Scottish in London

When I moved to London 3 years ago, a free paper was given out every weekday evening, The London Paper, and I loved it. It was just the right mixture of smut and substance to be light and easy to read. The ink came off on your fingers and it felt like you were connected with the city and the views held therein.

Like I've said before, I feel that news is heavily coloured by who writes it, therefore, not the truth...more like dressed up opinion. I enjoyed the feeling of reading London's opinions of things - this paper didn't tart it up to be the truth.

Also, they let you submit a column. Everyday a normal reader was published - and some of those normal readers were shockingly piss poor writers...and whiny. I decided to give it a go, unfortunately I don't think they caught my tongue in cheek humour. I made fun of Americans, the Scots, and well, here, I'll let you read it. I'll lovingly re-title it: 'Taking the Piss - American in London Seeks Better Company'

For many a fitful night, my wasted American heart dreamed of my very own Braveheart to, if not greet me at Heathrow, than to be jostling to buy me a drink at the first pub I stumbled into. In a devastating turn of events, I found that the skirt-wearing men of the Highlands are few and far between here in London town. So, to coax you out of hiding, I offer a public love letter to my favourite much-maligned London minority.

It seems so improbable that so few of you are here. How do all of you fit into those two tiny townships you have up there? I hear there are at least enough of you to make a rugby team. Nevertheless, I have kept my eye out for you guys and I think I spotted one of you at a club. You seemed really nice and I think you were trying to chat me up, however, it was hard to tell - I wish you’d spoken English.

It would have been good because then we could have had a drink. It’s a shame really because I was looking forward to trying some of your Scottish whiskey. I hear it’s as good as J.D. and I’m hoping to splash some into my coca-cola.

Due to the timing of my move to London, I’ve come to understand that R-U-G-B-Y is a big deal here, but I can’t understand why you, with your brute warrior skills have not won any titles, or is England winning close enough?

I have had the good fortune to hear your national anthem - very catchy. Who is this Edward guy you’re all on about? I haven’t heard anything about Edward since my arrival and I think that you Scottish should come out of hiding, because if I’m welcome in public I’m sure you are. Remember, my country successfully left the commonwealth. By the way, I’m happy to share tips.

I fear I may be seeking you Scottish here in London for naught, so far not a ginger in sight. But in all earnestness and jokes aside, know that there exists no group of people I could love more. So, for you Scots of London, please be advised I seek you and your company, because if I can’t find you, I have to talk to an Englishman.

Now that I've put in three years worth of effort, I know a handful of Scots in London, and I have to say, I was right to seek them out. The Scots may be few and far between-ish here in London, but that being said, they are the best connected bunch I've ever met. In fact, today, while having breakfast with my Scottish former company CFO after nearly 2 years, we were chatting and I come to find out he has a connection with a prominent furniture dealer who may be able to pass me onwards and upwards into this art world I'm attempting to launch myself. First I meet the Scottish CEO of a charity who introduces me to Scottish Hart - the art collector, and now Dada Don, as he's requested to be called (He thinks he's a Dada artist...bless), is going to introduce me into his friend's acquaintance.

I realise now why it's been so hard to meet Scottish people in London - it's because they're all ridiculously successful or else they'd be back up in 'God's Country'. Well, cheers to Scotland and cheers to success. Roll on new connections.

Effin' Insomnia

It is currently 3:16 in the morning.

I have a headache.

I am restless.

My brain refuses to shut down. It's telling me I haven't done enough lately. The problem with living in London is that there is so much to do, that people who like to weigh options and see what happens, end up doing nothing.

Though, in my defence, I did go to a fantastic exhibit at the Barbican earlier tonight. I went to a show called, 'The Surreal House' and it was easily one of my favourite exhibits I've been to in a long time. The lack of large-scale paintings by big name artists was a bit of a disappointment, but the obscure installations and pieces really helped create the juxtaposition of familiarity meets the unknown.

Which, as this was a surreal exhibition, was likely the goal.

