Lawyer by any other name

Classes were mercifully cancelled Wednesday as the LLM programme organized a legal tour of London. The practice of law was once under the purview of the church, where ecclesiastical courts were organized to settle both civil and criminal matters, so our tour started at the Temple complex, a massive legal community on the northern bank of the Thames steeped in religious history. The name derives from the Knights Templar, a chivalrous order founded on the same spot in 1118 for the express purpose of protecting pilgrims traveling to the Holy Land. It seems pilgrim-protection was big business, so much so that in 1312 the Crown confiscated all Templar holdings, charging the Order with immorality and heresy (synonyms for “too rich” and “too powerful”). In a move that I’m sure many a monarch has since regretted, the estate was deeded in perpetuity to England’s lawyer guilds and today two of Britain’s Inns of Court, or Honourable Societies of Barristers, reside in the complex. According to ancient custom, any student wishing to practice law as a barrister must join an Inn of Court (there are four in total), pass all of their exams, and dine in their guild’s Great Hall no less than 24 times. We navigated a maze of gas-lit courtyards and passageways during our tour of the Middle Temple and Inner Temple. Besides feeling as though I had stepped back to the 19th century, I found the sheltered gardens and fountains a pleasant respite from the bustle of noisy London. Our guide pointed out one garden in particular, littered with red and white roses, that figures prominently in British history. Here in 1455, the descendants of King Edward III, who were vying for the English Throne, demanded that parties swear allegiance to their respective claims by picking either a red rose for the House of Lancaster or a white rose for the House of York. This marked the beginning of a thirty-year civil war known later as the War of the Roses. I really wanted to get a picture of the Great Hall of the Inner Temple, but photography was strictly forbidden. The Great Hall looked very similar to the banqueting hall in “Harry Potter”, except that it was more elaborately decorated. Members of the guild sit at long wooden tables and must observe a strict code of conduct during dinner. You can only speak to the persons on either side of you, or to the person directly across from you (I suppose this fosters greater and more varied conversation). Also, once the feast begins you cannot leave the table for any reason. Should you have to use the toilet, you must pass a note to the head of your table, written in Latin, and your table master must then approach the head table and ask permission for your departure from the head master. Cool. The massive wooden table at the head of the banquet hall is built from a single gigantic oak tree cut from Windsor Forrest and donated by Queen Elizabeth I. Oh, and Shakespeare directed a production of “Twelfth Night” here in 1601. I’m just a poor Texan, who’s used to thinking of the Alamo as part of ancient history, so seeing all this history played out in such a small space made me feel a little queasy. In the nearby courtyard there’s a bronzed fountain that Charles Dickens used to frequent when he was a barrister-in-training. Since one of Dickens’ protagonists, Mr. Bumble, famously observed that “the law is an ass”, I can only assume that Dickens was as learned a law student as I am. Across from the fountain is the Temple Church, a circular structure built by the Knights Templar in 1185 and modeled after the Church of the Holy Sepulcher in Jerusalem. Lying on the floor of the nave were marble effigies of the Knights (again, no pictures… sorry). Finally, our tour ended with the Royal Courts of Justice (photo above) where wig-clad barristers scurried through what can only be described as a cathedral of courtrooms. The highlight for me was watching the supreme judicial tribunal for criminal appeals decide the fate of a crack dealer. Guilty. Yea. The defendant’s barrister made a good show, but the judges took his legal arguments, inverted them with their own brilliant jurisprudence, and proceeded to bludgeon his rhetorical framework to death. It was the best theater I’ve seen in a while. Towards the end, the judges complained that the barrister hadn’t proven as worthy an intellectual challenger as they had hoped, and they expressed regret at having granted him an audience. Ouch. I usually have to suppress my tongue and keep from eviscerating people with harsh words… but these guys get paid to do it. I think I’ve found my ideal job. After the courtroom drama I attended an organ concert at the Temple Church before returning home. Is it just me, or do organs sound awfully muddled? It’s like listening to the French horn section of a junior high band… I dare you to find the melody. Apologies for the rapid-fire nature of this post - there's just too much information and not enough time to record it properly. On my way to York. Grace & Peace.

