So yet another Burns day has just passed. A Scottish tradition for hundreds of years, involving poems that are barley understandable in today's culture, and the stabbing of a haggis.
At every wedding you attend you will hear some combination of The Proclaimers "500 Miles," "Flower of Scotland," "Auld Lang Syne," and "Loch Lommond." Every single excuse you can think of is a justifiable reason to go for a night out, the slightest bit of sunlight is an excuse to dress for "summer," and if we were all to talk how we do at home, even the next town along wouldn't understand what you were saying.
When other countries think of Scotland, they think Braveheart, whisky, haggis, tartan and good old Nessie. The stereotypes that have shaped public opinion on our great nation.
But within Scotland we all have our own stereotypes of ourselves, some of them are funny and most of them you hear or read and think that is so true:
- When you go abroad you will have to correct people that no you are not English, and no you're not naturally ginger, and you don't know that person they met once who lives 400 miles away from you, because no, not everybody in Scotland knows each other.
- Buckfast, Lambrini and White Lightening are for desperate measures only, and we have ALL tried them at some point or another.
- You can easily tell people that yes Nessie is real, and Haggis is a real animal, with one leg shorter than the rest, and do this without laughing.
- Swearing like a trooper is no big deal, it is acceptable for every second word out your mouth to be "fucking."
- You're British when your winning, but back to being Scottish when you lose.
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