Jet Lag, Round Two

OK, I’m just going to have to admit it to myself. I am no longer in Scotland. Friday morning, I fly from Edinburgh to Newark. My flight is delayed an hour, and I’m convinced it’s the gods telling me, “Stay here, stay here!” And they’re telling me this in more ways than one. An American man I’ve been speaking to for about 5 minutes asks if I’m Scottish. See? I’m so acclimated to the culture here that my own kind no longer recognises my accent or me. I’d better stay.

Finally and rather unfortunately, our flight departs. I may or may not have cried one little tear as I felt the plane wheels leave Scottish soil.

11 hours later, it’s 5 hours later. Jet lag? Definitely. When I wake up Saturday morning, I have no idea where or who I am, or what time it is, though this is not an entirely abnormal occurrence. It’s light outside, but in Scotland at this time of year, this could be anywhere from two in the morning to midnight. I stumble around and hear some strange voices coming from downstairs. Reverse culture shock? Maybe a little. Observe:

Top 10 Things I Find Strange to Find Strange at Home

10. People wear sweatpants? In real life? Really? Wait, I do too? Weird.

9. Where have all the cobblestones gone?

8. People drive all the time, everywhere.

7. It’s been a while since I’ve seen someone drink coffee instead of tea. Also, in cafés, tea comes only in mugs, not in pots. This is a very, very sad thing.

6. Sunshine and 58 degrees? Really? Is this the equator? Am I being punk’d?

5. American beers are very, very small.

4. American money is very, very dull. Also, Scotland is the only country I know of in which the appearance of notes (bills) depends on what bank it comes out of. Seriously, the banks make their own notes. We should really get on that. And here, all green, all the time? Really? I want Scotland’s purple, blue and even orange notes back.

3. Crossing the street. It’s. So. Hard. Every time I look right, I think I’m going to die, not only because I’m looking right, but also because the cars and the streets themselves are enormous.

2. Everything is bigger. Not only cars and streets, but also houses, sidewalks, humans, dogs, clothes, shoes, plates, tea cups, grocery stores, and probably a lot more I haven’t seen yet. Only one thing is smaller: swimming pools. 25 yards suddenly seems rather short.

1. Language. No one says “cheers,” “queue,” “flat” and “half five” anymore. I miss Scottish accents, and, I might as well admit it, being the person people ask about goings on in the States, being the person who has the cool accent.

0. When I look out my bedroom window I no longer see St Andrews Castle and the North Sea. Instead, it’s the roof of my garage.

I’ve been experiencing a bit of culture shock at home, too. I’d almost forgotten about chores and have gotten too used to people emptying my rubbish bins every day. Now, I have to empty my own trash cans. “Check your spelling on your blog,” my mom is telling me now. “We’ve been laughing at your mistakes all this time.” As annoying as it sometimes is, it’s good to have someone look out for me again, especially when it comes to my lacklustre spelling skills.

I think possibly what’s even odder is how quickly I acclimated to things here in the UK. I’ve been eating UK-style, cutting something and keeping the fork in the left hand, knife in the right, without even realising it. I say “cheers.” But in all honesty, I think it will be easier than I’d like it to be to switch back to the way things always were before.

That said, of course I learned a lot these past four months, and because I am back in the States and my study abroad experience is at its end, it’s time to think seriously. When I get back to Knox I’m going to have to fill out some sort of form telling the administration how living in Scotland added to my academic experience at a liberal arts college, so I figure I’d better start now.

Top 8 Things I Have Learned in Scotland

8. If you take the bus/subway the wrong way, just turn around and head back.

7. Investing in a compass would probably be a good life choice.

6. Only order beer on tap – it’s much fresher this way: in Scotland, they literally pull it up from the tubs in which it’s fermenting.

5. You may speak the same language as another person, but that doesn’t mean you can understand them, and you can still accidentally order the wrong thing in a restaurant.

4. Tony Blair and Gordon Brown are actually Scottish.

3. The United States is a very large, young country.

2. Sometimes it’s OK to mess up.

1. Scotland is not England, and it is very, very wrong to think so. Actually, you should be careful about saying anything to this affect aloud, as the Scots are rather sensitive about their nationality as Scottish, sometimes as British, depending on who you ask, and certainly not as English. This is why I want to say something to the American next to me in the airport who just asked his companion, “Is Scotland a country?”, but he also asked, shortly afterward, “Why is moonshine so dangerous?”, so I think he may be a lost cause.

It may be easy to see why the English cut their country off where they did. Scottish terrain is more treacherous; real mountains take the place of England’s rolling hills. Less of the land is farmable. It’s colder. It may rain more. The winters are darker and longer. Anyone would probably say, “oh you can have that half, I’ll take this one.” (Isn’t this a rule we learn as children, anyway: one person cuts, the other gets to choose their half?) But if the winters are darker and longer, this means the summers are longer, too, and lighter. The mountains are beautiful. If it’s easy to see why the English took the better half, it’s perhaps easier to see why the Scots love their country fiercely. The English didn’t like the weather, the landscape, the remoteness of Scotland, but that’s exactly why the Scots love it. While I had to tell the American at the airport, no, I’m not Scottish, I feel some sort of identity connection with the Scots, because that’s exactly what I love about this country, as well. Hopefully, I’ll be back.

Stirling Castle, Round Two and Edinburgh, Round Two, or Still Pretending I’m Not Back in the States

Wednesday night I’m staying in a hostel in Edinburgh, and I have all day Thursday to hang around Scotland before I leave for the States Friday morning. I decide that I want to see Stirling Castle again, now that the family’s quarters are refurbished and open again.