Always after me lucky charms

I will begin this post with a confession. During my five-day whirlwind tour of the Green Isle I consumed only one pint of Guinness. This might not seem so bad, but when viewed in the context of Ireland’s rabid alcoholism, my quasi-teetotaler policy was a seriously bold social move – on par with slapping a leprechaun, empathizing with Protestants, or suggesting that potatoes are just flavorless gobs of starch (potatoes for breakfast… potatoes for lunch… potatoes for dinner…). After the bout of “youthful indiscretion” at Oktoberfest, and with a newfound appreciation for my body’s metabolic efficiency, I decided to stay away from alcohol for the rest of the semester – hence the single pint of Guinness. While the consumption of alcohol seems to underpin much of Irish history and culture, I still found plenty to keep me interested. On our first day in the Irish capital city we visited Dublin Castle, situated on the ancient Dubh Linn, or black pool, from which the city derives its name. Danish Vikings birthed their ships in the Dubh Linn (the pool has since been filled in and presently contains the Castle Gardens) and constructed a fortress for its defense. The Irish king Brian Boru defeated the Vikings at the Battle of Clontarft in 1014, but it was the Norman invasion of 1169 that paved the way for real castle building (above photo). I love the Normans – these guys were seriously hardcore – instead of celebrating military victories with drink and mirth like their pagan adversaries, they built bigger castles and deadlier weapons. Their society was one huge military-industrial complex… what’s not to like? I had read a lot about the ‘Celtic Tiger’ economy of the 90s, and while Ireland may have the highest growth rates of any country in the EU, I was surprised at how poor the country really is. The potato famine of the 1840s was horrific: Ireland’s population plummeted from 8 million to 5 million people. It should be noted that the population of modern Ireland, including Northern Ireland, is only 5.5 million people… so that potato blight was pretty serious. Another thing that surprised me was how incredibly cold Ireland is. It’s fitting that Roman scouts named the island Hibernia – or ‘land of eternal winter.’ Ouch it’s cold. Near the River Liffey, there was a grand shopping district with a gigantic burnished aluminum spire (first photo below) – isn’t it beautiful? Pfizer has a huge pharmaceuticals plant nearby where Europe’s Viagra supply is manufactured, so it’s no coincidence that locals call this spire the “Stiffy by the Liffey.”





My first Irish pilgrimage took me to St. Patrick’s Cathedral; a fifth century church located on the site where St. Patrick used to baptize converts (second photo above). About 1,500 years ago a Christian teenager named Patricius, from present day Britain, was kidnapped and enslaved by Celtic marauders. He eventually escaped his cruel master, but returned some years later convinced that God would use his knowledge of the Celtic language and druidic religion to convert the entire country to Christianity. His confidence was well founded, and Patricius is remembered today as St. Patrick. The following quote from Patrick, which I found most moving, was inscribed on a bronze plaque in the cathedral:

“I am Patrick, a sinner, most unlearned, the least of all the faithful, and utterly despised by many. I was like a stone lying in the deep mire; and He that is mighty came and in His mercy lifted me up.”

Wow. The cathedral has contributed much to Irish life through its history – Jonathan Swift, author of “Gulliver’s Travels”, was dean of the cathedral in the early 18th century and in 1742 Handel’s “Messiah” received its first public performance here.





My second Irish pilgrimage took me to the brewery of one Arthur Guinness (above photos). This massive brewery complex is in the heart of Dublin and looks exactly like Willy Wonka’s chocolate factory. Like Augustus Gloop, I was hoping to find a massive Guinness river I could ‘accidentally’ fall into, so I was as cross as Veruca Salt when I found out they didn’t have one (but I want one NOOOOWWWWW!!!). The eight-story ‘museum’ (let’s be honest, it’s just a commercial propaganda center) told the story of Guinness from the 9,000-year lease signed by Arthur in 1759 to the ascendancy of the global behemoth we all know today. At the very top of the brewery is the Gravity Bar where you get a complimentary pint of Guinness with the price of admission. I was told by my fellow UTers that this was the best Guinness they had ever tasted, but to me it still tasted like a hopsy milkshake – I don’t really like Guinness, I feel no affinity or allegiance to the brand, and should a certain Mr. Slugworth wish to get his hands on an everlasting-gobstopper… I’m in a mood to sell. We finished the evening by visiting a local pub and listening to traditional Irish music. Thankfully, I left right before the evening turned political and the crowd started chanting “I.R.A.! I.R.A.!” One thing I do have to say about Ireland is that it has the best pubs in Europe, mainly because there’s no smoking allowed. Can you believe that? The primary reason I don’t go to clubs/pubs is that I don’t like reeking of cigarette smoke when I get home… I wish the bars in Austin would wise up and pursue this untapped demographic.



