Saturday, August 18, 2007

THE NEW (OLD) ABBEY



I went to see a matinee performance of "The Big House" by Lennox Robinson at the Abbey Theatre today.
I especially wanted to see the new interior. Last year the seating was redone so that now every seat is unobstructed. In the old auditorium (opened in 1966, the year of the 50th anniversary of the 1916 Revolution) the main part of the auditorium had seating that was pretty much all on the same level. There was also a balcony for better views of the stage. Now the balcony is gone and all the seats rise up steeply from the stage - a much better arrangement.
The play, first performed in 1926 very shortly after the events that it depicts, dealt with the history of a "big house" in West Cork during the period after the World War when Ireland saw its own war, first with England, then with ourselves, and then with the new Free State Government that tried to put an end to the Republican insurgency. The big house survives most of these challenges because of the respect the people of the (fictional) village of Baldoney had for the Anglo-Irish family that owned the house. But in the end the Irregulars (Republican fighters who rejected the treaty with Britain that gave Ireland a partial independence) torched the house, as they did many others.
I really enjoyed the show. There is something about live theatre that is magical. There is no amplification in the theatre, just the projected voices of the actors to command the attention of the audience. The Abbey is a really nice place now - it's hard to believe that the Government is going ahead with plans to build a whole new Abbey Theatre in the newly developed Docklands area. The Abbey is such a fixture of the inner city - it has been at this site in
Abbey Street since it opened in 1904 (The present building was built after a fire destroyed the original, but it was rebuilt in the same place in Abbey Street). I think we do need a new, modern theatre for spectaculars like "Riverdance" and that can be built anywhere. But the Abbey is the Abbey, the National Theatre of Ireland, and should stay exactly where it started in Abbey Street.

Friday, August 17, 2007

LAST NIGHT IN MONTSOREAU


We spent a wonderful day exploring the chateau and town of Azay-le-Rideau. When we got back to Montsoreau in the afternoon we found the Conforma people had already come to deliver our new mattresses. Unfortunately, we weren’t there to receive them. We had arranged for the delivery to be made on the next day, Friday. We tried to call the company but it was difficult finding someone who thought that this was a problem. Finally, while we were on hold, we went across the street to ask Gregoire, the guy who staffs the Maison de Parc Naturel Regional, to help us. He had no trouble rescheduling the delivery, but he never did get a satisfactory reason why they had come a day early. It seems that Tim Holland’s theory is correct!
With all that taken care of we could relax a little. Helen said she would like some rosé wine so we walked down to our local wine vendor to buy a couple of bottles. Between the three of us we were able to communicate what we wanted to the woman in charge and her teenage daughter who was helping out. I asked the teenager if she could speak English. She said she couldn’t even though she has been studying it for five years. We didn’t feel so bad about our feeble efforts to speak French when we heard that.
As it started to get dusky we walked down to the creperie for dinner.

Thursday, August 16, 2007

AZAY-LE-RIDEAU




Rich had talked about how beautiful Azay-le-Rideau is, though he had never been inside the chateau. We decided to take Timmy and Helen there.
We had a late start. As we were leaving we saw that the mason’s car was in the driveway of the new chambe de hote that is being built/rebuilt. We stopped to take a look at the building and the progress of the work. They started this project last year when we bought our house and are slowly getting around to putting in an electrical system and finishing the walls. We had a quick consultation with the mason. He is going to come by the house next week to give us an estimate.
We drove the thirty or so miles to Azay. It is in the department next door, Indre-et-Loire (we are Maine-et-Loire). By the time we got there it was time for lunch. We walked around a little, looking for a place to have lunch that wasn’t too touristy (or full of Brits). We found a café on the square where the old market is. There is also an old church dedicated to Saint Blaise. The façade had carved statues of Christ and the twelve apostles (great name for a band). Inside the market hall there was an art exhibition of drawings and paintings by locals; in America it would be referred to as County Fair Art.
For lunch Timmy and Rich ordered the 11€ “formule” which was an Andouille sausage. They thought they were getting something similar to the American sausage of the same name but when it came they were confronted by something that was basically the same as chitterlings. They were not very happy. Lots of wine, water and coffee failed to wash out the taste of pig’s pee.
We made our way to the chateau. The castle was begun in the 16th century by a royal tax collector. Before it was finished he had been accused of corruption and was executed. The building and lands were given to a war buddy of the king who finished it in an Italianate style. By the end of the 19th century the owners were fallen on hard times. They sold the castle and all the furniture to the State who refurbished it.
From the front the castle seems very imposing. It is surrounded by a moat, probably fed by the Indre River. Inside, the original furnishings are still in place. The woodwork and stone carvings are very impressive. But the overall feeling is of a doll’s house. A walk around the outside confirms that it is small, certainly smaller than the chateau of Montsoreau.

