Bonny Scotland

21.10.2004

Greetz to all

Well another long lag between updates....and again well there's been "nooten mooch ta rate hoom aboat" (as the folk in Wick would say).

After a quick trip to Norway (I think that was my last update back in July!?!?!), I settled into life in Edinburgh. After 2 weeks in a youth hostel in town, Kath (one of my good friend's from
school back in Oz) and I moved into a flat just up the street for a couple of weeks. Now aside from the gas-leak, mouse problem, constant dirty dishes, heating problems and marijuana smoking housemates, it was grand! Yes well, so we moved on to bigger and better things on the other side of town, in a Victorian flat with an Englishman who was so tight-arsed he would set the shower heater to a timer, and go and switch all the powerpoints in the house off after he thought everyone else was asleep. And to top it off, he talked like a psychopath... no offence to any of ye out there!

I managed to pick up temp work in Eds quite easily, though it wasn't the most exciting work. Firstly I temped with a recruitment agency for a week, then they offered me a temp position as an HR administrator (cause of all my experience right?!?!) for a further 6 weeks. Spent the whole month of August in Edinburgh for the Fringe (festival)....the biggest arts festival in the world with theatre, musicals, art exhibitions, book seminars etc.....all on at once. And then there's a load of free street theatre going on 24-7. Managed to hit about 10 different events during the festival, including Jimeoin, who seemed a little jet-lagged or something....not in his best form.

Aside from hitting a load of festival events while in Edinburgh, I visited some of the cities/towns nearby....

St Andrews - a medieval town with lots of winding alleyways (including the ridiculously named Butt's Wynd!), puttaphiles driving range rovers, dive-bombing steroid pumped seagulls and throngs of salivating teenage girls, trying to get a glimpse of St Andrew's most famous resident - the one and only Prince Willy! Sadly for the girls, Willy (let's call him "The Mighty" as all princes need a title) is seldom there as between semesters of studying art history at the university, he spends his hours cavorting about the Cote d'Azur with scantily clad society girls. Aside from having a wander about the town in search of "The Mighty", I visited the spiritual home of Golf at The Old Course, paid the patron saint of Scotland (St Andrew) a visit), and went for a run along West Sands (the beach where Chariots of Fire was filimed)

Stirling
Here I visited the splendid Stirling Castle, and paid my respects to the one and only William Wallace (think Braveheart). I was disgusted to learn that after being sentenced to death for charges of murder, robbery and treason, he was publicly executed by partial strangulation (they only seem to do things partially over here - even the sugar syrup in sweets is only partially inverted), before being disembowelled and then quartered.....

Perth - unfortunately not the one in Oz tho.....this Perth (pop. 40 000) was voted most liveable place in the UK in 2003 and it is quite nice. Visited St John's Kirk (where John Knox preached a serom against idolatry in the 16th century, causing the rascal multitude to strip all the local churches of their fittings and ornaments before stoning the preacher), and Scone Palace, sometime home of the Earl of Mansfield and his hideous collection of coiffured poddles, elephant skulls, and spades used by Royal Dignitaries from the world over to plant trees about the Palace. The scones they bake in the cafe at the palace aren't too shabby either.

After about 9 weeks in Edinburgh all up, I took up a locum position in a teeny tiny town called Wick (pop. 8,000), about as far North as you can go on the British mainland. Wick was originally a Viking settlement, and more recently a big fishing port, but nowdays, well it's become just another town on the road between Inverness (stopping off point to see a certain monster), and John O'Groats, a ghastly place overrun by tourbuses wanting to visit the most northerly point on "mainland" Britain....cept it's actually 10miles down the road at Dunnet head. Ah well....Wick and its surrounds are home to a plethora of good Indian restaurants (a lot of Indian doctors locum up in the far north), as well as a strange population of sheep with ears the size of rabbits. Could it be the nearby recently decommissioned nuclear reactor?? Or perhaps another batch of "Dolly the Sheep" sheep. The locals up here also talk about the the "coos in da feld" (cows in the field) and eat decadently tasty things like Macaroni pies (basically macaroni cheese baked into a scotch pastry shell...mmmmm)

So things up in Wick.....a tad on the quiet side but the work was ok (a little hectic) and I did get to see a lot of Northern Scotland, including Loch Ness (sans Monster), the Castle of Mey (the Queen Mum's former home) a re-enactment of the Battle of Culloden (last battle on British soil?), the Highland games (men in kilts throwing hammers over poles, playing bagpipes and running around like eejits), Dunrobin Castle (the biggest house in the highlands, filled with stuffed animals), the quaint little town of Dornoch (site of the last witch execution in Scotland) and Fort George (the base for George II's occupying army in the highlands).

I also made it across to the Orkney islands where I visited Skara Brae, the oldest prehistoric settlement in Europe (older than the Pyramids of Giza and Stonehenge); the Churchill barriers, used to prevent the passage of German ships onto Orkney's Mainland; the Italian Chapel, painted elegantly by Italian POWs during WW2); the Khyber Pass (there is a teeny tiny street named that in Stromness); and the Ring of Brogdar (a stone circle over 4500 yrs old).

After a few days in manky London, and a further few in lovely Cardiff (home to red dragons and the Millennium Stadium - where Oz claimed the 99 World Cup!), I'm now back over in Ireland....looking for a new home, settling back into work etc....I can't believe I'm missing the Aussie summer in place of the cold, wet, Irish winter.....crazy?? Nah, it's nice to be back again.

Anyway, gotta get going. It's a beautiful day outside today, hovering around 11C, slightly overcast...but not raining!!

Belinda
xo