My Scottish holiday - by Gavin Ferguson

What was my holiday?

I recently went on holiday to a Scottish highland town called Braemar. I stayed with my wife, parents, brother, my brother’s girlfriend (Sarah) and her mother (Chelsea) and step-father (Sean). Braemar is a little village set in the highlands of Scotland.

My brother normally lives in New York, so my mum was over the moon to have us all back together again. In this holiday, we hiked and ran through the hills, visited a whisky distillery and two castles, ate and drank together, did a guided tour and went to a concert.

I would like to tell you about some of the more memorable aspects of my holiday.

Why did I eat so much pie?

Scottish cuisine can be absolutely brilliant if you know what you’re looking for. On our first night, we had steak pie purchased at a local butchers.

When I started eating this pie I couldn’t believe how nice it was. One pie was supposed to be for 4 people, but my brother and I kept eating and eating, ignoring the disapproving sighs of my wife, until we had eaten half a pie each. I was stuffed and struggling to maintain myself in a vertical position, but there was still half a pie remaining on the table. I knew that if I ate any more pie I would run the risk of making myself seriously ill, but I also knew that I am genetically hardwired to not want to let my brother eat more pie than me – to not want to let him win. My brother and I both stared at the pie like Krushchev and Kennedy looking at a map of Cuba. My mum took the remaining pie off the table and the crisis was averted.

Was this a holiday or a dictatorship?

Some people like to relax when they go on holiday… laze around on a beach all day or sit in a holiday home reading a book by a fire, essentially – doing nothing. Not my dad. For my dad, a holiday is a challenge to see how many activities he can cram into one day, then how well he can marshal people into fitting in with his demanding schedule. This dictatorial holiday regime must have come as a bit of a surprise to Sarah and her family. After one proclamation of the day’s absurdly packed itinerary from my dad, Chelsea turned to me and my brother and asked with genuine curiosity and fascination ‘has he always been like this?’.

My dad knows that, as adults, we are no longer obliged to follow his holiday diktats – but where coercion fails, he resorts to cunning. Sometimes he will ask you if you fancy doing something – ‘do you fancy going on a 6-hour hike in the mountains?’. Lulled into a sense of false security, you may answer yes without knowing the time of this activity or the other activities that you have also agreed to participate in on the same day. Then one holiday morning you will go to take your first sip of coffee and see my dad waiting outside in the car with the engine on.

Who is Doug?

One day we did a guided tour of the village of Braemar with a local guide called Doug. Doug was in his eighties, tall, with a thick white head of hair and wearing a kilt. I think for many of us, Doug’s tour was the highlight of the holiday. He was funny and sparked in me an interest in Scottish history.

In 2018, a couple of Swiss millionaires developed a luxury hotel in Braemar, which has had a significant impact on the local community and economy. In the name of professional neutrality and objectivity, Doug started by half-heartedly claiming that he’d rather not discuss the matter, but on countless occasions throughout the tour, the mask slipped and his seething anger towards the hotel was revealed.

Doug was passionate. Speaking about the Battle of Culloden (a battle which took place not too far from Braemar), making eye contact with none of us, he stared into the distant hills and said ‘horrible things happened at Culloden – it’s a strange place’. His tone of voice gave the impression of a veteran scarred by the horrors of war, and perhaps some members of our group may have even believed he was present at the battle.

The Battle of Culloden took place in 1746.

What concert did we go to?

On our final night together, we went to watch a Gaelic singer. This was the perfect way to finish our holiday together and an important reminder that Gaelic is the ‘indigenous’, albeit little used, language in Scotland. Between songs, the singer would educate us with tales of Scottish clan culture. Historically, the map of Scotland was divided up into a patchwork of mini territories that were inhabited by different clans. If I understand correctly, a clan is an extended kinship network where everyone has the same surname and family tartan, pays homage to the same clan chief and occasionally goes and rapes and pillages the neighbouring clan. I guess I am part of the Ferguson clan. I would love to learn more about how they lived.

What was the most important part of the holiday?

The most important part of the holiday was spending time with my family, winding up my old man, and forming new bonds with Sarah, Chelsea and Sean.

This is a list of key vocabulary and expressions from the article in order of how useful they are. The student must choose 6 items from the list to study in the lesson.

Would rather ((not) do something)

To fancy (doing) something

To be supposed (to do/ be something)

To stare (at something/ someone)

To be over the moon

The highlight (of something)

To be scarred (by something)

Bond

To be stuffed

To be packed

If I understand correctly

Cunning