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Friday, April 30, 2021

Which Island's Which: The Faroe Islands, the Fairisle, The Orkneys and The Shetlands?



The Faroes 

First of all you often hear the Faroe Island mentioned on the radio on the  British shipping forecasts. But the Faroes are not British. They are Danish.

Flag of Denmark.


 However, they are fiercely independent and different from Denmark.


Flag of the Faroes.



What is different about them, from a travellers' point of view?

1 Food. Puffins. See puffins. And eat puffins, stuffed with cake. What! Yes, it sounds like Puffins are not endangered. Puffins proliferate.

2 Rocking Stones

3 National dress.

Worn at graduation and weddings. and on national Day.

National day is July 29. It is Saint Olav's wake after the king who died in battle. The day's events include the opening or Parliament and processions from churches.

Flag day.

4 Language.

 Museums in the Faroe Islands.

The Faroes (plural) should not to be confused with the Fairisle (singular), which is a small island in the Shetlands.

Now, let's look at the Orkneys. Scotland. British. (In May 2021)


Flag of Scotland.


The Orkneys

The capital is Kirkwall

Kirk is Scottish for church. 

Top three most memorable sites and landmarks:

1 St Magnus Cathedral


Magnus - there's a regional name. I recall Magnus Magnusson, TV personality.

2 The Underground Mounds

3 Did I mention the Big Tree. Not that remarkable, but in the middle of a shopping street, which is flagstoned and pedestrianised.  The tree has a plaque on the nearby wall.


The Shetland Islands

The Fairisle

The Fairisle is the furthest north inhabited island off Scotland, and Britain.

The Fairisle is tiny, about three miles long and one and a half miles wide, with its only attraction being a bird observatory which has the island's only eating place. The men work at fishing combined with crofting. Crofting - what's that? Lived on land which is poor quality but provides subsistence farming of crops, sheep or animals, with the tenant able to use common land and obliged to keep the allotment active, whilst earning a subsidiary income elsewhere.

The women's main activity is knitting Fairisle jumpers.

The jumpers became popular when worn by the Prince of Wales, later Edward VIII.

Edward, Prince of Wales in a Fairisle jumper.


Useful Websites

https://wikitravel.org/en/Main_Page

FAROES, Denmark

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Faroe_Islands

https://www.visitfaroeislands.com/about/history-governance-econo

Shopping and tours:

https://www.visitfaroeislands.com/see-do/shopping/

https://www.facebook.com/VisitFaroeIslands/

St Olav's Day

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/%C3%93lavs%C3%B8ka

You can buy Faroe islands flags, small hand held flags on sticks to wave at events, bunting (strings of decorative flags), and flags on oven gloves and notebooks.

https://www.amazon.co.uk/s?k=faroe+island+flag

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Scandinavia-Nordic-Seven-Different-Flags/

FAIR ISLE, Shetland, Scotland

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fair_Isle

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Portal:Scotland

ORKNEYS, Scotland

SHETLAND, Scotland

https://en.wikivoyage.org/wiki/Shetland_Islands

https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Shetland_Islands#/media/File:Jarlshof_(47506298641).jpg

Kirkwall, Capital of Shetland Islands

MULL, IONA & STAFFA

http://www.staffatours.com/boat-tours/departs-oban/

Not much useful information for the tourist except a picture of the Forth Bridge. (Not fourth, Forth.)

About the Author
About Angela The Author
The Author - Quick Quotations

Angela Lansbury B A Hons  is the author of ten books by regular publishers plus another ten self-published books. 

About Angela The Speaker & Trainer

Angela Lansbury is a teacher of English and other languages to Toastmasters clubs and businesses.

Braddell Heights Advanced Toastmasters Speakers Vice President  Public Relations, Immediate Past President.
Former Area Director S3. Club Coach for Nee Soon South Toastmasters Club.
Also Member of: TCA Toastmasters Club; Singapore Online Dynamic; Harrovians UK
Garen Tee on using story telling in business, on bha.learncool.sg . Also educational on using Powerpoint for posters.
Next BHA meeting, Wednesday evening, May 5th, 7 pm Singapore 
Angela The Blogger 

Angela has several blogs speeches, comedy and song writing and organizing, writing itermittently, but writes almost daily on these three:

See next post on sculptor Tom Harvey.

Please share links to your favourite posts. 



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What You Could See In Orkney Islands On a Cruise to Kirkwall

 

Scapa, distillery. To warm you up on a wet and windy day, whisky, Scottish whisky.


Sign outside Tesco, Otters crossing.

