I Could Have Ceilidh’d All Night

Posted on May 12, 2013 by lizzie mcmizzie

It’s pronounced kay-lee, and if Appalachian clogging mated with Richard Simmons to the sound of bagpipe music, the ceilidh would be their child.

And it is wicked fun.

With less than 12 days remaining in my semester in Scotland, i’m in a panic to cross off everything on my Edinburgh Bucket List. And easily, the biggest thing i have been looking forward to was going ceilidh dancing.

I’m the most pigeon-toed ballerina you’ll ever find. But when it comes to a kind of dance that requires a sense of gusto more than talent, i am your girl. I’d heard that ceilidh, as a cultural tradition more than a fine art, was something meant to be easy to participate in. Much like the swing dances i loved dolling up for so much in high school.

So my friend Megan and i donned our billie kilts (for obvious reasons) and made our way to the University’s Chaplaincy centre. It’s still the middle of exam season for us, so we weren’t expecting the largest of crowds. True to form, the crowd was a mixture of curly-haired wee lassies and older folk in full Scottish regalia. In the corner was tucked the band and on the floor was a stomp-clapping mob of high-kicking dancers.

And it was brilliant.

Being in the context of families and University students alike enabled us to see the breadth of tradition. I learned, from a man with a robust white beard and well-worn kilt, that children in Scotland tend to learn traditional dances in late primary school. I also learned, from the same gentleman, that if you just trust your knowledgable partner to lead the steps you might find yourself being flung off the ground and spun around without warning.

And just like that, i was learning jig steps and polka-pirouettes to the thrum of the fiddle. “You can forget about gym membership!” he bellowed, frolicking around me like the considerable age gap only made him more lithe with time. I heaved a giggle-gasp, asthma-attacked but with cheeks sore from laughing.

Observing a move called “The Helicopter” wherein the lads lift the lassies and spin! TERRIFYING.

It seriously was some of the most fun i’ve had in Scotland; that same delirious, verging-on-terrified delight i found in the Highlands i experienced when the dance left me so dizzy i could barely breathe. My calves are still recovering from the whole affair, but i am seriously hoping to go ceilidh dancing at least once more before my time here runs dry. It’s the best of Scotland: excellent attire, fabulous folk music, high-pulse dancing, camaraderie, and ever the element of sweeping-off-your-feet surprise.

Laughing in our kilts over after-dancing drinks!

And, if i said what happened next was the best part of the night, it would be a voracious lie. And mortifying. Because i broke my own rule and we totally made a midnight run to my beloved-and-despised KFC. Who doesn’t love capping off a good workout with fried chicken?

Thanks to Megan for taking this! (Gratuitous fast food eating commences)

—

current jam: ‘young & beautiful’ lana del rey.

best thing: today is both j’s graduation and mother’s day in the usa! wishing i was across the pond for both of them, so grateful to have them in my life.

support my book’s indiegogo campaign!

Erratic.

Posted on March 8, 2013 by lizzie mcmizzie

The film i had to watch for class this week was so utterly dull i spent the majority of it painting my nails a voracious shade of magenta. They’ve chipped so i re-did them this morning, my hands shaking.

I have so much adrenaline in me right now, i’m not sure i’d pass a drug test. Pugs not drugs. But, like, really. I made my coffee extra weak this morning and everything. With two dollops of milk. Two!

Two essays have been vanquished; the last stands some 1200 words in and a very thorough outline to the finish. Frankly, i just don’t want to talk about the male gaze in cinema right now. Any other time, gender politics and art rank in my top-five-favorite things to chat about. Not now. So the cursor blinks maniacally at me on the screen. Taunting my out-of-character inability to focus. In my head it’s the beat of a bass drum: thum, thum, thum.

It’s a proper Edinburgh day: miserable and misty and reeking of rain. I keep toying with the cord of my curling iron, wondering if it’s worth it. Nothing can ruin a bouffant like side-lining rain. No better way to pass time than trying to ensure my lion’s mane looks decent.

My coffee mugs need washing. So does my hair. When i know i will be an erratic mess of non-drug-induced adrenaline, i make a tight schedule for myself the day before: not a moment before nine-thirty, awake. Go to the library, return books. Vacuum. Re-arrange posters. First cup of coffee. Make it last. Wait until after his arrival call around noon from Amsterdam before showering.

