Hogmanay - Torchlight Procession

In Edinburgh, New Year (or Hogmanay) celebrations seem to last several days rather than the one night of festivities to which we're accustomed. On Monday evening, we took part in the Torchlight Procession.

Basically, it's a large march through town, with each of the several thousand participants carrying a 2 foot long, flaming torch. It reflects some of the Norse connections with Scotland and Hogmanay with, you guessed it, a large bonfire. The kindling for the fire comes from a Viking warship that is carried along the route by numerous Scots clad in Viking garb.

We've uploaded several photos (that you see by clicking on the photo above) that show our flame carrying brethren along the road to our ultimate destination, Calton Hill. This is an area of town that we had previously seen, but not visited. It's quite pretty, and obviously historic (it's Edinburgh afterall), though we weren't able to get the full effect in the evening. Plus we were more interested in trying to avoid the flames of careless torch holders.

All-in-all, it was a fun evening. The one casualty that we saw was a few tree branches, though they were quickly doused by the ever-present march stewards toting fire extinguishers.

Local Ales at our Local Pubs

Over the holidays, Alette and I decided to explore our neighbourhood pubs more closely. While we'd previously patronized Bert's Bar, it was primarily for their Internet access. While they have a decent selection of cask ales, they just didn't have the most welcoming atmosphere. From some reading online, it appears that a recent remodelling was the culprit.

A few days ago, we visited the Melville Bar. Nicer environment, but they only had two cask ales, once of which is Deuchar's. And while it's a fine ale, you can get it at every pub in Edinburgh. More interesting are the pubs that offer different local (meaning Scottish) beers. St. Vincent's pub does this (which we first visited in September), but it's not really that close to us.

After a short walk on Saturday, we finally checked out Teuchter's. They had four real ales available; I had a great little Ossian Ale. A great environment, with some nice comfy sofas. There's also a nice restaurant downstairs that's supposed to be good, and is on Alette's gluten-free list: A Room in the West End. We'll try it for lunch one day and report back.

Incidentally, if you're interested in another beer posting, I'd like to direct you to one of our other blogs, Green Living Edinburgh, where I recently posted a guest blog entry (it's really Alette's blog afterall) on beer and the environment.

Doctor Who At Christmas

Watching the Doctor Who special is a Christmas tradition in this part of the world, where Tardis is a word in common usage. As we might have already mentioned, Mike and I asked our landlord to remove the telly from our flat before we moved in, so we'd thought that we would have to forgo good television as well as the omni-present bad over here.

Happily, on that most boring of days, Christmas Day, Mike, Gen and I discovered that with a simple laptop and a basic high-speed internet package, we can stream BBC TV legally. So we indulged in the Doctor Who special. In fact Mike and I enjoyed it so much that we watched the previous three episodes Friday night, whilst Gen was off for a weekend of fun in Dublin. Mike and I had stopped watching Doctor Who after a particularly preachy episode called the Doctor's Daughter. But David convinced us to give the program another go and we're glad we did. The writing really is superb, as is the acting.

On Saturday when we picked up our weekly organic chicken from the farmer's market we were able to chat about the Christmas Special with Sascha from Hugh Grierson Organics. Like I said, Doctor Who is a cultural mainstay over here.

The rules about BBC's on-line television interface, the iplayer, are that television programs are available to watch for 7 days after they have been played on air. This time can be extended if the shows are repeated. So now we can watch British TV and we've had to fall back on our own self-control to prevent us from wasting too much time in front of the virtual boob-tube.

Two Edinburgh Nativities

Nativity scenes are often kitsch, sometimes folk arty, but rarely powerful pieces of art. On Princes Street, the main beat of commercial Edinburgh, two nativity scenes have been installed that are also provocative pieces of art. Pieces of art that convey some of the awe, that the birth of Christ story is meant to carry. (For more on awe and nativity scenes, please consult David Weale's The True Meaning of Crumbfest).




Edinburgh's main nativity scene (above) was carved by Tim Chalk in 2003. Yes, that is the baby Jesus' naked bum you can see.

Further West down Princes Street, is my second favourite nativity scene of all time, outside of St. John's Episcopal Church. This one is abstract and woven out of willow:

Carolling at the University

On Sunday evening, I attended the University Carol Service, held in the beautiful McEwan Hall (interior, exterior). Unfortunately, Alette was still nursing a cold so wasn't able to attend. Overall, I'd say it was a lot of fun, despite being slightly reserved and a little too "churchy."

The event is quite well attended, so much so that they often have to turn people away. I made sure to get there early, which meant 6:10pm for a 7:00pm start. And as is our usual experience in Scotland, it started right at 7:00pm. It was a good mixture of participatory singing and choir singing, with both the Edinburgh University Singers and Edinburgh University Renaissance Singers in attendance. There were seven participatory carols, and four sung only by the choirs. There were a few carols with which I was not familiar, and a couple that had slightly different melodies and lyrics. However, it was quite easy to follow a few people around me who seemed to know what they were doing/singing (and everyone received at hand-out of the lyrics, in case you thought it might be pure lyrical anarchy).

Like most Scottish holiday celebrations, it ended with some mulled wine at the University's Chaplaincy Centre.

Forced Bollywood Hiatus

Tonight is the first Wednesday in three months that I'm not Bollywood dancing. So sad. To cheer myself up I registered at Dance Base to take it again next semester. But that doesn't start for another four weeks. I was going to register for bellydance instead, but I went to Dance Base's end of term recital, Christmas Crackered, and the bellydancers just looked way to serious. If I'm going to pay to take a dance class, I want it to be frivolous. And Bollywood is a hotbed of frivolity.

The YouTube video linked to above is of my teacher, Venuri Perera, demonstrating the first quarter of the dance she taught us.

Dark Days

The days really are short here in the Winter. As I start to type this post at 7:55am, the sun has yet to rise. And according to this site, it'll be 8:32am before it does rise today. Setting at 3:39pm, we'll get just over 7 hours of daylight today.

However, it's not so bad as we're in the final stretch of the darkest 30 days of the year. Relative to today, once we reach January 3rd, things will start to be a little brighter. And perhaps I'll even be complaining about the sunlight keeping us awake around June.

Rudsambee

While Mike was off at one of his full-day Scottish songs workshops, Japhur and I headed down the the Farmer's Market. Not only did we get meat for the week, but we also got a Christmas card from Anghele, the Big Issue vendor we buy from regularly, and a leaflet about a choir concert in Canongate kirk by a group named Rudsambee.

Mike was game for a Christmas concert when he got home so the two us trekked over to Canongate and took our seats in the pew. It was a well put together concert, made up of disparate pieces that were brought together by the style of the choir. They sang everything from a 10th century hymn to a choral piece written last year by a Minnesotan named Abbie Betinis as a singing christmas card to her family. In case anyone wants some choral recommendations (and so that I can remember which pieces I liked), out of the 24 songs performed my favourites were:

• Jul, Jul, Stralande Jul -- Swedish
• Immanuel os i natt -- a very unusual, to anglo ears, Icelandic carol
• Lux Aurumque -- an Eric Whitacre piece
• In the Bleak Midwinter -- the Christina Rossetti poem put to song by Rudsambee's founder
• Amuworo ayi otu nwa -- a Nigerian carol
• O Morgenstern -- German
• Soorb -- By Armenian Komitas Vardapet
• Nata Lux -- from Morten Lauridson's Lux Aeterna