How I Fell In Love With Scotland

I’m rediscovering Scotland; I’m falling in love with it again.

Sam Heughan 

Here I am, in Scotland. Though I was born here, I didn’t live here until much later in my childhood, due to my parents’ work abroad. Suddenly forced to leave our home in Central Asia as a result of political unrest, we found ourselves thrown back into a country and a culture that I had never really known. All I remember of the first few weeks here is a blur of grey days and dark, restless nights. Honestly, I felt like an immigrant in my own passport country. This is the story of how I learned to love this mysterious land, and finally came to call it home.

My name is Kathryn Hediye, though these days and in this country, I go by Kat. On the surface, I am a Scot. I have what could be considered an ancient Scottish heritage, descended from the McSporran Clan, and filled to the brim with Scottish blood. I have received a Scottish education, currently live in Scotland, and have even developed a mild Scottish accent to match.

When I first moved here however, I couldn’t understand the Glaswegian dialect, was clueless about popular culture, and felt like no matter what I did and how hard I tried, I didn’t fit. On top of it all, I was deeply grieving for my friends, my family, and my culture back home in Central Asia, though I didn’t know it at the time. When I’m in Central Asia, I’m considered Scottish, but when I was young, this supposed fact couldn’t seem further from the truth. Though I’m naturally confident and expressive, my outsider status at school combined with the sudden and traumatic move had a huge knock on effect on my self-esteem, and I withdrew into myself.

With not much more than pens and paint for company, I found solace in writing and artistic expression. There was comfort in the rhythm of Scottish poetry, and I started writing my own poems and stories, as a way of processing my grief. Art was my second love, serving as a colourful escape out of the cold, grey environment surrounding me. Claude Monet’s paintings reflected the way in which I simultaneously felt like a vague yet resolutely vibrant outline of my true self, and Picasso powerfully demonstrated how I could use art to express how I felt, even if the expression of those feelings isn’t deemed pretty or acceptable by everyone else. Finally, the Scottish Charles Rennie Macintosh style didn’t bring any such deep emotional revelation, but was rather an escape into lines and symmetry, where I could feel peacefully present and far from my worries, intent on nothing more than curved roses and stripes etched out on the page. In feeling a connection to Scottish art and poetry, I felt like I had found a key to connect to the country itself. Art also showed me a different way of looking at nature, which is the thing I love most about Scotland.

Moving from a rural setting in Central Asia to a Western city was a big shock to the system, and I believe a big reason for this is because I felt incredibly disconnected from nature. As I have grown older though, I have travelled more though Scotland and discovered the mountainous landscapes Scotland is famous for. Even in big cities such as Glasgow and Edinburgh, there is a wealth of beautiful country parks, just a stone’s throw from the inner city. Smelling the pine, feeling the earth beneath my feet, gazing out to blue mountains, tasting sweet Scottish water, and swimming in ice cold lochs has been a deeply healing process for me. It seems that the best way to finally feel Scottish was to reach out my hands and touch. It’s taken over a decade, and I’m still a mishmash of many cultures, but for all the inner-heart battles I’ve fought, I believe I’m counted among Scotland the Brave.