Scottish Homecoming Announced for 2014

[cessna152towser]

I thought the Gathering 2009 was AWESOME and I am very much looking forward to another one

Its great to read that you returned home with such a positive experience of the gathering and of Scotland, and I hope you will return to Scotland soon, no need to wait till 2014.
However, from my perspective, living in Scotland, as Scottish Director of a clan society and secretary of a local highland games, I still believe the 2009 gathering in Edinburgh was poorly marketed in the home country and that the clan tent set up, at least as far as many lowland clans were concerned, was largely run by hosts from USA and Canada to the exclusion of willing home based members of Scottish clans and clan societies. No offence to the groups whom Jamie Sempill invited, certainly the American representatives of my family made me welcome when I visited their tent, but what was the point of labelling it a homecoming event if the people at home weren't on the tents to host you?
The cost of taking part in the clan march deterred many of us Scots who would otherwise have participated.
The bands and other entertainers, and the small companies who assembled all the necessary facilities, contributed to a positive experience, but it must be remembered that many of them never received the payments for their services which they had been promised by Jamie Sempill's company. Instead he liquidated his company and my perception is that he took all his personal wealth back to the USA with him, leaving a lot of honest Scots who gave of their time, materials and labour out of pocket.
I also felt that the activities were very limited at Edinburgh in comparison with regular Scottish highland games. I only saw one pipe band performance, not even the one I had come to see as their performance had been re-scheduled for earlier in the day at very short notice. This was a local junior band whose parents had gone to the expense of three nights accommodation in Edinburgh on the promise of a donation to the band by Jamie Sempill's company, which was never received. Nor did I see any of the heavy competitors in action. In fairness though I only attended on the Sunday afternoon and I am assured by others that there had been more going on during the Saturday.