Pubbing on my own

Tags

Blabbering, Pubs, Random thoughts, Travelling

After being asked whether I’d like to go to London for a work project and six hours later, after booking hotels and plain tickets, packing, gathering together everything I’d need for the job and doing a bit of laundry to make sure I didn’t run out of clothes while away, I found myself on a plane towards the capital of England.

I’ve been to England once before, in York, travelling with a group of about 30 where I was picked up at the airport, driven to the hotel, and given plenty of information on where to go, what to do, and what to expect. This time I’m in a slightly larger city, all by myself, with a building I need to go to and a paper in my hand saying my boss trust me with the responsibility. Quite a different approach to England in other words.

It’s a little odd travelling by myself. I’ve travelled alone before, but never stayed anywhere all by myself without knowing anyone or having anyone to talk to. I went out to eat today. I found an ok pub, not too far from the hotel nor from work and I really enjoyed sitting there by myself. I was a little twitchy at first, didn’t really know where to look, what to do, but then I just sat back and took everything in. I was sitting in the corner of a pub, a bright corner fortunately, next to a window. Outside I could see christmas decorations and as I sat there Paul McCartney’s voice reminded me that this was a wonderful christmas time. I started drifting off, thinking about buying home a few christmas decorations for Son and Husband. I’ve wanted to go to a large European city before yule, go to markets and see the various decorations.  And now, after working as hard as I can here for a few days, I have more days off around christmas that I can spend with my family. A win/win situation. I smiled to myself and had to agree with Paul, it was indeed a wonderful christmas time.

Next to my table sat a couple. It became obvious from their conversation that they didn’t know each other well and was probably on one of their first dates. The woman was talking a lot, on and on about a family situation, and after every third sentence or so she added: “But I don’t care”. In my head I finished that sentence for here “… I just go raving on and on about it anyhow, ironic isn’t it?”. The man was quiet, for obvious reasons. He did get a word in every now and again, he was more reserved than the woman, talking slower and without the gestures she so enthusiastically used. He had his back towards me, but I can’t imagine his facial expressions being any more dramatic than his gestures. His stories were met with more or less random “ah hah!”s and a person looking more out the window than at the man talking to her. Then he asked her something, and the stage was hers again. She reminded me a bit of myself, which is a scary thought. I know I can get very enthusiastic when talking about something that excites me, but I do hope I show more attention to the people I talk to. With the many interesting people I have around me and do talk to, it would be a real shame if I didn’t. I found myself trying to picture myself as a single woman in my late twenties. I met my husband at 15 and we have been together ever since. How dramatically different I would have been as a person without him. I’m glad I’ll never know!

Being at a completely new place, with nothing familiar around me except for the contents of my bag and logos and brands I know from back home, I found comfort in the music played in the pub. Music is the best therapy. “Let it never be said, that the romance is dead” said a familiar voice, while Husband’s face popped up in my head and brought a smile to my face. I had finished my dinner and was getting ready to leave. More people entered the pub, accompanied by Killers asking the always relevant question: “Are we human? or are we dancer?”.

A Scot I’ll Never Forget

Tags

Blue skies, Mood, People, Pubs, Scotland, Scottish men, Weather

This blog is called Anne blabbers. This is one of those post that will show you why. And since that is my name in front of the verb: allow me.

One of the wonderful things about travelling is meeting people. We had pictured late evenings in Scottish pubs, laughing and chatting with the locals while sipping on a pint. Listening to music and, listen to the varieties of Scottish accent as we travelled from one part of the country to the next. We met quite a few interesting people, most of them men, as a group of three ladies seem to attract them more easily than other women. And as you know, when meeting a lot of new people, someone might come around who’ll take up permanent residence in your head. This happened to me.