AZAY-LE-RIDEAU: VISITE VIRTUELLE

Tuesday, August 14, 2007

THIZAY DOLMEN


We got a late start today. Karen invited us over to
La Blanchière for lunch. We were on our way when Rich remembered that the dessert we were supposed to bring was still sitting on the kitchen table. They left me off in Thiezay and drove back to Montsoreau.
Thizay is a very small community tucked into the hills above the Vienne River. There is a church, started in the 12th century, rebuilt in the 15th, renovated in the 19th, in the main plaza, but it was closed. There was a statue of St. Michael above the door so I think it must be the Eglise St-Michel. I followed the road behind the church. I wanted to find the dolmen. I wasn’t sure where I was going until I saw a sign – “Rue du Dolmen”, which made me think I was on the right track. I followed the winding road up the hill stopping only to fill my pockets with the bright yellow and orange plums I found in an open field (I made sure to taste the ripeness of a good many of them first!).
About a kilometer up the road I found the dolmen sitting on a ridge to the left of the road. There were several oak trees behind it (no rowan tree). The dolmen itself consisted of three kerbstones, two in front and one behind, with a massive capstone on top. A smaller capstone was beside it but it wasn’t clear to me if there had originally been two dolmen or if the whole structure was part of a court tomb or passage grave. I climbed up on top of the capstone to get a better view of what the dead had to look out at for 3 or 4 millennium: mixed forest, the river, the nuclear power plant at Avoine.
I took a quick look around the neighborhood. There were mostly fields of grapes, probably cabernet franc or pinot noir, and thick hedgerows of blackberries that were not quite ripe yet.
MORE PICTURES OF THIZAY

WHAT IS A DOLMEN?

Monday, August 13, 2007

JEAN-FRANÇOIS AT THE CAFÉ FRANÇAIS


Jean-François is the owner of the Café Français, a hip bar in Chinon tucked away on a side street off the Place de General de Gaulle. He has live music almost every weekend. We usually end up here in the late afternoon for a quite glass of wine before heading home.
The Café Français has a website where you can get more information about who is playing there and the other activities that take place there (There is a knitting group that meets here regularly, for instance).

Saturday, August 11, 2007

TIMMY AND HELEN IN MONTSOREAU


Timmy and Helen are here in Monsoreau for a little visit of about a week. They had some adventures in getting here. There was no problem on the Ryanair flight from Dublin to Nantes (except for the 2km walk to the gate at Dublin Airport) but the journey to Saumur was more difficult. They came on a Saturday when there are less trains coming from Nantes to Saumur. They also found out that the shuttle from the airport to the train station is not as frequent on Saturdays. They had to take a bus to the tram line which took them to the centre of the city, then another tram to the train station. They had missed all the TGV’s for that day so they had to wait hours for a train coming from Quimper on its way to Geneva that was stopping in Nantes and also in Saumur. It was a sleeper train and also had four or five double decker loads of new cars, probably being delivered to Paris.
They finally arrived at 10:15 in Saumur. We had already called a restaurant in Saumur centre-ville, “Le Grand Bleu” to see if they would still be open but of course they had already stopped serving at 10. So we decided not to take any more chances. We went directly to the restaurant closest to the train station, “Le Case Creole”, a restaurant specializing in the cuisine of Reunion, the “French” island in the Caribbean. When we arrived there were still a whole lot of people there but when we left we closed the place behind us. Besides the food (shrimp in Reunion sauce, curried beef, halibut in a lime sauce, basmati rice and lentils) the waiter, a wonderful Reunionnaise, brought us a digestif of cinnamon-infused rum served in little glass jugs. What an experience!

RUES ET RUELLES


Pictures of the street signs in Montsoreau.

Friday, August 10, 2007

YVES DUTEIL CONCERT IN CHATEAU



Wikipedia article about Yves Duteil

VICHY, C’ETAIT AUSSI LA FRANCE?


I go to the local “tabac” every morning to buy the newspaper. I usually buy “Le Monde” but occasionally I will also buy another paper to see the difference in style. I find I can read “Liberation” without too much trouble but the colloquial language of “Figaro” is harder for me to understand.
“Le Monde” has published a number of articles in the last few weeks that are lighter fare for the summer. Right now there is a series about different world airports and their role in “mondialisation”. Today, Moscow’s three airports were featured, yesterday it was London’s Heathrow, and before that articles about Lagos and Amsterdam. Two weeks ago there was a series about the great battles that shaped various religions – Kerbala for the Shiites, Jerusalem for the Christians, the expulsion of the Jews from Spain for Catholics, the St. Bartholomew’s Day Massacre for the Protestants of France, and the slaughter of Hindus by Muslims, Muslims by Hindus that led to the partition of India (really, the partition of the Punjab and Bengal).
Today, as part of the series “Rétrocontroverse” there is an article retracing the discussion between Chirac and Mitterrand about the culpability of the French State in the deportations and murder of French Jews. Chirac argued the neo-Gaullist line that the Vichy State was criminally responsible for these murders but that France was redeemed by the triumph of DeGaulle and the Liberation. Mitterrand argued that the Vichy state was not a part of France, the true France of the Republique. In fact, that state was the collaborator of the Nazis and therefore the enemy of France. He argued that the Republique didn’t need to apologize for anything since it was an equal victim with the Jews.
I’m not sure what I think about this discussion. It seems there are doubts about Mitterrand the Socialist and his commitment to a France free of anti-Semitism. Conversely, Chirac the Gaullist is championing the revisiting of a sordid episode in French history. Either way, it doesn’t seem to me that the crimes of the French State, whether Vichy or Free, are to the forefront of the political discussion around racism and immigration in modern day France. Can France truly deal with its present if it hasn’t even begun to deal with its past?

