A month to remember

 Hallo city Cats!
Watch my new video please!

Did you enjoy the video? I hope so!

I landed in Berlin officially a month and 3 days ago! It's gone so fast already but at the present time it went reaaaaal slow.
So much exploring and yet there is still so much more to explore... So i have to keep myself busy.
I keep getting so ill here though. I've had a sickness bug, I've had the good old classic cold and now I think I may be suffering from some form a chest infection... woohooo.
So I am about fed up of feeling sick.. woe is me.
Anywaaaaaays! I've been all over the place with things to do... University begun 2 weeks ago and already in just the introduction classes I feel like the education is sooooo much more intense and a fair bit more difficult than it is back at home.
The Winter term in Berlin is excellent: There has been so much going on since I arrived, such as Oktoberfest and now the Festival of Lights is occurring, however it is finishing up tomorrow.
I have travelled to Munich for the final Saturday of Oktoberfest 2014, and it was amazing! Had to travel by bus which was a 8-9 hour journey (horrendous) but it was worth it when we finally got to the Festival. Myself and a few other girls purchased Dirndl (female version of Lederhosen) and we celebrated Oktoberfest just like we were Bavarian! Spent the whole day there. Drunk from Steins of Paulaner (I am not a fan of beer, but through forcing myself to drink it, Paulaner is my favourite, so WOOH Paulaner!), got suitably drunk, ate a Bratwurst in Brot, played Carnival Games (lost), rode on the rides... You could say... my Oktoberfest game was STRONG.
 

Next on the to-do list was Mauerpark... the day of returning back home from Munich.. thats right, after a 9 hour bus drive home and a full day drinking beer, i didn't go home to sleep, i got ready to go to Berlin's famous Floh-markt (flea Market). MAUERPARK. Thats a fun word to get your mouth around.
Truth be told I really wanted to buy a guitar so I can continue to play here but nah, I didn't bring enough cash with me to buy a guitar :(
Mauerpark is suuuuch a cool place! Its soooo full of stalls of people selling their old possessions. Little food stalls everywhere and next to the flea market, there is a huge park fenced off by a very arty wall which has been spraypainted on to precise detail, it has people just chilling on picnic blankets on the grass being entertained by various buskers playing their music, possibly smoking a joint and it is the most chilled out place ever! Such a cool place to go on a Sunday, which by the way is the only day the flea market is open and I have been told that it is closed over Winter months. As well as the chilled out part, there is a karaoke stage where the fearless visitors can get up and sing in front of the raised crowd. If this was ever to be in Glasgow, people would never do it and it would be laughed at most definitely. I love the culture in Berlin: so open and up for most things!
So I spent the entire day chilling by the karaoke and the drum band. A truly amazing place to visit if in Berlin!
The next order of Business would be the visit to see the Festival of Lights. If you are not sure what it is, I can sum it up in one word- AMAZING!
Its so cool. I will hopefully have posted up a vlog on here of my experience of the festival. This year is the 10th anniversary of the Festival so they went rather ham. Up to 120 buildings had some illuminations cast on them through a light projector tent. I can't even do justice with typing the words to describe this... it it something you HAVE to see!
So now, I am going to be going to the Bierkeller tonight, which is the student run bar located in the basement of the Student halls that I am living in.  There is an Oktoberfest celebration going on until 4am, so that should be fun!
The chest infection can suck it, I'm having fun tonight :)

Ciaow City cats ~
Emmapire

The beginning of the journey

Day one

So myself and my loved ones in Scotland woke up around 4:30-5:00AM. Yes that’s really the morning am to get to the airport for 6ish and I put my hold luggage through the baggage point. I only had a limit of 20kg and I was fair to say bricking it to see how much it was going to weigh because I couldn’t afford to add further baggage to the flight.

The numbers were dithering on the scales from 29kg to 14kg and finally it landed on 19.7kg. Was so thankful! That was my luggage away.

Me and Tama (my wonderful boyfriend who has been so supportive of this huge move throughout everything) moved back to my family who were waiting patiently and sat down. Oh God the lump in my throat was back and it was attempting to strangle me to a cry.

After a few sobs here and there, my good friend Martin turned up at the airport and joined the queue for baggage point, subtly waving to us all! He is actually going to be my rock throughout all of this! We both have boyfriends back in Scotland so we have that to focus on together!

We went to the departure area before security and I had to say fairwell to my family first!

TEARS let me tell you TEARS countless tears were shed between me, Karen (my sister) and my mummy! Dad was okay, reassuring me with a huge smile! Ugh even thinking about it leaves me with a huge lump in my throat… so that was 3 goodbyes in the same space of 3 minutes. Watching them leave to the carpark was a bit devastating.

The next goodbye was Tama. Oh goodness it was the most difficult thing I’ve ever done… ever!

Couldn’t let go, and I was so tempted to just say I wasn’t going anymore. After more countless tears being shed on my part, he was gone! L Havent stopped missing him since last seeing him and it is getting worse…

So after watching the love of my life descend on the escalators, me and Martin took off to the security area and went through without a glitch.

