Week Five

Greetings!

 

Another busy week here in Scotland.  Enjoy this longer post because the next two weekends I will be traveling and not so regular with posting.  Check back in a couple of weeks.  Before current pictures and tales, a message from my golfer friend, Sam:

“A small blog correction.  The patron saint of golf is "Old" Tom Morris (not Moore).  He and his son, "Young" Tom Morris are the subject of Tommy's Honor (one of the books in my golf book collection).  Didn't know it was being made into a movie, so will be on the lookout for it.” 

Thanks for keeping me on the straight and fairway, Sam.  For you and others awaiting the movie, you may be interested to know that it is being directed by Jason Connery (son of another famous Scot . . . yes, 007).

Glasgow

The first trip of the week was to Glasgow with Jerry Mooney, sociology professor here at Dalkeith House, also a native of Glasgow.  It is quite a different city than Edinburgh—larger and more industrial.  It was bombed heavily during WWII, so there is more newer construction in the city centre, too.  Jerry gave us a city tour before we did two museum stops: Riverside Transportation Museum and Kelvingrove Art Museum.  Next was a tour of the Celtics Stadium, and since it was the day of a big game between Scotland and Germany, we also saw lots of football/soccer fans (Scotland lost 2-3).  We ended the day with a tour of the Tennent’s Brewery, organized by the economics professor so we could learn about the business and marketing of beer (and sample a few).

The transportation museum includes a tall ship moored on the River Clyde,

a psychedelic van,

an old-style whisky wagon with a double-decker tolley in the background, and

a zebra.  There are zebras in Scotland!

It is in this museum to show its camouflage, and to show similar markings painted on WWII ships in an effort to make them harder for the Germans to spot.  Did it work?  There's no evidence that it did, but the sailors reported feeling safer on the ships with the zebra paint jobs.

The Kelvingrove building is beautiful and the collection impressive.  One of the most well-known pieces is Salvador Dali's "Christ of Saint John of the Cross."  Look it up.  It's a stunning piece, and quite a story about their acquisition of it.

We toured the stadium, including the trophy room ,the locker room, 

and the life-time seats of Billy Connolly and Rod Stewart.

The Celtics team was started by a priest who wanted to raise money to feed the poor children of the neighborhood.  It still has a neighborhood fan-base, as does the other Glasgow team,

 As we wander the city, we saw that those fans are likely to wear their kilts to the games.

Toastmaters

Tuesday evening my students and I did a field trip to a Toastmasters’ meeting.  If you don’t know about this international organization, it is focused on helping people improve their public speaking skills (think of making a toast or giving some other sort of speech).  They meet every couple of weeks and give speeches to each other.  Most of them are there to enhance their careers.  It was a very interesting evening for us all with a smoothly run meeting and several excellent speeches.  Plus we learned that those in this Toastmasters group call themselves “Toasties.”  And they go to the pub after the meeting—this is Scotland after all.

The Borders

On Friday, the program staff had organized a tour in the Borders for us.  This area is to the south of Edinburgh—continuing on to the border with England.  It was in the news Wednesday because Queen Elizabeth was there for the opening of a new train line from Edinburgh to Tweedbank.  That also was the day that she became the longest reigning monarch in British history.  Two days later, everyone was still talking about it.  

Our tour took us first to Scott’s View—a spot along the old road that was Sir Walter Scott’s favorite view over the valley.  Supposedly he stopped there so often that it became an automatic stop for his horse.  Then we travelled on to Melrose Abbey.  Founded nearly 1000 years ago, it was rebuilt in the 1380s but then was destroyed during the Reformation.  It still is beautiful.

              The central section that still is standing with an older portion underneath the newer part.

From the tower up where the view is good and the gargoyles near. 

Gotta love the pig!

Next we went to Bowhill House, which is owned by the same Duke who owns the house we are living in.  The staff had arranged a private tour for us, and we were treated like special guests.  In each room a staff person waited to answer our questions or to tell us about the history of the family or the objects in that room.  Though we saw only a small fraction of the house, we were duly impressed by the lovely furnishings and the fabulous artwork.  This estate is large (80,000 acres) and includes forested land where the royalty used to hunt (think foxes and deer and hounds).  The more I learn about the Buccleuch family, the more amazed I am at their wealth and status.  Bowhill House is where the Queen stopped on Wednesday for lunch after her train ride to the Borders.

The "yard" sprawling off the back of Bowhill House

The view of the house from the back, with as much more to the left

The last stop of the day was at Abbotsford, the home of Sir Walter Scott.  The architectural style is called baronial, which Scott started.  Not everyone is a fan of it, calling it mock medieval or fake castle (remind you of Disneyland?).  Scott’s writing also gets mixed comments, some arguing that he was looking to the past when Scotland needed to be looking to the future.  That said, he did invent the genre of historical fiction and his house shows that.  He collected historical objects at a time when others were not interested, so it was an interesting place to see.

Abbotsford from the entrance by the road

The dining room with a view out to the River Tweed

Music

In my first month here, I heard mostly street musicians, but this weekend I expanded my horizons.  I went just down the road to a Dougie (pronounced Doogie) Maclean concert.  He describes himself as a troubadour; others describe him as the musical hero of Scotland.  He plays and sings songs he writes about his life and this place.  He puts on a good concert—fine playing and singing mixed with banter and great stories.  Plus lots of singing along—he’d teach us the chorus or the fiddle riff or the drum part.  You can YouTube him and listen.  “Caledonia” is his most famous song, called the unofficial national anthem of Scotland.

This weekend was the Midstock Festival in our front yard (i.e., the Dalkeith Country Park).  Several bands played Saturday from noon to midnight on a stage set up in front of the house we live in.  Around the field were vendors with food and beverages, plus a “fun park” for the kids—some rides and games, face painting and trinkets.  It may have turned into Mudstock with the morning’s rain, but by mid-afternoon it dried up and the crowd had a good time.  Sunday brought even more people and activities, but they ended by seven.  Now we are back to the quiet.

Here's the list of bands.  Check them out to see if there are any you are sorry to have missed.

How can you tell this band is from Scotland?

The "fun park" looked more fun after dark : )

The stage with Dalkeith House as its backdrop