Scotland Post Olympics Update

The Beijing Olympics are over...I love the Olympics so much I am in mourning. Sad, sad, Piping Girl. So very sad.

BUT I was so pleased to see how prominent Scotland ended up being at the Beijing Olympics. And I don't mean just the athletes.

Opening Ceremony-What's That Sound??
I was watching the Opening Ceremony marathon and started when, as the first of the European athlete's marched in, the bagpipes struck in and began playing Scotland the Brave. About every 15-20 minutes they'd come in again and play a bunch of tunes. The silly American commentators never said a word about them, and there was no footage of them either, so I thought, maybe this was where China decided to save a dime and it was a recording.

But later, I was excited to find out that it was an actual bagpipe band. And an amateur band at that! And those stupid commentators went on and on about all sorts of random facts, you'd think they would've commented on the awesome musicians playing their hearts out on the biggest stage in the world. At the very least, they could have given them a little camera love.

It turns out it was the Mains of Fintry Pipe Band from Dundee, Scotland.

It turns out the Chinese were looking for music that represented Europe and they decided on the bagpipes! They heard the Mains of Fintry Band in France and were impressed enough to invite them to play at the opening ceremony. Apparently, at first they thought it was a joke, so they didn't reply to the invitation at first. But when they accepted, they were sworn to secrecy for the past year. What a secret!!

I found this story to be particularly inspirational because I play in a very amateur band. It's good to see these kinds of bands get their chance to shine in the sun too. Granted, the Olympics were very close to World Bagpipe Championships, so perhaps a higher graded band would've turned down an invitation, but I have yet to read anywhere that the Chinese extended an invitation to a higher grade band. Good on you Mains of Fintry!!

Scottish Athlete's Find Success!!
So, the athlete's that I featured in my previous post fared really well at the Olympics. I did watch some of the cycling events, and Chris Hoy found great success. He won a gold medal in the Sprint, Team Sprint, and the Keirin events. In fact, he was so successful that he was honored by the British contingent at the Closing Ceremony where he carried the flag for the most successful British team in 100 years.

Lee McConnell also did well. In the 400m she made it to the semifinals where she ultimately placed 19th in the semifinal round.

Other Scots who fared well were:

David Florence: earned a silver in the Slalom Canoe event.

Katherine Granger: earned a silver in Rowing Quadruple Skull.

ALERT! ALERT!
One of the best Olympic-Scotland stories I've run across is about a guy named Andrew Aitkens who was practicing his bagpipes outside an (unbeknownst to him) secure area in Beijing. He was practicing up for a charity walk along the Great Wall. A small crowd gathered around him and than all of a sudden a bunch of police cars pulled up. The poor guy almost got arrested because the Chinese thought his bagpipes were a weapon! Thankfully a bystander stepped in and explained that it was a musical instrument, and (at least in this moment in time) not an instrument of war. I guess they don't have too many bagpipe players in China!

Pipe on!

Scotland in the 2008 Beijing Olympics

I dearly love the Olympics, I should've put an olympic countdown clock up on this blog now that I think about it. So I thought it would be interesting to do a little digging into the history of Scotland's Olympic athletes and look at their prospects for the 2008 Summer Olympic Games.

The Summer Olympics started in 1896 but the first Scottish medals didn't come until 1900 when they won silver and bronze in...golf of course. (Golf is no longer an Olympic sport today by the way.) Their first gold came in a big way in 1908 when 5 Scots brought home the gold in steeplechase, 400m, coxless fours (a rowing event), water polo, and 12 metre class (sailing). And home wasn't far away as the 1908 Olympics were in London.

Since than, there's been a Scot who has medaled in just about every Olympics. The only one's they didn't medal in were 1932 and 1936. There were even some Scots on the 1920 tug of war team that brought home the gold...obviously no longer an Olympic sport, but it brought a smile to my face :)

There are many notable Scottish Olympic athletes. Track star Eric Liddell of Chariots of Fire fame of course. Shirley Robertson picked up 2 gold medals for sailing in the 2000 and 2004 Olympics, the only Scotswoman to have ever won 2 gold medals. And Rodney Pattison is the most decorated Scottish Olympian, winning 2 golds and 1 silver medal between 1968-1972.

Scotland has always competed as part of Great Britain's Olympic team. But it seems there was some effort by Scotland to bring their own seperate Olympic team to the 2008 summer games. They do have their own parliament after all but they are still not entirely independent from England. It seems that the issue was brought up because Scotland's Football (aka. soccer) Association didn't want to participate in a British soccer team for the Olympics.

Former British Olympic Association chairman Sir Craig Reedie had this to say about the whole situation, "The International Olympic Committee charter says that to take part in an Olympic Games you must have a national Olympic committee. You only get a national Olympic committee when it's granted to you by the IOC. When Scotland is an independent nation, I am 99.999% sure the IOC will grant them an NOC, but not before then. Until then, no Scottish athlete is disadvantaged by the current situation."

The official website for Great Britain's 2008 Summer Olympic team is a bit confusing. You can search their athlete's by country, but the results include both country of birth and country of residence. So while they list 25 athlete's as being from Scotland only 18 were actually born in Scotland. Two were born in other countries but basically grew up in Scotland. Mostly men (there are only 5 women) Scotland is represented in swimming, canoe, rowing, shooting, cycling, steeplechase, track, tennis, kayak, triatholon, and field hockey. Their dominant sport is swimming where they have 5 athlete's competing.

