GNÉ -ALTANNA
November 03 2020
9
Galway Christmas Programme How Writers Soc in the works on announcement Have Been Coping of the Cancellation of the with Lockdown Christmas Market By Niamh Casey
By Fiona Lee It was recently announced that the Galway Christmas Market will not be going ahead this year. The market usually runs from early November to the end of December and attracts thousands of visitors from around the country and abroad. Many have criticised the early announcement of the cancellation, including the organisers of the market, Milestone Inventive, who believe the decision should have been delayed. Owen Hanley, a Social Democrat Councillor in Galway City, understands it’s disappointing but sees it as unavoidable. “I think some people were surprised that the decision was taken so far in advance. The decision around granting licences in public spaces has to be made around 6 weeks in advance, so a decision
was needed. The view of the executive of the council was that it wasn’t feasible to put on the market. Anyone who has been through the Galway Christmas Market knows it is cramped at the best of times”. The council has a vision for a socially distant Christmas and is working on a programme for the city’s festive activities. “What I’ve requested, and I think it’s really important, is that we don’t just put out bad news. We are putting a plan together about what Christmas in Galway can look like that abides by restrictions and guidelines. We are putting together a list of programmes that people can look forward to because there’s not enough good news out there”. The council’s focus this year is on supporting local communities and businesses in light of the financial struggles of Covid-19. “Over the summer, there was a summer festival event with socially distant tents.
That is something we could be looking at. The Council will be fully funding the Christmas lights too. Some other things are up in the air, but I’m hoping we will have things going on, especially for local people, because things like the Christmas Market are really geared towards tourists. We have a market here in Galway that runs all year round! I’ve requested that we put in support for them so they can run during the Christmas period because they support the local economy”. “Part of the decision was taken because we have local businesses that have weathered difficult times this year. They are our focus. Hopefully, the Christmas Market comes back next year but right now, we want to support our own local market and our local businesses”. The city’s Christmas lights are set to be turned on in November to begin the Christmas celebrations.
Usually a festive fixture in Galway City, the Christmas Market is the latest event to fall foul of the Covid-19 Pandemic. Photo: Galway Independent
Societies week this year took place online through virtual booths and meetings. If there is one thing all societies can now relate to, it is the abundance of technical struggles that came with the shift to a solely digital presence. Many societies that had been strictly practical, or even just had a very small online presence, are now adapting to the new status quo in order to gain new members. Eadaoin Counihan, the secretary of Writers Soc, spoke about these new challenges and about how societies week went this year. “For a while we all honestly thought we’d be back on campus, so we weren’t fully prepared. The Socs Box did send out emails and had video conference calls on how to set up the virtual booths. I was the one hosting the virtual booth for Writers Soc but unfortunately my connection was terrible. The Socs Box helped me a lot though. They moved us into a virtual room, which fair play to them, they worked so hard to understand my terrible connection and help give us access to YourSpace, which is where you could enter the virtual socs week. Thankfully now if you go into any of the society dashboards there’s videos on how to use YourSpace, because everything is done through that system, and it’s actually easy enough to use once you have good connection.” Usually socs weeks draw a lot of people in , particularly first years, and the hall is laid out so that people get a chance to discover societies that they mightn’t have known about. Naturally, the numbers recruited were lower this year and there were much less people visiting the virtual booths than in previous years than would have been visiting the physical ones. As Eadaoin pointed out, Writers Soc begins with a ‘W’, so it falls towards the bottom of the list of societies and you would have to be searching for it in order to know it was there. The virtual booths were not what many expected when they clicked into them; “ A lot of people just expect
a video when you click into the virtual booths, just talking about the society. But they’re actually brought into a chatroom with us, and you have to say their names so that they know that you know they’re there, and it makes some people feel more welcome. It does catch a lot of people off guard though.” Eadaoin did however find that first years are now more involved with Writers Soc. As she pointed out, first year students had to use the YourSpace platform for their orientation week, so they were much more familiar with how it worked when it came to Socs Week. Also, it’s understandable that this year many students would turn to societies as a way of meeting people who they might share interests with. “ Especially if they feel like they haven’t clicked with anyone yet. It’s definitely harder this year for first years.” Society members get emailed the link to enter the virtual weekly meetings and attendance has been pretty good for Writers Soc. “We’re luckier than other societies because we actually can do a bit, even though before we never did anything online. We had our EGM because we needed committee members and they’re all really enthusiastic. It’s just really nice to see. Last week we had our first official meeting, and we played a prompts game and a word association game. We tend to do fun activities like that. It worked out really well.” Eadaoin also talked about the society’s plans to do something for NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month), which is in November, and she also hopes to start up workshops and monthly poetry writing competitions. Writers Soc are really adjusted well to the new ways of doing things. Their discord chat room is working well and is a big part of the weekly meetings and is super welcoming, with options that allow you to choose your preferred pronouns. They’re still developing their online presence too. People are welcome to join societies at any time in the year and writers soc love to see new faces, and all that is required to join is a passion for writing.
Oranmore Drones Deliver Flying Flat Whites By Mary Raftery Many NUIG students are missing their pit stop at Smokey’s for their takeaway coffee before a morning lecture. However, if you are fortunate enough to live within a 2km radius of Tesco Oranmore, you have the option of getting your coffee delivered in minutes – by drone! Manna Drone Delivery Service have partnered up with Tesco Oranmore, along with various other businesses in the locality, to provide local residents with a choice of almost 20,000 different products. If you are already in the festive mood, you can even order Christmas lights from Woodies!
Tesco store manager Catherine Swift spoke of her excitement to be on board with this innovative project. “We’re really excited about this partnership and delighted that our store in Oranmore is involved in this trial.”, she said. Oranmore is one of the first locations in the world to have a service like this. Minister of State at the Department of Transport, Hildegarde Naughton TD, has spoken about Ireland and innovative companies like Manna leading in the drone delivery industry, “I’m heartened to see Ireland leading in the highly valuable drone delivery industry. It is a testament to Ireland’s indigenous technology industry, and to
the Irish Aviation Authority (IAA) for their long-term vision on drones and the benefits that they can bring to our society.” The trial service began delivering groceries, pharmacy items, hardware, medications and hot meals on Wednesday 21st of October, and it will run into mid 2021. If the initiative proves to be successful in the coming months, there will be plans to extend it further. Manna trialled this service in Moneygall and it proved to be a huge success. Operating Manager Naomi Cullen reflected on this successful trial and said, “We were honoured to be able to help the community in Moneygall get vital supplies during the lockdown, we saw the commu-
nity really embrace the project and enjoy having deliveries made by drone.” The 8,000 residents in proximity to the drone hub can place an order online using their EirCode. The drone takes off from the roof of Tesco and travels at a speed of 80km an hour. The delivery journey takes 3 minutes, but time is added to this to prepare and package the order. The order can be tracked in real time and when the drone arrives at the delivery location, it lowers the order down to the ground, by a biodegradable thread, at a height of 15 metres. Certain aerospace-grade components of the Manna drones have been made by Éire Composites – an Irish company spe-
Image: The Irish Times cialising in high reliability components for rockets and commercial aircraft. The drone carries a package the size of a shoebox, not exceeding 2kg. Manna are already giving back to the community during these unprecedented and challenging times. They have implemented a corporate responsibility strategy by providing delivery to frontline workers free of charge. Manna will also waive the pharmacy delivery fee for the elderly.
