In Edinburgh

Day 1: 17 °  C and a light drizzle while we untangled ourselves and our luggage form the shuttle somewhere in the middle of Edinburgh. Music: Doves in the Wind off SZA's Ctrl album--" You can never trivialize..."  and Kendrick's part trailed me all day ... M ade it through the EDI airport by cracking jokes to score a short-term visa, apologizing repeatedly  for "being a mess", and brushing my teeth in the women's bathroom outside of baggage claim while Nora guarded our pile of baggage by an outlet to juice our phones enough to manage. Half an hour later we were lugging our suitcases off the double decker shuttle and gathering bearings we had not yet developed. Determined to navigate this city immediately, I looped Nora into lugging our five massive suitcases 1.3 miles south to our AirBnB--up the hilly, cobblestoned streets of this city. Above: Nora ready to lug these bags 1.3 miles up, down, and south to our place of rest for th...

[ ed -n -br uh ] --or at least that's what Google said to me when I clicked the little microphone symbol next to the name of my study abroad (living?) destination. Up until a couple of months ago, I didn't know of this city's existence, much less would I have trusted myself to point it out on a map. After an almost-cinematic and somewhat-cliche proposal to study abroad together, Nora and I had settled on Edinburgh as our destination of travel. I've included some of our reasoning for our shared amusement: Edinburgh... Falls within English-speaking territory. -Nora Green. - Laura "Is a lovely place to travel", "OMG--you have to go there", "is the best place in the world", "go to St. Andrew's, they have great golfing there", "Where is that again?" and my favorite, "it's pronounced ehd-in-brough not EE-din-burg "--compilation of quotes and reactions to our choice of city from which to kick off the rid...