Vancouver Courier's coverage of the Celtic Fest

[Macman]

First the Courier, now the Sun! Great picture, and I thought the article was pretty good too. Congratulations to you guys on the mainland!

[Colin]

Not surprising that organizations like the Highland games and the Scottish Cultural centre (both great organizations) didn't see a big need for a tartan day celebration. There is definitely an old guard in place in terms of Scottish events in BC right now that sees no need to advertise or expand to entice younger generations to celebrate their heritage. They assume that the kids and grandkids of current members will keep them afloat, but personally I see more and more people discovering their roots and exploring them at places like the Highland Games. The need is there for another opportunity for people to explore and celebrate their roots and one day that will be happening. I have met quite a few people in the current standing guard of highland culture in BC and may seem to have an air to them, but they may have forgotten one of the things that Highlanders and famous for....hospitality.

In BC we celebrate many different cultural days and the recent turnout at the Celticfest should be proof enough that it is time for the Scots to rejoin the party and show that not everything is so formal and that we can have a lot of fun and that we can welcome our fellow citizens to join in the fun with us.

[Raphael]

The Article:


The next celebration: Wearing the tartan
With B.C.'s deep Scottish roots, Tartan Day should enjoy the exposure of St. Patrick's Day

Chantal Eustace
Vancouver Sun

Monday, March 17, 2008

Never mind the shamrocks and green beer, it's time to start prepping the haggis.

A particularly Scottish celebration, part of a global attempt to celebrate bonnie Highland charms, is just around the corner.

April 6 is Tartan Day. (Not that you're expected to know that.)

The truth is, despite B.C's Scottish roots and significant population, the province has not embraced Tartan Day the way some other places have. It was begun in Nova Scotia in 1986 and officially recognized in B.C. seven years later, but very few people here know about it or celebrate it. Meanwhile, other places like New York began making a big deal of it as of the late 1990s.

The 22-year-old Nova Scotia invention first kicked up its skirt worldwide in the late '90s. It was officially proclaimed in B.C. in 1993, the same year the province recognized Philippine Veterans Week. Back then, local politicians sported kilts; communities held dinners with haggis and shortbread; and Tartan Day began to spread like an unfolded kilt.

It seemed like shortbread, bagpiping and whisky were set to take on leprechauns and limericks in the Celtic holiday popularity contest.

Then the holiday really piped up. Literally. The U.S. Senate recognized Tartan Day in the late '90s as a way to honour an estimated 11 million Americans who claim Scottish and Scotch-Irish roots. And Tartan Day took New York.

The New York Tartan Day festivities, which are spread over a week-long tribute to all things Scottish, lure thousands of pipers to the annual parade, with celebrity endorsements by kilted-out hunks Sir Sean Connery and Ewan McGregor. This year's parade, the 10th to date, will be led by New York Giants kicker Lawrence Tynes.

For many people, particularly in the U.S., parts of eastern Canada and Scotland, Tartan Day is a really big deal - just not here.

Ask a local Scot about Tartan Day (I did) and you're likely to get a blank look, maybe even accompanied by a head scratch or a shrug.

They might ask you if you're referring to Robert Burns Day, which is celebrated with suppers and festivities at the end of January or whether you're referring to the B.C. Highland Games, another local Scottish celebration held in the summer.

Then mention "that big parade in New York with all the pipers" and you might get some blinking, even a comment like, "Oh yeah, that thing."

Even those who've heard of it won't likely know the date.

(Disclosure: As a first-generation Irish-Canadian, I didn't know anything about Tartan Day prior to this assignment. I would have assumed Tartan Day had something to do with baking, as in "tartin' day," or that it was just another name for Robbie Burns Day held Jan. 25. But upon googling "Tartan Day," I found more than 58,000 entries. And according to sites like tartanday.org, April 6 is the anniversary of the Declaration of Arbroath in 1320, asserting Scotland's sovereignty over English territorial claims.)

It's a big tartan deal.

Curiously, the day's most fervent local supporter is a fifth-generation Chinese-Canadian who has never even been to Scotland.



Plaid one day a year

A quick archival search of the term Tartan Day in local news finds it mentioned a few times in stories from the late 1990s whenever former provincial cabinet minister Ian Waddell sported a kilt to the legislature. In 1997 now Premier Gordon Campbell commented on Waddell's Tartan Day attire, saying: "I assume everyone in British Columbia will be able to wear plaid at least one day a year."

That's what local Scottish aficionado Todd Wong - also known as Toddish McWong - would like to see happen. The blogger and mastermind behind www.gunghaggisfatchoy.com and the annual Robbie Burns Chinese New Year supper is part of a loose Tartan Day revival effort.

He wears his tartan at least once a month to a kilt night at a local pub and to dragon-boating events.

"There's no reason why we can't celebrate more holidays," says Wong, when asked about spreading Tartan Day to the local masses. "More people just need to know about Tartan Day."

The 47-year-old library worker, isn't the lone Tartan Day reveller, though. His blog includes photos from last year's Tartan Day celebration at a downtown bar, when his Gung Haggis Fat Choy dragon boat team took part in a kilt fashion show and Scotch whisky tasting.