Scottish athlete's to watch for seem to be Chris Hoy, 9 time world champion in cycling and Lee McConnell who runs the 400m has also picked up a lot of press.

I'll mostly be cheering on Team USA but the beauty of the Olympics is the international stage and being able to cheer on international players so if I recognize a Scot I'll definitely give them a shout out.

Pipe on!

Samurai Jack and The Scotsman

I just found this video on youtube and had a good laugh over it:



No doubt many a person has wanted to do this to the bagpipes!

Pipe on!

I Want My Bagpiper!

Let's get one thing straight, I do NOT regularly watch the WE show Bridezillas. But every once in a while it's on and I get sucked in! If you've never watched the it, it's a reality show that follows crazy irrational women who are about to get married. I'm sure it's all staged, at least I hope it is because all of these women are so mean and selfish it's scary to think that they really might be out in the real world.

I got sucked into watching it the other day and this episode providentially came on, it is honestly hilarious!


Pipe on!

The One With Joey's New Brain

I loved the television show Friends. In fact, when I was in living in Scotland I remember some of the kids I worked with asking me if I had been to Central Perk. And, since they were a season or so behind they asked me for show updates.

There is an excellent episode of Friends featuring (you knew this was coming), the bagpipes. The episode is in the seventh season and is called "The One with Joey's New Brain" because this is the episode where Joey finds out that his coma stricken soap opera character is going to get a brain transplant.

So how do the bagpipes figure into all of this? Well, since this is towards the end of the shows run, Chandler and Monica are planning their wedding. Ross decides that since Chandler is Scottish, he should play the bagpipes at their wedding. And he doesn't want to play any old song, he wants to play "Celebration" by Kool and the Gang.

Reality obviously has to be suspended here, you can't just decide to suddenly play the bagpipes and magically it happens. I stayed on the practice chanter (basically a glorified recorder) for a year before I even got my bagpipes and from everything I've read, this is pretty typical...or at least that's what I tell myself.

At any rate, it's a tv show episode, and it's pretty funny.

Here's the actual clip.



Here's a bloopers clip that I found, it's pretty funny.


Bagpipes don't make it into too many mainstream tv shows so I'm happy to celebrate a bit when one does.
Enjoy, and pipe on!

Man vs. Scotland

There is an excellent tv show that I enjoy watching called Man vs. Wild on the Discovery Channel. It stars a Brit named Bear (yes that's his real name) Grylls who was in the British special forces, climbed Mt. Everest and was part of the first group of people to circumnavigate Great Britain on jet skis. There are loads of other 'firsts' that he's completed, but basically he's the ultimate outdoorsman. Each episode of the show features him getting dropped in different survival situations with a minimum amount of survival gear. He then shows you how to survive and get yourself to safety. The best thing about the show is that he actually shows you how to deal with situations like getting out of quicksand, falling in a crevasse etc.

Recently he went to the Scottish Highlands, specifically Cairngorm National Park to show how a lost hiker might survive. The Highlands are a rugged area of northwestern Scotland. They are north of the Highland Boundary fault line. A small fraction of Scotland's overall population lives here but it's beautiful natural scenery is a huge draw to hikers and tourists. Cairngorm National Park is classified as an Arctic landscape and 30 people die there every year.

Some notable things on this episode include when he shows how to get out of a bog and when he uses moss to purify some water. This probably wasn't the most dangerous episode I've seen him in, but it was neat to see him in an area of the world that I think people might realistically find themselves in. And it's also an area that people don't typically think of as being very dangerous. Bear keeps a blog and the Man vs. Wild website is worth checking out too.

If you're a reality tv fan this show is definitely worth watching. Bear is very charismatic and he does some pretty extreme things, so it's definitely not for the faint of heart.

Enjoy, and pipe on!

I can go to Scotland in my living room!

I am always after good web sites that remind me of the time I spent in Scotland. I just ran across the BBC Pipeline which features a program hosted by Gary West. I just listened to the most recent program and if ever I wanted to vicariously tour around talking with Scottish pipers, this is it! Gary goes around Scotland talking to major players in the piping world and interspersed throughout are lovely piping tunes. He mentioned several towns and areas in Scotland that I've actually been to. And of course it was very pleasant listening to a bit of authentic Scottish brogue. If you've never been to Scotland, this is a very nice way to kick back in your easy chair and pretend you're there for a bit.

If you'd like to add a bit of the visual to your imaginary trip to Scotland check out the Monarch of the Glen series, but use it cautiously as spoilers abound, especially since it just finished its seventh season...see, I just clicked on a link trying to find the spelling of one of the characters and a picture revealed a spoiler for season 7, grrrr. But these are the sacrifices I make for my blog. You can get seasons 1-6 through Netflix but WARNING this show is very addictive...resist the urge to call in sick to work, binge on Mountain Dew, driving yourself into a sleep deprived state of euphoria filled with visions of the dashing young Laird Archie, the stunning scenery of Glenbogle, the wise advice of Golly and the sudden indescribable urge to sell all your possessions and run about the Highlands of Scotland. Did I say how awesome this show is??

Pipe on!