Digital Edition Nov 2021 Is 269 Vol 19
Animal Lovers Beware!
Criminal Dog breeders gearing up for Christmas
Also Ian Bailey Part 3
(I was branded “The Prime Suspect”)
The Young Carers saving the state a Fortune Massacre in the Phoenix Park + Lots more
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Contents
Going Forward The Covid-19 pandemic has taken its toll on us, like it has on many other magazines, organisations and businesses globally. Among the problems facing us are: Our new landlord’s reluctance to come to a compromise on rent for an unused office during the pandemic and threat to hike rent meant we had to vacate our home of 20 years, The genuine public fear of physical interaction makes putting a magazine on the streets problematic. The advent of a cashless society. Unfortunately, all have contributed to a landscape that has irreversibly changed since the Big Issue first hit the streets in 1995. To meet this challenge, Ireland’s Big Issue have reluctantly decided to host the magazine digitally-only for the immediate future. We will revisit this decision as time moves on and circumstances change. We thank you for your support to-date and ask that you continue to help us help those on the margins of society. This has always been our aim and shall continue to be our driving force. Digital Edition Contacts: Editor: Sean Kavanagh Ireland’s Big Issue Email: info@irelandsbigissue.com
Page 5
Page 16
Talking Point:
Anthony Quinn: The Ultimate Rags to Riches Story
We Must STOP Supporting Puppy Mills
Born into extreme poverty, Anthony Quinn would become one of the world’s most famous actors.... by accident! Shaun Anthony reports.
We are the ‘puppy farm capital of Europe’. It’s a cruel, callous industry - why are we creating demand?
Page 22 Massacre in Phoenix Park
Page 6
Sam McMurdock looks at one of the best-known political killings of all time - the massacre in Phoenix Park.
Letter to my Younger Self – Ann Ingle
Page 28
Ann Ingle (82) author of new memoir Openhearted has a word with her teenage self.
Quick-fire Questions with Kim Wilde
Page 8
We have a chat with singer and professional gardener Kim Wilde (60).
Five Acts of Fashion Provocation that Changed History
Page 30 Families Search for Loved Ones Gone Missing in Post-War El Salvador
Peter McNeil shows us that using fashion as a tool to address wider social concerns has been a strategy for people seeking change for many years.
Thousands of families in El Salvador have lost relatives who simply failed to return home one day and were never ever heard from again. Edgardo Ayala reports.
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Page 36
Shower Bus for the Homeless
Let’s Hear it For Our Young Carers
Dominic Bloh on how his own homeless experience helped him come up with the idea of a shower bus.
Contribute via PayPal at: info@irelandsbigissue.com
Sam McMurdock looks at the young carers in Ireland, aged between 10 and 17 who are saving our country a fortune - yet often fall between the cracks when it comes to commendation.
Page 12 Ian Bailey: In his Own Words (Part 3)
Regulars
Ian Bailey continues his on-going series detailing his life, before and after the tragic murder of Sophie Toscan du Plantier.
20/21 – Photo World 26/27 – Screen Scene 33- The Podcast Review 34 - Book reviews
3
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4
Issues: Talking Point
Animal Lovers Beware!
C
riminal dog breeders gearing up for the Christmas Season. Samantha McMurdock reports.
In Ireland puppy farming creates hundreds of millions for criminal gangs annually. These female dogs are subject to vile treatment, in dark, windowless sheds and pregnant their whole lives. The puppies are advertised as dogs from family homes and not the puppy mills they are actually from. How do we stop this? My friend Miranda’s son Benjamin (13) has been asking for a Pug for years. Last year Miranda’s brother, gave Ben £1500 to realise his dream. Hopping with excitement, Benjamin was flicking from Gumtree to Marketplace on his iPad in search of his long-awaited puppy when his mum candidly informed him, “A real animal lover would “A real animal go to the shelter lover would go to the shelter and give ANY dog a and give ANY home…” dog a home …. Spending money on a puppy whose mum never sees daylight and is then discarded is heartless.”
one dog down every day due to chronic over-breeding. Many of these dogs are less than 12 months. She explained,
Miranda told me later that she used this as a “teachable moment.” She went on to say,
The DSPCA recently stated that more than 30,000 dogs from licensed and unlicensed Irish puppy farms will arrive in the UK for the Christmas market. This is a frighting thought. These dogs are packed into vans/lorries, have long journeys without food/water and many die before they get there - countless others die days after in their new homes. The Daily Mail recently stated that these gangs are most often linked to the Irish ethnic community and recent news reports would attest to that. Brian Gillen of DSPCA says they have served “multiple warrants” on smugglers from the Travelling community who are exporting into the UK. Gillen went on to state,
“Kids put their heart on these Chihuahuas, Labradoodles etc and most of these dogs have serious health issues because they’ve been the result of intensive breeding and overcrowding, which leads to the parvovirus which attacks the immune system. The pups look fine in the pictures, sadly they don’t reach their first birthday - not helped by the fact they’re also taken from their mothers much too early. Many of these pups have severe anxiety/ destructive behaviours due to being locked up. To be fair, there’s no excuse to buy from breeders when our shelters are bursting with needy dogs.” Imports to the UK from Ireland have increased by 75% in the past 8 months alone, thanks to the trend for ‘lockdown dogs.’
“I explained that if there was no demand then these breeders would have to stop and that each of us have a responsibility to do the right thing ….. Even the so-called genuine breeders are not necessarily animal lovers.” Benjamin went to his local shelter and adopted a gorgeous 2-year-old Lab-cross called Luna and made a donation with a reasonable sum of his windfall. Drugs and guns used to be the black-market favourites passed between the north and south; now it’s a more profitable commodity - puppies. Pups are bred and raised in the most repulsive conditions and birthed by mothers who are pregnant their whole lives until they’re no longer lucrative. Thousands of these pups are then shipped to the UK, advertised on Marketplace, Gumtree and other sites and are pitched as dogs coming from loving family homes (images PhotoShopped). Ursula a vet in a small country practice in N. I. told me she has to put at least
“The Travellers operate very effectively . . . They can conceal themselves once they get into the UK. They don’t leave a footprint.” While we continue to buy from unlicensed breeders, we are supporting not only animal cruelty but financing criminals. If you or your child wants a pet this Christmas do the right and go to an animal shelter and provide a loving home for a lonely animal, you won’t regret it. 5
Issues: Life
Letter to my Younger Self Ann Ingle
A
t 20 Londoner Ann fell in love with an Irish man she met on holiday in Cornwall. At the church (to arrange their shotgun wedding) she discovered he hadn’t told her his name. Over 60 years later Ann looks back on that first glorious fall and in a series of essays considers what she has learned from the life that followed - giving birth to 8 kids, their father’s years of mental illness and tragic death at just 40, being a povertystricken single mum in 1980s Dublin, coming into her own in her middle years - going to college, working and writing, and continuing to evolve and learn into her ninth decade, even as she accepts the realities of being ‘old’.
Dear Ann You are now 18. Your birth on 23rd August 1939 occurred eleven days before the beginning of the Second World War. Nothing to do with you, just bad timing on the part of your parents. Your second name, Marguerite, is the name of the midwife who helped with your birth. A marguerite is a beautiful flower and you too are beautiful although I know you won’t believe me. You are forever looking in the mirror to check out if there has been any improvement. Stop it. Your nose is not too long, trust me. If you remember to clean your teeth night and morning and use moisturiser every day, you will stay as sweet and attractive as you are for years.
a bad time what with going to war with Egypt over the Suez Canal and one thing or another. Don’t worry, you won’t have to wait too long before the Labour Party comes to power, but you will be gone by then (spoiler alert). Your life takes a dramatic turn when you leave England. Embrace it all.
Be always true to your lovely self and try not to be influenced by negative people. Other people don’t think about you as much as you imagine they do. It was Eleanor Roosevelt who once said “You wouldn’t worry so much about what others think of you if you realised how seldom they do.” Remember you will never be able to please everyone even if you wanted to. I never really know what You are a kind and generous person today, never others think of me, and anyway it’s none of my business. lose that. Loving and giving This year, 1957, Tommy Steel is an essential part of is top of the charts with “You wouldn’t worry so much about what your personality and others think of you if you realised how seldom they Singing the Blues. I still a wonderful quality. love him just as much as do.” However, it might be a good you do now. Also, that Elvis idea to save a penny here and there but Presley is in the hit parade too with All I know that advice will fall on deaf ears. Shook Up. Unfortunately, he didn’t last as long as Tommy. You have recently become politically aware and joined I am so happy that you got to see Judy Garland in real life the Labour Party Young Socialists. The Tories are having last week at the Dominion Theatre singing Somewhere 6
over the Rainbow. You loved her ever since The Wizard of Oz. So much talent and such a sad life. Fame doesn’t always bring happiness. There is something you are struggling with and I am sorry to say you will continue to do so for many years. You know what I’m talking about, that chip on your shoulder that makes you resent middle class people and those with a better education than you. It’s a kind of reverse snobbery and it is just as bad as the way some of them look down their noses at you. But remember they can’t help being rich and super intelligent. Have compassion for those wealthy people in their beautiful homes and for the clever ones teaching in the university. Everything is not always as it seems and they have problems too. Remember, you are every bit as good as them so don’t waste your time thinking bitter thoughts. I had to learn the hard way until I finally realised we are all in the same scary world no matter what our station in life.
I am so glad that you love to read. I was frightened when I read that that book by Ray Bradbury, Fahrenheit 451. The idea of burning all the books in the world is a terrifying thought. Always find time to read, no matter what is going on in your life or how many children are running around under your feet (sorry once again for the spoiler). And writing too, I know you love that. Try to keep a diary or a journal. Memory is a strange thing and unless you write down what happens at the time it occurs, things can become distorted in your mind. Never throw away any letters you receive and try to keep copies of those you send. Would you believe me if I told you you would become a published author yourself when you are 82 with a memoir entitled openhearted. Of course you wouldn’t but it’s true. All my love from this old lady who is so grateful for her wonderful life. Ann ‘Openhearted by Ann Ingle is published by Sandycove and available now. (€16.99)’
7
Issues: Taking a Stand
Five Acts of Fashion Provocation that Changed History
U
sing fashion as a tool to address wider social concerns has long been a strategy for people seeking to make change. Peter McNeil reports.
