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THE

INDEPENDENT

STUDENT

NEWSPAPER

Ed Reilly discusses alternate union models that we can learn from

OF

TRINITY

DUBLIN

Laura Fergusson stalks the literati

TN Archive: The case for apartheid

Trinity News Est. 1947

COLLEGE

Ireland’s Oldest Student Newspaper

Tuesday, October 12th, 2004

www.trinity-news.com

Vol.57 No.1

Interview with the Provost

Keyleigh P r o v o s t H e g a r t y t a l k s t o T N a b o u t Pearson Page 3

himself, his position and his plans Business & Politics Page 9

USI and Trinity Student Defend Affiliation Fees Hike

Union

Kiernan Claims Popular Mandate USI President Ben Archibald: ‘No more increases’ past with a strong disaffiliation camNiamh Flemmingpaign undertaken two years ago. Again a referendum was held and it was voted Farrell that Trinity remain within the USI. Students will have noticed when paying their registration fees that the Union of Students in Ireland (USI) levy increased this year to a whopping €8.00 per student. The increase in membership cost of the USI came last March when it was announced that the charge per student would rise from €2.86 to €5.00.

The Trinity Students’ Union was mandated to accept this increase along with an additional €3 charge following a referendum posing the question 'do you support the continued affiliation of TCDSU to the Union of Students in Ireland (USI) and for the costs associated with affiliation to be met by an annual levy of no more than 8 euro per student?' The referendum was passed in April 2004.

Previously the SU collected €5 from students, €2.86 of that being the USI membership fee. SU Welfare Officer, Luke Ryder explains that the additional money charged by the SU serves to facilitate training events for SU staff.Increasing this amount alongside the rise in USI membership ensures that the full cost of training is covered.

It also serves to cover the college charges for processing the payment of this levy; a service college had not charged the SU for in the past.

Trinity's USI membership has been subject to debate in the recent

When questioned in relation to disaffiliation both Luke Ryder and SU President, Francis Kieran indicated they offered their full support to the USI in line with the mandate given them at last April's referendum. Francis Kieran reaffirmed his position stating, 'A referendum was held and people voted in favour of the increase'.

USI membership, both men argued, gives students a national body to campaign for their interests. Luke Ryder also pointed to the oft overlooked fact that SIPTU membership, the usual independent cost of which is €5/€6, comes with USI membership. All employed USI affiliated students are afforded SIPTU's full rights of membership, a privilige Ryder maintains should be appreciated.

From the USI side, the increase in affiliation fees was necessitated largely by serious financial trouble and debts resulting in the past three years from the unforeseen collapse in value of USI holding in the USIT Travel Group following the September 11th disaster. Serious financial pressure was also put on USI by the failure of certain colleges to pay all the affiliation fees they had collected. the efforts of Mr. Priestley, then USI president to recover €20,000 from the UCD Student’s Union led to serious tension between

CollegeDigest Medical Director argues for controvertial new charge.

The proposed charge of €10 for use of the College medical services is not a cynical fund-raising ploy, nor is it a lazy solution to the problem of funding the facility, according to Medical Director Dr. Thomas. In an interview with Trinity News, Dr Thomas defended his proposal to introduce a charge as a necessary and positive solution to a difficult situation, and one that will facilitate dramatice improvement in the heallth service.

Buttery Juice Bar There was a surprise for patrons of the Buttery Bar on Monday of Fresher’s week - the canteen and bar, long the preserve of Bavaria cans, crisps, and a strong smell of vinegar, appeared to have sprouted a stand selling a selection of fresh fruit and vegetable drinks, ice blends and smoothies.

Further ‘Stealth Fee’ earns SU Criticism Director of Sport Maintains that Charge is Essential for Quality of Service.

Students returning from summer break will receive an unpleasant surprise in the form of yet another student charge. From October 11th on, charges will be levied on students for the use of the fitness theatre in the Luce Sports Centre following a decision of the College Sport and Recreation Committee.

InternationalNews American electoral system for dummies.

BusinessNews

Student Politics.

In the first half of interviews, Trinity News asks the SU Presdient, Welfare and Education officers what they plan to achieve in the coming acadmeic year.

Features

Stalking the Literati

Four days. Four hundred and forty-nine seminars. Seven hundred visiting writers from forty-four countries. Features editor Laura Fergusson brings you the highlights from the 2004 Gothenburg Book Fair.

Comment Speaking French does not mean you are smart.

Haitian troubles reach fever pitch as pro-Aristide insurgents storm capital.In an article in last year’s Trinity News I discussed how I felt the situation in Haiti would resolve itself considering the impending ousting of Jean Bertrand Aristide. Certainly the situation looked bleak for the President with rebels under the leadership of Guy Phillippe intending an overthrow.This duly happened and the U.S. backed interim leadership of Gérard Latortue has been installed since February. The rebels were appeased and it was hoped that some resemblance of peace could reign on the troubled island. There is however an old Haitian proverb which has bore some truth in the months since and that is: “Sak vid pa kamp” or “An empty sack can’t stand up.”

Index College News: 1-5 News Features: 6-7 International Review:8 Business & Politics:9 Arts:10 Travel:11 Food & Drink:12-13

Listings:14 Careers:15 Science:16 Gaeilge: 24 SU & Societies:17 Features:18-20 Comment:21-22 Letters:23

Freshers Pics:25 Sport: 26- 28

Minister Dempsey visits the Phil as one of his last functions as Minister for Education. We think he notices the door to more than one students delight.

the two Unions.

USI President, Ben Archibald defended the decision to increase the affiliation fee taken by the USI National Council saying, 'the decision was taken in order to bring affilia-

tion fees into line with the actual projected spending of the National Union in 2004/2005 and beyond. In addition to funding our core activities, funds were designated to be set aside to pay for debts resulting from unbudgeted

overspends in previous years, establish a balanced budget, and reduce the debt burden for the future'. When questioned as to whether further increases should be anticipated Archibald said that he did not expect so except perhaps

USI, SU in Policy Split Derek Owens A public difference of opinion has already been revealed between the Trinity Student’s Union and the union of students in Ireland (USI), prompted by the publication of the OECD report into higher education. The report calls for larger investment by the government into higher education, as well as recommending the introduction of tuition fees, and was greeted by the USI with a protest outside government offices, to highlight their opposition to fees of any kind. Mr. Ben Archibald, President of USI, accused the framers of the report of “simply regurgitating the mantra of abolition of free tuition fees” while talking to the University Record (officialnewspaper of the SU).

Since then, Daithi Mac Sithig the SU education officer, remarked to Trinity News that “the report generally contains some very well-researched and strong ideas”, and has argued that, since

fees are off the agenda of the government, the report should be welcomed by Student Unions. He reserved particular praise for the report’s calls for more substantial and dependable state funding, as well as pointing out that the report also made recommendations on course accessibility that should be welcomed. He went further in an interview on Trinity FM on Tuesday 5th October, in which he described the report, as a positive weapon in the arsenal of Mary Hanafin, new minister for Education, in her expected battle to gain more government funding for higher education.

In the same radio interview, he stated that the initially aggressive USI reaction to the report was simply “emphasising that the introduction of fees would not be tolerated” rather than an expression of hostility towards the OECD report as a whole. Mr Mac Sithig said that he was confident that the positive qualities of the report were

appreciated by the USI, and that the USI position would be further clarified after the USI congress in mid- October.

On the evening of Wednesday 6th, however, an editorial comment was posted on the USI website, that indicated that a critical was still being taken towards the report by USI. The editorial describes the report as “somewhat disappointing, in terms that many of its proposals are uninspiring, unimaginative and also unsurprising”.

The editorial also alleges that the review team failed to grasp a thorough understanding of the working’s of the state’s third level sector, or even its ethos in terms of education”. Though the editorial praises some aspects of the report, it differs sharply from Mac Sithig’s cautiously positive attitude to the report. Though the Trinity SU has yet to release a statement on the issue, sharp difference in policy between to two bodies is now expected to cause early friction at USI Congress.

Provost in Open Call for Fees TOBY JONES After almost two years of maintaining a publicly neutral stance on the issue of university tuition fees, the Provost, Dr. John Hegarty, has revealed that he is personally in favour of re-introducing fees. Dr. Hegarty, who has previously admitted that he “has no problem” with the concept of tuition fees, further clarified his position in an exclusive interview with Trinity News on Thursday 7th October (inside, pg 9).

The Provost, though keen to stress that he doesn’t support the introducing of fees “just wily nilly’, and cautious about discussing the detail of any system of tuition fees, appeared convinced that, for him to “lead the university in a

position where it’s recognised internationally for its education, and the quality of graduates” some kind of tuition fee would be required. His position, he stated, was based on the pressing need of Trinity for funding, and the government’s signal reluctance to invest much more in third level education.

In the interview, the Provost was also far more open than usual about other issues, including his controversial vision of Trinity College’s future, the Strateigic Review (also examined inside, pg ....), and opposition to it from Students and Staff. He outlined much of the reasoning behind the document, and advanced the view also that the prime worry of students, with regard to the Strateigic Review, was about a perceived lack of consultation.

In response to these concerns, he

claimed to trinity News that the review was already subject to “the widest consultation that has happened in this university for a long time” but also dismissed bluntly any suggestion of a Student refferendum.

Dr. John Hegarty

PHOTO: Graham o’ Moanaigh

to 'enact provisions to increase the fee in line with the prevailing inflation rate'.

He also pledged that he 'will not be proposing any increase in fees as President this year'.

Archibald prefessed himself to be reas-

sured by the steady income from fees so far although collection of fees is a programme that will continue into Continued on Page 2

“

A fungus, growing on the backside of College.

”

Gloves Off For CSC Election L. H. Steffens Controversy surrounds Tuesday’s election for the office of Treasurer of the Central Societies Committee (CSC), with sources claiming that a covert campaign has been run to prevent members of the college Philosophical society, PhilSoc, from being elected to CSC positions.

The post of Student Treasurer, was held previously by Mr. Dermot Frost for almost 2 years. Mr. Frost recently resigned however, citing the immense workload of the position as reason for his departure, and an election was promptly organized to find a replacement. Among the early candidates for election was current CSC amenities officer Colm Brophy, precipitating another election. Should Mr. Brophy be successful in his bid to become treasurer, the winner of this second election will replace him as Amenities officer.

Matters have been further complicated by the fact that two prominent members of the Trinity Philosophical society, Mark Lalley and Patrick Cosgrave, have put themselves forward for the positions of treasurer and amenities officer respectively. Both Mr. Lalley and Mr. Cosgrave announced

their intentions to run for the position shortly after the arrangements for the election were made public.

It does appear that both Lalley and Cosgrave have more than the other candidates to contend with, however.

Within CSC there are a number of individuals who deeply resent, and are actively resisting, what they see as excessive influence being wielded by members of the Philosophical society.

One source, who did not wish to be named, alleged that it’s members tend to dominate proceedings of any institution or society they gain a foothold in, likening the society to “a fungus... spreading across the backside of Trinity”. The same individual had grave misgivings, however, about what appears to be a well co-ordinated and determined campaign designed to prevent either man being successful in Tuesday’s election.

The campaign is alleged to have begun with a series of phonecalls to various individuals with strong ties in the CSC, urgently requesting them to stand in the election. Subsequently, it’s been claimed to Trinity News, prominent CSC officers contacted the treasurers of various societies, urging them not Continued Page 2

COMPETITION: 5 FRESHER’S BALL TICKETSTO BE WON Check out our website for more details www.trinity-news.com/competitions

2

Tuesday October 12, 2004

COLLEGENEWS

Trinity News

Access Initiative Gets College Support Linda Barry There has been broad support around campus for the recent announcement that 15% of Trinity College admissions are now being granted to non-traditional students. ‘Non-traditional’ encompasses three groups of applicants – mature students, students with a disability and socio-economically disadvantaged students. This will signify a marked increase on the 2003-04 CAO intake, of which 4% were mature (age

23+) students, 2% represented disadvantaged students and less than 1% were applicants with disabilities.

The students who make up this target 15% will mainly come from the two existing Trinity Access Programme (TAP) Foundation Courses and also from three City of Dublin VECs that Trinity College is embarking on pilot partnerships with this year.

Students completing any of these preparatory courses will complete for places within the 15% made available by the new provision. College contin-

ues to resist pressure to deem the Further Education and Training Awards Council (FETAC) level four and five awards acceptable for admission to undergraduate degree programmes.

The introduction of this 15% target for intake of non-traditional students has been fully supported by TAP and by Trinity SU, especially by Education Officer Daithi Mac Sithig who informed Trinity News that he views the access issue as one of great importance for the college and for him personally.

This move also responds to the national policy imperative to use higher education policy to achieve broad national goals ranging from public policy to equity and social inclusion.

In recent weeks Dublin City Council passed a motion recognising the part that housing policy and standards can play in dealing with educational disadvantage. Also with the appointment of Mary Hanafin as the state’s new Minister for education we can expect a renewal of her predecessors’ pledges to put the tackling of disadvantage at the

top of the educational agenda. To aid her will be an internal departmental report, as yet unpublished, on the government’s effectiveness to date in addressing this issue.

Clearly, the new target introduced by the college will result in a fall off in the number of places available to traditional students – those who compete for their place in third level education based solely on their results in the Leaving Certificate. Mr. Mac Sithig is confident, however, that this will not lead to an increase in CAO points

requirements as a result. This, he explains, is because the number of student of school-leaving age is falling and will continue to do so, decreasing competition for third-level places. Mac Sithig does recognise that this situation will have to be continually monitored.

“It’s going to require careful observation by all concerned to keep a balance and make sure that the entry system is fair to students, whatever their background”.

For the future the Union say that they would “hope that Trinity’s stu-

dent population would reflect the city outside the walls of the college”. This will involve not only reaching the government’s target of increasing the nationwide proportion of places in higher education fornon-traditional students from the current 5% to 20% by 2007, but also retaining those students for the duration of the education cycle.

A - Level Value Alteration Expert group reccomends adjustment of A - Level Admissions system SU Education Officer expresses ‘strong reservations’ to Trinity News Liz Johnson A new policy regarding the admittance of students from the UCAS system looks set to be implemented. This policy reduces the points assigned to each A-level so that 3 top A grades will now only be worth 450 points, as opposed to 570 under the old scoring system. This has raised fears, especially in Northern Ireland, that A-level students will now be at a gross disadvantage when applying to courses at Trinity.

This possible policy change has come about due to a detailed benchmarking exercise in the UK, (the first of its kind), comparing the Irish Leaving Cert (ILC) to A-levels. UCAS, the admissions folk in the UK, subsequently assigned a points value to each ILC grade e.g. an A1 equates to 90 UCAS points, a B1 is worth 71. This is good news for Irish students entering third level education through the UCAS sys-

tem. However, in lieu of this benchmarking exercise, Trinity has proposed a revision of their own scoring system regarding A-levels, in order to bring it into line with the results found in the benchmarking exercise. The subject was discussed by the Dean’s Committee in May, which recommended that the findings of the Expert Group looking at the matter be accepted. This means that an A at ALevel would now be worth 150 points, a B worth 130, a C 105 and a D worth 80 points.

At this point it must be mentioned that if these new scores are implemented,Trinity will take into account the best of 4 A-levels, instead of the current policy of looking at only three. Thus, in order to achieve the maximum of 600 points, an A-level candidate must gain four A grades. The problem with this proposal is that most A-level students only take three A-lev-

els. Doing four A-levels is considered a hefty task and numerous students have balked at the notion. These students argue that it is absurd to expect that one must now get four top, or close to top, grades in order to gain entry to such courses as medicine or law, when in previous years three top grades has been considered more than sufficient.

Incidentally, most top third-level institutions in the UCAS process, such as Queen’s University Belfast, deem only 3 A grades necessary to obtain a place to do medicine.

Trinity College receives almost 70% of all A-level applications to Irish universities. A substantial amount of these applications come from students residing in Northern Ireland.

Daithi Mac Sithig, Education officer, has stated that he has "strong reservations about the application of the benchmarking exercise to Northern Ireland Alevels as they were not part of the

UCD Med Students Enter Trinity in style benchmarking", and that "it would be my intention to raise this issue at the first meeting of the Academic Affairs Committee when term begins.”

The education officer is referring to the fact that unlike the ILC, A-levels have several different examination boards, which allegedly differ in difficulty level. While this has never

Photo: Eamonn Maronn

been proven, it is certainly true that exams set by the Northern Irish exam board, NICCEA, were not looked at as part of the benchmarking exercise and therefore it is possible that because points values have been set on the basis of a comparison between the ILC and various English examination boards, students from the North may be at an

even greater disadvantage than others.

Essentially, if this policy is implemented, it will mean that it will be a great deal more difficult for A-level students to gain entry to courses in Trinity with the normal amount of three A-levels. Three top grades, more than enough to get a candidate into a top university through the UCAS system, will now

tally to a mere 450 points, not enough to gain entry to many courses in Trinity.

While the policy has not yet been implemented, it looks to be a very real possibility within the next couple of years and if approved, we could see a distinct change in the make-up of the student body of Trinity College.

Medical Director Argues For Controversial Charge Introduction of €10 charge ‘only real solution’ - Dr. Thomas Derek Owens

This is where the blurb about the pic will go blah b The proposed charge of €10 for use of the College medical services is not a cynical fund-raising ploy, nor is it a lazy solution to the problem of funding the facility, according to Medical Director Dr. Thomas. In an interview with Trinity News, Dr Thomas defended his proposal to introduce a charge as a necessary and positive solution to a

difficult situation, and one that will facilitate dramatice improvement in the heallth service.

The service, which in previous years has produced a produced a small yearly profit from treating students with medical cards and providing reduced-cost vaccines to students, is currently operating at a loss, and has

Photo: Someone eaten significantly into its budget surplus. This turnaround is attributed to the increased cost of hiring staff, as well as a dramatic increase in the number of students using the service. Student visits to the facility rose to 29,000 last year, fuelled by the rise in the cost of visiting a GP to over €40, making the service appear

CSC Election Battle

Buttery Juice Invasion David Thelen There was a surprise for patrons of the Buttery Bar on Monday of Fresher’s week - the canteen and bar, long the preserve of Bavaria cans, crisps, and a strong smell of vinegar, appeared to have sprouted a stand selling a selection of fresh fruit and vegetable drinks, ice blends and smoothies. The juice bar, which charges prices ranging from E2.75 to E3.15, is run by an independent company, and has been introduced to the Buttery as part of a campaign to improve the quality and selection of food and drink on offer. Mr. Eugene McGovern, manager of the Buttery Bar, was keen to stress to Trinity News that the decision to bring in an independent company to was not taken lightly, and not rushed into. The company, Smooch, is currently operating in college for a month on a trial basis, to ascertain whether there is a sufficient demand for a permanent presence to be viable. At the moment, Smooch is not being

charged for the use of the premises, but should the move be made permanent, Mr McGovern has assured Trinity News that Smooch will be charged rent, and that proceeds from this would be re-invested in the college catering facilities.

When asked about the success of the enterprise, Mr. McGovern frankly admitted that it has not gone completely smoothly. The drinks, already expensive by Buttery standards, were originally intended to cost even

Photo: Cassidey Knowlton

more attractive even to students who live in Dublin, and the rise in the number of international students, who rarely have their own GP while in Dublin. The increase in the cost of running the service will result in the Health Centre running into major deficit for the first time since the 1980’s.

Dr. Thomas was adamant that all other feasible alternatives to introducing a charge were explored.

One of the possibilities, supplementing the Health centre budget from international student’s fees, was rejected by College, and another idea, charging students fees for contraceptive advice and treatment, was rejected as discriminatory towards female students. Despite a personal reluctance to impose a fresh charge on students, Dr. Thomas has proposed to use money raised by such a charg to remodel the health service.

While Luke Ryder, the student Union Welfare officer remarked to the University Record that “if you charge a tenner, people won’t come – it’s that simple” this is a result that Dr. Thomas has, at least partially, taken into

account. Cases that he would term as “frivolous” would be discouraged, while students with health concerns, but who do not feel their problem is sufficiently serious to merit visiting the centre and paying the charge, will be albe to avail of new online medical advice and support. This new service, Dr. Thomas told Trinity News, will be paid for by the new Student charge. It is also projected that the medical Centre will be able to hire more staff from the proceeds, further increasing the quality of the service.

The University Record has asked whether the introduction of the charge is “simply another loop in Colleges web of ever-rising stealth charges and hidden fees”, an insinuation Dr. Thomas has dismissed out of hand. “The charge is not an exercise in fundraising for College”, he insisted.

“We have done everything possible to avoid this, but by introducing a small charge, which is far less than the cost of visiting a GP, we’ll be able to provide a top class service to students. I stand on my record of managing the Health centre well for the past twenty years. This charge is absolutely necessary”

more, but Mr. McGovern intervened, advising the company that no student would pay more than E4 or E5 for a fruit drink. His concern appears to have had good foundation, as business has been mixed over the course of the week. On Thursday night, for example, the juice bar took in roughly E150, not enough to cover the costs of operating for the evening. Mr. McGovern attributes this primarily to the problem of visibility, and student awareness in general. “Not everybody knows the juice bar is there, because it’s tucked away in the back of the bar. We’re looking at moving it in the next week, probably to the main cafeteria section. It’s not been a simple task at all, but we are trying to respond to student’s needs, and this is hopefully just a first step. The A fresh juice bar, along with a specialty coffee bar, was one of the main things that students have been calling for all year. Both would be a large investment, and right now we want to see if the investment is worthwhile.”

Allegations of official misconduct cast shadow over Tuesday’s CSC Election Continued from Page 1 to vote for Mark Lalley or Patrick Cosgrave in either election.

When contacted by Trinity News on the matter, Mr. Luke Reynolds, chair of CSC, denied participation in, or knowledge of, active campaigning by the CSC executive for or against Mr Lalley or Mr. Cosgrave. He stated that active campaigning for or against any individual standing for election to CSC posts was against CSC regulations, and that members of the executive certainly would not indulge in such activity. He also remarked, however, that he “could not be certain of what candidates are or aren’t doing in front square”, citing the obvious impossibility of monitering individuals throughout fresher’s week.

On the election itself, Mr. Reynolds

admitted concern that as heavily involved members of a large society such as the Phil, Mr. Lalley or Mr. Cosgrave “may well find it difficult to devote sufficient time” to either office.

He also stressed the need for somebody well versed in the workings of CSC to be in control at this busy time for the body. He tempered his remarks, however, commenting that last year, two prominent Phil members sat on the executive, and “that year was on of the best years for CSC ever” Mr. Cosgrave, when asked about the concerns that had been voiced to Trinity News regarding Mr. Lalley and himself, also made reference to last year’s success. When asked about the allegations of electoral misconduct that had been made, Mr. Cosgrave was cautious: “I’m not aware of any kind of ‘anti-Phil’ campaign being run,” he remarked. “To tell you the truth, even if I were aware, I wouldn’t really want to comment”.

PD’s Now Recruiting In Fresher’s Week Pre-Season Protest

Affiliation Fee Hike

Toby Jones

Niamh FlemmingFarrrrell

The first protest of the new academic year, a ‘tent for rent’ camp out around the Millenium Spire on Monday 27th September, to highlight what USI has termed a ‘housing crisis’ in Dublin received healthy media interest despite a low student turnout. Representatives of USI as well as the major Dublin colleges were present, with all Trinity Student Union sabbatical officers making an appearance, and a total of four other Trinity students braving the conditions of O’Connell Street on a Monday evening. This was enough, however, to outdo the Student Unions of larger colleges such as D.I.T. and UCD, who only sent executive officers by way of representation. Indeed, it had originally been feared that UCD’s Students Union would not be sending any representatives, but Fergal Scully (their SU President) and his entrourage .arrived shortly after 11 Pm and remained throughout the evening.

Despite the low attendance, the protest received an encouraging level of Media attention, with Both Francis Kiernan, student Union President and Ruth ni Eidhin, Deputy President, being interviewed on the RTE Evening News. Both were said to be “generally happy” with their TV performances and the protest in general.

Continued from Page 1 into December. He is confident that colleges have a will to meet their contributions to the USI. Archibald continues to point out that this increase will benefit students by ensuring the future stability of the National Union. He hopes that this will aid the provision in the future of an enhanced spend capacity and reserve campaign fund function, which in turn will lead to prioritising of frontline and outreach services within the Union.

Archibald states, ‘Currently, with four fulltime officers, three fulltime staff and branch members of the Executive National Council around the country, we are able to deliver on all constitutional requirements; we want to do better than that in the future’.

All else aside, it is an important note that should a further increase in the USI levy be proposed and passed, the matter will be once again put to referendum at Trinity.

Tuesday October 12, 2004

Trinity News

3

COLLEGENEWS

Phil & Hist’s Stellar Kayleigh Pearson Selection

The GMB: Now A Favourite Resort of Holidaying Celebrities

Photo: Matt Pitt

Nobel Prize winners to rub shoulders with pornstars, Republican Senators, and a “raving cryptofascist” Amy Colgan They say that college is all about expanding the mind, and this year, those two most prestigious of societies, the Hist and the Phil, have taken it upon themselves to do it for us. Both boast what must be said is a rather impressive line-up of speakers, chosen to enlighten the minds of the student body, in one way or another.

The Phil, it seems, have a particular way in mind, with a dazzling catalogue of celebrities that features FHM’S Favourite Girl Next Door Kayleigh Pearson, everybody’s favourite girl anywhere Pamela Anderson, and the infamous Ron Jeremy.

Alas, the list does not consist completely of porn stars, but there are some other impressive figures gracing the chambers- Nobel Peace Prize winner Bishop Desmond Tutu,

author Gore Vidal, the wonderful John Cleese, An Taoiseach Bertie Aherne, republican Senator John Mc Cain, and of course that well known ideologue Mr Justin Timberlake.

