Burns Night

BURNS NIGHT

In recent years Burns Night has been a major event for Morpeth Rotary. This year it had to be a virtual activity on Zoom. Around 50 members and friends took part, some with partial and even full highland dress. It included piper Bill Wotherspoon, members of Morpeth Inner Wheel, some members of the Rotary Club of Galashiels and the Mayor of Morpeth David Bawn. Prof. Andrew Hamnett was MC and he began with the Selkirk Grace. The virtual haggis was piped in by Bill and addressed and carved and then toasted by Andrew. The Rotary Loyal Toast to the Queen followed with a medley of tunes on the pipes by Bill. Alistair Christie of Galashiels Rotary, sporting a Northumbrian tartan bow tie, gave the address and toast ‘To the Immortal Memory’. He said that if Burns had been alive today he would have been a top star and TV presenter who could have made a sharp analysis of all of the vital issues of the day. He thought ‘Tam O’ Shanter’ was the best poem ever written noting that 10,000 attended Burns funeral. He was voted the greatest ever Scot in 2009. Mayor David gave the ‘Toast to the Lassies’ commenting that men had been pleased to be forced to share domestic bliss by the lockdown and had been given appropriate jobs to do. He was sure they were much happier at home than at the local. The ‘Toast to the Laddies’ in reply was wonderfully presented in verse by Julie Mulqueen with thoughts, comments and memories both bitter and sweet. There followed a challenging and uncoordinated simultaneous attempt at ‘Auld Lang Syne’ by all of the Zoomers in what appeared to be an unusually high key and dependant upon the reliability of 40 different sound systems of very varying quality. When the shock wore off, President Colin Dyson thanked Mayor David, piper Bill, MC Andrew, organiser Mary, meeting planner John and all of the other toasters, artists and visitors.