Thursday, August 9, 2007

TIFFANY


Tiffany came by with Karen and Nico to say goodbye. She is heading up to Paris on Saturday, and then flying home to Chicago on Sunday. Nico took this picture of us standing in our kitchen. They all had an impromptu dinner with us.
Tiffany is Karen’s niece by marriage – her dad married Karen’s sister after he divorced Tiffany’s mom (I think I have that right). Tiffany is 19 and has completed one year of college in Chicago. She has spent the summer being Karen’s au pair, looking after Nico while Karen is away leading the bike tours that she manages for Butterfield and Robinson. She arrived in May, a shy, unassertive American with a little French. She is leaving as a confident young woman who has learned how to handle herself in a foreign country. Along the way, she has become quite competent in French and has a self-confidence that was hard come by working with Karen and Nico in the house and preparing the lunches for up to 20 cyclists at a time.
Unfortunately, because of Karen’s schedule and Tiffany’s commitment to her job we didn’t get to spend as much time with her as we would have liked to. We did have one memorable day out in Loudon, memorable because it rained, that we enjoyed spending with her without Nico. Maybe next year we will spend more time together now that she knows how to manage Karen.
Goodbye for now, Tiffany. Perhaps we will see you in California during the winter.

Wednesday, August 8, 2007

OLD POSTCARD OF MONTSOREAU c.1850



Our neighbors, Les Racinet, gave us a copy of this old photograph which clearly shows our house. The one story building to the left of our house was once the village blacksmith's forge. It is now the Racinet's garage.

THE WALLS



We have been stripping the walls of the wallpaper to see what might be behind it. Removing wallpaper, even under the best of conditions, is a very messy undertaking. We have spent about three days at it and have successfully removed all the wallpaper from the first floor bedrooms. We found several layers of wallpaper and in some places there was even newspaper, which I guess they used to create an even surface for the wallpaper.
We started this project after being invited next door by Les Racinet (the neighbors in #16) to see the kinds of restoration they have done in the ten years they have owned their house. We saw how beautiful the tuffeau stone is when it is protected in the interior of a house. Metta encouraged us to explore our own house to see what treasures lay behind the wallpaper.

We also had a chance to see the inside of another house across the street. A gentleman came to the door to welcome us to the town. He introduced himself (don’t remember his name) and invited us across the street to meet his “amie” (whose name we didn’t catch either). She told us that she was cleaning out the house of her mother who had died earlier this year. She was getting it ready for her daughter who would be using it as a weekend retreat from Paris. She showed us how thick the walls are and the stairway to the first floor and the grenier (attic). She speculated that her house was probably built in the 16th century. She showed us a built over archway and said the house was probably built as a chapel but was never finished.

What did we find? We found two walls that are entirely tuffeau stone. We will have very little to do to make that look fine. The back wall of the house and the end wall appear to a combination of tuffeau stone and fieldstone. There are some areas where there clearly was a window or door in the past and that was filled with fieldstone and plastered over. In these areas we will have to remove the old plaster and have a craftsman mason replace the mortar between the joints in a way that leaves the stone largely exposed but nicely finished.

GWEN’S CALL


We are sitting in one of our favorite places in Chinon – the Café Français. Rich just gets through saying that he will take Gwen here when she comes to visit, that it is exactly her kind of place. He is thinking of the ambiance, the Frenchness of it, as well as the really good music they have playing in the background. We are lounging in very comfortable leather chairs quaffing our glasses of red Chinon wine. The band is setting up for a live performance of New Orleans style zydeco later that night. Suddenly his phone rings. Guess who is calling?

COUPE DE CHEVEUX


We went to have our hair cut in Chinon. We go to a barber who only works with men. He can speak a little English but he refuses to allow us – we have to speak in French in his shop. Today, I asked him about the actor, Michel Serreult, who recently died. That started him talking about the great actors of the past. He continued with a treatise on the French actors who have appeared in Hollywood movies. Then he moved on to jazz and the world of great blues singers and musicians who had lived in Paris during the 1950s. All the time we have to stay engaged - he asks questions to make sure we understand. Our haircut turns into a French lesson. Towards the end he reminds us that we have had a haircut, not a horsescut. Our pronunciation has a long way to go yet.

