Mitzi was a one-off…
Editor at Large
not easily forgotten, a kind and selfless heart who only ever wanted to make people smile. He had an extraordinary ability to make people laugh – and he didn’t mind if it was at his own expense.
He had that rare talent for making everybody around him instantly love him, even total strangers – on a recent trip with his daughters to the Kweilin restaurant, he went to the toilets and came out singing, laughing and joking with a group of guys he’d never met. They joined his table, and when they left, shook his hand and put money on the table insisting that “dinner’s on us.” That’s was Mitzi, he lit up the room wherever he went.
All his life, he was keen to share and help others, often doing so on the QT. He’d set off to buy milk and end up getting messages for a neighbour and some cakes for staff at the local Barbers’ shop where he stopped for a chat. There were a few bemused looks when he returned home two hours later.
At the age of four Mitzi was hit by a tram car on Leith Walk, after a visit to the hospital he was sent home. It must have been a dreadful shock to his parents when he collapsed 6 months later and had to spend 8 years in Leith hospital. Treatments included a cast up to his chest, which was regularly sawn off and replaced. And lying with his leg in traction with weights to stretch the damaged hip and knee.
During this time, hospital staff were amazed at what a trooper he was, especially since he was just a child, and they were not sure whether he would walk again. Over the years he became well known to passers-by who, on seeing his wee blonde head in the window, would drop off sweets and fruit for him.
At the age of 13 Mitzi left hospital, and over the next few years he showed great grit towards walking again; initially in a wheelchair, then with callipers, then walking sticks and finally with great pride walking independently with the support of a built-up boot.
He was left with a very bad limp and reflected on those times in the usual Mitzi fashion by calling himself 4ft/5ft and pointing out that he could walk perfectly straight if he put one foot on the road and the other foot on the kerb.
is Gaynor”, the guy came back with “like Mitzi Gaynor the American actress?” From that moment on, James was Mitzi to everyone.
A life-long Hearts fan, his love of football extended to coaching and helping the local football club, regularly washing team strips. On one occasion accidentally putting the red socks in with the white strips dying the entire team’s kit pink. The boys were not pleased to step onto the field to jeers of, “here come the flamingos!”
Mitzi was a much-loved regular on a Saturday night at The Docker’s Club, where he made numerous friends. And he, of all people, personified the Docker’s motto We Persevere
He had a great talent for singing from an early age, crooning away to popular tunes of the day - legend has it you couldn’t get him off the stage at The Dockers! He performed in countless clubs and competitions, once taking home the princely sum of £500 for his turn at The Kings Theatre.
Mitzi’s singing also played a big part in winning his wife Ann over, she heard him singing Englebert Humperdinck’s Love is All upstairs in Govan’s pub and it soon became the theme tune to their growing love.
Mitzi was utterly delighted to become a much-loved father of Paul, Stephen, Denise and Tracy and later down the line grandad to four grandchildren and ten great grandchildren whom he adored.
4 Mr Ross fulminates: Trump declared himself God’s candidate, sinking so low as to hawk bibles at $60 dollars a pop
12 At 4am, ascending from this underworld, Rodger Evans encountered a dozen German fans, white shirted ghosts of the morning after
16
Brittany had its wealthiest area annexed and handed over to their neighbours in the Loire valley, Sandy Campbell on France
19
When a tedious film version of Goodbye to Berlin called I am A Camera appeared, one critic wittily wrote ‘me no Leica!’ Ken Wilson concurs
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Whenever he entered a room
James Craig Gaynor, aka Mitzi, was the best of it
He was well known as a champion at marbles, again the calliper didn’t hold him back, he would bend his good leg and stretch out his callipered leg, so it was completely horizontal. He described the technique as looking like a half-shut Swiss Army Knife.
At the age of 16, Mitzi – still wearing his callipers - got a job as a “nipper” the kid on a building site who would nip to the shops to get the guys their rolls, tobacco or biscuits. On his first day a builder asked him his name. When he said “my name
Mitzi’s family tell me that even after being admitted to hospital he never gave up hope, a cheeky wee monkey to the end. They are extremely grateful that they got to say goodbye before he passed away peacefully at 12.35 am on Friday the 21st of June whilst listening to Frank Sinatra.
He leaves behind a thread of love, joy, kindness, and mischievous humour which has been woven into the lives of all who knew him.
His was a life well lived; a ‘few’ vodka and cokes with ice (no lemon), myriad stories, and an immeasurable number of songs. n
Thanks to Tracy Gaynor & Fleur Mellor
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Cover from top left: Field Of Sisal, used in production Of Rope, Twine, Cloth 1950s, Bleaching Department, Drying Green c.1906, Rope-Spinning Department c.1906, Cloth Packing Department c.1906
Mitzy in his best bib and tucker
Antony Buzzelli Montmartre, Paris
Serendipity is a wonderful thing...
When I woke up this morning, the first thing I thought of was my latest deadline which is, as I write, precisely thirteen hours. I’m not known for being ahead of the game in that regard. Far better to wait until the last possible few hours, just in case, as Dickens’ Mr Micawber was known to say “something’s bound to turn up”. And thankfully, when I dipped in to read the news this morning, bingo. Joe Biden had at last turned up his hearing aid, and heard what his advisers, many of his supporters, and every one with a smidgeon of common sense across the globe had been saying for months; that it was time for him to remove himself from the race to become the Democratic nominee for the 2024 USA election.
Of course, there had always been doubts about his candidacy this time round given his age, and the fact that he would be 85 years old at the end of the next presidential term. But there were also persistent and damaging noises being made about his ability to focus and remain sharp in the face of the unrelenting and poisonous untruths being spouted by Trump and his circus. Sorry, campaign. No, I’m not sorry, Trump’s a clown, so circus it is.
As the campaign unfolded, Trump and his acolytes were finding it increasingly easy to focus simply on Biden’s age, his cognitive ability, and most damagingly, his influence on the world stage as he stumbled along on the trail. Although Trump is only three years younger than Biden, he does appear to be more physically robust, and his no detail, deranged, and dangerous rhetoric sounds convincing to his base and some of those beyond because it is delivered in the hectoring style of a fairground barker hawking snake oil cures. The more
deluded and messianic he becomes, so the greater the number of idiots in the cult
If Biden was up against it for most of the early days of the campaign, two events threw tons more coal into the slowly rumbling train of fear and panic amongst his supporters until it became a runaway.
First of all, the initial, live television debate between him and Trump. In his pomp, Biden would have been doing Ali shuffles off-stage while preparing for such a debate given the chasm of intellectual ability and political nous that would have existed between the two at that time. But what we saw was an old man, who had given every fibre of his being to distinguished public service, now struggling to finish sentences and looking dazed and confused under the lights.
It wasn’t that Trump was a better, faster and more agile contender than Biden. He was simply a bludgeoning George Foreman, swinging wildly while spouting the same rubbish about building walls and millions of immigrants swamping the country. While such swings miss the target and gather no points, Biden simply wasn’t sharp enough or fast enough on his feet to effectively counter them. It was a severely bruising technical knockout.
The second event was the assassination attempt on Trump. Early on in his
Trump declared himself God’s candidate, sinking so low as to hawk bibles at $60 dollars a pop
GrahamRosscampaign, Trump declared himself God’s candidate, sinking so low as to hawk bibles at $60 dollars a pop to boost campaign funds.
