We woke up early on Saturday morning and prepared to show up for breakfast which was included in the booking, I got this very nice plate of bacon, eggs, tomato and hash brown and we could also choose from an assortment of cereals. I was truly impressed with their reception and how much they made us feel welcome almost into their own home. Abbeyview cottage gets ***** from me, cannot praise them enough. We finished getting dressed got our luggage together and paid for our room and off we went on to find where the conference was being held.
We made it into the town centre and made our way in the right direction from there. The problem with getting around St. Andrews is that it is soooo small everyone thinks you know where you are going! We were real tourists with maps pointing and hmmm-ing. We made it eventually to the place where the conference was but now the question was WHICH BUILDING, because there were a few around and non properly signposted. Well we found signposts in the end but they didn't indicate which direction you should go so that was a bright idea, but in the end we found it. It was held in the Purdie Building, North Haugh and when we came into the foyer most of the people were there already. We signed in and went browsing about the tables they had set up. They were offering books and booklets on sale, and I was incredibly lucky. I got my hands on ECMS (Early Christian Monuments of Scotland) for 20P, which is not bad considering this is very hard to get your hands on. It didn't take me a long time to decide to buy it. We also found Jo from the Music Department who was going to be so sweet to us and give us a lift back to Glasgow. Then Alex Wolf climbed up on a table to get our attention that the conference was starting and that we should start moving towards the lecture theatre.
The first lecture started at 10:45, speaker was Barbara Yorke from the University of Winchester ''Scottish Northumbria' as an Anglo-Saxon Province', which was about the Bernician dynasty around Bamburgh and Lindisfarne. Interesting but since I am not very up on history this late, I have no idea what she was talking about.
Then it was Dr. David N. Parsons from the Centre for Advanced Studies, University of Wales, 'Place-names of the Southwest revisited' which was very interesting and I enjoyed it very much listening to him. And then it was lunch. The buffet was very nice, although not very organised, so I had no idea what I was getting, also the problem was because you weren't really able to recognise what was on the sandwiches Catriona couldn't take a chance, so it appeared that the vegetarian choice was finished when we finally got there (if it ever was there). All she did get was a muffin and a bowl of fruit, I was lucky though, because I got a sandwich with ham and tomato (only one slice of tomato though), chicken, muffin and fruit.
After the break it was Alice Blackwell's turn from Museum of Scotland, she was talking about 'Reassessing the Anglo-Saxon material culture from Scotland', and I love hearing what she has to say. This is the second time I have attended a lecture with her and it's always fabulous. One of the highlights of the conference I must say. Following her talk was Dr. Nicky Toop, Field Archaeology Specialist from York, talking about 'Northumbrian Monuments in Southern Scotland: carving a Christian territory', and I must admit I was not impressed. She used so much out of date data for her talk and relied to much on what others had done it didn't give any clear focus on what she was really on about. It felt too much like she didn't know what she was doing there, not good at all. Then it was time for tea.
Tea was a lovely time, we got loads of cake and Catriona got tea so she was happy. I managed to wrangle a coke form a vending machine so I was happy too.
The conference was almost finished at this point but three speakers were still to left. So the opening act after coffee break was none other than Alex Wolf himself, speaking on 'The Sain'ts of Anlgo-Saxon Scotland'. It was a very brief talk, but fun. I thoroughly enjoyed hearing him recite a poem in Old English fluently, it was lovely, and his saints were fun too. Then we finally got an archeologists perspective on the Anglo-Saxon culture with Erlend Hindmarch from AOC (I have no idea what that is) who told us about 'New Discoveries from Auldhame', and I again enjoyed that talk immensely. He was telling us about an excavation of a graveyard dating from late 8th century until 15th century. It was amazing and great to hear of the work being carried out there. I don't know why but I always like listening to Archaeologists share their discoveries and listen to their lectures. Probably because they use a lot of photos!
Then it was time for our very own Professor Dauvit Brown to sum up the conference and give a closing speach. All in all the conference was a great success and I am so happy to have gone. I had also managed to get my hands on a couple of other booklets from previous conferences about Scandinavian studies in Scotland so I was mightly pleased.
After this there was nothing more to do than to take off home. Guto joined us as Jo had promised to give him a ride as well and when we were all there we headed for her car and she drove us all the way to Glasgow and home to our doorstep as well. She was so nice and it was a very nice journey to make all in all.
Showing posts with label Conference. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Conference. Show all posts
Friday, February 27, 2009
Thursday, February 26, 2009
St. Andrews Conference I
Catriona and I went to a conference in St. Andrews last weekend. It was hosted by St. Andrews University, Committe for Dark Age studies & EMERGE (I have no idea what that is). The title of the conference was 'Anglo-Saxon Scotland' and some questioned the validity or the apropriateness of this title.
