Hillside-ish

During the international orientation week, from Monday 3rd 'til Thursday 6th, the university provided us with a place to stay. As our flight was so late, and thus delayed our arrival to Dundee, there was no other option than to sleep at Hillside, student accommodation about 15 mins outside the centre by bus. From outside it looked like a typical dorm, and I guess it did from the inside too... the rooms were small and a bit shabby (is that even a word? anyway I guess u know what I mean), the kitchen even shabbier... but it was okay, as long as we were many there... We lived with 6 other girls; Barbara (POL), Jennifer (GER), Keti (IND), Tuuli (FIN, Arcada), Tia and Johanna (FIN, Vasa) - typical that we lived with the other Finns, but they're great girls, so we didn't really mind :)

Hillside was great only because lots of other internationals lived there - just about all the apartments were filled... Lots of French..! ...the apartments in themselves weren't that great though, the fact that Hillside will be torn down in Oktober pretty much says it all...;) But we managed!

On Tuesday night it was time for our first night out :) It was just us two for some weird reason... We decided to try an Irish pub across from the Courthouse Accomodation - quite a nice pub, but Tuesday definitely wasn't a peak day for them! From there we went to Fat Sam's (one of the "in" bars in Dundee; 4 stories & 7 bars) and before heading home, we even stopped by Yuppies, which is a bar pretty close to UAD. Fun night, and fun bars :) Prices were at least cheaper than back in Helsingfors ;)

Because we only got to move into our apartment at the Hub on Saturday the 8th, we were worried about where we were going to sleep between the 6th and the 8th - James, our "dad" fixed it though, we got to stay at Hillside (oh joy!)... And let me tell you, it was not fun to stay just us two girls in the crappy apartment for two more nights... needless to say, we slept in the same room :) Tuuli heard from somebody, that some French/Belgian guys were going to be staying there as well for some more nights, so we ended up in their apartment on Thursday night - it was just nice to know that we weren't the only ones there, all though the French/Belgian guys lived in the building furthest away from us...

Anyway, we survived, and on Saturday morning we "carried" our bags downstairs (more like pushing them and hoping for the best ;)) and headed for the local bus - that really wasn't fun, especially as we missed our stop and ended up downtown... Oh well, we got to the Hub eventually... End of Hillside adventure, thank God!