… is the sheep. They are pretty much everywhere. These are the Scottish Blackface sheep, which I am told, are pretty hardy creatures. They can endure fairly harsh weather.

Another thing you will observe in the terrain is a lot of vertical drops in the hillside – no more than a couple of feet. Apparently, these sheep will knock off dirt from the hillside with their hooves to create vertical walls of a couple of feet. They are always leeward facing. The idea is to protect themselves from the punishing wind!!

I was telling James – my driver and guide today – how we grew up in India learning the nursery rhyme “Baa Baa Black Sheep”… when he told me “You cannot say that here anymore.”

I was curious – “What do you mean?”

“Well, you cannot use Black word anymore”

“So, what are the kids taught?”

“Baa, baa rainbow sheep”

“What?”

“Yes!”

A bit incredulous, I asked one of the young girls working in our restaurant later if it was true. She confirmed it!!

I wonder what the kids in my school in India are learning these days…

(BTW, can you spot all the sheep that appear like white dots?)

The rolling hills of Scotland. The first thing I remembered was the title song of Teletubbies!!

4 very cute labs ranging from 8 years to 9 months. Incredibly disciplined. We stopped for a water break. I say water break – but what was provided was sloe gin!!

That would be Perth, Scotland, not Australia!

This trip, like every trip to a foreign land before this, I made quite a few friends. It always starts with the person who picks me up from the airport. This time was no exception.

James picked me up and took me to the Gleneagles – a little over an hour drive. After we reached, I invited him to have a drink with me (he stuck to no alcohol due to his driving duties). I learnt so much about Scotland, the people and his family.

It was incredibly encouraging to hear about how he left his dad’s business and started his own business in transportation and built it up one car at a time. In fact, he has his brother also in his business now. He has the cutest 3 year son one can think of.

I could have spent another three hours learning more about Scotland from him. I promised to come back and meet him soon. In fact, I want to see if I can bring Sharmila asap.

The rumors I had heard about the Scottish folks being the nicest of them all… is entirely true!

* I came, I saw, I canceled my India trip

Here I am – a couple of hours north of Edinburgh in the middle of sylvan country, rolling hills and apparently “firths”. I settle down at the restaurant attached to the golf club and ask for the menu. And am immediately hit with the most salivating options of Indian food you can ask for. Curiously enough, no “Chicken Tikka Masala”!

The taste was far superior than most Indian restaurants I have eaten outside India. (not counting that Indian restaurant in the small island of Nevis!)

This 99-year old building served as a military medical facility during the Second World War. It was called Gleneagles Hospital (my peeps from Kolkata – does this remind you of anything?). Apparently, it has 3 golf courses – including a PGA one. Which, of course, means nothing to a non-golfer like me.

But the property itself is beautiful. The rolling hills, trees, ponds are very well maintained and the hotel itself is a classic British style golf resort.

Edinburgh, Scotland

Just before we hit the tarmac at Edinburgh airport, we flew over this water body. You can see the disparate colors of the water – somewhat clean to totally muddy. If you see carefully (my picture does not do it any justice), you can see a bridge over the water. Actually, there are two bridges.

I learnt later from my driver friend James (more on him later) that the white one is a new bridge.

“So, is that the North Sea?”

“Well, it leads into the North Sea.”

“So, what is it called?”

My friend responded to my question. But I could not understand a word of what he said. I asked him to repeat it but that did not help either. I noticed that here people do not pronounce the “t”. We do the same in the USA with words like “dentist” and “Atlanta” but only when there is a “n” preceding the “t”. Here it is “beyer” (not “better), “splee up” (not “split up”). This part of the world spends half their time focusing on their “tea”s and the other half ignoring their “t”s.

In any case, James ultimately spelt it out for me – “Firth of Forth”.

That is a funny name. Almost sounded like somebody with a very bad dental plan was put in charge of naming waterbodies in Scotland.

Till you realize that Firth means an estuary. (derived from Gaellic?)

But why name the river Forth?

Ah, well! Firth of Forth it is!!