Class Action

Natalie Penry
18 minutes ago
8 min read

Dear Reader, we're in Scotland! And more than that, we're an officially matriculated student at the University of Edinburgh! After arriving to the city about a month and a half ago, I've been taking some time to explore, socialize, and transition back into a student mindset. We've just finished our fifth week of classes, and yet, the end of term seems eerily close. Week 6 is the "reading week" for most programs, a sort of midterm catch-up time, and I'm finding it hard to accept that I'm halfway through my first academic semester.

When Welcome Week started in mid-September, I got the sense I was getting a karmic do-over. If you can stretch your memory back about five years, you may recall that my undergraduate welcome week (BGR!) fell in August 2020, meaning my Boiler Gold Rush was a very socially-distant, not-so-hype affair. At times, being here for a real Welcome Week was a little weird - I felt both like a freshman and like a senior citizen. The actual 18 year olds are no strangers to the local pubs & clubs, and they were brimming with that classic energy that comes from being out in the great wide world by themselves for the first time. In my experience, the great wide world tends to travel easier on a good night's sleep, but maybe that's just the wisdom of age settling in ;)

On the end of the spectrum, I'm one of the younger students in my own degree program. My cohort is a really eclectic mix - people from all over the world, ranging from early 20s to early 40s, and a huge range of writing styles. I love how everyone's unique perspectives contribute to our workshops and discussions, both in and out of class. What an amazing opportunity, to swap stories with people so different from myself!

I could yap for hours on every detail of my life here, but part of being a student again means discipline in attacking the schoolwork. In the interest of my own free time, and taking advantage of the rare weeks of sunshine we have at the moment, I've drawn up a little 5-4-5 here: my top five moments from the first five-ish weeks here. Enjoy!

Ice Ice Baby

Before you get any ideas - it's a pun, and who doesn't love a cheeky pun ;) The BlueTits Society is one of Edinburgh's many student societies (a.k.a. clubs) you can join, and I first heard about it from the Society Fair during Welcome Week. The BlueTits take weekly trips on Sunday mornings to various bodies of water near the city to do a cold plunge, with a little hot chocolate & biscuits afterwards.

Trust me, no one was as surprised as me that I took such a liking to it. I was the one in Menorca who refused to wade in past my waist, and heaven forbid I get my hair wet. And that was in the Mediterranean! Here, the water is well below 60F/16C, and yet, weekly dashes into the sea. There really is something to be said for the restorative properties of a cold plunge. My friends and I may spend the first five minutes with a mix of expletives and shrieks, but once your legs go numb and the sand starts to feel warm, you feel remarkably relaxed.

I've gone to three plunges so far, with North Berwick being my favorite, and this has quickly become a staple in my Sunday reset. The BlueTits are set to have a longer weekend trip later this semester to Arran Island, and I'm really hoping to make it work with my schedule, so cross your fingers for me!

Cohort Shenanigans

As I mentioned, my cohort is a very varied bunch. Within this first part of the school year, I've already read so many unique pieces that continue to redefine the boundaries of creative writing. From an expectant OctoMom to a second-person fable, it's clear there's nothing but minds at work here in the Masters program.

Luckily, this particular group of creative writers is also dedicated to exploring the city and making memories. I feel so lucky to be a part of such a social & welcoming cohort, as it's really helped to make the city feel like home in just a few short weeks. We're constantly chatting before & after our classes, and there's a standing Writer's Room on Wednesdays. Technically, we're supposed to use that time to write together, but if often becomes more like a social hour, and I honestly can't complain...We've also taken on the task of exploring the city's literary scene, going to various pubs and bookshops for readings or networking. And lest we forget that we're still young, we also do our fair share of pub crawls. Some personal highlights include karaoke at the bar Frankenstein's (so fitting, I know), and dance parties at The Labyrinth. Bohemia is alive and well here in Edinburgh.

Exploring Edinburgh

When I was last in Edinburgh, I was wrapping up a ~3 week travel stint with The Jenna Boha (future veterinarian & current cat mom). She flew home out of the airport here, and I continued on back packing for another month or so after that. We spent a few days here seeing the highlights, many of which I had covered during my Study Away the year before.

Now, I'm getting the chance to really dig deep in the city here. It's a bit overwhelming, going from Mahón to here, but I'm enjoying the opportunity to find hidden gems and dreamy hideaways in my new city. One of the things I've enjoyed the most is seeing how drastically the city changes with the span of a few blocks. Back home, you'd never know when Westfield changed to Carmel changed to Zionsville if you didn't grow up there and internalize the slight differences. There is a unique charm to that, in a way, but let's face it: Indiana is a melting pot, in that everything becomes a homogenous blob, more fondue than fruit salad.

