Apr 16 2006

We on our part must realize that force may not bring unity. That the reverse in fact can be true. Force can create resistance and what we are trying to bring about is unity.

Published by Fence under Irishify, Weekly memes

Inniú I went down to take a look at the military parade we had in Dublin to mark the 90th anniversary of the 1916 Rising. I didn’t make it out early enough so didn’t try to find a space on O’Connell St, it was packed. Instead d’fhán mé on Parnell St. So I didn’t hear the reading of the proclamation, or any of the speeches. Which may be a good thing, I’m not sure. But the parade[1] itself was a little strange.

We don’t do miltary parades. We haven’t had one in almost 40 years, cause of Northern Ireland and all that.

But if you’ve ever seen any of the British military-type parades on the telly you’ll know that they are all flag-waving, almost triumphalist, displays of pomp and ceremony. Well, there was no confusing our parade today with that. I’m not saying that ours was any better because it wasn’t. Nor any worse. Just that it was clearly an Irish event[2] It was quite fun. Especially the triúr buachaillí who turned up halfway through and ended up near me. Is dóigh liom they were all brothers, and all under ten. They were delighra to see the guns, tanks and “Bazookas! Look at de bazookas” They were also very impressed with the airplanes and helicopters that flew over.

But they were grinning from ear to ear when a few of the soldiers accompanying tanks shook their hands and others gave them high fives.

So whatever else it may have been, the parade was very much a success from a PR point of view. And it was nice to see ordinary soldiers on parade. The only other time we’d really see them is the marching bands on Patrick’s day, and usually people are more interested in the floats and sweets being thrown from other participants.

RTÉ have a special section on their website devoted to their archives from the Cuimhneachán 1916. That’d be their coverage of the 1966 Golden Jubilee events. The site does seem to be undergoing some work though. I was on it yesterday and some links weren’t working. They’ve been taken down today and its slightly reorganised.

Agus ná rinne dearmad ar LunaNina.
Dúirt sí:

  1. Ambition ::
  2. Meatloaf ::
  3. Celebrity ::
  4. Coach ::
  5. Slacker ::
  6. Reflection ::
  7. Original ::
  8. Risk ::
  9. Saved ::
  10. June ::

So I say:

Continue Reading »

Linknotes:
  1. I’ll stick a few photos up on flickr as soon as the batteries are charged ↩
  2. yeah, the use of Irish and the flags would help you figure that out, but even they hadn’t've been there you’d have still known ↩
Tags: 1916 Rising, anniversary, as gaeilge, Dublin, irish history, Luna Nina, parade

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Dec 26 2005

Eyes for teeth waving over me

Published by Fence under Musing

Not to bring you down from your holiday cheer, but today marks a year since the Indian Ocean earthquake, and resulting tsunami. Since then 2005 hasn’t exactly been disaster free now has it? There was Katrina in the USA, and more recently the earthquake in Indai/Pakistan.

I was watching The Big Bite on RTE recently, and they were discussing the different responses to these three tragedies. And one of the questions asked if race has an impact on how much aid we give. There were many, many tourists effected by the tsunami last year and the response was immediate and immense. But the earthquake it didn’t seem to get as much attention. Was that because we could identify more with the white tourists in Sri Lanka, Thailand etc than with the Muslims suffering in Pakistan?

I don’t really think that is the reason. Yes there more white, European people who suffered because of the tsunami, but I think a huge part of the reason we all reacted the way we did was because of the timing. The 26th of December sees most people sitting around at home, watching tv, not really doing all that much. And because the tourists had camera phones, camcorders etc we were able to see the tsunami. The media was able to broadcast pictures 24 hours a day.

With Pakistan the news just took longer to get out. It happened in a very hard to reach part of the world and there wasn’t really any immediate footage to be had, so it slipped from the news. And as it did so it slipped from our minds.

But according to John O’Shea of GOAL the charity organisations do now have enough money to begin work. It simply took longer than might have been hoped for. And of course there is the fact that Pakistan is a country that is poverty stricken and yet 40% of its annual budget goes to the military. The govt. there didn’t do enough at the outset.

Tags: anniversary, charity, Hurrican Katrina, tsunami

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