David G Pullar is a highly regarded horticulturist working and living in Scotland and has worked with some of the industry’s most successful and celebrated gardeners and garden designers and has even enjoyed a stint at Scotland’s very own TV garden, Beechgrove.

It was my heritage that has led me down this path of self-discovery, ‘where am I  from?’, ‘Who were my ancestors?’ These are the questions I asked himself as I was growing up, it was through chatting with family members and doing some online research that I did indeed make a discovery, having  hoped I perhaps came from Viking warriors I was surprised to find out that my ancestors were those of the mysterious Travelling people, the Gypsy Travellers of Scotland.

I wondered what this meant for me and what would I do with this new information?  Well, where some people may have been left feeling slightly embarrassed or even ashamed of this discovery due to the negative stereotypes which surround this traditionally nomadic community, I was far from judgemental of my heritage, in fact I went as far as to embrace my heritage, with both arms!

One thing that may have helped me welcome and accept this part of my identity is one thing that sadly many people from ethnic backgrounds can’t claim to have, a celebrity great grandmother. 

Betsy Whyte, who sadly died just days before my 1st birthday was in fact a very accomplished individual, she was a famous author and a multi award winning Storyteller, but not only that, I came to realise she was viewed by the highest academics as one of Scotland’s key tradition bearers, which meant she carried her culture through her ballads and storytelling and through firsthand knowledge of her community which could have only been learnt from within.

Excited by my great grandmother’s amazing legacy I started sharing these cultural arts, through concerts, exhibitions and festivals and I even published a children’s picture book based on her life, which to my astonishment was a roaring success.

I was both overwhelmed and humbled by the response I received from the general public and from the Travelling community too, I won recognition and awards for my achievements, it was all very wonderful, yet deep inside me I felt as if I was a fraud, were these really my achievements?  Or was I piggybacking on the success of my great grandmother?  I never lived that life, I was sharing someone else’s story, not my own.  Then I realised that what I was doing was keeping her unique story and her individual relationship with her culture alive, allowing it, through me, to continue to travel in a world where there are gates and boulders at every historical stopping place.                       

There is no one alive today who can claim they lived that life and shared in her exact experiences.  In a modern form individual to them perhaps, but not in the ways of old, the ways which would make you a tradition bearer.  Some would say we make our own traditions, and indeed traditions can change with each generation, but those who claim to have lived this life are doing a great dishonour to those who went through hardships and struggles tougher than we will ever have to face today.

It’s because of these feelings that I’ve set out to become my own man, with my own skills, which honour those in my family who came before and left their legacy for me to take once more to the open road.  So, in order to achieve this, and as peculiar as it sounds, I’ve become a Storytellers’ Apprentice, based at the Scottish Storytelling Centre in Edinburgh. There I will gain skills in the art of storytelling and there I hope to find my own voice.

I will research and learn the stories which my great grandmother recorded on cassettes decades ago, which are now gathering dust in basement archives.  I will retell them, her words in my voice, to an entirely new audience or indeed anyone who will listen and by doing so I hope to pay homage to  my great grandmother whose skills, knowledge and experiences could so easily be left to fade into the murky mists of time.

This short film sets out the beginning of my journey and what I hope to achieve during my apprenticeship.  I am grateful to Moving For Change for funding this short film and am currently seeking additional funding to enable me to capture my whole journey.  I will shortly have a GoFundMe page set up and I will apply to heritage funding sources for support.   I hope you will you join me on my journey.