Scouring Scotland with a Sack of Potatoes (The Rant)

Visiting a new place and a new culture is always a different learning experience. I found that we Indians tend to be more insular to these cultures and in general make for one of the most finicky, fussy and lazy travellers ever. I have seen the “we are like this only” attitude surface every now and then; a complete refusal to adapt and a fiercely defiant need to stick to the Indian ways, unmindful of whether they are good bad or ugly. But is it really an Indian trait or was it just me picking the wrong group to travel with?

I was in the heart of Scotland with the 3 'wise' men from 'Indolia'. It would of course eat up all the available webspace if I were to expound their ineptitudes, but it would just suffice to say that they were nothing but deadload on the trip. What is with the strange obsession to look for an Indian restaurant and eat a three course Indian meal whilst in the heart of the Highlands? Yes, the Brits and Scots dote on our Indian food: but is that the pièce de résistance of travelling in Scotland? Every precious minute of our stay in Inverness would have ticked away at some dingy “Indian” restaurant playing infernal Indian remixes with seemingly Indian décor but run by Pakis and Bangladeshis, had it not been for me putting my foot down! While I managed to inveigle my co-travellers out of dining at an Indian restaurant, what followed seems even more baffling: eating take away food sitting in the restaurant! Take away food should be, and no prizes for guessing, just taken away and eaten as you go. It took me 5 minutes to eat my Veggie Sub whilst walking around the city centre, so it beats me why it should take 45 minutes to eat a Macburger and fries! There is much more to do in new place than to stuff oneself with fast(!) food.

Another thing that irks me the most is lethargy on the tour: indolence of both the brain and the body are totally unacceptable to me. When one goes touring, one looks forward to getting as much value for money from the journey as humanly possible or at least not lose an opportunity to see something exotic, do something adventurous and feel exhilarated by the very thought of doing it. So if a good part of the day is already spent getting there and then one would want to spend the rest of the time snoring inside a youth hostel when it’s bright and sunny outside, it really gets on my nerves! Most of the times in UK, the best way to get around anywhere is walking if there are no buses. I’ve found walking anywhere in UK very rejuvenating and not as tiresome as it is in India. Given my physique and dietary habits one would think, I couldn’t manage more than 2 kilometres at a stretch and that folks twice or thrice my size and rapacious eating habits would be ‘well-equipped’ for a physically exerting excursion like a 6 kilometre walk around the River Ness. Not only did I see one of the most divine looking river crossing, islands and a beautiful rainbow on my 6 km peregrination but also had my dinner and returned to the hostel before sun down whilst the rest of them were cooling their heels at a salmon eatery after a mere 2 km walk. Of course sacks of potatoes do not have legs do they?

I think the problem really starts with not knowing what to expect out of a trip.
The last thing one would want is a person going to Scotland to see sharks swimming in an artificial aquarium. Scotland is a place of natural beauty, so if one would go seeking a rollercoaster ride in a theme park at Scotland, I wouldn’t be surprised that one would meet with anything but disappointment and a big hole in the pocket. It’s a place you would want to travel into the tranquil wilderness, to sit on those little benches on the islands, soak into the capricious weather climb atop those castles and to capture the colours of terrain, the flowers and the joy of spring on your camera. In my view, a person who cannot appreciate these should never really venture into a Scotland trip. Travelling all the way there simply to claim that one went to Scotland is like raving about a bestseller one hasn't even read!

What exacerbates the situation is not planning it right! When you are focussed on what you want to experience and know the best place you can find it, nothing can really stop a determined traveller: rain, turbulent weather, hunger or even languid company. Unplanned travel is a sure shot recipe for disaster, wasted time and unforeseen expenses. So when one has no plan of one’s own it’s not rocket science not to figure that the next best thing to do is to stick to someone who has one! It’s totally juvenile to go to a tourist information centre and act like a kid in a candy shop. It is even more vexing when the person who knows what do next, is made to look foolish and dragged back into a redundant discussion to take a consensus. When you don’t even know which direction you are standing in, how on earth are you going to decide where to head? Men never believed in reading maps that’s why Columbus landed in the wrong country. And what’s more? He was egotistical enough not to accept his mistake and called the natives there as ‘Indians’. Men!!!!



Footnote: Like I said before every trip teaches you something new. For me this trip where I was carrying an extra baggage of 3 sacks of potatoes, taught me to travel light next time!