Bagpipes @ Victoria Pier :(

[Longdog]

Nice to see/hear a lad and load playing fiddle at the pier today for the cruise ship visitors. Hope they got some good tips

[Medziotojas]

Hope they got some good tips

 

^like "don't invest in a chanter"

[Longdog]

Hehehe... Well I actually like the pipes and would like to play them, but the fiddles were great

[Twerto]

slightly off topic.. but does anyone know why the pier has been barrier-ed off half way up.. been like that for a few months now and has had me puzzled for ages

[MuckleJoannie]

I didn't really know much about the Norwegian PM's visit, except that it seemed to focus on Scalloway and probably quite rightly too.

 

Was there a meeting with the illuminati of Lerwick/rest of Shetland scheduled or was it a private visit to Scalloway to honour the village with its new museum -featuring the Norwegian buss men prominently-

Otherwise shouldn't our own PM not also have been invited?

 

Although the main purpose of the Norwegian PM's visit was to open the Scalloway museum officially he was invited by the SIC, who also invited David Cameron and Alec Salmond as a matter of protocol. Neither was able to attend but Lord Jim Wallace represented the UK government and Bruce Crawford (Cabinet Secretary for Parliamentary Business and Government Strategy) was there on behalf of the Scottish government.

[MuckleJoannie]

I posted quite few links to the Norwegian PM's visit here

 

http://www.shetlink.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=11510&postdays=0&postorder=asc&start=50

 

You will notice that on some of them the pipe band feature quite a bit and the Up Helly Aa jarl squad are hardly to be seen. Considering all the links Shetland has with Norway they still see us as Scottish.

[hjasga]

My final word on this thread is that it was a sad, sad, day for Shetland and another nail in the coffin of Shetland's identity.

 

As seen today, the kilts, tartan and bagpipes idenity is slowly but sadly eroding Shetland's own culture. But again, it's a mark of Shetland's inability to understand and grasp its own identity that people think it's great.

 

The sad reason so many Shetland men are getting married in kilts is because they're too gormless to understand that the kilt is not a Shetland thing and has no place in Shetland culture.

 

It's not about selling our soul to"entertain" tourists, it's about preserving and promoting our own identity.

 

Identities can develop over time. How is celebrating our Scottish heritage diluting Shetland's sovereignity any more than celebrating Viking roots? We've been a part of Scotland and the UK for several centuries now and it plays as important a part in our history as anything else.

 

Do you think when Up Helly Aa started people were decrying it as ruining cultural heritage? They wouldn't have been doing anything different to what you are now.

[hjasga]

Instead of making a fool of people, why not address the issue of why a community which constantly brags about how great it is didn't even make the effort to honour an official visit by the Prime Minister of Norway.

 

Again, this is untrue to the point of being insulting.