Tuesday, August 7, 2007

SHOUT OUT TO MISS PEGGY




Dearest, Darling Peggy:

We hope you are feeling a little better after your recent health scare. You know we love you and hope you get better soon. We are praying for you (in our own way) and lit a candle for you at the church of Notre Dame des Ardilliers in Saumur (even though you are Pentecostal and not Catholic – God will hear our prayer, nonetheless).

Rich and Máirtín

Monday, August 6, 2007

NOTRE DAME DES ARDILLIERS


We have been whizzing past this church for the past couple of weeks trying to figure out when it is open. We visited this place five years ago when we first came to this area with Vladimir but we had forgotten why it is such a special place. Finally, tonight on our way home from a day of checking things out in Saumur we noticed the door was open and figured out that we could stop and visit.
Inside is a splendid church. An Italianate dome added in the 17th century and rebuilt after the Battle of Saumur in 1940 is the setting for a rotunda of eight smaller chapels. Above the chapels were eight medallions showing images of the four Evangelists and the four Doctors of the Church. Beyond this antechamber was the nave with a high alter that depicted the Crucifixion. To the left of this main alter was a smaller altar dedicated to Cardinal Richelieu and to the right another altar that had a large scene of the Flight into Egypt (pyramids and palm trees included).
The history of this church is particularly interesting. The church was built where a “Pieta” statue was found and an ancient spring gushed out of the hillside. In the 15th century the statue became the centre of a cult and the church that was built to house it became a major pilgrimage site. Later as the cult grew in importance the church was patronized by powerful people and became a royal chapel. Saumur grew rapidly during the period following the Edict of Nantes but after the king revoked the Edict half of Saumur’s population, the Huguenots, fled the city and a period of stagnation and poverty befell the city. During the Revolution the church was ransacked and priests of the parish were guillotined. Then the greatest tragedy of all: the bombing and firestorms of the Battle of Saumur that destroyed the rotunda and cupola.
For now, all the wars are over for this beautifully restored church. It was such a pleasure to drop our one euro piece into the box to turn on the lights in the nave. Around the rotunda is an inscription dedicated to the Virgin by “Ludivocus XIV. Dei Gratia Franc. Et Navar Rex.”, a reminder that Louis XIV, The Sun King, was present here as a child.

Sunday, August 5, 2007

FONTEVRAUD, L'ABBAYE ROYALE


A scorching hot day. Anna and Jag were leaving in the evening to go back to Paris. They are flying back to the States on Monday. We decided to visit the abbey of Fontevraud early in the morning while it was still relatively cool.
When we got there I noticed a sign for a new annual pass that they are offering. The usual price of entry is 7.90 euro but for 12 euro we can go anytime we like for a whole year. What a deal!
I hadn’t been inside the abbey in more than five years. We headed straight for the kitchens, the beehive structure with the fish scale roof. Inside the octagonal building there are eight fireplaces and chimneys – an indication of the numbers of people that the abbey served every day.
We walked around, soaking in everything: the huge refractory or dining hall, the cloistered gardens, the main church with the graves of Henry and Elinor, Richard and Isabelle. The abbey is vast, the biggest abbey in France. When you are inside the walls you definitely get the sense of what it was like for a young women to enter and never leave, to pass her whole life in that world of women and God, cut off from the world of temptation and the Devil outside the walls.
At the mortuary chapel I read the account of how a dying nun was laid out on a bed of ashes to remind her that she came from dust and would return to dust after her soul went to Heaven. This account solved a problem that I had been trying to resolve in my own mind – why does the mortuary chapel that Karen bought have a chimney? The oven and chimney are used to create the ashes that the dead body is laid out on before burial, a critical part of the faith of the Plantagenets and the people who lived at that time in this part of France.
There is an exhibition at the abbey, “Heros et Merveilles”, that gives a good account of what life was like for most people in the Middle Ages.

CANDES-St MARTIN




Rich was meeting Duncan in Chinon to go pick up the box springs for our new “French” beds. Duncan has a big pickup truck that could easily accomadate the double bed sized box springs. We left Rich off with Duncan at the Hotel Sans Souci with its glowing orange plastic palm tree. It was so hot, maybe 30ºC. The girls didn’t feel like hanging around Chinon, especially since most things were closed on Sunday. We decided to go back to Montsoreau and hang out. Along the way I stopped in Candes to show them the church.
The church is built on the spot where Saint Martin is reputed to have died. It was built in the 12th century. The headless figures in the entry porch are evidence of the ferocity of the wars of religion in this part of France.
It was interesting to be in this church with a Sikh and a Hmong person, who although Christian is from a culture that is shamanistic and animist. The images and iconography were very familiar to me; they tell a story that makes sense in the context of Christian mythology. But for Anna and Jag they seemed very foreign to their experience. Later, while we were having a drink in the café at the train station, we had a good discussion about the nature of faith and why people believe what they do.

