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The city, a clear target of the industrial revolution, became
one of Britain’s centers for ironwork and shipbuilding.
However, by the mid 1900s, economic depression crushed much
of Glasgow’s blue-collar industry and left the city teeming
with underprivileged neighborhoods and crime. Major projects
to beautify Glaswegian squares and gentrify neighborhoods
took effect by the end of the 20th century, and while somewhat
successful, evidence of the “old” Glasgow wrought
with poverty stricken tenements and violent drunken football
rivalries can still be detected (much to the dismay of city
officials determined to give Glasgow a complete face lift
to draw tourists the way nobly handsome neighboring Edinburgh
does). The undeniable truth that most of Glasgow’s prevailing
industry has faded away and its population is nearly half
the size it was six decades ago drapes a sense of self-consciousness
on the city that often smothers Glasgow’s contemporary
urban urgency, substance and cheerful politeness.
It is a fascinating city for a traveler to understand when
there seems to be no clear way to do so. However, the best
way to begin to construe Glasgow is through the Glaswegians
themselves.
As in most of Britain’s northern cities, there are few
better places to meet with the locals than a dim, smoke-veiled
neighborhood drinking hole; one of the great bastions of the
community. In pub after pub, I realized that while I was led
to believe Glaswegians speak English, their conversations
prove quite the contrary. Regardless, a few pints were often
all it took to begin to understand that thick Glasgow accent.
I sat at a bar wrestling with that alien language one night,
doing my best to translate to myself the questions an extremely
welcoming patron, on leave from the army, was throwing at
me. His inquiries were of the typical fashion most natives
of distant lands like to ask this young Philadelphian; revolving
mainly around America’s president, Metallica and Pamela
Anderson, and I was trying my hardest to interpret and field
them as they came my way between numerous refills.
Thirty minutes into our conversation, the soldier suddenly
perked up and asked excitedly, “Dewey dew eh?”
It took several moments to realize he was asking me if I
took the drug ecstasy, and before I could say no he slammed
his glass on the bar, twirled around, and ripped his shirt
off, exposing a fresh eight-inch wound over his right shoulder
blade.
I gasped and tried to argue that he should be in a hospital,
as he cheerfully explained that ten hours earlier he had woken
from a daze and realized that he had been slashed with a knife
at a nightclub at some point during a drunken ecstasy-fueled
stupor. To my astonishment, he chuckled, dismissed the whole
incident, put his shirt back on, sat back down on his stool,
and offered to buy me another drink.
Now I realize that immediately friendly, yet tough no-nonsense,
Scottish scrapper was my best means of understanding the city
of Glasgow’s underlying character, and for that, I am
grateful.
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Travel Writers: Glaswegian Gallantry by
Nicholas Lindner
