What a Difference a School Day Makes...

My favorite part of the day here in Scotland (after the morning cup of coffee, of course!) is walking to the school bus to meet the kids, and asking them about their days. They don’t bother to tell me about all the things they have learned, of course, but they do tell me a lot about their friends. John’s top friends are Everett, who is another American, Matthew, two Davids (“the one with the freckles and the one with the ears,” he says) and Norbert (yep, that’s the name.) Most of his stories, though, are about a boy named Athen, who is apparently about as naughty as they come. Athen got in trouble the other day when he decided that the long hair of the girl sitting in front of him was in his way and needed to be cut, so he took his scissors out of his desk and clipped a big section out of the back. At first, John said that his punishment was not to be able to go to lunch (can you imagine that happening in the U.S.?), but then he said that the teachers changed their minds and sent him up to P7 instead to be supervised by the older kids. I asked Emma about that, since she’s in P7, and she confirmed it, but added “They cleared the room of all the scissors first…”

Emma’s stories center mostly on an English kid named Charlie, and though she says he’s more annoying than naughty, her stories make him sound like the kind of kid that no one would want in class. They spend a lot of their class time divided into reading groups, and each group takes on a different novel. The kids get to pick which group they want to be in, but sometimes one of the books sounds much more appealing than the others, and too many kids choose that group, so they have to negotiate. One of the newest books is “Shark Island,” which six kids chose, but each group is capped at five. Emma said that Charlie was one of the six, and really, really, really wanted to be in the group. After pitching a fit, he was allowed to be in the group when a girl named Rebecca finally agreed to choose another group. But he forgot to bring his book for three days in a row, so the discussion wasn’t moving very far. Finally Miss Vaughey (the P7 teacher) lost her patience and asked him to give her two reasons why she shouldn’t kick him out of the group. “It’s good for my education,” he said, “and that should be a good enough reason for both.”

Aside from the naughty classmates, Emma’s class seems pretty interesting to me. The “reading group” concept is a great one, and she comes home every few days with a new book to discuss. Their homework is to read a good chunk of the book every night, and then they are all tasked with different jobs during the discussion the next day. Some of the jobs are Discussion Director, Word Wizard, and Literary Luminary. The last one is my favorite, and the one that Emma always seems to get. She has a chart to fill out every night after she reads in which she quotes a few of her “top passages,” then lists why they stuck out to her, and how she will encourage the other kids in the group to interpret them. The books are quite good, too, though neither of us have heard of many of them because they are put out by British publishing companies. Her current book is the Thirteenth Orphan, which is about Scottish myths and legends, and a part of the series they are doing on Scottish history. John’s class works on reading as a group rather than breaking up into smaller groups. They do a new book every few days or so, and read about a quarter of it at school (with each kid reading aloud in turn for a page or so), then read about 25 pages more at home as homework. He also comes home with big spelling lists, and has a test on them every Friday. The words are pretty hard for a second grader, I think, and in addition, some of them have different spellings (favourite and gipsy were on the list this week), so I hope that doesn’t prove to be confusing to him later in life!

Yesterday, I had the opportunity to see a lot of this first-hand, as I agreed to volunteer at the school for “Friday Activities.” These are hour-long co-curricular series that last six weeks, and are mostly taught by parents. The kids can choose between several sports (John does football, of course…), art, Chinese language, drama, baking, etc…whatever parents choose to lead. I agreed to fill in for an absent parent in the baking class, figuring that would be relatively easy. Wrong! The other parent divided the kids into two groups and took one, then sent about 10 kids with me (including, of course, the aforementioned Naughty Charlie!) to the kitchen to get ingredients to make “Rocky Road.” The recipe was essentially this: take 250g Stork and cut into 10 pieces, then melt with 50g chocolate. Add 75g crushed Malteasers, 75g digestives, and 50g marshmallows, then stir in 50g golden syrup. Of course, I had to begin the class by asking all the kids to define and find each of the ingredients, since I had no idea what most of them were. I did manage to hide my metric-system ignorance by deflecting all questions right back at the kids in a math-teacher-type voice: Well, how much do YOU think 250g would be? And after the recipe was all mixed together and divided into 10 little tins for the kids to take home, one of the little girls asked if she was supposed to bake it when she got home, to which I said, “Uh, I think your mother will know. Ask her…” She replied, “Oh, darn, I’m not going home after school. We’re going to the airport.” So I naively asked, “Oh, where are you going from the airport?.” To this, she said, “Skiing. In France.” So, I’m assuming that her mother won’t be too jazzed to see raw cookie dough in her carry-on bag at the Edinburgh airport!