The show really captured a sense of my own personal childhood. It was the perfect balance between safety and discomfort due to the unknown. A mixture of melancholies and mysticism that drew on deep memories.

I can say that surrealism brings out a sense of serenity for me, while some people find it disconcerting, I sought it out as a youngster - mostly to make my conservative-straight-as-an-arrow-Dali-is-the-devil mother, uncomfortable.

Then again, I guess children probably have a healthy sense of the surreal, this may stem from the fact that everything is not designed for them, or with them in mind. The world itself is new and untrustworthy, normal has yet to be established. This exhibit really brought that feeling to the fore again for me. And I enjoyed it.

I believed that there was a leprechaun in my parent's basement again, the jabberwocky roamed the park near the house, my shoes spoke to each other and conspired to hide in the morning (They might still do that actually...), and something sinister lurked beyond the door in the dark, therefore it must be kept shut at all costs until morning light.

Tonight I lived in 1989 again, the colours were autumn, film was antique black and white or colour tinted a la Victorian photographs, life existed in stop motion animation and the scary shadows cast by objects large and ominous.

I liked shirking away again.

I will happily stand in front of Corbet's The Origin of the World at the Musee d'Orsay and not even blush, but put me in a darkened room with a massive black cast of a bath tub by Rachel Whiteread and I'll cower.

This is what art is about - reaction.

Now, the given this admission, you'd think I'd love horror films, no. I like the feeling of surreality, not reality turned upside down by ghosts, spirits, and the like.

I'm a gullible soul. I believe all sorts of things that I see/hear. This is why I feel like a wiser individual for avoiding newsfeeds - I believe what I was being told and deep down, everyone knows it's not true.

I digress, tonight's exhibit was like being in a dream and stumbling around through the corridors of my childhood, and not in a sweet sense.

Maybe that's why I can't sleep now, I've already dreamed and now I must pay by feeding on my food for thought.

Then again, this is why having friends Stateside is so good. Someone to call when you can't shut your eyes. Nothing like soothing reminders of your adult life to help you drift off...ironically, when faced with the absurdity of being a kid and how strange it feels to not understand the world, all you want are reminders that you do get it now.

And that no, the jabberwocky is not outside your window.

(Though, in fairness, London, England is a far more likely habitat for the jabberwocky than Omaha, Nebraska.)

Dalliances

There is a nice feeling to having someone know all your exes and nicknaming them on your behalf, save the truly important one who fucked you up for all other afterward.

In my case, I have my ex boss.

He refers to the Spanish pop star as 'Oh yea, your Take That man', the American as the 'Yank Wanc' (short for wanker. Bless.), the Italian gets more favourable treatment and the Scotsman gets the reverence of a proper name as he properly fucked me up.

Every girl knows that you can't make light of your first really broken heart - the one that makes you so scared to ever give it away fully ever again. Therefore, without significant signs of trust and worthiness, you just don't fully give your heart away.

My ex-boss, knows my sordid history, and laughs about it, hugs when appropriate and it feels nice to have an almost-father figure who can simultaneously recommend me to future employers.

I went out with, hmm, I'll nickname him The Square Mile, and had a lovely evening. We were due a night out as last time I saw him I was on antibiotics and unable to drink alcohol, and let's face it, I live in Britain. Alcohol is a social lubricant that cannot be denied, doing so is a major party foul.

Yes, a major party foul, even at 2 in the afternoon.

You must drink goddammit!

So, that was the order of the evening - strengthen that tie as now he is about to be my reference for a work experience with an auction house in Edinburgh.

Not that I didn't want to see him mind you, but I like to have some face time with people who are potentially recommending me to future employers, gives that sense of freshness to what they may be saying about me.

All of this urgency for an internship was heightened today when, on my way to the pub, I received a 'Thank you for applying but please, go fuck yourself now.' e-mail from an auction house associated with Christeby's I'd applied to last week.

Of course. I love the polite brush off...

