Thank you to Margaret in Toronto for writing to ask me what that sign (above) seen on a shop in Barra is all about. In my Bernera Gaelic it is not very complimentary but it may be different on other islands. Any ideas?
Iain Maciver writes …
Scottish journalist and broadcaster
The local office for the MP and MSP?
Da Ablach-Two idiots or two misfits spring to mind!!
Hilariously illiterate and lengthy letter from one of them ( the MP, no less!), in the Stornoway Gazette today. And he was once a primary school teacher………..!
I believe the MP was at the Nicolson Institute recently extolling the virtues of separation to the assembled sixteen year olds, what a pity he did not take the opportunity to have a few lessons in basic English during the visit, perhaps he was distracted?
You’re being very hard on him, Bo-Dung. He normally used to the length of a Twitter. Anything longer than a couple of sentences and he’s struggling!
Donald, I think Bo-Dung is being exceptionally kind to the erstwhile MP, consider this gem-
” A nurse in Barra has told me that we are looking at the probable end of the possibility of blood transfusion on the island due what she described as “lunacy” from councillors” [sic]
I think the MP got Lochie to write the letter for him!
More bon mots from the letter to follow for your delectation and amusement.
I am looking forward to reading the MP’s purple prose when the Gazette gets to Barra, gales of laughter in the Castlebay…….
Seems he is still tutoring children MS. I did wonder why the SNP councillors act like kids.
Here is another quote from the MP’s famous epistle to the Gazette-
“After much thinking I really can see no rhyme nor reason as to why elected representatives when asked to vote on matter affecting their community, have so willingly gone and cut their own throats” [sic]
Monkey, that should keep you laughing until the Gazette arrives in Barra!
More gems from the MP’s opus to follow…….
To get back to da ablach. Ablach is usually used to refer to something that’s past its best, and no longer of much use. There is a story about an uncle of mine who responded to a gentleman who came to the door asking, “A bheil ablach briogais agad?” with the retort, “Nach eil brod an ablaich ort.” Translation : “Do you have a tatty pair of trousers?” “Aren’t you wearing a pretty tatty pair as it is.”
In terms of the shop in Castlebay, I always assumed it referred to two owners, who were deliberately disparaging about themselves.
Far be it from me to interject into this no chance debate but to say that I red the MP’s letter and it done him no end of good to go back to school for the improvement in idiom and diphthong is remarkable if not the grammar and I agree with every sillyable except his use of the banned word “interdependence”, banned by AS Edict FB93 along with s.e.p.e.r.a.t.i.o.n, and also you can keep a car going without the starter provided you have a hill and a good clutch.
I see that Dennis Caravan is coming up next week with “Yus Maybe!” taking advantage of low season fares the last time he was a socialist of the international variety and not an ounce of nationalism in him till the socialists rejected him in 99 and he turned to us for a berth which we should never have given him. Myself and Ba ba ba and so on, and the Guga are going to his meeting but I won’t throw a turnip at him like the last time which earned me Donald’s disapproval in public but a large dram of vile Islay malt in private.
And the following week Dave Stuart of the Eurythmics, a kind of toothpaste, is coming up with his petitions committee to provide me, Ba Ba, Ba and the Guga more fun they are coming by plane via Barra international.
Our own wee fellow from the borderland was on this morning telling us without a hint of irony that we had to learn east coast english and be able to read and spell it before we could get our highers, the MP will be in difficulty, and learn poems by McGonnagal off by heart worse than the 44th Chatechism,
Alex is still very unsettled and roaring like a moose since he found out I was coaching Nicola for the Mod Gold reminding me of the row with Donald when Winnie won the Gold at the Buckie Mod without teeth or a tune and poor Donald was always a strangulated tenor.
Still there is hope for ’14 yet with the boy struggling valiantly for the high notes with Back, and rumours from down south that the MP is going to go for the dancing like Calum before him a story for later.
I have to and get my mother her afternoon tea, a thick wedge of aran eorna, spread with a 1/4 inch of my own summer pasture butter with a hint of nettle topped with rhubarb jam ( 2 year old), and a thick slice of maderia cake and crowdie.
At first I thought the MP was masquerading in the Gazette and on this blog as the Lochie, but then I thought it couldn’t be, since Lochie seems to have a deep and detailed knowledge of politics, history, and current affairs, not to mention the obvious culinary skills, so he/she cannot possibly be the MP.
I can no longer afford a copy of the Stornoway Gussette. Can someone please tell me what the lovely AB McNeill wrote? I’m off to have another go at the recipe Lochie gave me for Greylag with a hint of mustard jus. Step one in the method requires the acquisition of the beast and this is proving very difficult. Even when following the instructions from our MP’s guidebook. I guess I have just answered my own question.
You mean he actually wrote a letter to the Gazette. Makes a change from him presenting a Commons .motion congratulating his beloved Celtic on some obscure anniversary
Ba, Ba, Ba Ba, Ba Baran and Iain Dubh, especially for you- another gem from the mighty pen of our MP-
“Whatever the trap of thinking amongst the majority of councillors reminds of a similar episode in the late 1980s, when there was reluctance by the then council to build a road to Rhenigidale in Harris as not many people lived there.”
More to follow……..
Well worth the wait, the last paragraph is particularly funny, the MP makes the case for the Union, extolling the virtues of “interdependence”!
Google search returned “two wrecks” so unless there was a double ship loss sometime past,and origonal shop was constructed from the remains the only explanation would be a branzeer type prophecy that 2 acts of folly were to come the way of Barra and we can apply this to our time. If the hats fit….
And some more from the MP-
“This time we have the spectre of thinking akin to a motorist who throws away his starter motor from the car engine on basis he only uses it for five seconds every trip and it is not cost effective.”
And there’s more!
OK Scots Wha Hay, we get the message, bring back Kenny Flip!
And the last words for now from the pen of the MP-
“Eventually it dawns on the motorist (voter?) of the interdependence of all car ( UK) components ( Post Office, NHS specialist services, Transportation, Pensions, Defence, the list is endless…) on the other”
I guess there can be no adequate riposte to that statement from the MP!
Having now read MP Angus Macneil’s Stornoway Gazette letter,I believe I’ve solved the coded meaning behind those mysterious words on the Barra sign. It’s not a Gaelic translation that’s required but an English one.
DA ABLACH : Defiantly Argumentative Angus Brendan Laughs At Comhairle Hierarchy.
Though I’m not a great admirer of the Barraman,I nevertheless congratulate Mr Macneil on successfully sneaking his uncensored letter past the Gazette’s unforgiving PC editorial eye – a feat which I’ve never been able to accomplish despite my reasonably expressed views.
Not only did the MP manage to get his eccentric epistle published, so eager were the editorial staff to please him they did not bother to do a spelling and grammar check! I look forward to the next mangled missive from my fellow Barraman for pure entertainment value.