I'm officially 5 hours ahead... IN EDINBURGH!
My first glimpse of Scotland!
The flight was...kind of awful, but very worth it, so I won't elaborate too much. All I can say is that I wouldn't recommend Air Canada Rouge flights to anyone.
Moving on, let me talk about my first impressions of Edinbvrgh (pronounced Edin-boro, for those of you who have issues with the pronunciation like I definitely did at first):
1. Scotland is very old, very green, and very beautiful.
Edinburgh castle just off of the Royal Mile.
2. People here drive on the wrong side of the road! I forgot about that when I came here.
3. The accents are very thick here!
4. Scottish people seem to be more environmentally friendly than we are.
This is the backyard area of the flat building, and people call it a "green". Its a shared area for hanging laundry, which is pretty common around the UK. You'll notice in my later photos of the kitchen area which has a washing machine, but no dryer! Its a great way to save energy.
This was one of my first sights of Scotland. Look at all those wind turbines!
Recycling and composting bins! This is not strange, its just...expected. Like how using a garbage can is expected in any regular Canadian home.
Entrance to our flat building. Notice all those green bins! They're for recycling, and there's one bin for composting. The whole city does this. Throughout the city you'll also notice signs just about everywhere instructing people to keep the city clean of garbage. One particularly hilarious sign that I came across today:
Do not allow your dog to foul footpaths! I love how formally polite this is. I laughed.
Something else interesting about how environmentally friendly Scotland I noticed when we went to a small market to do some grocery shopping today. The groceries themselves were a pretty decent price, we paid about the same you'd expect to pay at any average grocery store in Canada. The thing that struck me about the ScotMid grocery stories is that they pride themselves on local and fair trade supply chains. So all of the stuff we bought was produced right here in Scotland or obtained by fair trade or environmentally friendly means. I was really impressed by this. Its a good example for other countries who are so behind on this type of stuff, like us in Canada. We can learn from models of other countries that being environmentally friendly doesn't need to take a huge bite out of our pockets. This is what ecomodernism is about. Anyway, moving on.
5. Its not as crowded as I expected. But then again, its difficult to make fair comparisons after living in China previously, where the population density is absolutely absurd.
When we got here, we went directly to our flat. Our flat is located pretty close to everything, just on Ferry Road in Edinburgh. We're a short bus ride from a lot of major tourist attractions like Edinburgh Castle, The University of Edinburgh, the New Town, Holyrood Palace, and the Royal Mile.
The kitchenette in the flat.
Simon bought us some Scottish shortbread as a sort of welcome gift! It is delicious.
Hall way.
My first priority. #teaaddictprobs
Flat door.
Stairway
Part of our street.
My bedroom. That bed is pure heaven after being on AC Rouge for 7 hours.
View from my bedroom window, onto Ferry Road.
The flat is an old Victorian styled flat with a very gentlemanly host named Simon MacCauley. He's been very helpful in telling us how to navigate Edinburgh. We rented his flat for one week using AirBnB. Its actually pretty lovely here. I have a nice view of the street from my window, and comfortable bed, and honestly this place is 89712938712x better than what I imagine a hotel would be like. I find living in another country is best when you actually get to see the sort of things the locals are familiar with but that tourists who don't know the city don't ever even hear about.
Thats Simon! He explained that his ancestors come from Belfast and Scotland, but he lived in Manchester for a while before he moved to Glasgow and then Edinburgh for work.
After we settled into the flat (and jetlag punched me right in the face so I passed out for about 5 hours), we went out for a little gander. We have decided to travel by bus not only because its a bit more economical, buuut its also a good way to see things around the city in my opinion. Everytime I've commuted in another country by bus its been pretty fun and interesting.
Of course, Edinburgh is in the UK, so there are mostly double decked buses. We purchased all of our tickets using m-Tickets, a transportation app that allows you to buy e-tickets for Lothian buslines. Sitting at the top of a double decked bus is pretty fun! I loved it. Today was my first time on a double decked bus like that.
Anyway, I am absolutely beat, so I'm going to drink some British English Breakfast and head to bed.
Cheers!
KM
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