By the way, David’s friend passed on this hilarious video, which gives some idea of what we’re up against with the Scottish accent:

The One Month Mark

Today is the last day of our first month in Scotland, and to mark the occasion, I’m thinking about all the things that I have come to appreciate about living here. Rather than dwelling on the things I miss about the States (Ziploc bags, mostly, but also the ability to buy painkillers in quantities of more than eight at a time…) I’m going to think about the things I do like. Also, my friend and former classmate at Notre Dame Julia Harris has nominated me for a “Stylish Blogger” award (Thanks Julia!), and while I don’t believe it’s a contest (or at least am hoping it is not, since my little travelogue can in no way compare to her well-considered, pithy and oft-updated Mirrored Images blog), it does present a few requirements, one of which is to present seven things about yourself. So, in that spirit, I’m presenting:

Seven Things I Now Appreciate About Scotland:

1. It’s always “time for tea” here. Apparently, lunch is still often called “dinner,” so dinner is sometimes referred to as teatime. As far as I can tell, though, people are “stopping for a spot of tea” anytime from about ten a.m. until just before bedtime. And most of the sugary-sweet snacks at the grocery store carry some kind of product advert on the packaging that mentions how the product is the perfect accompaniment to tea. So, “tea time” officially seems to be code around here for “taking a break,” especially a high-caloric one. And who can find fault with a country that endorses that?

2. It’s acceptable to end a conversation with a “cheerio” here. And you are expected to do it with a straight face.

3. The weather here is great. It’s warmer here every day than it has been in southern cities like Atlanta and Tulsa this winter. And yes, Scotland gets a bit of rain, but they get a whole lot of sun every day too. I now realize that the Brits are just pretending that their weather is horrible so the entire East Coast of the United States doesn’t suddenly decide to winter here.

4. Roundabouts make a whole lot of sense once you get used to them, and they are actually quite simple. Here’s the deal: approach, look to the right, and if a car is not within ten feet of you to the right, then speed right on through. No muss, no fuss, and certainly no waiting--and never any red lights. This town of over 15,000 people has, as far as I can tell, three traffic lights, and they are ALL for pedestrians. As a result, I have spent zero time idling in my car at a red light in the last month. Of course, since it costs about $100 to fill up the tank on our sub-compact car, that’s probably a really good thing…

5. Squash. No, it’s not a vegetable. It’s a completely sugar-free, additive-laced, brightly colored fake syrupy substance sold by the litre bottle that comes in flavors like “marshmallow” and “tropical fruit,” that, once added to water, makes it completely drinkable. Plus, it leaves a wicked fruit-punch smile-shaped stain on the lips, making it very difficult for someone who has just taken a big swig to try to intimidate with that British accent!

6. Channel 4. Like the BBC, Channel 4 is apparently “a public service broadcaster.” Their definition of public service, then, is a bit different than mine. When I first came upon it, I was quite shocked by many of its “oh no they didn’t” programs. The adverts for the programs make them seem more shocking than they really are, however. “Beauty and the Beast” is billed as an unscripted clash between a person who is addicted to cosmetically enhancing themselves in some way and a person who is facially disfigured. Phew. In actuality, it’s a poignant portrayal of how the first group of people (wait for it…) aren’t nearly as happy with their appearance as the second group. I must admit that I am currently addicted to “Big Fat Gypsy Wedding,” which bills itself as a “documentary” about the extravagant celebrations of the traveller community in the UK, yet is really about the way that girls in the community are both revered and mistreated. Some of their other (and to me, less appealing) shows include “I Was Bin Laden’s Bodyguard,” “The Joy of Teen Sex” and finally “Booze: A Young Person’s Guide.” Public service indeed!

