Alan's Birthday!!

So this will be quick, because we have to get back to the last few hours of celebration!

Alan's birthday celebration:
To start, we stayed up really really late to watch the 8PM (American time, EST) Syracuse football game to see UCONN lose to the awesomeness of the Orange. We didn't make it through the whole game. I mean, it started at 1AM here, so it was tough to stay up! In the morning, Alan and I made homemade fluffy pancakes and bacon. Then we had cake and presents. Cake being brownies because Alan doesn't really like cake, and presents being awesome! Aside from the raincoat, I found him some strawberry poptarts and a cute ladybug card :) Best part, I got tickets for us to go to the bonefire on November 5th! It's Guy Fawkes Day, but you aren't supposed to call it that. There's a bonefire, concert, fireworks, and fair! We are going with my friend Sophia and her boyfriend who'll be visiting! Lots of fun!! Alan also got a card from Lynne and a package from his parents! My parent's showed us his gift on Skype because the package was too expensive to send ($200). Crazy! After presents and cake, we watched Haven, our SciFi show and relaxed during the afternoon. We had a plan to go to the Botanical gardens, but we decided to make that an adventure for another weekend. Instead, I did some research about Disney and certain events it can cater to. I have found positive results. At about 4PM, Alan and I went catch a bus to get to the tram (equivalent to the T) and took an adventure to the mall of the area. Malls are still a new thing here, so its pretty well talked about. Not as big as some of them that we've been to, but quality. It's not just clothes stores and there's lots of fun stuff, like the LEGO store that we went to visit.

Best parts about Meadowhall (the mall) was that they are already putting up Christmas decorations/have stuff out to buy and are advertising for it! I guess they don't have that "after Thanksgiving day" benchmark like us ;) The other great part was dinner. We went to TIGF and it was great! The nachos were weird because they arranged them and the salsa wasn't actually salsa and they melted cheese onto them, but everything else was the way it was in America! We will be visiting again :)

When Alan and I came back on the tram, we made a quick ice cream pick up at the grocery store, but, we found a heaven in the grocery store. Its a Caribbean section with hot sauces and spices AND TING!!! That's the Caribbean grape fruitjuice like soda that we love and was sooooo cheap. In the Caribbean, its at least $1 per bottle, here, it was 3 can per pound. Pretty exciting. We got a bunch just in case it was a one time thing (you can never be sure with the way they stock things here).

Now, we are going to Skype with Alan's dad and watch a movie before bed. Tomorrow is a study day (as is my Monday). Alan might have a few days off soon, so we might travel to Glasglow for a long weekend soon!

Other than Alan's birthday, we've been pretty consistent in study and hang out with friends. I made new friends from other management programs and countries, so Rose will be proud! I actually spend time with them outside of class and have contact information for after this year. I got a letter from Amanda which I am rationing reading because we are penpals!

So most of my classes end in the 10th week of class, giving us the last two weeks time to prepare in tutorials for our final assessments. We are in week 5, which means the first semester is halfway done class-wise. We've been here for a month and a half, but it feels like forever with all the things we've done!

Lauren and Alan