Saturday, August 4, 2007

SAUMUR WALKABOUT


Saturday in Saumur. The girls wanted to do some shopping before they have to go home. They are taking the train back to Paris on Sunday then flying home on Monday. Anna will be back at work on Tuesday.
Rich wanted to go across the river to a brocante, a kind of antique store cum junk store, but everything is closed in the country until 2 for lunch. We wandered down to the Saint Nicholas district to have lunch. I ordered a salad with a “white sauce” and Rich ordered a burger and fries. The salad was more like a soup, canned vegetables like peas and corn mixed with small cubes of white cheese, all floating in the white sauce. I should read the menu descriptions more carefully next time. Rich’s medium rare burger was very rare, blood rare, and had to be sent back for further cooking.
After lunch I took a walk around Saumur by myself while Rich went to the brocante. I saw a sign for an exhibit of tapestries in the Chapelle Saint Jean. I followed the signs to a little 12th century church that had steps down from the street level. The church was originally built by the Hospitalers of Saint John of Jerusalem then later it belonged to the Knights of Malta. It had a typically rectangular form – the Plantagenet style.
There were 5 large tapestries divided into 19 panels. The tapestries told the story of Saint Florent and Saint Florian, two brothers who defied the edicts of the pagan emperors Deocletian and Maximian and continued to worship the Christian god. They were arrested, tried, and sentenced to torture and drowning for their faith. While they were being tortured an angel descended from the heavens to save Floriant but poor old Floran was drowned in the river. Florent traveled to Candes to receive holy orders from Saint Martin then went on to found a monastery on a hilltop just outside Saumur. I wondered why the angel didn’t deliver Florian.
The tapestries were very detailed, many of the panels had a main image and several smaller images that added to the story. Also, they were in remarkably good shape, given that they were used at one point as covers for birdcages.

Friday, August 3, 2007

L’ART DU BAROQUE


We bought tickets for a concert of Baroque music at our local church, Saint Pierre de Rest. The church is only open one Sunday a month for mass so this was a good opportunity to see the interior as well as to hear some good music.
It seemed like the whole village had turned out for the concert. The church is small so we had to sit on benches a distance from the action. In front of us our neighbors, Christian and Metta Racinet, were sitting in all their finery.
The church itself was built in two phases – the rectangular floored nave was built in the 12th century and had rounded windows reminiscent of the Romanesque period. The transept was more ornate with columns and Gothic style windows. That part was added in the 14th century. There were two side altars, one dedicated to Saint Peter. The church has been recently restored. The tuffeau stone has that “well-scrubbed” look that makes it seem to glow. Apart from the Stations of the Cross there wasn’t very much of visual interest on the walls.
The concert was a performance of vocal music by Vivaldi, Farinelli, Scarlatti, and Handel performed by a singer named Alexis Vassiliev. He was accompanied by Mario Raskin playing the clavichord who also performed some pieces by himself at the start of the recital.
At the end of the concert the audience was invited to take a glass of refreshment in the little place to the side of the church. The organizers were serving champagne of the region. We had a taste before heading home.

JAG AND ANNA


We picked up Jag and Anna from the train station in Saumur. They have been traveling around Europe by bus for the past three weeks. They flew into Rome from San Francisco on Air Canada then headed to Nice, Madrid, San Sebastien, and Paris with a bus company called Busabout (busabout.com) that allows for set down and pick up travel between major European cities. Their ticket allows them make six stops so they went back to Paris from Spain by bus then took the train down to the Loire Valley for a short visit with us.
We took them back to Montsoreau to leave off their stuff then drove together to Chinon. Rich and I had to go to a big store on the edge of Chinon (the Bon’AFF) so we left them to explore Chinon by themselves for a while. Later we met up with them for afternoon drinks at a funky bar called the Café Français on a backstreet behind the Hotel de Ville. They had many stories to tell of their travels. Jag is a Punjabi Sikh from Yuba City in Northern California. She attracts the attention (usually unrequested) of every Indian bachelor looking for a mate. Her traveling companion, Anna, is a Hmong woman originally from Southern California (her family fled Laos in the mid-70’s during the ethnic cleansings that followed the triumph of the VietCong and the PathetLao). Anna told us of one young fool at a disco in San Sebastien who showed his affection for her by biting her arm!
In the evening we took them to the Baroque music concert at our local 12th century church then had a wonderful walk around the village at midnight when all the righteous villagers were snug in their beds.

Thursday, August 2, 2007

DONEGAL PORTRAITS


This is Klara from Germany, by way of the Czech Republic and Iran, who wouldn't let me post her picture to my blog last year but gave me permission to post it this year.