7. The firm belief shared by all Brits that “if it’s broke, Jamie Oliver can fix it.” Americans remember this guy as the “Naked Chef.” Here in Britain, he’s Rachel Ray, Michelle Obama and Ty Pennington all mixed into one ubiquitous television personality. He’s single-handedly remaking the British school dinner system by removing the sugar and refined flour and adding in veg and whole grains, while whipping up delicious 30 minute dinners in front of TV viewers across the land. He has apparently convinced the British Prime Minister to pledge £280 million to improve school dinners in the UK, and Morrison’s to devote 75% of every magazine rack to his publications. His shows include (and this is not an exhaustive list…) Jamie’s Kitchen, Jamie’s Food Revolution, Jamie Does, Jamie’s American Road Trip, Jamie Cooks Christmas, Jamie Saves Our Bacon, Jamie’s School Dinners, Jamie’s Return to School Dinners…you get the idea. And now, he’s tackling the school system itself with Dream School, a documentary (on Channel 4 of course!) where a handful of teenagers who have just dropped out of high school return to learn from an American-reality-show-worthy collection of figures: Olympic athletes, TV personalities, Simon Callow, and the guy that invented in vitro fertilization.

So, there’s my list…my seven reasons why it’s not too bad to live in Scotland. Now, if they would only start to sell Hidden Valley Ranch instead of all this “salad cream”…

Day Two of Edinburgh

So, where were we?

Ah, yes, in a very noisy hostel. Thankfully, the noise had nothing to do with the Colgate students...unless they speak Polish...

In any case, my memory of the trip picks up again at about 9:09 am on Sunday, when I finally made it downstairs to a cup of coffee. We had ordered a "full Scottish breakfast" for our group and went into the dining room in the hostel together, where we had our choice of eggs, Irish

sausage, Scottish bacon (which is twice as wide as American bacon, for some reason...), grilled tomatoes, and a few various fried products which neither David nor I could ever quite place. The kids stuck to their usual when we're eating out: white bread with several pats of foil-wrapped butter.

The first item on our agenda was the Museum of Scotland. David had arranged, through our pastor in Hamilton, for the group to meet a professor of art history at the University of Edinburgh for a lecture on Celtic art. We entered the museum as a group, but Emma and John and I quickly separated from them and I ushered the kids over to some of the Discovery Zone areas, where they could dress up as Vikings and princesses...assuming that would hold their attention more than Celtic art would. The museum was excellent: on the bottom floors, the exhibits began with the formation of the British Isles through glaciers, volcanoes, and land movement, then covered the Romans and the Picts. Upper floors covered the Stuart monarchs and the Reformers, the whole Bonnie Prince Charlie era, and the "Highland Clearances" (the forced displacement of the Scottish Highlanders to the sea coasts, the lowlands, and other continents like North America). At the top, there were exhibits on the industrial revolution and the tenements of Glasgow and Edinburgh, and several films about Scottish life at the turn of the century, and Scottish communities around the globe. It's a very well done museum, and does a good job of holding the attention of all kinds of audiences, especially kids (and it's full of them for that reason...and because it's free!) Emma was especially taken with the exhibits on the upper floors about life in the tenements, and wanted to stay at the museum long

after the three of us were ready to leave for lunch.

We finally managed to pry her away by promising to take her to see the Greyfriars Bobby statue, which is just across the street. The statue is of a Skye terrier who belonged to an Edinburgh policeman in the 19th century in Edinburgh. When the policeman died of tuberculosis, he was buried in Greyfriars Kirkyard, and the dog apparently sat on his grave for the next 14 years. Rather than serving as an inspiration, though, the statue made both kids start to whine about our dog, who is back home in the States. So, we moved on quickly. Next, we stopped at the nearby Elephant House, which is one of the spots where J.K. Rowling said she wrote some of the early Harry Potter books, overlooking Edinburgh Castle. This fact has apparently made the Elephant House the second most visited site in Edinburgh, judging from the crowd, which made me skeptical that anyone could get anything written here (where would they sit, for one?). A few people were trying to gather inspiration from Rowling, and several were sitting at the window table where she had sat with blank notebooks spread out in front of them, while other people were snapping pictures around them of the castle through the window. One bespectacled pre-teen boy was just wandering around the whole time, his mouth agape, as if he were expecting Ron Weasley pop out from under a table at any moment.