Every hour that passes is like a mile in a marathon. All i can do is calculate in my head the distance traveled in relation to the minutes it took to travel them. How many things can i fit in the waiting minutes, the minutes that crush me with their not-yet-itis?

I made guacamole yesterday, with a mojito chicken reprise. Both were a little heavy on the coriander. (I’d scheduled an extra thirty seconds for plucking herbs, so as to make the minute stretch longer). Still, cooking is a work in progress. I’ve dreamed up a new recipe for mac & cheese. Bookmarked some other salad concoctions i hope to try soon.

My pinker-than-pink nails are drumming to the imaginary beat of my aching cursor. Thum. Thum. Thum. Waiting is not my strong suit – it never has been. In the time before my driver’s license, i’d pace outside my mother’s office. Listen to her tap-tap-tapping on the computer, every tap an agonizing delay to my compulsive five-minutes-early reputation. We’d yell at each other like no other time, her furious at my inability to relax until arrived, me incredulous that the world did not move at five-minutes-early-everywhere speed.

I’d like to think i’ve gotten a bit better. Having my own means of transport certainly helped. But on days like today, i’m fourteen and a hypoglycemic meltdown all over again. But there’s no parent to pester to move faster. Only the proverbial clock, the unmerciful slowness of time that is in the in-betweens.

4 hours, 30 mintues. I can do this.

—

current jam: ‘you got what i need’ joshua radin. soothing music to soothe the drums and drones.

best thing: 800 words remain. 800 words can fill an hour, right?

Répéter: Trois Jours.

Posted on March 5, 2013 by lizzie mcmizzie

I should be writing my paper on sexuality and nationalism.

I’ve spent my afternoon making spinach-and-artichoke dip for my mojito chicken nacho dinner tonight. (The whole cooking thing? Yeah, it’s taking off with frightening fast elevation. I think i’ve watched three or four hours worth of Sorted videos in the last two days alone). Before that, there was a stroll around The Meadows and the library under the ruse of “returning my books.”

You get the idea.

My restlessness is not unfounded, if resiliently unproductive. In a mere three days (THREE DAYS) J will be here for his spring break. I can’t breathe, i can’t focus, and i certainly cannot think about anything else (much less worrying over the intersection of sexuality and nationalism in a 2500 word essay).

So here am i, procrastinating in my most favorite way. Writing to you. My current second-favorite means of not-doing-homework is reading up on restaurants in Paris and London, where we’ll visit in the twelve days J is here. (If you have suggestions, please do leave them in the comments!)

As if seeing him were not enough, i’m finally realizing my thirteen-year-old dream of scaling the Eiffel Tower and downing more wine and cheese than i can imagine. Maybe the wine part wasn’t so influential in my eighth-grade-doodles. Whatever. Je voudrais deux baguettes, s’il-vous-plaît, i practice. Mademoiselle Kelly would be proud. I’ve come two inches in my French grammar since my middle school days. But i can rock the all-black-clothing with pouty-red-lipstick look like Amélie personally loaned me her wardrobe. My sense of fashion has certainly progressed since then.

I have a running playlist of the strangest juxtapositions: Zac Brown Band (for him), Edith Piaf (for Paris), and the Hunchback of Notre Dame (for the guise of focusing, the reality of pretending to be Esmeralda in the famous cathédrale). Rinse, remix, repeat.

Rinse, remix, repeat. Mojito chicken, library, repeat. Three days, three days, three days.

—

current jam: ‘la vie en rose’ édith piaf.

best thing: affordable airlines.

To Amsterdam We Go!

Posted on February 20, 2013 by lizzie mcmizzie

One backpack. Two (full) days. Three nights.

See ya’ll on the other side!

For My Mother:

Posted on February 11, 2013 by lizzie mcmizzie

[Groupon UK is running a contest wherein entrants write a blog post about their perfect gift idea – either for themselves, or someone else - this Valentine's Day. This is my entry!]

I was in the fourth grade when she first left the country. I remember the gifts she brought back – small, plastic figurines of princesses with swords at their hips and knights mounted on horses. It was the peak of my fantastical stories age when i spent hours crafting intricate narratives against the backdrop of my waterfall Playmobile set. Her gifts were the perfect addition to my cast of characters: feisty female leads with dashing love interests played by an assortment of stuffed animals.