Tomb inside St Magnus Cathedral



St Magnus Cathedral

Another Distillery.

Scottish pipers in their kilts.

Flagstoned streets, and stone grey colour houses, so different from red brick London where the bricks are made from the red clay.

About the Author
About Angela The Author
The Author - Quick Quotations

Angela Lansbury B A Hons  is the author of ten books by regular publishers plus another ten self-published books. 

About Angela The Speaker & Trainer

Angela Lansbury is a teacher of English and other languages to Toastmasters clubs and businesses.

Braddell Heights Advanced Toastmasters Speakers Vice President  Public Rrelations, Immediate Past President.
Former Area Director S3. Club Coach for Nee Soon South Toastmasters Club.
Also Member of: TCA Toastmasters Club; Singapore Online Dynamic; Harrovians UK, in north west London, England, UK.
 Garen Tee on using story telling in business, on bha.learncool.sg . Also educational on using Powerpoint for posters.
Next BHA meeting, Wednesday evening, May 5th, 7 pm Singapore 
Angela The Blogger 

Angela has several blogs speeches, comedy and song writing and organizing, writing itermittently, but writes almost daily on these three:

See next post on sulptor Tom Harvey.

Please share links to your favourite posts. 

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Wednesday, April 28, 2021

UK Cruises to Where? Kirkwall in the Orkneys. What's in it for me?


This is the latest thing. After staycations and stay on ship cruises to nowhere, crusises to distant parts of the British isles.




Several of them go to Kirwall, in the Orkneys, a new destination for me. What's it got?

First where is it?

Capital and largest town of The Orkneys, islands about 130 miles (320 kilometres) north of Aberdeen in Scotland. No, you can't drive there. Take a cruise ship. For a change, from lockdowns and stay home and your area.

Wikipedia says:

Kirkwall (Scots: Kirkwaa, Scottish Gaelic: Bàgh na h-Eaglaise, Norn: Kirkavå) is the largest town in Orkney, an archipelago to the north of mainland Scotland.

The name Kirkwall comes from the Norse name Kirkjuvágr (Church Bay), which later changed to Kirkvoe, Kirkwaa and Kirkwall.

An archipelago is a series of islands.

Population9,293 (2011 Census)

What to see:

1 Burial mounds. Usually underground.

“Grain Earth House” (see Historic Scotland). It is a short, low, stone-walled passage, deep underground, leading to a small pillared chamber. This kind of earth house (or “souterrain”) is characteristic of the Northern Isles (although the Grain Earth House is unusually deep below ground).

Souterrain is French for underground, terra being ground, as in Mediterranean, a sea in the middle of the earth, territory, or land.

2 Museums.

3 # A distillery. For Scottish whisky.

4 Learn some Gaelic. The local language.

Amusing Jolly sign to send home from the holiday or add to any slideshow on anyting.


More information from these Websites:

AIRPORTS in the highlands

https://www.facebook.com/hialairports/

Wikiedia

Wikicommons

Wikivoyage

Cruises

Shopping - tee-shirts, dresses and more:

https://www.redbubble.com/shop/?iaCode=w-dresses&query=kirkwall


About the Author
About Angela The Author
The Author - Quick Quotations

Angela Lansbury B A Hons  is the author of ten books by regular publishers plus another ten self-published books. 

About Angela The Speaker & Trainer

Angela Lansbury is a teacher of English and other languages to Toastmasters clubs and businesses.

Braddell Heights Advanced Toastmasters Speakers Vice President  Public Rrelations, Immediate Past President.
Former Area Director S3. Club Coach for Nee Soon South Toastmasters Club.
Also Member of: TCA Toastmasters Club; Singapore Online Dynamic; Harrovians UK
Garen Tee on using story telling in business, on bha.learncool.sg . Also educational on using Powerpoint for posters.
Next BHA meeting, Wednesday evening, May 5th, 7 pm Singapore 
Angela The Blogger 

Angela has several blogs speeches, comedy and song writing and organizing, writing itermittently, but writes almost daily on these three:


Please share links to your favourite posts. 

 See previous post on Tom Harvey, sculptor and Heath Robinson, humorous artist, and pretty Pinner, Middx, North west London.

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Walk To See The Heath Robinson Sculpture in Pinner Memorial Park carving by Tom Harvey in detail

 

This photo was taken by my good friend, Inra Sikdar, who I met at Harrow Writers Circle. He introduce me to Toastmasters International in the UK and he was a founder member of Harrovians Toastmasters Club, Harrovians meaning people who live in Harrow (not necessarily the Harrow on the Hill area but the London borough of Harrow).