We were to wait for Rebecca, our third companion going to Berlin! It wasn’t long till we found her, thank goodness, so we went on through duty free, both excited and extremely tired, not to forget emotional. We were to depart Glasgow airport at 8:50am, only to find out that it was actually delayed by 4 hours. YES 4!!! So we had some cocktails and a sharing platter from the extremely overpriced Frankie and Benny’s in the airport. Don’t you hate how expensive things are in the airport?

Finally we got on the plane and took off. The flight went by reasonably quickly… or it seemed that way with the sleeping I did! As soon as we landed the heat hit us when we got off the plane.

The air was so still and hot which took us by surprise. Someone told me that the weather was cold in berlin… wow were they wrong!

We immediately regretted wearing winter clothes.

We gathered together our luggage quickly and tracked down our buddy, Felix.

From there we began our second journey, which was extremely long! Took us just over an hour to get to our accommodation, using 3 trains, a bus and a tram we finally got there!

The halls are so so sooooo large! SO many rooms! And we were told that this place used to be an  army base! Talk about creepy.

The halls were so echoey. Found out I am a floor above Martin and Rebecca which meant more stairs… with a suitcase and hand luggage that weighed the equivalent of an obese man. Was fun, let me say…

Got to my room and straight away felt extremely overwhelmed by everything… being up since stupid o’clock in the morning and travelling so much and having to wait around for so long and all those goodbyes. My room was so unhomelike and I hated it! No wifi either… so that was a kick in the teeth. What student halls don’t have wifi? That makes no sense what so ever, and it made skype and facetime that much harder and at that point I wanted nothing more than just to skype home.

Anyways, we had also discovered that there was no oven! The question phased us all… are we supposed to live here or not? No oven, no wifi, an ex army base…

Uhoh… we only had two tiny little cooker hobs, with no pots or pans, cutlery, plates, glasses etc etc… no food nothing. So we decided to try and track down a nearby restaurant, which took us a good 40 minutes. We discovered a little fast food take away restaurant called Ari’s Diner, and we had a good meal there… there was also wifi but my phone died so I couldn’t even take advantage of it. L

On our way back from the diner, we were all discussing our escape plan… Berlin is not for us… we must go back home!

We had a sleepover in martin’s larger room altogether after watching Bridesmaids, so we all fell asleep a bit easier than expected with minimal group cuddling for support haha!

Colour me Rad

Well city cats

I can now happily tick one thing off my bucket list- the colour run has officially now happened.

Got up so early to get to Edinburgh which is 1 and a half hour drive from where I live, and our run was scheduled for 9:40am.
After picking up the last of the hungover and sleep deprived team mate we made our way to the venue, not without an amazing Mcdonald's breakfast though to help us through our troubled morning what with being exhausted etc, and it was all courtesy of Vicky's wonderful Mother!
So when we arrived in Edinburgh the atmosphere was already... colourful! and exciting. So we got our racing numbers on and our RAD tattoos! pictures were taken left right and centre and im so glad!
However my camera just decided that it had run out of charge after 2 photos were taken!

We lined up at the starting line and watched as the last wave of runners reached the finish line and we were off!

The whole team kind of split up by accident because it was so busy! Me and Vicky ended up running together whilst having a catch up about our lives, and then we go to the first corner of explosive colours! I think that colour was pink, and it was so cool because the colour just lifted into the air creating pink smoke!

Anyways every now and then we'd reach another point where the coloured powder would hit us and colour us in! So much fun, and we actually managed to run a full 5K without any training prior to it! To say we were impressed with ourselves would be the understatement of the year! So much fun though, and I highly recommend everybody to go for it!

here are some fabulous photos!

 The Team

Job well done!

Ciaow city cats xoxo

Nerves of steel

So you have probably read previously that I will be moving to Berlin in September. This will be my first time away from home, and it is in a completely different country!

Is it weird that in June I am already feeling homesick about this huge move? I am so nervous for this relocation, and I would be lying if I said that I wasn't up most nights panicking and worrying about it!
You see, there are so many things that are causing upset over this huge amazing opportunity! I would not say that they hold me back from it but they do make me upset about it.

1) I have an amazing, wonderful Prince of a boyfriend. He is without a doubt the most incredible thing that has ever happened to me, and although he's currently ignoring me because of the stupid World Cup, I will never love anything or anyone as much as I love him. The original plan to go to Berlin was for only a semester, however dates were overrunning and my preference was no longer available to me and I now have to go for a year.
The huge issue being that I don't want to put him or myself through the pain of not seeing each other as often as we do just now. I know that there is skype and texting and letters blah blah but it is going to be seriously difficult. We have decided that what we have is too amazing and once in a lifetime to just let it go when I go to Berlin, so mutually, we have made the decision to make it work. It is going to be easy AND difficult.
Absence makes the heart grow stronger though, right? Maybe when I return from Berlin he would have made an Emma Shrine haha!