Early the next morning we joined a three-day Paddywagon tour of southern Ireland (tour map above). Leaving Dublin, we visited the monastic ruins of Clonmacnoise (first photo below) where in 545 St. Ciaran joined forces with the exiled Prince Diarmuid to start what became one of the greatest centers of learning in medieval Europe. Later Diarmuid was restored by his people and became the first Christian High King of Ireland, ensuring continued support for the monastic settlement. Between the 8th and 12th centuries the monkish community did everything it could to dispel the myth of the “luck of the Irish” by getting itself burnt down 13 times, attacked by the Vikings 8 times, 6 times by the Anglo Normans, and 26 times by the native Celts. Each time the monks rebuilt. Where does that phrase come from anyway? The Irish have to be some of the unluckiest people in the world; their history is replete with natural disasters, famine, political oppression, and poorly chosen military alliances. Even the Titanic figures into Irish history as it was built in Belfast. Meant to be ironic I suppose. In 1552 the settlement was finally razed by the more militant elements of the Protestant reformation - the local English garrison. The mixture of politics and religion is often an explosive combination and it saddened me to see so much death and destruction committed under the guise of faith… but more on that later, when we get to Belfast. Our next stop was the Bog of Allen, where we were invited to go bog hopping. The thing about bogs, that is their principle defining characteristic, is that they’re a muddy mess, so I declined the invitation to ‘soil’ myself and took pictures instead (second photo below). In rural areas people still collect peat from the bogs, dry it, and use it to fuel their fires (like cow patties on the western frontier).





That night we stayed in Galway, which is billed as Ireland’s premier seaside party town. Since I wasn’t drinking, I left the UTers and went back to the hostel to do some reading. The next day we visited the most spectacular geological feature I have ever seen, outside of the Grand Canyon. The Cliffs of Moher jut out an improbably high distance above the sea and there’s a huge fence erected by the local government council warning visitors not to approach the edge of the cliffs because of high prevailing winds and the occasional cliff subsidence. Apparently a couple tourists plunge to their death every month. Of course, the effect of the fence was to declare to passersby, “Dude, you HAVE to check out the edge of this cliff!” In the photo below, I’m actually dangling one of my legs over the side of the cliff… it was only slightly terrifying. I hawked a loogie, and the spit wad took 28 seconds to hit the sea. 28 seconds! If the cliffs look familiar, it’s because you’ve probably seen them in countless movies. For example, if you were carrying a Sicilian named Vinzinni, a Spaniard obsessed with hexadactyly, and the Princess Buttercup you would call this place the “Cliffs of Insanity!”. To continue our trip, we hopped on the ferry and crossed an inlet sea. Once on the ferry, our tour guide took us onto the deck and proceeded to give us lessons in Irish dancing (yes, it’s a lot like River Dance… but that was created by American Michael Flatley, so let’s just call it Irish dancing). The locals couldn’t stop laughing, and most were honking their horns in rhythm and clapping in support – I have never felt more like a tourist than at that moment.



Next up was the world-famous Blarney Castle (photos below) where visitors can kiss the Blarney stone and, according to legend, be blessed with the eternal gift of eloquence – a.k.a. the “Gift of Gab.” The custom originates from the late 16th century when the Lord President of Munster, Cormac MacDermot MacCarthy, seemingly agreed to deliver his castle over to the English Crown, only to delay the transfer by distracting the Court with fanciful stories and never-ending words, which became known as Blarney talk. High above the castle, at the base of the highest parapet, visitors lean backwards and descend into a murder hole in order to kiss the stone. I waited in line and finally leaned back to kiss the stone… now I’m not an experienced kisser, but I think I got it right. Unfortunately, my fellow UTers said I kissed the wrong stone, so my sedimentary make-out session was totally in vain! I’m not too disappointed though since, as my parents will readily admit, I already talk way too much. Who knows, maybe I kissed some unknown “Gift of Listening” stone… we can only hope.





Shane and I took a one-day Northern Ireland tour to Belfast on Tuesday. Along the way we stopped in Drogheda to visit the preserved head of St. Oliver Plunkett – yet another victim of English ‘justice’ who lived to witness his own disembowelment before being quartered, all for perceived threats to Protestant rule. We also visited the monastic settlement of Monasterboice (photo below) where another religious community weathered centuries of invasion and strife only to be wiped out by Protestant forces.



