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We attended The Royal Edinburgh Military Tattoo again this year. We’ve been to several tattoo’s (we got together while working at the 1999 tattoo) and been lucky enough to see our sister and brother in law perform (drumming and piping)at another. This year it was my brother’s turn as a PTI gymnast. My brother’s done two tours of duty in Afghanistan and will become a Sergeant this year in the PTI corps. I think you can guess how proud I am of him

Here’s a video of his section in the tattoo;

Bear with me while I go off on a slight tangent. During our much talked about trip to Florida this year we watched the Believe show, you know the one with the big killer whales. Before the show started there was a tribute to the American armed forces, they had videos from troops in iraq and they asked servicemen in the audience to stand for a round of applause. The response was huge and you could feel the emotion of the crowd, as I sat there I must admit that my default response was that it was all very american and a bit over the top. On reflection though I think that the Americans actually have it right, they’re proud and they aren’t afraid to show it. There were kids in that audience, lots of kids, and it was a great way for them to be made aware of the sacrifices that are being made and it was done in a very uplifting way. We could do with a bit of that over here.

I had my reservations about taking Erin to the tattoo with us, it didn’t finish til’ well after eleven and she was really tired by the time we were done, but she loved it. She drummed her hands at the pipes and drums and clapped at the dancing and gymnastics. She also asked questions. She asked about soldiers, about what they do and why. She also asked about the pictures that were beamed up onto the castle, and I’m glad I had the courage to tell her the truth; they’re the men and women that have died to make sure that we’re safe. I go with the honesty is the best policy on these issues, life is what it is and I don’t see the point in sugar coating it (don’t worry we still ‘do santa’!).

The Tattoo is a great opportunity not only to celebrate our military but a chance to honour our fallen and the wives or husbands and children they’ve left behind. The Royal Edinburgh Military Tattoo has raised over ?5m for charity – military and civilian, one of it’s main beneficiaries is the Army Benevolent Fund which supports soldiers but crucially their families too.

So when I think back to that Believe show and the respect they showed their servicemen and women I want to shout a big ‘hell yeah’, because they do deserve a bit of public recognition. They do deserve our respect and gratitude. Our children do deserve to know that there are girls and guys out there watching our back and there’s nothing cheesey about giving them a round of applause once in a while. You don’t have to condone a war to be grateful that someone was willing to lay down their lives for you and your family to be safe.

I was going to put a specific clip here from the Tattoo, however I couldn’t find it and when I searched for ‘Here’s to the heroes’ I found only American military tribute videos(!) So I put together a little something myself featuring my own (second rate) photos and my friends (premium quality) photos along with a few thought provoking quotes.