Democratic congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez ignited both controversy and celebration after wearing a gown to the Met Gala emblazoned in red graffiti text with the statement ‘Tax the Rich’.
social groups. In North America, the formal clothing codes of the old regime were actively resisted: men were not expected to wear the expensive and colourful embroidered silks typically worn to European courts. Their imported fabrics were considered bad for local economies, and their elite air at odds with the idea that all men might now be (relatively) equal.
Appearing as a guest of the Metropolitan Museum of Art at the annual fund raiser, (for which tickets cost tens of thousand dollars), the leftwing politician wore a custom gown by fashion brand Brother Vellies, bringing with her the label’s founder, the young Black designer and activist Aurora James.
President elect George Washington was sculpted by Houdon in the late 18th century with a button missing from his waistcoat. This was a deliberate gesture to show his actions were more important than his appearance. He also wore plain, home-spun American woollen cloth for his inauguration instead of the expected silk or velvet. This was a firm demonstration of North American independence and perhaps the first American ‘business casual’.
Using fashion as a tool to address wider social concerns has, in fact, long been a strategy for people seeking to make change — including wearing these clothes in spaces of influence. From 19th century Suffragettes who pounded the streets in heels, ultrafeminine dress and large ‘picture’ hats to refute claims that they were unwomanly, to patriot textiles in the second world war, to Indigenous Australian street clothes and accessories by a brand such as Dizzy Couture today, dress has historically conveyed political messages, creating ‘looks’ for generations of change agents.
The Abolitionist handbag Since the late 18th century, a range of objects from jewellery to printed dishes were produced to critique the Slave Trade.
British Quakers had advocated for Abolition in 1783. The Female Society for Birmingham (originally the Ladies Society for the Relief of Negro Slaves, the first Here are five clothing acts as provocations such group) mobilised their antithat changed history. slavery followers with handbags Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez printed with images and ignited controversy after wearing a gown to George Washington’s suit the Met Gala emblazoned in red graffiti with the slogans designed to gain support for the Abolitionist statement ‘Tax the Rich’. The founders of the American movement. Revolution wished to break with the old codes of European aristocracy. Much The silk drawstring bags, made by of the world still had ‘sumptuary laws’: legal edicts that women in sewing circles, were presented to prominent regulated the types, materials and amounts of cloth, figures such as George IV and Princess Victoria. The colours, jewellery and accessories permitted to various bags contained newspaper articles and tracts supportive 8
of Abolition. The Slavery Abolition Act, which provided for the immediate abolition of slavery in most of the British Empire was passed ten years later, in 1833. A similar Act was ratified in the USA only in 1865. No feather hats The ostrich and exotic bird industry was massive in the 19th century: as well as plumes, women wore whole bodies of birds as accessories, such as hummingbird earrings. The ostrich plume ‘double fluff’ industry was centred on South Africa, where the feathers were worth more than gold. They were exported to rooms in London and New York where exhausted young girls finished and dyed them for retail.
included skilled figures from advertising and design who created unified and stylish T-shirts, posters and banners. The designs were clean, slick and looked just like good advertising. As Sarah Schulman recently demonstrated in her 20 year history of ACT UP, the bold T-shirt designs both created optimum impact for ACT UP’s protests on the TV news and a new pro-gay identity. Worn with Doc Marten shoes, leather jackets, clean and tight jeans or denim shorts, ACT UP established the look of gay urban men for a generation. Government bodies and large drug companies were shamed by the public protests into adopting better and more rational health messaging, conducting better funded and more equitable drug trials and selling cheaper retrovirals. When Katharine met Maggie
In 1914 a massive ‘feather crash’ saw the raw material become close to worthless. Young women interested in the growing national park and conservation movements objected to the trade on ecological grounds. They simply stopped wearing the fashion, starting a global ‘antiplumage’ movement.
In 1984, designer Katharine Hamnett wore a t-shirt that read, ‘58% DONT WANT PERSHING’ (a reference to nuclear missiles) to a high profile fashion evening attended by conservative Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher.
Hamnett made her t-shirt the night before, recognising the The women involved with the opportunity she had, and hid it Massachusetts Audubon Society under her coat upon entry. Its were so successful that their graphic format owes a debt to lobbying led to the first US both 1970s Punk and ACT UP. federal conservation legislation, She later recalled of the widely photographed encounter with The Lacey Act (1900). Thatcher: “She looked down and said, ‘You seem to Taxidermied birds, feather boas and birds as earrings be wearing a rather strong message on your became largely unfashionable and were rarely T-shirt’, then she bent down to read seen again in women’s fashion. “Thatcher looked down and it and let out a squawk, like a said, ‘You seem to be wearing a rather strong chicken.” The ACT UP T-shirt message on your T-shirt’, then she bent down to read it and let out a squawk, like a chicken.” The AIDS crisis of the Social change needs its visual 1980s-90s saw the mobilisation of a unique blend of activism born from the women’s, Hispanic, Black power and 1970s gay movements. ACT UP New York determined that only anger and civil disobedience would focus the attention of government and big pharma on the plight of mainly gay men’s health. A series of extraordinary ‘zaps’ or site-specific protests, often theatrical, was engineered. ACT UP’s membership
forms. Fashion is one of them. Fashion is a brilliant communicator of new ideas. That we are reading about AOC’s clothing ‘controversy’ shows she fully understands fashion’s power. Peter McNeil is professor of design history at the University of Technology Sydney. Courtesy of The Conversation / INSP.ngo
9
Issues: Making a Difference
Shower Bus for the Homeless
T
aking a shower every morning or evening is a regular occurrence that most of us take for granted. While experiencing homelessness, Dominik Bloh became all too aware of the fact that access to bathing facilities is challenging for those on the streets and that being unable to wash regularly can have negative mental health impacts. That’s when he first thought of the idea of a shower bus. In 2019, it became a reality,
Dominik Bloh was kicked out of the house as a teenager and had to survive on the streets of Hamburg – all while he was trying to graduate from high school. He was homeless for over a decade, and he experienced for himself how it feels when you are unable to wash regularly. “I know that feeling. The feeling of people distancing themselves from you in disgust,” he says. “The outside affects the inside. The body and the soul go hand in hand. I was so dirty that I started thinking of myself as just dirt.”
Photo: Julia Schwendner
One of the bathrooms is also suitable for wheelchair users thanks to sufficient space and appropriate provisions such as a ramp and a height-adjustable sink. On the outside of the bus there is an eight by two-and-ahalf-metre awning covering the front and sides. One can warm up and find some peace here. In the first year of operation, the bus was used 250 times. It operates seven days a week and is driven to four different points in the city, including crowded places such as Millerntor and Steintorplatz on Saturdays. On Saturdays, showering is only available for women.
Bloh, who was born Today Bloh devotes himself to ensuring that Hamburg’s in 1988, came up with the idea when he himself was on homeless have access to shower facilities. the streets. He was certain of the fact that if things were to go well for him, he would never forget his experiences. “Those times when I was on the streets, one of the So the idea of giving something back stuck with him. He worst problems I had was the fact that I couldn’t wrote a successful book about his time on the streets wash myself,” he recalls. “I learned and founded GoBanyo, a non-profit on the streets that washing is company. “You can always do good [part of your] dignity.” Bloh even by just giving people a laugh,” organized a huge fundraiser he continues. “For some, this can be the “We are financing ourselves with his friends to finance a best moment of their day; it might give through donations. The bus shower bus, and the ensuing conversion was made possible them hope to carry on and not to give conversion of a Mercedes through crowdfunding, through up.” Citaro 530 started at the end of which we collected 168,000 Euros,” May 2019 and took six months. There he says. “We are improving ourselves are three fully equipped bathrooms in the converted continuously and are trying to create a social business out bus. In every bathroom there is one shower, one toilet, of a social project. We will find a product soon, [and with one sink and one waterproof cabinet with a power socket that] we will be able to finance ourselves independently. available. We can sell shower gels and build our shower buses with 10
the income. That’s the idea.” Until they manage to make this plan a reality, GoBanyo is working in partnership with The Right to Shower, a social enterprise that sells soaps for good causes.
courageous about approaching each other and talking to each other,” he says. “This is the first step. You may ask yourself many questions [in life] but you’ll only receive answers if you talk to others.
Bloh’s shower bus idea is now attracting widespread “You can always do good even by just giving people a interest and possible imitators. There have enquiries laugh,” he continues. “For some, this can be the best from all over Germany and the EU, and contact has been moment of their day; it might give them hope to carry made from as far afield as South on and not to give up.” Africa and Brazil. “We like “I learned on the streets that to support others with Bloh’s vision – when he was living washing is [part of your] dignity.” our knowledge. As long on the streets and had nothing at as the problem remains, we all – was to write a book and make need to make access to sanitation facilities the shower bus a reality. Both of these visions have affordable and easier,” Bloh explains. “The primary goal come to pass. As a result, he believes that anything is and the mission in years to come must be to introduce a possible and anything can be achieved. Bloh travels a Housing First policy in Germany.” He says this because lot, goes to schools, does educational work and contacts one thing is very apparent: The shower bus is trying to political decision-makers in order to spread the word. compensate for the fact that there are very few public He does this in order to share his message with as many shower facilities for the homeless. people as possible and to attract interest in the subject of ending homelessness. “I know that it [my outreach work] When it comes to homelessness, Bloh thinks that gives people food for thought,” he says. “They often later everything must change. People need homes, not a few change their actions because they gained a new insight more shower facilities. “It is time to deal with that,” – because their eyes were opened, so to speak – and they he says. “We can end homelessness through Housing now look at streets from a different perspective.” First in Germany. Every person should be able to have a roof above their head. Showering and having a place Translated from German by Metin Ahmet Ustabaşı to live are basic human rights.” And what is his advice Courtesy of Trott-war / INSP.ngo if one meets a homeless person on the street, how should you behave? Here, Bloh emphasises the power of reaching out to others: “I wish that all of us can be more
Word Power Over the next few issues we’ll be attempting to increase your word power. Have a look at the words below and afterwards see if you know their meaning. Word Pronunciation Answers 1. Ascetic Uh-set-ik 2. Enervate En-er-veyt 3. Fatuous Fach-oo-uhs 4. Gratuitous Gruh-too-i-tuhs 5. Libertarian Lib-er-tairee-uhn 6. Phlegmatic Fleg-mat-ik 7. Recalcitrant Ri-kal-si-truhnt 8. Calumny Kal-uhm-nee 9. Protean Pro-tee-uhn 10.Anathema Uh-nath-uh-muh. 11.Pusillanimous Pyoo-suh-lan-uh-muhs 12. Chicanery Shi-key-nuh-ree
ore? How did YOU sc tion!6-9 or more – Perfec 10 Brilliant. 3-5 Well done. tter. 0-2 Must do be
1. One who practices self-denial as part of spiritual discipline. 2. Lacking in vitality or mentally/ morally drained 3. Devoid of intelligence. 4. Uncalled for or unwarranted. 5. Someone who cherishes ideas of free will. 6. Expressing little or no emotion. 7. Resistant to authority. 8. The making of false and defamatory statements about someone in order to damage their reputation. 9. Frequently changing, trending, versatile. 10. A person or thing detested or loathed. 11. Lacking courage or resolution cowardly, fainthearted. 12. Trickery or deception by quibbling or sophistry.
