Friday, December 27

 Last night's shindig at Jamie and Nera's was its usual success. I tucked myself into a corner with another couple of Australians and we let all the revelry happen without us.  A whole roast pig was delivered and demolished, games were played and a good time was had by all.

Today is very quiet.  It's almost as if the whole world has slowed down to catch its breath.  

Today's story is about another New Year's tradition.

NOSTALGIA: SCOTTISH HOGMANAY                                                                MAY 29, 2020

The most important celebration in my family’s calendar was New Year’s Eve, although it was always Hogmanay to us.  I think all my parent’s nostalgic feelings for what they had left behind in Scotland were expressed in that one fantastic evening.

The Chinese make a fuss about their New Year, and cities like Sydney spend millions on fireworks displays but for drunken, maudlin sentimentality, the Scots win every time.

Our New Year celebrations started a couple of days earlier when Mum gave the house a serious clean.  Windows were thrown open and every corner checked twice. Even the chimney was swept.  Special food was prepared: a large pot of soup, griddle scones, shortbread, and black bun, and Dad made sure there was at least one bottle of whisky in the house.  My father never drank but it would have been unthinkable not to have a bottle handy to offer a dram to those who came by.  All the male guests at the party brought a bottle of whisky, whether they drank or not, although most enjoyed a dram, and the remains of their bottle went home with them at the end of the evening

The parties at our house always started with the retelling of old stories, reminiscing and singing old Scottish songs; special favourites were the Music Hall songs of Harry Lauder: I Belong to Glasgow and Stop Your Tickling, Jock but, as the night progressed, the songs became more Irish and melancholy: Danny Boy and I’ll Take You Home Again, Kathleen.  The combination of whisky, memories and sad, familiar songs brought tears to many eyes. When people tired of singing, they played records by Kenneth MacKellar and Moira Anderson.  Some years, a piper might come and all of the street would be entertained by his music

My family always stuck to the old traditions and superstitions.  I remember one time, when I was 11 or 12, I went to the outside laundry just before midnight to get a soft drink from the ice box.  While I was there I heard the chimes on the radio signalling that it was midnight, and then I heard the sound of the back door being locked.  I was shut out.  I had committed the mistake of being outside the house when the chimes rang and I wasn’t allowed back in until after the first visitor of the New Year arrived.

The first visitor or ‘First Footer’ was expected to be a dark-haired man carrying gifts for the house: a piece of cake or shortbread, a piece of coal, a small coin, and a dram of whisky, of course.  These gifts were to symbolise the wish that the household would have food and fuel and fortune in the coming year.  The fact that he had to be dark-haired harked back to the old days when people feared that the person knocking on the door might be a Viking and, of course, everyone knew that all Vikings had fair hair and were dangerous. It felt like hours that I waited and I can’t remember who it was who arrived to allow me entry to the house.

Like all traditions, Hogmanay has evolved over time.  Once it was celebrated in much the same way in Scotland and by Scottish ex-pats in other countries.  Perhaps it is still celebrated in the old way in parts of the old country but it is more likely that our modern celebrations in Australia involve a bucket of prawns and watching fireworks on the TV.

We can be nostalgic for the old times but it’s impossible to expect things to stay always as they were.