Since I trace my spiritual heritage to the Protestant tradition, this was a painful history to witness. It’s tragic not only for the evil meted out in God’s name, but also because greedy and politically ambitious men hijacked an otherwise noble reformist movement. While I believe Christians have a responsibility to engage in the sociopolitical debates of our time, the Church should never monopolize political power or align itself unconditionally with any political party, for when it does, men of ill will and evil intent will inevitably seek to work their craft through the Church. History has proved that faith must be left to conscience – it cannot be forced or legislated. Case in point: hundreds of years have passed and the city of Belfast in Northern Ireland still suffers from religious sectarian hatred. There’s no perceivable border between the Irish Republic and the UK’s Northern Ireland, except that prices change from euros to sterling and distances are suddenly reported in miles instead of kilometers. However, you can see British listening posts scattered throughout the mountains and our guide reminds us that over the past 30 years of violence, Belfast has seen 40,000 bombings. This past summer was the first season in decades when no explosions rocked the city… there were still scattered gunfights and a few murders, but at least no bombs. Once in the city, we joined a black taxi tour where native Catholic and Protestant cabbies took us on either side of the wall separating their city (first photo below), and described what it was like growing up in Belfast. We toured numerous political murals, bits of historic propaganda, where the story of this Catholic-Protestant conflict unfolds pictorially (second photo below). Aside from a sense of profound sadness, I left the tour realizing that while Belfast has an awful lot of religion, it has very little Christianity.





We finished our Belfast romp at the Crown Bar (photo below) where in Victorian times women sat in ornate booths, since it was considered unseemly for them to hang out at the bar. While not necessarily fun, the Belfast tour was extremely educational, and I’m glad to see that Catholics and Protestants have embraced a cease-fire and are at least discussing the possibility of long-lasting peace. Shane and I caught some sleep on the way back to Dublin, and flew into London just in time to catch the last tube home.



I want to thank you for reading this monstrously long post. I’m only maintaining this blog because my mom loves it and because I’m afraid that if I don’t record my thoughts and impressions, I’ll only remember a fraction of my semester in Europe. Grace and Peace.

I Prefer Showers

Over the weekend Vanessa Geil’s fiancée Sam came down from Edinburgh to watch the TX-OU game. I should tell you that before leaving home I actually purchased my first piece of UT paraphernalia ($9 t-shirt at Sam’s Club) in anticipation of the Red River Shootout, thinking that my display of collegial fanaticism might somehow influence the game. After all, this was my last season of UT football as an enrolled student (one can only hope…) and a victory was long overdue. We scoured London trying to find a pub broadcasting the game live, but apparently the World Cup qualifiers have a slightly higher viewership in Britain than American College Football, so we were forced to settle for a java applet on ESPN.com (totally lame). I suppose I could congratulate the Horns for preventing a slaughter and holding the Sooner offense back… but I won’t, because that’s loser talk! What really kills me is that they’re using Texans to defeat Texans… I mean, what is Oklahoma really? Take away natural gas exports and Oklahoma’s GDP is right up there with Giddings. If you tried to locate the centroid of ignorance and cultural waste in the North American continent, it would be 1.73 miles east of Stillwater. I HATE Oklahoma!

Sorry, I just needed to vent for a moment. Despite the loss, it was fun hanging out with Sam, and watching college football really cured my residual homesickness.



On Monday Shane, Erica, and I visited the Victoria and Albert museum, which sits across from the Paddington pad on the perimeter of Hyde Park. The museum was founded in 1852 to house art and design artifacts from the Great Exhibition of that year. The 145 galleries, containing four million exhibits, cover ten acres and spread over four floors. Like most London museums, there’s just too much to take in and you end up jogging past what would otherwise be landmark exhibits in the States, simply because you want to see sky after four hours. My favorite exhibit was the ‘plaster’ hall where the museum has amassed original plaster castings of all the great architectural and sculptural masterpieces from antiquity and the Renaissance (see above photo). In one of the massive rooms, dominated by Trajan’s Column, I managed to spot this little Norwegian gem (see photo below)… look familiar? This is a plaster casting from the tiny stave church I visited in Urnes, Norway (pop. 40), the ancestral home of one Alexander Soderberg – isn’t that incredible? I saw all the artistic wonders of Europe in about thirty minutes.



Tuesday Shane and I decided to check out the Roman enclave of Bath, site of the only geothermal hot springs in the United Kingdom (first photo below). The Romans believed that mysterious vapors emanating from the spring possessed unique recuperative powers, and the spa-resort of Sulis Aquis was built to capitalize on this belief. I got a good waft of the vapors and swear I smelt bromates, so I’m not sure what sort of healing the Romans expected – though I suppose skin irritants and free-radical carcinogens wouldn’t really concern lepers. We hopped on a huge double-decker tour bus, but since Shane and I were the only passengers, the tour guide sat next to us and gave us a conversational tour of the city. It really hit me how much my mom would love this place… all you do here is lounge around in spas and look at pretty flowers (second photo below). Bath is a relatively dense community surrounded by seven hills, and had there been any she-wolves nearby, I’m sure Romulus and Remus might have considered this a fine place to settle down.





