Upon arrival, I could immediately tell that things felt different from the rest of Europe, which is understandable since my Scottish friends said that the British don't consider themselves European. I also had an interesting encounter with a border control guy at the airport who intimidatingly grilled me on my reason for coming. As he was asking me to share my life story, all I could think about was a conversation I had with a Dutch girl in my hostel in Vienna: she once visited New York for a conference and got asked by security why she was visiting New York and all she could say was, "because it's New York?" Why am I visiting the UK? Because it's awesome?
History in the making: ads and info on the Scottish independence referendum everywhere. We'll find out the results in just a few more days!
I went to the Elephant House (place where J.K. Rowling first wrote Harry Potter) just to check it out, but the food was pretty mediocre. What can you expect from a place that's become heavily commercialized? I also went to Morningside the next day, but did not get a chance to stalk Rowling's house. One of my Scottish friends said he's actually seen her in person, twice!
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| The bathroom inside Elephant House is covered in Harry Potter-related graffiti and emotional confessions. |
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| Right: A delicious 99 flake. Quintessential ice cream of Britain, sadly no longer sold for just 99 pence. I regret not trying it with monkey blood. |
On day 2, my friend took me to Cramond island, which is only an island for a few hours a day. In the picture below you can see a walkway that you take to get to the island, which is submerged in water during the "island hours." Hard to believe that all that dry land can be covered in water. I also ate some wild raspberries on the island itself and luckily did not die of any horrendous foreign parasite.
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| Back to Edinburgh. Fashionable buildings, fashionable people. |
On day 3, I took a scenic bus tour out to the Scottish Highlands and Loch Ness. I tried to take more photos of the breathtaking view while on the bus, but couldn't get anything too good. I eventually gave up and just enjoyed the view. Well... it was also because the night before I had a slightly too authentic Scottish night out and suffered the next morning due to my inability to dump drinks behind my back.
Anyway, I loved the Highlands! It's a place I would like to go back to sometime, perhaps with my own car so I can have more flexibility. Also, there are no trespassing laws in Scotland, which means that as long as you aren't being overly disruptive, you can pretty much go onto any plot of farmland and get up close and personal with a cute highland cow.
As you get more north, the percentage of Gaelic speakers increases, and some places even have signs in both Gaelic and English. Before I learned this, I assumed everyone in Scotland was a native English speaker. But I also learned that in some places, kids don't learn English until they go to school around 5 years of age. The amount of diversity in such a small country (5 million) is really cool.
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| I went to one of the most beautiful places in the world, and all I have to show for it is this mountain picture. |