I take the bus and am a bit sad seeing the Scottish countryside, knowing it’s the last time I will for a while. But when my bus pulls into the station, I have the wits to check out a map first this time. And if I’ve learned anything in Scotland, it’s that if you’re trying to find a castle, go up.

Why is it that whenever you have no worldly clue where you’re going there are no signs to be seen, and when you do know where you’re headed, all the signs in the world appeared? Of course, little signs for the castle poke up all around me. I suppose it’s encouraging that they’re pointed in the direction I was headed, anyway.

I make it to the castle easily, and it really is nice that I’ve been here before, because I get to make my way quickly through all the things I’ve already seen, and slowly through whatever I haven’t, namely, the royal apartments.

They’re undoubtedly worth my time. They’ve been refurbished to look exactly as they originally did (discovered by years of painstaking research – but I want that job) and everything was painted, dyed, made, etc. by hand, as it would have been done originally. They also have the cheesy little dressed-up tour guides who call you “milady,” which I secretly love, though I don’t follow a tour group.

Here’s the king’s reception room:

and its ceiling:



As well as the king's private bedroom.




The queen has her own bedroom





and reception room, as well





Needless to say, it was some pretty sweet digs. And although my camera died in the middle of my self-guided, rather slow tour, it luckily died right after I took the last picture in the royal apartments, the only thing I didn’t have pictures of from my first visit. It seems that some luck followed me on this trip, after all.

Though I don’t have pictures in this entry (see “Seeing Scotland”), I did check out the rest of the castle for a second time. I also went to see the inside of that church I missed on my first trip, and it was pretty beautiful. I went to the Campbell again, just for kicks, and because that’s what I do, and it’s included in my ticket, so why not? I ran into a nice American couple who were very interested as to why I would spend 5 months in Scotland and not England or any place else, for that matter.

Of course, my chat reminds me that, yes, I do have to leave. I find the bus rather easily, because I know where it is and because I’m following those invisible signs that only people who have already been to the bus station can see. I’m feeling a bit like Jack Sparrow at this point.

Back in the hostel that night, I’m looking over pictures and blog entries, listening to backpackers’ stories, marvelling at how people can be in this whole country for only two weeks and think it’s a long time to travel, when I still feel like I’ve missed so much of Scotland. It is time, though, and I am going to be glad to get back home.

Fine Scottish Cuisine, or, My Excuse to Not Write About Going Home Yet

During my excursions to various other European countries, I’m always curious about what kinds of foods people eat. And while, yes, I love food much more than is remotely healthy, a country’s daily cuisine says a lot about the country itself. On that note, I realised I haven’t written about Scottish cuisine yet. It’s quite different than any country I’ve been too (even England), so here goes.

BREAKFAST: sausage, Canadian bacon, baked beans, sautéed mushrooms, fried tomatoes, AND some kind of potato. Another favourite is black sausage, also known as blood pudding, which includes parts of animals you didn’t even want to know existed. Including blood. Personally, I think it’s disgusting, and don’t feel very badly about this, since a lot of the Scottish people I’ve meet agree. This, or a filled roll, which means a hot roll with bacon, sausage, egg or all of the above. The Scots do not skimp on breakfast.

Nor do they skimp on LUNCH, also called high tea. For lunch it’s often chicken and potatoes, or lamb and potatoes, or fish and potatoes, or beef and potatoes, or just potatoes. Sometimes we have fish, chips and peas with salt and vinegar. Occasionally, we were offered a particularly Scottish Scottish delicacy: haggis. If you don’t already know what’s in it, you’d do yourself a favour not to find out. As a tour bus driver said to me several months ago when I first ventured into the highlands, if you’ve eaten a hot dog, you should have no problem with haggis. I took this advice to heart and ate my fair share of haggis here. If the Brits think one thing is disgusting, it’s a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. Of course, jelly here is always called jam (if you say jelly it means Jello – I learned this the hard way); nevertheless, they even think peanut butter and jam is gross. This makes me a little sad. I’m pretty sure PB&J’s defined my childhood.

SNACKS: While the French pride themselves on their fine cheese and wine, the Germans are into litres of beer and salty pretzel bread, and the Danes like a lot of pickled herring and pastries, the Scots figure that if they fry anything it will taste good. This includes Mars Bars, a true Scottish delicacy. When a friend and I buy one fried Mars Bar between the two of us, the man who sells it to us says, “The hospital’s by Morrison’s.” Despite these encouraging words, we ate the national food, declaring it delicious, but sickening. We were both pretty sure we could feel our arteries clogging as the treat made its way through us.

AFTERNOON TEA: This is not as common as it used to be, but occasionally we had afternoon tea in hall, usually on a Sunday. The Scots drink their tea (usually Scottish breakfast or Earl Grey) with shortbread, biscuits or small cakes.

DINNER (or tea): See lunch. Sometimes we also have Sheppard’s Pie.

DESSERT: sticky toffee pudding, chocolate cake, some other random things with sugar in them.

DRINKS: Whiskey, whiskey and whiskey are popular Scottish drinks. Also, beer. The Scots only drink one non-alcoholic beverage, and that’s Irn Bru. It’s basically liquid cotton candy, and, in my opinion, it’s pretty disgusting. Also, of course, there’s tea. With breakfast, in the afternoon, all the time, tea. The Brits drink theirs with cream, but I haven’t acclimated so much, and still prefer mine black.

While the Scots may not have extremely fine cuisine, nor are they known for their food, I’m probably going to miss the food here a little bit. Mostly breakfast. What counts, they make well; that is, whiskey and beer. I’m not sure that, upon my return to the States, I’ll be able to stomach Jack Daniels or Miller Lite. Contrary to popular belief, Scottish and English beer are very different, and Scottish is better. The Scots themselves might use this as a metaphor for much more than just beer, but I’ll leave that up to you to decide.