11
IAN BAILEY IN HIS OWN WORDS PART III On Tuesday 12th February 1997 I awoke from troubled sleep to hear my name on the radio news. That morning’s papers all carried reports with photographs of the high profile arrest. My head was in a daze after the previous day’s gruelling interrogation and accusation.
Cork Examiner quoted Spt. Noel Smith of Bandon as saying “the prime suspect had gone to ground”. It was front page news in both the red tops and broadsheets. From the moment my identity was released and confirmed by the Garda Siochana (AGS) I was branded “The Prime Suspect”, neither Jules’ or my life were ever going to be the same. There had been a cataclysmic tectonic shift caused by a dirty rotten lie created spread and perpetuated by non other than some members of Guardians of Freedom. I returned with Russell who had to run the gauntlet of a mass media phalange blocking the narrow lane. Within minutes of getting back, Paddy Clancy of The Sun and John Keirans of The Mirror were banging on the door. There was no hiding from this and I spoke to the journalist and gave a statement to protest my innocence and deny the allegation. The media branded me the “prime suspect” although I never accepted that myself.
After breakfast where I met Martin Graham I tried to phone The Prairy to check to see how Jules was. The line was constantly engaged for hours. I guessed she may have taken it off the hook but much later I was able to get through to her mother Beryl and asked her to pass a message that I was safe. It was the next day before we spoke. Jules said she was in a state of shock and the rural property was under siege from media. What neither of us could have known was that we were at the beginning of what became a 25 year living nightmare. For me to try to put all the details of the nuanced and convoluted roller coaster ride that had commenced into the 3,000 words From the moment of this article is impossible...it On St. Valentine’s Day an old friend my identity was released and will take a full length book for of Jules, Evoyne Ungerer called confirmed by the Garda Siochana that so to pre-empt critics this to offer support, sympathy and (AGS) I was branded “The Prime account had to be somewhat a bottle of champagne. I did an Suspect” abstracted into broad brush interview with Pat Kenny on RTÉ strokes. radio and the following Monday night Jules took a late night phone call from a man telling I spent the Tuesday night at Russell Barrett’s. That her to get out of West Cork. She recognised the evening he returned from London. We talked about anonymous voice as that of one of her interrogating the events and the following day I climbed into the officers. We made a complaint to AGS but nothing back of his red transit van and on the way back to came of it. On return I found a large number of my The Prairy he stopped to buy newspapers. The clothes had been taken by the garda. Eventually I 12
got a list of the items seized and at the top of the list was my long black coat which I had worn for the Christmas Day swim.
recording the encounter. I urged her to contact my solicitor, the late Con Murphy of Bandon, which she failed to do. Throughout 1997 the false allegation that I was the murderer persisted. In January 1998 February was bleak if for no other reasons than on my 41st birthday I was arrested for a second time. media were The grounds turning up that I had tried almost every to intimidate day and it was Marie Farrell clear the vast were a false majority had fabrication. bought the Officers from false narrative the National that I was the Criminal killer. Investigation Unit were On St. involved in Patrick’s Day the arrest and I saw Martin interrogation. Graham The arresting walking down officers the drive. I pretended immediately not to be sensed he aware it was was a “spy” my birthday. (The late) Martin Graham encouraged During the 12 by the Guards. hours I was I was right detained it and Martin subsequently admitted to me he had became clear that the detectives were not interested been recruited by a Detective. I recorded an audio in the truth, only sustaining the false narrative. I can interview with Martin in which he remember after 6 hours they said there would be a shockingly admitted he had been break. My reaction was to say let’s press on. It was clear to both approached by the detective The officers said it was they that needed Jules and myself that there were and his partner and had the break. a number of significant alterations been paid with cash, clothes and additions made to the actual and hash, to befriend me in In June that year the widower Daniel statements. the hope he could deliver a Toscan du Plantier, then 57 , married statement saying I had admitted for the fourth time to Sophie’s replacement the crime. He even said the Guards had at Uni-France, the French national film board. His promised him £5,000 if he succeeded. When the wife and mother of a daughter Tosca, Melita Nikolic Guards realised he was acting as a double agent he was 30 years old...27 years his junior. Paris Match was threatened and menaced and in early summer reported that the marriage had been delayed for fled Ireland afraid for his life. Stories were circulating several months. It is interesting to note that at the that a local shopkeeper Marie Farrell had made a time of the crime Daniel did not travel to Ireland statement saying she had seen me in the early hours to assist the Garda and left it to Sophie’s parents of Monday 23rd near the scene of the murder. In and family to make the harrowing journey. Despite early summer she approached myself and Jules in a three person team of Irish detectives who flew to the Galley Bar and said the Guards had been trying Paris in early 1997 Daniel was never interviewed to persuade her to identify me in different locations directly and only gave a very limited statement to including outside her shop on the Saturday before French police.The years between Christmas 1996 Christmas. Mrs. Farrell invited me to her shop. I and the turn of the millennium were difficult. The suspected the exercise might be a trap ...and I was false allegation persisted. The community of Schull right. I turned the jukebox up just in case she was and environs was split, I think approximately 50/50. 13
There were those who believed the false narrative and many who remained supportive. A cruel victim of conspiracy was to drive a wedge between myself and Jules and two of our closest friends, the musician Pol Coleman and his artist wife Marie. Every time we saw them they had visits from AGS and the friendship was shattered.
an ill-judged decision. The case was heard over two weeks before Judge Moran in the Cork Circuit Court. The defendant newspapers had somehow got advance knowledge and assistance from certain members of AGS. Basically I was bushwacked and Shanghaied. One of the witnesses was Marie Farrell, who subsequently In September 2000 the admitted she had Guards raided the Prairy been “persuaded” into again and with alleged making false statements search warrants. They by both serving and detained Jules in her retired members of bedroom and kept us apart AGS. A former member while they searched the of the Heavy Mob, house. Before departing had been hired by the they informed Jules that various newspapers to her youngest daughter “encourage” Mrs. Farrell Fennella had been arrested. with alleged threats It came as a great shock but unless she attended the nothing to what followed proceedings. Another the next morning. retired Garda associated There was banging at the with the case was also door and officers said involved. His role they had a second arrest appeared to be warrant for Jules. She to collect and deliver was taken away and once Mrs. Farrell to the court. Happier times. again questioned for 12 My legal team of Junior hours. Our solicitor of Counsel James Duggan that time, the late Con under instruction Murphy, drove her back from Con Murphy Happier times, growing prize-winning sometime near midnight. did their best but we parsnips on The Prairy Jules had been subjected to were well outgunned a gruelling accusation that by newspapers.The she was somehow covering for me. judgment was handed down the following January and I lost 6 out of eight claims. I won two against The In January 2002 the Commissioner Sun and Mirror and had a €250,000 costs of AGS, Pat Byrne, appointed awarded against me. Mrs. Farrell gave a long Detective Chief Superintendent statement saying that she had Austin McNally to review the been coerced into making a series of In April of 2005 Cork Solicitor Mr. whole case. Jules and myself Frank Buttimer, who had taken on false statements identifying me. both cooperated. It was many the case after Con Murphy became years later we got the see the a Judge, rang me to say he had received review which could only be described contact from Marie Farrell. Mrs. Farrell, as a whitewash which failed to answer many of the who I have long considered to be a victim of the questions which still remain. In January 2002 Daniel conspiracy, gave a long statement saying that she had du Plantier, who was the beneficiary of his dead wife’s been coerced into making a series of false statements, insurance bond, died in dramatic circumstances firstly identifying me as the mystery man seen from a heart attack as his took the stage of the Berlin outside her shop on the Saturday before Christmas Film Festival. The living nightmare continued. In and as the man she had seen in the early hours on December 2003 I commenced libel proceedings Monday 23rd December close to the murder scene. against eight newspapers, in what might have been This meant the so called “star” witness at the 2003 14
libel case was no longer available for the appeals. were going to use their powers to take over the The cases were subsequently appealed in 2007 investigation with a view to putting me on trial in and settled on the basis that my legal team of Mr. Paris, an event which was to take place many years Buttimer and barristers Juniors Jim Duggan and later in 2019, when in my absence I was found Ronan Munroe and senior Tom Creed received their guilty of the murder and sentenced to 25 years costs and the €250,000 bill was wiped. Although the imprisonment. It is worth noting that the French libel actions prosecution was based did not amount almost entirely on the so to an outright called evidence which victory it was could not make muster some form of in Ireland, including vindication and statement by Marie the settlement Farrell and others, long cleared the since retracted and way for two discredited here. significant new I went up to UCC in developments. September 2007 and went The on to gain an Honours commencement Bachelor degree in law. of a case against the State for On April 23rd 2010, wrongful arrest just two weeks before I and conspiracy was to sit my final year to pervert the exams, I was arrested at course of justice midnight on a European I took up wood carving as a creative pursuit and more Arrest Warrant based importantly on entirely on the evidence a personal level many times rejected in my application to study law as a mature student at Ireland. The arrest was contested in the High Court University College Cork. and despite clear case law which should have seen it rejected Judge Peart ordered my rendition to the One positive of the libel actions was that for the Republic of France. That order was appealed to the first time we received copies of not only our own Supreme Court and during those proceedings the statements given on the two arrest but also the DPPs Office contacted Mr. Buttimer and forwarded statements of others included in the Garda file a 46-page critique of the Garda case against me. The which had been repeatedly rejected by the Irish DPPs Officer Robert Sheehan critically analysed prosecution authority the DPP. It was clear to the Garda case against me and concluded it was both Jules and myself that there were a number of “thoroughly flawed and prejudiced. There was also significant alterations and additions made to the evidence from the first DPP Eamon Barnes, RIP, that actual statements that had been read to us. A further the Guards had made an improper advance to the indication of the conspiracy to pervert the course DPPs West Cork Officer Malachy Boohig attempting of justice which we have always maintained. The to bring pressure to bear to authorise a prosecution. altering or adding to statements is known in police In the subsequent Supreme Court appeal 5 Judges circles as “verballing”. In our cases we were read ruled emphatically I should not be extradited. The statements which were signed but when we got to see admission of the DPPs dismissive critique also them it was clear the Guards had added things which allowed me the opportunity of making a complaint were never said and omitted things in which were. of an attempt to pervert the course of justice to the Later that year another review of the original Garda Siochana Ombudsman Commission (GSOC). investigation, once again whitewashed the Garda I was arrested twice more on the foot of European misconduct in the original inquiry. At the same time Arrest Warrant requests from the French Republic. the DPPs office issued a statement saying there was insufficient evidence to warrant a prosecution. Meanwhile in France things began to take a sinister turn as the authorities there announced they Continued on page 35 15
Issues: Tales of Hollywood
Anthony Quinn - The Ultimate Rags to Riches Story
B
orn into extreme poverty, Anthony Quinn would become one of the world’s most famous actors …. quite by accident. Shaun Anthony reports.
