BEING A BURGHER

I love being an Edinburgher. I love that Edinburgh is small enough to walk around, but has lots of things happening because of the festival. I love that there's a castle and cobblestones and an old town and wynds and steps and alleyways. I love that rent is cheap. I love that there are wide open green spaces. I love that there's a mountain in the middle of town that peeks out from behind buildings when you least expect it. I love that the castle is sitting on an extinct volcano. It's cool.

I've seen some really interesting festival shows, and am a bit nervous about how quiet the town will be when the madness ends.

EDINBURGH

So here I am, officially living in Scotland as of today. Hooray! I had such a great time on my last weekend in London. The highlights were a drunken pub crawl in Smithfield, watching a Scottish band in Kentish town, seeing a play in the West End, enjoying the sun at a picnic in Regent's Park, a curry dinner with a table of drunken friends, drinking bottles and bottles of wine at Gordon's Wine Bar, and my "official" farewell dinner in Whitechapel. Jeez louise, no wonder I'm feeling a bit knackered.

I've organised a room in a house with three Aussie blokes and a Scot for the next few weeks, and am planning to take it easy for a while and enjoy the Edinburgh festival. Given that I've never even visited Scotland before, there should be enough to keep me occupied in this city for a good few weeks.