The Nazi, the Scotsman, Gaelic and Rasta Mouse

What a melange! And only the English language could have such a groovy word as 'melange'. I bet those French are still trying to get their tongues are 'entrepreneur'. Whatever, it seems as if tongues have been winding people up big time.

The Gaelic tongue has wound up the usual bigots - a small but vociferous minority who think that Gaels don't pay taxes and that money spent on Gaelic could be better spent on Trident missiles and an Anglo-German wedding due to take place in April. They also believe that the multitude of Gaelic placenames in Edinburgh and the Lowlands in general means that... Gaelic was never spoken there. Apart from having unreason on their side and George W Bush in charge of history lessons, the anti-Gaelic brigade have enlisted the help of Third Reich apologists. I guess this must tie in with the Royal Wedding somewhere...

Marilyne Maclaren - "Speak English or die"

 Last week, the stooshie surrounding Edinburgh's Lib Dem education chief and anti-Gaelic bigot Marilyne 'Butterball' Maclaren prompted a flurry of... er one letter to the local organ of truth, the Edinburgh Evil News. This letter came from none other than Alistair MacConnachie or in the original and ironic Gaelic Alastair MacDhonnachaidh. He railed against the fact that Gaelic speakers were indeed bilingual and therefore should ALL use English whether they like it or not. To quote:

Rather, it is a deliberate political project intended to promote a particular concept of Scottishness.

This is done in order to revise our history as if to suggest that such Gaelic represents some kind of "authentic" Scottishness which has hitherto been "repressed" by the English speakers, and to make uncomfortable those Scots and other British who do not identify, or who are unsympathetic, with this element of our history.

In short, every time we see a bilingual sign it is a little bit of ethnic cleansing propaganda from the SNP administration telling us: "If you don't like this, then xxxx off to England."

We've been here before, several hundred years ago.

The Hasselhoff of UKIP

But who is this anti-Gael who bears a Gaelic name? You could maybe forgive his ignorance as it turns out that MacConnachie was born in Hong Kong. No Asian he though. This is the man who hit the headlines a few years ago as the Scottish organiser of UKIP who denied the holocaust. UKIP stood by their man though until MacConnachie left - after it seems that UKIP discovered his attempts to play the lead part in the Hong Kong version of Knight Rider - to set up a one-man show known as Sovereignty. He uses this to campaign under the pretence of being 'independently Green'. Despite this, postings to blogs reveal that he still harbours a hatred of the Jews and reckons that... well let's give this basket case the free-speech he wants:

Is sucking up to Jews a requirement to get into heaven these days? Strange...never used to be!

If you were Jewish, I would understand your attitude, but since I presume you are a "Christian", then I advise you to pray deeply and ask your Maker just whom Jesus would bomb.

The Scotsman and its sister rags regularly prints letters from this neo-Nazi bampot. Further proof of the Scotsman's decline since... since the days the Highlanders called it 'the Daily Liar' due to its support of the Clearances. Now, who said the enemy was English?

But, the weakened defences of the endangered English language are not only being besieged by Gaelic speakers demanding services in return for their tax money - imagine that?! - but by a cartoon mouse who speaks in Jamaican English. Rastamouse has raised the ire of English people who can't decide if this mouse who speaks like a bleckmin will sully their children's education or will upset the blecks themselves. Here's the BBC's response. Here's another message to rearrange: life/ a/ get.

More bad news though for the Invisible Knights of the British Empire in their struggle to defend the Queen's English against Celts and cartoon Rastafarian mice. Tocasaid can reveal that from next year the new presenters of Blue Peter will be... 

Buju Banton, Donaidh Dotaman and Katie Price.

A healthy Scots tongue in 2011?

Bliadhna mhath ùr as you might say in the original and auld Scots' tongue. 2011 is shaping up to be an important year for our oldest indigenous language on many fronts. March sees the census taking place. Some are predicting a drop in the total number of Gaelic speakers though most agree that the rate of decline has slowed. There also seems to be a rise in the numbers of younger speakers, especially in areas with Gaelic medium units.

Gaelic medium education has been a huge success by any yardstick. There are still problems satisfying demand for it though and sadly some of these problems are caused by public 'servants' who do their best to hinder progress - and Edinburgh cooncil's anti-Gaelic harridan Marilyne MacLaren comes to mind here. Fortunately, anti-Gaelic bigots are thin on the ground though they are still vociferous enough. They don't really have any reasonable objections and resort to erroneous statements like 'Gaelic was never spoken here' (if one is being pedantic it could be claimed that Gaelic speaking monks reached the Northern Isles long before the Norse came - certainly they reached Iceland and the Faroes in their curraichean before the arrival of the Lochlannaich) and 'no-one speaks Gaelic'. Or else they harp on about tax-payers' money as if Scots Gaelic speakers have somehow evaded paying taxes for the past few centuries. If so, then i'm surely entitled to one hell of a fkn rebate. More usually, the bigots resort to abuse when logic fails them and tend to set out their stall with the likes of  'Punjabi mumbled backwards' or 'spoken by a few sheep-shagging crofters'.