Anthony Quinn was born Antonio Rodolfo Quinn Oaxaca on 21st April 1915, in Chihuahua, Mexico, to Manuela (Nellie) and Francisco (Frank) Quinn, freedom fighters in the Mexican revolution. Frank was actually born to an Irish immigrant father who hailed from Co. Cork so Anthony Quinn had Irish blood in his veins!
A couple of years later, Anthony’s mum met a man by the name of Frank Bowles and fell in love. Quinn became incandescent with rage and moved out, taking his granny and sister with him. He left high school so he could work fulltime to support them but soon his grandmother became very ill. Quinn was paralysed with fear and bought his granny any medicine he could afford, Extreme but nothing Hardship helped. One In his heyday evening when Anthony’s he came home parents were from work he dirt poor and worked together building railroads in found strangers gathered around her bed. Always the Texas, until his dad was injured and could no longer strong matriarch, it pained Anthony to watch her fade, continue. He moved his family to California to work struggling to inhale. The strangers were praying and in the fields as migrant farm hands. For several years trembling over his gran and Anthony became deeply the Quinns lived as itinerants, travelling distressed. He’d been studying with throughout California searching for farm a Father Anselmo with a view to He’d been studying to work and shelter. They eventually settled becoming a Catholic priest and becoming a Catholic priest… in southern California to work in the watching these charismatics citrus fields. offended him. He screamed, “Get out of my house, you’re evil!” His In a bid to secure a more settled existence, Quinn’s dad grandmother, struggling to moved the family to LA, where he found work at a zoo breath, begged to have them stay so he ran to Anselmo’s and later as a labourer at the new film studios. In January home as fast as he could and in breathless sentences 1926, when Anthony was just 10, his dad was killed by a exclaimed, car, leaving the family in extreme poverty. Anthony had “The holy rollers from Angelus Temple are practicing to get find work quickly and secured employment as a their heathen rites on my grandmother.” The priest waterboy on a construction crew in a bid to make life looked at him and replied, more comfortable for his mum, grandmother and little sister. “Tony, I don’t worship like the Protestants, but we 16
A Potential Leading Man
mustn’t be so narrow as to think they are devils. Let them come.”
Anthony was six-feet-two and weighed 13 stones, a Slowly Anthony began to accept the Protestants grand posture for a potential leading man. Despite being coming and going in his house, as his grandmother’s bombarded with fake platitudes that he had a career in pain subsided under their ministrations. When his theatre, his career was not taking off like promised and grandmother made a so, feeling discouraged full recovery against Maureen O’Hara with Quinn in Against All Flags (1952) by his lack of success, all odds, Anthony he drifted across the started attending Southwest for a while Angelus Temple and at the age of 21, and began studying joined a fishing junket under Aimee Semple bound for the Orient McPherson with a out of Ensenada in Baja, view to becoming an California, but detoured Evangelical preacher. back to Hollywood Anthony fell in love shortly before departure, with the inclusivity in response to a casting he found at the call for a Hollywood pentecostal church movie. The film, The with blacks, whites Plainsman starred Gary and Mexicans all in Cooper and Cecil B. fellowship together, De Mille was directing. “I’d never seen 500 To achieve realism, De people happy at the Mille wanted a Native same time,” he’d later state. American actor to play the part of a Cheyenne warrior. Quinn represented himself as a Cheyenne and pretended His Speech Impediment he couldn’t speak English in an effort to secure the role. De Mille was not impressed with Quinn’s first Anthony was a brilliant artist and, prior to dropping performance and would have replaced him had it not out of school had entered an architectural drawing been for Gary Cooper’s comment, “He seems like a nice competition. Months later, when the kid, give him a break.” De Mille allowed winner was chosen, Quinn received Anthony to play the part, which would have replaced him a letter saying he’s won first led to a long-term contract with had it not been for Gary Cooper’s prize, and the award included Paramount Studios. comment, “He seems like a nice kid, an appraisal of his work by the give him a break.” eminent architect, Frank Lloyd Anthony appeared with Carole Wright. Lombard in Swing High, Swing Low followed by Waikiki Wedding, directed by Frank Quinn’s poor speech annoyed Wright who recommended Tuttle. The Buccaneer with Frederic March was next, tongue surgery to help him talk properly. Paradoxically, followed by countless B movies, including King of Anthony’s speech worsened after the operation. He Alcatraz, King of Chinatown and Dangerous to Know. sought the assistance of a former actress, Katherine Hamil, to help him learn to speak clearly, in the hopes of By the age of 25 Quinn was an old-hand with 20 earning an apprenticeship with Wright. Hamil’s students, Hollywood films under his belt. Over the next nine for the most part, aspired to acting. They performed years he was in a further 29. Despite being grateful to plays, and Quinn participated in those productions on be a working actor, Quinn began feeling he was hired several occasions in a bid to improve his enunciation. He purely for his look as it seemed he’d become typecast as a joined an acting troupe called the Gateway Players and gangster, thug or Native American warrior. was offered a role in a Mae West stage production! He made his professional debut in a play called Clean Beds, The Breakthrough and later accepted a minor part as a prison inmate in a film called Parole! Quinn could barely believe he was Quinn would have his breakthrough when he received an receiving acting offers considering he’d only ventured offer to play a matador in 20th Century-Fox’s Blood and into the area in a bid to improve his speech. Sand with Rita Hayworth and Tyrone Power. In Quinn’s next film, They Died with Their Boots on, he played 17
the role of Crazy Horse against Errol Flynn’s General George Armstrong Custer.
Quinn returned to the USA and starred in the 20th Century Fox release of The Magnificent Matador with Maureen O’Hara. He spent much of 1955 in filming the life of Paul Gauguin in Lust for Life. The Gauguin role won him a second Academy Award in 1957. In 1964 he would star as Alexis Zorba in the hit musical Zorba the Greek. The character became Quinn’s signature role.
Anthony’s road to stardom took many diversions. He acquired a role as the lead in the 1947 film Black Gold but rejected Tinsel Town shortly after when advised by Darryl Zanuck that he was under investigation (with other Hollywood stars) by the U.S. House UnThe Ladies Man American Activities Committee as a From his earliest years suspected Communist as an actor, Quinn sympathiser. Quinn lamented that he soon left for New was rarely cast in the York City and proved role of the romantic himself as a stage actor leading man. “I never on Broadway. His first get the girl.,” he would play, The Gentleman utter. His remark In Lust for Life with Kirk Douglas (1956) from Athens bombed was jocular at best in after six shows but led consideration of his to a great offer from Elia Kazan who offered him the role personal lifestyle. He married three times (Katherine of Stanley Kowalski in Tennessee Williams’s Streetcar De Mille, the adopted daughter of Cecil B. De Mille, Named Desire for two years on tour. After the road show, Jolanda Addolori, a costumer on the movie Quinn co-starred with Marlon Brando Barabbas and his secretary in the 1952 Kazan film about the Kathy Benvin) and fathered I was born with very little Mexican Revolution, Viva Zapata! 13 children (with 5 women). talent… Quinn played the part of Eufemio After undergoing major heart Zapata, brother of Emiliano Zapata. The surgery in 1990 he fathered a 12th critics loved it. In March 1953, Quinn received the Best child (his first child Christopher drowned, aged 2 in the Supporting Actor award from the Academy of Motion lily pond of next-door-neighbour W.C. Fields.). A proud Picture Arts and Sciences. and willing father, Quinn’s large family was a source of pride to him, and he The International was flattered when Film Star three of his sons embarked on their Soon Anthony was own respective acting in Rome, where he careers. worked with many celebrated Italian Civil Rights film directors and Activism producers. He worked with Dino De Laurentis Quinn provided In the Guns of Navarone (1961) with David Niven & Gregory Peck and Carlo Ponti in funding for the the film, Ulysses and Latino advocacy appeared in Giuseppe group, the SpanishAmato’s Donne Proibite with Linda Darnell, and then Speaking People’s Congress and raised funds for starred as Attila the Hun with Sophia Loren. He was in Mexican American youth who could not afford good high demand. During the filming of Attila he worked legal representation. He fought tirelessly to expose job simultaneously on Federico Fellini’s La Strada, a 1956 discrimination faced by Hispanic Americans and even release that secured his reputation as an international narrated a documentary by the Equal Employment star. Opportunity Commission. 18
- one of my own favourites was the 1991 movie Only the Lonely with our own Maureen O’Hara. Of course he also had a lifelong interest in sculpture and painting, and his works have been exhibited all over the world (and are still drawing high prices on the international art market).
Quinn was good friends with New York City Mafia crime boss Frank Costello and countless other Genovese gangsters which caused much speculation over the years. Very Little Talent?
