252 years after the birth of Robert Burns – voted in a 2009 poll the greatest Scot of all time – I attend two very different events on a snowy Kyiv evening to mark Burns night.

Next Summer's Edinburgh International Festival will focus on the cultures of Asia and the influence of Eastern cultures on artists in the West. Announcing the Festival 2011 theme ‘To the Far West’ in Beijing today, Festival Director Jonathan Mills promised "a heady three weeks of exquisite artistic exploration which I hope will intoxicate audiences."

Links between a giant of the Scottish film industry and Indian filmmakers have already helped create one of the decade's biggest movies. Now it is hoped that a new link-up between film students in Edinburgh and top Bollywood talent could lead to the next Slumdog Millionaire, the Mumbai-set smash-hit made by Shallow Grave and Trainspotting director Danny Boyle.

According to the Nation Brand Index, which measures how countries are perceived by other nations, Scotland is ranked 18th, behind nations such as America and France. But one of the challenges Mr Dixon, who took over his post three weeks ago, has set himself is to elevate Scotland into the top ten.