The party started on Friday so Catriona and I made our way to Queen Street station early morning to catch the train to Edinburgh. I always like going on trains. We made it into Edinburgh shortly before 11, and I just managed to grab a sandwich, bottle of coke and a bag of crisps before we jumped aboard the train to Luchers. We had enormous amount of fun on the trainride to Luchers all thanks to Walkers Vote for Me crips. I had grabbed a bag of a new trial crips 'Builders Breakfast' and they truly were magical. I recommend them to anyone who want's a bit of Harry Potter feeling. It was like eating Berti Botts Every Flavour Beans, except crisps. 'Builder's Breakfast' was supposed to have, eggs, toast, beans and bacon, and the weird thing was, you picked up a crips and bit into it and maybe you got eggs, or eggs and bacon, bacon and beans, beans and toast! The point is you never knew and it could be any flavour, which made this incredibly fun. We are so easily entertained.
We made it into Luchers around noon and hurried to the bus station where a moment later a bus came to take us to St. Andrews. What a journey. We had no idea where we were or where we were going but alighted at the first viable spot, and landed basically in the heart of St. Andrews not bad. This was the start of a long day of walking ... and walking ... and walking. We went to the St. Andrews Cathedral, which is probably one of my favorite ruins of all time. Looking at it just makes you wonder what used to be there and makes you want to weep, it is beautiful. Next to the Cathedral is St. Rules tower and Catriona can tell you all about it. I only know a bit, that it is one of the oldest square tower in Scotland! We went up, but oh boy, it was difficult. The stairs were circular and tiny, these really were tiny monks, but I made it up and Catriona too. I took a few photos to prove it and then we descended the stairs again. I still don't know how I managed this and both my knees get nightmares thinking about this trip up and down. (My knees are magical and can think for themselves.)
Next on the list was finding the Bed and Brekfast, and after what felt like wandering around the desert for twenty minutes we found it. It was a lovely place in the middle of the suburb of St. Andrews (which is not big). The welcome was wonderful and the room was amazing, felt just like a hotel only smaller. After stopping for a short while where I was able to allow my feet to breath for a bit, we were at it again ... walking ... and walking. We went back to the city centre where we sat down at Costa Cafe to find out where we were going next, but in the end we mostly just wandered around town aimlessly looking for a place to eat. We basically ended up at the same place where we had lunch, at Victorias Bar. We knew we would get good food there so we weren't to disappointed of not getting to sample more of the local cusine. Also most of the places in St. Andrews are rather expensive.
We left the diner when it was still roughly more than half an hour before the seminar started. The seminar tonight was sort of the opening act to the weekends conference, The Anderson Memorial Lecture. It took us for ages to find the place, and its basically because I screwed up! I was so caught up with the street names there that I didn't really pay much attention to the map or address. So we turned down a road we shouldn't have, if we had basically moved half a meter more and into a courtyard we would have been there, but I wanted to go down Butts Wynd (which I renamed Farts Alley) and from there it went all down hill. We made it back but it was quite frustrating that we could have avoided all this walking, on the other hand there were people about now so we felt more assured that we were at the right place. And so we were, we found the lecture theatre and sat down, which was a relief for my feet.
The speaker of the evening was a Professor Nick Higham and his talk was titled 'Anglo-Saxon Scotland?' (very imaginative title as you can see). I had heard that not everyone was pleased with having him as opening speaker for the night, and I must say I can understand why (although I didn't until Catriona explained it to me). I didn't take the same history courses as Catriona did so she was much more up on things than I was, but basically this guy was spouting nonsence which no 'sane person thinks anymore', and that it had felt like stepping thirty years back into the past in scholarship. He was an entertaining speaker though, it must be said. There are probably not many that can actually get the sentence: 'Not that I am insinuating that Bede was a Dalek' into a lecture.
After the talk we were invited over to a reception given by the University and sponsored by Glenmorangie! They offered us whiskey, red wine, white wine and some other beverages that I wasn't exploring to much of. They even had snacks. I had a glass of whiskey but because I had been walking so much and had an early start to tomorrow I didn't imbibe too much, although Catriona got a bit mellow with a glass of red wine. We mingled, although just barely, we met a guy from Cambridge, named Paul (I thought his name was Bob, but found that odd for a Cambridge boy), all dressed up in tweed! He knew Geraldine our teacher so we had something in common to talk about. Then we spent a few minutes talking to Dauvit and Thomas before splitting. It's a good thing I am good at finding my way around places because I would not have trusted Catriona in her mellow state to get us where we were going, we walked back to the B&B and were very happy when we were finally in bed exhausted after an eventful day.