Anthony Quinn did Quinn as Nick Acropolis and O’Hara (in her last cinema film role) not rate his own as Rose Muldoon in the 1991 comedy Only the Lonely acting. Speaking of his life’s work, Not bad for a young he once said, ”I think I am lucky. I was born with very little talent but itinerant who wanted to correct a speech impediment! great drive.” Some would argue that luck can only take you so far and Quinn continued to entertain for decades
19
A cart pulled by oxen in the fields of Myanmar
Issues: Historical
Massacre in Phoenix Park
O
ne of the best-known political killings of all time and a dramatic story of plotting, insurrection and political assassination, Sam McMurdock takes a look at the lead up to that fateful day - a day that would see two men’s lifeblood seep into Dublin soil. The Phoenix Park murders have intrigued generations of history lovers, not only on our own island, but globally, in fact, nothing like it had happened in British political life since Prime Minister Spencer Percival was shot dead in the lobby of the House of Commons in 1812.
the tyranny - tenants protested for better rights and fairer rents. Over the next 36 months, this developed into one of the biggest protests in Irish history but the reaction by the British government was dire. As despairing tenants were pushed beyond breaking point, violence increasingly broke out when landlords had tenants dragged from hearth and home. The government had repressed the tenants and their body, The Irish National Land League. In 1881 they’d thrown over 900 leading figures in prison to send a stern message - but this had proven counterproductive, it had just worsened already strained relations and resulted in crime more than doubling in Dublin (1881 stats show that 4,500 reports were filed in regards to the Land League, with 22 murders and 66 attempted murders) and by the end of the year, things were getting much, much worse so the government decided they needed a more placating strategy and this is how Cavendish ended up sailing into Ireland on that fateful day.
On the sunny day of 6th May 1882 two prominent members of the British political nobility Lord Frederick Cavendish and 5th Earl John Poyntz Spencer arrived by the Ulster Steamship at Dún Laoghaire dock (then Kingstown) to be sworn in as Chief Secretary of Ireland and Lord Lieutenant of Ireland respectively. Cavendish was arriving Lord Frederick Cavendish in an unsettled country - the population was falling rapidly and Dublin was collapsing economically (76,000 people had emigrated from the city in the past 10 years). The In early 1882 mediation began between the government reason why people were desperate to get out was the very and spokesmen from The Land League, resulting in reason Cavendish had arrived - there was mass social an accord known as The Kilmainham Treaty in which pandemonium and Frederick had been sent the Land League figureheads would to pacify. It seemed impossible - they’d strive to pacify the country and essentially been handed the poisoned the government would launch ….there was mass social chalice, in a country that appeared legislation to increase the pandemonium…. beyond governance. rights of tenants, however, this instigated indignation from Background government supporters who thought this was acquiescing with lawlessness. It began in 1879 when a dispute between landlords and The Lord Lieutenant of Ireland and the Chief Secretary tenants broke out on a large-scale across the island, had both stepped down, creating political meltdown. creating widespread destitution. Poverty-stricken, due to Desperate to find someone to assuage, the job fell to crop failures, residents could no longer pay their rent and Cavendish - an unlikely choice given his fear of public were being evicted. Starving and unnervingly aware of speaking (he had a speech impediment) but his wife 22
was the niece of the British Prime Minister, William Gladstone and Gladstone, finding Frederick genial gave him the job (after his first choice, Irish MP Andrew Porter refused). That Day On that pivotal day, Lord Cavendish (45) went first to Dublin Castle where he was sworn in. He worked for the next few hours there and then set off for his new lodgings, (now the home of the US Ambassador to Ireland) in Phoenix Park. Permanent Under Secretary, Thomas Burke, who also lived in the park was walking home from Dublin Castle, but in the previous weeks had started taking a Hackney carriage on Parkgate Street to get him through the perilous park (perhaps he’d received a tip-off that he was in danger) but on that pleasant day, Thomas spotted Frederick walking along carefree under the sun’s rays and got out of the taxi to join him - little did he realise that that decision would be the last bad decision he’d ever make.
The assailants were driven away in a cab by James Fitzharris who served as the getaway driver. The murders were so savage they made breaking news around the world (the lowbrow publications sensationalised the gore, ensuring readers knew the surgical knives had created gruesome results) and the political consequences were colossal. Charles Stewart Parnell, Michael Davitt and John Dillon who’d just got out of Kilmainham Jail put out a statement in a bid to distance themselves and The Land League from the attacks at a time when tensions were so heated. “We feel that no act that has ever been perpetrated in our country during the exciting struggles of the last 50 years has so stained Ireland as this cowardly and unprovoked assassination of a friendly stranger and that until the murders of Cavendish and Burke are brought to justice that stain will sully our country’s name,” the statement read.
There had been many attempts on the The Hunt for the Killers previous Chief Secretary’s life, They set upon William Forster (who had quit Cavendish and Burke, stabbing The hunt for the murderers as chief secretary in May 1882 was led by Armagh-man them frantically with surgical in protest at the Kilmainham Superintendent John Mallon. knives…. Treaty) as he was hated due to his Mallon had a fair idea who was incompetency in curbing the revolts. responsible and decided to play them off against each other. He suspected a few The Attack former Fenian activists. A large number of suspects were arrested and were kept in jail by claiming they were A group (members of The Irish National Invincibles), connected with other crimes. Mallon actually got some an offshoot of the Irish Republican Brotherhood led of them to reveal what they knew about the murders. by James Carey were waiting patiently. They set upon Cavendish and Burke, stabbing them frantically with The case was successfully prosecuted by the Attorney surgical knives (the Lord Lieutenant, Lord Spencer later General, Solicitor General James Murphy QC and Peter described hearing the shrieking screams). Spencer would O’Brien, before Justice Willian O’Brien. The Invincibles’ later describe how immediately after the screaming he leader James Carey (a turncoat if ever there was one) witnessed a man running to the Lodge grounds shouting, Michael Kavanagh and Joe Hanlon agreed to testify “Lord Frederick Cavendish and Mr. Burke are killed!” against the others. Joe Brady, Michael Fagan, Thomas 23
Caffrey, Dan Curley and Tim Kelly (who was 19) were convicted of the murder. They were subsequently hanged by William Marwood in Kilmainham Jail between 14th May and 4th June 1883. Fitzharris was acquitted of murder then retried as an accessory and convicted. Others were sentenced to very long prison sentences. Interestingly, after the trial, Carey, supposedly under protection by the Crown, is unmasked and fatally shot aboard a steamer off the coast of South Africa. The shooter, an Irish American, claimed it was an accident. Wrong Place, Wrong Time
liberal government. Victoria showed a ceaseless preoccupation with the details of the trial and the subsequent executions. An eerie obsession some might say. Frederick Cavendish’s widow, Lucy, supported Home Rule for Ireland, and was identified with countless good causes, notably in the field of education (Lucy Cavendish College, Cambridge, is named after her). Kitty O’Shea, the go-between between the Irish freedom movement (specifically Charles Stewart Parnell) and Gladstone. Her motives, of course, more than just political. She had started a secret affair with Parnell (at the urging of her overtly ambitious political husband, Captain O’Shea, who essentially ‘pimped’ her in a bid to gain political advantage). Years later, their ongoing relationship, still secret and an authentic true-love match, became public. It caused a huge scandal among Parnell’s Catholic constituency and lead to his downfall.
It’s accepted that Burke was the target and not Cavendish. The Invincibles had originally planned to murder Cavendish’s predecessor as chief secretary (Forster) but after Forster threw in the towel they decided to assassinate Burke instead. The day before the actual stabbing, they had waited for Burke in The Result - Post Phoenix Park Murders Phoenix Park but missed him. They went back the next day, knives primed; unfortunately In the subsequent climate The Invincibles’ leader for Cavendish, he happened to be in of revulsion against James Carey, Michael Kavanagh Burke’s company on that occasion terrorism, Parnell was and died simply because he was in able to gain ascendancy and Joe Hanlon agreed to testify the wrong place at the wrong time. It over the Irish National against the others. seems unlikely that the killers knew the identity of the man strolling casually with League Burke. They killed him because he tried to defend his and strengthen the colleague and probably because he could have described moderate Home Rule Party. them to police. The Women of the Story
* Recommended reading: The Irish Assassins: Conspiracy, Revenge and the Murders that Stunned an Empire by Julie Kavanagh (Grove Press).
High standing women took front and centre in the aftermath of the killings. Queen Victoria, a toxic supporter who spoke endlessly on stages to condemn the Irish independence movement and Gladstone’s 24
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Screen Scene
Acapulco ***
tick, tick .... BOOM! ***
Starring: Eugenio Derbez,Enrique Arrizon Run Time: 10 x 1hr Streaming on: Apple TV+ Available to stream from: Currently
Starring: Andrew Garfield, Alexandra Shipp Streaming on: Netflix Run Time: 115 mins Available to stream from: 19 November
Acapulco is the latest feel-good comedy from Apple TV+, who inspired by the success of their big hit Ted Lasso have decided that wholesome is the way to go. This 10-episode TV series is (loosely) based on the film, ‘How to be a Latin Lover’ (2017) with its star Eugenio Derbez playing the role of Máximo Gallardo, a rich Mexican businessman living a life of opulence in Malibu. Máximo wasn’t always so wealthy and recounts his former life to this young nephew, Hugo, telling him tales and life lessons he’s picked up along the way. From this point on, the action unfolds in flashbacks, starting in 1984 when a young Máximo gets the job he’s always dreamed of at a luxury resort in Acapulco. There’s many hints that the resort’s owners aren’t as innocent as our sprightly portagonist suggests. Not entirely light-hearted with nods to racism, poverty and inequality.
Pulitzer Prize and Tony Award winner LinManuel Miranda makes his feature directorial debut with tick, tick… BOOM!, an adaptation of the autobiographical musical by Jonathan Larson, who revolutionised theatre as the creator of Rent. The film follows Jon (Academy Award nominee and Tony Award winner Andrew Garfield), a young theatre composer who’s Rafael Cebrián (Acapulco) waiting tables at a New York City diner in 1990 while writing what he hopes will be the next great American musical. Days before he’s due to showcase his work in a make-or-break performance, Jon is feeling the pressure from everywhere: from his girlfriend Susan, who dreams of an artistic life beyond New York City; from his friend Michael, who has moved on from his dream to a life of financial security; amidst an artistic community being ravaged by the AIDS epidemic. With the clock ticking, Jon is at a crossroads and faces the question everyone must reckon with: What are we meant to do with the time we have?
Well written and good television, especially for these darks nights. 26
1916 Seachtar na Cásca ****
The Wheel of Time ***
Starring: Rory Mullen, Tadhg Murphy Streaming: TG4 Run Time: 8 x 60 mins Available to stream: From 29 October.
Documentary on the 7 signatories of the 1916 Easter Proclamation. This episode tells the story of shopkeeper, tobacconist and old Fenian Tom Clarke who many believe was the brains and driving force behind the 1916 Easter Rising. Born on the Isle of Wight, to a family whose father served in the British Army, Clarke grew up to be a prominent Fenian, was jailed for 15 years for his part in a failed bombing campaign in England and put together the Military Council that went on to plan the Easter Rising. He was the first to sign the Proclamation and was executed by firing squad on May 4th 1916.