As for the Hist, many’s the heated political debate that lies ahead, with Gerry Adams, Mary Hearney, Micheal McDowell and Mary Lou Mc Donald on the Irish front, and on an international level, highly esteemed political commentator and journalist Robert Fisk and the hugely controversial Jean-Marie Le Pen. Le Pen is renowned for his extremely right wing campaign during the last French presidential elections. Though unelected, he shook the French and global political scenes quite dramatically and earned considerable support, with his anti-immigration policy becoming the subject of worldwide debate. His presence at the Hist is in itself somewhat controversial, but the society maintains

that it is important that students are given the opportunity to hear for themselves all shades of opinion and only in this way can we form and defend our own views.

The Hist have the somewhat qualified support of the Politics Society in this position. A spokesperson for the society remarked to Trinity News that “If the Hist want to import a raving Crypto-Fascist Frenchman to lecture us on nationality, they’re well within their rights. We certainly won’t complain, and if the Junior Dean actually allows him to speak, we’d like to hear what he has to say” All in all, this veritable plethora of Hollywood superstars, political masterminds and random buxom folk promises some undeniably interesting listening of an evening. Consider your minds well and truly broadened.

‘Accomodation Crisis’ On USI Agenda USI Running National Accomodation Campaign Welfare Officer Luke Ryder Offers Survival Advice Trinity Halls Experiencing ‘Teething Problems’ Kathryn Segesser What has four walls, a roof and is near impossible to find? If you’re a student the answer seems to be sufficient accommodation.

Latest reports have confirmed that this year has seen an increase in the level of difficulties facing both new and returning Trinity students as they struggle to find decent, affordable accommodation. USI and Luke Ryder, the SU Welfare Officer, have both repeatedly called attention to what is described as “unsanitary” and “low standard accommodation”.

Unlike their counterparts in other countries, Irish students are unable to secure accommodation early on in the year, and are therefore unable to ensure they get the best deal. Many returning students have to undertake a search for accommodation at this late stage, facing competition from the other universities in Dublin. In a city where prices are expensive anyway, many landlords are capitalising on the situation by raising rent and leasing sub-standard accommodation.

USI Welfare Officer Layne Aston expressed her concerns about the fact that “many unscrupulous landlords are renting unsafe housing”. Damp, inadequate fire safety provision and broken windows were just a few of the examples given. She also drew attention to the fact that regulation of landlords is lax at best. Currently as little as one in five landlords are registered with the PRTB (Private Residential Tenancies Board). By calling for more landlords to be properly registered, USI hope to encourage more ethical behaviour by landlords.

For freshers, the situation is perhaps even bleaker as they struggle to find their way around a new city and new system. Whilst Trinity is certainly behind other Irish universities in terms of accommodation provision, recent initiatives such as Trinity Hall represent an effort to tackle the problem head on.

Trinity Hall, opened just last year, has rooms for over 1000 students, adding to the on-campus accommodation for 760. Located 2.5miles south of campus, its rooms are all of a high standard and there is an effective security presence. Halls, for the first year, provide an ideal way to meet new people and are an easy transition from living at home.

Teething problems have occurred however. Rent currently stands at a combined total of €4069 for a standard single en-suite, a rise of roughly 5% on last year. Room rates on campus also stand near the €4000 a year mark. Whilst the standard is good, these figures seem high even when compared with the landlords of Dublin, as Luke Ryder points out.

Trinity Hall is not the sole domain of first years either. Many residents from last year reapplied for rooms this year, with the overwhelming majority accepted, regardless it seems of behaviour or past contribution to Trinity Hall life. Indeed, students have claimed to Trinity News that any of last years residents who applied as part of a group were automatically accepted for the current academic year. With such large levels of second years being allowed to return, it was inevitable that some first years would be excluded in favour of previous residents. the policy of maintaining Trinity halls as a smoothly-run business is unfortunate, particularly because, when being built, Trinity Hall

USI’s ‘Tent for Rent’ Protest, held to highlight the need for affordable accomodation on 27th September was presented as the solution to the lack of first year accommodation.

It is however, not to say that the situation is hopeless. Efforts are being made to help all students, in particular through the accommodation office. Advisory postcards are sent out to every student once accepted, with the websites of both Trinity Hall and the accommodation office on the back. The accommodation office also run an advisory service six days a week, from 10-6

Monday to Friday, and 10-2 on Saturday. Their website lists non university accommodation, with warnings and opinions clear to see.

The accommodation office did however express their concern that the majority of students they had heard from were from the Erasmus or Socrates schemes. When considering that only 7% of students are from Europe, this seems disproportionate.

The amount of students visiting the

accommodation office also seems low, perhaps suggesting that many have found their own way or were unaware of the service offered. All students of any year and any nationality who are facing accommodation problems are advised to contact the accommodation office in West Chapel for some guidance.

Meanwhile the SU and USI are trying to draw attention to the situation. Recent protests, including a 'camp

out' on O'Connell Street on the 27th of September, have brought the issue in Dublin to media attentions, with the USI also looking at other universities around Ireland and the poor situations there. Throughout the year students facing issues with their landlords, either university based or private, are encouraged to contact the Student Union. All students entering a new contract are also advised to keep and inventory of items in the house and demand a receipt

Photo:Derek Owens for any deposits paid.

As we enter a new academic year it seems that the accommodation issue is one that will not go away and one that is starting to be tackled.

Whether you are a first year entering Trinity Hall or a returning student facing increasing prices for decreasing standards, this is one topic that affects Students across Dublin.

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5

Tuesday October 12, 2004

COLLEGENEWS

Trinity News

UCC Proposal Prompts Academic Apoplexy Una Faulkner & Andrea Wickham There has been confusion and concern throughout the campuses of UCC, NUI Maynooth and NUI Galway this past week due to a controversial proposal to amalgamate the three universities Arts faculties.

Prof. David Harold Cox, Dean of the UCC Arts Faculty, wrote in a letter to his counterparts in Maynooth

and Galway of his desire to amalgamate smaller arts departments within the three universities in an effort to curb spiralling administration costs.

This confidential letter was leaked to theIrish Independent at the beginning of October and has received much publicity and debate especially among the three colleges concerned.

The reaction from students to the proposal in all three universities has been frosty, if not ice cold. This response is primarily due to the possibility of hundreds of students and staff being transferred to different universi-

ties across the country.

One student in NUI Galway said she would be “outraged” at such a move. She, like hundreds of other students, chose her course not only for academic reasons but also for the entire college experience in the city of her choice. This position appears to be widespread across the three universities, especially among students who are liable to be affected if the proposal is seriously considered. The possibility of being forced to move to the other side of the country is obviously a great worry to many Arts students.

Staff in the universities appear equally unimpressed. One lecturer in Roinn na nua Gaeilge (Department of Modern Irish) in NUI Maynooth informed TN of his grave concerns, noting that this idea would have definite implications for his department.

Within UCC Cork itself, several academic staff seem enraged.

One Lecturer, who wished for professional reasons to remain anonymous, described the proposal as "A joke. I am a member of one of the faculties this proposal would affect, and I was not

even consulted on the matter. I don't want to lecture in Cork on a Monday, and Maynooth on a Tuesday, and for my dean to propose to outsiders that i do so without my aproval is a gross insult"Prof. Cox was unavailable for comment on the matter, but it is understood that emergency meetings of the Arts Faculty have been convened, at which the mood has been decidedly frosty.

Despite the controversy, this is not the first time that such a suggestion has been put forward as an answer to reduce the spending of Ireland’s col-

leges. A similar proposal was considered by the Modern Language Committee in Maynooth only a few years ago but came to no effect.

Part of the reasoning behind the idea is most probably due to the government’s recent budget cutbacks of ten per cent to third level colleges. A similar idea has been proposed here in Trinity College Dublin, where the number of faculties will be halved to just three is an effort to cut down on administration costs.

The Dean of Arts in Maynooth, to whom one of the letters

was addressed, has stated publicly that he’s open to any ideas that could help the university’s budget, but that transferring students and staff is not a practical solution.

As of yet the Deans of the three Arts faculties have not meet to discuss Prof. Cox’s plan further, which gives the indication that that the proposal will never really manifest itself.

However, this is unlikely to be the last story of the kind as Universities and colleges up and down the country face into a new year of budget shortages.

in any other College in Ireland” In an interview with Trinity News Mr. Mc.Auley said “ We would prefer if we didn’t have to charge for this, but there are economic realities involved”, According to Mr. McAuley the fee is relatively low in comparison with other Universities, “UCC for instance charges its students €3 each time they use the

gym there”.

In addition to this move, construction of a new Sport Centre, which was first mooted several years ago is due to begin this month, as soon as agreement is reached with contractors. The new centre will cost 20 million euro, and will include a swimming pool, saunas, martial arts rooms and

superior changing facilities. Many have doubted the wisdom of this endeavor, given that the quality of facilities in the current fitness theatre are of an excellent standard according to the Dept, following a €350,000 euro upgrade of equipment in 2002 which was funded by the student levy. Despite undertaking a feasibility study on the costs of run-

ning the new centre, the Dept of Sport refused to disclose its estimates for student charges for the new gym once it is built, admitting that they would be significantly higher than the charges currently being introduced. Construction of the new centre is due to be completed in July 2006.

Sports Hall Charge Looms Further ‘Stealth Fee’ earns SU Criticism Director of Sport Maintains that Charge is Essential for Quality of Service Andrew Byrne Students returning from summer break will receive an unpleasant surprise in the form of yet another student charge.

From October 11th on, charges will be levied on students for the use of the fitness theatre in the Luce Sports Centre following a decision of the College Sport and Recreation Committee.

Trinity had provided use of the facility to students free of charge, however from this term on, students who entered the college after 2001 will be charged an annual fee of €75, or alternatively a €1 charge for each time they use the gym. Students who entered college during the period 1997 to 2001 will pay a reduced fee of €50 as they have already paid an annual €50 sport levy to fund the building of a new sports centre in previous years. This new charge is being imposed to help finance the costs of running and staffing the fitness the-

atre. Critics of the decision say the charge is unnecessary and unfair.

Student Union President Francis Kieran, who was the only member of the Sport and Recreation Committee to vote against the introduction of the charge said “I'm not going to deny that money is needed by the Department of Sport in order to run the hall effectively. The issue is where the money comes from. It is our view that it should not come from students because I fear this could discourage students from using the gym and from getting exercise as a result.” The feeling is shared by many students who will be unable to afford the new fee, and thus unable to exercise in the gym.

Critics of the move say it undermines the college’s belief in the importance of good physical health for general well-being and a balanced lifestyle, which it says is crucial to academic success. It is also criticized as

another example of charging students for the use of day-to-day services on campus, what the SU describes as “stealth fees” In a recent survey of University sports facilities published in the Sunday Times, Trinity received only two stars. Many are objecting that the abolition of the free gym facility can only lead to a decrease in student exercise, and the accessibility of sports facilities. Currently, the waiting time for a consultation with a fitness instructor is 3 weeks, which has lead to concern for the safety of the facility. The Department of Sport say that they want to triple the number of hours instructors work in the gym.

Those in favour of the charges say that it is needed to run and maintain the Luce Hall, which is described by the College’s Director of Sport, Terry Mc.Auley as “Of a better standard than any other fitness theatre

‘Enlightened Islam’ Finds Trinity College Audience Controversial guest to be hosted by a revitalised Politics Society Karina Finegan-Alves

One of the most challenging and charismatic guests of this academic year looks set to address a society that before its AGM in May 2004 appeared on the verge of extinction. Tariq Ramadan, author of Western Muslims and the future of Islam has been vili-

fied and lauded in equal measure, both for attempting to reconcile Islamic values with the Western World, and allegedly promoting more extremist views when off the public stage.

Professor Ramadan, who lectures at the University of Fribourg and the College of Geneva, has vigorously

denied allegations of latent extremism, accusing his detractors of failing to interpret his work fairly, or even to read it. He was, however recently denied a Visa to work in the USA and has in the past been refused entry to France for alleged links to a Parisbased Islamic terrorist organization.

Much suspicion surrounding Mr. Ramadan’s political affiliations doubtless stems from his family background. His maternal grandfather, Hassan al-Banna founded Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood, arguably the strongest Islamist group of the last century. A spokesperson for the Politics Society, however, stated “We are honoured to have such a distinguished guest address the society.

Tariq Ramadan espouses a view of Islam’s place in the Western World that encourages religious pluralism and toleration, in short he promotes an enlightened Islam.”

Professor Ramadan is only one of many guests lined up by the newly

revamped Politics Society and his scheduled appearance on the 30th October is expected to mark a fresh start after a year of stagnation and apathy. Polsoc’s committee has promised a term teeming with debate, controversy, pub-crawls and all your favourite political celebrities. The foremost aim of the ‘pol soc’ is to encourage the free flow of political discussion among students and to this end they reject the rules of formal debating (as practiced by the Phil and the Hist) as too restrictive. A second declared aim is to further the development of greater political awareness on campus, although a spokesperson for the committee was adamant that the society is not biased towards any one political ideology. “We will not organize anti-war protests or attempt to crush the capitalist machinery that bleeds us dry; nor will we hunt down liberals like the lazy parasitic dogs that they are.”

Other events planned include; a political pub-crawl of Dublin, as the pol soc ‘pays tribute to the subtle balance of power and alcohol in Irish politics’.

There will be a discussion on Northern Ireland to address the question, ‘Is the Agreement dead?’ speakers at which are soon to be announced. A representative from the Israeli embassy is set to discuss the future of Israel and finally there will be a discussion on democratic alternatives to modern proportional representation, such as those advocated by the Northern Irish De Borda Institute, which endorses what they term ‘inclusive voting procedures’ such as the ‘Borda Preferendum’ and the ‘Matrix vote’. Should Professor Ramadan’s visit, and the other events vaunted by the Politics Society go according to plan, this academic year may well see the overwhelming dominance of college debate enjoyed by the Phil and the Hist finally challenged.

Making Sense of the OECD Report Abigail Semple The OECD Review of Irish Higher Education Policy, carried out at the request of the Department of Education and Science (DES) and launched in Dublin on September 16th, has recommended significant changes to the third-level education sector in this country.

The OECD researchers employ international comparisons to highlight several key areas in which the Higher Education Institutions (HEIs) must change tack or risk future problems- particularly in terms of participation by less advantaged socio-economic groups, retention rates, funding, research and numbers of international students.

While the scope of the Review encompasses almost all aspects of higher education policy, of particular interest to students will be the OECD’s recommendation that fees be re-introduced for those students who can afford them along with either a targeted loans scheme or student finance system requiring graduates to repay the cost of their education tied to their income in later years. This recommendation stems from the need to reduce government dependency and secure the long-term funding viability of HEIs as well as promoting a more equitable system.

In the wake of the announcement of this recommendation the DES rushed to assure students that fees would not be reintroduced in the immediate future. Trinity’s Education officer

Daithí Mac Síthigh acknowledged that “The report generally contains some very well-researched and strong ideas, in particular in relation to improving access and on State funding…[the recommendation] on fees is not a political reality. As far as we’re concerned fees are now off the table and we’ll continue to seek betterfunded and fairer universities” The OECD recommendation that fees be re-introduced is made in the context of an analysis of third-level education in Ireland which highlights both the inequity of participation amongst the different socio-economic groups and the need to reduce dependence upon state funding by HEIs. The Review notes that participation in third-level by students from less advantaged backgrounds has not increased appreciably since the abolition of fees in 1995/96 and that the take-up rate in higher education remains largely dependent on socio-economic background. While the Institutes of Technology have done better than the universities in attracting students from less advantaged backgrounds, the noncompletion rates at these institutions is higher: about one-third of students leave without finishing their courses successfully.

The failure of the higher education authorities to make part-time study a viable and attractive option for students has also impacted negatively upon participation by less-advantaged groups and mature students. The Review notes that while the Points Commission recommended in 1999 that a quota of 15% for the admission of mature students be reached by all institutions by 2005, this target is unlikely to be met, particularly by universities.

The Review also indicates that Irish HEIs have not taken full advantage of the growing numbers of international students willing to pay premium rates for English-language higher education. While many other OECD countries, particularly Australia, the UK and Japan have in recent years reaped the financial and research benefits associated with high enrolments of international students, overseas students still represent only 5% of the student body here. The Review suggests Irish universities and colleges need to market themselves more intensively abroad to students in order to secure a share of such benefits.

In short, the OCD report is a varied document, one that seems to advocate nothing less than a complete ofervhaul of higher level education and its place in Irish Society.

Odd One Out : Bavaria Now Available on Tap Photographer : Andrew Leydon

Dowling Flees to Mexico Derek Owens The union career of Michael Dowling, outspoken former President of the Graduate Student’s Union, has ended with a sudden relocation to Acapulco, Mexico.

Mr.Dowling’s decision to leave the country came shortly after receiving an official vote of censure from the executive council of the GSU. It is understood that he began intimating his intention to move to Mexico before completing his term of office to friends a week after the motion was passed, in early August. His resignation was, however, not confirmed to the executive council until Monday 6th of September, a few days before his departure. While unnamed Union sources spoke of a dramatic, rancourous exit, new GSU President Ryan Sheerin maintained to Trinity News that “due notice had been given”, though conceding that “the final stages of it, like a lot of things, all happened rather suddenly”.

Ryan Sheerin successfully contested the election for GSU President for this academic year, running against Michael Dowling in a fierce campaign.

The election itself was notable for its intensity, with claims and counter-claims being issued from both sides. Dowling was attacked by several graduate students for his unusually personal style of leadership, his failure to consult with council on

issues affecting graduates, and his failure to spend an adequate number of hours in the GSU office itself.

He was also alleged to have held another job while president, teaching in American College Dublin. The GSU online forum relating to the election has been deleted, and Mr. Sheerin, when asked about the allegations, declined to comment, stating that “anything relating to his life outside the job is really his own business” and that he didn’t plan to criticize his predecessor unfairly and unneccessarily on his performance.

Mr. Dowling, for his part, alleged that a ‘dirty tricks’ campaign was being run against him, including tearing down his election posters, and defacing them with the slogan ‘anyone but Dowling’. He is also understood to have made a formal complaint regarding the management of the election. When asked about this complaint, Sheerin informed Trinity News that he too, had concerns with the organization of the election, but did not speak to any authorities besides the electoral commission itself. He also assured Trinity News that any difficulties encountered during the election were teething problems, resulting from a new electoral procedure, and a simple lack of manpower on the electoral commission.

These problems, the GSU hope, will have been resolved by next year’s presidential election.

6

Tuesday October 12, 2004

Trinity News

NEWSFEATURE

College Restructuring: We know what they did last summer The last time academic reform took place in Trinity College Dublin, the world was a very different place.

The Beatles were only in the early stages of fame, John Fitzgerald Kennedy was president of the USA and the Hist had yet to admit female members when forty years ago the present academic structures were established.

For four decades, the system of six faculties comprising of sixty departments has been in operation.

Financial resources are still allocated according to the same historical precedent set out forty years ago.

Anne-Marie Ryan But the academic world has not remained so static. Student numbers, both undergraduate and postgraduate, have increased dramatically.

Internationally, universities have become increasingly competitive in their quest to secure research funding, to attract excellent students and staff and to produce quality research. New financial sources are constantly emerging, particularly in the area of research funding.

Set against this backdrop of such an altered academic environment, there are few who oppose the need for reform of the present structures and management of Trinity. As the Provost, Dr. John Hegarty, wrote in a document entitled Resources and Structures for the Future: “There is, we believe, a general conviction in the College that change is necessary”.

Universal agreement on the nature of this change, however, is something that has been less forthcoming.

The issue has been discussed in earnest since April 21st, when the controversial discussion document, known as the Structures Report, was presented to the Board, along with the Provost’s Memorandum, entitled Planning Structures and Resources for the Future.

The Structures Report was compiled by a working group of seven academics within Trinity College, who examined the experiences of other universities, namely Aberdeen, Edinburgh, St. Andrews and UCD, throughout the course of their research. These documents outline what the authors perceive to be the major problems facing Trinity College and propose a number of solutions to overcome these difficulties.

One of the main problems, according to the authors of the report at least, appears to lie with the number of departments existing in Trinity. With 44% of departments consisting of less than ten full time employees, and 83% having less than twenty, College is seen to have an overabundance of depart-

can be crippling.

But size is not the only area of concern regarding departments. In recent times, severe difficulties have been encountered in finding staff willing to take on the onerous position of head of department. The Provost has cited poor communication between departments and inflexible boundaries surrounding faculties as having “made it very difficult to respond to interdisciplinary developments and the changing intellectual clustering of subjects”.

What the Structures Report proposes as a solution to these problems has perhaps been the most contentious of its recommendations. The GSMS

It is only a minority of the current student population who can claim that the proposed reform will not affect them. suggests reducing the number of faculties to three, and replacing the sixty departments with a total number of eighteen or fewer schools. Three Vice Provosts/Deans would have responsibility for these enlarged faculties and would also be members of the Executive Officer group. The vice provosts would be supported by a professional faculty office with specialists in the area of finance and personnel, but they would ultimately be the final budget holders for their schools. The changes would, GSMS hopes, fulfil their aim of creating “clear, short, direct lines of defined responsibility”.

While the composition of these new faculties has not yet been outlined, it would appear that the faculties of Arts (Humanities), Arts (Letters), and Business Economic and Social Studies (BESS) would merge into one faculty, that the faculties of Science and

the formation of schools, with the necessary criteria including subject area coherence and the establishment of schools of a sufficient size to create a “stimulating intellectual community”, to justify a professional administration and to attract research funding.

The current system of distributing College income is highlighted

by GSMS as an area that has restricted Trinity’s ability to compete with other third level institutions worldwide.

According to the Strutures Report, the current process “creates an inflexible, centralized, resource allocation system”. Recurrent income is still allocated according to the same model set out forty years ago. Those in charge of expenditure have little involvement in college-level resource allocation and planning. College is overdependent on government funding which has, as recent cutbacks have shown, proved to be less than reliable.

The new system of resource allocation proposed by GSMS is based on a system where “all income is attributed to its sources”, e.g. student fees are given to the units in which the students are registered, research grants are given to the relevant units. The transformation of the resource allocation process would, according to the Structures Report, result in “rewarding in a transparent manner those who do the work of the college”. State grant income is to be allocated to academic units by a ‘student and research weighted formula’. This ‘formula’ reflects the type of student (undergraduate, undergraduate laboratory/clinical, postgraduate, nonEU etc.), student policy priority and the research activity/output of the particular unit. Areas that have a low student demand and that struggle to secure research funding can be financed through resource transferred while their problems are being dealt with.

If a unit creates a surplus, that unit gets to keep the surplus and invest it according to an agreed multiannual academic plan. This creates an incentive to generate surpluses and consequently, the authors of the Structures Report believe, would lead College activities to “assume the profile of policy priorities”.

An overhaul of administration is also central to the success of any GSMS proposal. It is widely acknowledged that academics are obliged to spend much time performing duties that are not related to their teaching or research. Government has also placed an administrative burden on Trinity, with legislation such as the Universities Act (1997) resulting in excessive bureaucracy. Relief from administrative tasks, however, can only be achieved if larger units (i.e. schools and the enlarged faculties) are created that would be able to carry out administration in an economically viable manner. Information technology has not been employed to its full potential, meaning that much administration

Many departments are so small that the loss of one staff member can be crippling. ments that are too small to be considered viable in terms of finance and human resources, and are not of sufficient size to be capable of managing support services such as finances independently. Many departments are so small that the loss of one staff member

Engineering and Systems Sciences would also combine, while the Faculty of Health Sciences would remain a single entity. It is also hoped that research institutions would become part of these enlarged faculties.

The GSMS has laid out directions for

Reforms to an institution so steeped in history are being met with hostility. is unnecessarily done manually. Major investment in new IT systems is planned, at a projected cost of €2m.

While the nature of the reforms proposed by College authorities since April are quite dramatic, it is perhaps the timescale for the implementation of the proposed changes that is most ambitious. September 2005 is the proposed date for the phased introduction of the new resource distribution model. It is also the start date for beginning the implementation of the new structures, in terms of broad outlines and practice at least. Consequently, it is only a minority of the current student population who can claim that the proposed reform will not affect them.

These changes will occur well within the academic lifetime of students who are currently Senior Freshmen, for instance.

Between now and the Board meeting of December 2004, detailed

consultation is taking place regarding the specifics of the changes and particularly the final composition of faculties and departments. In the document Resources and Structures for the Future the Provost noted that “consideration should be given to how the views of students, especially graduate students involved with teaching and other university work, can be taken account of in this process”. However, according to the President of the Students Union, Francis Kieran, any measures taken as regards consultation with students have thus far been highly inadequate. At the December 2004 Board meeting the detail and design of the change is to be finalised. Between January and September 2005 preparation work takes place before implementation commences in September. Changes are thereafter implemented on a phased basis over a number of years.

While the implementation of

the reforms could prove to be a costly process, the Executive Officer Group hopes that long term gains will outweigh the initial expense. It is expected that having a ‘change agenda’ could help College to secure an increased State budget of €4m. The cost of creating and maintaining the new posts of Vice Provost/Dean is not known, neither is it certain whether or not changes in administration will result in cost savings, although it is not expected that there will be any cost increases.

