Scotland Part 2

 Day 4 

Breakfast at Thomas J Walls Coffee today, a little coffee shop right opposite the National Musseum of Scotland. We wanted to go to Mum's Cafe originally but it was closed. I don't think I'm a breakfast person, I just can't eat much first thing when I wake up. 

We had pre-booked the National Musseum and when we got there it was super covid-proofed with a one way system in place and with many parts of the musseum cordoned off. There were 3 floors in the musseum, a fashion gallery of what people in different countries wore, an animal section and a science section. There wasn't much about actual Scottish history in the musseum but we did learn that Scotland was originally inhabitated by the Picts who were then driven out by the Scots who were from Ireland. Interesting how no one is really 'originally' from anywhere and people are constantly migrating and mixing their cultures. The Scottish people now are a mix of Picts and Scots from Ireland. 

I liked the exhibit about Mary Queen of Scots the most. She had such a difficult life and was then exiled by her son to London where she was executed by her cousin. Historically most things are just power centred and people end up being casualties. Almost every monarch was overthrown, ousted or exiled and many times by their own family. Familial ties can be so fragile. 

                                        

James did a kebab food run for dinner which turned out to be a super healthy kebab and not a greasy one with chips like I was expecting. 

Day 5 

When we were planning this trip James suggested going to the Edinburgh Zoo because we both love zoos and animals. Growing up I never really went to any zoos because my mum didn't believe in having animals in captivity. Did so much research about whether we should go and this article from the New York Times in particular made me realise that animals shouldn't be in zoos at all. James had already booked the tickets by the time I told him I didn't want to go anymore so I was feeling a little guilty when we went this morning. 

The enclosures at the Edinburgh Zoo were massive compared to any other zoo I had seen before. Each animal had almost a field of land and a closed area away from the public. Although this doesn't make up for being able to roam freely as they would in the wild it did make me feel slightly better about being there. Most animals had a list of public sponsors that paid to maintain them as well as support from the zoo itself. There were so many Malaysian animals too surprisingly like the Malayan Tiger, Tapir and Sun Bears. Best thing about it was the wallaby field where they were free range and you could just stroll into the field.

Because of lockdown rules in Scotland, everything shuts down at 6pm because of covid. So once we were done with the zoo and walked to Arthurs Seat we had dinner at this little burger diner near the hotel which did burgers and shakes and it was so good, even better than 5 guys.  

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