Mirko Rambusch's Testimonial

When I think of Stornoway, I think of the castle, the Lews Castle.And immediately the Lews Castle College comes to my mind. That is where the 2-weeks-fast-track-practical-english-for-personal-development-intensive-language-course took place.

I attended this course from the 12th to the 26th of July 2009.

Everything started with my plane arriving in Stornoway on a Sunday. What I didn’t know at that time was, that this is in fact a kind of special circumstances. There is, except to the airport, nearly no public life in Stornoway, nor on the Islands at all, on a Sunday. Restaurants, pubs and cafes are closed and so are fuel-stations, shops, supermarkets. There are no buses on a Sunday and until a few weeks ago there was not even a ferry. This is part of the Hebridean life and, though it seemed weird from my large-city-used point-of-view first, it became kind of a symbol for the different and unique way of life on the Hebridean Isles.

But as I was told, the airport was working even on a Sunday and the director of the Murray International Language Centre, Gordon Murray himself, waited for me at the airport-lounge.

It was a very warm welcome and I was really impressed, that the director of the school came on his own. Later-on I found out that Gordon is the director, teacher and even founder of the language-centre altogether in one person and that impressed me even more.

We drove to the Bridge-Centre, which would become my home for the next two weeks and due to that fact, I was excited. When we arrived I was introduced to the staff in the person of Marion a very nice and helpful woman. Whenever there was a problem or even a silly question she or Mike, the other staff-member, gave a helping hand.

The Bridge-Centre is a modern and neat building. Located between Stornoway Castle (5 min. walk) and the City-Centre (5 min. walk as well) it offers a great view onto the harbour and the possibility to stay in the heart of the Hebridean Capital. I had a comfortable small room, equipped with a desk, wardrobe and cupboard, a desk, sunk and of course my bed. A leather armchair stood in front of the large windows, that looked onto the woodlands of the Castle-Grounds and a gentle stream beneath the trees that rises and falls according to the tides of the nearby harbour. Last but not least, I had my own small bathroom with shower and toilet.

The Bridge-Centre offers a few clean and well-equipped common kitchens, that used to be perfect for cooking and moreover for socialising. It’s a great possibility to meet other guys, who are staying at the Bridge-Centre, getting in touch, having fun and making new friends –this is a perfect opportunity to practice English.

Finally there’s a games hall as well as outdoor-tennis courts, crazy golf, pool billiard, table football, ping pong and lots of other possibilities to stop you studying too hard.

Of course I did! The language course started on the next day with an introduction to Stornoway by my teacher, Gordon. So I spent my first sunny English-lesson under a blue sky, while walking through the nice town, coming across the small harbour, authentic Harris-Tweed-Shops and unique Scottish pubs.

Gordon showed me the arts- and sports-centre, the bus-station, the public library (with free internet-facilities) and the supermarket. We had lunch at some quiet and delicious Thai-restaurant, where I found myself invited by my teacher, who insisted on paying the bill.It’s part of the service, he said, I remember him using this sentence very often. Seemed to be one of his favourites. In fact if anyone knows, how to care for his students it’s Gordon Murray. He managed somehow that I felt like…like everyone had just waited for this bloody, silly German to arrive in Stornoway.

I neither felt like a stranger nor like a visitor. I felt like becoming one small piece of the puzzle that showed the picture of the Hebrides to the world and it would be missing something if I weren’t there. Actually, I wasn’t, but I really felt like becoming a part of it.

I got involved and that’s what I appreciated most of my time in Scotland.

After the lunch I was shown some more important things of the town, like the post office and finally the Lews-Castle and the Lews-castle-college with the classroom where the course should take place.

All in all, Stornoway is a lovable town that knows how to enchant you with its picturesque places, its authentic pubs, its relaxed pace of life, its approachable people, attitude and atmosphere.

The next couple of days I attended the language course during the morning, together with an Italian girl. The location of the Bridge-Centre is perfect for this, therefore it takes you a nice 5-minute stroll through a secluded and verdant forest to get to the college.

We started the course at 9 or 10 am and did a short break at 11.30 and another break from 1-2pm for lunch. Usually we had lunch in one of the fish-and-chips-shops in the city or at the woodlands-centre, a nice cafe in the Castle-Grounds, near the college.

The course went on until 4pm and after doing some homework we spent the nights with our new friends from the Bridge-Centre, cooking, talking, gaming or just relaxing and watching „the office“ or stupid movies on youtube, it was nice fun.

Besides, the Hebridean Celtic Festival took place all over Stornoway right in the second week of my stay. One could positively feel the thrill of anticipation in the days before the start of the festival and when it has actually begun everyone became even more excited. There were numerous Live-Bands playing in the Festival Grounds, the town hall, the arts-centre and nearly every single pub in the town. So we went out quite a lot during the festival time, absorbing the fantastic atmosphere. It was an amazing experience becoming part of this celebrating city.

During the lessons I had a lot of interesting conversation with my Italian classmate and our Caledonian teacher, who even taught us a few Gaelic words. The main subject, by the way, was learning English and so I did.

It was a lot of grammar-work in the course, but we learned new vocabulary and dealt with idioms – I liked these parts. We had a lot of quite good conversation about everything under the sun. I would have need more time to put all the new learned items into practice. But although this review is on the English Course, the experience I made was much more than that.

If I only wanted to do an English-Course, I would probably have gone to London or Oxford , but the decision to go to Stornoway, was a decision to dig deeper, to look beyond the horizon, to really get involved in an authentic Scottish-Gaelic community, learning English on the fly.

After my course finished I spent one more week on the Islands doing some camping within the sheer beauty of the Lewis-Landscapes, especially Uig, gave me the impression of paradise.

I would strongly recommend to everyone who’s thinking about doing a language-course at the MiLC to allow oneself some more time to wholly experience Hebridean life and encounters with a marvellous nature and Gaelic culture.

I will remember my stay on the Islands for a long time and I am already making plans on how and when to return.

Finally, I want to thank all the nice people I met in Stornoway, thanks to all the guys from the Bridge-Centre for being this open-minded, welcoming and crazy, thanks to Cheggs (www.surflewis.co.uk) and his pal, who made me become addicted to surfing, thanks to the sheep that didn‘t jump in front of my rental car and big thanks to Gordon for being himself and the day he made the decision to start his own language centre at the edge of Europe but at the same time - in its heart.

Mirko