MORE PICTURES

Sunday, July 29, 2007

HAPPY BIRTHDAY, CARMEL



Timmy and Helen threw Grannie a great garden party for her birthday. Lots of Buckleys and Meates were in attendance. The weather even cooperated for most of the afternoon.

Saturday, July 28, 2007

ORANGE HALL, CO. FERMANAGH



WIKIPEDIA: ORANGE ORDER

DUNKEELY, COUNTY FERMANAGH




Three stones standing in a field, a boggy field, across the street from a Catholic church and graveyard. We followed a sign, as often happens, not really knowing what to expect. We were on the road from Beleek, going across Lough Erne to Kesh, in County Fermanagh to rejoin the main road to Enniskillan. We had taken a detour to see the famous two-faced figure in Caldragh Cemetery on Boa Island. About a mile from the crossroads we passed an Orange Hall with its defiant British flag. A plaque above the door said it was the Tubrid Orange Hall built in 1924. I wondered if Tubrid was an Anglicization of “Tobar Bríd” or Saint Bridget’s Holy Well. Barely a hundred metres further up the road we found the church and the field with the standing stones. These two places, the Catholic church and the Orange hall, were like the standing stones: forever linked but standing apart, their meaning only possible when read as a unit, if any meaning can ever be read from the history of conflict that we have suffered during the civil war of the last 35 years.

MYSTERIOUS JANUS FIGURE
BOA ISLAND, CO. FERMANAGH




MORE INFORMATION

LAST DAY IN GLEANNCHOLMCILLE


I took a quick picture of the house where I was staying - Liam's mother's house. The house is used by Oideas Gael for lodging. I had my own room and enjoyed meeting the other people who were staying there: Marcus, Emily, Paddy1, Paddy2, Gerald. The house had a good feeling about it - perhaps it was infused with the memories of good times lived there by Liam and his family, especially his mom.

MORE PHOTOS OF SUMMER SCHOOL CLOSURE

Thursday, July 26, 2007

CEOLCHOIRM


Tonight should have been the evening for the
Sean-Nós concert. It usually takes place on the Thursday of Scoil Shamhraidh and is orchestrated by Gearoidín. But this year Liam summarily cancelled the sean-nós and in its place had a sean-nós choir give a performance instead. The choir was pretty good, three part harmonies with men’s and women’s voices. Gearoidín was scathing about the idea of a sean-nós choir. I think she was also very upset by Liam’s lack of respect for all the work she has done to keep the sean-nós tradition alive. And rightly so. Every year she assembles a dwindling number of truly great practitioners of the art to pass on the tradition. This year it didn’t happen and perhaps it will never happen again.
That being said, the choir (Cór Thaobh a’ Leithid) were very good. The sean-nós class also performed two of our songs. Gearoidín sang two songs and there was also a performance of Donegal dancers. A Scottish man, Griogair Labhruid, sang a sean-nós version of an Irish song, “Áirde Chuain”.

BESSIE


The AA mechanic finally arrived from Bundoran at about 11:00 (we had called the previous night!). He said he could do nothing for us but guide us down to a mechanic in Kilcar. He said the brake lining was rubbing against the wheel rim and that it would not be wise to drive the car back to Dublin without it being fixed. Apparently, this is the most common problem with older Renaults.
The mechanic in Kilcar said he would need the car for about a week to fix it. When he saw the look of astonishment on our faces he suggested another mechanic in Kilcar, JohnJoe, who he said would put it right for us.
We got directions and set out in search of JohnJoe. We found his house at the end of a little bothairin on a hill with a commanding view of Slieve League. He said he could fix the car but a part would have to be got from Donegal Town. He called the supplier to have the part delivered to a filling station in Killybegs. Pat agreed to drive us to Killybegs and bring us back.
We got to Killybegs at about 12:30. It was pouring down rain. We had a wait of about an hour for the delivery van from Donegal so we went to the hotel for a little lunch. We all ordered the same thing from the carvary - fish chowder. When in Killybegs . . . After lunch, things looked a lot brighter. We went back to the filling station to pick up the part and before long we were back with JohnJoe enquiring about the cost of the repair. He scratched his head and looked at the price on the outside of the parts’ box then said “50 euro”. We were expecting him to say something in the range of 200 to 300 euro so we were more than pleased with ourselves. He said it would be ready tomorrow morning. Pat drove us back to GleannCholmCille with more than enough time to spare for our afternoon class. Thank you Pat!