Starring: Rosamund Pike, Joshua Stradowski Streaming: Prime Run Time: 8 x 60 mins Available to watch: From 1st November
Amazon Prime’s new TV series is based on Robert Jordan’s novel series of the same name and follows Moiraine a member of the Aes Sedai, a powerful organisation of women who can use magic. She takes a group of five young people on a journey around the world, believing one of them might be the reincarnation of the Dragon, a powerful individual prophesied to either save the world or destroy it. Rosamund Pike is fantastic as the lead, Moiraine! Perfect for fantasty lovers.
The Wheel of Time Alma’s Not Normal
Alma’s Not Normal *** Starring:Siobhán Finneran, Sophie Willan Streaming: BBC iPlayer Run Time: 6 x 28 mins. After a recent break-up, Alma tries to get her life back on track but with no job, no qualifications, and a massive rebellious streak, it’s not going to be simple. Family life’s not ideal either as Alma’s heroin-addicted mother has been sectioned for arson and her vampish Grandma Joan wants nothing to do with it. That was the starting point for Sophie Willon’s comedy when it aired its pilot, and the full series doesn’t flinch, diving further into the unusually dark subject matter with a shrewd, razorsharp script and a strikingly sincere performance from Willan – not least when she’s trying to muster enthusiasm for her job as a “sandwich artist”.
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Quick Fire Questions With ...... I
Kim Wilde
n occasional issues we sit a celebrity down on the hotseat and ask them some quick fire questions. This issue, pop star and professional gardener Kim Wilde (60) takes on the challenge.
You hold the record for being the most charted British female solo act of the ‘80s - were you aware at the time what a huge part of Eighties pop culture you were?
From the first time I heard Kids in America I knew it was utterly brilliant but could never have imagined its longevity and impact on pop culture. I’m convinced it will be playing on Mars one day. To give the younger readers a sense of your success, you’ve sold over 10 million albums and 20 million singles; did you enjoy fame and being instantly recognizable wherever you went and was there a lot of pressure on you to be a role model?
I think I have more awareness of my 80’s pop culture involvement in retrospect. At the time, because my family and me were working together in a sort of bubble, (we had our own recording studio in Knebworth) and were constantly playing catch up to get back in the charts, our heads were constantly down and getting on with it, with barely a moment to look up and see what was happening!
Mostly being a young 21-yearold Pop star was bloody good fun, and I quickly got used to being recognized. The pressure to be a “I’m convinced Kids in America will be playing on role model never Mars one day.” entered my mind, those were the Of course you burst onto the music scene at just days pre Internet and social media, there was a lot more 21 with Kids in America - again, are you ever psychological freedom then. surprised by the number of cover versions, from Nirvana to The Muffs to German dance group How did you remain level headed during such Cascada? crazy, busy years? 28
For the first few years I was living at home with mum and dad, Ricky and my baby sister, I’d get back from TOTP and change Roxanne’s nappy! Body image wise, was there a lot of pressure to remain very slim during your pop days? Luckily I was naturally slim at 21 so I didn’t feel the pressure until I put weight on in my 30’s, the pressure did get to me sometimes. These days I keep an eye on my weight mostly for health reasons and find it easier to keep the pounds at bay since I stopped drinking alcohol.
I loved going back to college after the 80’s, horticulture replaced my passion for music for a while, but now I enjoy the best of both those worlds. I would always advocate following your passion whatever that is for a happy life. What is it about gardening that captivates you? There are many lessons from nature that teach us resilience and patience, while also inspiring and healing us. Gardening for me started as a kind of therapy, the ultimate in mindfulness and a way to calm the mind and keep fit at the same time.
Did the pop world have Harvey Weinstein predators and how What advice would you have for did you navigate those anyone wanting to learn the situations? “Of course every dad cramps basics: would you recommend your style from time to time.” starting with a house plant or Fortunately I never came two? across a predatory man I couldn’t handle. I would recommend doing a short horticultural course online or at college, going to Capel Was having a dad (Marty Wilde) who was so Manor horticultural college in Enfield literally changed supportive (and wrote many of your hits) a big my life. There’s nothing so rewarding than to grow help or did dad ever cramp your style? something from seed, even just herbs on your windowsill ,my sister Roxy started growing veg during lockdown and My dad was very young when he had me (20), so was is now completely hooked! still young when my career began. We all loved the same Pop music and shared an eclectic and inspirational vinyl How did you occupy yourself during the record collection. Of course every dad cramps your lockdowns and did you learn anything about style from time to time, but overwhelmingly his amazing yourself ? songwriting input into my early recordings and his inspirational work as a live performer has outweighed I was in my garden every day; it has never looked so any negatives. good. I finally mastered the art of ‘living in the moment’. A concept harder to understand and appreciate than you You released a brilliant 2 CD Greatest Hits might think! album a couple of months back marking 40 years in the music industry! What advice would What’s your guilty pleasure? you have for new female acts emerging on the pop scene? Rowntree Fruit Pastilles- whole packet!!!! Surround yourself with people you trust and who believe in you. Listen to your instincts and don’t be afraid to jump into the deep end, that’s when you’ll learn how to swim! Are your children musicians? Harry Fowler is 23 and a singer/songwrite/musician. my daughter Rose is 21 and studying psychology at University.
What was your latest Netflix/boxset binge? Schitt’s Creek What, if anything would you have changed in your life and/or career? I’d have the knowledge I have now when I was 20! Pop Don’t Stop ~ The Greatest Hits: 5cd/2dvd Deluxe Expanded Boxset Edition is available now
During your first pregnancy you really got into gardening. Had you always been interested and did you enjoy studying horticulture? 29
Issues: Our World
Families Search For Loved Ones Gone Missing in Post-War El Salvador
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housands of families in El Salvador have lost relatives who simply failed to return home one day and were never heard from again. Edgardo Ayala reports.
The pain that María Estela Guevara feels over the Miguel, the capital of the eastern department of the same disappearance of her niece Wendy Martínez remains as name. She was studying cosmetology and that day she left intense as it was four years ago, when she learned that the at 7am to fix the hair of several clients. young woman, then 31, had vanished without a trace in “She said she was coming home again at 11am to give her eastern El Salvador. nine-year-old daughter lunch, but she never returned,” “I still feel the same pain, I want to know what happened Guevara said. “I kept calling her until 12 at night, and she to her,” said Guevara, 64, who has always considered never answered.” Wendy her daughter because she raised her from a very young age after she was orphaned, between sobs. Disappearances – nothing new in El Salvador Guevara’s plight is shared by thousands of families in El Salvador who The phenomenon have lost of disappearances relatives who is not new in this simply failed Central American to return country that was home one torn apart by a day and were bloody civil war One of the flyers pasted on a never heard between 1980 and tree in the city of Sonsonate, from again. 1992, which left in eastern El Salvador, which At least 2,383 some 75,000 dead on Jun. 28 called for help complaints and 8,000 missing. to find Flor Maria Garcia, of missing In the wake of the 33, missing since March. persons were armed conflict, The next day, the young reported woman’s body was found in a El Salvador has vacant lot near Cojutepeque. experienced a in 2019, CREDIT: Edgardo Ayala/IPS against 2,457 maelstrom of in 2018, violence, mainly at according to the report ‘Desaparición de personas en the hands of youth gangs that over time have grown into El Salvador’ (‘Disappearance of people in El Salvador’), powerful organised crime groups that control significant published in April by the non-governmental Fundación chunks of territory in this poverty-stricken country of 6.7 de Estudios para la Aplicación del Derecho (Foundation million people. of Studies for the Application of Law – Gangs have historically been behind FESPAD). The document covered many of the cases of missing ...that day she left at 7am to fix the period 2014-2019. persons, as they attempt to the hair of several clients. “She said she was The phenomenon has been leave no evidence of their coming home again at 11am to give her nine-yearoccurring for years in a highly crimes, said analysts, but old daughter lunch, but she never returned,” polarised political context without ruling out the in which the governments in power have sought to downplay the problem in order to show that they are efficiently fighting crime, and the political opposition has sought to draw attention to it. A grieving process that never ends Wendy went missing on 30 September 2017 in San
involvement of other actors in recent years. “There is certainly a high probability that this pattern (of gangs) will continue,” said lawyer Zaida Navas, legal head of State of Law and Security at Cristosal, an NGO that works to defend human rights in Central America. She added: “But disappearances are also the result of murders in cases of femicide, and executions by
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organised crime groups that are not necessarily gangs, However, many other families have no sense of closure, as and also due to personal disputes.” long as their relatives remain missing. One of the latest femicides was the high-profile case of Flor María García, 33, who had been missing since The numbers game 16 March. That day, her husband Joel Valle reported to the authorities that Flor María was missing. According Given the strained relationship between the government to him, she had left home early in Cojutepeque, a of Nayib Bukele and his political opponents, the issue municipality in the central department of Cuscatlán, to of missing persons has once again gained national head to the capital, San Salvador. prominence, with the president defending his security Valle, a programme, dentist, said the Territorial Flor María Control Plan, had gone as the reason to pick up for the drop in materials for murder rates. the dental But his clinic where opponents she worked as say that while his assistant. it is true that But in a twist homicides to the case, have declined, authorities cases of arrested Valle missing on 25 June persons are on as the main the rise. suspect in According to his wife’s government disappearance, and charged him with the crime of figures, homicides have dropped significantly since disappearance of persons. Bukele took office in June 2019 and began to implement “We always had doubts about him; we as Flor’s family the plan. knew that she suffered psychological and economic When the government took office, there were 50 murders violence in her home,” said her brother, Jorge per 100,000 inhabitants in El Salvador, Garcia, a few days after Valle was a rate that has dropped to 19 arrested. per 100,000, said Minister “Her little girl is now 13 years old, He added: “We found it of Justice and Security and she still has hopes that her mom will come strange that the day she Gustavo Villatoro in a home, she tells me not to remove things from Wendy’s disappeared, he, Joel, television interview in room, in case she comes back,” only sent us a WhatsApp March. message at about 7:00 at But establishing how many night, asking if she was with us, in people are missing in the country, Sonsonate,” the city where Flor María was and whether the number is increasing, originally from, in the west of El Salvador, and where her decreasing or remaining steady when comparing time family still lives. periods, is not an easy task, said analysts. This is true above all because there is no official census The authorities found Flor María’s remains on 29 June of cases, but three separate institutions keeping track of in a vacant lot on the side of the road near Cojutepeque, figures that are sometimes in line with each other and under tons of dirt and gravel. sometimes quite different: the National Civil Police, the The charges will be changed from disappearance of Attorney General’s Office and the Dr. Roberto Masferrer persons to femicide, the authorities said. Institute of Legal Medicine, and each one handles its own “I should have warned my sister, I should have insisted data based on the complaints received. that she leave him when the incidents of psychological “I think the most honest – although I don’t know if and economic, and even physical, violence occurred,” the most rigorous – answer is that the official figures Garcia added. allow us to conclude that we have a partial view of reality, historically,” said lawyer Arnau Baulenas, legal It is no consolation, but Flor María’s family will be able coordinator of the José Simeón Cañas Central American to give her a religious burial and begin the mourning University’s Human Rights Institute. process. 31
He clarified that he was not only referring to the current Bukele administration, but that this has been a problem for decades.
indicate that disappearances have indeed increased.” Bukele, for his part, said on 26 March that as homicides have gone down, investigators are better able to investigate other crimes. “It is not the same to investigate 40 homicides as three homicides a .....she still has hopes day,” he said in reference to the that her mom will come drop in the daily murder rate.