Wong says he'd like more people to know about Scottish culture through Tartan Day. "We're trying to revive it," he says, adding he owns multiple kilts, including a Maple Leaf tartan, ready for the occasion. "There's a whole bunch of kilt-wearers in Vancouver."

They just need to wear their tartans on the right day.

"Like anything, I guess it takes somebody to spearhead these things," says Angus MacPherson, chairman of the B.C. Highland Games, which attracts about 8,000 spectators to Coquitlam each year for events like piping, dancing, drumming and whisky tasting. Organizing a big festivity is a lot of work, he says: "Nobody really has run with [Tartan Day]."

That's fine with him. MacPherson says he's not concerned that Tartan Day isn't big in Vancouver. "It's certainly not a burning question," he says, adding that he didn't even know the date. "Is it really April 6?"

Simon Fraser University Pipe Band lead drummer Reid Maxwell says that despite the date's historic significance, it's an awkward time for a celebration since it's a little too close to St. Patrick's Day.

"Some people might not have fully recovered from St. Patrick's Day," he says with a chuckle. He loves to celebrate the Irish saint's holiday, since it gets people into the party spirit.

He's not alone. Sunday's St. Patrick's Day parade attracted about 250,000 people to downtown Vancouver. "[The Irish] just do a better job of celebrating," says Maxwell.

And, he says, it won't be easy to get everyone in the local community to agree to embrace a new holiday. "I always get the impression that Scots are not really into self-promotion," he says. "They are very low-key that way."

Maxwell, who immigrated to Canada from Scotland 27 years ago, adds that consensus-making isn't very Scottish.

"My grandfather would say, 'A Scotsman would argue with his shadow if he couldn't find anyone to argue with.' Have you seen the movie Braveheart? There's a scene where they are trying to get everyone together and become a united group. It didn't happen. Scots love to argue."

Glenna Urbshadt of the B.C. Highland Dance Association didn't know about the April 6 holiday either, but said that with Robbie Burns and the Highland Games, "two events a year is probably enough."



Tough to catch on

Darryl Carracher of Vancouver's Scottish Cultural Centre is not optimistic that Tartan Day will catch on: "When is it again?"

Ron Sutherland of Simon Fraser University's Centre for Scottish Studies, says he wouldn't mind seeing Tartan Day gain popularity, since it's "one more reason to have a party." He likes the idea of the day, too: "It's a celebration of Scottishness. You don't have to be Scottish to be involved with it."

Sutherland says Canadians owe a lot to the Scots, some of the earliest European settlers.

The historic footprints of Vancouver's first Scots are big and defined, even today.

There's the Fraser River and the Fraser Valley, named after Scottish explorer Simon Fraser, who is also commemorated by the university and its champion pipe band. There are more than 30 streets in Vancouver named after Scots. The city's first mayor, Malcolm McLean, was from the island of Tyree in Argyleshire, Scotland. He was elected in 1886, beating out another Scot, Richard H. Alexander, for the honour.

In the early 19th century, Vancouver was sometimes called the Glasgow of the northwest. And according to The Greater Vancouver Book, a compilation of local history, in 1939 more than 700 Scots crowded into the Commodore Ballroom for Robbie Burns Day to dine on haggis and celebrate.

Indeed, celebrating Scottishness still often involves the consumption, and affection for, that specifically Scottish meal known as haggis. This is traditionally made by boiling sheep offal, including the heart and liver along with oatmeal and spices, inside a sheep's stomach for about three hours.

Vancouver, the sister city of Edinburgh, is full of people who are hungry for real haggis, says local butcher and haggis master, Bruce Roane, who sells his haggis year-round to specialty shops.

He thinks Tartan Day sounds like a good idea but doesn't know if anyone would be willing to do the work needed to get it going.

A recent study by a Scottish charity, funded by Standard Life, noted that more than 4.1 million people across the country listed themselves as being at least partly Scottish in the 2001 census. This included more than 748,000 in B.C., nearly half of whom live in Vancouver.

Harry McGrath, who worked on the report, titled The Scots in Canada, said Tartan Day is important because it aims to celebrate the "historical and contemporary links between Scotland and people of Scots descent outside Scotland."

ceustace@png.canwest.com

[northernsky]

Ah how like British Columbians and how like the Scots! Can't agree on much but will defend yours and anyone else's right to disagree! I especially like the line about arguing with his shadow!

[Raphael]

I didn't pick up the actual paper until this afternoon. I soon realised my kilt made the front page and it was right next to Bryan Adams. Yay!!! I worn my leather kilt, I would not share it with Bryan Adams!!!

[Colin]

I figured that was your kilt as you were the only one in Black Stewart.

You'll have to let Jerry at SWK know that one of his kilts made the front page of the Vancouver Sun.

[Raphael]

The picture on the paper:



And you can see my Freelander Sporran clearly as well!!

[northernsky]

First time I've seen you in tartan Raphael, where's the leather?

[Raphael]

I left the leather at home because the shoot was for Tartan Day!!! If I wore leather, I would be sharing the front page with Bryan Adams!!! Also, I wasn't influenced by a certain lady friend of ours.....