Emma's Day Off

Today, Emma's class was scheduled to make a trip to the Fife police station (the "constabulary" here) as part of their continuing unit on the evils of drug use. The unit has been going for months, and involves an almost-weekly visit from a drug enforcement officer to make a presentation to the kids. Since there's not much crime in St. Andrews, I can imagine that these chaps have some free time on their hands, in between calls to the 999 center to report an incident of "pavement fouling" by a neighborhood dog, to make regular visits to the schools. The unit is also put on by an organization called DELTA, which operates workshops throughout the area with a "philosophy of prevention and harm reduction through program that are non-threatening, non-stigmatising, and non-judgemental." At least, that's what the permission slip for the day's events says. Emma begs to differ. The last workshop was held just a few weeks after we arrived, and involved a film of a former drug-user who recounted the time when she was high on meth and became convinced that bugs were crawling all over her, so proceeded to scratch off large portions of her skin. Not exactly the kind of story that Emma considers "non-threatening." Emma apparently ran out of the room in tears, and the school headteacher took her to P1 to help out for the remainder of the afternoon, then telephoned me the next day to ask if Emma had at one point been "especially traumatized by something" to be so sensitive. I wanted to say "yes, actually, during your drug workshop yesterday!" but thought better of it.

Anyway, when the permission slip came home for the event, I assured her that she just wouldn't go to school today, and would miss the whole thing. Unwisely, I tried to make her feel better by announcing that I would take her to the St. Andrews Aquarium instead then out to lunch as a special treat...all of which John overheard. He immediately started to campaign for joining us. I told him that we were going to miss a week of school for our upcoming trip to England so he could not be absent, at which point he muttered under his breath, "I don't see why I have to go to school just because I'm not a girl and not scared of a drug workshop." Then he asked me, "Well, I AM scared of maths...does that mean I can stay home too?" I did have to give him credit for a nice try...

So we took John to the school bus, then headed into town. It was a lovely 16 degrees C (about 64 degrees F) and the daffodils were in full bloom along the Lade Braes. When we got to town, we headed to the library to choose some books for the kids for our upcoming trip to Oxford and London. Then I told Emma that we would just quickly duck into Ness, which has become my favorite store here. Ness is a staple on the "Scottish High Street," or the shopping district ("Main Street" in the U.S. before the advent of suburban malls anchored with a Macys...), and sells kilts and tartans in unusual, bold colors. Their tagline is something like, "Scotitsh design doesn't have to be all shortbread and country houses!" It's a popular store here, but quite small, and when I go in, I'm usually the only person around, and so I spend a few minutes talking with the salesgirl while I browse. So we were quite surprised to see a group of about eight Japanese men standing in a big circle right outside the shop this morning when we arrived. When we entered, we understood why. Inside, a large group of Japanese women had descended upon the store, which was having a "3 for 2" sale on all their tartan items. The women were obviously visiting Scotland, and decided to take home a few souvenirs, and they were all crowding around the register (and the one salesgirl there) asking questions about sizes and prices. The salesgirl was completely overwhelmed, and though she was smiling and handling it very well, was clearly out of her element. Then the men started to call into the store, "5 more minutes!" then "4 1/2 more minutes!" as she was ringing up sale after sale, which clearly made her even more nervous. After the group collected their purchases (which was honestly about one-quarter of the store's entire stock...) and left, she looked at me and Emma, and all three of us just started to laugh! Then Emma and I stayed for a while to help her straighten up the wallets and purses that were now lying in every direction!

After that adventure, we went to Bibi's cafe on North Street for lunch, which is a painfully cute little restaurant. I would say that Emma chose it because it's known for its cupcakes, and I agreed because it's one of the few cafes in town that has more than four seats inside! We called David in his office to come and meet us, and the three of us had panninis and lemonade. My salad was topped with sun-dried tomato, goat cheese and chorizo, and was possibly the most delicious thing I have eaten so far in Scotland. Emma's pannini was made with brie and tomato and "chili jam," which she said was good but a little too sweet. Oddly enough, though, she didn't complain about the inch of icing on her post-lunch cupcake!

After lunch, we went to the St. Andrews aquarium, which is quite nice, especially considering it is located in such a small town. In addition to the tanks of catfish and turtles, there's a big tank of fish that are usually found around a coral reef, and two small sharks. The aquarium also has meerkats (not sure why...) and an outside pool for two seals (Laurel and Hardy). There's currently only one seal inside, however, and a small poster on the wall that explains that last March an especially large storm blew over the sea wall separating the pool from the ocean and took one of the seals back out to sea with it! Having mostly been to aquariums in the midwestern part of the United States where there's no risk of their residents being washed out to sea, I must admit that I was quite surprised by this! We toured the aquarium for a few hours, then walked back towards town, stopping for a stuffed animal and some lip gloss for Emma. What good souvenirs of a day off of school for a tween girl!