Page 148 - Microsoft Word - Guiding lights final version 0841 1007 big print.doc

Edinburgh, not even a decent map of Scotland in Japan (no google maps at that time!). Once she arrived, she found herself as the only Japanese person in town and was often asked to show Japanese visitors around.
Sachiko McKay also experienced similar struggles to find a book about Scotland and ended up helping her author husband’s research of Thomas Glover. Though Glover’s name was very well known in Japan, the fact he was Scottish was virtually unknown until recently.
‘I too came to Edinburgh as a tourist and a language student in 1987,’ she said. ‘At that time there wasn’t a single guidebook of Scotland or any books about Scotland in Japan. Scotland was only mentioned in general English guidebooks and usually it was only about Nessie!
With these new opportunities, suddenly, the Japanese public were keen to visit Scotland.
After all, this is the land of whisky, golf, and home of the Bay City Rollers. Many dreamy eyed Japanese ladies also filled the coaches to find the perfect spot to take a picture of the heather covered glens, where Princess Diana had her honeymoon.’
Nevertheless, as Naoko Tamura found, you constantly need to remind them that they were in Scotland and NOT in England! ‘According to STGA’s statics, in 1978 there were no Japanese Blue Badge Guides’ Naoko said. ‘During the 80s only two people were qualified, Kozo Hoshino and Akiko Patterson. Sadly, Akiko passed away before her time in the early 90s. She was our mentor and friend and we all hold her memory dearly.
‘Clearly this wasn’t enough to meet the increasing demand of the market. Some of us were already working alongside a local Japanese agency in an unofficial capacity until STGA decided to hold a course to increase the number of Japanese speaking guides.
Reiko Inder was in Orkney working at a local school when a friend showed her a newspaper article about the guide course. Reiko decided to apply and was pleasantly surprised to find many fellow Japanese girls were attending the course. She said ‘The first course held in 1989 led to ten new guides gaining their qualification in 1990. More had qualified by 1995 and 1996 but then the numbers began to slow. Currently we have 15 qualified guides, with the majority gaining their qualification during the 1990s, and we are all still working strong.
Reiko continued: ‘Such was the demand of the time, even with the new guides, there weren’t enough bodies to cover all the tours. Japanese wanted to see all of Scotland and itineraries often became so packed that they included a day trip to Loch Ness, a lunch trip to Skye from Inverness and back, and we would often even manage to squeeze in a half hour stop at St Andrews, all during a four day round trip of
147