Surely education enhances life and an education that leaves that person with two languages instead of one is excellent value for money. Leaving a child with only one language is a gross waste of his/ her potential and is a future of American-English monolingualism one that we should aim for?

On the bright side, Glasgow wants to go ahead with a second Gaelic school. The numbers of kids in the Western Isles in Gaelic medium finally seems to be rising though less than half of all kids there are in GME units or schools. Comhairle nan Eilean Siar however are still years behind their counterparts in Wales and the Basque Country on using and not just promoting their valuable heritage. Away from education, Gaelic is seen more and more in the arts - including galleries in Dùn Eideann. This month sees an attempt to get Gaelic in the charts for the first time in many years with Mànran singing Latha Math. Other contemporary Gaelic music is still being created by punks and indie rockers such as Na Gathan, Oi Polloi, An t-Uabhas, Atomgewitter and Sunrise not Secular. Dòl Eoin is another cool dude who seems to do more than just parrot old folk songs written by dead bards. Various types of courses for learners are now seeking new students in most corners of Alba. This included the ULPAN method which brings rapid competence in speech without resorting to complicated grammar lessons.

On the semi-legal front, 'shadowy' activist group Am Buidheann Dubh continue to decorate various parts of Scotland in a way not seen here since Ceartas did something similar in the 70s. If the Welsh can do it...

Gaelic cultural direct action.

Finally, the high heid yins at the BBC have finally seen sense and 'allowed' BBC Alba to be shown on Freeview. Deagh naidheachd gu dearbh.

So, if you're a non-Gael who's looking for a resolution for this bliadhna ùr then, I'd suggest (I'm allowed to be opinionated here after all. I mean, what else do you want to read in a blog? My latest IKEA purchase or what I ate/ drank at Xmas?) the following...

• seek out your local ULPAN course or night class in Gaelic and learn it. Use the BBC Alba website, radio and tv to support your learning. Click here for info on ULPAN and other courses.
• if you have kids - send them to the nearest croileagan or Gaelic school/ unit. If there isn't one, write to your council and demand it
• support Gaelic arts - go and see Oi Polloi if your ears can take it and buy the Mànran single
• stick an Alba sticker on your bike or car
• use Gaelic names when using the post. Dùn Eideann instead of Edinburgh, Sruighlea instead of Stirling etc... the post-code will ensure it gets there anyway. Why just go with the flow if you don't need to?
• if you meet Tory Hibee and Edinburgh Evil News slaverer/ jakie John Gibson, don't bother engaging him in arguments regarding his barely literate slaverings in the press, buy him a few drams, film the ensuing carnage and post it on You Tube.

Embrace diversity and fck conformity. Suas leis a' Ghàidhlig.

Link to the Scottish Government's census/ cunntas-sluaigh in Gaelic here.

Scotland and the poverty of ambition

Admittedly, this is written after the Scottish national football team has plumbed new depths. Though without being too tribal in sporting terms, I must also acknowledge the continued failure of bawbag Britain's latest great white dope in the tennis world, Andy Murray. The main point not being that we rarely win at anything nor even the constant whinging at perceived inequalities on the playing field. No, the problem is that we expect to fail or are scared to conceive success. We are even satisfied to have a primary-school level carving of an Australian Christian wife-beater's interpretation of one of our national heroes exist at the foot of his monument.

Sport though is just that. It's bad enough when the playing field is our very nationhood and culture. There are numerous examples but here are a few that come to mind.

G'day suckers

First up has to be the reluctance - cowardice - of the Unionist parties at Holyrood to countenance a referendum on independence. This is bad enough but the idiocy of some Scots is depressing. It isn't uncommon to hear views such as 'I dinny want to be ruled by an Alex Salmond dictatorship' or words to that effect. Strange that people can't see that an independent Scotland would be ruled by whichever party that won the subsequent elections. Do they think the Republic of Ireland is run by a perpetual Sinn Fein government? Do the Norwegians only have Det norske Arbeiderparti at elections? Or do these amadain even have a concept of 'Norway' as a successful though small and socially democratic independent nation?

And while we're on Norway... Its often amusing to hear 'auld Socialist' types coming across all Daily Mail in defence of the Union. Apparently, an independent Scotland could not survive the current economic crisis. "It just wouldnae work...". I wonder which part of bankrupt Britain's massive £400billion debt could be construed as 'functioning' or 'successful'? Perhaps the saddest thing about all this is not that the Scottish Labour Party or Lib Dems are unwilling to test their pro-Union faith but that they cannot see the opportunity in this for their own parties and for Scotland. Whilst I may happily vote for the SNP or the Greens at the moment because they offer a positive change from a backward Union that has given us little in the way of dividend, I would welcome the chance to vote for a post-Union Scottish Labour Party that had along the way re-adopted some auld and basis principles. The current malaise is exemplified well by Scottish Labour's leader Iain Gray - a man who seems to have made a committment to mediocrity his vocation.

