Nomenclature
It's early summer, but the tourists are already here. Edinburgh is hoatching. Orthopaedic shoes and Dacron raincoats abound. And that's just the Japanese. But it's the Americans that attract interest. It is totally empirical impression, but it seems to me that those few Americans with passports are 'travelling' much better than their erstwhile reputation would indicate.
Maybe its the aftermath of 9/11, or Gulf War enlightenment, or the realisation that the American imperium is reaching the end of the road, but they are - almost without exception - better informed, more polite and more respectful of the culture they are visiting.
It's a subjective notion and probably does not stand up to close scrutiny, but the Yanks are - somehow - nicer people than those I remember hitting the city in decades past. More humble, more open to fresh insights, whatever.. . .
Let's be clear - on their home turf, Americans are generally delightful, kind, hospital and have an openess that is in pleasant contrast to our tight-ass taciturnity. They just did not travel well.
I regret to report that the phenomenon has not entirely disappeared- the Ugly American is still with us. I encountered a particularly toxic example just two days ago while pavement-drinking on the unusually sun-scorched streets of Edinburgh. A native of Idaho - where else? - plunked himself down at my table and after the preliminary niceties, proceeded to de-construct his European experience.
Our public transport is crap (what?), our people hostile and unfriendly, the government is Commie and our food execrable (ok, I'll give you that one). And, by golly, he had a termagant wife, which may well explain his dyspeptic attitude.
So far, so slob. But what really got on my tits was his persistent (and apparently unironic) use of the word Scotch to describe his current location. Scotchland. Yes, really. You couldn't make it up. He'd been in the country four days, so you'd've thought he'd have been corrected, gently or otherwise, before now.
But no - it was Scawtch this and Scawtch that, with a cheerful and oblivious disregard for the dark looks directed in his direction.
So, for the benefit on my American friends about to travel to our shores, here's the definitive guide to our national nomenclature:
Scotch - that would be egg, mist, whisky, terrier. Errr . . . that's it.
Otherwise - it's Scots. As in Guards. Dictionary. Wha' Hae. Accent, Ancestry. Oh, and the people.
Scottish is the adjective.
And please, while we are on the subject - we are not English. That country is just one of the constituent parts of the United Kingdom. England is not a generic term. Its use causes huge offence to the Scors, Welsh and Irish. Not to mention the people of the Channel Islands or the Isle of Man. All of which are the separate entities which constitute the United Kingdom. OK, think United States. New York? California? Texas? Now do you get it?
Please remember this, or I will certainly point and laugh.
But then, why should I bother? In twenty years we'll be going through the same exercise with the Chinese and the Indians. Our new masters, finally enjoying their time in the sun.
Sic transit gloria mundi