Diary of a Shopkeeper, 1st October
Showtime! (Image courtesy of Aye Tunes.)
As regular readers of this diary will know, I haven’t been Chair of Kirkwall BID since March. Despite no longer helping organise events, I’m still an enthusiastic participant as a business member. Yesterday’s Girls’ Day Out was a great demonstration of why.
One of BID’s earliest successes, Girls’ Day Out was a colourful, whimsical way to get shoppers of all ages down the street. In the early days, encouragement was provided by copious offerings of cupcakes and Prosecco – both very much ‘a thing’ a decade ago. After a few seasons, it was replaced by other events: it’s important to keep events fresh rather than just repeating old favourites to diminishing returns. And then up popped Covid…
Girls’ Day Out came roaring back yesterday. Retailers and eateries created fantastic window displays, special offers and menus. BID set up their gazebo on Victoria Street, with a Let’s Go Party photo booth and a DJ. The public embraced the theme in great numbers, making the most of the fine day to throng the streets, visiting favourite shops and starting or finishing with a meal or a drink. Kirkness & Gorie had twice as many customers as we’d usually expect on a Saturday in late September. Thanks to everyone who came in, and to BID for their hard work in organising the event.
To fit in with the Barbie-esque theme, we bought a great length of neon pink tulle from Jude’s Joke Shop, and hung it over our cheese and olive fridges. We used the hooks that our Covid-era screen hung from. (Remember screens? Once they were everywhere, now they’re consigned to distant memory, hard to imagine as ever having existed.) It was only when I stepped back to gauge the effect that I realised our pink swag looked exactly like a theatre curtain, draping the wings and proscenium arch in glorious velvet folds.
The curtain opens, and the show begins!
The show begins: Flotta. (Image courtesy of Aye Tunes.)
Retail is a kind of theatre. The customers (audience) come in to be made happy (with purchases rather than a play) and the staff (actors) provide the entertainment. There’s no script, the whole performance is improvised. If it was a TV programme it would be called, Whose Wine Is It Anyway?
Girls’ Day Out was my second theatrical experience of the weekend. On Friday evening I saw an entertaining and emotional play in Stenness school: My Doric Diary, staged by Aye Music, a small Scottish company. It was a one-woman show performed by Katie Barnett, who also co-wrote it alongside guitarist James Siggens, one of the two musicians on stage.
I was predisposed to enjoy it, as Katie was born in Fraserburgh, as was I, and the whole story was told in broad Buchan Scots – my mother tongue. But you didn’t need to be a Brocher to love this play. Katie’s singing was remarkable, her persona engaging, and the story she told went straight to the heart.
It blended the ordinary – an Aberdeenshire teenager turning 17 in the company of her grumpy granny – and the extraordinary – time travel and the miraculous appearance of a much-loved, much-missed mother. Such is the magic of theatre that no justification for the fantastic events was needed. The skill of the writing and the conviction of the performance made us believe every word. What was equally magical was that the show was staged not just in Stenness, but also in Burray, The Hope, Flotta and Egilsay (where, I was told, 11 out of the population of 19 came to see it.)
Thanks to Aye Tunes, and to the local bodies who promoted this excellent initiative. And thanks again to BID and the shoppers of Orkney, for turning Kirkwall into one big theatre on Saturday!
You can read about Aye Tunes here. I look forward to them returning to Orkney with more shows.
This diary appeared in The Orcadian on 4th October 2023. A new one appears weekly. I post them in this blog a few days after each newspaper appearance, with added illustrations., and occasional small corrections or additions.