When I left Scotland, aged sixteen in 1977 to live in
London, it was raining heavily. When I returned in 2009 it still was.
Walking around in the sinus-battering wind and drizzle I realise how utterly dismal the
Scottish weather can be. That’s not to say that life down south was lived
basking in sunshine and light breezes – it wasn’t, the climate’s typically
dreary down there too. It’s just that there’s a unique quality to weather up
here. When it’s cold its bloody cold; when it rains, its cold rain; when it’s
dark, its pitch black. And the wind? Living in this micro-climate on the Firth
of Forth is like living in a wind tunnel with behavioural problems. It whirls
and skirls like a highland reel. It stops you in your tracks and blows you off
your feet. It whooshes in four directions at once. It buffets your windows to
breaking-point. You arrive home distressed, dishevelled and drenched muttering
“why did I want to come back to this?”
I am reminded of my childhood in East Kilbride, one of the
most exposed places in Britain, possibly on earth, outside of Siberia,
surrounded as it is by moors and flatlands. My father dubbed a particular part
of Princes Square, the central shopping precinct before the ubiquitous covered
mall was built, as ‘Cochrane’s Corner’ after the self-service grocer shop that
was situated there (I once stole a bottle of Soda Water and a Napoleon Solo
magazine from there, I can still feel the thrill forty-odd years on). On a
windy day (and those were plenty) you turned around this corner and were
literally stopped in your tracks by the gusts of wind. If you had a bomber
jacket on you could stretch it out bat-style like a proto-hang-glider and fly
away toward Glasgow.
Perversely, given that such traffic usually runs the other
way, I came back to Scotland for the work. Well, that and a romantic notion.
Scots in exile tend to be the most patriotic, yet in my experience Scots can be
reluctant to befriend one another say, in an office environment in London. I’ve
worked alongside many Scots in this way and experienced no sense of camaraderie whatsoever, often the
opposite in fact. The ritual of ‘where are you from?’ and ‘do you know?’
becomes tiresome very quickly. For the benefit of others though, especially the
English, we’re all Rob Roy’s and even
have the nerve - quite blatantly - not to support the host country during
important sporting events.
Being footloose and fancy-free I made the decision to return
and live in my homeland, and discovered quite rapidly that it was a foreign
country to me. For the first couple of weeks I was convinced I was about to be
attacked, such was the ferocity and volume of speech employed by those I
encountered. I’d become a ‘southern softie’ in all practical senses, soft of
tread and soft of voice. Sometimes ordinary conversations on a bus sounded to
me like declarations of war, and often they perhaps were. I’d obviously been
away too long.
This was all misconception of course, and I have acclimatised
fully. The natives, far from being hostile, are on the whole very friendly.
Chivalry, I noticed, is not dead in Scotland. Indeed, your
average ‘right-on’ feminist social worky-type in London would demand a fella’s
knackers be removed and exhibited in the town hall if they witnessed some of
the social mores still upheld here.
Letting women onto the bus first, a cheery greeting of ‘how
are you ma darling?’ from the bus driver, offering seats to women. This all
still happens in Scotland, and is accepted graciously too.
For it’s not meant to patronise or condescend. It’s not
meant as an expression of male-dominance. It’s appreciative, polite and
well-mannered. Cheers me up to see it (bring me my slippers and my copy of the Daily Mail, love!)
Scotland is a divided nation when it comes to health and
lifestyle choices. Either you’ll see people jogging about the place in their
shorts, i-pods blaring, or they’re standing in front of pubs and bookies,
choking on fags held back-hand fashion, huddled against the icy wind and
skittering rain.
What possible pleasure is derived from this is a mystery to
me. A smoker myself, I’ve always viewed it as a sedate event, to be enjoyed in
warmth and comfort accompanied by a large whisky and a facing telly. Standing
in the cold wind and rain is not an option I would even consider. Strange,
though, that smoking in public places was banned on health grounds when these
front-of-pub wheezers are widening the scope of possible health risks to
include pneumonia and hypothermia.
Even the joggers, though, are determined to uphold the
stereotype of drink-or-be-damned Scot. I’ve heard the young yins in the office
exclaim excitedly ‘as soon as the half-marathons over I’m gonna get absolutely
shit-faced!!’ As if the marathonial effort is serving only somehow to get in
the way of the main event.
Everybody’s become a wine connoisseur all of a sudden. Last
I knew, wine to a Scot meant Buckfast and El Dorado, Four Crown if you were
flush. Or even that old wine/whisky classic, Scotsmac. Only in Scotland would
anyone think to mix wine and whisky, let alone advertise it as ‘a subtle
blend’.
Now, it’s all about where to buy that half-price Prairie
Merlot or how best to chill the Chardonnay - and this is from office workers.
It’s all linked to this supposed healthy life-style. They still get blootered,
but it’s on fine wines, and that
seems to make a difference.
No comments:
Post a Comment