Changes of the kind proposed by the Provost and GSMS are not new to the academic world. Many universities, both in Ireland and abroad implemented such changes a long time ago, and many Irish universities are currently contemplating further radical change. Trinity has lagged behind in terms of restructuring, perhaps because of a general attitude that Trinity is a world class university. Unfortunately,

REACTION:Six into three doesn’t go WHILE IT HAS BEEN WIDELY ACCEPTED THAT THERE IS A NEED FOR ACADEMIC REFORM, THE NATURE OF THIS REFORM HAS BEEN FAR MORE CONTROVERSIAL In spite of the summer holidays taking place while much of the consultation and planning following the publication of the Structures Report was ongoing, there has nonetheless been a widespread reaction to the proposals put forward, from both staff and students.

Almost fifty comments from staff, departments and faculties have been posted on a special webpage set up by the Board as a means of keeping staff and students informed of developments in relation to the restructuring plan.

While there is an almost universal recognition of the need for change, the nature of the change has proved to be extremely divisive and contentious.

Giving his reaction to the proposed restructuring, the President of the Students Union, Francis Kieran, stressed that the Union will not make a final decision until they know for definite the specific proposals. “In truth it really is impossible to say yes or no at

the present moment in time, as this process is ongoing and all the information and detail have yet to emerge”, he said.

In particular, Kieran outlined his disappointment at the lack of student consultation. “Agreement in principle to the Provost’s plans was agreed on 7th July, just before the new Sabbatical Officers took over”, he said.

“A request to let us be observers at this meeting was turned down”.

He also highlighted the inadequacy of a ‘consultation meeting’ held by the Provost with undergraduate students, as it took place outside of term time. “In my view this was simply not a real consultation – a point I made forcibly to the Provost in a meeting with him in September,” said Kieran.

“As a result the Provost has committed to having another, proper meeting with undergraduate students, which I reminded him of at Board.”

At a joint meeting, the faculties of Arts (Letters) and Arts (Humanities) also expressed disappointment at the level of consultation with staff, pointing to the need for deans to strengthen their roles in communicating responses both up and down.

Students will have some involvement however with regard to the number and composition of schools and departments, as Class Reps will be sitting on their department committee and their faculty committee and will have an input into the inter-departmental discussions. Any proposals will ultimately have to be approved by the Board, where the SU has three representatives and the GSU one.

The new model for Resource Allocation has been broadly accepted, although there are concerns that the specifics of this model have not been clarified. At a joint meeting of the Faculties of Arts (Letters) and Arts

(Humanities) for instance, a comment was made that there has been to date no specific proposals as to how any new resource allocation models (RAM) should be formulated. The Department of Engineering and Systems Sciences welcomed the new RAM based on academic activities, but noted that in order to have transparency and fairness a management information system would need to be implemented, which would be quite costly.

No proposal is more controversial however than the plan to reduce the number of faculties. “No concise justification for amending the current Faculty structure is provided” was the forthright response of the Faculty of Arts (Humanities) in relation to the Structures Report. “Neither is there a clear identification of the problems with the current system.”

The response of the Faculty of Engineering and Systems Sciences

also found the claim that College needs major faculty restructuring unconvincing. “No firm evidence was supplied to support the contention that three is the required number of faculties. Indeed, if the safeguarding and maintenance of the academic integrity of College was truly the prime consideration, then the number of faculties should be an even number.”

The Faculty of BESS believes that four, rather than three faculties should be created, with BESS remaining a separate entity. Their proposal is based on their belief that it would “enable balance in representation to be maintained between classroombased and laboratory-based teaching in College”. The Faculty also believes that courses within the Faculty have integrated well and there is an absence of rigid boundaries between its constituent Departments.

While there is as of yet no official Student Union policy mandate on this issue there is nonetheless a definite “cause for concern”, according to Francis Kieran. “I am worried about distinct disciplines being merged

together for the sake of it”, he told Trinity News. “Trinity should be taking steps to preserve the integrity of its many diverse disciplines instead of the other way around. Also if departments are merged secretarial and other administrative support for students may be adversely affected”.

Another definite cause for concern has been the projected timescale for the implementation of the plan. The Department of Engineering and Systems Sciences are almost unanimous in their opinion that the measures are being introduced too quickly. BESS, on the other hand, agrees with the proposed start and end dates, but feels that the sequencing of events is more important and proposes that institution reform should come after, not before, the introduction of a new resource allocation model.

The Department of Genetics strongly opposes the notion that the new ViceProvosts/ Deans would be appointed rather than elected. “This would create a profoundly anti-democratic management structure, turning what is currently a collegiate body in which the aca-

Photo: Brenda Meaney surveys have disproved this theory, most recently the Academic Ranking of World Universities, carried out by the Higher Institute of Education in Shanghai, which ranked Trinity only halfway down the list of the world’s top 500.

Present structures have, according to GSMS, impeded upon Trinity’s ability to become a researchled institution, comparable with other universities on a worldwide basis. In spite of this however, there remains, as the Provost himself put it “a disquietingly complacent attitude that Trinity is doing fine in this regard”. It remains to be seen whether the restructuring programme can achieve the kind of changes that will make Trinity into the kind of academic institution that will justify the belief of those who work and study there that theirs is a world class university.

demic staff have a significant voice, into a body managed by a group of corporate-style executive officers managed by Board. The Report thus appears to value 'management' more highly than 'academic life'. This proposal was also opposed by many other faculties and departments, including the Department of English who found the prospect of unelected heads of schools and vice-provosts as “extremely detrimental to college morale”.

The joint meeting of the Faculties of Arts (Letters) and Arts (Humanities) agreed that the report confuses economic and intellectual criteria. “It is our responsibility to disentangle the two and respond to the intellectual arguments”, they concluded.

Francis Kieran also questioned the motives for introducing this plan. “Given that UCD and UCC are embarking on similar processes, we have to ask who’s pushing this agenda and why?” he said. Is the Conference of Heads of Irish Universities (CHIU) worried about government cuts and trying to create perceptions of slimming down as a result. I’m not saying that that’s the motivation – only that it would be unfortunate if it was.”

Tuesday October 12, 2004

7

Trinity News NEWSFEATURE Fluctuating CAO points cause difficulties for prospective Trinity students High entry points and huge differences in point levels from year to year have made entry to Trinity College extremely difficult Anna Kavanagh In a recent letter to the Irish Times (28th September, 2004), Ms. Gemma Carney of the Department of Political Science in Trinity bemoaned the “terror-stricken and cynical” students she encountered at the Higher Options Conference. She accurately pinpointed the ‘points race’ as the main root of the students’ anxiety.

The question on the tip of most students’ tongues was, “How many points do I need for that?” Unfortunately, even the most cursory glance at the points needed to gain access to Trinity merely accentuates the problem facing these students – on average, points in Trinity are up to 30 points higher than in UCD, are prone to increase and worryingly, jump erratically and inexplicably.

TCD has always had a reputation of elitism. The CAO, which came into being following a meeting held in Trinity in 1971, aims for “fairness and transparency in the conduct of admission to Irish higher education”. Despite this apparent levelling of the playing field, Trinity is still considered to be an unattainable goal by many students.

The main hurdle to be overcome is, of course, acquiring sufficient points in the Leaving Certificate (or equivalent) to qualify for one’s chosen course. Though advised not to, students invariably look to the points of the previous year to gauge their likelihood of success. However, a glance at the table below shows how fatal a mistake this can be. With jumps of up to 85 points between years, the equivalent of a B1 grade at Honours level, students are left

I decided to put it as my first choice on the CAO form regardless of the points, pairing it with Film Studies under the TSM system. The points for drama dropped from 540 to 350 but because Film Studies was 510, I didn’t make it.”

The decision of the college to treat each of the TSM subjects individually when allocating points has definite merit – it stands to reason that a higher academic standard would be needed for Psychology for example, than for other subjects. But it is hard to justify the fact that in 2003, 510 points were needed for Film Studies, but only 450 would have qualified a student for Mathematics as part of the Two Subject Moderatorship. The situation becomes even more baffling when this year’s points are taken into consideration.

Film Studies dropped to 480 and was overtaken by Mathematics which rose by an incredible 80 points to 530.

Surprisingly, Single Honour Mathematics required a comparatively low 420 in the same year.

The difficulty in calculating what points will be needed from year to year for a TCD course is visible throughout the faculties. Medicinal Chemistry rose by 70 points this year while Theoretical Physics topped the chart when it increased its points requirement by 85 points. Science has also been rising steadily for the last three years. In 2002, 385 points would have secured you a place. The following year, 425 points were needed and by 2004 the points stood at 450 in the first round of offers, with not all students achieving this level being offered a place. Overall, the points for Science have risen by 65 since 2002. Figures

Points for Law and Medicine remain in the elusive bracket between 550 and 590, levels achieved by only 2.3% of students helpless when it comes to realistically filling out a CAO form. With only ten spaces available, no one wants to waste spaces with courses they know that they ultimately have no chance of getting.

But the system disallows such prudence through the erratic nature displayed in the table.

This problem can have very real and indeed devastating effects.

Even when points drop dramatically, students may not have applied on the basis of previous years points and their expected results. Lucia Byrne, a 2nd year UCD Arts student, explained how unexpected changes in points cost her a place on the course of her dreams. “I’d always wanted to study drama at Trinity, but reckoned that at 540 points [2002], I hadn’t a hope. I decided to audition anyway, just to see if I was good enough. When I passed the audition and interview stage, I was so happy

like this leave one asking whether the class of 2002 were unable for the work or if the class of 2004 are overqualified?

Surely the standard of the course cannot change that much in 3 years? Why, so, have the points risen by the equivalent of a C2 on an Honours paper?

One of the most worrying aspects of this look at the points system in Trinity is that the majority of students gain their points through the Irish Leaving Certificate Examination system. Under this system, students are required to study a minimum of 6 subjects, with the vast majority studying 7 or more. Considering the highly specific nature of college courses, it beggars belief that in order to gain access to most of them, students must excel at entirely unrelated subjects. English, Irish and Mathematics are compulsory and must be studied. A foreign language

is required by most colleges. Once these four requirements have been filled, most students study a further 3 subjects.

However, very few secondary schools in the country are large enough to offer such a range of subjects that all the subjects studied compliment the students’ desired college course. As a result, students run the risk of being let down by

With jumps of up to 85 points between years, students are left helpless when it comes to realistically filling out a CAO form a weakness in a subject completely unnecessary for their 3rd level studies.

Fergal Hegarty (18) from Co. Wicklow understands this problem only too well. “I was aiming for Engineering and got an A2 in Honours Technical Graphics and B1s in Maths and Physics but was badly let down by my Irish and French and didn’t get enough points overall. I ended up having to take History too because of timetabling in my school and I hated it.

I’m repeating this year, and just taking 6 subjects so I can concentrate more on my weaker ones.”

It has gotten to the stage in Trinity where even students who receive results in August that would be considered excellent by a casual observer, are left nervously waiting for the CAO points to be published. Louise Ryan, a first year Psychology student tells of how despite achieving 555 points in the Leaving Certificate, she had to wait until the second round of offers to be offered a place in Trinity. “I had Psychology in UCD down second and was offered that, but I had my heart set on Trinity. My friends were amazed when they heard that I didn’t get my first choice in the first round offers.

Everyone assumes that if you get high points like 555, you can do pretty much anything, but it’s not always the case.”

Two disturbing trends are emerging as a result of the increasing difficulties experienced by students aiming at high-end courses. Firstly, to counteract a weakness in particular subjects, a problem already highlighted, many feel forced to attend grind schools to give them the best possible chance.

The expensive nature of these schools and private grinds and the resulting exclusion of many less well-off students from prestigious courses such as Law and Medicine is well-documented, but the points remain in the elusive bracket between 550 and 590, levels achieved by only 2.3% of students.

Restructuring: the main points Main problems: too many small unviable departments; finances still allocated as they were four decades ago causing an unfair distribution of resources; finance from government has become unreliable due to cutbacks; present structures impede upon College’s ability to compete for research funding; current system of administration ineffective, IT has not been employed to its full potential.

Proposed solutions: reducing the number of faculties from six to three; replacing the current 60 departments with approximately 18 schools; position of Vice Provost/Dean to be created to run new faculties and be in charge of their finances; financial resources to be allocated according to a student and research weighted formula so that ‘those who do the work of the college’ are rewarded.

Key dates: April 2004 – publication of the Provost’s Memorandum Planning Structures and Resources for the Future and the Structures Report produced by the Provost’s Working Group on Structures and Management Systems (GSMS) May 2004 – publication of Questions and Answers paper, responses of various faculties, departments and individual staff members published on the internet July 2004 – Executive Officer Board makes decisions on five key questions set out in Strucures Report December 2004 – final decision to be taken regarding composition of departments September 2005 – implementation of reforms to begin Website: http://www.tcd.ie/Local/Structures/index.php

Secondly, those students lucky enough to achieve such results often feel pressured into applying for and accepting courses they have no real interest in. A 22 year old native of Co. Laois who asked not to be named explained how she ended up dropping out of Veterinary Medicine in UCD midway through her second year. “I knew I was probably going to do well in the Leaving Cert. I’d picked subjects like English and History that I barely needed to study which left me plenty of time to focus on Maths, Chemistry and Biology which I found more difficult.

In the back of my head, I knew I wanted to do an Arts degree, but I’d heard so much about ‘BA wasters’ that I decided to try Veterinary because there was an obvious career path and I like animals.

Those were honestly the reasons I chose the course! By Christmas of 2nd year, I was so unhappy I dropped out and started working so I could figure out what I really wanted to do. All I knew was that spending the next forty years of my life in a freezing cold field with my hand halfway up a cow was not something I was looking forward to. I’m going to apply in a couple of years to study English as a mature student; it’s going to cost a lot though.”

Secondary students are finding it harder to plan their future There is some progress being made by College however. The Trinity Access Programme (TAP) makes available 130 places each year for students from under-represented backgrounds, where there would not be a tradition of 3rd level education. Now complemented by the new Trinity Access Society, run by students and open to all students whether they are

part of TAP or not, the TAP programme offers students a one-year foundation course to initiate them to the college system, a bursary to help with books and accommodation and academic support throughout their time at Trinity.

This combination of appropriate and targeted support has resulted in an 80% success rate for TAP students. In addition, the programme enables the college

society to more accurately reflect society as a whole, resulting in a richer college experience for all students.

Overall, unfortunately, Trinity remains out of reach for the majority of students and will remain so as long as the ‘points problem’ persists.

8

Tuesday October 12, 2004

INTERNATIONAL REVIEW

Trinity News

American electoral system for dummies Robert Lamontagne On November 2nd, tens of millions of Americans will go to the polls to elect candidates for thousands of offices, from dogcatcher to president, at every level of government. Almost every election will be wildly undemocratic, decided by a tiny minority of voters in ‘winner-take-all’ single-seat constituencies. And the more powerful the office, the more money is raised to win it – for all seats around the country altogether, about $3.5 billion.

The entire House of Representatives is up for election.

There are 435 voting seats, plus several non-voting delegates from territories, the commonwealth of Puerto Rico and the capital itself, the District of Columbia. The fifty states are represented in proportion to their population, with one representative for every 647,000 people.

The states draw their own House districts to benefit powerful incumbents. In the 2002 election, 98% of incumbents won reelection – and 83% of them won in a landslide.

Incumbents raise an average of $900,000 to run for reelection. This November, between 35 and 40 seats are contestable, and the Democrats need to win 13 seats to make a majority.

Thirty-four of the Senate’s 100 seats will also be contested. Each state has two senators, regardless of population. For example, Wyoming (population 494,000) has as many senators as California (population 34 million).

Since Americans began voting for senators in 1913 – they were elected by state legislatures before then – 83% of

incumbents have won reelection. This November, however, 5 Democrats and 3 Republicans are stepping down. With about 10 seats in play, and with the Democrats needing just one seat to make a majority, each candidate will raise about $9m to be competitive.

Running for the Presidency takes a lot of time, effort and money. Candidates start drumming up financial support 3 or 4 years before the election itself.

When a party has no incumbent candidate, party primary elections are held during the winter and spring before the general election. For example, Kerry

won the Democratic nomination in 29 days, running in early – or ‘frontloaded’ – primaries in states with 22% of the national population, where turnout averaged around 6% of the population.

Once the candidate is ‘elected’ and officially nominated at the party’s national convention, the candidates stop fundraising and campaign with public financing – this year, $75 million for each candidate. The amount of money is amazing: Bush’s run costs $260m, up from the previous $106m record he set in 2000; Kerry’s run is slightly cheaper

at $235m.

On the first Tuesday in November, the country votes. In every election except the Presidency, the candidate with the most votes (a ‘plurality’) wins. In presidential voting, state legislatures appoint electors to the Electoral College. There are 538 electors based on the number of members of Congress (the District of Columbia appoints 3 electors), which skews electoral votes: one elector in Republican Wyoming represents 164,500 people, while one in Democratic California represents 616,000.

Traditionally, electors cast their vote for the candidate who won a plurality of votes in their state. But they don’t have to: one elector from West Virginia has already promised to cast his ballot for John Kerry whether or not he wins the state, and there’s nothing anyone can do about it. Traditionally it was thought that citizens elected their president to the only national office in the country – but by law, the ‘individual citizen has no federal constitutional right to vote’ for the presidency.

Iraq: From dictatorship to democracy Khalid Ibrahim Saddam’s brutal regime ruled Iraq for 35 years leaving behind an unenviable legacy. Under Saddam, 2 million innocent Iraqis were murdered, hundreds of mass graves were filled and the country’s knowledge of chemical weaponry was employed to punish ‘disloyal’ Iraqis. Furthermore the regime decimated the lifestyle and culture of the Arab Marshes that had flourished for 5000 years, whilst still finding time to wage two bloody wars against Iran and Kuwait.

It was frustrating and painful for Iraqis to stand by powerless and vulnerable whilst Saddam and his cohort raped the country and massacred both culture and citizens. Worse though, was the evident failure and absence of intervention on behalf of the international community. Saddam was given support and weapons, which he then turned on any opposition; Iraqis were given pity and limited media attention.

They were forced to face the fact that in order to remove the barbaric regime they would have to accept military

The Republican Trail Robert Lamontagne Disgust with George Bush and the fear of what he will do next has unified the Democrats in a way last seen 1964, when Lyndon Johnson won the largest landslide in US history. But it was Bush – not Kerry – who unified the party. The slogan, ‘Anybody But Bush’ was both accurate and desperate.

The Republicans have convinced themselves that they are fighting for ‘freedom’, ‘liberty’, ‘leadership’, ‘the homeland’. The unspoken truth of this election is that Democrats are fighting for liberal democracy itself, for the future of politics based on facts rather

ideology. This what John Kerry means by the slogan, ‘We need national leaders who will face reality.’ And Democratic activist Dan Payne wrote that this ‘election is not about what America will be like if Kerry wins. It’s about what America will be like if Kerry doesn’t win.’

The focus is well and truly on Bush, especially in his role as Commander-inChief of the armed forces. Thus Kerry attacked Bush on his capacity not as mere ‘president’, but as a Wartime Leader. Kerry abandoned policy-talk and behaved as if, according to pundit Peter Canellos, ‘voters would choose him simply because he was better: A more credentialed military leader, a wiser man.’ He saw the choice as

Attitudes: Should foreigners pull out of Iraq?

The foreigners who work in Iraq have chosen to do so. They have not been forced to do so. They work in Iraq because of the pay, and for a variety of personal reasons that range from a sense of adventure to altruism. Should they feel that they no longer gain anything from their work, or if the risks should (to them) begin to outweigh the benefits, they should be free to leave. Many companies operate in dangerous countries and many prosper under these harsh conditions. South African companies are famous for operating in hot-spots around Africa and even Somalia has an economy of sorts.

Foreign workers in Iraq are not under any moral obligation to stay. If they pull out and terrorists regard this withdrawal as a victory of sorts, the blame should not be dumped at their feet. The only obligation these workers are under is to their livelihood and their consciences. The blame should be laid squarely on the coalition and Iraqi authorities for failing to provide proper security. Business is business and when costs such as paying larger allowances become too hefty, foreign direct investment will die in Iraq.

John Keating

Caroline Palmer

Foreigners including media representatives and aid workers should be encouraged to leave Iraq. Their presence in the country posits a genuine threat to international security. Kidnappings by Iraqi guerrilla groups unfortunately tend to draw international governments into the Iraqi situation. Governments involving themselves with kidnappers and terrorists in Iraq place their nations at unnecessary risk. Yet governments have a duty to campaign for and facilitate the save return of a captured citizen. The importance of this governmental role becomes particularly poignant when those captured citizens have their human rights violated on international television networks. Militant guerrillas are kidnapping foreigners to lure governments into the pit of destruction that is Iraq; they are using foreign captives as collateral in their campaign against the US regime.There is no denying that the work done by foreign aid workers and foreign media in Iraq is worthwhile, but the risk to personal security and international security is too great to support the continued presence of ‘targets for kidnap’ in Iraq. If you’re in the line of fire, you get out of it. If you’re a potential hostage, you go home. Citizens risking their personal security by remaining in Iraq should do so only at their own risk and not at the risk of their home country’s security. What this question needs is a cost benefit analysis. Such an analysis shows that the costs outweigh the benefits. I am not condoning a cessation of aid to Iraq, or a halt to media coverage of Iraq. I only argue that ‘at risk’ foreigners leave Iraq until such a time as the international community can be offered reasonable assurance that foreigners will not be used a pawns by Iraqi militants.

I strongly believe that we should not kow-tow to terrorism and terrorist groups. If we do so then they will appear elsewhere to continue their barbaric campaign of killing. We must confront the terrorists and tackle them instead of washing our hands and running away. Freedom will prevail and terrorism will be defeated and the only way to do that is by global cooperation. We have a moral duty to support the interim government in Iraq in its efforts to eliminate the pockets of terrorism that remain They are no more than murderers. Beheading and taking innocent people hostage or leaving car bombs in schools and markets are evil acts against humanity. They have hijacked Islam. Islam is about peace, not about killing.

One of the most popular names of GOD in Islam is “SALAM” which means peace.

We have to be united in our duty to destroy the roots of terrorism, not only in Iraq, but everywhere. Foreigners should not run away from Iraq.

Khalid Ibrahim

occupation. We were suffering and dying and our options were limited, either support and uphold a dictator who had and would continue to cause misery and deprivation or we could choose to support the military action and hopefully get rid of Saddam. The latter option is the one which the majority of Iraqis welcomed. During the war the Iraqis did not have the heart, nor were they inclined to fight for Saddam and consequently the American troops took Baghdad in just two weeks. This is

Iraqis and destroyed our country. It is too easy for Westerners to take freedom for granted. They declare a war unjust and leave the oppressed facing certain death without bothering to offer any realistic alternative. I do believe in the idea of a just war, and the Iraqi situation, though controversial was just.

Unfortunately, although the Americans were well prepared for war, the same cannot be said of their approach to peace. Once the regime collapsed they were unorganised and lost.

‘It is too easy for Westerners to take freedom for granted. They declare a war unjust and leave the oppressed facing certain death without bothering to offer any realistic alternative.’ significant if we look back to 1916, when because of Iraqi resistance it took the British troops all of three years to accomplish the same.

I know that some people still believe the war was unjustified because they did not find the promised weapons of mass destruction. In reality they did find them. The real WMD was Saddam and his two sons who killed millions of

Nevertheless there is room for optimism, democracy and freedom of speech and press are slowly climbing out of the rubble. We now have about 170 political parties and more than 150 newspapers, in addition to the many independent television and radio stations. Iraq now has the makings of freedom, ordinary citizens are once again free to live, travel, study and worship at

their holy places. Saddam is behind bars and is going to face a justice that he never offered his own people. We are succeeding in Iraq. It is, and will be a difficult struggle against terrorism and sectarianism but freedom and democracy will prevail.

The media focus has been on the tragedies and as such has somewhat neglected the more positive aspects of our fledgling democracy, but this does not bother the majority of Iraqis who are fully united behind the interim government. We must defeat the terrorists and their barbarism and for that we still need unwavering international support.

We are in a fragile transitory stage, whereby 35 years of dictatorship is being supplanted by democracy. We know that creating a democratic, prosperous and stable country, where differences are tolerated, human rights protected, and which lives in peace with itself and its neighbors; is not going to be an easy task. Yet the horrors of tyranny and repression have been burned into Iraqi minds and will act as a powerful motivator for rebuilding the country and reforming its institutions.

The independent electoral commission is working alongside the United Nations, the multinational force and the Iraqi forces to hold our first free and direct elections next January 2005.

In fifteen out of our eighteen Iraqi provinces we could hold elections tomorrow and the interim government is trying to tackle the problems encountered in the remaining three, so that all provinces are involved.

The terrorists and remaining Saddam loyalists will do all they can to delay or disrupt these elections but the will of Iraqis will triumph and the election will be held on time. The election will be a giant step toward Iraq’s democracy and future prosperity. The future is full of hope.

Lies, empty rhetoric and a defunct media

absurdly simple, and campaigned under the banner of, ‘America can do better’.

In doing so, Kerry joined every other Democratic presidential candidate since 1972 in seeking election based on common sense. In late August Kerry tried to convince voters by pointing out the fact that the Republicans ‘have obviously decided that some people will believe anything, no matter how fictional or how far-fetched, if they just repeat it often enough…You can’t cover up reality with a few empty slogans. You can’t lead America by misleading the American people.’ The result was a drop in the polls, even before the Republican convention.

Kerry’s campaign mistakenly assumed that the election would be a cakewalk – what with 8 million unemployed, 20,000 US casualties in Iraq, a budget deficit of $422 billion dollars, and falling wages. They were not ready for the Republican election machine.

The Kerry campaign didn’t have a rapid-response team to counter rightwing lies, whereas the Bush campaign had an entire industry set up to create them. The Republicans had a massive database on Kerry’s entire public life (and then some), while ‘the Kerry campaign had one volunteer watching three television sets and scribbling notes’ on Republican announcements, according to a New Yorker magazine article.

