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City Life

Piper in Nelson Mandela Square

Piper marches through Nelson Mandela Square in Glasgow during an All Under One Banner (AUOB) protest.

When we see the bagpipes, our minds immediately think of Scotland. When we hear the bagpipes, our minds immediately think of cats tied to the back of cars and dragged through city streets. No one would listen to the bagpipes for the mere pleasure of it. Would they? Then again, this is a people who thinks sheep’s offal stuffed with oatmeal into its stomach is a delicacy and washes it down with liquefied dirt (Laphraoig). Why then would it surprise us that they have such taste in music?

I caught this piper at a Scottish independence march: All Under One Banner (AUOB), passing through Nelson Mandela Square in the centre of Glasgow. It seems the vaguely racist and anti-immigrant rhetoric wafting up from the Tory government south of the border has galvanized many Scots. That and the economic fallout from Brexit. As a Canuck, I sympathize. We’ve had to put up with the stink of vaguely racist and anti-immigrant rhetoric wafting from south of our border too.