The North-Western European Archipelago

Yesterday I was called a Pom. I’ve been called worst things in my time. Being called early in the morning is my least favourite. But being called a Pom is up there. It means the speaker thinks you are English, or worse still knows you are Irish but lumps you in with the English anyway. Because to him, you’re all the same anyway.

Now as I’ve said before, I have nothing against the English. I think every house should have one. Particularly as a Butler. The English make very good Butlers. I’m just proud to be Irish and want people to recognise me as such.

This happens much more often in New Zealand than it ever did in Australia. I’m not sure why this is. Kiwis have a closer connection to the Mother country I guess and the European settlers here came primarily from the islands of Britain and Ireland, so perhaps it’s understandable that they see us as homogeneous mass.

I have a certain amount of sympathy. For the vast majority of the world, the geographical and political names are the same. New Zealanders come from the islands of New Zealand. Australians from the island of Australia. But some British people come from the island of Ireland.

So, I thought I’d present my idiots guide to the peoples and places of the North Western European archipelago.

The first trick for young learners is to distinguish between the Politics and Geography. “The British Isles” is a geographical term that includes the islands of Britain, Ireland and surrounding islands.

The United Kingdom is a political term and represents a country that can issue passports, raise taxes and spend every waking hour arguing about whether it should leave or partly stay in the European Union.

Ireland is both an island and a country but the country doesn’t encompass the whole island. But more of that later.

So, it’s clear that both the Irish and the British have some responsibility for confusing the world. But we’re not the only culprits. Macedonia is a small Balkan country but also a province in Greece. 

Citizens of the United States like to call themselves Americans, when the Americas run from Canada down to the tip of Chile.

Let’s start with geography. Ireland is the island on the western side of the archipelago that looks like a teddy bear driving a vintage car. To its right is the larger island called Britain which looks a predatory old man crouching over a teddy bear. Collectively (and from a geographic standpoint) this is known as the “British Isles”. It’s not clear where this name came from, although we can be pretty certain it didn’t start in Ireland. Use of the word British in this context is contentious. When you want to come up with a collective name for two things, it’s pretty lazy if you just use the name of the bigger of the two. Iberia is a better name than the Spanish Peninsula and the Scandinavians and Nordics are able to come up with collective names that don’t call out individual countries.

Understandably then, to the ordinary Kiwi it is logical to assume that if you come from the British Isles, you must be British. But being British is about identity, ethnicity and citizenship. The first two are difficult to define, but the third is clear. You are a British citizen if you come from the island of Britain or Northern Ireland, which is the six counties in the north east of the island of Ireland. So, those of us who come from the rest of the island of Ireland are not British.

We are of course Irish. We have Irish passports. We are a Republic, independent since 1922 and a stand alone member of the United Nations and European. However, to the casual observer if you come from the Island of island of Ireland you are Irish, when the north east piece is actually British.

So, not everyone in Ireland is Irish and not everyone in the British Isles is British. To complicate matters, we Irish call our country Ireland, which is three quarters of the island known as Ireland.

The British add to the confusion by having sub countries. England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland are regions but they get to play as separate countries in Football and other sports that originated in Britain. We Irish are not without guilt here too however. We play games like Rugby based on the geographical island of Ireland and not the political entity of Ireland which as I say makes up about three quarters of the Island.

There are many fans of this set up who think it should be extended to other sports such as Football. In fairness, the people who support this tend to be the ones who are disappointed that Ireland ever became independent of Britain in the first place. Outside of the “British Isles” every other country that plays international rugby or football is a stand-alone country with its own government. That’s why they can fly their national flag and play their national anthem, whereas the Irish Rugby team has to make these up so that they can pretend they are something they clearly are not.

As you can see, it’s a mess of geography, history and politics, which is a toxic mix. Ireland and Britain have been interconnected, often against their will for centuries. We Irish have a dark history of colonisation and conquest and the British are to blame. So names bring baggage and are rarely neutral. I’ve given up trying to explain that I haven’t just come back from the UK or that I should like warm beer because I’m a Brit. Life is too short and there are bigger questions to answer. I hope to address these in future blogs, now that I’ve so clearly articulated this one.

I’m just back from the North-western European archipelago. I spent some time in Ireland and the United Kingdom without leaving the island of Ireland.

