The Bonnie Bonnie Banks of Loch Lomond

Ok, so I didn’t see Loch Lomond, but I do think of that song when I think of Scotland. I also think of Mike Myers in SNL with his “All Things Scottish” shop sketch – a lady comes in looking to buy a stuffed Scottish terrier and Mike Myers replies, “Well we have three sizes, wee … not so wee … and FRIGGIN’ HUGE” – all done in a Scottish brogue. Interestingly, whenever I recreate this scene to a ScotI have never gotten so much as a smile.

Now, as I mentioned, I flew to Scotland gratis. I was able to do this because I went there for a job interview. The interview was for a small consulting firm based in Vancouver, but they also have an office in Aberdeen, Scotland for their European operations – hence the trip to Scotland. There are several MBAEC peeps in the firm currently and one of them passed along a resume for both Norm (the MBAEC currently in Azerbaijan) and me. Low and behold we passed the phone interview and were invited up to Scotland for a second interview (don’t ask me if I got the job because I don’t know yet).

I flew through Heathrow, which I am convinced is trying to challenge Moscow for the title of “Most Unfriendly Airport”. When I arrived at Heathrow I meandered through the maze of hallways before I finally came to a security check. However, I didn’t know if this was a check to get to my next flight, or whether I needed to keep walking to some other security check. Of course there were no signs telling me this and all of the departure screens were AFTER the security check so I didn’t even know where my flight was leaving from. On top of this there were two security lines. Which one do I go it? Do they both go to the same place? Who knows? Nobody knows. There is only one staff guy who is too busy looking for contact solution and other high explosives in people’s bags to be bothered with answering questions. Half the line was asking everyone else in line if this was the line to be in. Nobody knew. I can see why BA and Ryan Air are unimpressed with Heathrow’s operator, BAA.

I finally get through the security line find desk where I turn over my declarations form. Ironically I am the only person in this line – likely because everyone else is lost in confusion in the security section behind me. The conversation went like this,

Staff: “Why are you flying to Aberdeen?”
Me: “I have an interview with a consulting firm.”
Staff: “What type of consulting firm.”
Me: “A management consulting firm.”
Staff: “What kind of management consulting firm.”

At this point I thought she was joking with me with such a dumb question so I answered, “A management consulting firm specializing in consulting management.” She wasn’t too happy with that response, but after a glare let me through to my connecting flight to Aberdeen.

I make it up to Aberdeen without incident. Aberdeen’s airport is about the size of Sofia’s (in other words, small). What I do like about Aberdeen though is that, even though they don’t have gangplanks to the plane, the planes park right next to the airport so you can just walk in without having to wait for a bus to pick you up. I read on wikipedia that Aberdeen has the largest helicopter terminal in the world, which I can believe. Aberdeen is a hub for many of the North Sea oil rigs which are serviced by helicopter.

When I got to the airport I took some money out of the ATM since I only had 20₤ on me (still held over from when I was in London 6 years ago!). I didn’t realize until then that Scotland produced their own bank note – the Scottish Pound. It looks kind of like the English pound except that, instead of the Queen, it has such famous historical heavyweights as Sir Walter Scott and Jack Nicklaus printed on it. On the back, some notes have random pictures of people playing with chemistry beakers. Also, three private banks issue the currency for Scotland, and each one has their own set of notes. Imagine if Bank of America, Citibank and Wells Fargo decided to start printing their own currency. If you did – you’d have what exists in Scotland – well, almost. Upon reading more about the subject, it appears that no bank notes are legal tender in Scotland – even British Pounds. The Scottish currency is actually a promissory note although they are used like currency and are rarely cashed. I wonder what you would get if you tried to cash in your promissory note – a pound of sterling silver? Apparently the Scottish pounds aren’t very useful outside Scotland. One guy at the airport took money out of an ATM and immediately went to the money changer to exchange it for British pounds (which are excepted everywhere in Scotland).

The interview was taking place at the hotel where we were staying – the Craighaar Hotel, not far from the airport. It was a small hotel with a lot of character. As soon as I arrived I looked up Norm (who I knew was scheduled to arrive before me) to say ‘hello’ after not seeing each other since last summer in DC. We walked around a bit, got a bite to eat and headed off to bed.

Thursday from 10am-4pm was all interview. There was some talk about the company, a team building exercise (there were 6 of us interviewing) and individual interviews with the head of the European group, one of the team leaders and an HR person. The best part was the team building exercise. I have done these type of exercises before in business school. In a nutshell, we were given a scenario (in this case a disabled car in the snow) and a list of items that we had to rank as a group in order of importance. All of these exercises throw alcohol onto the list when, for survival, you don’t need alcohol. In this case the alcohol was a 25 year old Scotch whisky. Unfortunately, some of the interviewees were Scots or Brits who held 25 year old whisky quite near and dear to their heart and were unwilling to easily part with it “..but it’s a 25 year old Whisky – you can’t throw that away!” was heard several times.