When Dick Cheney told the American people to vote Bush or ‘we’ll be hit in a way that will be devastating’, the Kerry campaign’s response was pathetic. ‘We all saw Dick Cheney’s

remark’, they said, ‘and we all understood the disgraceful and dishonourable implications. Instead of more spin, it might be nice to actually get the truth from Dick Cheney or even an apology.’

This feeble response came after a month of scurrilous (and effective) Republican attacks on Kerry’s heroic service record by a rightwing organization called ‘Swift Boat Veterans for Truth [sic]’ (SBVT).

This revolved around rightwing hack John O’Neill, who had attacked Kerry in the early 70s for the Nixon administration. O’Neill had had a working relationship with Bush’s election mastermind Karl Rove during the Nixon years. It was through Rove that O’Neill met William Franke, who set up the SBVT. Franke hired Benjamin Ginsberg, White House counsel, as a lawyer. Ginsberg was Rove’s colleague, but claimed he never told Rove about the group created by one of Rove’s contacts, using one of Rove’s oldest friends to character-assassinate John Kerry – again.

Rove was also ostensibly unaware that his friend Bob Perry, (a long-time Bush donor from Texas) gave $200,000 to SBVT. A tiny cabal of wealthy rightwing backers in Texas funnelled in more than a million dollars: T. Boone Pickens, a rightwing Texas oil tycoon gave $500,000, two energy executives $350,000 between them, and two brothers (who had financed similar attacks on John McCain in 2000) donated another $100,000.

But the Bush campaign said there was ‘no connection whatsoever’

between them and SBVT after the (illegal) revelations became public and that’s just half the story; Harper’s magazine detailed a dozen other major rightwing think tanks with combined resources of $100m a year, and rightwing foundations with $2b in assets, all committed to a Republican victory in November.

The Republicans, under the command of the election tsar Karl Rove, leave nothing to chance. For example, Rove ensures that Bush is only seen by the media as speaking to cheering crowds by requiring citizens to sign ‘loyalty oaths’; forms endorsing Bush’s election, in order to attend. One Republican spokesman said ‘everyone is welcome at the rallies so long as they support President Bush.’

Rove is covering up the fact that, according to one Republican organizer quoted in Time magazine, Bush ‘doesn’t have a message. It’s the same old rhetoric of two years ago.’

This leaves Bush on the campaign trail imparting Zen-like wisdom – on Iraq: ‘It’s hard to get to democracy from tyranny. It’s hard work, and yet it’s necessary work.’ –while the rest of the rightwing propaganda machine stoops to new lows.

Senior Senate Republican Orrin Hatch’s warning that terrorists ‘are going to throw everything they can between now and the election to try and elect Kerry’ is only one tame example. The rightwingers even go so far as to use federal security agencies. For example, the Homeland Security Administration announced security alerts just days after

Kerry announced his running mate in July, and just days again after the Democratic convention. The first alert threatened a massive Al Qaeda attack based on ‘new data’ that terrorists would like to attack the US and the second decalred ‘new and unusually specific information about where Al Qaeda would like to attack’ – this information was 3 years old.

All in all, the Republicans have been cultivating a crop of hysterical zealots for 3 years, personified by one woman from Ohio who wrote, ‘President Bush is right on target.

Terrorists are our biggest threat. Forget worrying about the economy. That won’t matter if we allow terrorists to destroy our nation.’

It is this brand of political discourse, shaped by a media that whores itself to right-wingers that forms the platform for this years elections.

The managing editor of the Columbia Journalism Review recently told The Observer that the US press ‘is not comfortable injecting issues into the public discourse that are not put out there by some official source’ – i.e., the government, whose 3 branches are controlled by the right – so ‘the press doesn’t feel any obligation to point out what’s inaccurate’ This is why the Defence Secretary tells reporters that he never said Saddam Hussein: 1) was working with al Qaeda; 2) definitely had weapons of mass destruction; or 3) could use them against targets within 45 minutes. The media swallows endless

lies. The Republicans actually convinced two TV networks to broadcast ‘interviews’ of party operatives by party operatives during their convention – as news.

The Republicans will continue to lie because they know there will be no backlash. They can say or promise anything with impunity. As one rightwing pundit put it, conservatives ‘judge [political] success on the basis of the media’. Even now, for example, as many people believe Saddam had a hand in 9/11 as know he did not.

But even if the news organizations were doing their jobs, they would still be owned by the five enormous conglomerates that control 90% of American media. Rightwing mouthpiece Fox News would still be bigger than all its competitors combined. The 58% of American newspapers with 68% of national circulation that supported Bush in 2000 would still be tailoring the news to the Party line.

This leads Democrats to reasonably conclude that the deck is stacked against them. Harper’s reported a group of Democratic protestors at the Republican convention chanting, ‘Fuck Republicans! Fuck Republicans!’ until they found out they were chanting at a group of reporters; so they began chanting, ‘Fuck the media! Fuck the media!’

The two seem interchangeable.

Gays finally getting what they deserve Owen Corrigan The news that the Spanish government has approved a Bill which, if ratified, will pave the way for same-sex marriage in Spain is to be welcomed. This places Spain at the forefront of gayrights liberalisation efforts across Europe. Activists are nearly certain that Spain’s minority Socialist government will succeed in having Parliament pass the Bill in the next few months. Indeed, the government itself has remarked that it expects to have provisions in place for gay marriage as early as next year.

If this happens Spain will become only the third country in the world, after the Netherlands and Belgium, to have legalised gay marriage. Some other nations, notably Sweden, make provision for ‘same-sex unions’ which provide gay couples with many, but not all, of the more important rights and privileges that married heterosexual couples enjoy.

Indeed, Spain’s proposed reforms go a good deal further than many would have thought possible and their adoption will make Spain even more liberal on this issue than Belgium, which approved gay marriage in early 2003. The Spanish reforms encompass everything from tax breaks, widower’s pensions and inheritance rights to divorce laws, alimony payments and, most importantly (and most controver

sially), the right to adopt children.

Predictably this has drawn the ire of the frustrated and increasingly irrelevant Catholic Church in Spain.

Spokesmen for the Catholic Bishops’ Conference there recently reiterated the Church’s belief that homosexuality is a “mental disorder” and warned that legalising gay marriage would be similar to unleashing a “virus” on Spanish society. And while the majority of Spaniards identify as Catholic, they do not share the regressive views espoused by their Church. Recent polls suggest that 65-70% of Spaniards are in favour of gay marriage.

Here at home movement towards the provision of same-sex marriage has been slow. The biggest milestone in Ireland’s journey towards gay equality in recent years was, of course, the landmark case of Norris Vs. Ireland, where David Norris successfully brought his case for the decriminalisation of homosexuality to the European Court of Human Rights in 1988.

Decriminalisation followed in 1993.

Since then Senator Norris has been working on his Domestic Partnership Bill, with the help of the Law School’s Prof. Ivana Bacik. This Bill will seek to redress the inequalities gay couples in Ireland still face. Hopefully it will come before the Oireachtas for consideration, and ratification, in the not too distant future. Prof. Bacik hopes the Bill will win “wide cross-party political support”

and the gay community right across Ireland doubtless hopes so too.

Unfortunately members of the Government don’t show the same enthusiasm for gay rights liberalisation.

Mary Coughlan, speaking in her capacity as Minister for Social & Family affairs at the time, remarked during the summer that Ireland was not now, and “may never be”, ready for same-sex marriage. Ms. Coughlan’s capacity to influence social policy was severely curtailed recently, however, when she was moved in the Cabinet reshuffle, to the Dept. of Agriculture. She was last seen mucking about in a field somewhere near Carlow.

Across the world today the gay rights movement is increasingly less satisfied with mere toleration and demands for tangible, practical and meaningful equality grow increasingly more vocal. Recent setbacks such as the annulment of France’s first gay marriage, the annulment of more than 4,000 same-sex marriages in California and calls by Republicans for a federal ban on gay marriage throughout the U.S. are discouraging. But the progressive reforms undertaken by such liberal democracies as the Netherlands, Belgium and Spain, can only act to exert similar reforming pressure on countries across the world. Pressure which will ultimately result, it is hoped, in gays finally getting what they deserve.

BUSINESS&POLITICS Tuesday October 12, 2004

Trinity News

9

Provost Hegarty: More than a man with a plan Provost John Hegarty specks to Sinead

Redmond about his Strategic Review, the OECD report and the role of a University Education in Modern Ireland.

Education: Well, I’m from Mayo – I went to national school and secondary school in Claremorris. Then I did my undergraduate degree in Maynooth and did my PhD in Galway, and went off to the States for 9 years to do research. I came back to Ireland in 1986, back to Trinity, as professor of Physics, and was there until I became Provost.

Post of Provost: The function of Provost really is to lead the university and to manage the university, into the future.

What does the post of Provost entail?

The job is for 10 years, and I was elected by members of full-time academic staff, and a number of student votes, in 2001. There was an electorate of about 550 overall. The student votes came from those on the board – it was in the region of 10 to 12.

How much interaction with the student body would you have on a daily basis?

I would have regular contact with the Students’ Union, of course. If you take last year as an example, towards the end of last year, I held a meeting with all the class reps, there was about 180.

We had a question and answer session, to talk about where College was going, and there were a lot of questions andanswers there. I’m also the Patron of the Phil, so I went to a number of meetings last year there as well.

Which part of the job would you say you most enjoy, or you feel is most relevant to the day-to-day workings of College?

The most interesting part is actually less on the management and administrative side, and more on the people side – you know, where is education going, and what is the role of a university in society. Meeting with all types of students, and getting to know what members of staff are thinking.

On that topic of where you think education should be going, I have a quote here from Cardinal Newman, which is on the homepage of the Junior Dean “If I had to choose between a socalled University which dispensed with residence and tutorial supervision and gave its degrees to any person who passed an examination in a wide range of subjects, and a University which merely brought a number of young men together for three or four years…

I have no hesitation in giving the preference to the later…”– which stance would you take, if you were forced to choose one?

I’m a strong believer that education is about experience in a community of learners and of learning – I think it’s vitally important. I’d tend to go with the latter, for undergraduate education, and certainly for 18 year olds, I think it is important that they mix with students from different areas and

different disciples. A bit of a challenge.

Education is not just about acquiring information. It’s about being challenged in your beliefs and your attitude to life – that they’re challenged, that people continually challenge them. So it’s very important, no matter what age you’re talking about, even with e-learning and all of that, that the community aspect of learning ,and the personal interaction for the student, tutor or staff, that that is there. That that is actually respected and valued.

I’d like to now ask you a few questions about the Strategic Review [published last year, aimed towards restructuring College as a whole], which is quite a controversial topic. Can you give us a breakdown of what it’s all about?

Sure. In the second half of last year, we initiated a debate on two changes that we think are important. They arose out of our Strategic Plan, which was published the year before, which itself arose out of a long debate and consultation and so on. [Interjection from TN – When you say debate, what exactly do you mean by that, and who was involved?] For the Strategic Plan, which was published in 2003, it was through all sorts of committees, it was on the web, and so on. I did talk to students about it and various bodies. So, arising out of that last year, we did propose two changes, and quite fundamental changes.

One is the restructuring of our academic departments, and that is on the basis that we have 61 departments, many of them small, and as a result of that giving rise to uncertainties about delivering progressive education and research.

This is in the context of what’s happening in the world at the moment, a lot of change going on. Universities are particularly changing, and we needed to change. Financially, we were powerless. And the whole issue of what it is we offer in terms of education is also changing. I believe that education should be more interdisciplinary and that we should organise our structures to deliver that, and to deliver better, and to be more robust against all these changes andpressures and fluctuations that are happening out there in the world. So it’s to strengthen our programme, and also … so that there’s less uncertainty, so that we can plan better and prepare better. So that was the basis of the rreorganising of our academic structures, so that … each of them would have more devolved control, so they’d be more in charge of their own affairs. So that was the whole motivation.

The second part was the way in which we distribute our resources – and we knew this for a long time, that we’ve distributed our resources, our budget on a historical basis, without much connections with actually what was happening.

So the second part was to develop a whole new resource allocation to follow activity, you know, follow the students directly, provide incentives for departments to be more independent, to provide their own solutions etc. And more, it will be transparent. Everybody will understand how our resources are distributed.

So they’re the two fundamental changes we’re talking about. There wasn’t a lot

of controversy about the latter, the way in which funds are distributed and resources, but there was more controversy about structures and so forth. So we had two basics. Last April we distributed the paper [the Strategic Plan] over the system … and that went on the web.

It was available to the whole College community, and we had the two on display for debate and open for discussions, and of course many fora, public fora, for all types of staff, academic staff, cleaning staff (who are only here in the mornings) and we had one for undergraduate students. Unfortunately, by the time that was organised, it was into exam time, so there weren’t many students there. There was a very good graduate students’ forum.

On the foot of that then, do you plan to hold a student referendum over whetherit’s going to be introduced or not?

No. We’re not working by referendum.

What we did in July was agree the principles of the changes, but not the details. So the two principles we agreed were that we should move ahead with the development plan and that we should reduce the number of our academic departments significantly. And that between July and December would be the period in which we would plan to develop that.

So what’s going on at the moment with the restructuring is a ground up exercise out there. We’d like to have agreed what we want to do by December. It’ll take quite a while to resolve all the details,

and we’d like to begin implementation next October.

It’ll take time for it to be bedded down, it’s not going to kick in in October ’05.

It’s going to take a period of 3 years in operation for this all to be bedded down.

Why do you feel these changes need to be implemented at this point in Trinity’s existence?

Because I think universities, generally speaking, are going through a transition that probably hasn’t happened before.

All the universities in the world are facing that. I’d say there are too, in Ireland, I think for the first time, the number of 18 year olds is going down – the demographics have changed. For the last thirty years, the national imperative was to increase participation in higher education. That overrode everything, and every university and third level institution grew, and the problem was for Trinity how to respond to that change.

So that overriding concern is gone, the numbers are going down. So we’re into a different era. Growth is no longer about numbers and adding on new courses all the time. We have to think about consolidation and substitution – changing new courses for old as the pattern of demand changes. That we’ve never had to do before, substitution. So we have to have a structure that can plan for that better.

That’s one aspect, I think. The other is that public investment in higher education worldwide is going down and

that’s true in Ireland as well. So there’s a whole new environment out there about higher education, and how higher education survives. We need to take charge of our own affairs, to a certain extent, we need to find new solutions to deliver better for existing courses.

How are the departments reacting to this?

When we argued through this last year, one situation is to think about what happens if we do nothing. That’s not a stable situation. That situation’s getting worse and worse. Small departments, by and large, were heading into trouble. If people retire or get sick, you didn’t have the capacity to hire to fill their places. Small departments were vulnerable to fluctuations. You have to compare what you gain from change versus that sliding background. It’s not a constant background. The whole purpose was to basically strengthen ourselves, sothat we were less exposed to fluctuations and change.

There appears to be a fair amount of student opposition to this. Why do you think that is, and how are you going to address it?

Well I don’t think there’s student opposition to the changes per se. I think most, like the university and the departments have accepted the fact that change is necessary. I don’t think students are against the change. They did have a concern about the level of consultation. I would say, actually, in the last part of last year, we probably had the widest consultation that has

happened in this university for a long time, certainly in my memory, and certainly wider than most other universities at all. And remember, the process is not finished yet. We’re in phase two now. There’s a whole debate going on in every department, for students of every department. So they should be involved in that debate over the next two months.

There was a budget surplus announced a few days ago of two and a half billion.

Do you plan to ask the government if they’re going to change how they’re investing in higher education as a result of the increased funds?

Well, during the last two years we have been mounting a campaign to reverse the cutbacks that we’ve had, right through the last years. The OECD report which has just come out is reinforcing exactly what we’re saying, that society expects more from higher education than ever before. We’re talking about greater access to education, developing the graduate level. And for universities to be able to deliver this, we need much more flexibility in our structure than previously. So the OECD report, which is an international report, is saying that this must happen.

The channel by which they recommended this happen is currently blocked, and that is by introducing student fees. So there’s a huge dilemma facing us right now.

Are you personally in favour of introducing fees?

I am. But not just willy-nilly, I’m in favour of those who can pay, pay, that

there should be no financial barrier to gaining access to higher education.

But what if you have a middle-class couple with a reasonable income, but with three or four children that they would like to send to college?

Well, just backtrack a bit, I believe that as a university, we need to be investing more, in terms of quality and so on. There are two ways of getting that increased investment. One is through the public purse, and the government is very reluctant to do this. The country is also reluctant to pay any more in taxation, which is where it goes bad. So if that is a decision by the country, by society, then the only other way is for society to themselves to directly pay. So it’s one or the other. It’s a political decision in a way. I don’t see, given the international trend, this government and governments generally increasing the investment in higher education. So there’s a real dilemma there.

And finally, what are your main aims for this college year, other than the restructuring, and how do you plan to implement them?

My main aim is that – Trinity is the number one university in Ireland. And that’s good. But it’s not enough. We need to position ourselves internationally, in a much stronger position, and we have a long way to go. And I would like to lead the university in a position where it’s much more recognised internationally for its education, and the quality of graduates coming out, the quality of its research.

Student Politics.

Studying: Business and Politics in BESS

In the first half of interviews, Trinity News asks the SU Presdient, Welfare and Education officers what they plan to achieve in the coming acadmeic year.

Position on Sabbat team: Welfare Officer

things helped. The issues I highlighted in my manifesto, such as my proposal for a change in the grant system and the call for no more cuts to the health and counselling services and the crèche, connected with a large number of students, and I guess people felt I could deliver on them. I think a large part of it, though, was that I came across as the person for the job, whether that was from the hustings speeches, the manifestos, or simply based on their own impressions of me.

a major change in government policy.

The Counselling Service was drastically oversubscribed at some points last year; Mike Miley very helpfully left me a list of Trinity graduate counsellors who'll give substantial discounts to Trinity students - that list is there as a contingency plan in case the unthinkable happens again. What I want to do is make sure that the cuts we face impact as little as possible upon our experience as Trinity students.

As well as that, I want to do my best to make sure that the lives of Trinity students run as smoothly as possible. I've been dealing with a lot of casework over the summer, and I have no doubt I'll be dealing with a lot more in the coming year - if anyone's reading this who thinks their problems are too small for the welfare officer, they're

minister for education and a new minister for social and family affairs means that we have a rare opportunity to push for a meaningful change in the grant system. I don't know about having a change set in stone by January, but I'd certainly be hopeful of serious progress being made by then.

There have been a number of problems that have arisen over the summer – I’d hope to ensure over the coming year that next year’s welfare officer doesn’t have to fight the same battles. I intend to do my best to remove the possibility of a recurrence of what I’ve had to fight.

Finally, there are a number of campaigns to be run in the next few weeks – my immediate aim regarding those is to ensure that they go smoothly and successfully! First up is the Safe Food campaign on the week of October 18th, and there’ll be a competition with a first prize of a maid at your disposal for a full term, so keep an eye

Previous positions within S.U.: This is my first year as an elected representative within the SU – I’m unique among this year’s sabbatical officers in that respect!

issue’ with the Union; with people feeling it didn’t really represent them. OK there will always be some cynicism, but through hard work and talking to students I believed that we could reduce this, and that’s what I’m trying to do.

Francis Kieran Age/D.O.B: 21 years. 7 March 1983.

From: Bettystown Co. Meath.

Studying: Law Position on Sabbat team: President Previous positions within S.U.: Chair of Council, Irish Language Officer, Class Rep. Reason for running for post: In what was set (and still is set) to be a tough year for college financially I wanted the student voice to be as strong as possible. I wanted to work within college to try and minimise the effect of cutbacks on student services and student interests, and not only that, but to push for improvements in many areas.

I also thought that there was a ‘distance

Why you think you were elected by student body: It may have been got to do with the fact that I got the most votes. No seriously, I think I had a good campaign team, that I made time to listen to people and that I was reasonable with the electorate by telling them I’d try my best to achieve my goals, rather than promising things would change overnight.

What you want to do for TCD students: In addition to what I’m saying above and below, I want to give Trinity students a Union which works hard for them, is accessible to them and is interested in their concerns.

Aims to have achieved in office by Jan 2005: Better opening hours in some College offices Input into, and monitoring of College’s restructuring plans Plans for better variety of food in the Buttery to actually come to fruition Progress on getting water machines in some areas of college More awareness among students of their rights Improvements in SU services More work with, and better communication with, affiliate colleges

Luke Ryder Age/D.O.B: 22, born on the 6th of April 1982 - which makes me this year's oldest sabbat...

From: Cabinteely, south Dublin

Reason for running for post : After seeing the election the previous year, I was worried that another unopposed election could result in the election of somebody unsuited for the job, and that the ensuing year could end with a number of people badly hurt – we were lucky in that Mike was elected as Welfare officer following the resignation, but relying on luck seemed to be risky to say the least. I thought (and still do!) that I'd be suited to the job, and that if I was serious about trying to make sure that the right person was elected I should run myself. I was elected, and it’s been my pleasure to help who I can since I took office!

Why you think you were elected by student body: I suppose a number of

Daithí Mac Síthigh Age/D.O.B: 22 years, 7 August 1982.

From: Ashford, Co. Wicklow Studying: Law (finished) Position on Sabbat team: Education Officer Previous positions within S.U.: Access Officer (01/02), Law class rep (00/01 and 03/04) Reason for running for post: I've been involved in a lot of student activities - e.g. as first chair of Trinity FM -

What you want to do for TCD students: I want to make sure that the experience enjoyed by generations of Trinity students is still here for the rest of us. The budget cutbacks imposed in Noel Dempsey's term of office are impacting harder each year, and there's always a chance that something we take for granted will disappear. There was a real risk this summer that the College Health Service would have to start charging for basic medical care something that's never happened in the decades since its opening in 1965.

Luckily, extra money was approved in time to prevent that, but the threat still remains and will remain unless we see as well as in the Union, and I wanted to give full-time office a shot - to use the experience I'd gained from studying here and from working within student organisations, hopefully for the benefit of future students! I did give it a lot of thought - it's a very intense and always-on-duty sort of job- but I really wanted to spend this year arguing on behalf of and working for the benefit of all students in the college.

Why you think you were elected by student body: It was a very close election and my opponent was wellknown and well-connected, especially within the SU. I brought a perspective of having been in Trinity for 4 years, but with a different experience and

not! I'm here to help in any way I can.

Aims to have achieved in office by Jan 2005 (we’re going to run profile updates on you in Jan and April so the more specific the better!): I've been talking to Francis in particular regarding one of the proposals I made in my manifesto, for a change in the grant system. The fact that there's a new background, including going away on exchange, and seeing the college through new eyes on my return! I thought both of us ran honest and fair campaigns, and I was delighted to have been chosen to serve for a year.

What you want to do for TCD students: Basically I want all students (especially incoming Freshers) to know that they're getting the best possible representation - and that their interests are never going to be taken for granted by college authorities.

Even though there's financial pressures, I firmly believe that the student experience - especially the academic services that I have a role in (libraries, computers, etc) - can and must be improved. I also want to ensure that

out!

all students have an active class rep, and that they can know that their reps are valued as the central part of the Union, and can tell me what to do and campaign for!

Aims to have achieved in office by Jan 2005 : Successfully run the expanded class rep elections (and see through class rep training and the first Councils); keep up the pressure on the academic services; produce information for students on disciplinary rules, appeal grounds, etc (the great mysteries of College!), and campaign on disability awareness (in particular for dyslexia).

10

Tuesday October 12, 2004

Trinity News

ARTS REVIEW

The Trouble With The Dublin Fringe Festival

Person Trinity

News Recommends

FILM: COLLATERAL

Anthony Cole

Michael Mann’s new film is a first rate thriller, even if the psychological interplay between its two protagonists isn’t quite as taught as some critics have suggested. It’s also worth checking out for some genuinely stunning panoramas of L.A. – and for the chance to see Tom Cruise is his first ever bad-guy role.

Exhibition : Napoleon - From Emperor to Exile Exhibition – Napoleon: From Emperor to Exile An interesting and sometimes amusing collection of contemporary caricatures of Bony. It’s on campus and free to Trinity students, so you’ve got nothing to lose by checking it out.

Fiction : Cloud Atlas David Mitchell’s third novel consists in six contrasting narratives, all set in different times and places, but each nestled gently inside another like a series of Russian dolls. Undoubtedly one of the most original voices to emerge for years, Mitchell mixes humour, tension and deft characterisation with philosophic speculation and an often ironic commentary on different types of fiction – but what really sets Cloud Atlas apart is the tenderness the author retains for his characters, even when he’s drawing out their faults. Like all great fiction, this is ultimately about the importance of even the most pathetic human lives. Read it now, before it wins the Booker and becomes another Boho fashion accessory. And then read it again, because it’s a masterpiece and by that time you won’t care if it’s trendy.

Drama : Shining City A joint production between The Gate and London’s Royal Court, Connor McPherson’s new play might not be his best, but it’s still well worth a look.

Film:ShaunOfTheDead If you didn’t catch this in the cinema you really have to see it now on video – in fact, get it out even if you did see it on the big screen. It’ll keep you laughing all the way to the pub.

There’s nothing quite like discovering a genuinely impressive fringe production – that feeling of secrets unlocked, of burgeoning talent revealed – but like all great feelings, it’s hard to acquire. And here’s why: not only is most fringe crap, but there’s not even a reliable way of sifting the wheat from the crap in advance – decent reviews or a successful prior production by the same company are often no help at all.