 Let's look at the carving and see what we can see. Firstly, we want to know the elements, and how it relates to Pinner, then if it relates to Heath Robinson, finally how it relates to the sculptor.

1 Sculpture Features Mirroring Pinner

The Boy Bearing The Brolly

Starting top left we see a boy, in summery short sleeves,  holding a parasol (or umbrella) serving as a sunshade. The parasol suggests sun, and joy. 

However, it looks to me like the parasol is probably too far in front of the girl to be effective. (That is rather like a Heath Robinson absurdity. Good intention but not practical.)

The Tree Frame

We have a tree and plants across the top as a frame. It is a foreground, like the surroundings of the pleasant park. 

The Houses 

But by contrast in the area just below we see the small, distant, crowded buildings and cars. Seven houses in front, detached but linked by fences. Each house has watching windows and each one has a door. 

Behind, backing onto them, are five more houses. Same shape rooftops. Without windows. Adding perspective.

The Girl Reading, Relaxing

The girl is being pulled along by a dog. Absurd? Husky dogs are used in the USAr, in a team, in snow. But not usually to pull a pram or stroller, as the Americans say scribe, for a small sit up, contraption for a toddler. A stroller is usually pushed, not pulled. Her vehicle is almost reminiscent of a rickshaw, with the runner beside it carrying an umbrella. Fanciful, from times past.

The stroller is not a proper stroller but a deck chair. They started being folded on the decks of ships, then beaches, then back gardens. (Americans say back yards.) 

She is reading. She is barefoot.

An Arrow

Look again. top right is an arrow to the museum. The arrow comes from a design like the top of a Greek temple  which attaches to or turns into a tree branch from the tree trunk on the far right. 

The Vase of Flowers

Under the tree is a vase of flowers or an urn on a pedestal. However,  it is attached to either a securing rope or the rope pulled by the dog.

The Delightful Diligent Dog

The dog is wagging its tail happily. What is the skateboard doing? What is in the dog's mouth? If you can answer any of these questions, please tell me, and us. Thank you. 

The Line and The Sign

Finally, I took a last look. Along the lower edge is a dotted line. The line ends in an arrow pointing towards the Heath Robinson museum, echoing the line at the top of the sculpture. 

The design is so complicated, so elaborate, like Heath Robinson drawings, that I, as a viewer, found it hard to recall and detect the original purpose (a signpost to the museum). 

Wheel Around

Wheel around and take another last look.  I looked again. The vase is on a pedestal which is on two small wheels. They match the two wheels on the skateboard. So the dog is pulling along both.

The Cars' Direction

Finally, yes finally, there are seven cars parked outside the houses, or travelling in the direction of the arrows. One car below is returning.

All in all, a delightful sculpture. Worth a second look.  Or a third. Or more. Worth a photo. 

2 Heath Robinson

Many of his (Heath Robinson's) works are in the Heath Robinson Museum in the House beside the pond which  has (in April 2021 had) a museum shop, museum downstairs with the current exhibition, more displays upstairs, and a ground floor restaurant - all of which were open and which I visited several times before Covid-19 closures. 

3 Tom Harvey

Sculptures in parks all over London, and England. Featuring people, children, animals. Free to see.

 

Indra took this picture with a walking group. If you want to keep fit or keep in contact, or to promote your area, you could organize an outdoor walking trip, following a route, with a map, around local landmarks including sculptures, statues. London has several walking routes, including one from Hatch End station.

Useful Websites

https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Tom_Harvey#/media/File:Regent's_Park,_Boy_and_butterflies,_by_Tom_Harveyt.jpg


About the Author
About Angela The Author
The Author - Quick Quotations

Angela Lansbury B A Hons  is the author of ten books by regular publishers plus another ten self-published books. 

About Angela The Speaker & Trainer

Angela Lansbury is a teacher of English and other languages to Toastmasters clubs and businesses.

Braddell Heights Advanced Toastmasters Speakers Vice President  Public Rrelations, Immediate Past President.
Former Area Director S3. Club Coach for Nee Soon South Toastmasters Club.
Also Member of: TCA Toastmasters Club; Singapore Online Dynamic; Harrovians UK
Garen Tee on using story telling in business, on bha.learncool.sg . Also educational on using Powerpoint for posters.
Next BHA meeting, Wednesday evening, May 5th, 7 pm Singapore 
Angela The Blogger 

Angela has several blogs speeches, comedy and song writing and organizing, writing itermittently, but writes almost daily on these three:


Please share links to your favourite posts. 

 See previous post on Tom Harvey.




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