Last Saturday night, St. John's hosted its first Robbie Burns Night since 2016. It was a much more informal version than previous years, but the famous traditions were still included - such as The Address to the Haggis (delivered with vigor by Colin Robson), The Immortal Memory (a speech noting the relevance of Robert Burns and his works today, written and spoken by Andrea Rutty), and several musical performances and poetry readings. Thank you to our musicians: Lee Ramsay, Bradley Hitchcok, May Webster, Jaro Czerwinec, Alie Rutty, Ryan Lokan, and Ernesto De Luca; and our poetry readers: Sue Ferguson, Lee Ramsay, and Allison MacDuffee Special shoutout to Doug McLauchlan, dressed in full Scottish regalia, who made a brief speech to boost our energy.
With the participation of several members of the local community (we had a crowd of over 30 attendees), we had a plentiful feast of food for our potluck, including real haggis, vegetarian haggis, roast beef, lentil soup, and even real trifle! Many people felt welcomed into St. John's for the first time because of this event, and they are looking forward to more potlucks and concerts for the community in the future. There was even a request for an Irish concert for St. Patrick's Day - so stay tuned for an official announcement about that...
Thank you to everyone who helped make this event so successful!
Alie Rutty
Photos by Christopher Rutty and Graham Venney
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