Time to start chanting some mantras about life's and the ebb and flow blah blah blah...or humming tunes my Spanish 'Take That singer' wrote.

Both equally useless and grating, at least one has the pleasure of memory attached to it.

Where Did You Go Internship?

Well, it's been awhile since my last post, mostly because I've been babysitting my brother while he had his first real London experience.

By 'real' I mean, an experience where you stay with locals, don't get lost on public transport, use side streets and see about 3x more things that are at least 5x less expensive and 6.4x more interesting than the average tourist site.

For example: You could queue for hours trying to get on the London Eye, first at the ticket office, then again going on the bloody death trap or take a few cheeky snaps of it and walk the Southbank over to London Bridge and cross the famed bridge to hit up The Monument. For all of £2 (students) you can walk up 311 stairs (dizzying good fun!) and have amazing views of The City with no tourists and no queue! Amazing.

Now, while all of this is great fun for my little brother, the history buff, I am exhausted after a few days, especially as his visit came right on the back of Sicily.

And it cut off my dissertation research but a week.

No matter, I had a productive meeting with Tutor the day before my brother arrived. She doesn't think I'm a misguided idiot...well, probably. That sample chapter written on powerful antibiotics and loads of painkillers may have swayed her opinion of me.

I'm going to err on the side of I'm not an idiot and continue to try and bond with her further.

On a sour note, my internship in at a PR firm that represents art galleries didn't exactly work out.

No need to dramatise, but that was my one and only chance at career happiness and now it is dashed into a million little bits, like a shattered Ming vase! I'll never recover from the blow and life is meaningless and empty. I am but a shell of an internship-seeking student, the wind is out of my sails and I think that I have to throw myself from the highest skyscraper in London in absolute shame. What a pitiful excuse for an employable graduate I'll make! Oh the future is dire! Oh woe is me!

Or, on an honest note - I've come back from worse.

Truthfully, after the annoyance wore off, it felt like a burden lifted. I was sure I wanted an internship, but not sure that I wanted to be in PR after training to work in an auction house.

Of course, if I don't get an internship at all I might be a bit more distraught than I am now.

For now I am the Ghandi of internship seeking: There is more to interning than increasing how quickly you get one.

Well, I've sent off one application today, and am preparing another one for a position in Scotland...Me? Leaving London?

scary.

But I'm a big girl, I can handle life and all its monkey wrenches...

Just in case I'm tempting fate too much, Life, would you do me a favour? Please stop throwing so many monkey wrenches at me? Aren't there other people who need 'to develop character' too? I think I have enough for now!

Sicliy

Due to previous immigration experiences, usually involving me sitting in a poorly lit, 1970's plastic version of hell while people probe into the status of my employment and the nature of my visit a little too closely for comfort, I have a genuine fear of border control. I might add, it's always a chubby blonde woman who nearly tosses me out of the country. I don't know what I do to enrage them, I must emit rays that say, 'Oi! Blondie! Over here! I'm trouble! Hold me up!!'

Needless to say, when approaching the border control in Trapani I was crippled with a case of the uncontrollable sweats.

You know the ones, where you want to with sit toilet rolls under your arms and wait for the end of the world to arrive.

Though, part of that feeling may have resulted from Sicily, on a cool day, being at least 10 degrees F/ 5 degrees C warmer than London on the hottest day in August.

As I was the last person off the plane pretty much, everyone with an EU passport had just been through immigration as I reached the immigration window. Soon the first police officer was joined by the other one and they were muttering!

Sicilian border control was muttering over my passport!!

Please, I swear, I'm not doing anything wrong! I'm in Europe completely legally! Puh-leeeze don't take me 'round the back of the airport and shoot me!!

The fact that I was thinking this was painfully evident on my face. I know this because one of the police looked up and smiled, 'No, no, don't worry. We are just saying you are very pretty. You are pretty.'

'Oh. Err, thanks. Um, grazie.'

That's better than the chubby blondes in Britain.

