Day 6: September 20, 2024 (The day of choices: Garden or Gallery? Postcard or Jewelry? Paprika or Celery?)

 (by Rebecca & Tugba)

Today was the day we were confronted with typical Scottish weather which we had not seen before: grey sky, drizzle and cold temperatures. But these conditions did not concern the early birds among us who went outside for a morning walk or prepared a delicious brunch for their apartment with orange juice, pancakes with maple syrup and scrambled eggs, all inclusive. During breakfast some of us regularly disappeared and went upstairs to Mrs. Ruf’s apartment because all students had to attend a briefing there. The ten-minute briefing was about our individual history portfolios which should include three reflective as well as two creative entries, inspired by our trip to Scottland. Some of us could already proudly show some work they had done while others could only present rough ideas. After the short conversations with our dear teacher a couple of students were a bit stressed out and directly sat in front of their screens and started right away typing swiftly on the keyboard to get some progress for their portfolio entries. 

A few prepared lunches but the majority was still full of their late and rich breakfast. 

In the afternoon, we could choose in individual groups an attraction of choice to visit. Our teachers gave us a list of ten recommendations, but we ended up just going to two attractions, the National Gallery and the Royal Botanic Garden. (It seems like we are super close to each other after one week of our trip and we cannot let go of each other, not even for a few hours of sightseeing ;)). 

Tugba and Mila headed straight to the national gallery. There they enjoyed paintings such as “Sheep at a Watering Place” by Charles Emile Jacque and “A Hind’s Daughter” by Sir James Guthrie. A bit later another group went to the gallery as well and after marveling at the gorgeous art they spent a lot of time at the gallery shop where they bought pins and postcards of the beautiful tableaus. 

Two groups were motivated to hike half an hour (!!!) to the Royal Botanic Garden. There they were surprised by its vast size, 70 acres to be exact, nothing compared to the Botanic Garden of Basel. Some strolled around the grounds and took nice pictures, for example of Rhododendron saluenense or Bistorta officinalis delarbre, while others preferred to climb up some trees from where they had a great view on the variety of plants. By the way, this botanic garden offers one of the largest and richest plant collections on Earth, so we were lucky to be there. A little grey squirrel also made Mio’s day (and not only his day to be honest) because it was both extremely cute and fluffy and climbed up his trousers while he lingered through the garden. 

After we had seen enough of our attractions we spread again in different directions. A common urge was to go thrifting at the little (secondhand) shops around the city center. While our bags were filled up with typical tartan scarfs, jumpers, pants, perfumes as well as souvenirs and postcards for our loved ones, our wallets emptied more and more. 

Some even had the courage to visit a cemetery, which from the outside looked very spooky but with a closer look it turned out to be a very nice and pretty spot of Edinburgh. 

Some ended this afternoon with a stop at Sainsbury’s to pick up tomorrow’s lunch for our five-hour-journey to our next destination, Oban. The difficult choice whether paprika or celery would be the fresher snack flickered through one’s mind. 

It cost us a lot of effort to pack our suitcases and rucksacks and slowly but surely to say goodbye to Edinburgh and our lovely apartments.