SUNDAY CHURCH

I am staying in a house that is about 5kms from the school. There is an interesting group here. When I got here there was already a man from Scotland who had been here last week and is staying for another week. He has a car. There is also a man from Cambridge Massachussetts who was already here when I arrived. Two more people arrived late last night. They are a couple (I think), a Swedish man and a woman from Dublin. I think that they are both living in Dublin right now but the Swedish man has also lived in Philadelphia for six years so his English is very good. Another woman has been here but went to Sligo for the weekend to visit relatives. She arrived back this afternoon.
There are a number of new signs around the village to go along with all the development that is taking place here. I am staying in an area called “An Droim Rua” or the Red Ridge.
I went to church this morning to the Protestant church in the village. I had agreed to meet Jane, a woman from Vancouver who I had met here before. The service was very dismal. There were only three local people and about 10 visitors. The hymn singing was accompanied by a CD version so it was a lot like karaoke. I wonder how much longer this community of believers will survive.
In the afternoon my class met together for the first time. Our teacher is a woman from Tyrone with a very strong Northern accent. She didn’t want to miss the Tyrone-Antrim football game so she had us listen to the radio commentary (in Irish). Tyrone won and will go on to the All-Ireland Quarter Finals.
Many of the people in my class have been coming here for years. I recognized quite a few. There are two Irish people who live in Luxemburg, an English man who lives in Norway, a Harvard professor and an Irish woman who lives in London. At least one woman (Celtic goddess wannabe) dropped out after the coffee break.