Arrival

Planes. I've always appreciated the speed at which one can travel to a far away destination. By FLYING!! How cool is that?! This particular flight was six hours from Chicago, IL to Reykjavik, Iceland and then a two and a half hour flight to Birmingham. I went through Icelandair and would definitely recommend it to anyone interested in flying overseas. No footrests and, like any plane, seats weren't really comfy to sleep in but the headrests came around, there were movies and music to occupy time, and tickets were really reasonable. The advertisements they previewed made Iceland seem like a beautiful land full of many adventures. Given the chance I would love to travel there to stay for longer than just an hour to be able to go whale watching and hike on their glaciers. I was fortunate enough to travel with a girl who is also from Purdue and studying animal science as well at Aber, Leah. I really appreciated having someone with me for such a long flight and now someone to do things with as we wait for everyone to move in.

 Of course there happened to be a rainbow in Iceland :)

Birmingham was a nice airport. Aberystwyth students met international students there and took them to the university: meet and great. They were really well organized and very friendly! A big shout out to them for all of their help!
The bus ride from Birmingham to Aber was a three hour ride. What I could see of Wales before it got dark was absolutely stunning! Rolling hills, dairy cattle, lots and lots of sheep, hedges instead of fences, driving on the opposite side of the road, no security lights for any houses or barns, and minimal street lights when we got to the university.

The sights did not disappoint in the morning:


I have unpacked fully and have made a few runs to the stores around here. Things to note: all their juices come in cartons, the sidewalks look a lot like the streets with no step in between so one has to be careful where one walks, people are really friendly, there's a lot of roundabouts, and they do have a KFC and Dominos Pizza.
I also enjoy comparing different currencies to the US dollar. The dollars and cents we have are really boring compared to others. Here they use pounds and pence. The pounds are like dollars but are more colorful and the pence come in different shapes, thicknesses, and they have a one and two pound coin.


 Just an example :)

Overall a great start! This next weekend and week are for freshers activities (like Purdue's BGR week). I hope to enjoy a lot of their activities and become better acquainted with the countryside. Also to buy cooking utensils. It's a little difficult to eat anything without silverware.