And that’s because most really good fringe productions are snapped up by major theatres, so what we’re left with tends to hover on either side of Mediocrity – sometimes it’ll hit, sometimes it’ll miss, and most reviewers seem to lower their expectations accordingly. My experiences at this year’s Dublin Fringe Festival seemed to bear this out.

The first play I went to, The Indian Wants The Coombe at the Andrews Lane Studio, looked extremely promising. From the Purple Heart Company, who brought us last year’s brilliant Coyote On A Fence, the play takes an

Trinity News Detests Fiction : Politics There’s no doubt that Adam Thirlwell is an extremely clever man – nor that Politics, his debut novel, is an extremely clever book.

Unfortunately, though, it’s also pretentious, trendy, semi-pornographic and emotionally cloying. Avoid at all costs.

Blacklight Productions’ Miracle Of Love at the International Bar, more of a sketch than a full-length play, was successful in what it tried to do – namely, reverse expectations and play jokes on its main character and, in so doing, on the audience – but wasn’t ambitious enough to merit any real attention. Something of a one-trick pony that left me feeling slightly cheated as I left the theatre. (Though perhaps that was the point.) More ambitious by far was Alice Coghlan’s delirious musical interpretation of Chekhov’s The Seagull at the SS Michael and John. But I can’t help feeling that its ambition was somewhat misguided. While many directors have made the mistake of ignoring the irony in Chekhov and turning him into a heavy-handed, moralising bore – a mistake that this production certainly avoided – it seems to me an even greater mistake to turn one of the greatest nineteenth century writers into a giddy, simpering twerp. This play aptly demonstrated why searching for the new should only ever be a secondary aim in art. Similarly, MooCow

Productions’ A Show Of The STANDing UP Variety scored high in the random humour stakes, but failed to pull together into any kind of cohesive whole, and left me wondering what the point was.

It wasn’t all bad, though. The highlight of the festival for me was the Australian dance production Bumping Heads at the Players’ Theatre. Funny, moving, sensuous and technically perfect, it was the only event I went to that seemed to be doing anything different, anything at all inspiring. A beautiful, strange and haunting piece of theatre that achieved an artistic maturity which puts the rest of the above productions to shame.

No doubt there was more to this year’s festival than met my eye. No doubt there were enough decent productions to keep even the most critical theatregoer from grumbling throughout.

I just wish I’d known where to find them all…

Who Will Win The Booker Prize?

Edmund Gordon The six-strong shortlist for the ManBooker Prize, the most prestigious award for English language fiction outside the United States, was announced late last month. Although there were a number of notable omissions – such as Louis de Bernieres’ Birds Without Wings, and William Trevor’s A Bit On The Side – the judges have lavished praise on those novels that did make the list. The question is, though: who’s going to win? TN has some tips for the gamblers among you.

Sarah Hall – The Electric Michaelangelo

Achmat Dangor – Bitter Fruit

Bookies’ Odds: 10/1 TN Odds: 5/1

Bookies’ Odds: 12/1 TN Odds: 1,000/1

Vivid, unusual and haunting.

Shouldn’t be dismissed.

A terrible, terrible novel – clichéd, ponderous and surprisingly unaffecting. Its worthy subject matter will have assured it a place on the shortlist, but if it wins – if this wins in place of Cloud Atlas – it’ll be impossible to take the prize seriously again.

Gerrard Woodward – I’ll Go To Bed At Noon Bookies’ Odds: 10/1 TN Odds: 15/1 A sequel to August, his debut novel, I’ll Go To Bed At Noon sees Woodward’s writing taking a far darker turn as he explores the effects of alcoholism on the Jones family. He pulls off this difficult subject with laudable sensitivity – the problem is when he tries to be funny…

Colm Toibin – The Master Bookies’ Odds: 4/1 TN Odds: 5/1 Toibin’s portrait of Henry James is so much better than anything else he’s written it’s quite astounding. A serious contender for this year’s prize.

Music – TheLibertines The Libertines’ self-titled second album is – as we all know by now – likely also to be their last, due to the much publicised addictions of singer/songwriter/guitarist Pete Doherty. The hype surrounding Doherty’s lifestyle will no doubt mean that the album sells in huge quantities, but for all the wrong reasons: a shame, really, because it’s actually pretty good stuff. Produced

by Mick Jones of The Clash, it’s an altogether more polished affair than their debut, and contains some of the most beautiful punky riffs around.

intensive look at two working class Dubs who are stranded at a bus stop one evening with an Indian who can’t speak a word of English. The acting was good – Emmet Kirwan was particularly noteworthy for his comic portrayal of a bored teenager out for a laugh, and Rodrigo Rodriguez was brilliantly deadpan as the Indian – but sadly the piece failed to deliver. The faults were mainly with the writing.

The Indian Wants The Coombe was structurally bizarre, with hopelessly clumsy devices – like the introduction of a love interest, over an hour in, which is then forgotten about five minutes later – and a series of embarrassing attempts to ‘say something’ as the final curtain approaches. The beauty of the gentle start – where themes of urban isolation, racism and violence are explored in an unusual and interesting way – is lost by a number of crass u-turns in the plot. Like many young writers, Michael Sheridan would be best advised to remain low key rather than trying to pack punches which inevitably end up as heavyhanded adolescent slaps.

Alan Hollinghurst – The Line of Beauty Bookies’ Odds: 5/2 TN Odds: 5/3 Very stylish and delicately observed, this is more of a ‘booker book’ than Mitchell’s – and even if it’s not as good, it might well come out on top.

David Mitchell – Cloud Atlas Bookies’ Odds: 5/4 TN Odds: 3/2 The only thing that might stand between Cloud Atlas and the Booker prize is the chance that it’s that bit too original. Novels of this scope and vision often get left by the wayside: just think of Kazuo Ishiguro’s The Unconsoled, which didn’t even make the shortlist.

Hero: Has The Martial Arts Flick Come Of Age? Marcus Watson After this summer’s dearth of quality cinematic releases, Zhang Yimou’s Hero has arrived on these shores (albeit somewhat belatedly – 18 months have passed since its Oscar nomination) to much acclaim and carrying a ‘presented by’ tag from none other than Quentin Tarantino. And I must say that, regardless of the problems typical of the genre, this film unequivocally restores faith in the visual possibilities of filmmaking.

Set in China in the 3rd Century BC, the Qin Emperor is pursuing his idealistic but violent dream of uniting the land’s warring states to establish one single nation; one China.

The story revolves around a mysterious marshal (Jet Li) and his claim before the Emperor that he has killed three of the sovereign’s most-feared assassins; Sky, Flying Snow and Broken Sword. His reward involves him being invited through the palace defences and to within 10 paces of the paranoid Emperor. However, all is not

what it appears to be, and as the story is told and retold in flashback, the marshal’s true motives gradually emerge..

At the allegorical heart of the story lies the conflict and perhaps inherent incompatibility between society and the individual (even the narrative itself is unsure whether to define itself as about personal revenge or a tale of peoples). This is underlined by the fact that apart from the main 6 or so characters, all the large number of other actors in the film remain cloaked in anonymity, depersonalized by the crowd. Yimou appears to be conveying the underlying message that Communism is in the roots of China’s history, and that individual suffering is ultimately justified by the intent of the many. But rather than being a straightforward apology for contemporary Chinese authoritarianism, the film clearly laments the functional sacrifice of its main protagonists, especially the fated love of the two assassins Flying Snow and Broken Sword – played

magnificently by Maggie Cheung and Tony Leung of 1999’s In the Mood for Love. (The Shakespearian ending to their story significantly throws up the lasting image in a film full of powerful images.) This is a society which undoubtedly prioritizes the collective gain over individual happiness; but while stressing the painful necessity of this, the film simultaneously mourns its consequences.

Hero employs largely the same production team that was behind Ang Lee’s Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon – so expect more ballet-style martial arts choreography, wire-simulated flying, serene music and breathtaking locations. The fight scenes are to films like this how songs are to musicals, they are the climaxes of each movement, the head-on confrontation of the dominant themes. Though you may fear you have seen this all before, the sheer beauty and intricate construction lends each battle its own unique defining quality and throughout it manages to be both entertaining and

moving in equal measures. This is obviously helped by the quite phenomenal use of colour (reminiscent of The Last Emperor) where each narrative thread is themed by a different colour of the rainbow, providing a visual variety sometimes conspicuous by its absence in films of this genre.

There are some clear weaknesses. The retrospective narrative structure at times comes across as clumsy and contrived, and the odd narrative twist seems to be included only as an excuse for another set-piece fight scene. Also, apart from the fated love story, the characters are often twodimensional, making emotional involvement with the film quite difficult. But these are common weaknesses of the martial arts epic genre, and besides, the real coup d’etat of this film is its visual breadth and extravagance which cannot be emphasized too greatly.

Quite why it took so long to get this film distributed to European cinemas is unclear, but the good news

Tuesday October 12, 2004

Trinity News

11

TRAVEL Basle, Bilbo Baggins & Paddy Reily’s Sean Brady

Tradition: the irish abroad will always be the first to crush people for free drink

There are some things that just have to be experienced so that at the end when you meet the Big Guy at the Pearly Gates you can say that you have made the most out of life. There is love, joy, anger, sorrow and a trip away with the Boys in Green! This is the story of one such trip, when a motley crew of six Irish eejits headed off to Basle, Switzerland for the crunch European Championship Qualifier between the Irish and the Swiss.

Where to begin?! Well the beginning sounds like a good idea, so..we got up at eight am on a cold but bright friday morning from our base in Italy where we were doing Erasmus. We picked up the Polo which we had rented for the weekend having pulled a nice one on the rental company the day before, telling them we were going to do a wee tour around Lake Como and the lovely fishing regions south of Genoa! We then drove the car to the nearest supermarket where we bought five crates of kronenberg, six bottles of wine and some vodka. We then quietly made are way to the swiss border where, acting like responsible citizens, we charmed our way past the border guards without getting the beer confiscated, let the madness commence!

We stopped in a service station five miles up the road and cracked open the beer and started the car decoration.

From our kind sponsors at bar San Tommasso, we had obtained hundreds of Paddy's day balloons,green hats, metres of shamrock bunting, tons of shamrock shaped "kiss me I'm irish" stickers,guinness hats, keyrings and flashing shamrock shaped badges! I will leave it up to your imagination as regards the state of the car as we flew down the motorway forty minutes later as the kronenberg flowed!

As we rolled our merry way across the mountains and vallies of Switzerland, destiny caught up with us.

As we scanned the local radio a bewildering announcement was made.The next song to be played was to be "Bilbo Baggins", performed by none other than LEONARD NIMOY! We could not believe it-here we are decked in green, driving a car taken straight out of a St. Patrick's Day parade organised by an overzealous American whose great grandaddy was from Wick-low, as Spock sings a song which dramatically narrated the story of the Hobbit in three minutes with crazy horn solos thrown in for good luck!

It is moments like that makes you just laugh at life and the madness of it all!

Here are some of the words of the verse: Bilbo, bilbo, bilbo baggins, only three foot tall, Bilbo, bilbo, bilbo baggins, the greatest little hobbit of the all!!!!

Well after that you can imagine the criac we were having singing and 'dancing' in the car as a long traffic jam emerged on the horizon in front of us.

It was at this time that one member of our strange band of travelling leprechauns band took it upon himself to leap from the back seat of the car across 4 lanes of oncoming traffic to relieve himself in the trees beside the road!we kept on moving forward though and soon Dan was out of sight and we were getting worried, well as worried as you can be when you’re drunk in a shamrock decorated car with Spock singing in the background! All worries were needless however as Dan came running back but only after just dodging a german lorry which i swore was being driven by david Hasselhoff!

So we descended on the bar with our bags of beer and sat outside and drank to the tunes of "we all dream of a team of gary breens" Our foolish band soon arrived in Basle and descended on the Promise Land, Paddy Reilly's Irish Pub and be God, the sight would have brought a tear of joy to a West Brit sitting in his Orange Lodge wearing his Rangers Jersey in Dublin 4! The best of Ireland was there, St. Patrick and his leprechaun followers, the bodhrans,football jerseys from the 4 corners of the island(i even saw a Cavan one-God knows how that purebred cavan man survived in Switzerland, the land of the 10euro McDonald's given that this cavan-louth crossbreed was going mad), and sure of course we had our national symbol there in all its glory-the steaming drunk bastards!

So we descended on the bar with our bags of beer and sat outside and drank to the tunes of "we all dream of a team of gary breens" and molly malone and the sights of wee leprechauns climbing up poles, bridges and trees to hang up flags,sights of fellas wearing green hotpants dancing on kegs and getting a Lee Carsley chant

going....aww I tell ya i saw more in those view hours than many a man does in a lifetime! We took the first victory of the weekend as well, we drank the bar DRY, and i say that in big letters coz i mean EVERYTHING in the bar was gone-not even a drop a whiskey in the place!!we're a great nation!

The decision was then made to go back to the car to restock our bags of beer and listen to bilbo baggins-i couldn't even see at this stage,so here was me trying to find the radio but completely missing and ending up putting on the fecking indicators, windscreen wipers,the water spray to clean the windows, the steering wheel lock-but not a sound came out of the radio!

Meanwhile one mate has passed out beside me, one is in the back stoned off her face talking about elephants, giraffes, the cartoon Babar and who's next in line for the rhino kingdom(cornelius seemingly!) It was then that we hear some swiss dude in his dressing gown shouting down from his bedroom window for us to shut up-so we then decided to drive away to find another spot- God know how we made it, its all a bit blurry but we drove on the wrong side of the road manys a time!

We all soon proceeded to pass out and reawaken an hour later at 7 in the morning, and to restart the drinking!ya can imagine the sight-7 in the morn, six leprechauns cracking open the cans and doing ceilis in the middle of the street to the sound of Spook chanting on about how bilbo battled Gollum to get his magic ring!Ould jacko was represented too as smooth criminal was played as we tried to moonwalk on window stills and doorsteps around the car!my riverdance/graham Norton impression was also on show!

Hands and knees and any other limbs capable of carrying us were then used to get to the bar where in full war paints, hair dyes and weaponry-beer and an inflatable hammer- we met lads and went out to the stadium for the game..lets not talk of the horrors that ensued later on the pitch as our hopes of going to Portugal were crushed but lets just say that after the initial period of mourning we began afresh- leading to stories of german uboat commanders,sickness, alan McLoughlin, the immortal Alan and his two Hall Soothers, cabaret shows, missing persons, German accordion bands, babies, handbreaks,hills and sidemirrors......an Irish away match, it's what life's all about.

Journey to Yangon’s whispering streets Jane Plunkett Arriving into Yangon airport in Myanmar, formally Burma, with only dollars in our pockets, we headed straight for an official looking money exchange counter to get a few ‘kyat’ for a taxi. At 450kyat to the dollar at this bank counter, which was pretty ‘kyat’ all right, paying the taxi in dollars and seeing if a better exchange rate popped up city centre seemed like the best idea. Being two of a hand-full of westerners to land in Yangon that afternoon, taxi drivers swooped around us like vultures for the fare. We fell prey to a determined taxi driver; whose teeth were stained a not-so-charming shade of red from chewing tobacco and for two dollars was dropped at an adorable, clean and inexpensive guesthouse called ‘Okinawa’, situated on 32nd street in Yangon centre.

On the streets of Yangon, black market dealers breezed by me, whispering in my ear ‘you exchange money?’. The city boasts busy treelined boulevards, packed with market stalls, selling all kinds of everything that you really don’t want or need. You can be lucky however and come across a gem find, like a pair of 1970’s original Ray-Ban motorcycle shades for a mere $4.

Being Monsoon season, the rain pours down randomly from the heavens, leaving you slipping and sliding along dirty hole pocketed streets, dodging scampering rats as they run for cover. The thunderous rain caused us to eat and drink tea at a little covered street side stall. Tiny children’s plastic chairs, barely 20cm off the ground are the norm to sit on, and it’s a funny sight at first. Rather like a quirky scene from Alice in Wonderland. However the delicious food, tofu, green bean salad, tealeaf salad, rice and noodles and abundant pots of tea, soon take your mind off trying to master a ‘crouching tiger’ position on a toddler’s chair. If Ireland and Myanmar have anything in common, it has to be a love of tea and tea drinking. Anytime you rest, wait for something or even stall mid-stride in Myanmar, someone will offer you tea.

Having been taken quite by surprise at not encountering any other travellers our first night in Yangon, I was actually more taken aback at the lack of military or police presence on the streets, which I had somehow expected. All I saw around me were friendly, smiling, playful faces that were keen to talk and find out where we came from. ‘Ireland’, I would tell them; ‘Oh Ireland yes’, they would reply and then shout out, ‘Roy Keane!’ through smiling red stained gums.

Towering over the colonial streets of Yangon is a most impressive site, the Shwedagon Pagoda. A golden, glistening, ruby and diamond adorned ancient landmark, safekeeping stories of past kings and rulers. The best way to make your way around this astounding temple is to get hold of a guide, who will spend an hour or two explaining the history of the Pagoda and narrate intriguing stories about each monument. It’s a fascinating site, where in today’s cynical world, their public display of faith is a welcome breath of fresh air.

Eighteen hours on a reasonably comfy air-conditioned bus brought us to perhaps what is the most beautiful place I have ever experienced, Inle Lake. The bus pulled in about 6.30am, while we in turn slowly dragged ourselves out of valium induced sleeps. The place had a serene air to it and in our sleepy state, this was nicely complimented by the fact there were no frantic, crazy tour-guides or street-sellers fighting for our attention. We ended up just following the calming voice of Kyaw Soe, a local boat driver, to his sister’s restaurant where a day trip on the lake was organised.

Inle Lake is dense with lush surface vegetation and home to Myanmar’s unique breed of leg-rowers. In order for them to make their way through the crowded water plants they stand on one leg at the back of the

A golden, glistening, ruby and diamond adorned ancient landmark, boats and wrap their other leg around the oar and use this leg to propel the boat forwards; a captivating sight.

Dotted around the 25km lake are numerous markets, floating villages, a silk mill, endless pagoda’s, a hot spring and energising peace and quiet.

Blanketing the lake also, are local fishermen with interesting looking nets and methods of fishing. A quick stop at the Nga Phe Kyaung monastery, otherwise known as the ‘monastery of jumping cats’ on Inle’s shores, is a worthwhile disembark. The temple is home to a rather cheeky cigarette smoking monk as well as twelve cats that have been trained in the art of jumping through hoops.

After eight hours on the open lake, in which time my skin had metamorphosed into a similar shade of red to that of the Burmese tobacco chewing teeth, our boat driver invited us back for dinner in his lakeside village. Kyaw Soe’s humble bamboo hut stood tall in his little village and

looked out onto an indescribably beautiful view of the lake. As we approached, excited kids and curious neighbours greeted us and ushered us into his hut. An evening of unrelenting Burmese hospitality was enjoyed by flickering candlelight and as my friend produced a guitar, a session of Burmese and western songs were enjoyed till late in the evening. Well eleven o’ clock, late by their books!

We were brought back to our guesthouse the only way that was possible to be brought back, by boat. All day I had complete trust in Kyaw Soe’s boating skills, however after an evening of drinking local rice wine, especially with his visible low tolerance to alcohol, I felt a little uneasy being powered back through pitch dark and narrow waterways. Uneasiness, that was perhaps highlighted by the fact I had to nearly pull my fingers out of indentations I’d left in the boats crafted woodwork as I jumped off.

Just witnessing the quiet, humble and kind nature of the Burmese people is therapeutic in itself. They lead simple lives and hold no concerns for trivia that bothers the western mind. Their gentle, unassuming and generous ways are traits that the western world could heed, before the power of greed actually gobbles us all up. I left the hut of Kyaw Soe that evening almost jealous of the peacefulness I’d felt in his families’ presence. A humble way of life, free from commercial and material pollution.

The comfy air-conditioned bus we got to Inle Lake must have been some sort of freak luxury, because the jam-packed ‘Toyota Hi-ace style’ bus (advertised as a first class coach), which took us to Bagan, was certainly no-where in its league. It was interesting however witnessing how twenty-nine people actually can, if you really try, fit into a bus that would normally probably only hold sixteen.

Needless to say the weight of the bus along with absolute dismal road conditions, led to a burst tire and a two-hour wait on the hot and dusty roadside for repairs.

Bagan offers visitors a great selection of 70’s style Japanese bicycles to tour the city on. The word city in relation to Bagan, which comprises of an ‘old city and a ‘new city’, can be somewhat misleading, as there are mainly just small street side shops and restaurants. However, surrounding you on all sides is a ‘city of pagodas’, the main and almost only incentive for visiting Bagan. Cycling off the main track leaves you enveloped in a landscape of mesmerising Pagodas. Some are gigantic and almost give you a sense of intimidation as you circle their circumference. They are scattered randomly across Bagan, hundreds of them, all magnificent. Built and donated over

A Tramp Abroad Heidelberg, Dueling,the Beer King, Student Life Sam Clemens Dueling……The third duel was brief and bloody. The surgeon stopped it when he saw that one of the men had received such bad wounds that he could not fight longer without endangering his life. Sometimes spectators of these duels faint--and it does seem a very reasonable thing to do, too. The fourth duel was a tremendous encounter; but at the end of five or six minutes the surgeon interfered once more: another man so severely hurt as to render it unsafe to add to his harms.

Both parties to this fourth duel were badly hurt so much that the surgeon was at work upon them nearly or quite an hour. But this waiting interval was not wasted in idleness by the assembled students. It was past noon, therefore they ordered their landlord, downstairs, to send up hot beefsteaks, chickens, and such things, and these they ate, sitting comfortable at the several tables, whilst they chatted, disputed and laughed. The door to the surgeon's room stood open, meantime, but the cutting, sewing, splicing, and bandaging going on in there in plain view did not seem to disturb anyone's appetite.

I had seen the heads and faces of ten youths gashed in every direction by the keen two-edged blades, and yet had not seen a victim wince, nor heard a moan, or detected any fleeting expression which confessed the sharp pain the hurts were inflicting. People laugh at it mainly because they think the student is so covered up with armor that he cannot be hurt. But it is not so; his eyes are ears are protected, but the rest of his face and head are bare. He can not only be badly wounded, but his life is in danger; and he would sometimes lose it but for the interference of the surgeon.

Formerly the student's armpits were not protected--and at that time the swords were pointed, whereas they are blunt, now; so an artery in the armpit was sometimes cut, and death followed. Then in the days of sharp-pointed swords, a spectator was an occasional victim--the end of a broken sword flew five or ten feet and buried itself in his neck or his heart, and death ensued instantly.

The student duels in Germany occasion two or three deaths every year, now, but this arises only from the carelessness of the wounded men. …..The grave, precise, and courtly ceremony with which the thing is conducted, invests it with a sort of antique charm.

Beer King Club events – or “Kneips”-- are held, now and then, to celebrate great occasions, like the election of a beer king. The solemnity is simple; the five corps assemble at night, and at a signal they all fall loading themselves with beer, out of pint-mugs, as fast as possible, and each man keeps his own count--usually by laying aside a lucifer match for each mug he empties. The election is soon decided. When the candidates can hold no more, a count is instituted and the one who has drunk the greatest number of pints is proclaimed king – I was told that the last beer king emptied his mug 75 times.

No stomach could hold all that quantity at one time , of course- but there are ways of frequently creating a vacuum, which those who have been much at sea will understand.

Join Trinity News Have you seen things no one else believes?

Been to the Depths of Mordor? bron-yraun/California J1/ vacwork erasmus/ backpacking/interrailing Referred to by locals as the ‘spinning top of the god Ragaputu’, the Sowedagon Pagoda is believed to have fallenout of the sky over 3000years ago ancient years by various rulers these pagodas are a wondrous sight to behold and leave you awe trying to take in their dominating beauty. It is amazing to observe in these remote parts, how life with all its apparent necessities, continues uninterrupted.

The blazing sun shines down on the beautiful Burmese skin day in and day out, but they do not spend bundles of money on expensive sunscreens. A simple procedure of rubbing the base of a stub of wood on a wet wooden surface, produces a yellow sap that is

applied to the skin, dried with a fan and gives all day sun protection. It also doubles as make-up and is very popular among younger Burmese women.

Why not share the experience?

Send in your Travel Stories to: travel@trinity-news.com

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Tuesday October 12, 2004

Trinity News FOOD & DRINK Made to go unnoticed Not far from the Luas and the carnival of Graftons street a chef at the very top of the demented and beautiful hierarchy that is professional cooking plies his trade.

Patrick O Connor Christy Ring was the finest hurler of all time, period.Having only a rough sketch of the man fahioned from paper articles and tattered photos I found a man of unparalled genius. More so than the physiolog and a few well told legends what allowed me to experience the grace of Christie Ring were the hurlers who people said were almost as good, the likes of John Fenton, Jimmy Barry Murphy, even in Cork the list is short.

The awe that is still associated with him was possible only because hurling was the county’s most successful sport, its heroes were passed on as each generation fed off each other.

There are a small number of outstanding Irish chefs working both here and abroad but they are too few and far apart. Whether we accept it or not the level of cooking in this country couldn’t inspire greyhounds out of a trapdoor. Yet on an internet site created for chefs all over the world to dish the shit and give oral testimonies to their culinary deities an Irish man is regarded as one of the very best, only behind Thomas Keller and Alain Ducasse as the greatest chef in the world. In a country devout of a culinary culture he is a fluke affair, lucky. I spoke to the him at his restaurant, the eponymous Thornton’s in The Fitzwilliam Hotel on St Stephens Green.

POC: You seemed surprised that anyone would want to interview you?

KT: I’m surprised when anyone wants to interview me. I don’t go around thinking I’m x, y or z. I just do my thing. This is what I do. I’m lucky to be doing it.

