. Largely because of the slinky bit.

I seem to recall thinking the “she’s a virgin!” scene was the most scandalous thing when I was 8. I was also far too amused by the rhino scene for my current age. Ace Ventura clip, anyone?

Saturday 29th October

Anne and I had scrambled eggs for breakfast before heading to the train station to pick up Fio. It was a lovely day in Edinburgh and actually Fio and Anne picked the perfect weekend to come up and visit. Edinburgh was truly beautiful that weekend (and actually, is incredibly beautiful today as well).

After picking Fio up from the train station we ambled towards Biblos for lunch with a couple other Hong Kong friends. They have a wonderful student discount and the food was okay.

For dinner we went to a little Japanese restaurant. I stuffed my face with sushi and green tea which was a really nice change from eating roasted salmon on what seems to be a daily basis.

So so so delicious! Durham fails at providing good east-Asian food so I got a chance to stock up on sashimi and tempura, score! 

It can

Afterwards of course we had a halloween party to get ready for, so full with sushi we waddled our way back to the flat. Fiona and Anne dressed up as kittens and I was medusa. It was a pretty uneventful flat party. Ahem. Apart from someone getting special attention from a superhero whose costume really was far too tight in the crotch area and then later, an attractive but dull pirate.

No, just dull. (Kim is talking about Fiona here btw, I received no such attention).

On the way home we stopped off at the kebab shop right under my flat, and I found myself getting aggressive because they didn’t give pita bread with their humous, and then trying to get a discount on account of living in the same building. Hm.

ANOTHER incredibly delicious thing, humous/hummus really is the greatest thing ever invented. 

Sunday 30th October

We had brunch at my favourite cafe in Edinburgh, Kilimanjaro. Delicious. Preach it!

Then we tackled Arthur’s Seat for the beautiful view of the whole of Edinburgh.

Again, it was a beautiful day but that doesn’t mean we were able to escape the horrific wind at the top of the hill. If you want to illustrate this comment about the wind with your photos Anne, feel free since the one I doesn’t really demonstrate how painful it was.

It was like being whipped in the face for an hour? Worth it.

We then ambled down to the bottom and that’s where I took this pretty picture and realised just how much I love my new phone.

We then headed back to the flat where Fio and Anne packed their bags, and we headed off to another favourite cafe of mine, Black Medicine, for some amazing smoothies and hot chocolate.

They had the greatest jack-o-lantern on display as well, which I think will give you an idea of the kind of place it is (answer: awesome).

AWESOME.

CUTE

Fio hopped on a train at half four and then Anne, Emma and I wandered around Urban Outfitters for a bit, before grabbing our dinner at a nearby Costas. We then came to the horrible realisation that pretty much everything in Edinburgh shuts at 6pm on a Sunday and we had to entertain ourselves till their 8pm train.

All together it was a very lovely weekend. I absolutely love showing off Edinburgh to people and I’m so glad it was a beautiful weekend that allowed me to do so. I’m so pleased Anne and Fio could come up to visit.

Then just over a week later (aka, on Monday) I will be heading to Durham to see Anne for a couple of days! VERY EXCITING.

YES. A much needed break from dreary Durry. Next week: Durham, the lake district and perhaps more? Stay frosty, people. 

Yeah!!!

Yeah …

P.S.
I think we owe an Edinburgh post.

It could ruin someone’s CHANCES OF SELLING THINGS.

I discovered Bon Iver in the Hong Kong HMV in Causeway Bay shortly after For Emma, Forever Ago was released in 2008. I was walking around and saw a band I was familiar with in one of the CD players. For the life of me I can’t remember what band it was, perhaps Uh Huh Her? But in the CD player directly below was For Emma, Forever Ago. I was intrigued by the short blurb that had been written about Justin Vernon retreating to a cabin in the woods and so I gave the album a little listen. And what can I say, I fell in love.

When I arrived at university I knew that they would be playing on the Wednesday of Fresher’s Week at Queen’s Hall. It was not sold out. Me being me though I was far too shy and a little but too awkward to ask any of the people I’d just met if they wanted to go. It never occurred to me to just go by myself. And so I missed a great opportunity to see Bon Iver perform live.

Roughly a year after I discovered Bon Iver, I preordered their EP Blood Bank. The sound was still quite true to For Emma, the songs were essentially those that didn’t make it onto the For Emma track list. With the song “Woods” though there seemed a bit of experimentation.

Then came their self titled album. Also pre-ordered but this time I had to wait until I returned to Hong Kong from my time in Beijing before I could get my hands on it. I think this album was a bit harder to love after being so obsessed with For Emma. The album reached number 2 in the US charts and 4 in the UK. If I were to name my favourite songs from the album I would name half of the album – “Perth”, “Minnesota, WI”, “Towers”, “Michicant” and “Calgary”.

So realising a new album was being released meant the possibility of a tour, and perhaps either an Edinburgh or Glasgow gig. The tickets sold out on the day they became available to the public. I struggled with the website and when I could finally pick the tickets there were only 6 remaining. That was in May.

5 months later (last night!) I saw them perform.

Not the best seat in the house, but it definitely had its perks.

The set list to begin with left much to be imagined in the sense that the songs were played in the order they appeared in the new album. So they, like their album, started strong with “Perth”, then played “Minnesota, WI”, then “Holocene”, “Towers”, “Michicant”. But then things were mixed up a bit once “Flume” from For Emma was played.

I say that the set list was a bit dull to start, but the band were absolutely amazing. What started out as just Justin Vernon has become a 9 piece band with everyone being incredibly talented. So many instruments were picked up and played: violin, trumpet, trombone, clarinet, chimes, french horn, saxophones… The result was beautiful swells and crescendos and absolutely incredible moments when – and this is where it will become painfully obvious that I know nothing about Music really – descended into an artfully constructed sound with every instrument playing. I can’t even describe how wonderful some of the instrumentals were.

And Justin Vernon’s vocals did not disappoint at all. I think to an extent I was worried that he wouldn’t match up to expectations. But Justin Vernon’s voice is more beautiful live than off of a CD. “Re: Stacks” was absolutely stunning because all we listened to and watched was essentially Justin Vernon and his guitar.

I don’t know how to end this post really. This was a beautiful gig. Because I had been waiting 3 years to see Bon Iver live, last night I could have experienced crushing disappointment. Instead, I’m sitting here and I cannot wait until I can see them again.

Standing ovation! Also, how beautiful of a venue is usher hall. Wish I'd taken photos of the details in the construction.