Week 9

For this module I am teaching an intercultural communication class.  We are in a terrific situation for students to be having intercultural interactions, so we spend a fair bit of time processing those experiences and applying the course concepts to them.  We also have been doing field trips to increase their exposure to other cultures.  Here are a few from this past week:

Punjabi Junction

Run by local women as a social enterprise, Punjabi Junction serves meals, provides training, does catering, and offers cooking classes.  The area of Edinburgh it is in is called Leith, and the street it is on is Leith Walk.  You supposedly can buy anything on this street.  Many of the businesses are ethnic: Polish, Chinese, Spanish, Turkish, Portuguese, even American.  My students and I went to Punjabi Junction to learn how to make curry from Bulwinder and her assistant.  Bulwinder is a delightful woman whose appearance is Indian, but having been born and raised in Edinburgh, she speaks English with a beautiful Scottish accent.  Under her guidance, we chopped and stirred for the curry and kneaded and rolled for the chappati (roti) bread.  Then we ate and smiled.  It was good fun and good food.  

 

A watercolor rendition of the outside of the restaurant 

Can you guess what this ingredient is?

 Maybe you will find it on this spice "tree" that is painted on the wall of the restaurant

National Museum of Scotland

Most of us had been to this museum before (one of many benefits of free museums is that people like us can go frequently).  However, for this class we did a private tour titled “Customs of Cultures.”  Instead of learning about Scottish culture, we learned about other cultures from elsewhere in the world.  The tour guide was a charming woman who has traveled extensively.  She focused on a dozen or so items from places like Benin, New Guinea, Nigeria, the Cook Islands, China, India, Turkey, Tibet, and Afghanistan.  In addition to learning from her, we also learned from and about each other as we shared what interested us most and why.  

A Chinese hair ornament made of kingfisher feathers 

 Prayer wheels and flags from Tibet

A more contemporary cultural practice from Ghana is to "go out in style," 

as one would in this coffin styled after a Mercedes

This feast bowl came to Scotland with a Scottish businessman and his wife, a princess from the Cook Islands.  It was something from her culture that she wanted to bring, and considering the bowl is large enough for me to lie down in, bringing it was no small feat. Business must have been good : )

Virtual field trip to London and Onllwyn

Last year, a film came out that tells part of the true story of a group of gays and lesbians who raise money to support striking coal miners.  This year, that film was released on video, so we got to watch it.  Set in 1984, the gays and lesbians from London donate their money to miners in Onllwyn (in the Dulais Valley of southern Wales).  Both groups are battling the government and policies of Margaret Thatcher, and they begin forming friendships that cross all kinds of boundaries—class, gender, age, sexual orientation, urban-rural, Welsh-English, even carnivore-vegetarian.  It is well done, will make you laugh and cry, and led us to an interesting discussion.  If it is available in the US, I highly recommend it.

Ceilidh Dance Lesson

Ceilidh, in Gaelic, means a visit or a house party.  It is pronounced “kay-lee” and such gatherings usually include traditional Scottish folk dancing with informal music.  Many people of all ages are involved.  If you were to search for ceilidhs in Edinburgh, you would find several happening each week at town halls, university centers, pubs.  We plan to attend one next week, so we took this opportunity to learn some of the dances before we go.  Annabel was our teacher, and she absorbed us right into the class.  About 40 locals show up for this weekly session, and they were very gracious about helping us learn.  That was good because the students were really nervous about the class, fearing that they would embarrass themselves.  First Annabel talked us through the steps as she and a partner demonstrated, then we walked through them, then the music was added (on the accordion played by Grant).  It didn’t take more than one dance for the students to relax and begin to enjoy themselves.  By the end, we were swirling around the dance floor like we knew what we were doing.  The dances may be for partners or for the whole group in a circle or line or for 5-6 couples together.  One called the snowball dance reminded me a little bit of a Virginia Reel (which I haven’t done in many years).  Some of the dancers there showed us the more complicated steps that could be done; we were happy to step and skip in time and call it good enough.

 

Although this isn't us, it gives you the idea of the lines and steps.  

This kind of dance also may be done at a wedding with fancy dresses and kilts.

What's Next?

  

This week we will do a couple more field trips—a visit to the crypt at a local church, an intercultural scavenger hunt, more dancing at a ceilidh, and a tour of the Edinburgh Central Mosque.  It’s also the week before our fall break, during which I will travel with my friend and colleague Kathy Steffen.  That means there will be no blog post until October 25 or 26 or so.  Enjoy your time off!

One side note:  Some of us also had the intercultural experience of being part of the largest audience for a British television show this year—that’s nearly 14 million people watching the finals of The Great British Bake-off.  You heard me right, this show gets more viewers than any other—more even than the Great British Sewing Bee : )  It is the culmination of a 10-week competition in which the contestants take on baking challenges, hoping not to get sent home.  See the link if you want to watch the highlights for yourself. 

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b013pqnm