POC: What attracted you to the idea of being chef?

KT: Its hard to say what attracted me.

You don’t make conscious decisions.

What happens is that you’re pulled towards something and you have no real understanding why. You have been training for several years and you look back at things you’ve done. To me its more than cooking, it’s a chosen path maybe for me a way to express myself.

POC: Can you tell me how you got from Cashel Palace to here.

Well I wasn’t born in Cashel Palace.

When I was a kid I worked in a abattoir and in the gardens there ( Cashel Palace). I was really attracted to the raw materials behind the food. I got college in Galway and stayed there for two years. I went to London for a year, then hitched around Europe working in vineyards and making earrings.

POC: Earrings?

KT: Ya earrings and bracelets. You see cooking is not just my only thing. You have to be open. Cooking is a way of doing what I do. Its like in anything in life if you do the one thing you’re focus is not correct. What really helps me I suppose is photography. If you just do the one thing you are trapped in the one environment, you don’t even see what’s happening around you. It’s really difficult to explain it in such short detail, its like if someone goes for a walk on a beach, and you take ten steps you can see more than if you walk for ten or twenty miles. So anyway getting back to it, I worked in London, then Europe and came back to Ireland. It was horrible place to be at the time, in the sense that it was very sad, dark and gloomy, all my friends had left. You had to have a job to get a job. I came back to Ireland because you always miss Ireland for some reason. Then went to France and Switzerland and then came back. I always wanted to live in Dublin because I never knew what it was like. I worked at the Shelburne hotel and Adare Manor. I lectured in Cathal Burgha street. I set up the degree course. I thought if you can get a degree in bullshit why can’t you get a degree in cooking. Then we set up the Wine Epergne in Rathmines, originally with a six month lease but we stretched it to two years. We looked at buying the place but rates were at 27% and I needed a rest. So we closed that and I lectured for two years. Then we opened Portobello.. I was too young to be teaching. The trouble was they were all so narrow minded, they didn’t want a challenge.

POC: Traditional entry into cooking is changing. Charlie Trotter has a philosophy degree, Heston Blumenthal had range of admin type jobs, the list is getting longer as chefs come from more middleclass backgrounds especially in America. Does catering college still have something to offer?

KT: In this country you were a gobshite if you went into cooking, it was the last thing you did if you couldn’t get into anything else and the colleges haven’t really progressed since then. In the last two years they have started to. When we started up the degree it was to change their minds and mentality. If you think of the skills you need to run a business of this calibre it’s huge. I don’t really want to think about it and then you have to be creative but being creative is the easy part.

more to attract a better calibre of student.

KT: No. I don’t think they’re dealing with.

POC: With all the talk of good food in the country has the quality of cheffing actually improved.

KT: No. Certainly not. The quality of the gobshites has got even worse, They come in full of shit with briefcases, excuse the language but they think they’re amazing. They have the mentality. They don’t want to go into a job to earn the right o be X, Y or Z, they don’t want to do an apprenticeship. They have a degree so they think they are entitled to this but you know nobody is entitled to anything. You have earn it POC: Can we talk about what is happening in haut cuisine. There is a lot of talk about the originality, the science of restaurants like El bulli and The Fat Duck. Is this a style of cooking you enjoy.

KT: No, it’s a laboratory. The Fat Duck is a complete copy of El Bulli, that’s great for them, they’re good at marketing, we’re shit at marketing. Personally I don’t believe in it. Of course you can’t knock, but in a sense it’s not for me.

POC: What chefs are exciting you at the moment.

KT: Pierre Gagnaire.

POC: Even what he’s doing at Sketch.

KT: Yes, he’s brilliant, his mind is brilliant. The Patisserie is like a jewellers, it is a different thing. I think I spent the whole day in there. Also Michel Bras.

I’m a naturalist.

POC: He’s cooking at his best now. I read in one interview that you would like “maybe a place in the country where I could produce everything I need for the kitchen. A place where I wouldn't have to rely on other people to produce the food I cook” Is that still a something you might be interested in, creating a something like Bras at Laguiole.

Ya. If you freak out it has to be to the point, short and brief.

KT: Definitely for the future. You’ve got to do certain things, to get certain places. It’s a learning curve, I’m learning all the time. This ( Thornton’s) is not our destination either, I want to be….it’s hard here, it’s hard in Ireland because the Irish don’t appreciate although it’s unfair to say that because it’s a new thing for us, they don’t know the difference between good, very good and excellent food. That’s why we try to educate, our lunch menu is 30 euros.

POC: So are Catering College doing

POC: What does the Michelin stars

POC: Being creative is the easy part?

The enterance to Kevin Thorntons two michelin star restaurant at the Fitzwilliam Hotel mean. Does it help you to focus.

KT: I’m always focused I think. I don’t want to get sidetracked. Ok it’s good publicity and I want my to get my third star, its helps you to get to the next level. I’m lucky, my food is energy cooking. I always get the staff to look at themselves as the customer. Again it means more than cooking, it’s a spiritual thing. I’m very privileged to do what I’m doing, I’m working with live energy.

POC: I ate at Helen Darroze last month and it was really disappointing. Do you think there is inconsistencies in the Michelin system.

KT: There is inconsistencies in everything. We are two different people.

When you go into a restaurant and you don’t feel that kick in the arse thing, no

energy, its stale, it’s not live, you feel there is something wrong and what is usually wrong is the person ( chef) is not there. I can only stay away one maybe two weeks after that small things drop. I’m lucky I’m really into what I’m doing. We’re as good as anybody. We’re a theatre, two shows a day, five days a week, that’s tough going. Everything is against you. Something like this should be a protected species, it’s very important for the culture, everything is speed, it’s important for people to sit down and relax. Back to the restaurant, maybe your minds not focused, your taste buds not right, your looking for something that not there. All our expectations are too high, if you go with an open mind and chill out you’d probably get a much better buzz.

POC: That’s it. Thank you for your time.

KT: No problem.

Photo: Patrick O’ Connor

The lunch menu at Thorntons Restaurant 2 Courses - Eur 30.00 3 Courses - Eur40.00 Sauteed Queen Scallops with Aubergine Caviar Beetroot Puree and Lime Oil Noisette of Venison, Chanterelle Risotto, Hazelnut Sauce Confit of Vegetable Terrine with Truffle -----Sauteed Fillet of Red Mullet with Ballotine of Halibut Prawn Bisque and Sabayon Braised Pheasant with Chestnut Puree, Wild Mushroom Ravioli and Calvados Sauce Magret of Duck wit Confit of Red Cabbage, Celeriac Mousse, Blackcurrant Sauce -------Pear Parfait with Glazed Red Berries, Pear Sorbet White Chocolate Mousse with Raspberry Sauce Apple Tartlet with Nettle and Thyme Sorbet

Pub and Restaurant Review: The Merrion Hotel and Carnival Merrion Hotel,21-24 Upper Merrion St.

Carnival, 11 Wexford St

want to eat this type of food in restaurants simple salads, simple soups, simple steaks. Why bother have chefs at all?

Entrance to the Merrion Hotel In the Transvaal there is a witch doctor who fattens mussels in maize. He eases the maize into barrels of salt water and tips the mussels into the brackish porridge. The mollusces lap it up. The idea of fattening is simple. Fattening, however, is not simple. Nor is force feeding

or restricted dieting. The idea of hunger is simple, keeping it at bay it isn’t. In fact there is nothing simple about food.

Yet there is a movement, no a revolution that seems hell bent on trying to make people believe that there is such a thing as simple food. The idea of simple

Photo: Eamon Marron food was lashed around in an effort to sell more cook books and more cooking programs. What it really means is that it is possible to create at home these dishes, the proviso being that you need to have a larder that would make a restaurant blush. The affect is that people now

The Cellar restaurant is not this type outfit. Its food is thoughtful, like the shellfish platter starter for two. Its menu constructed around flavours other than chilli and garlic, like goats cheese with pea and mint. The deserts were nott so successful, the cheesecake was like sucking on a baby’s soother. Except for its name its an ambitious restaurant.

The service was suspicious. A waitress was shoed away from our table by restaurant manager and he never left our side. When the wine we asked for had ran out he produced a sensational bottle of red burgundy for the same price. The wine list is appalling, too short, too big on Bordeaux. It’s a lonely enough restaurant, the cellars functionality creating a cold, unshakeable dimness as if it was still parenting ( very pc) fine old ports and clarets ( very unpc). If your were narcissistic you’ll be fine otherwise bring a crowd.

You should go, bring your class and your friends‘ class. For the standard of food and service it represents almost the best value in town. Upstairs in the main body of the hotel you can have a pint in one of the finest publicspace’s in Dublin. Mains start at thirteen euros.

Grade 2:2.

Carnival, sister of Voodoo and the Dice bar in Smithfield, sits on a corner Wexford St. and is the quintessence of a laid-back New York style bar. The snug east-village-y charm of Carnival most likely originates from the fact ‘Hugey’ of the Fun Loving Criminals owns a stake in the bar. In the past many bars tried to make a go of this prime location on Wexford Street, but none it seems ever managed to take off. Then Carnival arrived, painted the entire exterior black, put up a modest little sign in coloured lights and it’s doors have been bursting at the seams every weekend since. You would barely notice it and that’s what makes it popular.

Inside it’s dark. Large church candles on tables generate the lighting and the

whole bar is enveloped in a red hue as they flicker off the red poster splashed walls Comfy leather couches circumference the room and if you’re their early, there are two nice cosy booths down the back. The interior is draped with masks hanging from the walls and ceiling and the whole place generally boasts a carnival theme, surprise surprise! Upstairs at Carnival is a new venture that will be opening its doors to the public in the next few weeks. The split level space will have a circus theme running through it, which will also be available for private hire.

The drinks menu is your normal run of the mill list, beers, wine and spirits. A Guinness will set you back €4 and a larger €4.50. The music, like the clientele is funky and fun. Friday, Saturday and Sunday nights are host to great DJ’s

and lots of dancing. Saturday night kicks off with a Northern Soul session from 6-9, which will ensure putting a smile on your face. While Sunday’s Reggae night is threatening to be the best around.

Smokers don’t have to stand on the street to get a fix, because there is a huge beer garden out the back. It’s not exactly what you’d call swanky, but when the sun goes down and the candles come out, it’s perfect. Graffiti covers the walls, old looking couches with high wooden tables and chairs are scattered around the place and some are thankfully covered with canopy’s for the approaching winter months.

Rumour has it they are soon to invest in heaters too!

Grade 2:1

Tuesday October 12, 2004

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Trinity News FOOD & DRINK Schwarzenegger gets tough on foie gras but will the fat liver be back?

When TN heard that Arnie has banned foie gras we thought he had mistaken it for a gay parade but does the argument against cruelty hold up?

Herodotus and Arnold Schwarzenegger are both part of the story. So is the Louvre, Rome and Egypt.

Proust maybe too, certainly Paul McCartney. Casey Affleck and Pliny the Elder. What piece of truth might these have in common is more than nobody would care to think about?

Hopefully not anymore. While I’ll don’t take pleasure in ramming anything down your collective gullet, the particulars of the above fairy-tale are perhaps crucial to the life that truss’s them together. The thread binding the good, the evil and the vegetarian is foie gras.

Foie Gras, which means fat liver, has long been the delicacy of choice, its rich butter like texture and taste aches something crunchy and sweet. My desert island preparation of this is mi-cuit terrine with a baguette grilled over the fire and a bottle of cold, sweet Saussignac. The problem is I better get stranded very quickly because foie gras is definitely the next hunting.

On September 29, 2004, Governor Arnie signed into law California SB 1520 which will ban the force feeding of ducks and geese in the production of foie gras and the sale of the product in the state, the provisions taking affect by 2012. Israel, Germany ( who imported 32 tonnes from France, 1995), Switzerland ( who imported 73 tonnes from France, 1995) and ,rather predictably, the United Kingdom ( who imported 37 tonnes from France, 1995) have already banned the production of Foie Gras. Ban the production of a good that was not being produced in any considerable amounts but let it come in from the neighbouring country because it tastes so bloody good. Keep the control, the quality and the science out but the urban mis-morality intact.

The History.

Depending on which side you fall on foie gras is either a human inhumanity or a showstopper of human ingenuity.

The setting is the Egypt 2500BC. The young son of a fisherman watches as ducks gorge themselves prior to migration in order to temporarily store fat in their liver and skin, which they use for energy over the period of the migration.

Noting already that ducks, like all waterfowl, seem to be able to swallow whole live fish he begins to invest in the idea that he might be able to increase the food load of the ducks if he force fed them, then farming them for their meat and offal. The ducks can swallow whole as they have no gag reflex, stomach or throat, the oesophagus serving as a holding area for the food, while it’s being digested.

Force feeding has being been noted by Horace, Homer and Herodotus. A high ranking Egyptian official, Ti was so fond of the stuff that when he was buried, in accordance with his beliefs, he wished to take the livers with him into the next world. His funeral chamber was decorated in cartoon like strips with the process of force feeding. The paintings are now in the Louvre along with the statuette of a fattened goose more than 4500 years old. The ancient Romans fattened their geese with figs.

Around the sixteenth century the Jews of Bohemia were well known for their skills at feeding geese, the Jews beginning to puree the liver, expanding the culinary possibilities of foie gras. But the high art of manipulating the almost beige like liver came around the middle of the seventeenth century in France, Lyon and Strasbourg both claiming the honour. The livers were combined with truffles, spices and alcohol, the result was pate de foie gras.

Foie gras is now a world taste, like Big Mac, rubbery sushi, camembert and risotto. And like them its has its very bad, bad, good and, very rarely, excellent examples. In Ireland you can buy it in supermarkets, cheese mongers, deli’s and wine stores. Most of it is very, very bad.

The Food.

Once the liver has been removed one can then begin to see the real skill and ingenuity of the chefs that buy the birds or the by-products. The liver is only one part of the fattened bird, its preparation is minimal compared to the challenge of the thigh, the gizzard and neck. The breast of fattened goose is delicious. In fact every piece of the goose can and should be eaten, the crispy piece of skin really well salted is delicious with a pint of stout. Try it the next time you roast chicken. Bring out a plate of the crispy skin as a starter with any stout, it tastes like bacon fries.

Every white knob of fat can be melted and preserved for roasts and sautés.

Foie gras can be eaten at any stage right up to the time of desert. It can act as an accompaniment for a greater cause like beef Rossini or can star almost entirely of its own. Foie gras can be eaten hot or cold. An example of its versatility can be seen in Daniel Bould’s elaborate dish of Roast Foie Gras with Port, Figs and Frisee. The foie gras is sautéd on a very hot pan, the idea being the outside forms an almost crust like texture sealing in the molten liver. Preparation of foie gras like this is not normally found anywhere other than restaurants. It’s a dish where chefs like to engage in metaphors and refer-

ences, the above dish is definitely Napoleonic, the chef resorting to foods that are not French in origin but have become signature French ingredients, bar the Port, through a type of culinary foray and repatriation.

Bird Specifics.

The duck chosen for foie gras production is a cross between a male muscovy or Barbary duck and the female of the breed like a Pekin, a domestic duck.

The product is a sterile hybrid called the mulard duck. The male of this hybrid is used for liver and the female for meat.

Geese which are forced fed are a specific strain : oie du Gers and oie grise du sud-ouest. Far more duck foie gras is produced than goose. Ducks take less fattening in terms of the length of time and the mass of maize. They require more handling and will yield only a liver that average 500 grams compared to a goose which is much larger averaging at about 1.5 kg.

The Process.

The mulard ducks are kept in doors on straw or wood shavings for 4 weeks. They are then allowed to live outside, walk about and have access to all natural feed and water. After three weeks the birds begin preparation for the feeding, this is designed to widen their oesophagus. After four weeks the bird receives large quantities of food ad libitum, the birds begin to fatten but the force feeding period has not yet begun.

Again the oesophagus widens in preparation for the forced feeding. The birds movements become restricted to prevent too much loss of weight. In the final period of feeding forced ingestion is done daily, for 12 to 15 days for ducks and 15 to 18 days for geese.

The feed is usually maize which is boiled and mixed with fat. However some producers have begun to target haut cuisine restaurants and gourmands by fattening them a l’ancien with figs.

It is administered by force using a long tube consisting of a pneumatic pump that pushes the feed out into the oesophagus. With no stomach the feed is held in the crop-like area. The birds must always be restrained and positioned.

The complaints.

The most obvious problem people have is the force feeding. The image of restraining a duck while a tube is rammed down its throat and then food mechanically pushed into the crop area is the stuff of nightmares for most.

Indeed so is the idea of a metal hook entering the mouth of a sea bass under the cover of bait then wrenched firmly so the hook enters the top of the fishes mouth. In food the ways in which humanity coxes animals into a more user friendly products is endless. Calves

and lambs are fed only milk so the meat is whiter neither being the natural way to rear a lamb or calf. But maybe I’m wrong. Nature provides above all function. There are two elements to the above treatment of calves and lambs.

One is that the calf’s meat will turn white when fed only on milk and two is that we function in such a way as to be able to recognise to natural phenomenon. And we take advantage of this because we can, we see enterprise or know that the food has become more presentable.

The problems brought to the fore by the Scientific Committee on Animal Health and Welfare for the European Union point to some of the abuses in the practice of force feeding. ~The birds are kept in small pens, often in large groups. ~ They can’t forage and often can’t bathe which is a greater motivator to eat especially for the muscovy ducks.

Animals that normally respond really well to be fed from the hand of a humane walk away after being force fed. ~ Animals that were force fed did not leave their pens, some unable to stand. ~ The insertion of the tube must overcome the gag reflex, the birds find this distressing and injury can result.

Whether these can be dealt with while continuing to farm foie gras is difficult to tell. The problem has become that soon France may be the final resting place for farming foie gras.

Legislators in Europe are happy to let the France farm all the foie gras needs of this huge market, letting big businesses that are sloppy on humane animal practices to continue without research into alternative forms of fattening livers.

One thing is certain. Foie gras is a taste that is not going away.

The only country that has stuck with its animal welfare epithet is America. The existence of a black market for foie gras where the livers were inserted in wheels of cheese and bellies of fish delivered from France and Canada led to the U.S Department of Agriculture certifying eleven French foie gras producers, allowing them to export from France to the U.S. In 2000 the U.S. reviewed its certification and told the French to upgrade their practices. The French resisted. The USDA complained that the upgrade was necessary to better predict contamination, the French complained that the upgrade was too expensive. In 2002, the USDA decertified four of the eleven and in February of this year it enacted a full ban until the French met with the revised sanitation standards. Last month, after calls from Paul Mc Cartney, Martin Sheen, Chrissie Hynde, Casey Affleck, the Californian State senate passed a bill to ban the production of foie gras from 2012 on.

The debate will continue to rage. PETA’s Dan Shannon, has said “that once anybody finds out how it’s

Tuna foie gras soon to be no longer available in California produced most will swear never to eat it again”. People aren’t so fussy Dan. What is it that makes people produce foie gras and continue to eat it in full knowledge of the process, even dare I say, in high regard for the practice.

Dan’s insinuates that we suffer from a different moral structure even morally retarded. I lived near at least five small farmers who produced foie gras for their own table, some sold it on to the restaurants where they were de-veined, marinated in sweet wine, wrapped in

cloths and cooked. Without being twee both the farmers and restaurant were committed to the idea of using everything that nature provided. Ears, cheeks, wild mushrooms, there was nothing that could not be used to add to the pot.

Some see foie gras as animal cruelty and some as a part of an elaborate and dynamic food chain.

It’s dangerous to try and separate the idea of killing and the idea of eating. What about the mass produced chickens that appears in your

sandwich everyday? The birds are debeaked and declawed, held in pens where they fight amongst each other, subjected to the rough handling of highvolume farming, and finally slaughtered with grotesque efficiency.

Is this any less cruel then force feeding. Not at all. If you think I’m wrong then a decision has to be made. Meat or Mooli, you decide.

Wine Words

fication in this case. You know of the producer and have been satisfied with the work they have been doing in previous years or someone lays off to you a tip, for example this year in Bordeaux I’m backing Chateau Pibran.

The En Primeur wines for sale are from the 2003 vintage, harvested in September/ October 2003.

The wines will be delivered to the wine merchants in 2006 were they can be stored in bond at a registered warehouse, the duty and Vat deferred until you take them out of bond.

The Giant Food and Drink Quiz.

Answers to: foodanddrink@trinity-news.com

Prize: Lunch at Kevin Thornton’s with the Food and Drinks editor.

1.

2.

3.

4.

5.

6.

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8.

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A tropical fruit banned on the entire Singapore Transport System.

How many litres in a Bordeaux Tonneau What is the name of the only six Michelin Star chef in the world Name the Parisian hotel bar that featured in the closing episodes of Sex and the City.

Favism is triggered from the consumption or contact of what bean.

The wife of a famous British architect is a co-owner of this Hammersmith restaurant. Name the restaurant.

Name the restaurant in the Merrion Hotel that has two Michelin Stars.

The name of a Californian garage wine, Screaming …..

The name of The New Yorker writer who about his life in Paris from 1995 to 2000.

The restaurant critic for the Sunday Times is……

Name the travel site founded by the above restaurant crit ic.

The two colors of Truffles ( Mushroom, Not choco late ) Where does Port come from.

Zinfandel and P…….. are close cousins.

Germany’s most successful (in terms of recognition of quality rather than volume) white grape.

Germany’s sweetest white wine.

Passard makes a point of turning this fruit into a desert to show the limitations of Italian cooking.

The San Sebastian restaurant seen as the fore-father of El Bulli.

Two countries famous for their cigars.

The trinity bar on the periphery of the cricket grounds.

The vegetable used in chips.

The Trinity Guide to all your food and drink needs. Issue by issue we ingest the best. Area by area we pick apart your locality. The marks next to the victors are to emphasis how well they do against the very best in Dublin. The total of the marks will give you an idea of which part of town is the real liver and legume of Dublin’s food and drink scene.

PORTOBELLO Best for Booze: Jack Carvill and Sons, Wexford Street. (Great on beer, poor on wine) 3/5 Best for spices and exotics: Spiceland, Between Richmond St. and Harcourt St. (Go on Saturday morning) 2/5 Best for Meat: Hogan’s, Wexford Street. (4/5) Best for fruit and vegetables: Evergreen, Wexford Street. (4/5) Best for Stout: O’Connell’s, Richmond Street. (3/5) Beamish no Murphy’s. VG Guinness.

Best for Atmosphere: Carnival (4/5). Smokers get a well deserved break.

Best for tea: East, Richmond Street. (3/5) Best for the Larder: Listons, Camden Street Upper (2/5). Feta, biscuit cake and chocolate good, otherwise way overrated.

Best for bread and cake: Bretzel Bakery, Lennox St. (3/5).

Best for cooking: Locks, 1 Windsor Terrace. (3/5) A well deserved 31 out of 50, a 2:1

En Primeur.

In the last month or two catalogues for wine to be bought En Primeur have arrived in wine stores like Berry Brothers. There is some cloak and dagger notion about what is En Primeur.

It’s sounds terribly glamorous to be buying you’re wine En Primeur,. Well it kinda is in so far as it means that you have to have a little excess cash hanging around, some brass-neck like discipline and a little frontier like thinking.

In brief it’s a little like gambling. What your doing is buying wine before it is bottled. You will have studied the form, the vintage and vini-

En Primeur is an exciting way of buying wine, it’s all that wine buying isn’t anymore. You take the risk, the more research you do the more you reduce the risk. It’s a very personal purchase, ideal as a thoughtful present or a well deserved pat on the back.

14

Tuesday October 12, 2004

Trinity News

LISTINGS

THE NEXT FEW WEEKS IN DUBLIN.......

WEDNESDAY OCTOBER

13th

COLLEGE EVENTS

THURSDAY OCTOBER

14th Dance classes/ recep- party atmosphere with St, D 2, Jazz 10- 12 pm, Copmmon

COLLEGE

The PHIL, "This House believes that America Is The Hist, American A Terrorist State", 7.30 Presidency debate pm in the GMB. "That this House would Redneck Manifesto, gig Remove George from in the Buttery, the Music Washington", 7.30 pm, Society, 8.00 pm. the GMB. Fine Gael, Branch meeting, 7.00 pm, Swift GIGS Mosso/ Elation at the Theatre, Arts Block.

Eustace St, LSBT (Lesbian, Gay, Hub, Bisexual and Temple Bar, 7 euro Transgender Society) Table Quiz, 7.30 - 10.00 BARS/ CLUBS Dorans: pm, Elizabethan Eamon Rooms, 1st Floor, Copmmon Currency, Temple Bar, music/ House 6.

Maths Society drinks promotions form Doughnut Reception, 11 pm, 7/5 euro Picture House: Dirty 7.30 pm, SNIAM. House, Cmaden St, D2, Bowie/ Madonna/ BARS/ CLUBS Jackson/ Doyles, D-Basement, Michael Fleet St, D 2, dance/ remixes... 10-3 indie/ soul til 2.30, Red Box: The Pod: 'Graffitti, D2, student FREE Coyote: MonkeyFunk: night, R'n'B, Hip hop, 10.30, D'Olier St, D2, Chart/ chart...form classics/ R'n'B, 10 til ladies free before midnight, 5 euro late, FREE Wax, Basement Spy, Spirit; Rapture, Middle different South Willima St, D2, Abbey St, music on different lev80's.

Red Box, Yo-Yo student els, student night, 5 night; for the students euro with student card. who prefer Kylie to Bojangles, Salsa night, Oakey or Justin to Jeff Harcourt St, D 2, beginMills, Yo-Yo features all ners class 8pm 'til late the very latest R'n'B, with Dr Rumba....how chart & pop music, can you say no?

