A Guest Blogger!

Leah has been sick for the last two days, with a fever of 38.3...whatever that means! She alternates between lying listless on her Peppa Pig airbed, asking weakly to watch "the bees" which is a British cartoon, and lying in her play tent, dressing her baby doll despite being in a prone position. Since I have been hanging out with her, and not doing much else, Emma is going to take a turn at the blog. Take it away, Emma!

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Being an American in a Scottish school means being asked loads of questions about life in "the States". I've learned that most Scots think that New York is just a city and cannot believe that I'm from a town smaller than St. Andrews, five hours from the city. One boy, upon being told that I live outside the city, said "Oh so like Brooklyn." People here also don't seem to understand just how big the county actually is, and they love to ask where I've been. In my first week, they asked, "Have you been to Compton?" I said no, then they said, "How about Detroit?"

They also all assume that it's always bright and sunny and are shocked to learn that we get snow and have much colder temperatures than they do. Some of my friends will have the opportunity to go to Ohio next year on an exchange for a week and they all seem to think that they're going to be visiting Los Angles.

I'm also constantly ambushed by classmates with preconceived notions about the U.S. from various movies and T.V. shows. They ask things like "Are there just tons of McDonalds everywhere?", "It is normal to see someone carrying a gun?", "Are your chicken nuggets way bigger than ours?", "What's wrong with your bacon?", and my personal favorite "If you walk on someone else's property will they shoot you?"

They also seem very interested in how we perceive them and were disappointed to learn that Americans generally consider British and English to be the same thing. When I told them that everyone thinks that the UK is just like Harry Potter minus the magic they were very taken aback. I was quite disappointed to learn that no one here really likes, or even has read, the Harry Potter books.

Some parts of going to school here really are just like Harry Potter, though. For instance we have this big quad in the middle of our school that looks exactly like the place where Mad-Eye Moody turned Draco Malfoy into a weasel. 

The quad at Madras College

We also have houses, although we only have three instead of the Hogwarts four. These consist of Blackfriars (for the church that used to stand where the school is now), Castle (for the St. Andrews' castle), and Priory (this is my house and I have no idea what it's for). At Madras, they really aren't a very big thing and no one really seems to care what house they're in, though we do have house games where you can earn house points!