Forget the fact that Biden is the more overtly religious man, a lifelong practising Catholic who has always found it difficult to reconcile his views on abortion and women’s rights with his faith. Trump’s hypnotised congregation simply went nuts for them.
It all played neatly into the sinister movement of the Republican party to the extreme right, and to their desire to engineer the first steps of a dangerous and despotic theocracy’s march on the White House. And then, the ultimate deification. Trump survived the attempt on his life.
For the snake oil imbibers, this could only have been achieved by divine intervention. God had waved his hand and the bullet only took off a bit of Trump’s ear so of course, God was a republican. And crucially, the polls started to widen.
For Biden it was over. The noises grew louder, from his aides, his supporters, and most likely his family. He had to stand down. In recent days, it has been reported that he has contracted Covid which only increased the noises from his opponents that he is vulnerable and weak. For a man who has given his life to the cause, it may appear to be a sad ending, but by standing down he has shown that he still knows when to do the right thing.
It appears likely that Kamala Harris, his Vice President, will now win the Democratic nomination. If so, it will be an embarrassingly huge intellectual mismatch between her and Trump. But the bible belt has been roused. God save us. n
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We don’t need no
stinking badges!
The humble badge was once a simple pleasure. Now it’s a bloody identity war on a lapel, cavils Colin Montgomery
Before I kick off, can I please assure anyone reading this that it is not my intention to target any one particular political or identitarian perspective in this month’s uppity broadside; they’re all fair game as far as I’m concerned. In that respect, these pensees are the equivalent of Jesse Ventura in ‘Predator’ using that ludicrous GE M134 Minigun to destroy large parts of greenery in the South American jungle. It shall be an indiscriminate, obliterating sweep, without fear or favour. The ballistic ‘Id’.
Incidentally, US spooks trying make up for their Trump potshot shame can stand down. I own no camouflage clothing –although how would I know if I didn’t? the only bullet I’ve ever had was the one I got from a job years ago. And yes, I looked up the make of the gun referenced above; to have known it would have singled me out very quickly as A. a threat. B. an
inadequate. And C. someone with anger management issues. Sometimes I tick boxes B and C admittedly. But never A. Unless it’s my internal cholesterol count talking.
Apart from being a massive weapon, there are other less shooty ways to identify folks quickly these days; indeed many of them embrace a means that positively encourages it. Ladies and gents I give you… the badge! And in this wideranging rant – remember the GE M134 Minigun – I am going extra rogue, by exploring the metaphorical as well as the literal. Because by God, can people wear badges these days.
To define terms, when I say ‘badge’, I’m initially talking yes… a badge. The wee metal things that used to adorn a green cushion in my bedroom when I was a nipper. We collected them you see, made sense, they were everywhere back then. It was Badge City, Badgeville and BadgeUpon-Sea all at once.
Any gift shop slapped its name and image on a badge. Not even attractions – just any place. Carpet Factory? Badge. Victorian folly? Badge. Electrical substation? Badge. Okay, maybe not the last one, but…
Then you had badges from brands, usually in synch with their latest ad
campaign. That’s nothing new tbf; they’ve digitised it now so you can change your profile pic or your avatar or whatever shizz they do. Back then it was as though the ad guys went out of their way to create campaigns that would be badge-able. I had a stack of ‘Wimpy’ badges with the wee beefeater guy in different scenarios; in space, playing badminton or whatever. And one with ‘I’m Nuts about KP’ on it. And ones for the ‘Tufty Club’ and the ‘Green Cross Code Man’.
Of course, you got a badge for practically any sporting event – big or small, global or local. My badge cushion had an outsized tartan one with ‘I’m on the march with Ally’s Army’ on it, next to one for ‘The East Kilbride Corporation Table Tennis Championship 1979’. Oh and bands got in on the act too – the Rollers, Sham 69, Wings even. Then we had the oddities: underwhelming wise-cracks like ‘I’m With Stupid’ and an arrow pointing to the side. Or ‘Wot No Badge?’ and a wee silly chad character on it.
Politics reared its ugly head of course – and hey, badge-wearing started that way… a hangover from military insignia and whatnot. Things like ‘Maggie Thatcher Milk Snatcher’ and ‘Up the Workers’ were a hit round my way – even though it was suburbia and comfortably middle-class. But I guess that’s the point of a badge really: to ruthlessly summarise, advertise and confirm one’s tribe/viewpoint/experiences/humour or favourite type of fast food. Well, it used to be. For these days, badges are weapons. I don’t mean bending the wee spiky bit at the back to jab in someone’s eye. I mean they’ve been weaponised by people who can only see the world through causes, ideals, political choices and their own carefully curated sense of self. All blended into an overbearing shake. The issues de jour, political activism, sexual preferences, social justice, your fragile sense of nationhood, wider geo-politics, they are all now to be a matter of public record – earnestly signalling intent, belonging, and beliefs.
We collected them, they were everywhere back then. It was Badge City, Badgeville and BadgeUpon-Sea all at once
It’s the sort of person you can read in a pub before you even talk to them. Judgemental, simplistic or one-dimensional? Maybe. No more so than reducing yourself to a series of badges, symbols and red lines in such an outwardly physical way. With the Nazis it was a time-saver; you knew who to avoid. Sadly, it’s often the same with those of a supposedly progressive bent now. You know that within ten minutes of any chit chat turning into anything deemed remotely contentious… a pious ear-pelting awaits.
For me, the older I get, badges are best when divested of such spiky earnestness. Like the David Shrigley one I sometimes wear: ‘Look at my badge’ it says. I’ve narrowly avoided a slap for wearing it, I’d rather it was for cheek than getting an emotional debate about how to fix the Middle East.
I stand by the famous line uttered by Alfonso Bedoya in Treasure of the Sierra Madre: “Badges? Badges?! We don’t need no stinking badges!” n
The Wee Museum in a Shopping Centre!
Many people go to Ocean Terminal to do a bit of shopping, see the latest film, get a vaccine, hit the gym, or have a cheeky wee Nando’s. But did you know there’s also a free hands-on museum waiting to be discovered?
The Wee Museum of Memory is situated on the first floor of Ocean Terminal. It offers a cornucopia of artefacts to stimulate the senses and trigger memories - carpet sweepers, old televisions, washboards, typewriters, school belts, carbolic soap, even a tin of Cremola Foam! With over 10,000 objects in our collection, and photos from Edinburgh’s past papering the walls, the museum is packed full of history; it’s almost like walking into a cluttered 1950s tenement flat!
Our museum offers a trip down memory lane for local and international visitors. Last year we welcomed 45,000 people through our doors. We’re open 7 days a week, 10:30am - 4pm (11am - 4pm on weekends), and we’re always free. You’re welcome to pick up anything that’s not screwed to the floor, and talk to our friendly staff and volunteers.
We are an accessible venue, based in Ocean Terminal with many amenities; cafes and restaurants close by, good wheelchair access, disabled toilets, baby changing facilities, and free parking.
We also host regular groups for all to join. On alternate Tuesdays (1pm), we host a reminiscence slideshow of old Edinburgh photographs, and on Thursdays (11am), we share memories while playing games, having a singsong, or trying out some arts and crafts. Our groups are free, exciting, and all are welcome.