After the interview ended Norm and I left the hotel and checked into our hostel, where we would stay for the rest of our stay. The ‘hostel’ was actually the University of Aberdeen Hillhead residence halls. It was actually quite nice, because all the rooms were singles and were organized in a suite formation where 5 or 6 rooms would share a kitchen, and 2 bathrooms. We dropped off our bags and took a walk along the beach where there was a long bike/walking path that ran along it. We ended our walk down at the port where there was a lot of activity with large ships constantly coming and going. The best part was a tasty Mexican meal for dinner. Mmmm, mmmm, good! Interestingly, the Mexican restaurant we ate at was heavily advertising their Christmas Party – a “Book your spot at our Christmas Party Now!” leaflet was on every table. Personally, I think August is a bit early to plan my Christmas party, but it appears Aberdeen thinks differently.

On Saturday we woke up early (although not really early for either of us since Baku is 5 hours ahead and Sofia is 2 hours ahead of Aberdeen time) and caught an early train to Edinburgh for the day. Since we were taking the last train back we got a reduced price ticket, but I still thought 30₤ was a bit pricey. The train ride was about 2 ½ hours, but was mostly along the coast and had some really great views of the ocean and countryside. We got into Edinburgh around 11am and got off at Haymarket Station – one of two stations in the city – and the one further away from the center (although Edinburgh is pretty small so it’s not a tough to walk from one side of the city to the other). We were going to catch tour bus across the street from this station, but I didn’t see one and I’m impatient so Norm and I just started aimlessly walking through Edinburgh. Luckily the cities’ main attraction, a huge castle on a hill, is hard to miss and we soon found ourselves in Edinburgh Castle.

The castle has some great views of the city as well as some interesting museums on the military history of Scotland. There was even a wedding going on while we were there. Edinburgh Castle is at one end of the “Royal Mile.” The “Royal Mile” is a continuous line of souvenir shops that connect Edinburgh Castle with Holyrood Palace. There is also an information center that boasts palm reading and is filled with Halloween stuff. I don’t know if it’s because Halloween is only 2 months away (and I already explained their 5 month Christmas preparation) or the Scots just like Halloween stuff, but several restaurants and bars were outfitted in a Halloween-esque sort of way.

Our second major tour was of Holyrood Palace – the Queen’s official residence in Scotland. One thing I really liked about the tour was that they provided the free audio tour guides. I’ve never tried one out before (mainly because they typically charge extra for them and I’m cheap), but I was well impressed. The Palace is quite nice and there is an attached church ruin next to the Palace which was interesting. Across the street from Holyrood is the Scottish Parliament building. The building is a modernist, Frank Gehry-looking building which doesn’t fit in at all with the rest of the city. I think most Scots think the same thing.

After our tour of Holyrood we walked through New Town (as opposed to Old Town where the “Royal Mile” was). We were going to go to a park there we saw on the map, but the park didn’t have any entrances (bizarre) so we gave up and meandered elsewhere through the city.
We were able to see all of Edinburgh in about 6 hours. Like I said – not a very big city.

One thing that struck me about Edinburgh were all the disrespectful punk kids around. It was like Johnny Rotten had cloned himself to all the children in Edinburgh. Norm and I went into an old graveyard and it was full of teenagers drinking, goofing off and harassing tourists. In one of the parks some workers had an area cordoned off by rope to set up some equipment for the upcoming Edinburgh Festival fireworks. Despite the workers trying to stop them, kids disregarded their threats and walked through the restricted area like nothing was amiss. In the park teenage couples were dry humping in public. All over the city were drunken, rude teenagers. Cops were nowhere to be found. This is why there’s nothing wrong with introducing kids to a swift paddle in the ass, when deserved.

The last train back left Edinburgh at 8:30pm and we were back at our Aberdeen hostel by 11:15pm or so.

Aberdeen was smaller than Edinburgh – it took us only three hours to see the city on Saturday and that included a trip to the cinema to see “You, Me and Dupree”. Aberdeen is quaint, but there isn’t too much to see for tourists. The University of Aberdeen has some impressive looking buildings that are hundreds of years old. The main thoroughfare through the city is also impressive – especially if you like shopping. We ended up killing a couple hours bouncing around from shop to bookstore to shop. I went into a music shop and was surprised by the huge assortment of accordions the store had. They probably had about 20 – 25 different types of accordions – which is more than I’ve ever seen in my life.

My flight left around 7pm so I took a cab to the airport from the hotel. Cab drivers in Aberdeen are overpaid. I know this because, a) fares for even short distances seem to be over 10₤, and b) the taxis are all nice Mercedes, Volvos or other luxury automobiles. Many of them have in-dash DVD players, attached handheld computers, all leather seats, and stuff I normally only see on MTV’s ‘Pimp My Ride’. I feel there are some free market forces that are being tampered with here.

My flight back to Sofia was delayed leaving Gatwick (I was able to avoid Heathrow for my flight back) so my scheduled arrival for 4:30am in Sofia was pushed to 5:30am. When I got home I slept most of the day.

I’ll post pictures soon.

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