We went against the advice of a few former Edinburgh visitors and had lunch at the cafe, but were pleasantly surprised that the food was pretty good after all. Of course, John was just relieved to have finally found a hot dog, and my panini was a combination of salty meat, melted cheese and a jammy mango concoction, so how can one find fault with that? Emma was displeased that her vegetarian chili contained so many vegetables, but her mood was reversed when we went to the bathroom and she discovered that a list was being formed on the back of the door of visitors who considered themselves part of "Dumbledore's Army." I wordlessly handed her a pen, and just as she added "Emma D." as the 243rd member of the Army, she turned to me said, "You know, I don't usually write on bathroom walls, Mommy..."

After lunch, we walked back up the Royal Mile, and stopped in at the Museum of Childhood, which has five floors devoted to toys from yesteryear. It was a well-done museum too (and also free!), and while Emma had a fabulous time reading through each and every display, the rest of us were nearing the end of our energy supply. David and John retreated to a corner window to play games on his Blackberry (yes, amidst a ROOM full of TOYS!) while Emma painstakingly matched up the dolls from around the world with their country of origin according to the various placards, then rating them on a scale of one to ten on their creepiness. At about four pm, David started to hint that one of the BBC channels might be carrying the Superbowl, so we walked back to the hostel to get our luggage, then to the train station, followed by two very unhappy kids who were desperately recounting the story of the previously promised, yet never delivered upon, post-lunch pastry. Eventually, we made our way back to St. Andrews on a train so packed full of people that that the four of us managed to share one and a half seats for the whole ride home. By the time we got "home" (exclaiming how strange it was to be so relieved to be back to a house that didn't belong to us...), our plans to stay up for the Superbowl had been dashed, and we all went to bed straightaway...an act that David considers so un-American that he’s afraid we’ll have our passports revoked. I assured him that after Christina Aguilera apparently messed up the National Anthem so badly, we’re probably safe!

Day One of our Edinburgh Weekend

We’re just back from a weekend in Edinburgh, and though we are all completely exhausted, we had a fabulous experience. All of the Colgate students arrived safely in the middle of the week last week (just ahead of the big storm and all the flight cancellations, fortunately), and spent the rest of the week going through St. Andrew’s international student orientation. They registered for classes at the end of the week and will begin their regular schedule on Monday. So we took the opportunity to use their first weekend in Scotland as a chance to take our first group trip.

We left on Saturday morning and took the train to Edinburgh. The ride is beautiful, and crosses the Firth of Forth (say that five times fast!) before arriving into the bustling Waverly Station in the middle of town. Our group stayed in the Edinburgh Central Youth Hostel, which was only a six or seven minute walk from the train station (but feels much longer when carrying heavy luggage and managing a seven year old who insists upon digging through it for a third piece of gum), and we went right there to drop off our stuff. As a Midwesterner, I don’t have too much experience with riding trains or staying in youth hostels, so I was a bit wide-eyed at the whole process, but it went quite smoothly (the hostel goofed our reservation and had us all mixed up in various dorms, but we managed to sort it out, with only a bit of rearranging of people and beds, etc…). We then turned the students loose for a few hours, with plans to meet up at the Edinburgh Castle mid-afternoon.