In Edinburgh, each little neighborhood has its own distinct feeling. Dean's Village, Newtown, Holyrood - there's a visual difference to each. Within a few miles of the city, you can travel to a beach town, a castle, or an airport. To borrow a phrase from one of my seminars, Edinburgh is a city where the location is a character. I know I have a year here, but I feel like I could live here forever and still not meet all the players on this stage.

Café Culture

You'd think after Spain, I'd've had my fill of afternoons at a café, considering I don't actually like coffee very much. Yes, while I'll almost always opt for a diet coke over a latte, I do love a cutesy café to study and write in - Edinburgh is very obliging in that manner.

Café (which is pronounced CA-fay here, for some reason??) Culture in the city is different from what I expected. In Spain, cafés are for no-frills coffee and for chatting with friends. You can easily spend hours there, but you're expected to be present. In the US, we see cafés as a "third place" of sorts. Coffee shops are places for chats, yes, but it's also totally normal to see a student or hybrid worker set up shop with a laptop. A café without WiFi is unfathomable, especially in college towns or larger cities. Here, it's a bit of an in-between of the two. Most coffee shops do serve the bougier drinks, as well as a delicious assortment of pastries, but the hustle & grind culture isn't as established. Very few cafés have free internet, and it's almost discouraged to be on technology for hours on end.

I have discovered a few cafés that pass the vibe check - Cappuccino is my personal favorite, at the moment - and have found a balance between takeaway drinks brought to the library and locking in at a WiFi-blessed location. That being said, I miss American Fountain Soda Culture desperately. What I would give for a Den Pop, or a crisp coke zero. (my family should take note: this will be a required stop when I come home!)

This reminds me again of the differences between being a student now vs. the fall of 2020 - I literally could not set up shop in a library or coffee shop for hours on end with my friends back then. I have such strong memories of hunting for empty classrooms with two or three friends freshman year so we could socially-distantly study on one of our precious reading days, or of coordinating which dining hall we were getting takeout dinner from so we could all sit on the floor of someone's dorm room without breaking Protect Purdue policy. I mean, we all knew that the period of our lives was singularly unique, but it's still kind of trippy to go back to school and realize how isolating my first ~2 years of college could have been, if it weren't for the friends I made (whom I miss very much 🥲).

A Study in Studying

You know, I often describe my parents as "white collar hippies." We were the family that actually had dinner table chats, covering all sorts of topics that celebrated curiosity and diversity of thought. I think that's an understated and key part of the reason that I developed a genuine love for learning as a kid, something that's stuck with me. As much as I adored my life in Menorca and all the challenges & growth that came from teaching, it's nice to be back on the other side of the classroom, focused solely on learning again.

The optional course I'm taking this semester is 21st Century Fiction - in other words, a contemporary literature studies class. We're reading ~10 novels from the past 25 years that my professor deems significant contributors to the current state of the literary scene. Coming from my film major background, I'm less versed in the modernism vs. post-modernism debates, but my class is a mix of Creative Writing and Literature & Modernity students, so I'm learning a lot just by listening to others. So far, we've read novels like White Teeth, Atonement, and Falling Man, each challenging me both as a reader and a writer.

I think I've ended up calling my dad at least once a week, just itching to discuss a passage that's struck my attention on what it's saying about the world. Some authors have an otherworldly talent for predicting the course of human events - the three novels I just mentioned were all written before 2009, and yet, look at this:

"it makes an immigrant laugh to hear the fears of nationalist, scared of infection, penetration, miscegenation, when this is small fry, peanuts, compared to what the immigrant fears - dissolution, disappearance" (White Teeth by Zadie Smith)

"the real danger came from the mob itself, its righteous state of mind. It would not be denied its pleasures" (Atonement by Ian McEwan)

"'For all the careless power of this country, let me say this, for all the danger it makes in the world, America is going to become irrelevant...it is losing the center'" (Falling Man by Don DeLillo)

Do those not feel so incredibly timely? Published in 2000, 2001, and 2007 respectively, and yet, so very applicable to today. I am legitimately excited every week to begin a new novel and discover some alternative perspective on being human in the twenty-first century. Reading is just the best :)

That's all for now! I genuinely love being able to share some of my experiences with you here, as it also gives me a wonderful opportunity to reflect on how my time abroad is shaping and influencing my worldview. If I've said it once, I've said it a hundred times: you don't realize how small your bubble is until you leave it. I consider myself among the luckiest people, to have repeatedly left home and built a life all my own. Alas, it's time to get back to work...writing at a coffee shop...in Edinburgh...oh, the humanity.

Ciao!