I was getting excited! A year after
going to my first ever convention (last year's Scottish),
it was time for my 4th (this year's Scottish)! Having
became a lot more confident and less shy throughout
the year, coupled with the fact I would already know
a stack of people at the Convention, I was sure that
this was going to be a great Convention for me.
| 115 people attended the convention this year,
and the farthest away traveller was Wayne van
Wijk from Australia. |
The downside was that my companions
for every other convention, my trusty band of juggling
mates from Stirling (Stirling Posse) could not make
it at all. Our Stirling Juggling Project has many
jugglers, all of whom would have loved to attend
the Convention, but as most of them are unemployed
or just able to get by, they couldn't afford the
trip to Glasgow as well as the tickets. For the
others in the juggling project, they were disappointed
that they could not attend the Convention for free
seeing as they were going to be part of the Show
on the Saturday night, so they were not attending
as a matter of principle. All of this meant, that
none of my usual travelling companions would be
making that journey with me.
But at least I would not be travelling
alone, as I had arranged for two of my Youth Group
to accompany me. I am a voluntary Church Youth Worker
and take young people for football every Monday
and general Sports every Thursday, and about a month
before the Convention, I decided to ask the two
lads (Chucky and Tim) who have shown the most promise
and enthusiasm for juggling if they would like to
join me. These two, have been buying up equipment
from my juggling store and I have been teaching
them little bits of juggling on a regular basis,
and so it was hoped that they would learn loads
at the convention and want to start coming along
to Stirling Juggling Project and attend more conventions
(and of course buy more equipment from me)!
My juggling
store has been making so many sales recently
that I had needed to re-order stock, which arrived
on the morning of the Convention. This meant that
I had my work cut out checking the order, and getting
it all processed (and I still had to pack)! With
my order, I had also purchased lots of new shiny
toys for myself to learn for the first time, and
these toys were to accompany me to the Convention
so I could get a basic understanding of them all
eg Poi, Scarves (large and small), Shaker Cups,
Knives, Staff.
And so it was, that I (Steve Thomson),
set out to Glasgow by Train at 5pm accompanied by
Timmy (Tim Hamlet) and Chucky (Rab Donald). On the
way there, we practiced some card tricks and magic
(the two boxed sets that are on sale at my juggling
store). My map reading is not all that good, so
it took us an hour to get to Glasgow Science Centre
from Queen Street Station, at which point, we sat
down and realised that we were meant to be at a
place called Kinning Park! Thankfully at this moment
of realisation, as if on cue, Graham and Marie arrived
to put up some posters to show people how to get
between venues, and we walked with them back to
the hall (10 mins walk).
On arrival, we were asked to choose
a piece from a map of the world jigsaw. This was
to be our passes for the Convention. Zoe and Chirlene
then showed us around the community centre, and
we found a place in a corner of a corridor that
the three of us could call home for the weekend.
Friday night was spent reuniting with friends from
last years convention, trying out my shaker cups
(Gandolf taught me a few tricks to practice), and
poi (Ruth showed me a few things to practice). I
was tired after my hectic week of work, so I didn't
stay up too long. The only way I could sleep while
stretched fully, was by keeping the door to the
attic open and putting my legs up on the steps (very
uncomfortable, but I was tired and soon dropped
off)!
Saturday
Breakfast supplied in the morning,
and everyone slowly woke up and the juggling began
to happen. Tim, Chucky and I decided on what workshops
we wanted to attend throughout the weekend, and
I explained to them that they would probably make
it to one or two workshops if they were lucky, because
you always set out to attend as many classes as
you can, but invariably fail and end up doing other
things! We waited around for the facepainting workshop
at Kinning Park. 20 minutes after it was supposed
to start, we were told that they were holding the
workshop at the Glasgow Science Centre instead!
We quickly packed the juggling equipment and stuff
for the day ahead, and walked out to the Science
Centre.
When we arrived, Chucky and I decided
to watch a face painting class, and got asked to
be models. He was made into a green tiger, and I
became a lion. When it came to the ceilidh later
on that night, I wore my brown and gold waistcoat
so I had a fantastic look!
