Heart of Midlothian

Am ehemaligen Eingang des «Tolbooth», dem früherem Verwaltungssitz und Gefängnis des Bezirks Midlothian ist dieses Herz im Bodenbelag eingepflastert.
Traditionell wird auf diese Stelle gespuckt, um die Verachtung für die Sassenachs und Mitgefühl für deren Gefangenen auszudrücken.
Viele Menschen, insbes. Touristen laufen heute aber darüber hinweg, ohne es zu beachten. oder zu bemerken.

Me encantan las tradiciones, y yo soy muy de seguirlas todas. Mucho ojo con pasar por encima del Heart Of Midlothian y no echarle un buen gargajo, porque la tradición dice que si lo haces, volverás a Escocia y encontrarás al amor de tu vida.
Así que no hagas oídos sordos y prepara un buen escupitajo en tu paseíllo por la Royal Mile, porque allá donde fueres, haz lo que vieres.

The heart of The Mile
a pleasant sight on a stroll
Spit for luck or not…

I love this place. Go up to the heart of midlothian in the royal mile Edinburgh, It’s about the only place in Edinburgh where you can spit. OK it’s disguating but apparantly if you spit in it the story story has it you’ll be lucky in love.

The only reason I’m not getting all excited about the rating is that, 1) no-one’s feelings will get hurt and 2) I generally dislike inanimate things that have crowds of tourists creating a blockade between me and my destination. This include Greyfriar’s Bobby (it’s all a lie, by the way!).
Also, I have hella superstitious friends. Friends who will physically push me away from three drains lined up (or something like that). Friends who will not let me walk on their other side, because you’re not supposed to cross over them or something ridiculous like that. Friends that spit on the Heart of Midlothian every single time they walk passed it. These friends are of the few people I know from Edinburgh. And so they’ve probably been doing this for 21 years. Them and many more. This is only one reason I’m not particularly interested in the Heart of Midlothian.
But hey, it’s one of those places that’s free and you’ll probably walk by it anyway, so maybe if you’re feeling glum, you should give it a good spit for good luck. But, please try aiming accurately.

I am actually part of on an ongoing controlled experiment into whether its true that the arcane powers of the Heart of Midlothian really do stop you from finding true love. I’ll let you know how that goes.
The Heart of Midlothian is a famous sight of a 15^th century tollbooth often used for public execution. Though that habit has more or less died out over the years, the «Heart» is still a victim of phony public scorn with the local habit of spitting on the site, still on the go.
Despite every tour leader and his wife stopping at this famous site, there isn’t really much to see at the Heart of Midlothian. If you’re the sort of person who needs their attractions to «do stuff» you’ll probably be disappointed. The Heart of Midlothian just lies there being a bit stone. It’s not beautiful or master craft stone-​masonry either. But its free, it famous and you’ll probably bump into it anyway.

The saying goes, that if you walk directly over the Heart of Midlothian, you will never find true love. I walked over it nonchalantly the other day, and was shouted at for apparently stepping straight into the superstitious jaws of bad luck. I could well be cursed for life now, however I’ve walked under quite a few ladders and probably also broken a mirror in my time too, so I don’t suppose a love curse is going to affect matters that much.
The Heart of Midlothian marks a spot where there used to be executions, and somehow this translates into the not classy in any way practice of spitting on the heart for good luck. Never mind the curse of never finding true love if you step on the heart, what about the dirty fact that you’re walking over the liquid contents of other people’s mouths? If you spit on the heart, legend also has it that this means you’ll return to Edinburgh, much like throwing a coin into the Trevi Fountain in Rome, but not nearly as scenic.
Anyway, if you want to find this heart shaped Royal Mile decoration, it’s near St Giles High Kirk and Parliament House. It gets a three, purely because I really dislike spitting in public, call me uptight.