Bagpipes give Scots pair ‘goose pimples’

Press, 26 July 1986, Page 30

Bagpipes give Scots pair ‘goose pimples’

By

KAREN NIMMO

NZPAstafffcorrespondent Edinburgh The emotion of the opening ceremony gave the Scotsmen, Morgan Moffat and Matt Marshall “goose pimples” as they marched under the New Zealand banner yesterday. Surrounded by bagpipes and Scottish schoolchildren, the pair paraded with the 173strong team. “It gets you right in the neck,” said Dr Marshall, the New Zealand head team doctor, after leaving the stadium. “They (the officials) tell you not to wave until you get alongside the Duke of Edinburgh. But, once you get in there, you just can’t help it” Moffat, skip of the bowls four, agreed. “The bagpipe music is very stirring — the whole thing was just great.” Marshall, who left Scotland 29 years ago and now lives in Whangarei, said that he and Moffat, who emigrated from Edinburgh in 1975, were chosen for the team for just one reason. “We’re the interpreters. I don’t know how they’d get on without us.” For Moffat the 13th

Games hold special meaning. As lead in the Scotland fours team he won a bronze medal at the Christchurch Games in 1974. This time he wants to reverse the result, but it is not the bronze medal he has in his sights. The triple Commonwealth Games medallist — he won slivers in the fours for New Zeland at Edmonton and Brisbane — wants gold. “This is the one. It’s gold we’re after,” he said. Moffat has taken the role of tour guide since the bowls team arrived in Edinburgh. He has had his teammates up before breakfast for long walks around the city. The daily stroll — “great for the stamina and helps them sleep* — takes up to two hours. Moffat had helped the team — several of whom are of Scots descent — investigate their ancestry, and he had one or two other “treats” lined up for them. “They haven’t been game to try the haggis yet_l think they know what it’s made of,” he said.