My mother has always ensured i live a charmed life. She left the country for the first time in her thirties. I was fourteen when we boarded the plane for Uganda.

Her friend’s book club had booked a trip to Paris and an extra spot was vacant. My mother purchased this exquisite, calf-length black coat for the occasion. The collar was faux fur, and i thought she looked like a movie star from the 1930s. Paris is cold in February, she told me then.

Edinburgh is too.

At the age of twenty, i’ve been given the best gifts i could ever ask for. Love in my life, warms homes, stamped passport, recipes for fried chicken. There’s not much more i could ask for than that. My mother was my gateway into the world, and she has opened innumerable doors since i came through.

When we’d opened our action figures, she told me how the street she’d found them on was like Diagon Alley. Like magic made it appear, cobblestone-covered and impossible to find again. She talked and talked, how the windows in Notre Dame dimmed in the rain but dazzled in the sun. Chirping her Bonjour’s and reminiscing the wine, i drank in her memories like the stories she’d given me bound in books.

It was her first and only time to Paris. We’ve traveled together across East and West Africa, hearts full with adventure and simplicity and constancy. But it’s been some time since my mother has traveled abroad. I can hear little aches in her voice when i tell her how spellbound i am with the red letter-boxes on the streets.

There are many things i wish i could give my mother in return for what she has given me. But a parent’s love is a kind of gift that i, even in my neurotic-must-repay mindset, can never hope to give back in equal measure.

If i could, on Valentine’s Day i would give her is a chance to fall in love with Europe all over again. To visit me, in Edinburgh, and to see why it is that Scotland possess its own kind of magic. I would take her to St. Margaret’s chapel in the Edinburgh castle, because i know she’d like that the oldest building in Edinburgh was built to honor a holy woman. We would eat mussels along the coast and drink in salt air with our wine. She’d tell me about her father and his shrimp boat, and about growing up along an oceanside river. I’d tuck my chin into my folded-up knees and soak in her stories, feeling and looking no different than from when i was ten and she first told me about Paris.

I would show her Edinburgh’s own kind of Diagon Alleys and histories of princesses with swords at the hip. I’d show her to see how her piles of storybooks and memories of Paris have woven in my imagination seeds for endless possibilities, endless adventures.

It’s a gift i wish, so much, that i could give. But in the stead of taking her to the foot of Arthur’s Seat i send pictures. There are long talks on Skype. Some days, when i miss her warmth and her storytelling most acutely, i remember her movie-star black coat and the stories she told, giving a prayer of thanks for the gift of a mother i have been given.

—

current jam: ‘oh my sweet carolina (live)’ zac brown band.

best thing: moms.

Maps & Gastronomy: Eating and Reveling in Edinburgh

Posted on February 4, 2013 by lizzie mcmizzie

Edward Tufte says maps are metaphors. I’m no infometrics whiz, but i like this idea – if, for no other reason, than my affinity for maps. Splayed across my wall before me is a map of Edinburgh i peeled out of my guidebook. Adjacent to it is a map of Durham, North Carolina that i plucked from a visitor’s desk downtown. Though these maps are from far-away places, the greens couldn’t be of a more identical hue.

I love this metaphor within a metaphor: a town that is known to me and a town that is new are not so very different that they are required to clash. Durham’s streets are reminders of the world that has nurtured me, and Edinburgh’s closes and squares nurtures the at-times-overwhelming feeling of falling in love with a new world.

Yet falling in love with a new place means i need to share this love with the people who make up the home in the map of my heart. I sometimes fear my noticing of the very-matched greens will be a noticing only for me. That while this world i’m coming to know in Edinburgh is vast and exciting and beautiful, it starts to make my own dot on the globe all the farther from the world i knew.

This fear, though, was deeply assuaged this past weekend: i had the delight of sharing my budding romance with Edinburgh with one of my dearest, dearest friends – Nora!

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA

As she is also studying abroad in the UK, Nora and i threw together a weekend excursion about the city on a whim – a marvelous, serendipitous, and delicious whim. Because i’ve been so focused on making myself feel at home in Edinburgh, i haven’t necessarily done all the typical tourist-y things one might explore on holiday. Having a guest, though, was the perfect excuse to give myself full permission to go light on the schoolwork and heavy on learning all the reasons you should holiday in Edinburgh.