Wednesday, July 25, 2007

SEISIÚN CEOL


We had some car trouble tonight. A fierce storm came in off the Atlantic with gusts of wind and buckets of rain. Somehow that all upset Bessie (the car) and she didn’t want to work right. We did get her going again and she works fine as long as you are driving forward. Reversing is the problem.
We eventually made it to Sylvia and Edie’s house for dinner. Gearoidín was already there. Three men from the house, Brian, Seán and Rick were also having dinner with us. Brian and Seán are in my Irish class. We had a great dinner.
After dinner there was conversation. Rick talked about his parents from Mayo and the difficult life they had when they went to England. Brian and Seán made great efforts to speak in Irish and Gearoidín, in that wonderful quiet way of hers, encouraged them.
Myself and Treasa began singing the “Maighdean Mhara”. Gearoidín continued with two verses we didn’t have. Then she told the story behind the song, the story of how the man fell in love with the mermaid and stole her cloak to prevent her from going back to the sea. He hid it under the thatch until the day that her children found it. At that moment her longing for the old world of the sea overwhelmed her. She said goodbye to little Máire and Pádraig and went back into the ocean leaving them behind her, crying on the beach.

BIDDY’S


Development has arrived in the Gleann. Biddy’s, the iconic pub, is being transformed. A new wing is being built to accommodate the hoards of expected tourists. In celebration of this growth the owners threw a foam party last week, the likes of which has never been seen before in GleannCholmCille. I did not attend – in fact I haven’t even been inside of Biddy’s this year. Most of the action has been taking place in Roarty’s, a more comfortable place to listen to music or to hold a conversation.
Apparently there are new owners of Biddy’s. They want to spruce the place up, make it more attractive to younger people. As with so much else in Ireland, though, there is very little planning. The addition looks like an attached shed rather than an integral part of the building. I don’t like the way the classic profile of the building has been changed. I think it would have been better to build the addition at the back where it would not have distracted from the traditional façade. The new Ireland, where function lords over form, is suspiciously like the old.

Tuesday, July 24, 2007

CATHAL O SEARCAIGH


Cathal is in the shadow of the president as she greets him after his annual lecture and poetry reading.


BBC ARTICLE ABOUT CATHAL O SEARCAIGH

AN TRÁ BÁN


THE SILVER STRAND

I came home after the first day of the sean-nós class just ready to relax and be by myself. Treasa wanted to practise the songs. I started to make dinner for us both but it was extremely difficult to focus on my polenta with Treasa singing in my ear. I tried to be very explicit: I wanted to focus on what I was doing which was making dinner but I think Treasa was upset by my directness. After dinner she left and I felt I could have some time to myself.
I decided not to go down to the evening performance but to go instead to the Silver Strand. I actually started off by driving west to see what was beyond the hotel but I saw signs for the Silver Strand and didn’t remember ever being there before.
The parking lot was a high bluff. There was a steep path down to the beach. From the top I could see how bright and clean the beach was. In the light of the setting sun the sand reflected an orange color.
I was the only person there. I walked to the end of the beach, about a half a mile, then sat on the rocks looking out at the deep blue of the ocean. On either side of the bay arms jutted out to embrace it.
As darkness descended I made my way back to the car, grateful for one of the most beautiful and quietest moments of my life.

Monday, July 23, 2007

LEABA CHOLMCILLE





The advanced classes went out for a walk along the Turas with Jimmy, the local historian and expert on St. ColmCille and the pilgrammage route around the valley. The pilgrammage can be done at any time but it is traditionally done by local people on July 9, the anniversary of ColmCille’s death. There are twenty four stops on the pilgrammage route and special prayers are said at each. It is usually done barefoot.
Jimmy, who is in his eighties, was very hard to understand. Ray MacManus did a kind of translation into intelligible Irish but it was still hard to follow.
We made our way up the mountainside to the holy well associated with St. ColmCille. Along the way we stopped at ColmCille’s Bed. Jmmy explained how to a stone is passed around the torso and a blessing said. When we got to the well he showed us how a stone is thrown onto the pile by each pilgram. He told us that he threw his first stone in 1945.
It was such a beautiful day. From high up on the mountainside you could look east down the valley as far as the Eaglais Gallda (what the locals refer to the Protestant church as) and beyond that to Glenish. To the west the deep blue of the Atlantic was caressing the feet of Malin Mór. Centuries hung in the air between them.

Sunday, July 22, 2007

ANOTHER COURT TOMB


I woke up early on Sunday with the intention of driving out to Tobar Naomh Ciaran to see the court tomb that is in the fields beyond. It was such a beautiful beginning to the day I didn’t want to waste the opportunity of seeing this monument. Last year I got as far as the cairn with Beryl and Madeleine but was persuaded from going further. This year Oi was determined to see it.
I picked up Treasa at the Teach Mór. She was as eager as I to see the tomb. As we went past Roarty’s we saw Edie and Sylvia walking up the road. We stopped and asked them if they wanted to accompany us. We had a great time in the car, singing and catching up on everybody’s story.
The monument looks a lot closer from the road than it actually is. It took us quite a while to make our way through the bog, over fences, across a stream, and down the steep hillside to the tomb. But it was worth it. It’s hard to describe in words the feeling of being in the presence of something that has been sitting there for millennia, suffice it to say we were awestruck.
On the way back up the hill to the road we found wild peppermint growing and two different species of orchids.

