Dublin unveils City of a Thousand Welcomes
Topics: News
Fri, Jun 17, 2011, 01:00 First published:Fri, Jun 17, 2011, 01:00
BLOOMSDAY IN Dublin. Elegant ladies, all bustles and bonnets, glide along Grafton Street to the bemusement of tourists. The sun may be shining but in a large room with a lovely view at 15 St Stephens Green, the headquarters of the City of A Thousand Welcomes initiative, a fire has been lit. The home fire is burning in honour of the first tourist to take part in an endeavour aimed to introduce visitors from all over the world to the more than 2,000 volunteers who have signed up to be “ambassadors” for Dublin. Trevor White, writer and former publisher of The Dublinermagazine launched “thousand welcomes” last March, when this reporter became a volunteer. White hopes to reinvigorate Irish hospitality, encouraging civic pride at a time when Irish identity “has taken a bit of a bashing”. Yesterday, he asked me to be the first local to greet the first tourist to step through their grand Georgian door. I waited nervously, hoping the tourist in question didn’t expect encyclopedic knowledge of Viking Dublin and would be content with good pub/park recommendations. My first impression of communications graduate Diana Morris (22), a New Yorker in Dublin as part of Boston College’s Ireland Internship Programme, was that she didn’t appear to be a high-maintenance tourist, which was something of a relief. “I am just so happy to be the first person to take part in the programme. I think it’s a wonderful idea,” she said. White and Simon O’Connor, project co-ordinator, did the introductions and told Morris how “thousand welcomes” works. The initial meeting between tourist and ambassador takes place on these premises which later in the summer will be opened as The Little Museum of Dublin. The collection is still being curated, but already there are eye-catching historical artefacts dotted around the room. One 1940s political poster, hanging above Alex Findlater’s famous messenger bicycle, is particularly diverting: “Fianna Fáil is on your side, always was and always will be.” After the introductions, the tourist is given a choice of three Dublin hostelries where they can go for a cup of coffee or tea, or a pint. These are the Merrion Hotel, Bewley’s and the Porterhouse pub, the initiative’s three “hospitality partners” who foot the bill for the drinks.