As the thwack of stamp striking passport page rang out in the booth I felt the wave of relief that I was so desperately seeking and the compliment really sank in.

I smiled, took my passport and walked through.

I heard behind me as I walked through, 'Ciao, enjoy Sicily.'

He'd stepped out of the booth to watch me go! I smiled again, but felt painfully conscious of the eyes on me as I walked off.

Now, Londoners are fantastic at staring without appraising, it's a tube life skill - this is not considered an admirable skill to have in Southern Italy.

That's okay.

I chose to find this charming. I was on holiday.

In arrivals my lovely host is there, worried he's missed me or that I'm lost. He'll be referred to as Il Siciliano henceforth. After gathering my things, we headed out to the car (whereupon I hit my head on a signpost - don't ask), and then drove through Northern Sicily to Palermo.

Sicily defies description. The beauty is so robust and unashamed it makes you gasp a little.

Then again, I live in London - the sun is a novelty.

Because I was staying with a native son and in his familial home, I was immediately welcomed into the rhythm of Sicilian life. Once this happens, it is impossible to not feel loved and cherished. I am allowed this priveledge becayse I have known Il Siciliano for over 2 years now and this is my second visit. Situation has changed considerably since my first visit, but no matter, I'm still allowed to graft myself into life for a week.

Days in Sicily are sun-drenched and sweltering. Personally I may have struggled with the heat a little, and by 'maybe' and 'a little' I mean 'definitely' and 'so much I thought I might be living on the surface of the sun'. All day long we baked on the beach, me religiously applying sun cream over every inch of flesh.

I buy the hype about skin cancer and premature ageing.

Il Siciliano's charming friend made it a point to highlight my glaringly white body daily, or if we were lying next to each other on sun loungers, hourly.

Because he is genuinely charming and I'm not being sarcastic, I didn't mind in the slightest. It was actually quite funny, especially when as we were all swimming in the sea, I rested on some rocks just poking up through the surface, he shouted, 'You are like the Little Mermaid! (pause long enough for me to smile) But pale!'

Bless his comic timing and dedication.

Evenings in Palermo are social and designed for those who can truly handle their drink. A G&T in London is 2 parts gin, 5 parts tonic; reverse that ratio in Sicily and you're still being given a generous amount of mixer.

As such, legendary lightweight that I am, the list of embarrassing moments was sizeable and racked up mostly when everyone accustomed to drinking paint thinner was still completely (mostly) sober.

Luckily Sicilians like to laugh.

Am always happy to oblige.

My last full day was spent sight seeing around old Palermo with Il Siciliano. Nothing makes me smile brighter than seeing Palermo from the back of a Vespa.

Well, it's up there with being sat in the Raeburn room in the National Gallery of Scotland. Two different but equally powerful personal manifestations of pure happiness.

Leaving was hard for me not because it was unexpected or bitter. Bittersweet - definitely.

I will miss the beautiful weightlessness I had for the better part of a week. And honestly, how could I not feel sad to leave when Il Siciliano very kindly cleaned and bandaged cuts on my feet? I can't remember the last time someone cleaned me up out of the charity of their heart. (I didn't tell him about the cuts on my hands from the rocks. I have high hopes that if left untreated they'll turn into little scars I can look at and smile remembering the lightness of Sicily.)

At the airport there were tearless goodbyes and no grand promises for the future, save my burning desire to surprise Il Siciliano by being able to speak Italian when next we meet.

Whenever that may be.

Going to the gate was painless and eventually the same border agent walked up to me while sat reading Generation X. He leaned over and said, 'You remember me? I said "You are pretty". How was Sicily?'

'Oh, yes, si. Va bene.'

'And when will you be back?'

I shrugged my shoulders and smiled, 'Pronto?'

They called us to the gate to board and I looked at him, reached up and kissed his cheek and said, 'Ciao.'

Now, if that isn't adapting to the culture, I don't know what is.

