Relax with a wee drap of tay and watch A Word In Yer Lug

Whilst having his hair cut before leaving, he told his barber, one of the brethren, that he was foregoing the glorious Twelfth for a holiday in Italy.

Off he went with his new haircut and as well as “seein’ Michelangelo’s David an’ the leanin’ tower o’ Pisa” he chanced upon the Pope in Rome who exclaimed “Who in God’s name cut yer hair that bad?”

The poem’s author, acclaimed champion of Ulster Scots, Liam Logan, is currently co-presenting an online video series with seasoned broadcaster Jane Veitch.

While sampling some of Ulster’s unique scenery and unrivalled visitor attractions they jointly explore a selection of Ulster Scots words and phrases and their role in daily discourse.

Readers of The Scotsman newspaper recently voted ‘pin yer lugs back’ high on their top 40 favourite Scottish sayings.

It means ‘listen carefully, pay attention’ and it’s no coincidence that the video series is entitled ‘A Word in Yer Lug’ as the 20 episodes are utterly captivating.

All across Ulster, Liam and Jane together take a witty and informative look at each location and at the richness of the Ulster Scots language with its unique descriptive assets.

There’s also a ‘brave’ amount of ‘codology’ between the two though the ‘cutty’ usually wins!

And there’s more than a few surprises, such as occurred on The Gobbins coastal cliff path near Larne, undoubtedly one of the most dramatic walkways of its kind in Europe.

Travel writer and thespian Richard Hayward once described The Gobbins’ deep, iron-bridged inlets and hand-chiselled, undulating, sometimes precipitous stonework as a “mile of wonder...pierced and fretted by the tireless sea.”

It’s quite steep and strenuous in places, so Jane jokingly asks Liam if he can cope.

He hopes he can’t, because cope (or ‘coup’) in Ulster Scots means to fall over or slip down.

Meanwhile the camera focuses ominously on Hayward’s ‘tireless sea’ far, far below.

They embark on an avian adventure at Castle Espie’s wetland nature reserve on the shores of Strangford Lough where Liam explains “we owe a debt to our feathered friends for a very popular word in Ulster Scots derived from the bird’s beak which we render as ‘bake’ and use instead of a person’s mouth!”

He introduces Jane to a curlew with a long bent ‘bake’.

He calls the curlew a ‘whap’ and if you’ve got a big nose in Ulster Scots “you’ve a ‘neb’ on you like a ‘whap’”

“There’s no need to get personal,” quips Jane before discovering that a snipe is a ‘heatherbleat’, a magpie is a ‘pyyet’ and Liam is cold so “we’ll hae tae fly!”

On cue, they’re at the Ulster Aviation Museum near Lisburn, in a helicopter, with Liam in the pilot’s seat.

Should Jane be worried?

The answer is probably ‘yes!’ but “the fly we’re looking at today is nothing to do with being up in the air,” Liam clarifies comfortingly “it’s fly meaning sly, sleekit, cute.”

Jane interjects “but not cute like a wee fluffy kitten?”

“No, cute like a fox,” Liam stresses.

They further discuss ‘fly’ with Liam suggesting it would be a ‘fly move’ to take a lift in a car whilst competing in a marathon.

“You’re a fly boy,” Jane tells her Ulster Scots collaborator.

“We’re at Lough Barry, on Inishmore Island,” she explains in an episode filmed in her home county of Fermanagh.

She’s gone fishing which “is something I haven’t done since I was a wee girl.”

Liam reminds her that back then she’d have been called a ‘cutty’ in Ulster Scots.

“That’s a great word,” Jane enthuses, and when she hooks a “quare size” of a fish Liam tells her that “a hook can also be a bit of a rogue”.

Produced by Macmillan Media with the Ulster-Scots Agency and NI Screen’s Ulster Scots Broadcast Fund, the series also spotlights May McFetridge ‘acting the gype’ in Belfast’s Grand Opera House; grimly recalls the ‘glar, clabber and stoor’ that coated the battlefields of the Somme and adds a ‘squig’ of milk to a ‘wee drap o tay’ during a Lough Erne cruise.

‘A Word In Yer Lug’ is available to view on YouTube.

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