THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, June 5, 1994 TAG: 9406030217
SECTION: CHESAPEAKE CLIPPER PAGE: 02 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: Tony Stein
DATELINE: 940605 LENGTH: Medium
Hmmm. Looks like an awful lot of you have your hands up. There was a time when I would have raised my hand, too. Not anymore. When I hear massed bagpipes playing ``Scotland the Brave,'' my blood surges. I feel so Scottish that I would almost eat haggis, which is mealy stuff cooked in a sheep's stomach. Remember, I said I'd almost eat it.
{REST} All this is to let you know that the annual Tidewater Scottish Festival will be held June 25 at Chesapeake City Park. The hours will be 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. The tab is $7.50 for adults and $3 for kids 6 to 12.
Up until this year, the Scots scooted over to Norfolk Botanical Garden for their festival. But a new building gobbled too much parking space, says Eleanor Unger, the Virginia Beach lady who is festival president. She's a Scotland native who was brought up in New Zealand. A pleasant touch of Scottish burr lingers in her voice.
The festival's search for new turf led to Chesapeake and the park, home of the Jubilee. ``We got a warm welcome from the Parks and Recreation Department,'' says Unger. Mayor William E. Ward issued a proclamation saluting the festival, but I hope City Council doesn't show up in kilts. I don't think the world is ready for that.
Let me tell you about the Tidewater Scottish Festival. It is a real hoot, mon. They make music. They dance. Their dogs herd sheep. They radiate Scottish pride. And they toss telephone poles.
I kid you not. It's called the caber toss. A caber is a pole 17 or 18 feet long that weighs about 100 pounds. The idea is to lift it up and flip it forward so it lands as straight as possible.
I have been thinking about this and believe that Virginia Power could benefit from caber tossing. Instead of toting poles on expensive trucks, hire muscular Scots to flip the poles down the boulevard. This is the best idea I've had since I suggested putting borrow pits on giant turntables. Thus they could be shifted from neighborhood to neighborhood, giving all citizens an equal chance to complain.
The caber toss is just one of a whole series of athletic events at the festival. Among them is a tug of war, and Unger says eight-member teams will be welcome. So will wrestlers to compete in a new event called Cumberland wrestling. You can get more information by calling 587-4126.
Being a dog nut, I'm most hooked on the border collies demonstrations. They are the sheep-herding pooches trained with nothing more than whistles and hand signals. There is something nearly magical about the communication between man and dog. My favorite bit is called ``the eye.'' That's when the dog just stares wayward sheep into submission. It's practically hound hypnosis.
Then there's the bagpipe music. As I said, I used to hate it. Finally, I started really listening. A beat, by golly. A tune. And now I can truly appreciate one of my favorite war stories. It's about a Scottish unit in World War II. The Scots' commander dispatched a message: ``We are surrounded. Send six tanks or one piper.''
As a matter of fact, Unger says the U.S. Customs people list bagpipes as an ``instrument of war.'' And a lot of the athletic events have their basis in Scottish battles for freedom. Tossing the caber, Unger says, comes down from laying a tree-trunk bridge across a stream or a moat. As for throwing weights, ancestral Scots sometimes hurled stones with ropes attached over an enemy's castle walls.
If there is a certain martial spirit about the festival games, it is an expression of Scottish history and tradition, Unger says. She's talking about centuries of Scottish battle against the Romans and the English.
``There is a defiant attitude that stems from Scotland's refusal to become enslaved as a nation,'' she says. ``There is a love of liberty. Patrick Henry, who said, `Give me liberty or give me death,' had Scottish blood.''
But there's more to the festival than muscle-flexing and blood-boiling music. There is lovely, graceful Scottish dancing, a fiddle contest and - new this year - a singing competition. It will be held at Indian River Junior High School on the Thursday before the festival. Winners will perform at the festival.
If you're a man who can't dance, play the bagpipes, sing, toss telephone poles or wrestle, there's still hope for success at the festival. There will be a knobby knees contest you can win just by standing there. ``An Irishman won last year,'' said Unger with a wee bit of annoyed sniff.
There's that Scottish pride again. Even when it comes to knobby knees.
by CNB