The four of us and six students headed to the Royal Mile, and planned to walk down the hill to begin with a tour of Holyrood Palace, which is the official residence of the monarchy in Scotland. The queen is in residence each summer for a week or two, but since she wasn’t in town, a good bit of the palace is open for tours. The tours are quite well-done, as each visitor picks up a small audio device at the entrance, which are available in various languages, and for various types of visitors. The four of us chose a “family guide” which contains the same kind of information (skipping some of the details about the murder of Mary Queen of Scots personal secretary in her bed chamber, thankfully) but focuses more on the ways in which some of the tapestries or trompe l’oeil were created. Emma was quite taken by the Palace, since she has been reading a few books on Scottish history and knows more about all the various Marys and James than any of us do, but John struggled a bit more with finding something of interest in one empty room after another. I hustled him between the tapestries and the paintings, looking for any war or sword imagery I could find. He was pretty impressed with the king’s bedchamber, though his favorite part of the tour was the courtyard just outside the Abbey, where he could run around in peace and pretend to recoil in horror every time he found another gargoyle.

After the tour, we walked up the Royal Mile, which is incredibly picturesque. I had read various descriptions of the walk in guidebooks and could point out the Cathedral and the Parliament building (Emma’s favorite because it’s incredibly modern). Along the way, we looked down each of the alleys, called closes, which illustrate how the city was built right on top of itself over the centuries, until it was so overcrowded with people that everyone pretty much moved out and build a new town a few blocks away. Now, the Royal Mile is in an area referred to as “Old Town” while “New Town” is to the side of the castle, though many of its buildings date to the early nineteenth century. As a result, Old Town does attract a bigger share of tourists, and in between some of the historic sites are plenty of shops selling rugby wear, cashmere, tartan and kid size Highlander getup. Though it’s winter and not officially the tourist season yet, there were also a few street artists and people advertising one of the various ghost tours that are offered in the closes. It was certainly bustling, and made for a fun afternoon walk (except for David, who had to walk up the hill with John on his back…).

We met the students for a tour of Edinburgh Castle at 3:30. The castle is built on volcanic rock, and has been the site of various military attacks over the years, as well as a royal residence. It dominated the skyline of the city, and is its most distinctive feature (and it’s the most visited site in Scotland). It’s really more of a fortress, than a castle, and a few of the buildings in the complex date to the 12^th century. The Scottish crown jewels (crown, sword and scepter) are kept there, which are also called the “honours” and were used in the coronation of kings and queens from Mary Queen of Scots to Charles II. The Stone of Destiny is there as well, and though it was interesting to see them (between the heads of the rows and rows of tourists in front of us, naturally…) I was a little disappointed that the display didn’t include more information about the Stone. Most of what I know about the stone comes from Emma’s school books (as does pretty much everything else I know about Scottish history at this point…), but the stories include

details about how the stone was taken by Edward I from Scotland to Westminster Abbey and used for coronations (sometimes incorrectly, according to some sources), how it was part of a terrorist attack in the 1920s and a theft by a group of Scottish students in the 1950s, and how it’s still considered by some to be a fake (with the real stone still safely hidden in Perth, just up the road from us.) In any case, our tour of the castle was well-done, though most of the students were freezing at this point in the afternoon and hopping up and down to keep warm. Emma and John had a great time in the castle (Emma loved the little cemetery just below St. Margaret’s chapel that was for the dogs of various military officers, and John never got past all the big cannons lining the fortress walls) but were also more than ready to go after the tour, so we left the castle and went into a café before dinner for hot chocolate and scones. This, of course, is the part of the trip about which they are still talking!

Our whole group had dinner out together, at a North African and French restaurant called La Maison Bleue that was just off the Royal Mile and near the castle. Previous study groups had gone there before and loved it, so we went with the known. The restaurant was in a beautifully restored building on Victoria Street, which is a steeply sloping cobblestone street, and our group took up most of the top floor. David and I had been in touch with the owner a few times, so he came up to meet us, and while he had put together a menu for the students which included starters like calamari, haggis tempura or mussels in white wine and ginger, and mains like steak au poivre, venison, and duck confit, he made some grilled camembert toast and pommes frites for the kids. He also put on a big show of shaking John’s hand and pretending that John’s grip had done some serious damage, which John found mildly amusing (though after he left, John whispered, “There, I shook his hand, NOW can we go back to the dorm?”). The meal was fantastic (though, really, what meal served among medieval walls in candlelight by a charming Frenchman isn’t?) and Emma was flattered that one of the students was asking her all kinds of questions about how she was finding school. By the end of the meal, though, both kids looked completely deflated, so we walked back through Old Town and down the hill again to the hostel for an early bedtime…or at least early by Edinburgh standards!