Harcourt Street, Doors N E U T R O N Y X ; 10.30pm, Ladies free Powerful Turbosound until midnight, €5 after 20KRig, projections & visual illusions will be 11:30pm Spirit; 'Deliverance', provided by K.J-Hoo. The roots and riddim Prepare to get into a express with Fadda psychalien nation and Fowl and King Rashid get abducted by the playing skanking reg- light & colours of the gae, dancehall and dub, new psydecoration and Abbey Street, Doors performances provided

by Neutronyx' psyde10pm, Tickets €5 The Globe/ Ri-Ra; 'U- coartists Atom.Glow, flyer, Turn', Soul to funk and €15/12with www.neutronyx.com. back again via the chipper with Stevie G and Colm Kenefick downstairs, while the The Fear’s Dave Cleary and friends keep it waterproof in the Globe, Exchequer St, 11:30pm, €7 / €5 with concession

FRIDAY OCTOBER

15th

COLLEGE EVENTS The Phil, "An Interview with the Great Ron Jeremy", 6.00 pm in the GMB.

THE WEEK IN ENTS...

Currency, tion, 7.30- 11.00 pm, an Temple Bar, music/ award winning Regent House. drinks promotions form sound system and all BARS/ CLUBS your favourite party Ri-Ra: Strictly handbag, 11 pm, 7/5 euro. tunes from chart to Dame Court, D 2, Picture House: Dirty GIGS Sonny Candell Band/ R'n'B and all those big Eclectic electrics/ rare House, Cmaden St, D2, Bowie/ Madonna/ late club, at the Hub, room anthems. Drink soul/ pop, 7 euro.

Michael Jackson/ Eustace St, Temple Bar, promos. Doors 10.30 remixes...

10-3. pm, ladies free before TUESDAY 19th OCTO12 euro.

Red Box: The Pod: 12.30, €10/€8 students BER 'Graffitti, D2, student DJ DAARA J @ LIVE MUSIC night, R'n'B, Hip hop, Boogie Allstars at Break Crawdaddy, Harcourt COLLEGE EVENTS 10.30, Society chart...form for the Border, Lower St. Last year's release Orchestral ladies free before midrehearsal, 7/00 pm, of 'Boomerang', the Stephen's St, D2. night, 5 euro. third album

by Regent House.

Spirit; Rapture, Middle Biochemical seminar, Senegalese crew Daara BARS/ CLUBS different 6.00 pm, Abbey St, look out for the free- J was described by The 5.00Observer as "one of the Baroness Susan music on different levbies... els, student night, 5 hip hop albums of the Greenfiel, Mac Neill.

Cocoon; 'Shakedown', euro with student card.

Duke Lane, D2, funky/ century" and he was Bojangles, Salsa night, BARS/ CLUBS later awarded a world soul/ disoco, smart music award by the Ri-Ra; Bump'n'hustle, Harcourt St, D 2, begindress, FREE Doors 8pm. Dame COurt, D2, rare ners class 8pm 'til late FRIDAY @ the Odean, BBC. groove/ latino/ hip-hop, with Dr Rumba....how Tickets; €15 standHarcourt St, D 2, retro/ can you say no? seated, from 11-30, 7 euro. disco/ indie/ R'n'B, til ing/€18.50 Spy: Wax Basement: www.ticketmaster.ie / 2.30, FREE South FRIDAY 22nd Gaiety Theatre/ Club, credit card hotline 0818 'Lowdown', William St, D 2, house OCTOBER South King St, 3 lev- 719300. from 11. els...live music, 11.304.

SUNDAY 17th COLLEGE WEDNESDAY 20th The PHIL, Las Vegas Hogans, off Camden St, OCTOBER D2, hip-hop, party/elec- OCTOBER Casino Night, 7.00 pm tro, 'til 2.30, FREE in the GMB. Pravda: 'Icon', Lower The Hist, The World COLLEGE Dance society, 7.30Liffey, D 1, soul/ funk/ Run-Offs, 10 am - 5 pm, The Hist- Northern 9.30, Regent House.

Ireland Debate; "This rock and roll, 'til 2.30, GMB. Savannah, Lower house believes Politics LIVE MUSIC FREE Spirit; Revelation, D2, Rathmines Road, D 6, have worsened the Charley's Angels @ Middle Abbey St, 11- Laid back, chill out Troubles", with Mark Break for the Border, sounds 'til 1 am.

Durkan (SDLP) and Lower Stephen's St, late, 15/ 20 Euro Paul Murphy, 5.30 pm in D2, Wax:Powerscourt the G.M.B. Townhouse, Sth William LIVE MUSIC Live Jazz @ Zanzibar, St, 11pm, 5/8 euro.

CLUBS Spy; DJ Quilly with Lower Ormond Quay, D CLUBS Cocoon; 'Shakedown', Doyles, D-Basement, Duke Lane, D2, funky/ upbeat lounge music, 1, 5-7.30 pm, late bar.

P o w e r s c o u r t Jazz @ Cafe en Seine, Fleet St, D 2, dance/ soul/ disoco, smart Townhouse, Sth William Dawson St, D 2, indie/ soul til 2.30, dress, FREE FREE St, Doors from 5pm , Varying times.

FRIDAY @ the Odean, Coyote: MonkeyFunk: Harcourt St, D 2, retro/ Free CONCERTS D'Olier St, D2, Chart/ disco/ indie/ R'n'B, til Sarah McLachlan @the classics/ R'n'B, 10 til 2.30, FREE SATURDAY 16th Point, 7.30 pm, 46/ 44 late, FREE Gaiety Theatre/ Club, OCTOBER euro.

Wax, Basement Spy, South King St, 3 levSouth Willima St, D2, els...live music, 11.30The Village; All day 18th 80's.

4. event, Rahzel from the MONDAY Red Box: YO-YO, the Hogans, off Camden St, OCTOBER Roots, Camden St. Pod, Pure popstudent D2, hip-hop, party/elecThe Hub, 'Salthouse', night, free 10.30-11.30, tro, 'til 2.30, FREE Eustace St, Temple Bar, COLLEGE EVENTS Trinity FM, 97.3, 8.00- 5 euro after.

Pravda: 'Icon', Lower 8 euro.

Liffey, D 1, soul/ funk/ Club night, Savannah, 12.00 am, news, music, THURSDAY 21st rock and roll, 'til 2.30, Rathmines, dance/ comedy...broadcasting OCTOBER all week.

FREE chart/ R'n'B, 5 euro The PHIL, "A Lecture by Spirit; Revelation, D2, after 11 pm.

COLLEGE EVENTS An Taoiseach Bertie Middle Abbey St, 11Redbox; STUDI04 with Resident DJ Jason Ahern", 6.00 pm in the Meditation Class, 5.15 - late, 15/ 20 euro.

7.00 pm, FREE, Room Wax: Powerscourt Dee. It's glam, it's sexy GMB. 50, Atrium.

Townhouse, Sth William and will make you want St, 11pm, 5/8 euro. to dance your little LIVE MUSIC BARS/ CLUBS Big Band/ Swing Night, SATURDAY 23rd socks off. The big room Dorans: OCTOBER Cafe en Seine, Dawson Eamon

Science & Health Sciences Headliners: Tuesday 12th October Redbox, Harcourt Street, Doors 10pm

Arts Block Bash Headliners: Electric 6 Wednesday 13th October Spirit, Abbey Street, Doors 10pm

Club night, Savannah, Rathmines, dance/ chart/ R'n'B, 5 euro after 11 pm.

SUNDAY 24th OCTOBER Savannah, Lower Rathmines Road, D 6, Laid back, chill out sounds 'til 1 am.

MONDAY OCTOBER

25th

GIGS The Bees @ The Village, Camden St, 7.30 pm, 14 euro.

BARS/ CLUBS Ri-Ra: Strictly handbag, Dame COurt, D 2, Eclectic electrics/ rare soul/ pop, 7 euro.

TUESDAY OCTOBER

26th

Ri-Ra; Bump'n'hustle, Dame COurt, D2, rare groove/ latino/ hip-hop, from 11-30, 7 euro.

Spy: Wax Basement: 'Lowdown', South William St, D 2, house from 11.

WEDNESDAY 27th OCTOBER GIGS Kate Rusby @the Village, Camden St, 7.30 pm, 21 euro.

BARS/ CLUBS Doyles, D-Basement, Fleet St, D 2, dance/ indie/ soul til 2.30, FREE Coyote: MonkeyFunk: D'Olier St, D2, Chart/ classics/ R'n'B, 10 til late, FREE Wax, Basement Spy, South William St, D2, 80's.

Red Box: YO-YO, the Pod, Pure pop, student night, free 10.30-11.30, 5 after.

Engineers & Teachers All tickets available from the Headliners SU Shop Thursday 14th October Coyote Lounge, D’Olier St, Doors 10pm €5 or €7 at the door

DEAF...the music festival?!

DEAF 3'04 the exciting music festival returns to Dublin from the 19th to the 25th of October.

DEAF, the Dublin Electronic Arts Festival is back and celebrates its third year with a programme of the highest quality with performances from international artists and a host of

Irish talent.

From the 19th DEAF will spread across Dublin city centre over seven days and nights, throughout an array of music venues, from bars to clubs to gallery spaces. Kicking of the DEAF Festival this year is the very special music force that is The

Godfather of NoyzeRahzel presented by Choice Cuts. The Irish premier of ‘Moog’: a documentary exploring the life's work of the renowned electronic pioneer will be screened at the Sugar Club followed by a unique audio-visual performance from

Donal Dineen and Jape.

This year's festival will put special emphasis on providing a platform for a new crop of Irish electronic artists to showcase their work alongside their international counterparts. The fact that D1's and Bassbin's nights in

Crawdaddy are doubling as album launches by Irish labels is of particular cause for celebration. DEAF will also feature the launch of a new online radio station, a series of music software workshops and a seminar of new music technology.

The highlight of DEAF

2004 will be a special live performance by electronic and performance visionaries Coil in the unique setting of Dublin's City Hall, with a rare ambient set Decal in support. The festival closes with a special Detroit Cabaret night with DJ Bone and a host of musical

guests.

One of the most exciting and innovative festivals in Ireland at the moment, DEAF 3'04 promises another week of inspiring, entertaining and challenging music.

Check out www.deafireland.com

Tuesday October 12, 2004

15

CAREERS

Trinity News

INTERVIEW TIPS-For the day the real world beckons

Wendy Williams Interviews for work experience, parttime work or your first graduate job can be a daunting experience but if you just take note of these tips there is no need to dread it.

Before you go Research the employer and the job. You need to know as much about the position and the organisation as possible to increase your chances of success.

Plan your interview. Prepare any questions you may have for them.

From your research and the job descrip-

tion you should be able to work out a list of qualities the interviewer will be looking for. Think of specific examples to demonstrate these skills.

Practice your answers with a friend and anticipate certain questions you’ll be asked. Get them to give you feedback.

As cliché as it sounds, the only cure for nerves is good preparation and practice.

Re-read your application form and the company literature (or visit their website) Remember to take a copy of your CV or application form.

Check travel arrangements and plan to

arrive roughly 15 minutes early.

First impressions Keep your handshake firm.

Think about your body language. Keep your head up and your shoulders back.

Maintain eye contact throughout the interview, but especially at the start.

Smile!

During the Interview Be enthusiastic and don’t be afraid to use your hands.

Speak clearly but not too fast.

Give lots of examples of how your experience and skills match their requirements. Don’t be afraid to repeat

examples from your application form or CV. Give optimistic responses and never be negative or apologetic about yourself.

Always be positive. Even when things have gone badly for you, try to think positively about what you have learned from the experience.

Be ready to recognise simple questions calling for a brief answer however bear in mind that saying too little can be as big a mistake as talking too much. Short answers put pressure on the interviewer.

Always be prepared to expand on something which seems to interest the inter-

viewer but keep to the point.

Reply to the question that is asked, not the one you might like answer.

After the interview, Even if you get rejected do not be afraid to call up and get feedback.

Websites First website to check out is the CAS website at www.tcd.ie/careers. It also has links to other websites which increasing numbers of students are using to get up-to-date information on postgrad study, job opportunities and taking time out.Also look at graduate-orientated sites such as www.gradireland.com, doctorjob.com and www.prospects.ac.uk.

DO YOU HAVE WHAT EMPLOYERS ARE LOOKING FOR? With the first of the employer presentations to final year and postgraduate students starting on October 18th, SEAN GANNON, the Director of the Careers Advisory Service, outlines some of the qualities employers require.

There will be a lot of recruitment related activity over the coming weeks with a number of major Irish and UK employers making presentations to students in Dublin on opportunities with their companies. The job-hunting process, however, has become highly

competitive not just because there are more graduates leaving universities but also because companies are looking for the best and the brightest graduates.

Many companies who have been traditional recruiters of graduates have seen their businesses change

through competitive pressures, through the more effective use of information technology and through having a greater focus on global rather than home markets. Coping with these pressures has implications for the way in which companies recruit and the types

of skills that they seek. Specialist or professional expertise based on a person's academic studies is still a key requirement in most jobs but behavioural factors are increasingly at the heart of a graduate recruitment programme.

One of the major recruiters visiting the College this year uses the following four selection criteria at all first interviews: *Analytical or Problem solving skills The interviewer asks hypothetical questions (what would you do if......?.) There is no correct answer, but the interviewer is looking for how you react. Do you think through the problem logically? Can you think on your feet? Can you prioritise? Are you aware of cost limitations etc.? *Interpersonal skills and leadership potential Typically questions are asked about your life - Why did you do something? How did you do it? The interviewer is looking for evidence of diplomacy, tact, persuasiveness and the ability to be a team player. *Personal attributes such as motivation, energy, flexibility or decisionmaking Have you prepared for the interview? Are you enthusiastic about working for the company and are you knowledgeable about the work area you have applied for? Are you able to cope with change? *Communication skills including clarity, fluency and the ability to listen Have you listened to what has been said? Are you concise? Do you have a good vocabulary?

In preparing for this type of selection process be able to discuss benefits, likes and dislikes of various life, work and academic experiences - how you work with others and are perceived

by them. Don't forget that you have also got quite an extensive range of well developed or even potential transferable skills which you may have acquired through your formal course work in College, vacation work experience, extra-curricular activities, or simply through some other area of daily living.

Some examples of these transferable skills and the types of evidence of them that you could talk about at interview include: ~ Skills in defining and solving problems, both analytically and creatively (from specific formal assignments, informal personal challenges) ~ Effective communication skills (from tutorials, workshops, essays, extra-curricular activities, vacation work experience) ~ Goal achievement skills (from working to deadlines, completion of a degree and the standard of a grade) ~ Co-ordination and facilitation skills (from extra-curricular activities, vacation work experience, certain study projects) ~ Other team work skills (from group study projects, extra curricular activities). ~ Self-discipline, self -motivation and other self-management skills (from planning study commitments and scheduling other non-study activities) A degree alone will not guarantee a worthwhile job. Selling yourself to a prospective employer requires thorough preparation with particular attention being paid to behavioural factors. Your personal uniqueness (and therefore suitability for employment) will be established by clearly presenting your success or competence in these areas. Log onto www.tcd.ie/careers/student/pdf/whatsnw.pdf for details of key presentations during October.

Question: I don't know what I want to do when I leave College?

Answer: Finding out what suits you best will be a process - there is no 'quick fix' answer. Preview your strengths, interests and values to help you make a match - that's sure helps to start you off.

Question: Why would an employer be interested in me as my course is not relevant to any job?

Answer: Around half of the jobs advertised each year are open to graduates of any discipline.

An employer is interested in: * the achievement of a degree * the wider skills you have developed through being successful in other areas of your life.

Question: I am not happy in my course and wish to leave/change - how do I do it?

Answer: If you think that you have chosen the wrong course for any reason see your tutor.

You can change to a new course within the first few weeks if: * You have the points * You have the necessary subject and level of achievement requirements * AND if there is a vacant place.

The Careers Advisory Service may be able to help you identify your options.

Make an appointment to meet with your Careers Adviser. It is suggested that you evaluate your interests by completing one of the guidance software packages.

If you are thinking of leaving TCD and going elsewhere you may need to go back to your school guidance counsellor. Also talk to the Admissions Office of the institution to wish to go to.

Worst Jobs in Student Lives “This summer I worked at mini

supermarket on a daily basis starting at 7am for eight hours with only a 20 minute break. It was absolutely horrifically awful – I had to stock shelves, do stock-taking and work behind the counter – I just could not stand it, the tedium, boredom and sheer repetition of it all. And I had to deal with a vacuously rude and egotistical addict horse gambler as a boss, which was the cherry on the cake. Thank goodness it’s over.”

Senior Freshman History “Last year, I peddled sports clothes and those charming ‘suck my co*k’ tshirts in a store that was either called McCann Verdun, Stadium Sports, or Mimosa interiors, depending on whichever creditor was asking.

Needless to say, we were failing miserably, a situation that wasn’t helped by a boss who reminded one of Daffy Duck, but without the dry wit. I still have memories of clambering about a deathtrap of a stockroom, trying to

find a laminator she had suddenly decided was crucial to our business, while she flailed about desperately in the doorway. The whole experience was a tragic-comic farce. With bad clothes.”

Junior Sophister History “The summer before I started college, I was working in a teeny tiny pharmacy in the very centre of Dublin. It was really really hot, with no air conditioning. It didn’t help that the boss (also the owner and therefore the Supreme Commander) was an utter control freak and didn’t seem to appreciate the fact that sometimes there was quite literally nothing to do. Customers didn’t seem to want to spend long in the hot, sticky, disgusting shop. Unfortunately, I had to. I wasn’t allowed stand still EVER. There was always shelf rearranging (fascinating stuff) to be done, according to His Highness. Urgh. He also never paid my (minimum) wages on time. I shall NEVER return!

Senior Freshman English

The CAS is located on the first and second floors of East Chapel (next to the Bank Of Ireland PASS machine). Our facilities are available both during term vacations: - term time 9.30 am – 5.00 pm - out of term time – 9.30 am – 12.30 pm and 2.15 pm – 5.00pm You are advised to check opening times during vacations as they may vary.

16

Tuesday October 12, 2004

SCIENCE

Sexy Science Jane Ferguson is back - and she brought a whole lot of sexy stuff. This week:

Aspirin and Sex SO WHAT’S THE CONNECTION between aspirin and sex? Is it a new wonder drug for the “honey not tonight, I have a headache” syndrome? Come to think of it, that could be a new marketing angle, but it’s not what I’m talking about here. Most people know that taking illegal drugs, drinking alcohol, or smoking during pregnancy can damage the foetus; but new research indicates that other, seemingly harmless, substances can have some more subtle damaging effects too.

Rats that took a dose of aspirin in their water during the last two weeks of pregnancy, turned out to have sons with a lower libido than males born to painmedication-free mommies. These males had problems ejaculating, they were shy to mount females, and had some awkward penetration issues. They usually managed to have sex eventually, but they were like inexperienced fumbling fools compared to their sexually adventurous Casanova friends in the cage. The dose given to the rats was equivalent to that which a human would take for a headache, so even a perceived safe dose can have a noticeable effect.

Aspirin works by lowering the level of prostaglandins, which are a group of chemicals that affect inflammation and cell-signalling, but which also may have many diverse roles that are not yet fully understood. In this case, it seems that while aspirin lowers the level of the prostaglandins responsible for inflam-

mation, and hence pain, in the mother’s body, it also affects levels of other prostaglandins that are important in the developing brain of the foetus. It appears that some prostaglandins are responsible for “masculinising” the brain, and if these prostaglandins are absent, certain male-specific behavioural patterns do not develop.

Conversely, it has been shown that newborn female rats develop typical male behaviour, such as mounting other females, following an injection of a particular prostaglandin.

Many common over-the-counter drugs target prostaglandin levels, and as of now, we don’t know exactly how severely these drugs could be affecting developing foetuses. Some studies have already shown links between use of aspirin and other drugs during pregnancy, and birth defects. For example, aspirin has been implicated in cases of renal abnormalities, gastroschisis and congenital heart disease. One solution to this problem would be to develop drugs that target specific prostaglandins, so that women can take pain medication during pregnancy without fear of harming their baby.

As far as the study concerning rat libidos goes, humans are a little different to rats, and nobody knows if aspirin has the same effect in humans, but it might be worth putting up with some headaches during pregnancy, just to save you the headache of putting your sons through sexual assertiveness training later in life!

FANTASTIC FOODS Forget the Buttery... here’s the A-Z of healthy foods

A

pple

So “An apple a day keeps the doctor away”? This old saying could hold true! Apples contain a whole array of vitamins, minerals, and biologically active molecules that are beneficial for our health. One of the main chemicals found in apples is pectin. Pectin absorbs toxic by-products of metabolism in the intestines, thus helping to detoxify the body. It can inhibit the growth of unfriendly bacteria in the digestive tract, thus preventing stomach upsets and food poisoning. Pectin also prevents fatty deposits forming in the arteries, and can lower cholesterol.

Apples aid the elimination of uric acid from the body, preventing toxic buildups. As well as containing pectin, apples are rich in magnesium, manganese, phosphorous, potassium, sulfur, and malic acid, which are all important in a balanced diet.

Apricot Apricots are sometimes referred to as “a fountain of youth”. This is due to the high concentration of anti-aging molecules that are found in apricots. Betacarotene, which gives apricots their bright orange colour, strengthens the immune system and supports cell renewal. Carotenoids, such as betacarotene, act as anti-oxidants in the body, protecting cells from free-radical damage. Vitamin C, found in this fruit, also has an anti-oxidising effect.

Apricots have high levels of folic acid and pantothenic acid, which slow down aging. They are also a useful source of iron, potassium and fibre.

Blueberry Blueberries are often listed as being one of the healthiest foods around; and for good reason! These fruits contain high levels of antioxidants, which remove free radicals from the body, and thus prevent damage and aging of cells. The antioxidants and phytochemicals contained in the fruits can also help to prevent cancer. The rich colour seen in blueberries is due to the high concentrations of anthocyanosides; there are 15 different members of this family present in each blueberry!

Anthocyanosides can cross-link collagen fibres, and promote collagen biosynthesis. They also prevent the release of histamine, serine proteases, prostaglandins, and leukotrienes, resulting from an inflammatory response. Blueberries have an antibacterial action, and can heal gastric ulcers. They lower blood sugar, decrease blood clots and can lower cholesterol. They are reported to improve eyesight, by increasing blood flow to the capillaries in the eyes.

Blueberries also contain bioflavenoids, glycosides, delphiniol, vitamin A, vitamin C, catechol- tannins, and hydro-

Broccoli quinone.

Broccoli has been receiving a lot of publicity recently, and has been exciting scientists and the general public alike, with claims about its potent anticancer properties. Can this vegetable really help people suffering from cancer? Studies have shown that the phytochemicals present in broccoli, are indeed effective at preventing cancer, and may even be able to help people who already have tumours. Broccoli is especially effective against tumours in the prostate, breasts, lungs and digestive tract. When combined with tomatoes, which contain lycopenes, the combination is even more effective against tumours. Broccoli is a member of the Brassica family of vegetable, which includes cauliflower, sprouts, cabbage, swede, wassabi and others.

All of these vegetables contain phytochemicals, and may be able to prevent cancer from occurring, if included regularly in a balanced diet. Broccoli also contains good sources of vitamin C,

C

arrot

folic acid and calcium.

Carrots contain large quantities of betacarotene, which is used by the body to make vitamin A, and is itself a powerful antioxidant. Vitamin A helps slow down cell aging, and improves the quality of skin, nails and eyes. Vitamin A works together with growth hormones, and so is essential for normal health. Carrots also contain folic acid, iron, potassium, magnesium, manganese, sulfur, copper and pectin. Raw carrots inhibit salmonella and listeria, and so are good for cases of food poisoning and infections. Carrots have long been said to be “good for your eyes”, and they do indeed increase night vision. They can also help people with anaemia, and heal stomach ulcers.

Carrot juice can be applied to the face and skin to help acne, dermatitis and eczema. Carrots lower cholesterol and can prevent stroke and heart disease.

The beta-carotene in carrots can protect against cancer, especially lung cancer, but also breast and ovarian tumours.

C

hilli

Chillies contain capsaicinoids, which are the chemicals that make them so hot. As well as causing pain and extreme discomfort to the weak-stomached among us, these chemicals are very beneficial to our health. The main member of this family is Capsaicin, which is present in high amounts in chillies. This chemical helps to thin the blood, prevent blood clots and improve circulation, thus helping to prevent heart attacks and strokes. Eating chillies increases production of digestive enzymes and cleanses the digestive tract of disease-causing bacteria. They increase mucous in the digestive tract, which protects against peptic ulcers.

They also stimulate production of endorphins, so once your eyes have stopped watering, and your burning tongue has been cooled, you should feel pretty happy! Chillies also contain beta-carotene, vitamin C, antioxidants and phytochemicals, which, as we have seen in previous foods, are pretty useful to have!

Jane Ferguson

Trinity News This Summer in Science Monkeys, mice & more - we give you what you missed the most analysed in the hope that they would offer some more clues as to the origins of the Solar System. In a rather ironic manner though, given the Genesis probe’s ‘fruit of knowledge’-style mission, the parachutes failed to open and the mission came to an abrupt halt in a crater in the Utah desert. The delicate hull of the capsule was somewhat damaged by the 310km/h landing, and scientists expect that the majority of the material will be irretrievable.

Kirsten Bratke Daniel Kelleher SO THE SUMMER IS OVER. As beautiful as it was, of course you sorely missed your TN. And while we relaxed and slept, science didn’t. To bring you quickly up to speed, here are the major stories that made the science news over the summer.