Clearly it helped reverse my immigration karma. The chubby blonde at the UK Border wasn't even mean, she even smiled.

It's not exactly, 'You are pretty.' But it's a hell of a lot better than 'Could you just take a seat over here, Miss?'

I'm Not Dead Yet...Thanks to the NHS

I survived that which was a sinus infection. Yea, gross I know. I'll leave that there and just say a big thank you to the NHS for not letting me die.

Which, I'll be honest, I kinda thought I was getting there. It wouldn't have been long until my kneecaps did hurt and everyone knows once your kneecaps are hurting that's really death knocking on your door.

(Death is in fact a hobbit and this is why he knocks around your knees instead of face-level like full-sized persons.)

I've been meaning to write that sample chapter for my dissertation the past few days. Really...I've been meaning to. Yesterday's word count: 0.

Today's word count: 0.

Tomorrow I have to knock out around 2,500 words...

meh. I might even start researching tomorrow.

Oh god. I'm so fucked. Damn sinuses!

So, most of this week has been spent in bed or just trying to escape it. Of course I made it to the doctor or GP as they call them over here. And Cocker Spaniel and Afghan Hound braved what could have been nose e-coli to check on me, but I still have a lot of time to entertain myself, alone, and in bed.

There are games you can play from bed.

Alone games in bed. Granted it's more fun to have company but I'm single. And sick single people are very much alone in bed.

For the purpose of clarification I don't mean happy time games, illness doesn't really get you in the mood, so just to clarify, nothing raunchy.

Here you have it, 6 games* you can play whilst alone and ill and largely bed-ridden.

*Note* All games must either have a '!' or '?' at the end otherwise they're just sad things you're doing alone in bed while you're sick. The punctuation makes them fun things.

1. Tissue Launch! How far can you throw that fucker when your muscles feel like jelly?

2. How Long Are Your Jelly Arms? Variation on Tissue Launch!, it's for when those tissues land on something important, like that plate of food you fixed for yourself but couldn't quite finish and were saving for later...and you're feeling a little too tender to just get out of bed and remove the tissue. You've gotta stretch!

3. DVD Memory Times! The point of this game is to find a DVD in your collection that you don't remember the plot to and then re-watch it, because watching the same film over and over again is not an option. Remembering halfway through what happens counts as neutral. Not quite a win, but allowed.

4. Texting Inappropriately! You know those people that you have in your phone but never made the time to contact them properly? You've got the time now!! It doesn't matter that you met them 3 months ago in a bar and then failed text back after a week or two of chatting...no time like the present. Everyone will be happy to get back in touch. Word to the wise: Exes don't count, they're out of bounds.

5. Bravery! In this game, your physical abilities and mental strength are challenged. On your struggles across the living space to the toilet you are greeted by the spiders that decided your bathroom is a happy non-human place. Here you either bravely kill them using determination and super-human strength to squish them OR you choose to bravely watch them and allow them to live because you don't want to get bitten with their poisonous fangs and die from a sinus infection and arachnid venom. Valour is needed for the last option. You know you'll have to face them again when you're well.

6. Ventilation! Your flat might get a little stuffy, what with the being in bed and not being able to throw tissues all the way into the bin, so on one of your games of Bravery! you may want to try this game on the stumble back to bed. It's a reasoning game. You must weigh the option of either opening the back door and getting in lots of fresh air at once, but know you'll have to get up and close it again. Or, you can painfully stretch up and leave your full underside exposed to the cold of the room, open the above door window and get less fresh air, but know it won't require shutting should you fall asleep/pass out due to antibiotics/it begins to rain/you neighbours decide to have a garden party.

Just think, when you're sick and alone, there is so much fun to be had! And who said there isn't much fun in being a party of one?

I'm so glad those antibiotics did the trick. I'm glad I've left the house and that the world is sunshiney and full of other humans. As much fun as games of Tissue Launch! are, it doesn't top seeing films with friends, dinner parties and preparing to travel again.

And Sicily is in less than a week!