St George Has His Day
Posted by Vikki in May's MagazineSAINT GEORGE HAS HIS DAY VIKKI GRAVES braves the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune to report on a singular experiment in cross border harmonisation.
Once upon a time, a man named George killed a dragon to rescue a damsel in distress. All the English people loved him and made him their patron saint. And they all lived happily ever after.
Now I’m from England and that’s as much as I know. I can’t recall any St George celebrations in my youth. In fact, the day would have passed unnoticed yet again this year had it not been for The Leither. Flicking through last month’s edition, I was surprised to find an advert for a St George’s Day themed menu at The Roseleaf. Surely in Scotland they give even less of a monkey’s about it than I do?
I confess the news made me feel a bit warm and fuzzy for a moment. Like I said, I’m from England and I live in Scotland, which I like very much. But sometimes I feel this is not enough to explain my presence. To make up for my posh voice, I say ‘British’ more than is necessary, and intersperse my received pronunciation with liberal spatterings of ‘ayes’ and ‘kens’ which, thankfully, most Scots are polite enough to ignore. I demonstrate my proficiency in the Scots velar fricative pronunciation of ‘loch’ and force myself to say ‘neeps’, or at the very least ‘turnip’, even though we all know it’s really ‘swede.’
I must point out that I’ve never really had any grief about being English. And it’s not that I’m ashamed of it – with my accent I couldn’t get away with being anything else. But I’m not actively proud of it either. I didn’t know that George is also the patron saint of lots of European countries and other far flung destinations such as Ethiopia and Lebanon. Not only that, but according to the St George Unofficial Bank Holiday website “he’s also patron saint of soldiers, archers, cavalry and chivalry, farmers and field workers, riders and saddlers, and he helps those suffering from leprosy and plague.” Busy man.
On further investigation, there are many people south of the border calling for more to be done to mark George’s murder of the mythical fire-breathing beast. Some want a public holiday, cheeky blighters, others want the red and white flag flying, and the diehards are calling for an English parliament. And for the first time ever, in an attempt to summon up an increased sense of English national identity, the esteemed Mayor of London, Boris Johnson, treated the city to Morris dancing, a maypole and a Punch and Judy show, saying “St George’s Day has been ignored in London for far too long…I encourage everyone to join in the fun and celebrate England’s great patron saint.” Down south it looks like in a few years, the bold St George might even need an agent.
But this feverish activity hasn’t quite reached Scotland yet, so instead I focussed my attentions on lunch. I thought about proper pie and mash, with mushy peas and liquor; a ploughman’s lunch in the pub with white bread, a doorstep hunk of cheddar cheese and tangy pickle; a massive Cornish pasty from a beachside bakery, straight out of the oven with a filling so hot it’ll strip the roof of your mouth off. I could get into celebrating St George’s Day. Gripped with a newfound appreciation of Englishness, I set off for The Roseleaf. Although I knew in my heart of hearts it was unlikely, I still didn’t quite give up hope of stepping through the doors to find a host of diners in Kiss-Me-Quick hats, and Chas and Dave blasting out ‘Dooown to Maargate’ in the corner. But, predictably some might say, there wasn’t a red and white flag or a cuddly toy dragon in sight.
They did have Yorkshire puddings though, giant ones at that. How could I have forgotten about Yorkshire puddings? Crisp and light as a feather on top and soggy and gooey on the bottom, having sat in a pool of rich onion gravy. Thank you Roseleaf. Although the presence of beardy men in knee high socks with bells on, hitting bits of wood together on Leith Links is probably some way off, I realised that some lighthearted English-Scottish banter and a bit of a sense of national pride is no bad thing. Because you say turnip, I say swede, but we both say Yorkshire pudding.