48-2,p24

Festivals

Highland Fling - The British Juggling Convention

by thomasl

Scotland? It's a pretty country. I've enjoyed festivals there before. Now Jay

Gilligan, Morty Hansen, and Fritz Grobe were going over as Blink, invited guest artists. Joanne Swaim competed, Alan the video guy shot video, and Fergie turned up. American talent was well-represented; all bases were covered. Hey, no journalist! I wangled a press pass, packed my bags, and booked overseas, to bring the story home.

Weathering Frights:

It's called Great Britain. What makes it so great? Hint: not the weather! It's the pubs, the drink found there, and the people drinking, and that's where I often found myself. It's said that a pint is a pound the world around. In the U.K. a pint runs around 1 pound 80 pence these days. The local populace bested the Americans at hanging about drinking, demonstrating the benefits of constant practice. Americans apparently spend all that pub-time practicing! From the whiskey bottle balanced on Jay's face in the newspaper publicity, to the renegade performance of a pint balanced on a club on the face, chugged through a tube, there was a strong British flavour to the fest.

The weather was Scottish, as was the food. Not the best. "I'll be dipped and fried," an expression of amazement in the U.S., is a standard recipe in Scotland, where everything from haggis (ugh!), to pizza (really!), to Mars bars (I kid you not!) is deep-fried and yummed right down. You wouldn't want to eat it sober, but in Scotland, you aren't - you drink bitter! In honor of the weather.

Tents? Relax!

The convention was not in the lovely city of Edinburgh proper, but the ride out there took you past the city sights, to a small college campus by the sea. Picturesque, starkly scenic, and really really cold and windy. Most jugglers overseas camp. They were cold. Which made the renegade, food, and beer tents, at the heart of the tent village, an important part of the convention, providing sustenance, entertainment and warmth. Jugglers collected there, evenings.

I could have camped, but I didn't want to, because (have I mentioned this?) springtime in Scotland is cold. Saturday night it snowed horizontal, the wind from the sea whipping solid precipitation sideways. The rooms and showers were warm and lovely, and very welcome, thank you.

The convention began Friday, but travelers took advantage of the invite to arrive Thursday, when vendors set up. They found the cafeteria open, and, at the campsite behind, the portaloos in place. By evening, when the cafeteria closed, the Vietnamese tent kitchen began serving up hot food and tea. Campers gathered under gray skies, eyes watering, huddled together in a loosely-queued pack in the windbreak of the tent's open mouth, their own mouths watering at the hot cooking smells as they patiently awaited their turn.

Captain Bob's runs the beer tent, but their rig broke down in the lane, so they didn't get properly set up until Friday. Thursday evening people wandered off to the pub, or, if they had really come to juggle, to the 24 hour gym. Guess where I was?

Advance publicity was good, with over 600 jugglers pre-registered. Scads more turned up, totaling over 1,100. Friday they poured in. In Scotland shoplifters are tagged with a wristband, and so are jugglers - the fluorescent orange wristband was the fest pass. It could not be removed without scissors. I gnawed mine off. Jay wore extra ones. The nifty fluorescent orange postcards looked spiffy as posters and t-shirts (mine is ear-marked for the IJA auction). Three gyms and a dance studio were used for workshops and open juggling, and the 24 hour outside gym began to take on the ripe stench and indoor campers it would carry for the weekend. Here, at 2 a.m., you found found the serious numbers jugglers, diabolists, and kinky passing patterns. Here's where Fergie tossed big numbers in funny patterns, and Fritz did outrageous diabolo with the hard-core diabolo artists that didn't spend their nights in the beer tent. At this hour people pulled out the really wacked stuff, although Andy Premdas did his weird and wild stick release combos any time he had a diabolo in his hand, or in the airspace nearby.

Friday night rocked, from the traditional Scottish party (Ceilidh), to the midnight renegade show afterwards. Space heaters kept us warm, as did the Scottish band. Even Jay danced, sans shades! Never mind the kendama tricks or numbers juggling, Morty can waltz! A caller went over the steps of each dance, and the dance floor became crowded with romping jugglers doing variations on country dances and reels. Because socializing is at least as important as juggling at overseas fests, people come to party. Beer flowed freely, paper-dart airplanes (the jumbo map one was a star!) filled the air, thrown by spectators filling picnic tables around the crowded tent. I must have been hungry, because I sampled vegetarian haggis. And liked it!

The tent parties lasted late into the night. In the outdoor gym, so did the juggling. Generally the Americans were the better jugglers, but I was exceptional in this regard, spending more time in the beer tent than in the gyms. My heavy social schedule meant no juggling until the final afternoon, when I passed clubs with the legendary Charlie Dancey. I did accidentally learn a three-ball trick, a diabolo trick, and two kendama moves.

Early Saturday featured a parade and games in the center of Edinburgh. Buses shuttled jugglers in. Early. I was up for the workshops on-site later that day. Few workshops meant they were well attended, which means crowded. There wasn't room to swing a club, which may explain why, at the end of Ann Semlyn's club swinging workshop, everyone in the gym was hopping about with their clubs held onto their heads like bunny ears!