In a time where loneliness and social isolation are increasingly common, we encourage older people, including those living with dementia, to come and visit us at the Wee Museum. Reminiscing is great for lifting the spirit, and our regular visitors love to have a blether about their schooldays, the matinée shows at the Capitol, or a night dancing in the Palais de Danse. Our staff are trained Dementia Friends, and we welcome people from all walks of life to share their stories with us over a cup of tea and a biscuit.
If you can’t visit us in person at the Wee Museum, you can check out our digital resources instead. We have a variety of reminiscence videos about the photographs in our archive and the objects on display in our museum – roller skates, 1960s hairdryers, school milk bottles… the list goes on.
You can also listen to interviews about the lives of local heroes like Micky Weir, Ken Buchanan and Pat Nevin. Or, on Tik Tok we’ve got bite size snippets from
interested in reminiscence. The tactile experience of handling an object is a great way to unlock people’s memories, and our boxes have always received positive feedback, so get in touch if you’re interested in these!
As if all that isn’t enough, we also host other heritage and community spaces in Ocean Terminal. On the ground floor, we run an exhibition about shopping and retail heritage called Away for the Messages. This space is filled with stories, photographs, and objects relating to shops and shopping in days gone by. Open 7 days a week, it is well worth a visit.
Ê Info: livingmemory association@ Facebook, YouTube, TikTok, Instagram and X… thelmascotland@ Instagram and X… livingmemory. org.uk
our regular visitors, like Sophia’s story about a gin drinking budgie, Charlie’s tale about the famous Old City Wall pub, or the legendary story about Roy Rogers and Trigger at the Caledonian Hotel told by Stewart (check our social media links at end). For those of you working in the older people sector, or who are eager to learn new skills, we offer training in reminiscence and oral history, and we have plenty of volunteer opportunities. We also have a variety of resources like our handling boxes that can be borrowed for a small donation.
Our boxes contain objects and photographs that appeal to the senses and help to stimulate memories. We have boxes on themes such as childhood, schooldays, going out, going on holiday, domestic life, a visit to the doctor and more. We offer these boxes to community groups, care homes and anyone who is
We’ve also created The Wee Hub – a vibrant community space used by many local groups, such as the Ukrainian Kid’s Club, Latin American Community Association of Edinburgh and Tinderbox Collective. Our Wee Play Hub (located next to the Wee Museum) is a free children’s play area, open Wed-Sun 11am-4pm.
The Wee Museum of Memory, Wee Hub, and Away for the Messages are run by the Living Memory Association (SCO30234). The Living Memory Association is an inclusive charity that works with all sectors of society, including refugees, the LGBTQ+ community, people living with disabilities and mental health issues. The Living Memory Association receives funding from the National Lottery Heritage and Community Funds, Culture and Business Fund Scotland, the Scottish Government and more.
We are grateful to our funders and Ocean Terminal for supporting our work. n Naomi Lawson & John McCaughie
Interior of Wee Museum of Memory; Heinz promotion to win Mini car at the Leith Provident Co-operative store in North Fort Street c.1965
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Scurry to the Sea
TracyGriffen
Writer without portfolio
Standing on top of one of the Pentland Hills, I gaze down to the coast, the finish line, the sandy shore of Fisherrow at Musselburgh. ‘Scurry to the Sea’ is an annual footrace, where participants need to pass through three designated checkpoints on their downhill run from the hills to the sea. Literally, a scurry to the sea.
The route itself is a variable distance and it’s up to individuals how they orienteer from one checkpoint to the next. This being so, husband and I did a trial run of our chosen route bright and early on the morning of summer solstice.
We ran up then down the hill next to the ski slope, with only Highland cows and some tweety birds for company, the bright sun still low in the sky.
I don’t think skirting a Ministry of Defence fence was part of the official route, but it was fun to do. Through an underpass under the City Bypass and through illustrious Oxgangs. It’s not somewhere I run often, but it was all downhill. So, all good.
Except the toes, the toes were complaining. No worries, I tightened my laces on a quick stop passing through Farmilehead park. We popped out the end, and crossed over Comiston Road to the Braids. I love the path right through the leafy canopy to the back of Blackford Hill. Buzzing with wildlife and the occasional runner, we dodged past the landslip to come out the other end.
Trying to stick to quiet routes, we discovered Double Hedges Road did indeed live up to its name. The Inch is Scottish Gaelic for ‘island’ or dry area in a meadow. We ran adjacent to Inch park where the Council’s plant nursery is located. So tempting, however, it was deemed impractical to run with plants. One day!
We ran on through Niddrie and found the wee tunnel - literally, it smelled like wee - to Bangholm. On familiar territory we happily galumphed past Fort Kinnaird and up and over the rail bridge at The Range (my fav lockdown shop, an excuse for bike ride to stock up on art materials).
The path down along Brunstane Burn is a wonderful place with wildflowers, overgrown bits and lots of interesting corners. Even better was emerging at the bustling Joppa intersection with the end in sight. A scurry along the seafront took us to Musselburgh’s Fisherrow Harbour for a welcome rest on a seafront bench.
We loved the route but my ongoing foot issues decided that running for longer than an hour is . Despite regular appointments at Easter Road Podiatry, my feet (and detached toenails) decided not to do the actual race. But this adventure is one I’m glad to have hadit’s easy to forget how many beautiful
green spaces we have in Edinburgh, and when you venture to the southside of town, it feels a million miles away from the ding of the tram.
It’s amazing how many times over the last 15 years I’ve thought ‘this will make an interesting Leither article’ when faced with a challenge:
From mountain biking Mainly Middle Age Muddy Men March 2012, to an early dawn ride A Summer Sunrise Bike Ride June 2013, to publishing a book My Booky Baby February 2013, giving up booze for 2012 A Very Dry Year January 2013 and becoming teetotal forever Farewell To A Troublesome Friend January 2023
I write narrative in my head as I’m doing something challenging, and being the protagonist of a story gives me confidence. It’s a visualization technique from NLP, Neuro Linguistic Programming. Now at the grand age of 50, I’m focusing more internally and less on the external. Many distance runners run almost as therapy, to escape their
I don’t think skirting a Ministry of Defence fence was part of the official route
mind or stressful situations. Over the years I’ve done a lot of distances (and coached many people to run distance).
I’m not hanging up my trainers just yet but am happy to no longer have to prove that I’m tough enough to go the extra mile, as it were. Nowadays time and energy saved by not bothering with social media or longer runs is spent swimming or cycling, or even on the allotment and maintaining our municipal planter.
And writing, I will never stop writing. Thank you, readers, I’ve met some of you on the street and it’s nice to know that my adventures have entertained you over the years.
Arthur Street Planter Update: It’s late July our planter is still in place, the marigolds flowering and nasturtiums have started to spill over the sides. A ladybird was spotted feasting on black aphids on aforementioned nasturtiums. Four sunflowers are about to bloom. We’ve adopted an additional bollard found beside the bin, it stops cars squeezing by on the footpath. We’ve also spotted more on-street gardening popping up on Balfour Street. If we don’t do it, who will? n
Ê Info: www.getfitandenjoyit.com
The happy couple at Fisherrow, Mussleburgh
The day before the funeral, on a train south
Ibump into the Falkirk IT girls, the two of them drinking gin for Scotland – the tonic merely a concession – and me a squad player, more Anthony Ralston than Andy Robertson.
