October 23, 2003

In order to more fully understand our trip to Edinburgh, Scotland, you may need a refresher on some pertinent facts. One, the city's name is not pronounced anything like "Edd-in-berg," even though that it is exactly how it would be pronounced if British English were run by sane people. It is, in fact, pronounced "Edd-in-ber-uh," because in Scottish English the "gh" actually makes a schwa sound. I suppose this makes perfect sense, as all over Britain their inserting schwas into words that don't really need them. Take the word "necessary." Now we Americans pronounce this as it is written, that is, with actual vowels. But the British? Nope. To them, it's just one long schwa, like this: "nuh-suh-sry." If you ask me, the British are overly fond of their schwas. If you don't ask me, they still are.

You should probably also know something about the history of Edinburgh. Ahem. A long, long time ago, before Britain was known as Britain and was instead called "The Midnight Isles,"* Edinburgh was buried under 6 billion tons of ice, which may have something to do with how come nobody lived there. When the ice receded, it left behind an interestingly shaped mountain with steep cliffs on three sides and a long slope on the other, making an ideal place for a future tourist trap.

You see, one day, the ancient Scots were sitting around a fire, as the ancient Scots often did, not yet having invented "Tivo," when one of them just randomly said, "So, anybody feel like founding Edinburgh?" "Aye!" said all the other ancient Scots in unison, and so all they packed up their ancient kilts and golf supplies and went over to the Firth of Forth to survey the land. They found many lush, fertile areas that were pleasing to the eye and also to the stomachs of their sheep. They took one look at this place and said "Nay," and then spat vigorously upon it. Then they found the big mountain the glacier left behind. They saw that the mountain provided many strategic advantages, such as forcing future tourists to climb thousands of steps merely to walk from their hostel to the rustic Italian eatery across the street. This pleased them greatly. And so they laid the foundations for Edinburgh Castle.

After that, Chris arrived in Edinburgh on the big happy tour bus, and immediately set about the task of lugging his luggage up the many flights of stairs to the "third" floor, which in Scotland and England actually means the "fiftieth" floor, of the youth hostel, which evoked just the right atmosphere for the city by reconstructing the feel of a Manhattan crackhouse. Chris was very pleased to find that the hostel shower had a wide variety of settings, including "Off" and "Also Off."

I should probably clarify something at this point. Although just about everything that I type in my C-Files has been of a rather sarcastic nature, I do not want to suggest to anyone that Scotland is not the coolest place on Earth, because it is. It's just that saying "I like Scotland" has little humor value in and of itself. Saying "I like Scotland so much I pee vigorously in my pants every time somebody says 'Scotland'" has somewhat more humor value, but it's just not my style. So, allow me to set the record straight by saying that Scotland rules, and there is a lot more to Scotland than the Edinburgh Woollen Mill and broken hostel showers . despite appearances.

The geography of Edinburgh is simple. At the highest part of the mountain, known officially as the "tippy-top," lies Edinburgh Castle, famous for looking very dramatic. Down the smooth side of the mountain one can travel along a road crowded over with beautiful ancient buildings, called the "Royal Mile," because it measures 1.7 miles. At the bottom of the Royal Mile is the beautiful tourist destination Holyrood Palace, right next to the permanently unfinished Scottish Parliament building, which the architects have endeavored to fit in to the overall feel of the Royal Mile by making it look like a hideous modern glass contraption.

It is possible to spend an entire day taking a tour of the Royal Mile, starting at the Castle and working down to Holyrood, stopping in the middle for John Knox's "house," where you can see real-life ancient museum exhibits simulating what it would look like if John Knox's house were filled with nothing but giant, black plastic signposts. The walking tour was actually very interesting, because we had an exceptionally knowledgeable tour guide, who could you tell you all sorts of things about barristers and David Hume and medieval sewage systems, sometimes referred to as "The Look Out Below" system. However, it was very long, and by the end of it, we were all so tired from being on our feet all day that we had no choice but to go see a Monet exhibit at a museum on the other side of the Royal Mile and stand up for maybe an hour or so more.

I don't know, maybe I'm just being a whiny baby. The other students didn't seem to have much of a problem with it. They, being more appreciative of art than I am, would often stand beside a Monet painting appraising its subtle intricacies while all I could manage is, "The overall composition is suggestive of tightening calves." But needless to say, just as soon as we were through the Monet exhibit, we all immediately walked several miles to find a place to eat.

I am very proud to announce that I ate haggis while I was in Edinburgh. For those of you unfamiliar with haggis, I recommend that you stay that way. For the rest of you, you should probably know that I kind of cheated when I ate it. I didn't have a big haggis on a plate. Instead, I had a dish called "Crofter's Chicken," which is chicken stuffed with haggis and wrapped in bacon and covered in this sauce. It was actually really good, and if you asked me what the haggis tasted like, I could honestly say that it tasted like chicken.

Speaking of haggis, you should click on this link right now: http://web.mit.edu/patil/www/media/video/yatta.asf .

So, back to Edinburgh. Actually, that's probably a good note to end on.

* Davies, Norman. The Isles: A Big Honking History. 2000 and something, I think. Pp.
        80,000,000. (Published in Midnight Isles, or possibly Alba, or maybe Outremer, or
        wait, no, that was Madagascar. let me check the glossary)