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Tartans, Scotch and addressing the haggis

It was all things Scottish Sunday afternoon at the Guelph Civic Museum as visitors braved the cold to celebrate the life and works of poet Robbie Burns.

Few historical characters embody a region’s national identity the way poet Robbie Burns represents Scotland and his spirit endures through his stories and poems.

“He was referred to as the Ploughman Poet and the Bard of Ayrshire but he had been a workingman and knew what it was like to struggle,” said storyteller and historian Douglas Robinson aka Seamus Gunn. “I think the enduring power of celebrating Robbie Burns Day is the folk stories and Burns’ own life was a folk story. He was the son of a failed farmer who never thought for a moment he could make a living selling his words.”

Gunn recited Burns’ poetry and shared stories of his life and times during a special event at the Guelph Civic Museum Sunday.

“We are trying something new with a ticketed event for our Robbie Burns Day where we are doing a bit of a whiskey tasting as well as the traditional addressing of the haggis and stories,” said Val Harrison supervisor of visitor experiences at the Guelph Civic Museum.

“Throughout the museum we have different activities happening as well and Seamus, our storyteller has great stories to tell.”

The ticketed event was restricted to visitors 19 years of age and older and included a traditional Scottish meal of haggis and a Scotch whiskey tasting.

“The Scotch tasting is a big part of Robbie Burns,” said Harrison. “Norman Litchfield is our expert on the different types of Scotch we will be tasting today. It is kind of neat to add the Scotch tasting now that we have a liquor license. It allows us to do some different kinds of events especially with our beer exhibit.”

Litchfield introduced guests to two single malt Scotches. The 12-year-old Cardhu was pioneered by two of Scotland’s earliest female distillers from the Speyside Region of Scotland in Morayshire. The 10-year-old Talisker comes from the Isle of Skye and has been wetting whistles since 1830.

“All Scottish whiskeys have to be distilled in Scotland and aged there for three years to be called that,” he said. “Scotch is just the term for whiskey and over there it is just called whiskey. It’s called Scotch so everyone else in the world can determine where it came from. Whiskey is part of the heritage and so is Robbie Burns. They go hand in hand.

Litchfield can trace his Scottish heritage back on his grandmother’s side to the Campbells of Cawdor Clan in Northwest Scotland. He and Gunn both wore kilts bearing their clan tartan and as such neither were eager to brave the frigid winter winds outside the museum.

“It doesn’t get this cold in Scotland,” said Litchfield. “This definitely isn’t kilt weather.”

A sacred rite of any Robbie Burns celebration is the reciting of his poem Address to the Haggis a staple food of the poor in Burns’ time.

“It’s been said that the Scottish traditional diet is worse than not eating,” said Gunn. “You did less harm to yourself by not eating.”

Nevertheless he has developed a taste for the offal sausage and took pleasure in praising and consuming it during the event.

“They have sold off all the parts of the sheep that people will pay money for,” said Gunn. “They take the offal - the heart, the liver, the kidneys and sometimes the lungs. They grind it up and cook it with some oats, wild onions and whatever seasonings they could afford and put it in the sheep’s stomach much like a sausage casing, and it sustained them. So, it is a celebration of the core of our culture to have haggis.”

Eating it, he said, was a testament to their cultural resilience

“What we are basically telling the world is, bring on the worst that you can possibly do because there is nothing you can do to us that is worse than what we’ve already done to ourselves,” he said.

Perhaps Burns’ summed things up best himself.

“Some hae meat and canna eat, -- And some wad eat that want it; But we hae meat, and we can eat, Sae let the Lord be thankit.”

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Troy Bridgeman

About the Author: Troy Bridgeman

Troy Bridgeman is a multi-media journalist that has lived and worked in the Guelph community his whole life. He has covered news and events in the city for more than two decades.
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