A report by the Efe news agency, based on official figures, stated at the end of May that in the first four months of 2021, reports of missing persons had increased by 112 per cent compared to the same period in 2020, climbing from 196 to 415. “But it is very difficult to assess whether the increase in complaints filed actually means there are more cases, because there is a counterargument: that people are reporting cases more because they see that the authorities are taking action,” Baulenas said. He added, however, that “Such a sharp rise would
Meanwhile, María Estela Guevara does not lose hope of one day finding out what happened to Wendy on that day in September 2017. “Her little girl is now 13 years old, and she still has hopes that her mom will come home, she tells me not to remove things from Wendy’s room, in case she comes back,” said Guevara with a heavy voice. Courtesy of Inter Press Service / INSP.ngo
Proud Supporters of Ireland’s Big Issue & Homeless Street Leagues
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The Podcast Review W
e attempt to bring you the best selection of podcasts each issue. This issue we look at The Love and Courage Podcast, The Bellingcat Podcast, Crime Junkie and Katherine Ryan: Telling Everybody Everything.
The Love and Courage Podcast(Social Issues)
roadside in Cameroon. Topics are heavy and sometimes aren’t the easiest to listen to but if you’re in the mood for something more braintaxing, this is the one for you.
A great local podcast hosted by multi-ward winning social innovator, community campaigner and writer Ruairí McKiernan, The Love and Courage Podcast features indepth conversations with inspirational individuals from across the globe. Last FM actually listed it as one of the world’s top social justice podcasts and McKiernan, founder of several non-profits has a genuine knack for relaxing his guests and bringing the best out in them in his interviews. From national treasures like Vicky Phelan on bravery to all things spirituality and sobriety with Christy Moore, there’s always a great conversation, and unlike many other similar interview-style podcasts, there’s always something very uplifting in McKiernan’s delivery.
Crime Junkie (Crime) If true crime is your thing, Crime Junkie is probably the best crime podcast out there. Each episode features a mysterious death, an unsolved missing person, a serial killer or a conspiracy. Recents episodes include the disappearance of Gabby Petito and The Cleveland Strangler. Cases are chiefly American but very interesting nonethe-less.
Katherine Ryan: Telling Everybody Everything (Comedy) Comedian Katherine Ryan can’t help telling everybody everything. Candid chat, pettiness, phone calls, and some serious stuff too - straight from the lady of comedy of the moment. Great for laughs!
The Bellingcat Podcast (Human rights, criminal underworld etc.)
How to:
The Bellingcat Podcast takes an indepth look at investigations that used open source material and cutting edge investigation techniques to investigate a range of topics. Season 1 for example examined the downing of MH17, Season 2 focused on the investigation that revealed the killers of two women and two young children executed at a
You need to download an app like Acast from Google Play (if you’ve an Android device) or the App Store if you’ve an Apple device. Once the app has downloaded you can search for any topic that interests you & there will be a podcast that’s right up your street!
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Issues: New Book Releases
Patricia Scanlan’s Book Club
Patricia Scanlan was born in Dublin, where she still lives. She is a #1 bestselling author and has sold millions of books worldwide. Her books are translated in many languages. Patricia is the series editor and a contributing author to the award winning Open Door Literacy series.
This issue, Patricia brings her favourite books of the moment. Beautiful World, Where Are You – Sally Rooney – Faber & Faber. Alice, a novelist, meets Felix, who works in a warehouse, and asks him if he’d like to travel to Rome with her. In Dublin, her best friend Eileen is getting over a breakup and slips back into flirting with Simon, a man she has known since childhood. Alice, Felix, Eileen and Simon are still young – but life is catching up with them. They desire each other, they delude each other, they get together, they break apart. They worry about sex and friendship and the world they live in. Are they standing in the last lighted room before the darkness, bearing witness to something? Will they find a way to believe in a beautiful world?
in time. Rooney ignores the usual conventions of using quote marks, paragraphs, and of ‘showing and not telling’ – there is a lot of telling. It’s only in the last third of the book when the two couples spend time together that the pace picks up, and the dialogue, through which we finally get more of a sense of the protagonists, is superbly written. There are plenty of breathy, steamy sex scenes, which no doubt will please potential filmmakers, and for the millions of Rooney fans worldwide Beautiful World, Where Are You, has been well worth the wait. High Hopes - Steve Garrigan - Hachette ireland.
Rooney’s main character is a college graduate who has had unwelcome fame thrust upon her following publication of her highly successful novels. Living quietly in the West of Ireland she connects with Eileen, who works for a Dublin literary magazine, mostly by email. Alice frets that writing fiction, feels “vulgar, decadent and even epistemically violent,” and, after having an existential crises while food shopping, writes in distress to Eileen that ‘”the culmination of all the labour in the world,” “all the burning of fossil fuels and the back-breaking work on coffee farms and sugar plantations. All for this! This convenience shop!”
As lead singer and songwriter of hugely successful Irish rock band Kodaline, Steve Garrigan plays to thousands of fans worldwide – his business is being in the spotlight. But, for years, Steve was privately battling his own demons. High Hopes is a deeply personal memoir about how everyone carries a story. In his downto-earth and often humorous style, Steve takes us from his childhood growing up in Dublin and the shyness that only dissolved in front of a microphone, to the highs of rock star success touring and playing stadiums, and the lows of anxiety, depression and panic attacks.
Eileen too agonises about the state of the planet and the use of “cheap clothes and imported foods and plastic containers.” Rooney’s millennium zeitgeist is full of angst, self-recrimination, and despair. Alice’s distain for the publishing industry that has provided her with affluence and success, far beyond what she has ever expected, might easily lead the reader to think this is autobiographical, although the author, through Alice, warns us about making such assumptions, suggesting that just because we feel like we know them, does not mean that we do, and that all we actually see of them in a novel is merely a moment
Ultimately, his story describes how it is only by learning to share our deepest vulnerability – embracing all aspects of our true selves – that we can work through darkness and ultimately find freedom. Any young person experiencing mental health problems will certainly identify with the author’s experiences and this honest, heartfelt exploration of his journey thus far will give hope, and offer encouragement to look for help and keep going. 34
Continued from page 15 On the last occasion in December 2019 I actually travelled up to Dublin to facilitate the process in the precinct of the Central Criminal Court.
It was originally listed for six to eight weeks – ultimately it took 63 days over five months and became the longest civil action in Irish legal history. It was gruelling and dramatic. I had some 20 odd witnesses which included Over the next two years I continued my post graduate Jules, her daughter Saffron and both Mrs. Farrell and studies of law. Firstly I did a LLB and produced a Martin Graham , RIP. It put not only myself and Jules dissertation on the subject of the European Arrest under the most extraordinary pressure, physical , Warrant. Studying the law that was being used to mental and financial, but also stretched Mr. Buttimer’s persecute me allowed me to gain a detailed knowledge of resources almost to breaking point. Ultimately, despite the system and to rationalise what I was being subjected high lighting much of the Garda misconduct, the case to. I then went on to do a Masters or LLM which failed at the last hurdle because of a technicality relating included a first class mini thesis on police accountability to the Statute of Limitations. I went on to appeal the case in Ireland. and despite an initial decision in the Court of Appeal to allow limited grounds the State in the form of Senior In the lead up to the civil action it emerged as part of our Counsel Pol O’Higgins and Luan O’ Brainon objected discovery process that there had and the court acceded thus ending my been illegal recordings of various attempt to prove a conspiracy. I was also calls to Bandon Garda Station. It landed with a legal bill of an estimated €5 transpired that a senior detective million.At the commencement of the case had arranged for the recordings of I was approached by a number of people calls and that a number of tapes who expressed interest. One of them was the had been found. The transcripts Oscar nominated director Mr. Jim Sheridan and recordings when we eventually and a young couple called Sam Bungey and got them fell into three categories; Jennifer Forde. Jim went on to produce a those of calls from the media, five part investigative documentary Death calls from detectives to Marie at the Cottage for Sky TV and Sam and Farrell and Martin Graham and Jennifer, with enormous cooperation from Graduated with 3 law degrees in 5 most incriminating calls between myself and Jules went on to produce the years (2007-2011). detectives which talked of the award winning podcast called West Cork. need to “cloud and filter” various Ultimately I believe I was very badly served statements and the need “to break Jules”. Anybody by the Irish legal system. It is clear to this day that there listening to the foul mouthed talk of the detectives was a witch hunt to put me in the frame for a crime I had could not help be appalled by the crude and xenophobic nothing to do with. Most recently I have written to the tones. They repeatedly referred to me in racist terms as Commissioner of An Garda Siochana , Mr. Drew Harris, “that English bollix”. They even talked of the need to calling for a comprehensive Cold Case Review. Until this “stitch me up”. I wrote to An Taoiseach Enda Kenney matter is fully explored not only has my life been ruined who had appealed for anyone with knowledge of Garda by a conspiracy which has robbed me of reasonable misconduct to come forward. I wrote to him highlighting legitimate expectation and lead to the disillusion of my the wrong doing and that subsequently lead to the long term relationship and rendered me homeless but has foundation of the Fennelly Commission which although left a dark dark stain on the otherwise good name of the it found wrong doing fell short of ruling there was Irish police force. outright corruption. The same was the case with my complaint to GSOC who While I have experienced much during the course of the although they highlighted evidence of mal practice and last 25 years, losing my parents Kenneth on Christmas that important evidence had gone missing including Eve in 2000 and my mother Brenda in 2016 was hard to exculpatory statements and the six bar gate from the bear. Although I was able to travel to England to be with murder scene found there was no evidence to warrant my dad the night before he died, which was comforting, prosecution of the remaining living members of AGS. my mum died in a nursing home in 2016 but because of In November 2014 my long awaited case against the the European arrest warrant I knew if I went to England State and AGS commenced in the Dublin High Court I would be arrested on entry. Not being able to visit or attend my mum’s funeral was the cruellest of blows and which was, for a number of factors ultimately doomed to fail. Mr. Buttimer’s office mounted the onerous case. still greatly saddens me. I remember the enormous stress and pressure the preparation involved on his resources. We were all under In the final part of this series of articles I will discuss how immense stress and I joked that the case was causing Netflix poached Jim Sheridan’s documentary idea and the outbreaks of BCOS – Bailey Case Overload Syndrome. traumatic aftermath of the release of the documentaries. 35
Issues: Making a Difference
Let’s Hear it For Our Young Carers
S
am McMurdock looks at the young carers in Ireland - children aged between 10 and 17 who are saving our country a fortune - yet often fall between the cracks when it comes to commendation. Family carers save Ireland €20 billion each year and provide 19 million hours of unpaid work each week. A staggering 67,000 of these carers are children, aged between 10 and 17 years of age. This means that 13.4% of our unpaid carers in the Republic are youngsters.
