Mark Steel's In Town

Mark performs from the Pickaquoy Centre in Kirkwall, Orkney, where he encounters Thorfinn The Skullsplitter and an extraordinarily violent ball game. He also learns why it's pointless being a hairdresser on the island.

This week, Mark is at Pickaquoy Centre in Kirkwall, the capital of Orkney, which is perhaps the smallest capital city in the world and certainly the most northerly place he has visited during the series. Still at least Mark is guaranteed a cheer from the locals, just because he made it to the islands.

Not only is there the issue of getting to the islands themselves, but there is also the weather, which was described by one local scholar as, "the vilest under heaven." This leads to Mark saying that the most pointless job in Orkney would to be a hairstylist because of the wind and rain.

One interesting aspect is that the locals do not see themselves as Scottish nationalists but Orkney nationalists, mainly of Norwegian heritage. One famous early Orkney resident was Thorfinn the Skullsplitter. Not much of him is known, but it is safe to assume he was pretty violent. The locals respect him and have even named a very strong beer after him. It is also revealed that in its early history, the Vikings settle in Orkney happily and then they used Orkney as a base to attack Norway.

Mark then takes a look at Kirkwall itself, where he learns that the crime rate is one of the lowest in Britain. The locals do however have a strong dislike of Stromness, the second largest city in Orkney, and the town has road signs warning of otters crossing the road. Perhaps strangest of all the local sights is the shop which in the front window displays a pram but is actually an off-licence.

He then deals with one local grievance which annoys the locals: the word "Orkneys" is wrong because "Orkney" is already a plural. Out of the islands, about 13 are inhabited and Kirkwall is on the largest, which is known as the Mainland.

One of the things that Mark admires about Kirkwall is that fact that people do not mind things which people from Britain consider strange. For example, one time when a baby was born the local men celebrated by drinking whiskey, which they also feed to the baby using a teaspoon.

There is also the ancient Norse warrior Sigurd the Might thought a battle with Pict called Tusk, so called because he had a large protruding tooth. Sigurd won the battle, cut off his head and took it with him on his horse, but on the way back the tooth pierced his leg and Sigurd died of blood poisoning.

Mark then looks at some of the visitors to Kirkwall. Amongst them include a German tourist you complained about the bus service, saying that there was only one bus that went right around the Mainland, which only went one way. Other visitors included army troops who stationed there during the two world wars. During World War Two, a theatre was set up here which attracted Gracie Fields, Vera Lynn, George Formby and Yehudi Menuhin, but that did not stop one of the soldiers writing a poem saying that everything in Orkney was bloody awful.

Lastly, he talks about the Kirkwall Ba, perhaps the most violent ball game in history. It is played every year on Christmas Day and New Year's Day between the Uppies and Doonies (depending where you were born). The Doonies have to get the ball (the Ba) into the harbour and the Uppies in a goal up town, and that is all the rules. Almost any amount of violence is allowed.