2) The big upset of leaving home for the first time is seeing parents and siblings upset. I quite literally think that the departure hug and farewells from my beloved family might actually kill me. I know I will be back and its not like I'm going away for more than 1 year, but its a huge move and I am sooooo nervous about leaving my lovely family behind! They are my rock when I need support so its going to be ridiculously hard. And again, there is skype, messages and letters blah blah! But its not the same!

The good thing is though that I have a sort of studio flat to myself in germany, so family, friends AND my wonderful boyfriend can come visit as much as they like so that I won't be totally homesick! And my good friend Martin from University is embarking on this adventure with me also, so its not so bad!

This post was totally unplanned and is quite literally the worst layout ever buuuuuut, I had to get some worrying thoughts of my head before I let them explode in my head.

Ciaow city cats xoxo

My Student Friendly Makeup Review

Hello there fellow students or other people who are currently on a bit of a budget...

Now I'm not going to say the usual rubbish, that you are all beautiful without makeup, because as much as it is true, you will probably not believe me and then this whole blog post is a bit pointless... so for those of you, like myself who love makeup and ADORE a bargain, then please read on.

Okay, so I am not one of those people to have a serious obsession with makeup. I used to be, but lately I have given up wearing lots of eye makeup due to annoying over watering of my eyes (I WONT STOP UNWILLINGLY CRYING).
I am partial to a nicely winged cat eye effect with eyeliner, and I enjoy an occasional smoky eye, but the one eye product that I am always ALWAYS going to use, without fail, is...
MASCARA! If I go out without any mascara on I feel like a panda without it's black eyes. It is just a weird feeling and I am very sure many of you ladies (or gents) will agree with me in saying that mascara is a must!

So I have had 2 long years of living in a budget, a very tight budget at that, but throughout it I have always had enough money in my purse for a new mascara.
I love opening a new bottle of Mascara as it is obviously at its best and its so nice and smooth to apply.
I have switched between Collection's mascara, which can be bought at your local drugstore. Its only a couple of £'s, but it is worth it and it makes your lashes as long as the longest lashes in the world! nah okay it doesnt do quite that, but it does make them extremely long and thick!
However, after I ran out of that mascara, I bought a new kind, which was a dare I must say.
I bought the Natural Collection Water Guard Mascara for get this... £1.99! What a bargain, right?
 let me show you the difference...

This is before 3 coats of application









And this is after 3 coats of application. Imagine what it would look like after 4 or 5!










So I highly recommend the mascara from Natural Collection makeup, which is sold in Boots.
And another type of makeup that I have recently fallen in love with it a "take notice" lippy. I am absolutely in love with red or raspberry coloured lipstick. I have naturally small lips however so sometimes red lips can make me look a bit witchy, so I have found the perfect colour which was also super cheap!
I am proud to say that I bought this lipstick off of Ebay. "EWWW" i hear you cry, but alas it is not second hand makeup, in fact it is brand new makeup which is maybe made by a brand which is less heard of. And I am extremely happy to use it and love it! The colour I bought of this lipstick was in Mulberry, which is no longer being sold, however I will link you to another gorgeous colour of the same lipstick! The casing makes application super easy as it just glides over your lips, no matter how bumpy or shapely they may be! And it as well as it is nice to use, it also has moisturising properties which help to keep your lips looking moist and purdy, and on top of all these wonderful factors, it tastes and smells amazing! I am so not let down by this product. I love how pigmented the colour is!

If this type of blog post is your cup of tea then please let me know so I can do more of them for you. I do love my makeup!

Ciaow City Cats
xoxo

LTE

Hello there people of the world!

My name is Emma, the daughter of another blogger, who is especially talented at making others smile, Ellie.
I hope to one day have a blog as lovely as my Mum, but lets see how this goes!


About me, as I know that is exactly why you are here... hehe.
I am a full time International Business Student in University, and I also work part time as a waitress in a small town cafe, and have done for 5 coming up to 6 years. The staff in the cafe that I work in have become a small family, which is lovely. Its an ok place to work, but every workplace has its downfalls sometimes right?
 I do love my job because for every horrible customer I may get, I also get at least 2 lovely customers. I'm sure most of you get me. If you are the nasty rude customer then leave, swiftly. :)

So for my 3rd Year of University, I am studying abroad in....

DRUM ROLL PLEASE...

Berlin, GERMANY. "Sweet" i hear you say, and I concur that Berlin is indeed a "sweet" set up! I cannot wait to get going to Germany so I can practice my slightly existing German skills, and learn all about a completely new culture!

I have a colour run this Sunday in Edinburgh, which is going to be something awesome to experience I think! :) I will definately have some pictures to show when that is done! And when that is done, I can tick it off my bucket list *refer to first blog post* which I can apparently do twice, because of a bit of a typo haha!
But that is you... You have pretty much learned about me in one blog post! So congrats! You all recieve a cyber high five for reading my drivel ahaha

Ciaow city cats. xoxo

Emmapire's Premier

Ciaow city cats

xoxo