Glasgow Travels Part 1

Friday 29th November

Raven and I headed South to Glasgow by coach. We arrived at the coach station at about 21:00. It was dark on our drive in, but I remember passing Stirling with the castle illuminated on its crag, and then approaching Glasgow, with the tops of tower-blocks ringed by bright coloured lights (I guess that's one way of making drab 1960's architecture more exciting) and then arriving at Buchanan St. bus station rather tired! We were met by our good friends Sarge and Cordelia, and walked from the bus station to Sarge's centrally located apartment. I kept getting distracted by the amazing architecture of the central shopping distract as we walked, and at one point was so distracted by buildings that I walked into a bollard!

Our original plan was to go to Sloan's pub, and then go out for drinks in various places, but we were both too tired and too hungry, and in the end settled for popping into the Tesco mini-shop at St. Enoch's to buy food. While in there I spotted a very lovely Goth lady wearing New Rocks [if you're reading this -"hello!" - I was the girl in Gothic Lolita]. We had dinner of pittas, houmous, olives and a something that was between paella and stir-fry. 

Sadly, that night there was a terrible and fatal air accident not very far from where we were staying. A helicopter malfunctioned and crashed into the Clutha bar which was at that point rather busy as it was hosting a gig by ska band Esperanza. I had no idea that it had happened at the time. I heard a bit of a commotion, but didn't think it any more than the sorts of commotions sadly frequent on late Friday evenings on many of our city streets. Quite a few people people died - the two police officers in the helicopter and their pilot, and at least six of those who were in the pub. My heart goes out to all of the families affected. May those whose lives were cut short in this tragic accident be remembered. 

On a more cheerful note, his weekend was part of Hannukah, and Sarge, being Jewish, held a little celebration, complete with a small home-made hannukiyah and a rather specific sort of jam-filled doughnuts (yum!) Apparently a Hannukah candelabra, while often referred to as a Menorah, is actually a Hannukiyah, as a Menorah has fewer branches. The story as told to me by Sarge, goes like this: "The candelabra or Menorah as they (mistakenly) call it in English represents the original Menorah of the temple of Salomon. The temple had been sacked by the Greeks during their occupation, but the rebel Macabis drove them back, and took the temple back. They were about to proceed to light the Menorah, which had seven branches, one for every day of the week, but all the oil pots had been smashed, except a small one, which should've lasted them a day, and yet it lasted 8 days, hence the 8 days of Hannukah  and the 9 branches on a Hannukiyah (as it should be called), so 8 branches for the 8 days, and one more for the candle you use to light the others with (essentially a taper)."

That was Friday - check out my next post for what I did on Saturday! Lots of photographs aheas