Shane and I caught an afternoon train to Salisbury (of cafeteria lunchmeat fame) in order to see Stonehenge. Unfortunately, we arrived too late and missed the last bus to that mysterious stone circle, so we visited the Salisbury cathedral instead (photo below). How is it that unheralded little Salisbury managed to build such a magnificent structure? The cathedral contains one of only four remaining copies of the original Magna Carta grant; the British Library holds two and the final copy rests in the Lincoln cathedral. I knew that many of my friends back home were attending lectures while I romped through western England, so on the train ride back to London I assuaged my sense of guilt by catching up on my class reading assignments.



Thursday night I fly to Ireland where I’ll spend a couple days in Dublin and backpack through the countryside. I’ll keep you posted. Peace.

Stepping on Aggies

Were you to visit Lilian Penson Hall, at the cul de sac of Talbot Square in London, you would find, amongst beautifully styled Georgian town homes, a concrete rebar monstrosity straight out of East Berlin. And the crown jewel of this architectural scar is room 108, my room incidentally, where vomit-colored plaster and the liberal application of asbestos and lead paint presents perhaps the most convincing proof of man’s total depravity. Though on a beautiful sunny day in London, with the windows thrown open, our hovel is actually quite nice. On Thursday Shane’s two Aggie friends, Juan and Mary Helen, came to visit and over the next two days I learned what is was like to share 150 square feet with three other people (like sleeping on a Tokyo subway). Of course the Aggies were great, and apart from the torture of listening to the Greatest Hits of Randy Travis (I thought Article III of the Geneva Convention forbid ‘cruel treatment and torture’ of civilians… so much for the rule of international law), their company was most welcome. With no classes on Friday I decided to take in a show, since London is reputed to have some of the best theater in the world, rivaling if not surpassing Broadway. I met Erica at Leicester Square to buy tickets to a show later that evening (I was hoping to see some Shakespere). While standing in line we read about a critically acclaimed musical at the Cambridge Theater, which made history by winning every award granted in Britain for ‘Best Musical.’ Convinced by the hype, we secured our tickets to “Jerry Springer the Opera” and decided to visit the British Museum in the hours leading up to the much-anticipated performance. In hindsight, I should have realized that any production involving the persona of Jerry Springer would be best avoided, but more on that later.



It was really considerate of the British to collect most of the world’s ancient treasures and put them all under one roof. Founded by Sir Hans Sloane in 1753, the massive campus houses over six million artifacts, and should you ever doubt the remarkable reach of The Empire, just remember that the museum has more mummies than Egypt, more marble friezes than Greece, and more manuscripts than… well, you get the idea. In the above photo, you can see the old British Library, now the museum reading room, which forms the apex of the Great Court, the largest enclosed square in Europe. Like kids in a candy store, it was hard to know where to start, so we decided to see the 3D mummy exhibit narrated by Gandalf (Ian McKellen) – followed by a lightning fast tour of the ancient world. I tried getting a picture of the Rosetta stone, but that black piece of granite is like the rock star of antiquities, so I couldn’t get in for a close up (I think it even has its own groupies). Discovered by one of Napoleon’s generals in 1799 near the Egyptian port city of Rosetta, this pharaohic declaration allowed the French to decipher Egyptian hieroglyphs for the first time. The stone was later surrendered to the British after Napoleon’s defeat at Waterloo. Despite the crowds, I did manage to get into a face-to-face altercation with a huge bust of Ramses II – I shook my fist and told him to let my people go. We also glimpsed the famous, and controversial, Elgin Marbles in the Ancient Greece exhibit. These large marble friezes were removed from the Parthenon by Lord Elgin in 1801 and have been on display in the British Museum ever since. The Greeks have demanded the return of the statuary for much of the twentieth century, but their cause reached a fevered pitch as the Athenian summer Olympics grew closer. Of course the museum claims rightful ownership of the pieces. I’m of the opinion that the British deserve a little something for all their trouble… after all, civilizing savages is no easy business. And speaking of savages...