And easily ranked in the top ten reasons to visit Edinburgh would be the food! Thus, this is the first of two blog posts chronicling our weekend together. And it’s all about the food. (Don’t worry, the latter will be about the actual tourist-y things we did!)

Our gastronomical tour began with the comfort food haven, Mums. “Top nosh at half the cost,” according to the website, Mums boasts of a vibrant and edgy charm: they’re home-cooked comfort mixed with urban attitude. I mean, the mac & cheese has a spice kick to it and comes with chips!* Who doesn’t love drowning in cheese and carbs? Their food is locally sourced, their service impeccable, and the deal incomparable to anywhere else. Eating there with Nora was my first time, but it will so most definitely not be my last.

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA

Having sated our need for traditional fare, the next evening’s meal was one reminiscent of home: Southwestern American cuisine. Living in North Carolina for so long spoiled me, with taco stands and sit-down Mexican restaurants on every block. So to tend to my poor, burrito-deprived needs, we ventured to the local Tex-Mex joint: Illegal Jack’s. It was all i wanted and more, guacamole included.

Our final dinner was at a place i’ve frequented before: 10 to 10 In Delhi, a Halal Indian restaurant with excellent chicken roti and even better student deals. If you’re looking to stretch your pounds, three quid will get you a belly-stretching meal here. We particularly loved the pretty tapestries stretched across the ceiling and the cozy couches!

Easily the best place we visited, though, was no foreigner to me: The Elephant House Café.

I met Nora in the fall of our first year at Mount Holyoke. She was wearing a Hogwarts crest t-shirt, it was love at first sight, and the rest (as they say) was Hogwarts, A History. Nora and i are no strangers to Harry Potter-themed adventures; in the winter of the subsequent year, we attended the Brooklyn Yule Ball together. On the last day of finals. In Christmas-themed ball gowns. We’d skipped dinner in an effort to catch the last train into the city, downing rolls of bread and Dr. Pepper’s in a convenience store outside the venue as substitutes.

There aren’t many people you can romp about New York City in a gold petticoat with, but Nora has always been an exceptionally genuine and beautifully adventurous friend.

I remember gleefully turning to her, as Harry and the Potters crashed and roared over their keyboard and guitar on stage. “I’m so tired, but i am having so much fun!“she mouthed over the din. It was a magical moment to share with a dear friend then, and it was just as magical to share the “Birthplace of Harry Potter” with her this weekend over elephant-shaped shortbread and excellent cups of tea.

We were sure to leave our own note in the bathroom – signed, as ever, with our nicknames for each other: Padfoot & Prongs.

(note the painting of JK Rowling writing in the café behind us!)

Feeling known is an immense gift. I feel known by this city – but part of this feeling known comes from sharing it with an old friend. Nora and i have a history of adventures (gastronomical and literary alike!) and to make this weekend a part of that map of stories was such a treasure. My green maps still match, and the loves in my life make the most beautiful harmonies when sung together.

—

current jam: ’good morning sunshine’ alex day.

best thing: a beautiful place to be with friends.

p.s. you can always find my reviews of restaurants and attractions on my tripadvisor profile!

*for friends in the states: chips = french fries, just in case your daily dose of the BBC hadn’t kept you abreast of British slang!

The Elephant House Café & Greyfriars Kirkyard!

Posted on January 15, 2013 by lizzie mcmizzie

For lunch today i met up with a group of ladies from my flat for lunch at (you guessed it!) The Elephant House Café. Over cups of tea and coffee we gabbed about our love for all things Potter, marveling at the view of the castle from her customary chair. The food could have been horrendous and we’d have loved it (because, you know, Rowling). Much to our delight, though, the sandwiches and tea were all exquisite. The café is bathed in a warm light and bedazzled in elephants; everywhere, there are petit statues and large posters of the gentle mammal. It’s an eclectic and comfortable place to be – with tremendously reasonable prices for American exchange students trying to stretch the pound as far as it can go!

Having a cuppa where Jo used to dream up the inner-workings of Hogwarts, no big deal.

the view from our table!

Afterwards, some of us went to explore the graveyard at Greyfriars Kirk where we’d heard a Tom Riddle was buried. The search was a long one, before we finally found the grave on a wall in the rear of the garden.