Saturday, July 21, 2007

CREEVYKEEL




On the road back to Donegal from Sligo we saw a sign for Creevykeel Court Tomb. Of course we had to stop! Right at the entrance to the site there was a “rag tree”. This is a tree where people hang a piece of cloth or a strip of clothing that has touched the part of their body that needs curing. This tree was covered in strips of paper towel and paper napkins instead of cloth. I wonder if one person had done all the hangings.
The court tomb itself was very impressive. According to the information sign it “was built in the 3rd millennium BCE and consists of a burial chamber opening off the open central courtyard.” There are possibly two more smaller passage graves at the narrow end of the wedge shaped structure. From the mound you can look out at the bay in one direction and the mountains in the other. A really beautiful place to build the Taj Mahal.
MORE INFO ABOUT CREEVYKEEL

STONE PAGES: CREEVYKEEL

SLIGO TOWN


We got to Sligo Town at about 3:30 in the afternoon. It was such a beautiful day – sunny with big white clouds in the sky. Sligo is a busy place, and of course we were there on a Saturday, the busiest day of the week. We found parking along the river. We had to run the gauntlet of an aul’ one who might have been waiting for the space that we took. Treasa wanted to see the shops so we split up. I went looking for a cybercafe and she wandered around the town centre.
Later in the afternoon we got together again. I had already met Emily and Aaron on the street. They were in Sligo to pick up a rental car at the airport. Treasa and meself went to the Yeats Memorial Building (where there is a little restaurant) to have coffee and a sandwich.
By the time we were finished the shops were starting to close up. We hurried to Tesco to buy a chicken for the Sunday dinner. Tesco has self-checkout but that’s a misnomer since we had so many problems with the machine that the supervisor ended up checking us out. Whoever came up the concept gets my vote for most useless modern invention.
We left Sligo at 6:30 so that we could be back in the Gleann for the big opening meeting of Scoil Shamhraidh.

YEATS' GRAVE, DRUMCLIFF CHURCHYARD


“Under bare Benbulbin’s head” we stopped to visit Yeats’ grave. The cemetery is just outside Sligo Town on the road from Donegal. There were a lot of people about, the car park was full. There is now a tea room and art gallery on the grounds that weren’t there the last time I came through in 1982!
The church itself has been restored but it is now so new and shiny looking that it has lost all its old character. I suppose buildings must be conserved and restored but couldn’t they be renewed in a way that is sensitive to the centuries of struggle and strife that the building has been witness to?
There is a fine high cross from the 11th century in the churchyard. On one side panels depict the Fall of Man (Thank you Eve!), the Presentation in the Temple, and the Crucifixion; on the other side, Cain is slaying Abel and Christ is resurrected.

MORE PHOTOS

DONEGAL TOWN



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We got an early start to the day. We decided to go down to Donegal Town to do a bit of shopping, and if we felt like it maybe drive as far as Sligo Town. It didn’t take us long to get to Donegal. It was a fine bright morning with little traffic on the road until we got beyond Killybegs.

As soon as we had the car parked we took a little walk about town. Treasa had postcards she wanted to mail out so we went looking for the post office. After that we dropped into the Blueberry Café for a spot of breakfast. There were at least two other people speaking Irish in the café. Brian, the owner came out to speak with us. He always remembers me and Rich and always asks about Vladimir. He is such a wonderful host, it’s not surprising his café is thriving. There is no longer tagine on the menu but at least he is trying other new things like coq au vin and tandoori salmon wrap. I wonder how the dour Donegallers are taking to that.

Treasa wanted to see the famine graveyard so we took a walk out in that direction after breakfast. Along the road the skies darkened and a heavy downpour caught us out in the open. We took shelter beneath a rowan tree until the rain let up.

Thursday, July 19, 2007

FAKE VILLAGE (FOLK VILLAGE)


There is an incredible building boom going on in GleannCholmCille. Houses are springing up everywhere. There is a new small hotel with self-catering apartments by the fire station, and close to where I’m staying five new holiday homes have been built.
This expansion has been taking place all over Ireland but until recently the Gleann has been relatively untouched. Now development has arrived with a vengence. It seems every telephone pole has a planning application notice displayed. There are even more street lights too so it never gets quite as dark as it used to.

Wednesday, July 18, 2007

DEORA DÉ


It’s getting a little rough – sessions every night until 2 and classes every morning at 10. Last night there was a tremendous session in Roarty’s which wasn’t very crowded. When singers sang people actually stayed quiet! Margaret and Derek led the session with guitars and fiddle and others joined in. A woman played the harp and sang a haunting version of “Fields of Gold”, not exactly traditional material but beautiful all the same. And of course Salvatore was in fine fettle. How did we ever keep the tradition alive before Italians and Poles came along?