The Weather Report

Yesterday, I had an appointment at a hair salon to get a trim. I figured I would start with a quick haircut to see if I liked the place that had been recommended by previous study group directors, and then make a later appointment for highlights. So I showed up and met Addy the salon owner, sat in her chair and explained in great detail what I wanted: an inch or so off the overall length, long layers on the top, maybe a little bit shorter on the bangs but not too short as I wear very long bangs, if any at all. I tried to say in as many ways as possible that I wanted to make sure it was long enough everywhere to be worn in a ponytail when I go for a run. She studied me as I explained, saying nothing. When I finally stopped talking, she nodded her head and said, “Okay, ya joost want a wee fringe then?” I shrugged and nodded, wondering what a “fringe” could possibly mean. She, of course, proceeded to give me the exact same haircut that she and the other three women in the salon had, which in no way resembled what I had asked for. It turns out that the “fringe” is not a bad haircut—just not what I would want if I had a say. Which, apparently I do not. And since two of them had pink hair, I was just grateful that I decided to hold off on the highlights! And, incidentally, a “fringe” includes very short bangs, which will certainly not make it into a ponytail.

As always, going to the salon is not just an opportunity to get a haircut—it’s also a chance to learn a lot about a community. This trip was no different. I learned that none of the women lived in St. Andrews as none of them could afford it. They all lived in Cupar, which is about nine miles inland. They, like most Scots, spent a lot of time talking about the weather, and one of them was convinced that it was especially windy that day because of the cyclone in Australia (I doubt it!). They had heard that a big snowstorm had hit “America” (very few people here use the term “United States” for some reason), and one of them commented on how much more dramatic the weather was in America than it was here. They are right, of course, and I still think it’s strange that the BBC weather reports cover the whole country, and that the whole country has pretty much the same weather forecast every day (that includes England, Wales, Scotland and northern Ireland, of course). It’s often a few degrees warmer on the east side of the country than on the west, or a bit colder in the very northernmost Scottish islands than it is in the south of England, but for the most part, it’s the same. A forecast for London is pretty applicable in most of Scotland too. And it’s usually the same forecast day after day as well…a little fog, a little cloud, a little sun and a little rain—all wrapped into one day. After watching it for a few weeks, I started to wonder why they even have a weather report at all here!

Only one of the women had been to America before, and said “I drove through for about an hour one time.” I asked how on earth one manages to drive through the US for only an hour, but she said she had been to a conference in Canada and a group of the conference goers wanted to see the country so they crossed the border and drove around a bit. After an hour of driving, though, they all decided that it was terrible— and terribly unsafe— and returned to Canada as soon as possible. I was quite surprised, as I assumed she was near Toronto for a conference, and was either driving through Niagara Falls or Alexandria Bay in New York State, both of which are quite nice (or at least I think so!). I asked and she said, “I think the name of the town was Flint, maybe? Have you heard of it?” “Aha,” I said, then added, “you know, that part of the country has kind of suffered in recent years from substantial economic decline. It’s a pretty big country, after all, and not all of it is like Flint.” She nodded, but said nothing, and it was pretty clear that she wasn’t buying it!

It’s always interesting to me to hear what Brits think of the U.S. when we meet. When we first arrived, we told people we were from “New York,” but quickly learned that they all naturally assume we’re from the city when we say that. Then we started to say “New York State…but not New York City,” which then makes them think we live by Niagara Falls. The other day, I told someone I lived in the middle of New York State, about four hours from the city and four hours from Niagara Falls. He was quite surprised by this, and said he had no idea the state was that large. I think that in one way the British know that the US is a huge country, but in another way, don’t understand that at all. They may know that we have a few states that are larger than their entire country, yet they are surprised when they hear about driving distances—that it would take about 40 hours of straight driving to get to California from New York. Imagine how surprised the women in the salon would be to see that in the US, weather reports aren’t given for the whole country—they can’t even be given for one whole state!