The depressing blue skies of Scotland

I was, as you know, travelling with the most wonderful travel companions I can imagine, two of the most wonderful ladies I’ll ever know. Now, I could go on and on about the amazing qualities they possess but I will focus on one thing that one of these ladies shows immense talent for and that is finding people to talk to. More specifically: in a pub she walks over to the bar to order a drink only to return to our table with the most interesting people in said pub.

After finding the perfect company for us in a pub in Oban, we hit the pubs in Edinburgh, looking for another night of perfection. We sent our lovely blonde off to the bar to get us drinks, as that would guarantee a man following in her path back to the table. She did not let us down. Introduced to us was a man who’ll we’ll never forget.

Let’s call him Scott, or, let’s not, that could be interpreted as us seeing him as the stereotypical Scotsman, which I don’t don’t think he is. In fact, this is the type of man you don’t come across every day, and thus also one who leaves one heck of an impression.

He didn’t really stand out in the crowd, but then he opened his mouth. And then, my friend, I realised a few life-altering truths. The first was that we had obviously lost our good luck somewhere around Glasgow. Second was that a nice Scottish accent is not synonymous with being sweet, kind, and polite. Can you imagine our disappointment?

The man seemed to be thrilled to be the only man at our table, and he was not going to waste his time. He blabbered even more than I tend to when I’m nervous. And to give you a brief summary of some of the topics we (or, rather he, as this was more of a monologue than a dialogue) touched upon:

• “Everybody hates the Brits. Nobody likes them at all. They’re in the European Union, but really, they shouldn’t be because everyone hates them. They get along better with their closest neighbour(?), the US, but unfortunately they don’t really seem to notice them at all.” How we can be so sure everybody hates them? “Well, have you ever seen the results of Eurovision?” I now pointed a finger and tried to remind him of what the previous British entries have been in the song contest, with which he replied: “Well, everyone hates us anyway and nobody’s going to give us any point anyhow, so why bother sending anyone good?” There seems to be a bit of an evil circle going on there, but who am I to talk? Norway is attached to the continent and thus I am biased as I already loathe them. Fortunately there’s Australia. Australia rocks and is by far the best country in the world.

• “The UK is the most corrupted nation in the world. Every politician is corrupt. They will do anything for their own personal wealth and can be turned in any direction with the right amount of cash. Of course may of them start out nice, but once they smell money their souls are sold to Satan and they cannot be saved.” The poor man did not get the expected responses from us on this subject which resulted in a silent moment, where his eyes flicked back and forth between us. He gave off a nervous laughter before he asked: “You’re not politicians, are you?” He was never really convinced we were, which in fact really made my day. I can now proudly say I have been accused of being an undercover politician set to infiltrate society in order to see what Average Joe thinks about how we run the country. Badass!

• “Scotland sucks! The weather is horrible, it’s cold, it rains, and the sky is always grey. There is basically no reason to live and every Scotsman we’d ever meet would be depressed and grumpy.” ( I assume all other Scots I’ve ever met have just been extremely good at hiding this). “What makes them all so depressed is the weather and the cold. Nobody can live and function normally under such circumstances,” he said and looked at us who were both smiling. We had to remind of where we were from, the amounts of rain we get, the fact that our country is further north and thus is probably both colder, and definitely has fewer hours of sunlight during the winter. He could not explain this, but it could have something to do with our blond hair and blue eyes. Duh!

• Oh, and being a Glaswegian in Edinburgh is worse than anything else in the entire world!

Castles and blue skies - to depressing for words

The guy left our table in a fury when we counter-argumented and happened to say something about Scotland that he misinterpreted as criticism. “Who were we to criticise his country!?”

We were glad to see him go. Before leaving the pub, we were asked by a few men(lads) at the table next to ours, where we were from. When Norway was our answer, they looked at us in bewilderment, shook their heads and said that we could not be. We looked as confused at that comment and wanted them to elaborate. With which we were met with “You can’t be! There was a terrorist attack in Norway. You were shot!”

We then left the pub, never to look back. But with memory of Scott, far from the average Scot, who we’ll never forget.