As the museum closed, it was time to head back to the West End to see “Jerry Springer the Opera.” It’s nice to know that American cultural exports are so popular on this side of the pond, and apart from foul language, the first half was quite hilarious. In the above photo, the Ku Klux Klan had just finished a River Dance routine complete with tap dancing and a flaming cross. In the second half, a murdered Jerry Springer descended into Hell where he produced a reconciliation show between God and satan. At this point the play became extremely blasphemous, so much so that I can’t even recount the dialogue, but I was sitting on the front row and couldn’t leave the theater. At one point in particular, I simply clenched my fists and started praying for God’s mercy on me and especially on the actors. It’s not enough that we murdered our Creator; we now lampoon Him on stage as well. I’ll be sure to stick with Shakespeare next time.

Holy Hand Grenade of Antioch

Apologies for the sporadic updates – dad will be relieved to hear that classes have finally started and I’m acting like a responsible student. However, this in no way means my traveling days are over… as we speak a crack team of UTLawyers is planning another 5-day whirlwind tour, this time of Ireland (complete with a tour of the Guinness Brewery!). Scotland was absolutely amazing, and I can’t wait to share a brief glimpse with you. On Thursday Erica, Frank, Luke, Shane, and myself hopped aboard the Flying Scotsman for the four-hour journey to Edinburgh. If cold, wet, and grey are your three favorite adjectives, then this medieval enclave is the city for you. We stayed in the Castle Rock hostel, just across the street from Edinburgh Castle (above photo) – home to Scottish royal regalia, including the Scone Stone (i.e. “Stone of Destiny”) on which Scottish kings were crowned (and English monarchs after Edward ‘Longshanks’ stole the stone and placed it in Westminster Abbey). The stone was returned to Scotland in 1996, symbolizing the modern atmosphere of political devolution favored by the not-so-United Kingdom. From the Castle descends the Royal Mile, a winding cobblestone road buttressed by shops and pubs, which finds its terminus in Holyrood palace. Radiating from the Royal Mile are narrow alleyways called ‘closes’ which connect all parts of the old city. After touring the castle and much of the Royal Mile, we ate dinner at the World’s End pub, so named because it stands on the foundations of the old city wall, which used to encircle all of Edinburgh – to locals, this was the end of the world as they knew it. We finished the night with a literary pub-crawl of Edinburgh. Two local actors/writers took us from pub to pub quoting from famous Scottish writers like Sir Walter Scott (Ivanhoe), Sir Arthur Conan Doyle (Sherlock Holmes), and Robert Louis Stevenson (Treasure Island). They also provided critical commentary and historical context to these writers (one of the more interesting theories was that Stevenson’s Dr. Jeckel and Mr. Hyde was modeled after Edinburgh itself, the medieval center reeking of crime, filth, and disease, alongside the Georgian styled ‘new city’ populated by proper society). Of course, I only understood a third of the tour since the thick Scottish accents and intellectual snobbery obscured the rest.



The next day we toured Holyrood Palace (another official residence of the Queen), situated at the foot of Arthur’s Seat, a cliff overlooking Edinburgh. In the above photo you’ll see the ruined Abbey in which Scotland’s Kings were crowned. We also visited the new Scottish Parliament building across the street, just one day before its official opening. The controversial building cost nearly a billion dollars and, in my humble opinion, looks more like a Holocaust Survivor’s museum than a partially sovereign legislature (perhaps the architect was English). In the evening we took a tour of Mary Kings Close, an alleyway in the old city that forms the foundation of the present day city hall – our guide wore a bloodied Plague keeper’s uniform and showed us around the derelict subterranean vaults that once housed Edinburgh’s poor. I’m constantly looking for new business opportunities, since engineering and law haven’t really panned out, and the tours of Edinburgh have given me an idea. After brainstorming with Erica, the sole girl on the trip and a jaded liberal arts major from Tulane, we’ve decided to start a tour of Central Texas. We’ll explore the seedier side of Texas history and politics, discuss famous murders, battles, betrayals, etc… and take in some natural wonders in the Hill country (e.g. Enchanted Rock). Of course we’ll be working from a brilliantly written script (should only take us a couple weeks to work it all out) with guest appearances from actors in period dress and audience plants. We’ll form a partnership with bed and breakfasts in San Antonio, Fredericksburg, and Marble Falls and our tour bus will have an all-you-can-eat chips and salsa bar. Of course if this doesn’t work out, Shane and I are planning a huge bierhaus in Houston, Matt Hill and I have some real estate development ideas in the pipeline, and my cereal-bar idea could be a real winner (though this silly Atkins fad portends doom). We all decided to take a backpacker’s tour of Scotland the next day, but instead of getting a good night’s sleep, we went clubbing. Now I’m not one for clubbing, but there was a three-story club called Frankenstein’s, which was littered with Testla coils and Van der Graaf generators, so I had to go. We were told that at midnight a huge animatronic Frankenstein would descend from the ceiling (I LOVE animatronics), so I got out on the dance floor at 11:00p and started shaking it like a Polaroid picture – this may have been my first mosh pit experience (what dancer-density is required for mosh pit status anyway?). To my disappointment, Frankenstein never showed so I left the club at 1:00a to get some sleep.



