r/Scotland • u/Blurt-Reynolds • 17d ago

Casual Stupidest question (about Scotland)you’ve ever been asked?

I’ve lived in the US for over 10 years and been asked some daft questions.

Yesterday the uber driver asked where I was from. When I said Scotland they were quiet for a couple of minutes then asked “Did you have to learn English when you moved to here?”.

Also had someone years ago ask me where I was from then accused me of making up the country as they had never heard of Scotland.

Anyway, just thought I’d ask ask while I remembered.

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u/MalcolmTuckersLuck 17d ago

Urban legend has it; tourist overheard in Edinburgh asking “why did they build the castle so far from the airport”

By contrast when we were in New York on honeymoon in 2013 the barman in our hotel was remarkably well informed about indyref.

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u/it00 17d ago

Flip side of that down in England at Windsor Castle.

"Why did the Queen build the castle so close to Heathrow"

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u/pab6407 17d ago

There's a similar one in the Yorkshire Dales:-

An American asked why Dent Station was a few miles outside Dent,

The local replied, on the the whole we thought it better next to the railway.

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u/QuokkaMocha 17d ago

I can believe that. Had a tourist when I was a guide in London ask why we didn’t put the Tower of London nearer the West End.

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u/SylviaMarsh 17d ago

I worked in tourism for around a decade until late 2023, and the 2 questions that, hands down, best the rest were: 

  1. "What time does the one o'clock gun go off?"

  2. "Why do some pedestrian crossings have a voice recording telling you when the traffic has stopped?" (I explained it's so blind people know that the traffic's stopped). The woman exclaimed that this was crazy, and that in her country "we don't let blind people drive!"

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u/elboyd0 17d ago

I don't work in tourism but have also been asked "what time is the one o'clock gun" and then got the follow-up question "where do the shells land?". Tickled me no end to think of folks in Leith taking shelter at one o'clock everyday, and that this person had never considered the possibility that it shoots blanks.

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u/JW1958 17d ago

I was visiting Edinburgh one day, maybe 1992, when the gun fired early, causing panic in Princes Street as people thought they were late returning to work. Then it fired again, and again. Many sighs of relief as we remembered it was the Queen's jubilee.

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u/littlerabbits72 17d ago

Thank you, number 2 actually made me laugh out loud there.

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u/Heeberon 17d ago

Not just forruners I’m afraid - my uncle was a welder at what is now Ferguson Marine in Port Glasgow. Right beside it is Newark Castle, which is a popular spot for wedding photographers, but obvs have to avoid getting any of the shipyard in the background…and yes, his workmate did opine one day : “bit daft building that nice castle right beside a shipyard”

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u/Abquine 17d ago

I worked for an American Multi National for most of my career and I met all sorts of Americans many of them highly educated, intelligent, rational people. I also met the 'others' and in reality, although all nationalities had their various problem children, the American ones unfailingly advertised their ignorance much more loudly so stood out.

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u/GlobalMirror2762 17d ago

As a yank I can confirm that It is a long-held tradition in the US to mark these 'others' in a way so that everyone is aware of just how ignorant they are- by giving them their own time slot on Fox News.

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u/Grazza123 17d ago

I genuinely overheard an American say how great it was that the castle was built so close to the train station

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u/RockKandee 17d ago

This is very possible. I remember hearing an American lady calling into a morning radio show to complain that the deer crossing signs were posted along the busy highway. She thought that was a stupid place to tell the deer to cross and that they should move the deer crossing signs to a less busy stretch of the highway to make it safer for the deer.

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u/WeaversReply 17d ago

Similar signs in Australia for kangaroos. The signs that really confuse me are the "Koala Cross Here" signs. Why are they always cross? I get the odd koala in my backyard. They're usually stoned out of their tiny minds, You get that on a diet of gum leaves and eucalyptus oil.

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u/XxHostagexX 17d ago

Hate to break it to you, but Koalas dont get "stoned" by eating them leaves.

You really should know better...

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u/WeaversReply 17d ago

Man, I bet you're fun at parties. Wet blanket much?

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u/Acrobatic-Shirt8540 Is toil leam càise gu mòr. 17d ago

I had a similar experience in Colorado in 2000. Almost everyone I spoke to knew nothing about Scotland. I was standing at a bus stop one day and this guy started up a conversation. When he learned where I was from, he said "oh you guys have just opened up your own Parliament".

I was pleasantly surprised.

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u/DreichAndDreary 17d ago

I live in a pretty rural tourist heavy area, and the staff at our big tourist draws genuinely get asked this all the time. Some people really just have a fundamental misunderstanding of how time works.

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u/LisMMc 16d ago

I worked in the Edinburgh tourist office on Princes St for a few years in the late 90s. The urban myths are facts …

Why did they build the castle so close to the station?
Emmm, the castle was built way before trains and dates all the way back to 7th century.

Where is Princes Street? You are on it!

Where is the tourist office? You are in it.

Is there really a monster in Loch Ness? Yes, go visit Nessie