Lunch in St. Andrews

Yesterday, David and I walked into town for lunch at one of the student spots that we have been reading about in the various guides that we found in the house. The St. Andrews students are still “on holiday” so the town is a bit quieter than normal, and we decided to take the chance to enjoy lunch in one of the tiny, tiny sandwich shops when they weren’t packed elbow-to-elbow with students. We chose Cherries on South Street, which is one of the larger ones as it actually has two tables inside, and each table has four seats. There’s also a strip of cork mounted about table-height in front of the window that can serve as another table in a pinch, and that’s where we sat.

There was a queue of customers out the door the whole time we were there, and most of them were holding big wicker baskets full of drinks and disposable silverware, so I assumed they were probably the unlucky mates who drew sandwich-gathering duty for their office that day. The sandwiches at Cherries are excellent, and it looks as if the word has gotten out. There’s a big board on the wall that lists all the things you can put in a sandwich, and though I was prepared for some strange combinations (given the ubiquitousness of the baked potato topped with tuna and corn here…), most of the sandwiches sounded quite good. There was the turkey with cranberries and brie cheese, the ham with Swiss and chutney, the smoked salmon with capers and cream cheese…all quite straightforward and yummy sounding. I chose a less yummy sounding prawn, avocado and rocket (shrimp with avocado and arugula) baguette. The sandwich maker thankfully asked if I wanted butter on the bread before he started, so I had a chance to say no, as most sandwiches in the UK just come standard with a healthy spread of butter and thick slices of cucumber. David fared less well in the sandwich-ordering process, and ended up with chunks of ham, grated cheese and dried apricots between two slices of bread. But…no butter! We took a pass on the Irn Bru, but did pick out a bag of crisps to share and went with the Honey Roast Ham and Cranberry flavor (among our other options were Ludlow Sausage, Beef and Horseradish, or Turkey and Chestnut Stuffing…essentially a Thanksgiving dinner wrapped up in a foil bag!)

After lunch, we took a walk through town and stopped in a few of the charity shops that are everywhere in town. Most of them are filled with glassware, men’s shoes and cassette tapes of REO Speedwagon…things you would find in your parents’ basements. They are definitely worth a stop, however, because there is the treasure-hunt aspect to them—the possibility that you’ll find something you never really knew you needed for an incredibly small amount of money. I ended up with a necklace for £2 and David bought a kids DVD that won’t play on any DVD machines except those sold in the UK (and our house has only a VCR player, by the way...). We also went into a fabulous shop that pledges to outfit you in head-to-toe lightweight, packable, waterproof yet breathable, hi-tech syntheticwear…I’m not kidding when I say their slogan is actually something like, “Technology masquerading as clothing.” No mention of the flammability rating anywhere in the store, however.

Finally we ended up in possibly the world’s most fabulous housewares store. Most of its fabulousness, of course, was related to its Britishness. If you can only say one thing about these Brits, it’s this: they really do know how to go about creating a good hot beverage, and they have thoroughly thought through the entire coffee and tea-making process to enhance it with various fabulous products at every step. There’s the electric tea kettle found in every home, school and hair salon used to almost instantly boil water (everyone knows that the water cannot be merely HEATED…the horror!), the tea balls that hold the tea at the bottom of a proper ceramic tea kettle, to which you would add the water (NEVER the other way around!), the little ceramic trivet that protects your kitchen counter from the hot tea kettle, and the padded tea cozies that go over and around the full kettle of tea once it’s made to keep it hot. And for coffee, there’s the full-size coffee press (I learned the hard way that those are NOT called French presses here…), the mini-size coffee press, the to-go-travel-mug-coffee-press. The store was filled with hot beverage making implements, and I spent about 20 minutes browsing through all of them, thinking about how ironic it was that three weeks ago when we arrived and I saw some of these things on the counter of our new kitchen, I couldn’t imagine how we were supposed to use them. And yet now I can’t imagine a proper kitchen without any of them!