I’ve always had a peculiar fondness for graveyards; they’re steeped in history, usually quiet, and endlessly inspiring. The search, then, for the mysterious Thomas Riddell was not at all unenjoyable – particularly because it was made in the company of new friends!

Besides, i even found a grave adjacent to Thomas’ with an Elizabeth Riddell. Perhaps Voldemort had a long-lost aunt bearing the same first name as me?

Greyfriars, the street, is most famous not for ancient relatives of You-Know-Who, as it turns out. At the helm of the road is a statue of a small Skye Terrier, Greyfriars Bobby, who loyally waited for his human every day even after the human had long died. Both the human, a man named John Gray, and the dog are buried in the kirkyard.

It was lovely to explore this little corner of Edinburgh – and especially to do so with new friends! Days like today, even when my toes go numb, are making me fall in love with this enchanting city.

—

current jam: ‘i will wait’ mumford & sons

best thing: new friends!

Hometown Tourist: Merritt’s Store & Grill

Posted on January 6, 2013 by lizzie mcmizzie

Should you ever think Chapel Hill, NC, is filled with too many misplaced Northerners to be truly in the South, look no further than Merritt’s Store & Grill. Located at the crossroads between 15-501 and 54 West, this small white-washed building promises one of the best Carolina experiences you could hope to have.

it’s not carolina unless you’ve had cheerwine.

My first exposure to Merritt’s goes back to lunch-box days spent at Frank Porter Graham Elementary school. Sometimes, when my Dad would pick me and my brothers up, we’d go for an “old-timey” soda: a coke in a classic glass bottle. Since living in Uganda where most sodas i drank were in glass bottles, the novelty of a coke in a glass casing has somewhat worn off. But the memories, and Merritt’s, remain very much something to be reveled in.

The soda bottles in glass containers, though part of the charm of this grill, are certainly not the main attraction. The reason to go to Merritt’s is the sandwiches – and most especially, for the BLTs. Though i’ve oft contemplated going off pork, the main reason i stay a pig-eating machine is so that i can continue to bask in the wonder that is a mayonnaise and salt-n-pepper doused slab of bacon, lettuce, and tomato on sunflower bread.

It’s unreal. Like, the crunch of the bacon and the sweetness of the mayo blend perfectly with the salt and pepper to make this amazing bite that fills you to the toes with Southern meaty goodness. (Really, though, when they say their BLTs are world famous, this is not false advertising at all!)

accurate advertising.

The food, which is served to you in the kitchen by the drink stands, is really only paralleled by the delight of the grill itself. The building has the feel of a small home converted into a country store, and on any given Saturday you’ll find a bluegrass band pickin’ out heartbreaking tunes in the corner. That’s the thing about Merritt’s: the fixings are the real deal. You get your food from a kitchen, you eat crammed into a tiny but delightful storefront, and there is no escaping the music. Merritt’s is nothing if not authentic!

local bluegrass bands making a scene!

I thought it apt, in my last few days in the States before the Big Departure, to head over to Merritt’s for lunch. It was something of a clandestine moment; clearly, Merritt’s has enough longevity that it will still be around when i come home at the end of May. But it also is a place so rich in culture and memory for me, i couldn’t help but feel a twinge of sadness. And then, like magic, some women in the corner began to do this Appalachian-style dance to the music. Clearly, i’m not as informed about Appalachian culture as i’d like to be, but i’ve often seen this sort of stomping-and-clapping and easy-to-do dancing that gives bluegrass percussion through bodily rhythm. It’s very cool. It also has (this i am fairly certain of) roots in Celtic music and Scottish dancing.

So as i sat there, snapping photos with my new iPhone for the last hometown tourist blog for a long while, and feeling oddly connected to my new home-to-be.

—
current jam: ‘as long as our hearts are beating’
best thing: making music.

Making Rice, Making Do.

Posted on January 5, 2013 by lizzie mcmizzie

What i lack in Southern charm, my mother makes up for with every sultry ya’ll she smooths out of her mouth like butter. When she cooks, our table is swimming in vats of her fried miracle meat masterpiece she’s fondly named “Hannah’s Second-Helpin’ Chicken.” A friend of hers recounted their initial introduction, enumerating specifically that she was wearing her perfect pearls strung around her neck. My roommate frequently remarks that my ability to curl anyone’s hair (no matter the thinness or resistance to hairspray) is my Southern Superpower. I’m always quick to share it’s a superpower i inherited from my South Carolinian mother.

