Gigha’s global citizens

Argyll’s Isle of Gigha is making its mark – literally – in New York City – on a mini golf course being created by Manhattan schoolchildren.

The course is to feature elements from various areas of Scotland.

Schoolchildren from Gigha have been beachcombing for their contribution and will be sending shells and pebbles – presumably for a bunker. The future will reveal how many budding Big Apple golfers come to grief in the Gigha Gullet.

Joking apart, this is a charming project. There is no doubt that the gift of physical artefacts reinforces connections and creates ownerships beyond the normal spectrum of expectation.

If kids from the Manhattan school ever get to Gigha – and what about it? – we want to be there to record the event and to talk to them.

There would be young people from a culture where umbrellas for sale hit the streets on the first spots of rain and there are pretzels and fast food of the most amazing quality available on every street corner.

Then there is a tiny island, as low and undulating a sea snake as Manhattan – though not all-but-sinking under the weight of wall-to-wall high rise buildings and short of grid-locks, delis, coffee bars and opportunities for retail therapy.

This is a cultural collision which has to happen.

Education Minister Michael Russell is quoted as saying that all Scotland’s school children should be global citizens. The New York school golf course engagement definitely brings a widening of horizons – and Gigha’s already on the route west.