Forward with mediocrity and the war on teeth

If anyone doubts the lack of a Union dividend, they need only go to some of our housing schemes. Decades, indeed centuries, of London rule under different parties has changed little or nothing. Compare it to Norway. I wonder how many young men in Oslo had power drills taken to their skulls by gangsters recently? Or had chisels and knives taken to their groin and face? Maybe we should just compare their longevity and general health and well-being? Or count the number of teeth in your average Norwegian teenagers mouth? In short, just what the fuck is the status quo doing for our poor? Independence aint a magic pill but its a start. And Norway is a pretty good role model to emulate.

Norway too has an egalitarian approach to its two languages - Bokmal and Ny Norsk. Compare this to the usual whinging about Gaelic - most often followed by some vague reference to tax-payers' money and its status as a minority language. Hmmm... I wonder which other minorities should have services denied due to cost? Couldn't we just round all the minorities up into cattle trucks?  Fact is, Gaelic is ours and to those who deny that it has a place in Lowland culture, go and learn some and maybe then you'll see the mountain in front of you. Its like a Francist madrileno denying the Arabic influence in Spanish culture but being unable to explain the significance of Al-Andalus. Gaels are tax-payers too and as native Scots are surely entitled to services in our indigenous tongue. This should not be confused with efforts to reverse the erosion of the language - after centuries of repression and neglect. 

On this point, its dissapointing to see Edinburgh Council further postpone a decision on whether or not Dùn Eideann should have a stand-alone Gaelic school. Pure fence sitting. Arguments about cost won't wash. Our kids have to be educated. We might as well give them 2 or 3 languages in the process as let their minds' potential rot with mono-lingualism.

Lastly, and on subject of education, is the new 'Curriculum for Excellence'. This has been in the pipeline for years. Some though claim that they aren't prepared for it. Others claim that it is too 'vague'. Thankfully, some understand that it empowers the teacher to give children the necessary tools of enquiry and research. Why just teach children to memorise facts? Why not give them the skills to find out for themselves? I for one certainly welcome the new emphasis on exploration, reasoning and philosophy as hopefully it will lead to a gradual reduction of religious worship in schools. Why teach children to enquire and search for evidence while simultaneously telling them to 'just believe' a bunch of unprovable auld tales with absolutely no basis in logic?

There are other issues. From the suspicion of euthanasia (strange, but the churches are at the forefront of opposition to yet another advance in the understanding of, and steps to alleviate human suffering) to our inability to effectively and sensibly deal with the drugs issue - and this includes our harmful relationship with alcohol and tobacco.

In the next qualifying matches for the Euro Championships, it would be refreshing to hear the players talk up a win against world champions Spain - not only because we've practised and relearned the basics of passing and shooting but because we don't fucking fear success. Simply, if the laws of science say its possible, then go for it.

Edinburgh Roc, whisky and German sweeties

Roc na Gàidhlig saw three excellent Gaelic-singing rock bands of differing genre deliver some roasting new Gaelic music to a bitterly cauld Forest Cafe in the new Gaidhealtachd of Dùn Eideann. I once saw the Forest described as a kind of 'hippie Starbucks'. Does that mean a laidback cafe with broken windows and one toilet cubicle per 100 people? Whatever, in this age of cynical capitalist greed that sees bankers getting golden handshakes while all sorts of working folk - including those at Johnnie Walker and Tamdhu - facing the dole, it's good to see some kind of cooperative venture apparently succeeding.

Hey, there may be some tosspots involved in these things but that's life. Show me one microcosm of human activity that doesn't include some conflict with those involved.

Speaking of tosspots... senile Tory Hibee and Edinburgh Evil News columnist John Gibson failed to show up for Roc na Gàidhlig. As did his fellow pro-ignorance campaigners Iain Whyte and Michael Blackley. If only they'd known that Edinburgh Gael and punk 'legend' Ruairidh Polloi was handing out whisky to all who wished a wee slug of the uisge-beatha.


High-Commissioner aint really my taste but recent weeks have seen me have plenty of the good stuff. Frau Wind and Cloud was fortunate enough to score a birthday-present bottle of Cadenhead's 2001 bottling of an 11yo bourbon hogshead Inchgower at 61%. Beautiful stuff and classic Inchgower. A fruit-salad nose gives way to honey and salt on the tongue. Superb stuff. It also goes great with 'Salzige Heringe' - a kind of salty liquorice chewy sweet from the north of Germany.

It's also the time of year that our Deutsch freunden start eating the stollen that they baked a few weeks previously. This sugary fruit-loaf type of thing goes well with our old Ileach friend Lagavullin 16. The 'Lag a' Mhuillinn' btw was picked up for a mere £30 odd from Wine Rack - another store facing the good auld capitalist axe.

With the boom and bust brothers of Tory and New Labour looking to win the right to run/ruin 'Great' Britain sometime next year - and both of them seeking to plunge the Great Satan into even deeper debt with more spending on nuclear weapons and foreign wars - then it has to be time for Scots to seriously think about going it alone.