Having spent two solid days in Edinburgh, it was time to see the countryside. We signed up with an outfit called Mackbackpackers – their three-day Highland Romp bus tour circled Scotland with countless stops at parks, castles, battlefields, and villages (route in above photo). For only £65, this is a great way to experience Scotland. Our tour guide Duncan was absolutely hilarious and we knew we were in for a treat when his first question was, “Are there any bloody English aboard?” Fortunate for us, there weren’t, and we got the ultra-nationalistic, if not slightly xenophobic, version of Scottish history. We began our travels through Fife, stopping just before the Highlands at the Hermitage waterfall. The ground in many parts of Scotland is a thick carpet of squishy moss, as you can see from the following photo. I actually posed for this picture since I thought my mom would appreciate the effort – I haven’t done that since participating in Mrs. Arber’s 3rd grade class photo. A lot of Scottish writers and poets used to come to this park, get completely wasted out of their minds (or ‘properly pissed’ as Duncan describes it) and write trippy, sometimes brilliant, work.



Our next stop was a complimentary tour of the Edradour Distillery, the smallest legal whiskey distiller in Scotland (emphasis on legal). The tour began with a video about the distillery and a free glass of 10-year-old single malt Scotch. Despite the use of pure ingredients, time-honored methods of manufacture, and years of aging, to me whiskey tastes a lot like jet fuel. I mean, at the end of the day it’s really just poison, isn’t it? Our tour guide (photo below) took whiskey so seriously that I almost started laughing at points throughout the tour. When the guide discovered that a person in our group liked his whiskey on the rocks, he proceeded to lecture us on the evil of ice cubes. Well, I hate whiskey and I don’t play golf… I guess I’m not much of a lawyer, or a Scotsman.



The bus stopped by Ruthven Barracks, a ruined fortress in the Grampian Mountains, and the battlefield of Culloden, where the Highlanders made their final stand. Towards evening we visited Loch Ness (photo below), where the guys all decided to jump into the freezing lake buck-naked. Despite peer pressure I decided not to join them for the following reasons: (1) I believe in the Judeo-Christian concept of shame, (2) there was a large group of people watching (men, women, children…) and (3) have I mentioned I want to have kids? However, I did manage to get some good pictures – I’ll mail them to Dan Rather should any of these guys ever run for political office. Oh, and would you like to know where the word ‘blackmail’ comes from? Highland cattle rustlers used to extract payments (called ‘mail’) from ranchers by offering them ‘protection’ from rustling. The cattle were black in color… hence ‘blackmail’. Of course, I’m not sure I fully trust Duncan’s historological skills – half of his stories could be completely made up. Later that evening we arrived in Inverness, the largest ‘city’ in the Highlands (a veritable metropolis of 70,000). I love the hostels in Scotland so much – if you’ve ever read the LOTR or similar quest-fantasy you know all about ‘inns along the way.’ There’s nothing better then hanging out in the common room with a roaring fire, hot tea, and conversation with people from all over the world. I met an Israeli couple this evening and asked them all about their country, compulsory military service, and the intifada. They seemed surprised to meet a Zealous Zionist in Europe (alliteration with a ‘z’ – now that takes talent) and we had a good time joking about the Palestinians. Mazaltov!



Early the next morning we were off for Rogie Falls, a gorgeous waterfall and salmon-leaping estuary (though I didn’t actually see any salmon, except for the one on my sandwich). Did you know salmon identify the place of their birth by sense of smell, and can navigate to their exact ancestral river? All to breed and die… talk about lives of quiet desperation, though as I grow older, it doesn’t seem all that bad really. Next we pushed deeper into the Highlands visiting Eilean Donan Castle, and Glen Coe (photo below) where the MacDonalds were slaughtered and the Highland clearances (the ‘MacPogrom’ as I like to call it) began. The landscape was unlike anything I’ve ever seen before – like being in the Himalayas if Nepal were green and temperate.



