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Bastille Day and the revolting Irish

Posted on Jul 14, 2018 in Ireland | Comments Off on Bastille Day and the revolting Irish

Today, Bastille Day 14th July 2018, is the 229th anniversary of the storming of the Bastille Prison in France. It is hard to recall the French Revolution without thinking of the response of the Chinese Premier Chou En Lai, who when asked what he thought was its impact answered “It is too early to tell!” When […]

Bloomsday 2018

Posted on Jun 15, 2018 in Dublin | Comments Off on Bloomsday 2018

Bloomsday, the day named after Leopold Bloom, the dapper central character in Ulysses, is being celebrated in James Joyce’s hometown of Dublin on Saturday 16th June 2018. That is the day in which Bloom took his meandering stroll through Dublin city in the literary classic, which is set on one day, June 16, 1904. […]

Ireland of the Skinny Dippers

Posted on Jun 11, 2018 in Ireland | Comments Off on Ireland of the Skinny Dippers

Women gathered in the glorious Wicklow sunshine yesterday afternoon and managed to raise hundreds of thousands of euro for charity and set a new Guinness World Record for a skinny dip in the process. Over 2,500 women have stripped off and broken the world record for the largest mass skinny dip. A total of 2,505 […]

Those rowing O’Donovan Brothers from Skibbereen

Posted on May 12, 2018 in Ireland | Comments Off on Those rowing O’Donovan Brothers from Skibbereen

It is well known that Skibbereen is the biggest small town not just in West Cork but in the whole wide world, and not just because it is the home of the famous Skibbereen Eagle! Set on the River Illin in West Cork “Sweet Skibbereen” is a place tinged with tragedy and joy. It was […]

Big Tom and his Mammy

Posted on Apr 20, 2018 in Ireland | one comment

Irish Country Music Legend “Big Tom” McBride died this week at the age of 81. I always loved the fact that Big Tom McBride’s group was the “Mainliners” – More innocent times which his nostalgic music spoke to in the great Irish Showband tradition. Tom McBride was no musical genius but his nostalgic easy listening […]

The Skibbereen Eagle and the Czar of Russia

Posted on Mar 20, 2018 in Ireland | Comments Off on The Skibbereen Eagle and the Czar of Russia

The Skibbereen Eagle was a small paper from a very small town in West Cork, Ireland. Once it warned the Czar of Russia who ignored it. Some years later he was out of a job. The rest, as they say, is history! The legendary Skibbereen Eagle newspaper was founded in 1857 in the small town […]

The Real St. Patrick

Posted on Mar 17, 2018 in Ireland | Comments Off on The Real St. Patrick

On Saturday March 17, the Irish and the Irish-at-heart across the globe will observe St. Patrick’s Day. What began as a religious feast day for the patron saint of Ireland has become an international festival celebrating Irish culture with parades, dancing, special foods and a whole lot of green. And today at Twickenham in the […]

More Irish than the Irish themselves

Posted on Feb 18, 2018 in Ireland | Comments Off on More Irish than the Irish themselves

Edward III had a problem in 1366, English power and influence in Ireland and the reach of the Crown was being eroded by the Anglo-Norman aristocracy and officials becoming “More Irish than the Irish themselves” in the words of a chronicler. This was the description applied to the Anglo- Norman Lords who controlled English occupied […]

Dublin’s Saint Valentine

Posted on Feb 14, 2018 in Dublin | Comments Off on Dublin’s Saint Valentine

As we approach the annual soppy snogfest of St. Valentine’s Day you might be surprised to hear that Saint Valentine is yet another romantic Dubliner! There have been many famous Dubliner’s but as we approach St. Valentine’s Day you may be surprised to hear the good saint is among the illustrious group! The saint […]

West Cork’s singing Ambassadors

Posted on Feb 6, 2018 in Ireland | one comment

WEST Cork Choral Singers performed in New York’s prestigious Carnegie Hall in January as part of a ‘choir of distinction.’ The choir – which features between 40 and 50 men and women from the locality, as well as eight different nationalities who have made West Cork their home – joined choirs from 14 other countries […]