So far I’ve been to two of the world’s biggest and most famous cities and I only really saw one from the air. New York was spent holed up inside a hotel room whose default television channel is porn and whose lobby has a very pretty waterfall decoration right across from a front desk completely encased in bulletproof glass, and the London airport is busy but I can’t say much for the city. I didn’t even see that one from the air! Long story short- I missed my flight from Chicago to New York, which meant that after two frantic and panicked hours in the O’Hare airport I got into New York as the flight to London was getting airborne. So I tugged a 40 pound backpack around the airport and into a close by hotel. But at least I got some sleep. I made it to Kennedy airport in plenty of time and the flight to London was fairly nice. We had a stopover in Bermuda, but unfortunately all I got to see from the middle seat was the other side of the airport. Fortunately I had a middle seat all to myself so I was able to stretch out (as much as the word “stretch” applies to airplanes) and sleep. Probably for about 30 mins tops, but that’s ok. In the London airport I lost my boarding pass once, but there are still honest people in the world, and someone turned it into the information desk. I’ve decided I’m really bad at flying and that I hate airports.
So Edinburgh! I was educated about the correct way to pronounce it within my first ten minutes of being in the UK, and practiced on the bus all the way to the hostel It seems to be a city one likes upon first impression and then really loves and appreciates as time continues. It is amazing to walk through the streets and see so many old and beautiful buildings, wondering how much differently the city would have bustled in the 1500’s. I haven’t been inside Edinburgh Castle yet, but it’s a presence you can feel anywhere in the city, standing majestically on its cliff above Edinburgh. And yet the landscape of spires and staircases is also spotted with cranes and scaffolding. Apparently old Edinburgh was built with some very soft rock and parts of buildings need to be replaced every once in a while, so buildings begin to look like checkerboards with new stones spaced between old ones. It gives a feeling of modernism along with all of this medieval history, and a feeling that nothing is ever finished. I can’t take anything on its face here, because to do that would be to miss out entirely on all the treasure I’m sure is hidden behind the ever-changing stones.
I went on a tour of Edinburgh today and found out a great many interesting stories about the city, including the origin of the name “Bobby’s Bar” and “Maggie Dedrick’s Pub”, the reason for a very small and otherwise unnoticeable plaque near the castle, the coffee shop in which JK Rowling wrote Harry Potter, the school from which she got her inspiration for Hogwarts, and a freaky story about two Scots who capitalized on dead bodies.
The other kids in the hostel are all nice and ready to meet as many people as possible. It feels like I’ve been here for longer than a day, and now I’m feeling the call of the hills. To the Highlands I go? We’ll have to see.