And so, by the time I arrive at my wee brother’s, parting ways with the bibulous pair at some point south of Birmingham New Street, I’m pizzled, not to say blooteroo, bordering on ruddled.
What are the Jocks drinking? asks my Uncle P when we arrive in Abingdon United’s clubhouse, venue for Uncle D’s wake, me wondering why the black ‘n’ white photos on the wall, a gallery of the greats of English football and a few other sports, feature hardly any Scots or Irish players. There’s one face of colour –Muhammad Ali, a hero here since a visit when the boxing career was interrupted due to his defiance on Vietnam – and a couple of honorary non-Anglos in Dennis Law and George Best.
But where are the Lisbon Lions, Liam Brady, John Toshack, and all those Jocks and Irish and Welsh who were the spine of the most successful English teams of the 60s, 70s and 80s? Uncle P suggests the Irish diaspora never made it to this part of Oxfordshire.
Identity is an odd thing, right? As an Anglo-Scot with a Welsh surname, Highlands-born with an English accent, with a great grandparent married in Ireland in the late 19th Century and buried in Easter Road cemetery in the mid-20th, and family from the West Midlands with French origins, I consider home is as much where you are as where you’re from.
There are two things though that draw me closer to the Oxfordshire in which I grew up. Football is one. Equal parts Oxford United and Celtic, cut me and I bleed a Pollock-esque spew of green ‘n’ white and yellow ‘n’ blue. The other being an Oxon accent. Think the yocal burr of Pam Ayers, Thom Yorke, or Robin Cowen, close to but not quite in cowpatflinging cider-slinging distance of the West Country.
The moment I hear this cadence the distance between past and present is squeezed like an accordion playing the Captain Pugwash theme. I resist the word Proustian for that would be wanting to have my Madeleine and eat it.
Which is why seeing the Mighty Yellows win a play-off final at Wembley this year, along with upwards of 30,000 fellow U’s fans, my oldest child sitting next to me, is a day of such undiluted delight. When Josh Murphy scores his second and never mind that Cloughie dictum of it only takes a second: our Josh must be on double time.
Scottish fans in Munich for Germany game, 14th June 2024
At 4AM, ascending from this underworld, I encounter a dozen German fans, whiteshirted ghosts of the morningafter
He controls a defence-splitting pass while accelerating away from his marker, rounds the keeper and sends the ball goalwards from what my school-boy self insists to be an acute angle. (As one angle said to the other: Why do you always have to be so obtuse?) Two seconds, two touches, two goals the better.
The guy on Sky gushes: Ecstasy for Oxford…Wembley Stadium is yellow n blue. He’s half right. The other half, the Bolton Wanders half, is black ‘n’ white in its misery and, given their team’s dismal performance, registering no shots on target, Dr Dulux would surely describe the white component as Cloudy Dreams or Cliff Walk rather than Frosted Dawn or Feather Flock. I consult him again but it seems White Surrender isn’t a thing.
Speaking of no shots on target…a month later I’m in Munich’s Allianz Arena watching the most execrable performance from a Scotland team since, em, how spoilt we are for choice, Iran in ’78, Costa Rica in ’90, Morocco in ’98???
At half-time, three goals in deficit, down to 10 men, doused in beer, my pal having spilt half the contents of his refundable plastic pint cup over me, I reflect that if I were at home I could always switch off my television set and
go and do something less masochistic instead; like having an ice bath while listening to an endless loop of smug TED talks and wondering when my (rolling) kidney stone, whom I choose to christen Bill, will unplug that bass guitar he always holds at a 45 degrees angle (don’t get acute with me, kid) and, uh, leave the stage.
Post-match in Munich we discover a dive bar in Marienplatz and drop down and down and down some more to a basement where a mixed crowd of Scots and local beserkers are dancing on tables. In between the Eurotrash technopop, the DJ plays Toto and BA Roberston and I sing along to Africa and We Have A Dream, ever the squad player, drinking for Scotland.
At 4AM, ascending from this underworld, as if in a dream directed by Wim Wenders, I encounter a dozen German fans, white-shirted ghosts of the morning-after – let’s go with Feather Flock – falling like bowling pins up the spiral stairs before me.
What are the Jocks drinking? Beer and Schnaps, hurt and hysteria, grim fatalism and forever what-ifs, clowns’ laughter and an angel’s tears. But I could just be apostrophising. n
Rodger Evans
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A Morridge and a Jerp
Tom Wheeler talks ta-ta-toes and morridging moments
One endearing element of raising small humans is their propensity to invent new words, or to find new and unexpected uses for existing ones. Socks become ‘ta-ta-toes’, the irrefutable logic being that, on applying a sock, you say ta-ta to the toes that disappear into it. (The removal of said sock, perhaps just moments after it went on, has been known to elicit a murmured “hello toes”, but this hasn’t yet made its mark on the domestic lexicon to quite the same degree.)
Before I know it, these toddler neologisms will fade into memory. The time will soon come when it’s easier just to call them socks like everybody else. It’s tricky enough to keep track of the thousands of words that have found their way into common usage, without also having to remember (and explain) the ones you’ve coined yourself. Come adulthood, you’ll barely remember the multitude of terms invented by your tiny self for everyday things, and the rest of your life will be spent using words invented by others. Which is inevitable, but a pity nonetheless.
The exceptions to this rule tend to arise in social groups: closed sets of friends, colleagues or team-mates who are the only people in the world who know or care what a Womnack or a P-tea is. For as long as these words remain in the collective memory, they provide a bond between the members of the group that time and distance cannot break. And
You’ll barely remember the multitude of terms invented by your tiny self for everyday things
that’s a lovely thing indeed.
In this context, there are around eight people on this planet who could correctly identify slee on a colour chart, following its accidental invention in a disastrous attempt at art (it’s somewhere between grey, brown and purple, yet strangely unlike all three). Those same people are also the only ones who know the difference between a morridge and a jerp.
But these two terms deserve to be more widely understood. A morridge and a jerp are two contrasting ways of getting from A to B. A jerp will take you to your destination as quickly and directly as possible, whereas a morridge is more leisurely, and prone to spontaneous detours and pauses. (To be clear, a morridge is not the same as an aimless wander; the morridger still has an ultimate destination in mind; it’s just slightly further towards the back of it.)
For the benefit of future lexicographers, the terms originate from a teenage holiday in a beach hut on the Solway Firth, during which the two main activities were to visit the pub that lay a few miles in one direction, or the ice cream shop a few miles in the other. These journeys happened often enough that they could easily have become repetitious; but the scenery was pretty, and time was plentiful, so we’d usually morridge there and jerp back, or vice versa.