We were under the impression that
we had a pass to the whole Science Centre, but we
are only allowed on the ground floor (£6.50
to go on the other 3 floors and try the 300 interactive
experiments). We put all our stuff in the juggling
area where all the other jugglers had amassed. We
were a good showcase in the corner of the Science
Centre, as people coming in to the Centre could
watch us practice. Jamie took a devil stick class,
and I learned a couple of new tricks from him. Tim
bought a flower stick, and Chucky borrowed a stick,
so they learned the basics. Chucky had an idea of
how to combine Poi and Staff Spinning, so he sellotaped
the poi to each end of the staff, and did an impressive
routine, that many others were amazed at and wondered
how he did it! We then headed to the UV room to
do some UV juggling which was fantastic. Ruth joined
us, and showed us her UV poi sticks she made, which
were fantastic! I then went to the Beard Stall,
where I bought the Fire Staff that Greg had brought
down especially for me.
Review
of the show
also available as a link from the top and
bottom of each Glasgow Convention 2003 page.
|
The show was followed by a haggis
supper and free beer (only a month out of date!)
Then it was time for the ceilidh at which a new
dance was introduced “the Jugglers Jig”!
There was far more room to fling your partner about
the hall floor this year compared to last year,
and most people had a dance at some point in the
night. Rerr Terr Ceilidh Band as always were fantastic!
Chucky and Tim preferred to spend most of the time
outside with the fire jugglers and practice fire
staffs. I saw Larissa use a fire diabolo (which
I had never seen before). It was impressive. Got
chatting to a lovely girl called Mirabel, until
it was time for the Renegade, by which time most
people had crashed out somewhere.
RENEGADE (a talent show where anyone
can get up and do anything they want):
The highlight for most people was
a very talented Spanish flamenco type guitarists
who played some solos and accompanied one of the
acts. There were a few other musical acts, and,
I finally decided to get up and do a renegade, so
I did the Bird Impressions Ball Juggling Routine
of Gordon’s (which I later found out was Gordon’s
first ever renegade act also)! It went down reasonably
well, and I persuaded, Chucky to get up and do a
quick show of his Poi/Staff combination that impressed
people earlier. An 11 year old boy got up and did
a shirt bounce 3 ball trick (that I had taught him
yesterday), and Ewan did his escapology whilst on
a unicycle (except he was so drunk that he couldn’t
stay on the unicycle, so he cheated and stood on
it whilst it lay on the ground!) There was an astrojax
versus jitter-ring showdown also between “more
danger” man and Richard. The renegade then
finished and I headed off to catch some Zzzzz’s!
Sunday 9 February
Chucky had been awoke by Zoe and Chirlene
at 11am, when they persuaded him that he had slept
in and missed half the days events! He soon got
up quickly! Chucky, Tim and I grabbed breakfast
and headed to Science Centre. I went to a 3 ball
workshop and learned some fancy pauses. Tim then
went to a contact juggling workshop, and Chucky
and I decided it was time to chance getting up the
escalator into the exhibits without a ticket…
When we reached the escalator, we told the woman
that the supervisor had said it would be ok for
us to go upstairs, and she let us go! We couldn’t
believe it, and made the most of our hour upstairs
going round as many exhibits as we could (too much
to get round in so short a time), before the Juggling
games commenced. Captain Duncan and Delphine turned
up and headed off wall climbing with Ewan.
JUGGLING GAMES:
I teamed up with Gav for all the club
passing games, but he dropped everytime. I teamed
up with Chucky for the stredging, and we were fine
on the practice, but he just couldn't flick up during
the real game! I did ok at Gladiators, and even
drew with a girl at devil stick gladiators! It was
then time for the WORLD RECORD 3 HAGGIS JUGGLING.
About 20 of us took part, and after 2 minutes, for
some weird reason, only me and "more danger"
man were left! We wandered around and chatted out
loud to each other and told jokes to keep ourselves
amused, as it is quite a boring thing to do and
watch. I managed to last for 6.5 minutes (world
record was 8.5 minutes), and the more danger man
(Andy Blackett) managed 9 minutes 47 seconds and
got the new world record! I was surprised I had
gotten so far. I had been getting cheered on from
the sidelines and I thought I could win it. There
was diabolo in a box game, but no diabolo's got
in, then there was the throwing diabolo up, and
catching someone else's diabolo (I was out in the
first round). There was some more gladiators, then
it was time for the raffle, and we ended with the
TOSSUP!
And then it was time to begin our
journey home, approximately 48 hours since we set
out for Glasgow! We had crammed a lot in to our
time at the convention. Tim and Chucky had a great
time at their first convention, and I hope they
will want to come along to our Juggling Project
and indeed more conventions. I had a great time,
although I did miss not having all my juggling posse
from Stirling there with me. I am already looking
forward to the British and European Juggling Conventions
so watch this space.
Scottish Juggling Conventions
