Halò a h-uile duine!
Fàilte gu leabhar-dealan agam! Welcome to my blog!
Since there are a number of people who I wish to keep in touch with while I'm here and who have been requesting that I send as many pictures as humanly possible I've decided to try blogging. I will make a disclaimer now that I am not the most consistent when it comes to e-mailing regularly so this too could fall by the wayside, but I will try as best I can to provide updates on a fairly regular basis.
It is only the middle of May and I am already getting excited to head overseas. I began looking at the cheapest ways of travel to get to Skye today and it got me even more excited! I still have a lot that needs to be sorted out though, before leaving, such as student loans, figuring out residence at Sabhal Mòr Ostaig and getting myself a cellphone just to name a few.
I don't really have much to say in this post because I'm still in Canada, but I know a number of people might be wondering what's up. So, here are some facts:
~ I am heading to Sabhal Mòr Ostaig in September for a year-long exchange until next May.
~ Sabhal Mòr Ostaig is a Gaelic immersion college located near the southern tip of the Isle of Skye, the largest of the Inner Hebridean Islands off the northwest coast of Scotland.
~ Scottish Gaelic is one of the Celtic languages [The others being Irish, Manx, Welsh, Breton and Cornish] There are approximately 58,000 people with some degree of Gaelic in Scotland and about 500 native Gaelic speakers in Cape Breton. On top of this, there are a large number of learners all over the world.
~ Sabhal Mòr Ostaig is the only college of its kind in the world and has a student population of approximately 200.
~ Sabhal Mòr Ostaig [pronounced: Saval more os-tayk] literally translates to "Big Barn at Ostaig" in English.
~ One of my goals in doing this exchange is to obtain a certain amount of fluency in the Gaelic language, so expect more Gaelic phrases to appear as the blog progresses. Perhaps you'll get to know a bit more about the language by the end of all this too! =)
