I meant to mention this in my last post because I found it so weird, but I completely forgot. Every Friday a few of the teachers walk up to a nearby bratwurst and pommes frites (french fry) place and eat lunch away from the school. While there we talked about what our plans were for the week break we have off school in October. My cooperating teacher (CT) is going to Jordan and one of the other teachers is headed to somewhere like Africa. I shared that I would be going to Scotland and Ireland and suddenly everyone was staring at me incredulously. "Why would you want to go THERE?!?" I wasn't quite sure how to answer that question. "Why wouldn't I want to go there?" Apparently the Brits have issues with the Irish and the Scots.
THEN, while on the alternative tour, I was chatting with some Scottish exchange students. (They seemed inordinately distressed that I was travelling by myself, for some reason) I told them that I had been hanging out with people but most of them went back to London. At the word London one of the girls suddenly snorted disdainfully. I then relayed the story above to her and asked what the issue was. The Scottish guy broke in with, "The English are retarded!" and then she explained further with, "Have you ever seen Braveheart? It's basically that." They seemed genuinely upset so I laughed nervously and then quickly changed the subject.
Whoops didn't mean to stumble into any cultural grudges....
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