Thirty years on, whenever I see any of the same friends, we’ll still talk about jerping and morridging without need for additional context, to the bewilderment of everyone else. I’m still proud that the sounds of our made-up words help to convey their meanings; not quite onomatopoeic perhaps, but it’s obvious which of the two activities is quicker
and more purposeful. And I don’t know of any single word in English that quite captures the essence of either of them. But if only one of these words should ultimately make it into the OED – I don’t want to be too greedy – then it should be morridge. We all do more than enough jerping already. Every commute, school run or shopping trip is a jerp. When we jerp, our sights are fixed so clearly on the destination that we wish away the journey. And that’s mostly OK; few of us have so much spare time on our hands that every trip can be a leisurely one. But there’s much to be said for a journey that provides scope to pause, look around and let the brain absorb something new –even if that involves nothing more than an impromptu pint in a pub beside an unfamiliar station, where you’ve hopped off to await a later train that’s not quite so full of jerpers.
These morridging moments, I’ve begun to realise, are the ones that provide the signposts in my memory. I’ve no great connection with Taunton, Dingwall or Grenoble; but if one of them is mentioned, all of a sudden I recall the book I was reading in that café, the sound of the rain on that bus shelter, the shop where I almost bought those ta-ta-toes. When these snippets of memory arise, they prompt others, and I find myself remembering people, places and events that had remained dormant in the mind for years. Over the same period I’ve undertaken countless jerps, and I barely remember a thing about any of them. So the campaign to add ‘morridge’ to the dictionary starts here. Join me if you will, but either way, I’d strongly advocate adopting the practice. Because as the kids will all be saying in a few years, a morridge is worth a thousand jerps. n
“What does he know of England who only England knows?” I was made aware of this particular line from a poem by Rudyard Kipling thanks to my Mother
She quoted it when she was encouraging me to explore life beyond Edinburgh as I was leaving school in the early 1970s.
It’s a line that has stayed with me ever since; all the more so as I start to immerse myself in more and more things French. Indeed, venturing beyond the tourist experience and actually connecting to real French people in their own country, on their terms, in their language, has been a much-desired dream that is now starting to feel within reach.
I have always been drawn to all things French; its history, culture, art, and politics. It’s easy to fall in love with la belle France, her peerless gastronomy, the elegance and sophistication of its people, and the seductive, pouting musicality of the language. Their titans of history: Joan of Arc, Napoleon and De Gaulle, inspire an admiration in me almost on a par with Bruce and Wallace. So how come that whenever France squeezes into our UK news cycles it’s either about riots, terrorism, or head-to-head elections to hold the ‘far right’ at bay.
In the UK we are used to American politics. We understand their arguments because we speak the same language. But when it comes to France, most of us have only the sketchiest of understandings. In this year of multiple elections, we could be forgiven for concluding that Marine Le Pen is simply a Gallic version of Trump or Farage. All three do seem to draw on a certain nostalgia for those halcyon days when everyone knew their place and we never needed to lock our doors. But of course, with each country the yearnings for bygone days are different; shaped as they have been by their respective histories and patriotic narratives.
France is a republic like no other; the most famous republic ever, established following the bloody revolution of 1789, still marked nationwide on July 14th, the day of the storming of the Bastille, the key event symbolising
revolutionary struggle. Those of us with republican or leftist leanings are easily attracted to its rallying call for liberty, equality and fraternity. Its constitutional promise of equal citizenship for all “without distinction of origin, race or religion” seems like a nobrainer. But these bold statements on their own are clearly not doing the trick.
Since the Revolution there have been five very different republican models, along with two empires and one puppet state during German occupation. Today’s version is known as the Fifth Republic. It was created by De Gaulle in 1958 to stop France tearing itself apart during the Algerian war of independence. Order and stability were its goals and De Gaulle believed that the only way to do that was by creating a strong presidency; what is often referred to as a ‘Republican Monarchy’.
France’s president has much more power than the US equivalent. They appoint the prime minister, who doesn’t even need to be a politician. They can rule by decree, simply by-passing parliament altogether, like Macron’s decision to increase the retirement age from 62 to 64, or Hollande’s decision to bomb Libya in 2012, or, if they feel like it, to dissolve parliament whenever they
Brittany had its wealthiest area annexed and handed over to their neighbours in the Loire valley
Sandy Campbell On the Loose
want, as Macron did earlier this year.
France is the most centralised democracy I can think of. The French language is regulated and vigilantly policed. Shopkeepers can be prosecuted for stocking foreign products which do not have instructions in French. The Breton and Corsican languages were banned but are now quietly tolerated. Only French is recognized in matters official, governmental or judicial. There is one education curriculum the length and breadth of the country, including its overseas territories in the Caribbean and the Pacific: no exceptions, no variations, and that includes private schools too. Regulation of this single system is the responsibility of the president himself and enshrined in the constitution – “the provision of free, public and secular education at all levels, is a duty of the state”. Their constitution opens with the words, “France is an indivisible, secular, democratic and social republic”. To re-enforce the indivisible part, the president can chop and change the boundaries of the Regions at will. Ten years ago, when Scotland and Catalonia were flexing our respective independence muscles, President Hollande felt the time was right to send a message to France’s fringe ethnicities and thwart any
aspirations they may have of greater autonomy. Alsace, with a rich history and culture of its own, was wiped off the map and swallowed up into a larger conglomeration with Champagne, Ardennes, and Lorraine. Similarly, Brittany had its wealthiest area annexed and handed over to their neighbours in the Loire valley. It would be like Edinburgh and the Lothians being transferred into a new province of Northumbria at the whim of ‘President Starmer’.
Getting to know a new country, how it works and what has formed it, is a bit like getting into a new relationship. Initially, we are giddy with the obvious elements of external attraction; seduction is in the air, and France certainly exudes sex appeal.
But now, as courting days ebb away and certain deeper habits and behaviours start to emerge, maybe moving in together is not such a good idea after all. Let’s just stick to having an occasional rendezvous and enjoy the good bits without long-term commitment…
Some further reading recommendations:
} Fixing France – how to repair a broken republic – by Nabilla Ramdani
} The Secret life of France – by Lucy Wadham. n
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Kennedy Wilson looks at two creative outsiders
It’s 100 years since the release of one of the most outstanding films in Hollywood history. The Thief of Baghdad (1924) was a silent epic that reinvented the medium. Its star and producer was film royalty: Douglas Fairbanks Sr. On specially created-sets that seemed to float in the air he wanted a spectacle that audiences had never seen before. Minarets, the harem, the old bazaar…
As the ‘exotic’ Mongol slave girl he cast teenage Chinese American ingenue Anna May Wong in her first notable film role.
It was clear from the outset that she had star quality. Anna May’s story – her talent, her style and the racism that ultimately thwarted her career – is told in a new biography Not Your China Doll by Katie Gee Salisbury. There’s been talk of a film biopic in the works. Crazy Rich Asians star Gemma Chan has been slated to portray Anna May and also executive produce. Chan appeared on the 2021 Met Gala red carpet dressed in a stunning homage to Wong.
Anna May (2025 is the 120th anniversary of her birth) was thrilled to be plucked from obscurity by Fairbanks, one of the world’s first movie stars, who had fame, fortune and connections: he loved to entertain at his home the likes of Chaplin, Anna Pavlova, Albert Einstein and Henry Ford. ‘Anna May [saw] with her own eyes how the work ethic of the industry’s biggest names had paid off’, writes Salisbury.