But easily, one of the most Southern things i have inherited from my mother (particularities with hot curlers aside) is an abundant love for steamed white rice.

She is the master of rice. Nowhere else have i had rice that compares – not the kitchens of Mount Holyoke, not the restaurants in Uganda, nor the meals consumed at friends’ homes. My mother’s rice is the kind of food i cling to as a measure of perfection. While some rice dishes may rank on a scale of goodness, none have ever paralleled Hannah’s Second Helpin’ rice concoction.

Part of what makes her rice so delicious is the particularity with which she makes it. In the unending panicked phone calls i’ve made to her asking for cooking advice (including, once, from Uganda) she’s quick to reiterate: rice is very, very precise.

“Don’t be sloppy with your measuring cup,” she shows me in my umpteenth lesson, bending down to be on eye level with the red dashes marking ounces and liters. Often as she does this, there is a persistently misbehaving strand of brown hair (curled, of course) that she tucks primly behind an ear.”You have to make sure it is exactly 3 cups of water.”

Over the phone, she reminds me the name for the recipe: 3-2-1 Rice. Precision in name, precision in numbers. 3 cups of water, 2 cups of rice, 1 teaspoon of salt. For the longest time, i couldn’t remember whether the three was for the grains or the water. Naturally, a few pots have turned a delicate shade of brownish-black as a result of my imprecision.

Living in Massachusetts for two and a half years now has been brilliant. I’m even growing to like snow. Living there has also been a lesson in just how Southern i am – even if i’ve spent the better part of my early adulthood in denial. Sure, i don’t own anything Carhart and will never suggest a BBQ joint for lunch. But i have a strong affinity for pearl earrings and i brew my own sweet tea (à la my mother’s recipe). The longer i live in New England, the more i come to make peace with – and embrace – the roots i have in Carolina country. The salience of my differences among my peers has been a wonderful part of this path of discovery.

And in five days, i begin the next big cross-cultural expedition to Scotland.

As i frantically decide between which map of Durham, NC to bring and put on my wall, i can’t help but think about how much more i’m going to learn abroad. I intend to try Haggis, explore the bowels of Edinburgh castle, breakfast at the Elephant House Café. I hope to grow in my sense of a globalized identity and engage critically with my own assumptions.

Learning who you are while abroad is a messy process. There’s plenty of journaling and contemplating and weepy phone calls ahead. Nothing is precise about identity, i think. But that’s also the adventure of it; for every homesick day i’ll have, assuredly there will be wildly wonderful moments where i can scarcely believe the world unfolding around me. For me, the most important thing right now is to focus on making those moments meaningful by being present in the moment.

And when the days are so messy and i feel so foreign and disembodied, i’ll go home by making a bowl of rice. In all the messiness, there is still the precision of her 3-2-1 Rice Recipe. (Hopefully, i can even find that calm without burning the pot.) And the thing is, rice is still rice even when you’re 3,700 miles away from the woman who makes it best in the whole world.

—

current jam: ‘toes’ zac brown band

best thing: hanging paintings.

Giving Thanks.

Posted on November 25, 2012 by lizzie mcmizzie

Having survived another round of baggage claims and poorly packed suitcases, i’m back at Mount Holyoke after a wonderful excursion home to Carolina for Thanksgiving. My nine days in dixieland were spent with such beautiful people it was impossible to go un-reminded of how blessed i am to share in their company. And, with a family that is expanding and beckoning, i was thrilled (and stuffed with) no less than three Thanksgiving meals to partake in. This misplaced Carolina girl has had enough sweet tea and sweet potato casserole to survive forty days in the ~~desert~~ tundra of the impending finals season.

(from thanksgiving #1 out of 3. spoiled and privileged and ten-pounds-gained am i!)

I hope, for those of you who celebrate Thanksgiving, that is was a bountiful time for you. I hope especially that this bounty in heart and spirit continues in the coming weeks!

Thank you for being.

—

current jam: ‘beautiful things’ gungor

best thing: journey mercies.

Wandering Writes

one woman's quest to satisfy her insatiable curiosity.

Tag Archives: blog