Uist Lady

stop press: I’ve now posted the results of the games on a new page on the left hand side

The South and North Uist Highland Games take place in the same week, separated by one day, during which Highlands and Islands Young Piper of the Year competition takes place in Benbecula.
They are sociable days, calendar days when you are sure to meet old friends and people you haven’t seen perhaps for the last year.
Here is the week in pictures:
The South Uist Games took place in overcast, windy conditions.



Young Piper of the Year was James D MacKenzie, of Back, Lewis.

Connor Sinclair from Crieff is under-15 champion, and definitely one to watch::

The North Uist Games. Ranald Fraser of Lewis swept the board in field events:



The start of the hill race, which was won by a Glaswegian holiday maker. That’s the nice thing about the games, anyone can join in. Islanders don’t mind if mainlanders beat them-well, not that much.

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I’m aware my blog entries have been thin on the ground of late, but there was a good reason- or is it a poor, tired excuse? Excess work.
Never mind, I can now reveal that I’m shortly heading for the Royal Highland Show to promote top quality crofting produce for the Scottish Crofting Federation.
We’re taking a gourmet buffet to the media featuring lamb, hoggett (mature lamb), beef, pork, vegetables, fruit, salad and herbs from amazing croft enterprises from Sutherland to Shetland. The island of Lewis features very large, thanks to the involvement of the truly amazing Murdo Alex Macritchie, chef of the fine-dining Sulair restaurant in Stornoway and complete aficionado of the crofting larder.
He’s created our gourmet menu, which is as follows:
Lamb and Marjoram all-butter pies with summer pea puree, pea shoots and marjoram vinaigrette
Carpaccio of beef with tarragon emulsion, beetroot crisps, horseradish and cress
Confit of ras el-hanout spiced shoulder of hoggett with peat-smoked tomato and red pepper chutney and basil crisps
Scotch eggs with croft pork and quails’ eggs
Strawberry and basil cheesecake tartlets
I’ll post photos from the big day, Friday, when we take the buffet into the press room for the media to graze upon, and invite selected VIPs and folk we need to schmooze with to taste the goodies at our stand.
Which is at Avenue 4, no 522, if you’re passing. But don’t expect any grub unless you are a highly important VIP, like the Queen or something.

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THIS WEEK IN UIST

Comunn Na Mara (Society of the Sea) members went on a guided tour of Lochmaddy Bay.
The bay is a special area of conservation and full of wonders. We learned a new word: fjard. Apparently it trips off the tongue of marine scientists when describing Lochmaddy Bay. A fjard is the opposite of a fjord, so instead of being a long narrow inlet with steep sides carved by glacial activity, it’s a shallow, broad one.
Lochmaddy Bay is some two miles long by three miles wide (what a fjard!) with a complex and fascinating eco-system. It’s only around 30m at the deep end. Our resident marine scientist Andrew Rodger rigged up an underwater camera to enable us to see below -entrancing displays of sea plants studded with ghostly starfish and sea urchins.

MARGARET BENNET, FOLKLORIST, SINGER, WRITER BROUGHT THIS WONDERFUL QUEBECOIS TO OUR SHORES

Daniel Audet runs The Gold Rush restaurant and inn in Gould, Quebec.
Not only does he cook in his kilt, he has made it his mission to discover and record the stories of the hundreds of Outer Hebrideans, mainly from Lewis who settled in that area after the famines of the 1840s and 50s.
He has closed his business for two weeks to visit the islands and get a flavour of where those people, many of whose descendants he knows, came from.
His is the only establishment offering Scottish fare in Quebec, from recipes Chef Audet has collected from customers.

ALINA BROUGHT HER GREAT-UNCLE HOME TO BERNERAY

Alina Simpson realised a dream and saw her great uncle, Iain Archie MacAskill buried in Berneray- 76 years after he died.
Click here for my report: a
I’ve been in contact with Alina for months following her story. Her compassion, commitment and energy blew me away from the start.
Her mission to get her great-uncle home to his beloved island has been filmed by Mac TV for BBC Alba- hope you can catch it to see an amazing woman getting things done. (Oh dear why is it so difficult to post a link in wordpress? Apologies for this pig’s ear of a link, can’t seem to fix it.)

We've had wall-to-wall sunshine all week up today when it's turned somewhat chilly again. We're blaming the Iceland eruption. The island looks parched from so little rain for months. Lambing is in full swing, bird song fills the air from dawn until dusk- but we won't be happy until our swallows return. I saw them in the townships of Cape Town. See you back home, I told them. Safe journey.

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I’m pondering the importance of traditional music in this community as I write a feature about the tenth anniversary of a traditional music and Gaelic course in Benbecula.
It’s something so close to the hearts of Uist people that casual visitors to the islands may not immediately appreciate its significance.
To say that the music scene here is vibrant is an understatement. Almost everyone plays an instrument ( or more than one) and/or sings. Fiddle and piping are taught at Lionacleit secondary school in Benbecula, with massive take up. Around 90 children were learning fiddle last time I looked into it, and almost as many learning pipes.
At every social occasion people, even very young children, will get up to sing or play in the most natural manner, with confidence, without inhibition.
Each year there are feisean, or Gaelic summer schools run by volunteers, where language, music and culture are taught to children from 8 years old upwards. By the time they are 17 or 18, youngsters who have attended their local feis every year are coming back as assistants or even tutors to the next generation.
South Uist’s Ceolas attracts people from all corners of the globe to enjoy a week long celebration of Gaelic culture through music, art, stories and ceilidhs.
I can’t imagine a mainland community with music shot through it in quite the same way.

I asked linguist and lecturer Gordon Wells about it. (check out his excellent site at www.gordonwells.co.uk)
He said: “It’s to do with a strong tradition of self-reliance. TV came late here. People were used to making their own entertainment and that tradition continues. There’s a much higher rate of voluntary work here, and a lot of it revolves around music and dance. Everyone gets involved. It keeps music close to the community, and you can see that with so many ceilidhs, piping, accordion and fiddle clubs on the islands.”
To be a child here offers enviable opportunities to engage in music and dance in a way that I’ve seen take youngsters all over the world. For others, it is simply something that helps them feel part of their community- and a means to integrate into other communities when they leave the islands.
For leave they mostly do, and in the next couple of days I’ll be blogging about that.

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