Up to Vermont

View from the drive to Vermont

My home for five years. I attended college in the Burlington, Vermont area and lived in South Burlington for one year after I graduated before I went to Korea. There are so many memories for me in Vermont, it's where I became an independent person, learned to live on my own, and found that 10 degrees F can be warm.

I had to drive up here to get my transcripts and a copy of my diploma notarized. I got quite a few extras, just in case, because it's a long drive and kind of a pain to do, and impossible from outside the country. Then had to bring that to the Secretary of State to get the apostille form.

I left my house around 9:30 and was on the highway before 10am. I got to my college at 1:45 and brought everything to the registrar's office to be processed. They said it would be a bit, so I went out really to get lunch, but the cafe was closing on campus because it was 2:00 on the last day of finals and no one was around. So, I went up to the Biology department to see if any of my old professors were around. I used to hang around there all day every day and I would stop in and say hello to all my professors whenever I wanted. I like to think we had a very good rapport back then. Sometimes I worry that they will forget who I am, and I'll show up and they'll give me some cockeyed look and think to themselves that I look familiar, but not remember my name or what class I had with them....

But, that wasn't the case. I was welcome with excitement from all the professors that we still around. I guess I must have left some sort of impression on them because they all still remember me well. Now with the advent of Facebook, I guess my adventures keep popping up on their news feed.

From there I went back, picked up my documents and headed down to Montpelier, the capital (with a whopping population of about 10,000 I think...). It was getting late, I had spent more time than I expected with my professors, but I found the building of the secretary of state that I had come to last time around that I went to Korea, rushed in the door with about 15 minutes to spare and went to the desk asking about getting my apostilles. "Actually, they do that at the office of archives, which was moved to Middlesex about 7 months ago." was the response that I received.

With that I went into full panic mode because I had come up to VT with this purpose only and now I had only 10 minutes to get to the next town over and find the office of archives. "Can I make it before they close at 4:30?" I asked. "If you speed." was my answer. "hurry up".

I ran out the door flew out of the parking lot and called up the office. It's Vermont, and things are usually pretty laid back. I figured if I called, and they understood the situation, they'd wait around an extra 5 minutes for me. Well, when I explained my problem, all they said was, "hurry up, the door locks automatically at 4:30, we have no control over it".

So I hurried down the highway to the next exit. I actually didn't go much over the speed limit, but fortunately, these two towns happen to have exits very close to one another, unlike most of Vermont. Usually there is 8-10 miles between exits in the state.

I got there, and found the office pretty fast, ran in the door and they recognized me immediately as the flustered out-of-stater that needed an apostille. They did it for me quickly and I could finally breath easily.

Then I went on my way to go up to Newport, where my friend and his fiancee live. I didn't really realize where Newport was, especially in relation to where I was. It's not that close, in fact it's quite far. It's waaaay up by the Canadian border, in fact I could see Canada from where I was. But, that's ok, it was great to finally see their house, and Newport was beautiful. There will be a separate post about Newport, because they brought me on a tour of the town the next morning.

That night my friend and I got some pineapple pizza in the only pizza joint in the town, then went back to the house to down some wine I picked up at the New Hampshire State Liquor Store for 9.99 (a big bottle of Yellow Tail).

In the morning, I woke up early and they brought me on the tour of the town (not too much to see besides main street) and then I headed back to Burlington to meet up with my old roommate from college/ year after college. She's living in New York now, so we both had to drive a ways to meet up, but it was worth it.

Church St., Burlington, VT

We got lunch at Tiny Thai in Essex, which is a great place (though I was disappointed because they only had black tea offered with their lunch special). The food there is excellent though. Highly recommended. After we went to Church St. in Burlington to get some things for Christmas before we had to say our goodbyes. A storm was predicted to hit Mass. that evening and I didn't want to get on the road too late.

Fortunately, I didn't hit any of the snow, it didn't start 'til after I went to bed. I made it home safely and I'm hoping to get back up to Vermont at least once more before I go back to Korea. It's so beautiful up there in the winter. I would also like to go skiing once on a real sized hill before I go back to Korea and their midget-sized ski hills.

Expect more posts soon on Newport, and maybe even the snow storm... if you can convince me to go out again and take pictures... it's pretty cold out there...