More on Driving (or "Moron Driving" in my case...)

Out of necessity and a bit of practice, I may have finally mastered the art of driving in Scotland. I do say “art” rather than “science” on purpose, of course, because several rules of the road do seem to be a bit subjective here. The rules regarding the roundabout seem to be set in stone—one yields to anyone coming from the right. There are a few instances where this seems counterintuitive, of course, such as the situation where you come upon a very small roundabout in the middle of the road and intend to go straight, and just a split second ahead of you, someone comes upon the same roundabout headed in the opposite direction and wants to turn right. That person, being on your right in the roundabout, would officially have the right of way, and would therefore turn right in front of you. That definitely seems odd the first few times it happens (and certainly the first few times you have to turn in front of oncoming traffic!) but it seems to work just fine.

It has taken a few weeks for me to get completely comfortable, of course, and at first I would only drive if one of the kids would promise to sit in the front passenger seat and chant “Stay to the left, mommy, stay to the left.” I was convinced early on that rental car companies in the UK should only be permitted to give cars to Americans after they had preset all the radio stations to classical music and issued a prescription for Xanax along with the rental papers. To me, it was ironic that, in my first few days of driving, about 10% of the other cars I saw on the road had some sort of “School of Motoring “placard on the roof or door and were filled with young native Brits who understood perfectly well the rules of the road here and yet hadn’t been licensed, while I was careening about like a passenger on “Mr. Toad’s Wild Ride,” having no idea what any of the cryptic street signs meant!

Now, though, I feel as if I have cracked the code. In doing so, I realize that the code itself is sometimes completely baffling. For instance, it seems at first to be a hard and fast rule that one drives on the left. And yet, the roads here are so narrow in spots (and almost always lined with either a hedge or a stone wall…or both!) that drivers often have to stay all the way to the right to get around parked cars. In fact, there are several roads in St. Andrews that are essentially one lane—only wide enough for one car at a time. These types of roads seem to be governed by their own “you-then-me” policy, as long as they are short enough to allow one driver to see that another is oncoming at the other end in time to prevent a “head-on crack-up.” There’s actually one spot near the harbor where you enter a medieval-era “toll booth” (now, obviously, not used to collect taxes…) that was apparently constructed to allow a horse and rider to pass through and not much more, and drive through it on a road not much wider than a car for about 20 yards, then make a sharp left just on the other side, drive for about another hundred yards, then a sharp right. It’s (incredibly) not a one-way street and I have no idea how oncoming cars (who cannot see each other) would ever be able to get around each other if they met in the middle, nor how anyone would back up out of it. So, for the time being, I’m going to deal with that part of driving in the town in one way: complete avoidance!

So, the rules for driving are sort of easy to understand, but the rules for parking, however, are quite different, and in fact, I have yet to figure out if there are any parking rules at all! Some people park on the left, headed in the same direction as traffic, while others cross traffic to park on the right. Some people put one side of the car up on the “pavements” while others park their cars snug to the curb (and yet others seem to just stop in the middle of lane and leave the car there with a “right, then…good enough, eh?”). Since the roads are so narrow to begin with, a parked car tends to clog up traffic a bit, and most drivers will slow way down before going around a parked car, or stop completely and wait for oncoming traffic to clear before going around. I do say “most drivers” because there are still several who will just swerve into oncoming traffic anyway to get around the parked car. When this happens, I can’t help but instinctively jump and pull in my shoulders and elbows—as if that will retract my side-view mirrors, which are undoubtedly about to get clipped…)

I am proud of myself that I have figured out driving for the most part. I’m sure I’m still driving much more slowly that most drivers and taking too much time in the roundabouts, but I figure that I’m not too worried about what other drivers think. They probably just shrug and assume I’m a “pensioner” who won’t be out on the roads much longer. Now, if only I could stop signaling my ineptitude to my fellow drivers by CONSISTENTLY getting in the car on the left, realizing there is no steering wheel there, getting out and walking AROUND the car to get back in on the right.