Anna May’s intelligence shone through on screen. ‘Unlike most Hollywood starlets she was well read and full of droll repartee, a delight for the eyes and the ears’, says Salisbury. All the while Anna May feared that her future would be limited in America. Hollywood needed a happy ending and had to avoid mixed-race relationships on screen.
She realised she would never be the leading lady. Always doomed to play the dragon queen or the lotus flower. In 1928 Anna May travelled to Berlin to star in Dirty Money, she was only 23. From there she went to Paris and London where she appeared in 1929’s Piccadilly co-starring the young Charles Laughton with a script by Arnold Bennett.
In 1932 she starred in Shanghai Express with Marlene Dietrich. There were widecirculating (unsubstantiated) rumours that Anna May and Marlene were a romantic item for a while. Anna May provided, as ever, the spicy side dish. The movie was banned in China which didn’t approve of the film’s politics nor of its depiction of the Chinese as shifty and malign.
With limited choices of roles Anna May’s career stalled; her sister’s tragic death also left its mark. The later years were marred by alcoholism and she died in 1961 at the age of only 56.
Another Hollywood outsider, Christopher Isherwood, was a prolific writer best known for his Berlin stories
Anna May, Christopher & their kind
transmogrified into stage and film adaptations. ‘Isherwood had been on the run ever since he could remember’, writes Katharine Bucknell in a riveting and exhaustive new biography
Christopher Isherwood: Inside Out published to coincide with the 120th anniversary of the writer’s birth. ‘He ran away from his schoolmates. He ran from Cambridge University and a proposed academic career. He ran from Hitler’s Berlin. At the height of his fame… he ran west, from New York to Hollywood where he found work writing for the movies and where he embraced a new religion’.
Essayist, novelist, screenwriter, playwright and diarist Christopher had an extraordinary life but one often plagued with anxiety. Behind all fears, he wrote, ‘is the most unspeakably terrible of all: the fear of being afraid’. He controlled his own agonising nervousness with the aid of a Hindu guru and in doing so helped usher in the consciousness-raising movement of the 1960s.
Christopher also led a promiscuous gay life. He was an attractive, intelligent and charismatic single man and was often the pursuer and the pursued. He met the love of his life Don Bachardy on Valentine’s Day 1953 and they spent the rest of their lives together.
Anna May Wong & Christopher Isherwood
When a tedious film version of Goodbye to Berlin called I am A Camera appeared, one critic wittily wrote ‘me no Leica!’
When he wrote up his louche Berlin experiences of the 1930s in the autobiographical novel Goodbye to Berlin it got rave reviews. There was a play version and in 1955 a tedious film called I am A Camera. One critic wittily wrote ‘me no Leica!’
The 1966 Kander and Ebb stage musical gave his stories a new lease of life. And the 1972 Oscar-winning movie version made Liza Minelli a superstar. Says Bucknell, ‘Goodbye to Berlin shaped Isherwood’s life from the inside and the outside’. Having a gay hero in a novel when homosexuality was seen as a criminal offence and a mental malady was as daring as it was transgressive. Born in 1904 Christopher came from a respectable family and was heir to a vast estate. His father was an officer in the British army, his mother a cousin to Robert Louis Stevenson. As a child Christopher lived a life of posh country houses, housemaids and nannies, a far cry from his years as an activist in California. n
Ê Info: Not Your China Doll by Katie Gee Salisbury (Faber £21), Christopher Isherwood: Inside Out by Katherine Bucknell (Chatto and Windus £35) Ê X: KenWilson84
The success of the Netflix series Baby Reindeer seemingly even surprised the streaming service. The controversy over the way the stalker in the series can be identified - with fairly minimal online sleuthinghas marred Richard Gadd’s breakthrough moment. Had Netflix known it would be such a success, their legal department would surely have asked Gadd to change the opening words ‘this is a true story’. Gadd has since qualified this, saying that the series is “emotionally true”. As the Guardian writer Marina Hyde noted, this is a ‘very 2024’ statement.
The furore is in some ways emblematic of the social media age. In previous eras, many works of ‘fiction’ have been ‘roman-à-clefs’ but the reader or viewer had fewer tools to unpick them. Throughout cultural history, writers, dramatists have drawn on their own personal experiences, cathartically forming great art out of them. Joseph
Gadd’s win brought prestige to the PBH Free Fringe, and also countered the accusation that local performers cannot make an impact (Gadd being from Fife). Gadd’s view that “the Fringe is a magical place… don’t let anyone tell you otherwise” was clearly demonstrated that night. The 10 minute standing ovation was fully merited. Gadd’s performance has stayed with me, exemplifying why I and thousands of others return to the Fringe every year.
Baby Reindeer has a similar feel; Gadd switching from moments of incredible vulnerability to those which leave you bewildered and perplexed. “Why did he do that?” audience members will surely utter as he commits a series of selfsabotaging, self-destructive acts.
One particularly striking aspect is the brilliant use of music. Classic bits of folk, pop and rock add emotional depth to each episode. Nowhere is this more apparent than a scene in which Donny recovers from being ‘glassed’ by his
Wonders of the Unknown
If Netflix knew Baby Reindeer would be a success, they’d have asked Gadd to change ‘this is a true story’
their songs; immediately downgraded due to the bands’ lack of ‘cred’. I recall hearing a version of their New York Mining Disaster by the folk legend Martin Carthy and being mesmerised by the song. Perhaps I wouldn’t have been if I’d known who the original artist was.
As a result of Baby Reindeer, the song is being rediscovered. There is nothing new in this. We’ve seen how the work of Kate Bush reached a new generation through the series Stranger Things Other classic examples of overlooked or slightly forgotten artists being revitalised include the soundtrack of Reservoir Dogs which helped Stealers Wheels’ Stuck in the Middle with You reach a prominence they never achieved in their active years.
This connects to a narrative that there is much great culture out there waiting to be discovered or discovered anew. Cutting against the view that what is popular or highly ranked has emerged in some natural way, with the cream rising
Beuys felt that artists needed to “show their scars” in their work. Gadd has consistently done this.
What is not in doubt is that Gadd has produced a fantastic, searing piece of television. This is little surprise to me, I was lucky enough to review his first triumph at the 2016 Edinburgh Fringe:
‘The room was heavy with expectation as Richard Gadd came onstage. Earlier that day he had received the Best Show award for 2016. The resultant exultant mood helped energise Gadd to deliver one final performance of Monkey See Monkey Do. A breathtaking show; literally in Gadd’s case - on a treadmill throughout. The show was an exploration of the fear, shame and self-doubt that resulted from sexual abuse. Making brilliant use of video and voiceover, Gadd created a performance of mesmeric brilliance.’
stalker, Martha, and makes his way to perform at a comedy gig. It begins with Donny walking through London streets, emotionally disconnected, heading woozily towards the venue.
Before going on stage, Donny visits the loo and looks in the mirror, his face soaked in water and tears; facing the true depths to which his life has sunk. This is his breaking point. The scene is soundtracked by a tortured 1960s tearjerker, I Started a Joke. The plaintive vocals and lyrics (‘And I fell out of bed hurting my head from things that I said’) perfectly match the scene. Robin Gibb’s beautifully wobbling vibrato shakes the tears out of every line.
