Toddish McWong gives Address to the Haggis
at VDLC Burns Supper
Friday January 21, 2011
Maritime Labour Centre
Vancouver, BC
The Burns Supper by the Vancouver & District Labour Council is one of my favorite Burns Supper events. It is also a fundraiser for the Queen Alexandra Elementary School hot lunch program. I also belong to CUPE 391 Vancouver library workers, and I am a delegate for the VDLC. This past year has been challenging for Queen Alexandra School, because it was one of the schools named to a short list of schools that could be closed due to budget cuts for Vancouver School Board.
Paul Sihota, Todd Wong, and Bill Saunders, VDLC President. Bill is wearing the tam hat and bow-tie in Burns check, that I brought back from the Burns Cottage last year from my trip to Scotland. Paul and I are looking very dapper in our kilt outfits. We were finalists in the “Best dressed kilt” contest… that was decided by a final showdown between the two of us. Paul had great applause, but I pushed it further when I stepped up to the stage edge, and performed a kilt twirl.
This was the third year in a row that I have performed the Address to the Haggis at the VDLC Dinner. Each year I receive great compliments. Last year, somebody said they were outside the room, and heard a Scottish voice, but walked back into the banquet hall to see a Chinese face… They were surprised!
Here is the bottle of Glenlivet single malt scotch that I won as a prize.
Dinner! There is a wee bit of haggis on the left side of the plate, but I do prefer the roast beef.
Jim Sinclair, president of the BC Federation of Labour, gives the toast to Robbie Burns, after giving the Immortal Memory – which recounts the life of Robert Burns. Sinclair highlighted the reasons why Burns was known as “The Ploughman's Poet”, or “workingman's poet”, emphasizing that Burns was also a public employee, while he was an exiseman (tax collector), which he hated doing, and apparently donated some of the taxes to worthy causes.
Click on this videoIf you look closely, you will see an Asian Highland Dancer… well half-Asian….
see more pictures here on my Flickr account:
VDLC Burns Dinner