The party started on Friday so Catriona and I made our way to Queen Street station early morning to catch the train to Edinburgh. I always like going on trains. We made it into Edinburgh shortly before 11, and I just managed to grab a sandwich, bottle of coke and a bag of crisps before we jumped aboard the train to Luchers. We had enormous amount of fun on the trainride to Luchers all thanks to Walkers Vote for Me crips. I had grabbed a bag of a new trial crips 'Builders Breakfast' and they truly were magical. I recommend them to anyone who want's a bit of Harry Potter feeling. It was like eating Berti Botts Every Flavour Beans, except crisps. 'Builder's Breakfast' was supposed to have, eggs, toast, beans and bacon, and the weird thing was, you picked up a crips and bit into it and maybe you got eggs, or eggs and bacon, bacon and beans, beans and toast! The point is you never knew and it could be any flavour, which made this incredibly fun. We are so easily entertained.
We made it into Luchers around noon and hurried to the bus station where a moment later a bus came to take us to St. Andrews. What a journey. We had no idea where we were or where we were going but alighted at the first viable spot, and landed basically in the heart of St. Andrews not bad. This was the start of a long day of walking ... and walking ... and walking. We went to the St. Andrews Cathedral, which is probably one of my favorite ruins of all time. Looking at it just makes you wonder what used to be there and makes you want to weep, it is beautiful. Next to the Cathedral is St. Rules tower and Catriona can tell you all about it. I only know a bit, that it is one of the oldest square tower in Scotland! We went up, but oh boy, it was difficult. The stairs were circular and tiny, these really were tiny monks, but I made it up and Catriona too. I took a few photos to prove it and then we descended the stairs again. I still don't know how I managed this and both my knees get nightmares thinking about this trip up and down. (My knees are magical and can think for themselves.)
Next on the list was finding the Bed and Brekfast, and after what felt like wandering around the desert for twenty minutes we found it. It was a lovely place in the middle of the suburb of St. Andrews (which is not big). The welcome was wonderful and the room was amazing, felt just like a hotel only smaller. After stopping for a short while where I was able to allow my feet to breath for a bit, we were at it again ... walking ... and walking. We went back to the city centre where we sat down at Costa Cafe to find out where we were going next, but in the end we mostly just wandered around town aimlessly looking for a place to eat. We basically ended up at the same place where we had lunch, at Victorias Bar. We knew we would get good food there so we weren't to disappointed of not getting to sample more of the local cusine. Also most of the places in St. Andrews are rather expensive.
We left the diner when it was still roughly more than half an hour before the seminar started. The seminar tonight was sort of the opening act to the weekends conference, The Anderson Memorial Lecture. It took us for ages to find the place, and its basically because I screwed up! I was so caught up with the street names there that I didn't really pay much attention to the map or address. So we turned down a road we shouldn't have, if we had basically moved half a meter more and into a courtyard we would have been there, but I wanted to go down Butts Wynd (which I renamed Farts Alley) and from there it went all down hill. We made it back but it was quite frustrating that we could have avoided all this walking, on the other hand there were people about now so we felt more assured that we were at the right place. And so we were, we found the lecture theatre and sat down, which was a relief for my feet.
The speaker of the evening was a Professor Nick Higham and his talk was titled 'Anglo-Saxon Scotland?' (very imaginative title as you can see). I had heard that not everyone was pleased with having him as opening speaker for the night, and I must say I can understand why (although I didn't until Catriona explained it to me). I didn't take the same history courses as Catriona did so she was much more up on things than I was, but basically this guy was spouting nonsence which no 'sane person thinks anymore', and that it had felt like stepping thirty years back into the past in scholarship. He was an entertaining speaker though, it must be said. There are probably not many that can actually get the sentence: 'Not that I am insinuating that Bede was a Dalek' into a lecture.
After the talk we were invited over to a reception given by the University and sponsored by Glenmorangie! They offered us whiskey, red wine, white wine and some other beverages that I wasn't exploring to much of. They even had snacks. I had a glass of whiskey but because I had been walking so much and had an early start to tomorrow I didn't imbibe too much, although Catriona got a bit mellow with a glass of red wine. We mingled, although just barely, we met a guy from Cambridge, named Paul (I thought his name was Bob, but found that odd for a Cambridge boy), all dressed up in tweed! He knew Geraldine our teacher so we had something in common to talk about. Then we spent a few minutes talking to Dauvit and Thomas before splitting. It's a good thing I am good at finding my way around places because I would not have trusted Catriona in her mellow state to get us where we were going, we walked back to the B&B and were very happy when we were finally in bed exhausted after an eventful day.
To be continued ...
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