That the name of the artists (the Bee Gees) isn’t mentioned perhaps helps here. There’s little doubt their reputation coloured by a strong dose of naffness - a negative halo effect - affects
Richard Gadd and his Baby Reindeer!
Ê Info: The author thanks SICK Writing Group for their comments on this piece
to the top. It reveals something about the profound malleability of cultural tastes.
It also highlights the importance of timing. I Started a Joke bursts through the screen because it brilliantly enhances the scene. Gadd’s performance at the 2016 Fringe undoubtedly impacted me particularly deeply because I’d had to run along the Cowgate to get to the venue, fortuitously grabbing the last seat, on the last night.
There are many things we can take from Baby Reindeer, including being cognizant that those who behave badly do so for a reason. Another lesson might have deeper implications. There are many wonderful things that you are, at present, completely unaware of. This is surely one of the most profound reasons to keep alive and keep exploring.
What comes next? n Charlie Ellis
last minute table at Paloma
ATheLeithGlutton
Amos Karahi
Paloma 50-54 Henderson St, Leith
8 Book through: Open Table
We waltz down Henderson Street with skipping hearts having secured a last-minute table at Paloma which is currently scoring a 4.7 on Google. Never mind us restaurant critics, the wisdom of crowds tends to be real. Another great taco shop would be a fine addition to Leith.
We already have a top-notch taco shop in the form of Chorrito, nestling in the sandstone building on Leith Walk. Their counter and diminutive tables showcase exceptional Mexican food, with added zing from their house-made hot sauces. Paloma looks promising, all mint green and Instagram pink. Vivid chairs and tables spill on to the street. It is buzzy. But while the place is hard to miss, it is also best to avoid, I am sad to report.
To be kind for a moment: we all want new restaurants to open up. This is a hard premises and the spot hasn’t worked for a succession of openings, most recently the much-vaunted Borough. Not everything at Paloma is bad. There are one or two decent dishes, but too many plates miss the mark.
First, a word about the service. I am absolutely fine with relaxed service. Frankly, it is much nicer than the hover and bother style of some waiters. But Paloma’s service is as flat as their tacos. As we enter, a table is vaguely pointed out across the room. Eventually, but not graciously, we are permitted to close the French windows.
When food arrives, it is thrown down quickly by the waitstaff, one of whom might wish to pay a little more attention to his personal odour. All of them seem to mutter at a pace which challenges even
the most loquacious amongst us. Are they afraid of actually speaking to the customers? I listen to podcasts on double speed and still couldn’t catch half the words.
One phrase I do catch. “Food comes as it is ready, and it is designed for sharing”. Naively, we thought the starters might come well, at the start, but this waiter wasn’t joking. For a place plastered in bright colours, there is not a lot of laughter happening around us. We are meant to enjoy the food without unnecessary smiling.
First came some tostadas with whipped feta, pineapple and red chilli. In retrospect, I wish I’d ordered more – it was definitely the best dish but hardly demonstrates fiendish culinary technique. The next best dish was monkfish skewers, cooked with morcilla blood sausage, piperade and red pepper. The words “cooked with” are doing a lot of work in that description.
While the skewers were good, the morcilla was dumped on the side of the plate, slightly cold. It offered no cohesion with the fish. Black pudding and a robust meaty fish kebab has potential, but the magic doesn’t happen just by putting two things on the same plate. I was tempted to jump behind the pass, grab a frying pan, and crisp off the morcilla myself.
Chicken skewers were beautifully plated on a mole rojo, a traditional Mexican dish made from chili and nuts. As a prop for social media, it was superb. On taste, however, the mole had that faint sense of having been made a day or so ago and heated up in a
microwave. Perhaps I am committing a great calumny here, but it certainly wasn’t very tasty. Mole sauce should be earthy, smoky and show far more depth of flavour. This one was sadly off the mark. Ribs with ancho, served with toasted corn and a mezcal glaze were better. Temptingly, the waiter pops down a second plate of them, and then, realising they are meant for another table, whips them away without so much as a word. At least not one I could make out. A jalapeno slaw had more carrot than even Peter Rabbit might care for, insufficient lime, and seemed less acquainted with a jalapeno than needed to ensure full compliance with whatever the Trades Description Act is called these days.
And we should discuss the tacos. The masa (corn flour) had good flavour, and they were nicely charred, but were not on the generous side. Maybe the kitchen had stamped them out with the top of a wine goblet. A good taco needs space to show off what is inside. You need some proper real estate for the crema, a main ingredient, perhaps something crunchy and julienned, and a hot sauce, to fold together. You just can’t do it well in a two-biter.
Carnitas is a classic Mexican dish made from slow cooked pulled pork. It is meant to fall apart. Here, three sad cubes of pork belly sat on a particularly small taco. The flavour was ill-defined and the fat chewy. On the other hand, the lamb birria taco was very good indeed. It had much more
flavour, with waves of spice and heat, and had clearly been simmering for hours.
It came with a dipping sauce described on the menu as a ‘bone broth’ which is apparently what slightly oily meat juice goes by around these parts. It was actually quite good, but it wasn’t broth.
£35 per person, including drinks
Why not serve roast lamb, roast beef, pork or chicken
Mon-Fri: 8.30am-5pm Sat: 8am-2.30pm 26 Albert street, Leith, Edinburgh EH75LG 01315540533
‘Bone broth’ is apparently what slightly oily meat juice goes by around these parts
The fried chicken taco was more, er, interesting. On the plus side, the chicken was fried in a light corn batter, allowing the taste of the marinade to shine through.
That was, however, also its main downfall. So far, a lot of things had tasted the same.
Chilli and lime prawns definitely tasted different.
I presume it was meant to taste like an early-nineties prawn and cream cheese sandwich from M&S. We finished with a fried avocado taco, served with confit tomato and roast garlic. It was pleasant, but no-one wanted the last bite very much.
We trundle out, disappointed, and set about perking ourselves up at Bittersweet, where the cocktails keep getting better and better. We prop up the bar, drink negronis, discover that their bowls of courgette fries are just delightful, and promptly order a second bowl.
Thence to Ardfern to finish off the night with a bottle of something delicious. We are reassured that Leith still does wonderful hospitality with great food and drink.
Paloma will need to up their game in the kitchen and front of house to tempt me back… n
From left: Ribs with ancho, chicken tacos , whipped feta tostada
Newhaven may have had a reputation for being insular and guarded about incomers but, ironically, never had any issues about integrating people who came from abroad — probably identifying with the time when craftsmen came from the Continent to build the Great Michael ship.
The businesses of four Italian families — the Crollas, the Gisertiris, the Lannis and the Ranaldis — were well supported and the members of their households highly regarded and fully absorbed into the community.
At the start of WW2, Britain adopted a reasonable policy towards Germans, Austrians and Italians who lived here. The official approach was to identify out of these ‘enemy aliens’ who were antiNazi and leave them to stay free in their communities. However, the evacuation from Dunkirk and Mussolini’s declaration of war against Britain on 10 June, 1940 caused Churchill to issue his famous pronouncement “Collar the lot!” As a result, all German and Italian males between 16 and 70 were rounded up, many being interned in a camp on the Isle of Man.
Italy’s entry into the war had immediate and dramatic consequences locally. A riotous rampage of plundering and vandalisation ensued in many cities throughout Britain. Italianowned shops down the length of Leith Walk and into the Kirkgate were seen as justifiable targets for the mob that assembled.
