Calling Scotland - Kerry

Tuesday, I had my first experience talking to real live Scottish people on the phone. That is, I have spoken with Scottish people in person, but these were Scottish people in Scotland. Does that actually make any difference? I don't know, but it seemed significant at the time.

I have assumed primary responsibility for the finding and procuring of housing in Edinburgh. I felt this was fair since I enjoy doing this and since Lara is doing everything else. You know, 50-50. I have discovered one thing about Scottish people: they do not easily return emails. Perhaps this is an example of sowing and reaping, as my friend JDD will likely comment below. Nevertheless, I am not made of money that I can buy phone cards every few minutes in order to make international phone calls. I also discovered that there is a particular type of phone number in the UK that is like an 800 number in the US, but actually charges me more than the standard call amount. This, I thought, was somewhat backward. I thought the idea of a business toll-free number was to encourage customers to call you, but instead, these phone numbers appear to charge me, the caller, more in order to pay for the business's internet and phone charges. Obviously, these people have not fully grasped the glories of capitalism.

But as I was saying, I have been attempting to make contact with Scottish property management companies via email in order to secure a place for Lara and me to live. However, until very recently, the longest email response I have received after I would send a query about properties was, “Sorry, this property has been let.” That was it. No alternate suggestions, no further commentary or questions. Come on, people, take some initiative! I am wanting to spend some money here! But I have grace on the proto-capitalists with a poor work ethic and send them another email declaring that I am not specifically attached to the particular property in question and would very much appreciate any assistance they might give me in securing a property with certain characteristics and am very open to whatever suggestions they may have and kind regards, yours truly, with all due respect, hugs and kisses, and so on and so forth. Thereafter there comes no reply. Period. This pattern has taken place at least half a dozen times.

Finally, I broke down and decided to call someone. This is a bit tricky, because I cannot do this in the evening, since that is the middle of the night in Edinburgh. I must call in the morning. So Tuesday morning, I targeted two specific companies that had promising properties. My first task was to figure out how to make the call. I found the phone numbers, which were 11 digit phone numbers made up of a group of four, a group of three, and a final group of four. The first group of four, I discovered, was called a city code, much like our area code, but it is not always the same length, and it is not always attached to a city, either. The last seven digits, like our last seven digits, are the prefix and number, though I don't think the prefixes are assigned to specific carriers, as in the United States, since I think the phone lines are government operated (I'm not sure about this; someone may feel free to correct me). But these seven digits are not always seven digits. That depends on what city you're calling. Sometimes it's eight. With my phone card, I had to dial the 800 number of the card, hit 1 or English, enter a 10 digit pin, hit *5, dial 011 for international, 44 (for UK), then, according to the phone card, the city code and local number. The city code, however, turned out not to be exactly the same as the city code I had learned about. It was a version truncated by one digit. That did not make sense to me. Perhaps it will in heaven. I'll ask Jesus about it.

Finally, I sorted it all out and “ring ring.” This was also new, since the “ring ring” was a short grouping of two polite “rings”, as opposed to the more grandiose and significant “rings” one hears when dialing American phones. When the woman answered, her greeting was so quickly spoken and quiet that I simply had to assume she said something like “Thank you for calling so and so, how can I help you?” She could have said, “Cursed are you above all callers for interrupting my tea time,” and I would not have been able to tell. I haltingly identified myself and my purpose for calling, suddenly aware of how completely American I sounded. All of a sudden, every single phrase coming from my lips sounded idiomatic. I found myself thinking, “What sort of second person plural pronoun do I use?” It's easy in the US. Even if someone is not from the south, you know they understand “Y'all.” She was gracious and polite, but no she did not have any properties at the moment that were suitable. I must say this about the Scottish: so far, when I can get them to communicate with me they are extremely polite. They might secretly hate my guts, but it certainly does not come across over the phone or email.

I had no problems with her accent, though I have to say I was not expecting to. I usually am pretty good at understanding accents foreign to my own. Being emboldened by this successful phone call, I called the second, expecting the same ease of communication. The man's greeting was most likely in English, I think.

Once again I identified myself and my situation. We managed to exchange a few sentences, though I was growing worried because this man's accent was the strongest I had ever encountered personally. Finally, he spurted out a long sentence so fast and so thick with his Gaelic ancestry that I was immediately lost. Then the sentence ended abruptly with an upturned tone of voice indicating he sought a response. Unfortunately, the two words I had recognized were not enough to help me establish the syntax of the whole sentence and I, humiliatingly, was forced to say (likely not for the last time), “I'm sorry, could you repeat that?” I, who have prided myself on a good ear and above average linguistic skills was struck down in my second ever phone conversation.

What he had said was that I should talk to his associate in Edinburgh (this company handles properties in many cities) because his associate has actually been to these properties and could tell me more. Unfortunately, this last phone call had depleted my phone card because it was one of those backwards toll-free numbers I mentioned before. So I asked him for his associate's email address. I haven't gotten a response, yet.