Both my mum and me enjoy driving. Always have. We were taught by my dad who ran a driving school outside of school hours (he was officially a PE teacher). Nearly caused their divorce – as it turned out that was only delayed.  We also share a liking for small blue cars. This stems from both a general lack of finances and an inability to parallel park. Why blue? Don’t know  - except I was raised in a house with 3 Glasgow Rangers fans so green was never an option.  Owning small cars though has never put us off driving long distances.

Probably the best holiday in my childhood was spent at a caravan park near Frejus in the south of France.  I was 11 years old, making my brothers 9 and 8. My mum, having just split up from my dad, saw an ad in the paper for a caravan rental.  Never having driven anywhere longer than a Glasgow- Edinburgh round trip on her own, she decided to drive the 3 of us to the south of France in what must have been the smallest car available at the time – a Fiat 500. Being the oldest child, I was designated navigator, responsible for reading the map!  We got as far as Dover and, while looking for a place to pitch our tent before getting the morning ferry, we followed a sign we thought said ‘campsite’ only to find ourselves in a restricted security area with a rather unfriendly chap with a gun.  We settled for sleeping in the car in the ferry car park.  

Hitting Paris though is what I remember the most. My navigation skills did not improve.  We ended up on the Boulevard Périphérique, one of the busiest highways in Europe.  In my memory we went round and round for hours!   I googled it recently and discovered it takes 26 minutes to go round the whole circle driving at the speed limit. So we could easily have been on it or hours. We could not stay on it forever and so we got off it but given the options of west and east (no south), we got back on it again.  I think it was pot luck that we did manage to find a road going south because it certainly wasn’t the result of me reading a map.  We did eventually arrive in Frejus and had a wonderful holiday. 

Now, over 40 years later, I am driving the small blue car, this time a Maruti Suzuki  800. Our weekly round trip is from Colombo to Unawatuna on Friday afternoon and back again on Monday morning. It’s 120 kilometres along the south west coast of Sri Lanka - a good 2 hour drive.  My mum sits happily in the car commenting on the idiotic driving of others and reading as many of the signs around her as possible.  She likes the Singer signs especially and they can prompt a monologue on Singer in Glasgow. She reads aloud the brand names of the cars we are driving behind or alongside –  “Sunny,” “Tata”, “Caravan”, “Isuzu.”  She reads the road signs even when they are a bit of a challenge – “Thimbirigisiyaya”, “Bauudalokha Mawatha”. Her comments often surprise me.  “They all add up to 7!” she says out of the blue.  When asked,  “What add up to 7?” she states as if I am a complete idiot, “3 and 4 is 7; 6 and 1 is 7, see on the number plate,” pointing to the car in front of us.

Although we sit in the same car, our perception of the round trip could not be more different.  In my reality we drive from the centre of Colombo, south through the suburbs of Colombo (Dehiwala, Mount Lavinia, Moratuwa, Ratmalana) and over the bridge into Panadura. Then we turn inland heading for the highway.  This opened last November two weeks before mum arrived in the country. It has shortened the trip considerably.  One hour along the highway you end up in the outskirts of Galle. Turn left when you hit the coast and you are soon in Unawatuna and at my house.

 In my mum’s reality we start in Colombo (I think), the suburbs become Wishaw (for those not in the know Wishaw is in central Scotland) accompanied by indignant comments of “hasn’t this place been looked after”, “why is there so much wood lying around?” Then we reach the stretch past ‘Wishaw’ on the coast. Here mum looks for the big black tanker that is her favourite. If that is not available, other tankers will do. Luckily outside of Colombo loads of them queue up waiting to get into the harbor. Then when we hit the highway, we are in China with comments on “those Chinese men have been busy.”( I have a vague notion that I may have said the road was started by the Chinese as I can’t think of any other reason why she would associate China and the highway.)  Initially this stimulated a monologue about her uncle who had gone to China as a sailor. On the highway, we pass the rather incongruous signs for Macwoods Clyde and Macwoods Culloden and we’re back in Scotland.  It is a multi-national journey!

The many steps along the highway fascinate her. Bit of a mystery to me too actually. Along the sloping sides of the highway, the steps climb to the top. Some of them are in fact drainage tracks. Others though are definitely steps.  My brother came up with a plausible explanation – the landscape gardeners need to cut the plants and grass back. On her early highway trips, mum would spot and count the number of instances of steps.  After the highway you drive straight to the sea. All of a sudden there it is stretching across the horizon in front of you.  And with the sea we are back at spotting the tankers. It’s always a delight when there on the horizon is a big black tanker.  Makes both our days! It’s quite a journey from my mum’s point of view.  

France and Sri Lanka - very different journeys, same small blue cars.