#1 Hospitality

We have always thought of Texas as a hospitable place, and it is. But time after time we have been blown away by how friendly and welcoming everyone has been to us. We cannot leave church without someone introducing themselves and asking where we are from and how we are settling in (even when we are trying to make a dash for the door to move on to lunch). In the first month that we were here, the pastor, counseling pastor, social events coordinator, missions director, and small group overseer had all introduced themselves to us. This is in addition to the dozens of members of the church who welcomed us and made sure we were getting along well. This is incredibly impressive to me considering the 1000 people they have coming through their church each day.

We have found this friendliness everywhere, even while riding the bus. It is an unwritten rule that every passenger tells the bus driver thank you or cheers before stepping off. 

The welcoming is even true with random people we have run into noticing we were “tourists”. The gentleman we talked to while walking through an old cemetery in St. Andrews and a gentleman as we were taking pictures of a beautiful bridge in inverness just to name a few. They each told us where to go and what to see along with sharing about their lives in Scotland. 

We chose this as our number one because it alone has made this adventure worth it. 

#2 There's no such thing as bad weather, just people who are poorly dressed

We were told, and now understand, that Scotland only has one weather forecast: Sunny spells with scattered showers. If it's sunny in the morning and you dress accordingly, you will be miserable later in the day soaking wet and freezing. The changes aren't even the worse part, but the speed at which it changes. Just walking to your bus stop or playing in the park can see a gorgeous day become cold and wet. We've since learned that before leaving the flat each morning one should always have the following three items: umbrella, jacket, and sunglasses. You will need all three everyday. We've also learned that you can't let rain get in the way of a good time. If your philosophy is to wait for it to stop raining before you go do something, you'll never go do it. You might as well go jogging in the rain or it will be 3 weeks before you can. The greatest line we've heard about Scottish weather is from a tour guide we were with the other day. He asked how long we planned to be in Scotland and told him till August. His response was. "you'll love the summer here, the rain is warmer then."  

#3 Well behaved dogs

After living here for over two months, we've noticed that the dogs in Edinburgh are the best behaved dogs in the world. Apart from walking down a crowded sidewalk, almost all dogs here are not on leashes. Normally this would result in mass hysteria with dogs running all over the place and destroying everything.  Here, dogs always stay close to their owner and I have yet to see two dogs get in to a fight. The greatest example of dog behavior here has to be at the grocery store. It never fails that each time we go grocery shopping, there is always a dog sitting perfectly still right outside the store just waiting for their owner to return. They are never tied up outside the store, just sitting there even in freezing cold temperatures and rain. We've also seen a homeless man who has a dog and while the man sits on the sidewalk, his dog is sitting in front of him holding his hat in it's mouth to collect coins. We have all sorts of new tricks to teach bear when we get home.

#4 Locks here are tricky

When Andrew and I first read our lease, we were nervous. There was a clause that if you forgot to lock the doors and the place was robbed, you were liable for all missing property of the landlord. Now, as most of you probably know, I am notorious about forgetting to lock up. In fact, we didn’t even start locking our house in Georgetown until my sister had her car broken into.  This was a problem waiting to happen. So we were somewhat relieved to find out that you can’t forget to lock the doors. That actually, every time the door closes, it locks itself. Good news: we won’t responsible for any of the property in our flat. Bad news: if you ever leave your keys on the other side of the automatically locking door, well, you are locked out. I always check and double check to make sure that I have my keys with me. But Saturday night, as Andrew was back in the states for work, I ran out the door without thinking. As the door was about to close,  I tried to get my foot in to prop it open. But it was too late. I looked in my purse and pockets hoping for my keys, but to no avail. I was locked out, and Andrew wouldn’t return until Monday morning, 36 hours later.  Now, it turns out that a lot of people have had this happen to them. So everyone had suggestions. One friend explained to me how to break in using a plastic coke bottle. Great idea, but didn’t work for me. Another friend explained I should just catch a train and get the keys from my flat mate. Brilliant, except my flat mate was an ocean away. I kept thinking why don’t people just call a locksmith when this happens. I quickly found out; the locksmiths here know that if it happens on a weekend, they are your only option for getting back in. So their weekend prices are outrageous. It would have cost 150 USD for me to get back inside. That wasn’t going to happen.   In the end I was very fortunate to have a friend offer me a place to stay until Andrew returned. Slumber party here I come! Fortunately Andrew took his keys with him, and had them in his pocket when he arrived on Monday morning. We are getting a copy of those keys made!