Yesterday I went to Fester Road for some pictures. I’m writing some articles about the derby and needed some pictures. I’ve only been there once before. So I had to made some new photos. Funnily it was almost exactly six years ago (19/10/2008, also an Edinburgh derby). After I made some pictures, I saw a wee plaque with the text “celebrating the famous 5”. I thought it was funny to put my finger in the air next to it. I know it’s not very original, but as part of the research for my book I needed to do it. I was giggeling like a wee schoolgirl when I did it, but then a guy with a dug came around the corner. He had seen me making that picture and said:

“What are you doing, cunt?”

The guy was a bit smaller than me, but also looked a bit tougher. In a fight I would propably have lost. And If I had won, that angry dug of him would had propably killed me. So I decided to act as the totally unaware foreigner and made my accent even thicker as it normally is.

“Huh, what do you mean?”

The angry guy was a bit suprised by my accent and looked perplexed. But he wasn’t 100% convinced.

“I saw you doing the fucking 5-1.”

I saw he was not amused and even his dug looked supicious at me. So I tried to even act more unaware.

“What is a 5-1?”

He didn’t explained it to me, but said it has something to do with Hearts. He felt for my bad acting.

“But why the fuck are you here?”

I explained to him that I was a tourist and just liked making photos of football grounds.

“After this one I maybe go to Tynecastle as well. Is it far from here?”

He didn’t liked it that I mentioned Tynecastle, but his angryness was luckily gone.

“Don’t go fucking there. It’s a horrible place with an old ramshackled stand. You can better go to Murrayfield. That’s a good ground. And there is just another ground up the road here.”

I thank him for the advice, said goodbye and was quite happy he didn’t punched me in the face. Research can be dangerous.