However, none of the four Italian shops in Newhaven was affected by this wanton destruction that had broken out so close at hand in Leith. This was thanks to the spontaneous stance taken by many villagers, predominantly the womenfolk, to prevent any such attacks.
In Chris Garner’s book, Newhaven: A Scottish Fishing Community 1928-1978 published by Newhaven Heritage, he cites the recollections of shop owner, Joe Ranaldi’s son, Peter.
Before he was ushered away from the scene in case of violence, Peter remembers a crowd of people gathering in the Main Street consisting of his older brothers and their pals together with a collection of other men and women.
They knew that people would be coming from Leith intent on destruction. When the invaders duly arrived, fighting broke out and the incomers were chased away after scuffling in the Main Street. There are stories of women standing against the shop windows, their arms outstretched in order to stop any missiles being thrown at the windows.
If one was looking for an example of community solidarity, this would surely be it and, significantly, women appear to have played a dominant role.
Peter Ranaldi and his family tragically lost their grandfather, Joe Snr, when the Arandora Star was sunk by a U-boat on 2nd July 1940 while transporting detainees and some German prisoners of war to Canada. In all, 805 passengers and crew were lost, including almost
The Italian Connection
three-quarters of the Italian detainees. Joe had been crippled from a young age and it was believed that this left him unable to abandon ship. Ben Crolla, however, was one of the lucky ones to survive and was able to return to the UK and Newhaven after the war.
The Crollas threw a party for all the villagers in Victoria School in celebration of his homecoming. For a few years thereafter the Crolla family also provided a Christmas party for Newhaven’s children free of charge.
Alessandro, or Andrew, Lanni had served during the Great War with the East Yorkshire Regiment and was allowed to join the Pioneer Corps for the duration of the Second World War.
According to Chris Garner’s research, George Gisertiri had failed his driving test 15 times and was considered therefore no threat to Great Britain and was left free. The fact that he was married to Mary, a strong-minded Newhavener, would probably be the more likely reason.
For many years after the war, until the time of Newhaven’s Clearances, the Italian shopkeepers were an integral part of the Newhaven community and
Clockwise from main: Tony Crolla’s Ice Cream Shop c1920; Joe Ranaldi’s sweet shop c1960s; The Lannis c1960;
Mussolini’s declaration of war caused Churchill to issue his famous pronouncement, “Collar the lot!”
their children formed close friendships, playing in Fishermen’s Park, now Great Michael Rise.
Tony Crolla’s ice cream shop was at the bus stop that came up the short brae to St Andrew’s Square and turned onto Main Street on its way to Leith.
Joe Ranaldi Jnr reopened his sweet shop and café in the hexagonal building built as part of the village’s redevelopment at the foot of Great Michael Rise.
Mary and George Gisertiri maintained their reputation for the best fish and chips in Newhaven at the far western end of Main Street. It was a magnet for local children who would often be lucky enough to be given a bag of the batter crumbs from the fish-fryer.
And Andrew Lanni along with his wife and two daughters continued to run his well patronised shop in Anchorfield for many years after the war selling morning papers and cigarettes to the workers from Newhaven employed at Henry Robb’s, Leith’s foremost shipbuilders. n
Gordon Young
Ê Info: newhavenheritage@gmail.com
Festivals, funding, a future for community culture
With the Edinburgh Fringe Festival and the Edinburgh International Festival making international headlines, it’s easy to get caught up in the excitement of festival fever. There’s so much to love about Scotland’s world-renowned culture sector – from our music and museums, to our films and festivals. But Scotland’s culture sector is on shaky ground, and even our internationally acclaimed festivals are feeling the pinch. The Scottish Government’s chronic underinvestment in culture has left the sector in crisis. When you zoom in to the local level, like here in Leith, community culture events and organisations are struggling to survive.
A vibrant landscape of community groups, creative works and festivals has the power to highlight rich histories, encourage cross-cultural learning, foster deep connections, and build thriving communities. The culture sector is also a critical component of Scotland’s economy, creating jobs and bolstering the tourism and hospitality industries. But the culture sector is in crisis. Along with my Scottish Labour colleagues and leaders in the creative industry, I have been calling on the Scottish Government to urgently address the need for stable, long-term funding for arts and culture organisations. The Scottish Government has recently promised new investment but without a clear plan to deliver that funding, organisations have been left in limbo. They are unable to plan their futures and they’re losing faith. The Scottish Government must urgently roll out the £100 million pledged last year and plan for long-term funding to facilitate sustained growth in the culture sector. It must also heed my calls to convene an urgent festivals funding summit to save our world-renowned festivals from collapse.
However, funding for big-name festivals is not enough. The foundations of a healthy culture sector are in local communities, and this must be reflected through funding to communities as well as Edinburgh’s Festivals. Leith Festival is a great example of the value and potential of local cultural events. With an emphasis on community building, the Festival connects businesses, local groups and individuals, and strengthens community bonds. It celebrates Leith’s creative scene through exhibitions, performances and workshops from local artists and makers, and fosters intercultural exchange within Leith and beyond. Continued funding for local cultural festivals like this is critical to sustain the benefits to the community and to the local creative economy.
Leith Theatre is a historic local institution but has struggled and been labelled ‘at risk’. On a visit, I heard their funding concerns and discussed their need for substantial restoration. I’m relieved that Leith Theatre has since received a grant, but the reality is that they should never have reached a crisis point. More reliable funding for local venues is needed to prevent the losses of such important community assets. I look forward to visiting the Theatre again to hear their restoration plans and discuss how we can help them thrive.
There are countless other local gems in need of support – from The Citadel, an outstanding host to community and cultural events, to the live music performances of the Leith Jazz and Blues Festival. Among the local events this summer was the Citadel Arts Group’s promenade play which ran from August 8-10th, and told the stories of Leith Custom House in the 1970s.
Local organisations, venues, and events like these work with smaller budgets and they feel the squeeze of funding cuts acutely. Funding for the culture sector needs to do more than allow local institutions to hang on by a thread. We need to empower them through sustainable and flexible funding, allowing them to effectively manage their resources, plan their futures and flourish.
Funding for big-name festivals isn’t enough, a healthy culture sector requires local communities
Growth in the local creative economy also means more young people and diverse voices can gain a foothold in the industry. We should be striving for greater accessibility, affordability, diversity, and cultural democracy. But in the current landscape these goals are far off and local groups are struggling to stay afloat.
I will continue to advocate in Parliament and work with local authorities to secure the long-term future of Scotland’s culture sector. I look forward to engaging with local groups to discuss their needs and their plans and see how I can help. As Shadow Culture Minister for Scottish Labour, Convenor of the Cross-Party Group on Culture and Communities in the Scottish Parliament and through engaging directly with my community, I will continue to support local community culture organisations, venues, and events. I will always listen to their needs and advocate on their behalf, so they can thrive in Scotland’s multifaceted cultural landscape. Scotland’s culture sector and local scenes should not be taken for granted. Funding the culture sector should not be viewed as a luxury. This is one of Scotland’s essential industries and supporting it is an opportunity that the Scottish Government must seize. n Foysol Choudhury MSP for Lothian Region
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