One of the recurring themes of this historical tour, besides the ‘English as evil overlords’ bit, is that you can never trust a Campbell. The Campbells cooperated with the redcoats and are seen as betrayers to their own people. It was the Campbells that so willingly participated in the Highland clearances and in the villages surrounding Glen Coe, you can actually find establishments with posted signs declaring, “Management reserves the right to deny service to Campbells.” We skirted the Isle of Skye (first photo below) where the MacClouds used to plot and rule (there can be only one…), but didn’t get to explore the island. Duncan seems to think the Isle of Skye is the most beautiful place on earth, so I’ll have to come back and visit one day. Before reaching our overnight stop in Oban, a Victorian harbor town and point of departure for the Scottish Isles, I took this photo of ‘Loch Scot’ (second photo below, not the actual name) – isn’t it remarkable how closely the shape of this lake resembles that of Scotland? I dunno, just thought it was cool.





You hear a lot about the Jacobite Rebellions in the Highlands. Jacobites were Scottish supporters of the exiled Stuart dynasty of Roman Catholic Kings, and specifically the last Stuart King of Britain, James VII, whose Latin name was ‘Jacobus.’ The clans would rally around a Stuart’s claim to the throne from time to time (Bonnie Prince Charlie’s dad, the Great Pretender, being the most famous example). Unfortunately, this wasn’t the most successful of political unions, and the clans were usually defeated. In the photo below, Erica and I are standing in front of the last Jacobite stronghold – the Jacobites disbanded from this fort, returned to their clans, and the Highland clearances began shortly thereafter, marking an end to clan society.



The English may have crushed Scottish kings and clans, but at least they left the hairy cows. After leaving Oban we went on a hairy cow safari in Glen Lonan. Aren’t these just the coolest creatures? If you could miniaturize the species, dull their horns, and potty train them, hairy cows would make great pets.





Next, it was onward to St. Conan’s Kirk on the shores of Loch Awe (photo below). The Knights Templar was populated with myriad Scotsman, and their ornate graves dot the landscape. This quirky little church was home to a rather elaborate Templar grave. I’m sure it’s only a matter of time before Dan Brown makes it out here and creates another mythos perverting the Christian tradition. You suck Dan.



After visiting the ruined Campbell stronghold of Kilchurn Castle and the lovely Orchy Glen, we stopped by the grave of Rob Roy MacGregor in the churchyard of Balquidder. Rob Roy was known as the best swordsman of his day, and his exploits as cattle rustler and Jacobite made him as much a hero to the Scottish as he was outlaw to the English. He lived a truly violent life, making his death all the more ironic. As an old man he was enjoying himself in a pub when a young upstart claiming to be the best swordsman in Scotland challenged him to a swordfight. Tired of fighting and killing, Rob Roy agreed to fight to first blood – he then cut his hand with his own sword, declared the youth the victor, and retired back to the pub. Shortly thereafter, Rob Roy developed blood poisoning from his self-inflicted wound and died. Later in the day we entered William Wallace territory and learned a lot about Braveheart and the War of Independence (‘Braveheart’ actually refers to Robert the Bruce, whose heart was cut out postmortem, wrapped in cloth, and taken into battle by the Scots who would hold it aloft and cry, “follow the braveheart”). You can see a picture of the Wallace monument below. From what I gather the real William Wallace was somewhat of a psychopath – but hey, countries need psychopaths from time to time to help them find their way.



Of course, no post about Scotland would be complete without an obligatory reference to the best movie of all time: Monty Python’s Search for the Holy Grail. Below you’ll find a picture of the Castle Stalker (better known as the Castle Arrrggh…) where in 934 King Arthur and Sir Bedevere came upon the castle in search of the Holy Grail, only to be rebuffed by cow tossing Frenchmen. That’s my faithful paige Frank banging the coconuts while I storm the keep (Of course you’ll remember King Arthur was arrested in the final scene for the death of a man named Frank… so I’ll have to be careful). For me this was the most fun part of the whole trip, and I’m sure the members of the tour group enjoyed my recitation of every line from the movie… twice. I was really hoping to visit the Castle Anthrax (I have no problem being in grave peril… in fact I love grave peril!) but alas, Duncan had no idea where it was taped (probably on a sound stage next to Buzz Aldrin’s Tranquility Base set).



With only a little disappointment I headed back to Edinburgh and caught the long train ride back to London. If ya’ll have ever wanted to visit Scotland, take my advice and do it sooner rather than later. You won’t regret it. Grace and Peace.