See Proust and thon madeleines bringing memories flooding back. I know what he meant.
What brings back my childhood, more clearly than any other memory, and particularly at this time of year is the smell of a turnip lantern as it gently toasts in the heat of the candle giving it life. You deprived souls south of Hadrian’s Wall call them swedes, apparently, but the neep is a fine beast whether it is lying mashed on a plate beside a haggis that has been caught in its prime or being carried around the neighbourhood to keep the ghosts and ghoulies at bay on Hallowe’en.
None of your ‘Trick or Treat’ nonsense when I was a child. You had to learn your party piece and be able to perform it or you had no chance. We called it ‘guising’. You didn’t necessarily dress up but you went round all the neighbours and gave of your best. They would, of course, check if you had had your tea before they let you in, but were usually prepared to part with the odd bar of McCowan’s Highland Toffee or similar if you gave a reasonable performance. You would get to dook for apples or try to eat treacle scones dangling from a string with your hands tied behind your back. Above everything else, you would get to stay up late until at least 9 or 9.30 pm, even if you had school the next day.
I was word perfect in ‘Davy Crockett’ from an early age. Unfortunately (and it’s been a consistent source of distress to me over the years) I never got close to being able to sing it, or anything else, in tune. So I ended up as the repetiteur, making sure that the rest of them got through the song without too many awkward pauses.
It all changed more than fifty years ago when my Dad got posted to Southern Command. We arrived in early October and I settled into my new school in Salisbury without too much trouble. As the month wore on, however, I came to realise that my new chums had absolutely no idea what I was talking about when I started anticipating Hallowe’en.
Luckily, my parents were obviously missing it as much as I was and decided to hold a Hallowe’en party for the children on the Bulbridge Estate in Wilton. As Dad was a Colonel, that meant that they all had to turn up except, of course, the General’s son but he came anyway.
Totally memorable. We sat in complete darkness as Dad told the tale of the dismemberment of a corpse and passed around the bits – spaghetti for the guts, a rubber glove filled with water for a hand, grapes for the eyes and ‘mair o’ horrible and awful, that e’en to name would be unlawful’ as the poet Burns would have it.
We dooked, we got treacle all over our faces and I failed to sing ‘Davy Crockett’ in tune.
Mainly gone, I’m afraid. We have pumpkins instead of turnips in the supermarket and it’s all ‘Trick or Treat?’ up here these days. Personally, I blame ‘ET’.
First posted MyT Oct 31st 2008
Boadicea's Chariot 
Nice tale John. Neeps are Turnips, swedes are swedes, which ever side of the border you come from. Each is very different.
Haggis isn’t a Scottish dish is it? invented by the Italians/Romans, or was it the English and just adopted by the Scots.
Ooh, Val, looking for a punch-up on a Sunday? :-0
PS. Sorry, JM, nice piece.
Hi valzone.
I know that they are different but the point is that what you call swedes down there are called turnips up here so neeps and lanterns are made from swedes (sometimes called yellow turnips) and not from white turnips.
I believe that the first recorded recipe for haggis is an English one but no harm in that and we are grateful to the Southrons for giving us the idea. Just hope that you feel suitably recompensed by us giving you tarmacadam, pedal bicycles, pneumatic tyres, Jameson’s Irish whiskey, radar, Susan Boyle etc. etc. Smiley thing.
Don’t forget the deep fried Mars Bars.
I’m reminded of that famous headline, I’ll let The Independent explain…
“England were knocked out in the group stage of Euro ’92 and The Sun ran its cruel headline “Swedes 1 Turnips 0″ with the England manager Graham Taylor depicted as a root vegetable.”
🙂
When I were a lad, there were no such animal as hallowe’en, only a C of E service for the departed. Nov 5th was the biggie. One of the highlights of the year, in my opinion. And the left-footers didn’t seem to mind.
John, Aye 🙂
Thank you for that, JM. It brought back memories indeed. It’s chucking it down here, so only one small Hallowe’en visitor so far.
Husband says he is duly grateful for tarmac, etc – not to mention penicillin and TV – but he feels that Gordon Brown has wiped out all of Scotland’s credit.
Lovely, Mr Mackie!
I’m afraid I don’t celebrate this particular day, but we used to do so when we were young ‘uns. Horrid slimy things, dark rooms and nasty costumes. All very atmospheric and wonderfully spooky.
Shiver!
Sheona, Tell your husband Brown is a a Fifer – a kingdom all of its own. I think the only thing they ever invented in Fife, aprat from Brown, was Linoleum as a derivative of the Jute trade into Dundee!
aprat? A Prat indeed, but I meant apart – freudian slip, perhaps?
Well met on Hallowe’en, Sheona. I seem to remember that you and I both know the poem of the night that’s in it, ‘Tam o’ Shanter’, by heart. One of Rabbie’s best, in my opinion.
I think that you will find that the Society for Asserting Scottish Superiority don’t claim penicillin or TV as Jockish these days. Fleming was just a slaister who left a dirty plate out and got a wee bit lucky and Baird invented a mechanical TV that nobody ever developed successfully. Don’t even get me started on Alexander Graham Bell and his non-invention of the telephone!
Still got a proud record of invention, including the Bank of England and ‘Rule Britannia’, so regards to your husband but I personally believe that we are still in credit when it comes to the great scheme of things, despite the downside that G Brown Esq undoubtedly was.
Oh, I remember it well. We arranged it all without parental consent and charged a penny entrance fee. Little entrepreneurs, we were.
Good post, Mr Mackie.
Hi, cwj.
Half-Fifer myself (East Neuk). Never really fitted in, being about a foot taller than your average Fifer but can speak the patois and do have a certain pride in my Pictish genes.
And I believe that Gordy was Weegie-born and is nae Fifer, DNA-wise.
In re linoleum, my Uncle John worked for forty years for Nairn’s. Still remember that linseed oil smell when we went to visit him in Kirkcaldy.
Gordon may have been born near Glasgow, but he has none of the characteristics of a true Glaswegian. If Rabbie were still around, he’d have done justice to the devious hypocrite. My parents used to live in Alloway, not far from the bridge and the auld kirk. So now I’m sitting going through Tam O’Shanter to myself.
Husband has been informed that while there are too many Scots among Labour’s current bunch of no-hopers, and we apologise for them, I don’t think you can pin Balls on Caledonia, nor Harman, nor Patsy Hewitt, nor Hoon the Buffoon, etc.
Blimey, it must take some skill and effort to carve a swede into a lantern compared to the simplicity of preparing a pumpkin! Bet there are some Scottish parents even now that dissuade their kids from touching a “softie southern pumpkin.” 🙂 Good piece, John!
It was always my father who did the turnip lantern. janh1, and I’m afraid I never gave a thought to how difficult it was. It was just what happened.