tons of homework.” Anna tells me that Cora makes her a cooked breakfast every weekend, Cora takes care of her mother & is in the top 3 in her class
“….and always checks to make sure I finish my cereal on school mornings… [laughs] even if she’s running late she’ll brush her teeth and pop her head around the door to check I’m still eating. At lunchtime she’ll ring me to remind me to eat the sandwich she’s put in the fridge or prompt me to put something in the microwave. She’s a good girl….. but sometimes I worry she’s lost a lot of her childhood.”
*Cora & *Anna’s Story
Cora is 12-anda-half and inbetween going to school and consistently remaining “in the top three” of her class in English, Irish and Science, she cares for her mum Anna (44), a single mum of one from Roscommon, who battles debilitating Rheumatoid Arthritis Anna tells me that Cora doesn’t see “I’m not her carer …. and Fibromyalgia. Anna’s arthritis not herself as a carer despite having I love my mam so I want to take to help her mother dress each only affects her joints but due to being care of her.” autoimmune in nature, her immune morning. system attacks her body’s tissue, creating a myriad of health struggles. “She’s a gem…. you know she went online and ordered me a zipper pull so I Anna suffers from fatigue and struggles to maintain an could zip my fleece jacket up and down, and when I was appetite and a healthy weight. Cora explains on Zoom having trouble with my shoes she ordered me elasticated laces … she’s always trying to find ways to make my life “Mam always eats when I make curry so I make her lots easier.” of different curries.” Cora smiles, “I’m not her carer …. I love my mam so I At that she rushes off and comes back, holding up a big want to take care of her.” hardback ‘The Curry Guy Bible’ and starts pointing out the curries she’s made and asking her mum to rate them! Anna and Cora’s story is one of thousands across our country. “I also Google recipes on my phone sometimes at lunchtime in school but lots of times I cook loads, put Northern Ireland them in boxes and freeze them, then mam always has something if I’m at school and she’s hungry or if I’ve In the north there’s 213,980 unpaid carers, of which an 36
estimated 30,000 are young carers (young people aged between 8 and 18 who care for someone). These carers are saving NI £4,389,900,000 each year. *Melissa and *Isobel’s Story
and then our vice-principal asked me if I would give a talk to the Year 8s [11-year-olds]. I did and their form teacher told me I did a good job and gave me an Amazon gift card, a school hoodie and all the pupils signed a big card. “It’s touching.”
Melissa is 13 and has 9-year-old twin brothers who have ADHD (Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder) and ASC (Autism Spectrum Condition). Finding it nearly impossible to cope with the twins’ increasingly challenging conditions and oftentimes violent outbursts, Melissa’s mother, a single mum of three became ill with depression and mild agoraphobia. Melissa, according to her proud mum Isobel (30),
Isobel intervenes,… “…she gave me the £50 gift card to buy something for myself and I nearly broke down …. I told her, ‘People are proud of you, buy something for YOU.’ Would you believe, the signed card meant more to her than the money card or the hoodie, even though she really hoped to get the school hoodie for Christmas.”
Speaking with Cora and Anna on Zoom and Melissa and Melissa gave a talk on her Isobel at their home on the Ards role as a carer at school Peninsula and seeing even a tiny fraction of their lives and what the caring process looks like for our young carers, I’m overwhelmed by how selfless these kids are - because “….sought help all by herself at school and asked her that’s what they are - kids. At a time when the media French teacher how she could help me….. they put her seems to report only the negative and we’re bombarded in touch with services, including help with the boys and with the anti-social antics of teenagers across the globe, Melissa not only does the shopping but keeps the house seeing these selfless youngsters not only dedicated their clean ….. I wouldn’t have got back on my feet without free time to the care and wellbeing of someone else her…. but seemingly matter-of-factly is not only inspiring - it’s downright breathtaking. “Every day has its challenges but Every day has its there was something about her How you can help. challenges but there was something initiative, her get-up-and-go that sparked something in me. about her initiative, her get-up-and-go If you’d like to donate to Young Even now, I’m slowly getting Carers Ireland see: https:// that sparked something in me. back to my old self, she’ll ask familycarers.ie/donate me how I’m feeling and how she can help. A few days ago I gave her £20 to go down the In the north you can donate here: https://www. street for some shopping and she came back with nearly actionforchildren.org.uk/how-we-can-help/our-locala tenner. I asked, services/find-our-services-near-you/ni-regional-youngcarers/ ‘How’d you do that’ and she replied, ‘Mum, you’ve got to shop around the shops for the best offers.’ Doing your Christmas shopping? The Body Shop Advent calendar is on sale now. Every purchase made during I laughed, because she’s a coupon clipper and knows the Christmas period will directly support Family Carers when the Spar release their special offers pamphlet and Ireland Charity which helps to give young carers in highlights the offers! She’s very good and my neighbours Ireland the support they need to build brighter futures will often tell me on Facebook that they see her doing the and happy childhood memories, so do buy one if you can shopping and ticking things off her list. I can’t afford a lot (I can personally recommend - a box filled with beautiful, with the Universal Credit cuts but I’m saving up to make cruelty free products in a gorgeous reusable box and sure I can give her a nice Christmas - she deserves it.” at a fraction of the price of purchasing the products individually). I ask Melissa how she feels about being a young carer. “I didn’t know I was a carer until my teacher told me I * Names have been changed & stock images used to protect should be very proud of myself because I was a carer, children’s identities. 37
s e k Jo A coach is looking after a young soccer team. At one point during the game the coach called one of his 7 year- old players aside and asked, “ Do you understand what cooperation is ? What a team is ? The little boy nodded yes. Do you understand that what matters is not whether we win or lose, but how we play together as a team ?” The little boy nods. “So” the coach continues, “ I’m sure you know when a penalty is called,you shouldn’t argue, curse, attack the referee, or call him a pecker –head. Do you understand that?” Again the little boy nodded. He continued, “and when I call you off the pitch so that another boy gets the chance to play, its not good sportsmanship to call your coach a dumb as*hole, is it?” Again the boy nods. “Good,” said the coach. “ Now go over and explain all that to your mother.” While taxiing at London ‘s Gatwick Airport the crew of a US Air flight departing for Ft. Lauderdale made a wrong turn and came nose to nose with a United 727. An irate female ground controller lashed out at the US Air crew, screaming: ‘US Air 2771, where the hell are you going? I told you to turn right onto Charlie taxiway! You turned right on Delta! Stop right there. I know it’s difficult for you to tell the difference between C and D, but get it right!’ Continuing her rage to the crew, embarrassed she was now shouting
Because laughter is the best medicine!
hysterically: ‘God! Now you’ve screwed everything up! It’ll take forever to sort this out! You stay right there and don’t move till I tell you to! You can expect progressive taxi instructions in about half an hour, and I want you to go exactly where I tell you, when I tell you, and how I tell you! You got that, US Air 2771?’ ‘Yes, ma’am,’ the humbled crew responded. Naturally, the ground control communications frequency fell terribly silent after the verbal bashing of US Air 2771.. Nobody wanted to chance engaging the irate ground controller in her current state of mind. Tension in every cockpit out around Gatwick was definitely running high. Just then an unknown pilot broke the silence and keyed his microphone, asking: ‘Wasn’t I married to you once?’ Seems that, after all these years, the romance and love just wasn’t what it used to be for John and Jane. In an attempt to salvage their thirty years of marriage, Jane convinces her husband to see a marriage counselor with her. The counselor first asks Jane what she feels the problem is, and before he can even finish his sentence she goes into a tirade listing every single problem the couple has ever had even before things went south. She goes on and on for nearly an hour, and finishes in tears. Finally, the counsellor gets up from 38
his couch, walks over to Jane, embraces her and begins to kiss her passionately. The woman quiets down, immediately, and sits there in a daze. The counsellor then turns to the John and says, “Your wife needs this at least three times a week. For the sake of your marriage, can you can do this?” The husband ponders this question for a moment, and confidently replies, “I can drop her off here on Mondays and Wednesdays... but on Fridays, I play golf.” A young woman went to her doctor complaining of pain. “Where are you hurting?” asked the doctor. “You have to help me, I hurt all over”, said the woman. “What do you mean, all over?” asked the doctor, “be a little more specific.” The woman touched her right knee with her index finger and yelled, “Ow, that hurts.” Then she touched her left cheek and again yelled, “Ouch! That hurts, too.” Then she touched her right earlobe, “Ow, even THAT hurts”, she cried. The doctor checked her thoughtfully for a moment and told her his diagnosis, “You have a broken finger.” “This guy said to me: ‘I’m going to attack you with the neck of a guitar.’ I said: ‘Is that a fret?’” “A cement mixer collided with a prison van. Motorists are asked to be on the lookout for 16 hardened criminals.”
D is c o u n
t Corne
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Is í ár dteanga féin í. It’s our language.
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