DIARY: Ruminations, Occasional thoughts & happenings - as they arise
Meeting an old friend in Dundee, Scotland -
7 September 2004
In September I left my young son Conor to
Dundee. He's starting a new course at the University of Dundee
(pharmacology! - having spent a year at Queen's University Belfast - Civil
engineering and party-making! - and two years at Trinity, Dublin - Computer
Science and party-making!).
Hopefully he has at last refined his interests. I feel sure he has.
It was only after intensive research into his educational background and real
personal interests that he realised he had always been interested in the human
body, fitness, health and how we relate to drugs - legal, that is, though
illegal drugs are, of course, an important concern.
So, there we were, Conor and myself in my battered 12-year old Nissan Micra, having traveled by ferry from Belfast to Stranraer skirting Glasgow and Edinburgh to arrive in Dundee, strolling in warm sunshine thorough a fine shopping centre - until I exclaimed "Desperate Dan!" for there in the distance loomed a large statue of a childhood favorite from the Comic "Dandy".
"Desperate Dan!", I exclaimed in joy - memories of sixty years ago flooding into my mind, recollection of slowly walking back home from the newsagent, browsing on the new, weekly activities of the famous cow-pie eater.
Conor my not have the same memories, but he agreed to stand
beside my childhood hero while I took a photo:
Hooray! Desperate Dan - a son of Dundee, famous for the "Dandy" and the "Beano", Cake and Marmalade! I was really tickled to see him.
Dundee itself? Quite a pleasant city, after one gets over the slightly forbidding impression created by dark-brown sandstone buildings - a feature of many Scottish cities. Everyone we talked to was warmly welcoming. A great university city, with a lot of life hidden behind those brown walls.
I reckon Conor is going to have a fine time, studying something
in which he is really interested.
That's half the battle, isn't it? Such a trouble for young people,
deciding what to do with their lives!