In September last year, I moved into a flat on Dundas street in the New Town of Edinburgh with two close friends. Diving into my final year at university, I decided it was time to achieve something I had hitherto never done. Namely, become a local at a pub. Social life in my first year was too volatile and fragmentary to allow for the routine commitment necessary to establish myself as a ‘local’ anywhere. I was more concerned with the nightclubs at that stage. The kaleidoscopic lights; the suggestive but ear-ringing music and the dancing with fellow virile students. Sitting in a dimly lit room in the company of red faced Scottish imbibers did not seem a very attractive way to pass ones time in comparison. My second year was hamstrung by Covid. I was not all that keen on wearing a mask in between sips of my pint and throughout visits to the bathroom so opted to drink copious numbers of tinnies back in the flat. I am not really sure why I didn't achieve the objective in my third year. Perhaps a decent pub wasn’t close enough. Indeed our nearest were mostly concerned with capturing the custom of middle aged theatre goers. £5 pints and a sanitary atmosphere. Or you could pop down the road Wetherspoons, an experience which resembles having a pint in Tesco. Neither were for me.
My final year was then upon me. The opportunity was ripe for two reasons. I had learnt that standing in a nightclub for hours, with small interludes for shifting from side to side and pumping my fist into the air in an effort to advertise enjoyment was no longer that enjoyable. Receding, beer in hand, into a conversation on the hierarchy of artistic creativity or the potency of Erling Haaland seemed much better. I had reached the next stage of the evolution of man. Next steps (which I hope will never happen to me) include the enjoyment of long distance cycling, and fascination in the mechanics of lawnmowers. I digress. The other reason why it was high time to become a local was our proximity to the perfect pub.
The Wally Dug sits on the edge of Northumberland street beneath Kweilin, an exemplar, family-run Chinese restaurant. The perfect set up. We often fantasised drilling a hole in the roof of the pub to give instant access to Chow Mein. A small set of steps leads down to the pub. Its positioning, just below the level of the road adds to a feeling of escapism as one enters. There are three rooms. The first is the biggest and contains the bar, some seating space and a piano. ‘The study’, off the right of the bar contains only seating space, and ‘the library’ at the back has seating and some space to stand. The dim orange glow of industrial lamps lights the pub. The furniture is an odd mixture of rickety wooden pieces. Portraits of spaniels, paintings of game animals and ornamental mirrors adorn the walls. The atmosphere is original, but does not have that sordid masculinity which afflicts many city establishments and dissuades the custom of the more light hearted.
Kingsley Amis was a fastidious analyst of pub life. He lamented on what he saw as its decline in the 1980s, criticising everything from the blanket taste of the beer to the ‘tv commercialisation’ of interiors. But what really got to him was the presence of music and the way it disrupted conversation:
If you dislike what is being played, you use up energy and patience in the attempt to ignore it; if you like it , you will want to listen to it and not talk or be talked to, not to do what you came to the pub largely to do.
While one disagrees with Amis on matters of drink at their peril, I can’t say this is totally true. If not too loud and selected sensibly, music can act as a background beat to the rhythm of conversation. This was for the most part the case in the Dug. The playlist was exquisite, ranging from Pink Floyd to the Stone Roses, essential listening for students. The opportunity for audio mob rule was not presented by a juke box. Nor did the music put off older drinkers. The age of visitors to the Dug ranged from early 20s to I assume late 70s. If the volume did ever rise too high and inhibit conversation, the staff were polite enough to turn it down upon request.
Beer is also a key ingredient of any good local. I am not of the age to have established a sophisticated pallet but I do get tired of instinctively signalling for a fizzy and blanket taste lager which is often the cheapest option. The Dug managed to set itself apart in this department. To my surprise and wonder, at the beginning of the year there was a student discount on the ale, brewed by the Scottish outfit More Ales. The selection of bitters and pale ales had interesting names such as Tea Vicar and Auld Money. While the taste of each was not exemplary, it was a welcome break from the constant flow of Tennents. Amis decried the lack of draught beers to be found in pubs, stating ale could not be described as ‘real’ if it was from a keg. The setup here would have appeased the deceased novelist.
To my surprise he never laid out his criterium for pub staff. George Orwell did, however. He wanted barmaids to ‘know most of the customers by name, and take a personal interest in everyone.’ At risk of critiquing another venerated scribbler, Orwell’s pub utopia sounds all a bit too easy. There is merit in having to ‘earn ones place’ as a local. For me this involved early antagonisation from the barman. He would often overlook me to serve more seasoned visitors or be curt when I was deciding what to drink. I understand this prickly behaviour would put many off. But there was a definite sense of achievement when I broke through the abrasive barrier to become known on first name terms. We even came to each others side in an acrobatic debate with ardent Scottish nationalists. He was present but never imposing. If you were in the midst of conversation with friends you would not be interrupted. Somehow the balance was about right.
There is far more to comment about the Wally Dug: the out of key piano, the cosy outdoor ‘Dug outs’ and the smoking area in which you straddle between drunken fantasy and up market urban realism. Nevertheless, a long yarn on the place I spent many hours of my last year studying is likely to bore the reader. Instead, I shall bid good bye to the Dug and shift my sights to the urban metropolis that is London, and fortify myself for the battle to become a local at one of its many drinking houses.
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A great read