Farewell Dad

Last Monday I woke up to a notification from the Irish Times to tell me that Limerick had just won the All-Ireland hurling championship.  My immediate instinct was to ring my Dad to discuss the final, as I have done every year since I left home 31 years ago.

Then I remembered that he wouldn’t answer because he passed away a month ago. That’s happened a lot these past few weeks. A thought pops into my head and like a sledgehammer I remember that he’s no longer with us.

Hurling was a huge part of his life. He was a proud Wexford man and brought me up on tales of Nicky Rackard’s exploits in the 1950s.  That was the golden era of Wexford Hurling and Dad was lucky enough to be in his 20’s when they won three titles in six years. He moved north to Dundalk where hurling was as rare as a Pope Francis t-shirt on the Shankill Road. So, when a hurling team was set up in my primary school, I was made the team captain on the basis of my Dad’s heritage. It certainly wasn’t on the basis of my talent.

After living abroad for eight years, I moved back to Ireland in 1996 which happened to be the year that Wexford won the All-Ireland for the first time in twenty-eight years. We went to the early rounds as a family. Mam, Dad, me and my sister Mary. Dad would make his famous cheese and coleslaw sandwiches and pack a few cans of Harp into a cool bag. We would enjoy these out of the boot of the car before the game as he had done forty years previously.

As Wexford got closer to the final, tickets became harder to source. Dad started calling in favours. He had lived in Dundalk for thirty six years by then and had more contacts than a Hollywood Agent. He somehow managed to source four tickets for every game up to the Final. But in the week before that game, he announced that he was only able to get two tickets for the big game. Wexford probably had the biggest support in Ireland and their opponents that day were Limerick. They were going through their own drought then, a drought that wouldn’t be quenched until last Sunday and they had a huge support too.

We agreed that Dad and myself would go to the game and that Mam and Mary would enjoy the picnic with us beforehand and then retire to a local hostelry. I donned my new Wexford jersey and we made our way to the old Nally Stand and as we climbed up the steps I could see a glint in his eye as though the ghosts of the 1950s were tipping their caps to him.

It was a tense game. Wexford had a man sent off in the first half but they hung on tenaciously to win a title that is still being sung about in the pubs in Dad’s home county.  When the final whistle went, I was reminded of all the tales he told me of games in the fifties when the fences would be scaled at the end and the crowd would pile onto the pitch. And so I dragged him down the steps towards the pitch against the tide of Limerick fans coming the other way. He complained bitterly that he was too old for such childish caper. But something told me that this might be my only opportunity to stand on the hallowed soil of Croke Park and led him on.

We climbed the last obstacle and suddenly found ourselves among thousands of delirious fans.  We couldn’t hear the speeches because, as I learned that day, the speakers at sporting grounds point back into the stands and not towards the field. But we did see Martin Storey lift the cup and the memory of all those childhood stories washed over me as I stood beside Dad in the September sunshine. We made our way out of the ground and back to the pub where we had left Mam and Mary. Dad was like a giddy child as he told them about our on field adventures. It seemed to be the highlight of his day.

Later that evening as we watched a replay on TV, Dad leaned across and whispered that he had actually been offered four tickets for the final. But he wanted to enjoy the game with me. The others weren’t real hurling fans. My Mother had a tendency to ask questions at crucial times of the game such as “who does the guy in black play for?”  

Dad was always there for me. He taught me how to ride a bike, he taught me how to enjoy a beer and how not to be seduced by it. He even taught me how to attract girls. “Let the hare sit” was his enigmatic advice to an over eager sixteen year old. It took me a while to appreciate that advice. You don’t catch a hare by chasing it. You catch it by staying still and to trigger the hare’s curiosity.  Then the hare will come to you.

I feel now that I have nobody left to teach me anything. Nobody to pick me up when I fall off my bike. Nobody to talk to about hurling.

He died as he lived, making as little fuss and causing as little hassle to others as possible. He slipped out of the world on the 24^th July. The same date that my Mother passed away eight years previously. He would have liked the symmetry of that and the fact that his coffin was placed on top of hers and not beside it. She was normally the kingpin in their relationship and he would find it hilarious that he will now be on top for the rest of time.

They say that hurling is the sport played in heaven. I hope so, because they have just received its greatest fan. I’ll miss you Dad. You were my hero.