Ghost Tour and Spring Break

Well I guess I thought that school in Europe was easier. Definitely wrong. I have two papers due this week and massive amounts of reading all the time, but oh well.

I have been trying to set myself up to do more touristy things in Edinburgh, perhaps I will save a lot of them for when my mom and Mark come. I went on a ghost tour, which I have been dying to do since I came here in high school. There are a few others that I would like to go on. I went with my flatmate to the City of the Dead tour. It met at St. Giles Cathedral, which is on the Royal Mile. I think it is one of the oldest cathedrals, maybe THE oldest, in the city. She told us about how Edinburgh was in the 18th century .... smelly. The people got rid of their household waste by dumping it out in the middle of the street at a certain time. The bells of St Giles would ring out every night at 10 pm, and someone would shout 'Gardy loo' which had some French meaning that escapes me now .... but it meant dump it, basically. All the waste would run down into what is now the Princes Street Gardens. It is actually very lovely now. And green. Hmmmm.

Then we walked over to the Greyfriar's Kirkyard. You walk past a statue of this little dog, Greyfriar's Bobby. There's even a pub named after the dog. We get into the kirkyard (graveyard) and she tells us the story of Bobby. He sat at his master's grave in Greyfriar's for 14 years, was adopted by the city, presented the key's of the city, etc. We stood in front of what people think is his master's grave. Unfortunately, it isn't. His master is on the other side of the city. Poor Bobby. Our tour guide told us that since Greyfriar's was the site of much illegal burial during the Plague, when it rains in Edinburgh, bones often float up to the top of the soil.

She then took us to the site of what once was a wall to block out the English. It used to be this massive wall that enclosed Edinburgh (which, granted, wasn't that large at the time). One night, the guardsmen forgot to lock the gate and the English strolled into the city. The walls that remain at Greyfriar's were used later for something not so nice. The anatomy department at my school needed cadavers, but they were short in supply in the 19th century. So, the head of the department would pay people for bodies. People would wait outside the walls for a funeral, and then after the mourners had left, dig up the body and deliver it. Then we were told about Burke and Hare (who coincidently have a strip club named after them in Grassmarket...). They also gave bodies to the anatomy department, but got them in a different way. They would get some poor vulnerable person drunk in a pub, take them back to their place. One would jump on their chest, the other would stick their fingers up their nose and tilt their head back, so as to suffocate them leaving little marks. One turned the other in for his freedom. The convicted one was hung in front of about 25,000 people within an inch of his life, and then had all the skin removed from his body. They covered a Bible with it, made a pocket book out of it, and then a business card holder which still is in the police museum in Grassmarket, and has hair follicles in it..... ew.

We walked a little ways and were about to enter Covenanter's Prison. Covenanter's were Scottish Presbyterians who didn't want to convert to the Episcopalian beliefs of the English. They signed a Covenant saying they would never convert, and took an army against the King of England. They lost, and the suvivors were put inside this makeshift prison. They were forced to lie facedown in the tombs, without covering and with little clothes or food, for five months of Scottish winter. They couldn't escape of they'd be shot. I sort of think I'd prefer to be shot. The man who orchestrated this was Lord George Mackenzie, who coincidentally is buried a short ways from the prison. One evening, around eight years ago, a hobo stumbled into Mackenzie's tomb. He started banging on the lid, and fell through the floor into a pile of the bodies that had been illegally buried. Apparently, the poltergeist of all the negative energy that had been in this graveyard was unearthed at this time and people began to feel poltergeist activity in what was termed the Black Masoleum. Like physical attacks. We went into that tomb. I heard noises, but the scariest part was when a hired part of the tour jumped out at us.

My spring break plans : HOME March 23-31. PARIS April 2-5. LONDON April 5-7. ROME April 7-9. FLORENCE April 9-11. VENICE April 11-16. Oooh.

i have been lax on updates and even laxer on taking photographs, but i shall be more dilligent now. i've mostly not been doing anything after doing too much, so i guess it is acceptable for a few weeks. i can't believe that the semester is already almost half over, it's sort of nuts. i hope to explore more of scotland and more of edinburgh in the rest of the time i have here, and have lots of photographic evidence as well.

i am trying to learn how to cook. i can make toast very well, also scrambled eggs. it is all in a day.

upcoming ideas for plans that i hope to accomplish: glasgow, italy, spain, prague. and more of edinburgh! i went to grassmarket with caitlin yesterday, it had a lot of antique and vintage shops and sat right below the edinburgh castle, i completely wish i would have brought my camera. later we went to the bedlam theatre and saw this strange play ..... the audience chose the plot denoument but there was far too much screaming for me to enjoy it fully.

i also completely hate doing laundry here.