Once upon a time, there were two Americans, who laid around
and did nothing all day. Like that’s ever gonna happen…
Unfortunately, it does happen, all the time in America in
fact, and yesterday it even happened in Ireland. Oh sure, we got a decent
amount of work done, but to my hyper-active little soul it seemed like we
didn’t do a blasted thing.
We had intended from the start when planning our weekend that
Sunday was to be a computer work day. So, we slept in to recuperate from a late
night of music and partying (ok, it was mostly music), and rose to open our laptops and begin
arranging the tons of information
we’d been blessed with. I sorted through pictures with a decent amount of
success, and Sam transcribed several of the interviews we had made so far.
In keeping with the true spirit of our journey that Sam
reminded us both of, I’m going to tell you a bit about these interviews, so you
can understand these dear Irish people. After all, that’s the point of this
trip, to gain and spread knowledge of them, not of us. First we talked to the
principal of an Irish-only speaking school here in Belfast by the name of An
Droichead. This school is under the same roof and name as the cultural center
where we went to the concert on Saturday night. This lady was very passionate
about Irish, and as Sam pointed out in his last blog, both she and An Droichead
are very concerned with pushing Irish culture forward and seeing that future
generations continue the tradition. She spoke to us with an insider’s knowledge
of the school system and told us all about the Irish medium schools. Many of
the kids that start out in these schools at the age of 5 come from English
speaking homes. Their parents understand the importance of knowing Irish, so
they send their kids to be immersed in Irish at these state funded public
schools. The kids are exposed only to Irish in the classrooms, until about the
age of 11 when they are taught English, but only as a second language. These
children, if they continue through the Irish medium schools through graduation,
will grow up truly bilingual, as they are immersed in Irish in the majority of
their daily conversation, but are taught English as a formal subject and from
hearing it at home.
Our next interview was with the awesome people that work at
the Culterlann. This community center is more concerned with preserving the
history of the Irish culture and language, reminding people of their past and
heritage. It stands as a wonderful compliment to the efforts of An Droichead.
Our interviewees spoke of the differences between Catholics and Protestants,
which unfortunately is the main object of Irish history. They went into detail
about the struggle that some bold souls went through to preserve the Irish
language in a time when the ruling government went to an awful lot of trouble
to blot it out. But, history tells the story and now many Irish schools, civic
centers, and other celebrations of Irish heritage are both allowed and eligible
for funding from the British government. Huzzah.
The interview that was the most fun to conduct was with our
Ceili
dancing instructor. If ever I had to pick out someone from a
foreign country to take me in, I would want Mrs. Mara to be my grandmaw. She is
a very sweet old lady, full of energy and always laughing away any trouble or
inconvenience that might arise. She told us how she learned Irish through her
husband, who grew up a fluent Irish speaker and now teaches advanced Irish
courses. She talked about the community of Irish, how it brings people
together. How she was talking with some friends of hers in Irish on the street
one day, and as she turned to leave she absent mindedly thanked a perfect
stranger who held the door open for her, in Irish. “Go raibh maith agat” she
said, and was pleasantly surprised when his reply came back “ta failte rote.” The
stranger explained that “you’re welcome” was about all he knew how to say in
Irish, but the fact that he had tried brought a great joy to Mrs. Mara, and
definitely brightened her day. That’s the kind of thing that Irish does. It
brings people together. It provides a common ground that human beings
desperately long for, whether they know it or not.
As we reflected back on the content of our interviews and
the pictures that went with them, Sam and I were filled with a sense of awe.
And with a sense of hunger. We needed nourishment, of a significant nature. It
was on our venture for food that we witnessed even more the spirit of Ireland.
We went to the front desk and asked if there were any food
places relatively close we could eat at, and you cannot fathom our joy when we
found out that the Chinese food joint down the road delivered! The lady working
the desk at our hostel was more than happy to call in our order, and we were
again delighted at the hospitality of the Irish people. We ordered our
respective dishes, continued working until our food arrived, and never even got
out of our jammies.
After a delicious meal of sweet-n-sour prawn and chicken
fried rice, we were laying down in our beds simply digesting, enjoying the fact
that we never actually left the hostel all day long, when Sam had a gloriously
dumb idea. It was one of those ideas that he wasn’t entirely serious about, but
it didn’t take much to talk him into actually doing it. Sam sat upright in his
bed, looked over at me and said “man, lets go get some root beer floats!” A few
minutes later, we were dressed and walking the short way to the local
convenience store to buy root beer, ice cream, and cups.
On the way, we got to see a small part of Irish life that we
hadn’t noticed before. Being it was Sunday afternoon, very few shops were open,
but many people were still out and about, seeing friends, visiting one another,
etc. The most noticeable thing though was the kids. The kids really come
outside to play on Sunday afternoons. It was the neatest thing ever to see
older guys out in the yard practicing hurling (think of Lacrosse, only you play
with flat paddles), little girls skating down the sidewalk, and these awesome
little dudes who were having a full blown Jedi war with their light sabers. Its
so good to know that, even in a country so foreign as this one, light sabers
are still cool.
-Ethan Bossier
4 Days Left in Ireland
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