Festival Fringe

Come August and Edinburgh the beautiful capital of Scotland turns into a massive performance pad buzzing with artists and performers from across the world.

The Edinburgh Festival Fringe or simply ‘The Fringe” started in 1947when 8 theatrical groups decided to land up uninvited at the Edinburgh International Festival (EIF), the original and the official festival consisting of opera, theatre, dance, music and visual arts. Over the years new and more performers started turning up to perform on the outskirts of EIF and by 1958 The Festival Fringe Society was formed which provided all information pertaining to the Fringe shows. Now the EIF and the Fringe run as independent bodies bringing separate programmes every year.

I was lucky this year, as my trip to Scotland got to be around the festival time. As you walk the Royal Mile, a long and wide stretch of cobbled street between the Edinburgh Castle and the Royal house of the Queen and family, you will stop not once but a thousand times watching the various street performances that are held on the road. Not only the Royal Mile but every nook and corner in the city centre gets hijacked by the performers who enthrall their audiences with their performances.

Human statues (about which Q shared an article with us sometime back), Street performers, solo music performances, group performances, gimmicks, stunts, funny acts are few of the things you get as you walk around. All these performers get no remuneration from the Fringe society for entertaining, which explains why they ask for donations at the end of their performance. You will also find artists walking in their theatre/stage costumes on the roads promoting their plays. The tickets for these plays can be bought from the Fringe office. There are also promotional offers for certain plays and stand up acts tickets for which can be picked up from the half price Fringe office. Also look out for free performances, which sometimes are really good. I accidently found out about one such stand up act and thoroughly enjoyed it. All these plays are shown in hotels, auditoriums, halls… etc details of which are provided on a map.

Fringe is an open arts festival, meaning that Fringe Festival society doesn’t invite any of these performers, does not produce any event, does not run any venue and as said earlier does not pay any fees to the performers.

Right in centre of the Royal Mile is a small outlet serving fish and chips, haggis (traditional Scottish meal – meat cooked in sheep’s intestine), fried pizza (you miss nothing by giving it a miss!) and a fried Mars chocolate bar! It’s a popular joint and you can easily locate it by the number of people thronging the outlet. Just don’t miss this outlet, its got a blue board right near the Fringe Box Office. For ones with a sweet tooth, as you walk towards the Royal Palace, you will find a Fudge outlet, which claims to have pioneered the fudge long time ago. They even have a board outside claiming so!!

The one-month of Edinburgh festival is one massive event with over 30,000 performances, 15,000 performers and 2000 different shows. The festival has been a launch pad for the careers of Emma Thompson, Hugh Grant, Robin Williams, Jude Law and many more.

Other attractions of Edinburgh are the Walter Scott’s monument, Writer’s museum, Book Lover’s city guided walk that starts from outside of the writer’s museum, Edinburgh castle, The Scottish Parliament… etc

As you walk the streets you will get to hear the bagpipes playing in every other shop which kind of adds up to the whole Scottish experience and if you are lucky you will actually find a real band playing in the garden near the Walter Scott monument, like I did! The traditional outfit for men the Kilt can be bought for as cheap as 20 Euros but finer quality ones can get as expensive as 500 to 1000 Euros. Sporrans, bagpipe and other accessories come at an additional cost of course!

As for the weather, you will either love it or absolutely detest it. The weather God seems to be indecisive as the weather turns around dramatically every 15 minutes with Sun, Rain & the Wind taking their turns. You got to have a windsheeter, an umbrella, a cap and a jacket in your bag as you venture out in Edinburgh.

Well, that was a slice from my Scottish experience for you…