Francis Crick dies

Mouse with two mothers

The more low-key partner of the famous Watson & Crick duo who discovered the structure of DNA more than 50 years ago, died in La Jolla, California, from colon cancer. For a more detailed obituary of this great scientist and his work read “Mentor and Revolutionary” this page.

Men became a luxury item when Kaguya, the first mammal with two female parents, was born in Japan. In April, Tomohiro Kono and his team at the Tokyo University of Agriculture announced that the mouse Kaguya had survived into healthy adulthood and given birth to her own offspring.

The nuclei of the eggs from two female mice were fused and sperm, usually needed to provide half of the genetic material, was no longer needed.

However, there is no need to write off men quite yet. Apart from the fact that the technique used would be ethically unacceptable for humans at this stage, Kaguya is the only survivor out of 460 embryos – not a great success rate. And while Kono plans to tackle pigs with two mothers next, fatherless humans seem to be a long way off.

Noah’s Genetic Ark

Intra - Galactic News You may remember your faithful TN telling you about the potential tenth planet in our solar system, the miniscule Sedna. Scientists are still perplexed by this distant and seemingly inconsequential piece of galactic debris.

Its apparent slow rotation speed (somewhere between 20 and 50 days per revolution) was thought to be a result of the gravitational effect of a satellite, however, no such moon can be found, leaving two alternatives, either the calculations of the astronomers are wrong, or all is not as it seems fifteen billion kilometres from earth.

However, we need not even travel as far as the outskirts of our solar system to clock up the discovery tally, as the Cassini space probe demonstrated in August, when it carried out its mission while in orbit

Gene Therapy could help “cure” laziness in monkeys around Saturn, a mere 1.4 billion kilometres away. It returned photographs showing two previously undiscovered tiny moons bringing the total number of natural satellites of the gas giant to 33.

Their orbits appear to have developed enough from their initial position to suggest that these moons are older than many of the others and that they are not merely asteroids captured from the nearby Kuiper belt. Consequently, the fact that they still exist despite their age and size may place limits on the number of comets in the solar system, as a collision with a sufficiently sized one would certainly have destroyed them.

At the same time, Cassini photographs of the rings of Saturn are expected to give us clues as to the manner in which

the solar system itself was created, including the formation of planets.

Scientists consider the dynamics of the dust particles that make up the rings to be a microcosm of the beginnings of the solar system, when similar rings once existed around the Sun, and gave birth to the planets.

The closest encounter with space, at a lethal zero kilometres, comes in the form of the ill-fated Genesis probe, which crashed to Earth on September 8th. After three years collecting microscopic particles from the Sun’s solar winds, the probe was to float back through Earth’s atmosphere with the help of parachutes, before being gently collected in mid-air by helicopters flown by Hollywood stunt pilots. Then the collected particles would be

The Natural History Museum in London is preparing a gene bank for species on the verge of extinction. In cooperation with the Institute of Genetics at the University of Nottingham and the Zoological Society of London they are collecting, preserving and storing DNA and tissue samples of many endangered species.

As up to 1130 species of mammals and 1183 species of birds alone are estimated to disappear completely off the face of the Earth within the next 30 years, their genetic material is stored for future scientific research and study. The first animals to enter the ark are among others the Yellow Seahorse, the British Field Cricket and the Scimitar Horned Oryx.

WWW inventor knighted Tim Berners-Lee, essentially the man responsible for all those hours you have wasted on the Internet, was knighted this summer for his pioneering work in computer science. He started off as a software consultant at the gigantic physics institute CERN in Geneva. His vision was to create a virtual space where information stored by everyone’s computer could be easily accessed by anyone else in the world, making collaboration and research a lot easier. A technology called hypertext was already used to link related documents

and let the reader jump from one to the other, based on associations. Another great invention was the Internet, a network connecting computers together regardless of their type or software.

Berners-Lee, it seems, just brought the two together – hypertext and the Internet – and thus in 1991 created the World Wide Web. He wrote the language known as Hypertext Transfer Protocol (the ominous HTTP), which computers use to process hypertext documents and he also came up with the system of giving every document an address on the Internet. When the Web became ever more popular, BernersLee apparently worried about the directions his brainchild was taking, having designed it to be a medium for exchange of professional information.

Eventually he set up a WWW Consortium that was supposed to aid the smooth development of the Web, not acting as a Web police but more as a Web grandfather, dispensing advice and recommendations. Berners-Lee has been the head of the consortium since it started in 1994.

Lazy monkeys cured Are you an eternal procrastinator? Can only get things done in the last minute?

If you have ever wondered why, monkeys might provide the answer.

Researchers at the American National Institute of Mental Health have shown how gene therapy can turn lazy primates into workaholics. The monkeys had been trained to operate a lever triggered by a green light. After using the lever several times they would receive a treat. Another light showed them how far away they were from getting the reward. When some DNA was injected into their brains, switching off a key gene the monkeys could no longer estimate how many trials were left before the reward and they started working hard throughout the experiment, making fewer errors along the way. While gene therapy may be a drastic measure to cure laziness in humans, it is interesting for researchers because it may increase their knowledge of mood disorders like depression and obsessivecompulsive disorder.

Mentor and Revolutionary: Francis Crick (1916-2004)

The Nobel-Prize winning discoverer of the DNA double helix passed away this July Tomas Ryan FRANCIS HARRY COMPTON CRICK, co-discoverer of the DNA double helix, died of colon cancer in San Diego in late July of this year, at the age of 88. For elucidating the structure and significance of the double helix Crick shared the 1962 Nobel Prize for Physiology and Medicine with James Watson and Maurice Wilkens.

Francis Crick was born in 1916, in Northampton, England. Like many revolutionary scientists throughout history, he displayed at an early age an immense curiosity into a wide range of subject particular the nature of the universe. He proceeded to study Physics, obtaining a B.Sc. in 1937 from University College London where he then started a PhD. He was inspired by Erwin Schrodinger’s book “What is Life?”

This historical text, based on a serious of lectures delivered in the Schrodinger lecture theatre at Trinity College, Dublin, ignited Crick’s passion for the physical basis of life. He began to explore the mysterious border between the living and non-living worlds, and in 1949 joined the Cavendish laboratory of Cambridge where he worked with a team dedicated to understand protein structure and its predicted role in the chemical basis of genetics. It was here that Crick had his fateful meeting in 1951 with the young James Watson, an American biologist equally captivated

by Schrodinger’s book. Both scientists believed that DNA rather than proteins formed the genetic material of life. In 1953, the duo succeeded in cracking the double helical structure of the DNA molecule. They published their findings in what can now be considered one of the most pivotal and revolutionary scientific papers of all time.

The nature of their discovery was that within the DNA structure there existed two chains, held together by specific

hydrogen bonding between specific pairs of inert complementary nucleotide bases, i.e. adenine will only bond with thiamine, and cytosine will bind with guanine. The critical feature of the structure is the unique pairing of the bases, so that when the two chains come apart during DNA replication, each single chain may then act as a faithful template for the synthesis of a new double stranded molecule that is a duplicate of the original, thus faithfully transferring genetic information.

Watson had figured out how exactly the bases fitted together, while Crick worked out the helical structure by Xray diffraction and clarified the exact one to one ratio of the bases. But there were many obstacles and mistakes the pair had to overcome before their finished hypothesis was formed, not least of all was their own lack of experience.

One year ago here in Trinity, James Watson jokingly remarked in a public lecture that had Francis Crick been a chemist, the discovery would have been made months earlier.

It is often flippantly remarked by many contemporary scientists that after the discovery of the double helix, Watson claimed the spotlight while Crick faded into obscurity. Nothing could be further from the truth, but then, as Watson himself once candidly stated, “a goodly number of scientists are not only narrow-minded and dull but also just stupid.” Crick may not have taken as much administrative responsibility as Watson has in the course of his career, but Crick’s impact in science and academia is perhaps unmatched by any scientist alive today. In addition to the double helix, Crick used his knowledge of Xray protein analysis to solve the structure alpha-keratin, a fundamental problem in structural biology. At the same time he was ardently working on solving the genetic code and was responsible for the famous adaptor hypothesis, which explained how the genetic infor-

Francis Crick (centre) receiving Life Sciences Achievement Award from UCSD in 2003 mation in a DNA sequence is translated into the structural form of proteins in cells; how the parts of an organism are formed and maintained. Following this, Crick applied his imagination to solving the genetic code; the relationship between particular sequences of DNA and the protein sequences and structures they represent when translated.

Throughout the sixties Crick dominated the field of molecular biology. In the words of scientific journalist Matt Ridley, “ Francis Crick made not one but many great scientific discoveries, he found that genes are digital codes written on DNA molecules, he found that the code is written in three-letter words, and he was instrumental in cracking the code”.

But his contributions to science did not end at the molecular level. Attracted to the frontiers and black boxes of biology, Crick moved away from the field of molecular biology that was established (by him), and, after spending some time conducting original research in cell biology and embryology, he moved to fluoxetine in the laboratory”.

Europe’s Young Scientists in Dublin A group of three Austrians, Martin THE 16TH ANNUAL EU CONTEST for Young Scientist was held in UCD this September. 74 award-winning projects by 105 students from 34 countries were shown. The students, aged 15 to 20, competed for prize money of €28,500. Their projects were judged by 15 scientists, one of them was Professor Jane Grimson from TCD’s Department of Computer Science.

First prizes were worth €5000 each and went to teams from Denmark, Germany

and Austria in different categories, with second and third prizes going to Lithuania, Turkey and Poland. In Physics, Mario Chemnitz (17) from Germany won with his “ultrasonic detector for gas chromatography”, a cheap but sensitive machine that analyses gas mixtures and their components by using a software package.

In Chemistry, Charlotte Strandkvist (18) from Denmark won by “improving the method for synthesising N-methyl

Knoebel, Gerhard Schoeny and Florian Groessbacher (19 and 20) won first prize in Engineering for their “breakthrough in the manufacturing of condenser microphones”. They developed and manufactured the first automated self-tuning device for condenser microphone-membranes.

While Ireland has won the competition nine times since 1989 but hosted it for the first time this year. The Irish Young Scientist exhibition 2005 will take place in January so Watch This Space.

the Salk Institute at La Jolla, California to begin his work probing the nature of consciousness. His book “The Astonishing Hypothesis”, describes his ideas on how the study of consciousness, previously restricted to philosophy, is now accessible at certain levels to scientific investigation. In his late years Crick approached this problem at levels of neural networks, neurophysiology, neuroanatomy, psychology, and philosophy. Although he did not make breakthroughs in neuroscience comparable to the milestones he achieved in molecular biology, his contributions to the field lay primarily in his theoretical writings, his job as an administrator at the prestigious Salk Institute, and his role as a generous mentor to students, all to the end of promoting research. He once eloquently and humbly expressed that “the brain sciences have a very long way to go but the fascination for the subject and the importance of the answers will inevitably carry it forward”.

In his lifetime, Francis Crick wrote 4 books and published over 130 scientific

papers. In addition to his Nobel Prize, he earned a Lasker Award, the Award of Merit from the Gairdner Foundation, and the Prix Charles Leopold Meyer of the French Academy of Sciences.

His tireless intellect and fierce dedication are evident in his death as in his life; he died in a hospital bed just 3 hours after completing the manuscript of a paper.

He is survived by his wife, three children, and six grandchildren.

The role of Science is to describe nature; it is about moving beyond our perceptions of the natural world and towards truth, to dissolve illusions that nature imposes on our sense and our brains. In this spirit, Crick postulated; “It is essential to understand our brains in some detail if we are to assess correctly our place in the vast and complicated universe we see all around us”.

Francis Crick is sure to be remembered in the annals of biology and intellectual history as a Promethean revolutionary, who created a new science, alongside that of Newton, Einstein, Mendel, and Darwin.

Nobel Prizes 2004 THEY WERE ANNOUNCED shortly before TN went to print. Stay tuned for more info on these and the Ig Nobel Prizes next issue.

Physiology or Medicine: Richard Axel and Linda B. Buck, USA, for their discoveries of “odorant receptors and the organization of the olfactory system”.

Physics: David J. Gross, H. David Politzer and Frank Wilczek, all USA, for their discovery of asymptotic free-

dom in the theory of the strong interaction.

Chemistry: Aaron Ciechanover, Avram Hershko, both Israel, and Irwin Rose, USA, for the discovery of ubiquitin-mediated protein degradation.

Tuesday October 12, 2004

17

Trinity News SU & SOCIETIES Union Solidarity and the Importance of Trinity SU To the Entire Student Body

Ed Reilly Student Union - International Students Officer In the last week of September the British labour party held their Annual Conference in Brighton. As a delegate both from USI and as International Students Officer within TCDSU the chance to observe such a conference at first hand was one not to be missed. I went there to understand the mechanics and workings of Trade Unions that operate on a much larger scale than our own SU both within Trinity and on a national level - and secondly to form links with other Student Unions across Europe particularly with the NUS [the U.K equivalent of the USI] who had a large presence at the conference.

It is often forgotten since the shift of the Labour party to centre– undertaken by Blair and his cronies that the party had been originally set up at the turn of the century by Keir Hardie as a political organ of the Trade Union movement that sought to wield parliamentary power. In the first half of the last century the Trade Union movement, not only in the U.K but throughout the globe, was at the forefront of establishing and then protecting the rights of all those outside the upper echelons of society. It’s through these organisations many of the rights we take for granted – minimum wage, annual holiday leave, subsidised health care and unemployment benefit – were fought for and won.

Despite the controversy of Clause 4 that reformed Labour by reducing the Trade Union vote to 40% within the party [whereas before it had majority control], the Trade Unions influence over the Labour party, and by extension the government of the U.K cannot be underestimated. The TUC [Trade Union Congress] forms the main apparatus of the Trade Union organisation and is home to all the major workers Unions in the U.K like the GMB [Public Sector Union], TGWU and Amicus.

What the hell do all these Unions in another country have to do with me and the problems facing the average Joe Trinners you may be asking at this point? The recent OECD report that suggests the re-introduction of third level fees is essential in order to tackle chronic under funding or even worse the application of a fully privatised system within Trinity to turn it into a ‘mock-Ivy league’ institution illustrate the problems we as a student body face.

On an everyday level we have to prepare to pay for the use of the sports hall, which hitherto had been free, on top of the printing charges introduced last year. The phrase ‘stealth privatisation’ has often been used around college by the student body and depressingly this seems to be the case day by day. It is my heart felt belief that any prevention of such changes can only be achieved by support or our SU that every student at college is registered to.

My personal support and inherent affection for Unions – be it trade, student or any other- stems from my personal background. My grandfather came over from Tuam in Co. Galway after hoping to find work in a decimated post war Britain. He was totally discriminated against for being Irish and without any formal education his prospects were bleak indeed. His plight was similar to many other Irish immigrants of the time who left in their droves searching for work to find any labour jobs available to make ends meet. In areas of Liverpool and Glasgow, with their huge docking and shipping industries, through to the car factories of industrial Birmingham and Coventry [the city my grandfather ended up at] right through to Kilburn in London huge Irish communities spawned through the U.K. It was through a Painters and Decorators Union that my grandfather found support, a job to provide ends meet for his family and fundamental protection of his workers rights in the most testing times of poverty. My own father was heavily involved in Unions, not in a grassroots/activists sense but in the High Court. As a Student Lawyer, who

along with a group of other Law students in the U.K, took the Law Society [the governing body of all Lawyers within the U.K] to the High Court and successfully argued for all apprentice lawyers to be referred to as Trainee Solicitors rather than Article Clerks.

The Law Society preferred to refer to them as Article Clerks as it reduced their professional status [despite the fact they would carry out nearly all the work of fully qualified solicitors] thus allowing them to exploit all young Solicitors in terms of pay and general rights. All current Law undergraduates or even those considering doing a conversion course will probably be aware that after completing your LPC [Legal Practioner’s Course], that despite not being fully qualified Solicitor your Trainee Solicitor status [analogous to an on the job apprenticeship] allows you competitive salaries and rights almost equivalent to the fully qualified one’s.

In both my grandfather’s and father’s time Unions have played a central role in looking after the interests of the many rather than the few. Indeed it is through Our union, and its wholesale support by the Student body, that our own rights as students of Trinity College can be defended.

It is a little known fact that when you register at the University and pay your levy to become a member of Trinity SU and the USI, you also become a member of SIPTU [the largest Trade Union Organisation in Ireland].

SIPTU’s links with the TUC are strong, as is their relationship with other Trade Union Organisations within the EU. Going back to the Labour Party Conference it is interesting to note how the problems facing their Unions are similar to the one’s SU are facing in general terms. Apathy amongst its members, the belief that the whole concept of Union movement is a dated 20th Century concept, the rise of individual rather than collective enterprise, and the general belief that everyone involved in Union movements at executive level are self-serving careerist or bickering in fighters. One only needs to look at the in fighting between various groups of the TUC within the Labour in the 1980’s that made the party totally unelectable and allowed Thatcher and the Tories four terms in office. I was fortunate enough to have moments alone with Ken Curran [Head of the GMB Union] and explained some of the problems we as students faced and how they could be tackled. Ken stressed to me the importance of finding common ground between Unions across the EU. I told him about the possibility of a fully privatised system being introduced by stealth measures and he replied that the situation was analogous to the problems his own Union was facing with privatisation of public sector industries [the employee’s of which his Union directly represents]. It became obvious to me that we as an SU can learn a lot from Unions like the GMB whose expertise in lobbying, campaigning and organisational structure vis a vi government bodies is second to none. Their belief in solidarity between all Unions – finding our common links rather distinguishing features – makes better communication essential. As Ken poignantly said whilst addressing the TUC, ‘a government whether it be in Ireland, U.K, France or Germany, will always be able to pick different Unions one by one, but if Unions co-operate together such a task will be a lot harder’.

What then are the SU doing in response to such developments?

Under the stewardship of current President Francis Kieran, the SU is attempting to reach out to the Student body in a way not seen before. This involves forming much stronger relations with the various Societies and sports clubs around college, listening to their particular qualms or problems. It involves supporting student co-op systems like the JCR, who received a generous subsidy over the summer so that their Goldsmith Hall premises could finally be refurbished. Ents Officer Niall Morris Fresher’s Week programme exemplifies this direction. Any monotony during the Fresher’s fair was dispelled by the special live music he personally organised along with the spectacular fireworks show that brightened up the Dublin sky above Front Square. The programme itself was a mixture of old and new – The Traffic Light Ball, Histeria and Club Philth [around when I was a wee Fresher] combined with Afro-dizz and The Camembert Quartet. These new events were held in association with One World and Snow and Surf. Crucially it showed the SU’s commitment to smaller, medium sized societies, providing them with a platform to publicise them-

selves during Fresher’s week with a prime spot, as well as for the larger one s such as the Hist and Phil. In coming weeks events have been lined for a various range of societies and Niall would more than welcome any ideas from societies, clubs or particular classes, wanting to put on nights out. The SU is here to work for you! Similarly SU Pres Francis, as well as the other sabbats and those on the exec, have been working tirelessly at meeting as many students as possible both at lecture halls and out and about. This year we introduced a special tour programme, organised by Tom Lowth Access Officer, showing new Trinity students all the basics they needed to know about college to supplement our student union handbook.

Although the SU would never interfere with the character, set up, organisation or structure of particular societies within college we would not want either to disenfranchise ourselves from them either. The SU should fully represent all sectors of college life, be it particular societies sports clubs or classes. The self-perpetuating myth of the SU hack, which spends his or her time in House 6 and is part of distinct social group within college, is one we as a Union are trying to address. I feel the need for cooperation amongst all sections of the student body under the umbrella of the SU will become self evident when our SU centre is finally completed [late October at the time of Press]. One only needs to look at the collaborative events that took place last year to see how successful they could be. The Players Christmas Pantomime, in association with Vincent De Paul, allowed V de P Voluntary Tuition kids from deprived

areas of Dublin the chance to come to our very own student theatre. It promotes access – showing kids who rather than look at Trinity students as social elitists [which if we look at pictures of ourselves poncing about at the Trinity Ball or through chats with most Dubliners] perhaps want to come here too, it allows two big societies with differing student compositions to find out more about one another and finally it gives talentless, tone deaf arses like myself the opportunity to pretend they can dance and sing like Justin Timberlake for half an hour. Complete collaboration – perhaps a mutual appreciation night between the Phil and the Hist, organised by the SWP, Sinn Fein, Fine Fail and Fine Gael – of course is an impossibility and of course not wanted – competition between societies are healthy and are needed to preserve the individualism of those particular societies. The SU actively supports such projects though. We hope by fully representing the student Body, listening to societies clubs and classes and helping out where we can in ways not tried previously, we can galvanise interest in our own campaigns where we need your support. As a student body we work together not in isolation. Just as Ken Curran outlined to me in Brighton, combined Union effort can achieve real results. Similarly at Trinity by turning this SU into a fully representative organ, not filled with careerist hacks but real students from a cross sector of backgrounds within college TCDSU and college life in general will grow and grow for everyone.

Above: Bono speaks at the Labour Conference in Brighton.

Below: Tony Blair addresses his party

18

Tuesday October 12, 2004

Trinity News

FEATURES

Stalking the Literati

Four days. Four hundred and forty-nine seminars.

Seven hundred visiting writers from forty-four countries. Features editor Laura Fergusson brings you the highlights from the 2004 Gothenburg Book Fair.

"A Book Fair?" The young Swede looked at us in confused disbelief. "You mean...just books?!"

"Well, no, there were lots of famous writers giving talks and seminars, and we met some of them, and there were exhibitions and it was all really cool..." our words tumbled over each other in a distinctly uncool display of English student enthusiasm. He gave us a sardonic, more than slightly bewildered glance. "I don't think that is something I would like to go to," he said firmly.

Fortunately for the organisers of the Gothenburg Book Fair this view is not representative of his countrymen. The annual event regularly attracts well over 100,000 visitors, and this year was no exception. Lured by the promise of 39 British writers at the 2004 fair (Swedish Literature not being our strongpoint), Simon Thompson and I decided to have one final adventure before thesummer was over and headed across the North Sea. Not having seen any way of obtaining tickets before the event we

cautiously approached a desk claiming to sell seminar passes. It did so, immediately, calmly, with a friendly smile, and for less than a third of the usual price because we were students. I liked this country.

To many Russians Stalin remains "the greatest Tsar that never was", and 26% would vote for him this week.

Gothenburg has played host to a book fair every year since 1985, when it began as a librarians' trade fair.

The trade side is still an enormous attraction for publishers from as far

David Lodge succumbs to the camera had not done so, but as 9am on the Thursday morning rolled around, with our hearts firmly set on seeing David Lodge at 10, I began to question the wisdom of this excessof laissez-faire.

Not for the first, and certainly not the last time on thistrip, I was firmly told to stop panicking and given another cup of tea. Having managed not to blame Simon for the fact that the hotel which he had reserved had had no record of our existence the night before, I was hoping that he would show a similar restraint if it emerged that I had dragged us over to Sweden for an event which it was necessary to book six months in advance, but I wasn't too sure. I assumed at least that we would be faced with a colossal queue and be forced to fight with half the city for the final seminar passes. Not so. We arrived, by a peaceful 5 minute tram ride, at the Swedish Convention Centre given over for four days to "Bok & Bibliotek". It appeared to be almost deserted, so my panicky mind came up with the alternative disaster scenariowe must have got the dates wrong. We

Photo: Simon Thompson

afield as Iran and Latvia, but the majority of casual visitors attend for the writers' seminars, of which there were 449 this year. The British Council has always been involved, and this year British Literature was chosen to be in focus, resulting in, as the promotional pieces claim, "the largest gathering of British literary talent ever assembled at one place outside the UK." We began with David Lodge, critic, Emeritus Professor at the University of Birmingham, and king of the campus novel. Simon having displayed immense excitement at the discovery that Lodge was to be on the menu, I felt ashamed to admit that I had never read anything by him, so I devoured Thinks the week before we went, only to find that Simon had only read Therapy. So we were perhaps slightly less Lodge aficionados than the enthus astic Swedes in the audience, but had both loved what little we had read - the wit, the pace, the varied forms (emails, letters, press clippings and students' essays all find their way into his novels), not to me tion the

Gore Vidal Simon Thompson Gore Vidal was wheeled onto the low stage in a wheelchair, looking every second of his 79 years.

This however, was still an improvement on how I had thought of him before I saw the name on the Bok and Bibliotek Fair schedule, which is to say dead. I

was remarkably pleased to find that he is still alive for he is without doubt one of only a handful of figures in the literary world of today who commands respect, whether that respect is accompanied with a sneer or a smile.

Vidal dispelled the thoughts I was having about being wheel-chair bound and thus not long for this world.

Within seconds of arriving at centre

lavish helpings of sex, which as fellow novelist Margaret Drabble pointed out in her role as interviewer, seems to preoccupy Lodge's characters even more than it does real people. The absence of sex from his latest novel, Author, Author, was, says Lodge, both a challenge and a relief. The book is a fictionalised account of the life of Henry James, an oddly popular topic for novels this year, with Colm Toibin's The Master in the shortlist for the Booker Prize, and two others having also appeared. Lodge does not attribute this to any general surge of interest in James, but acknowledges that the novel about real people is a "newly fashionable sub-genre", without the emergence of which he would not have attempted his own novel. James has, however, been a recurring presence in Lodge's work - the female protagonist in his last novel, Thinks, is a James expert, and the novel's theme of consciousness makes much use of James' exploration of this in his writing. Author, Author examines the psychological impact on James of the unfavourable reception of his play, Guy Domville.. Lodge admitted to empathising with, and seeking to portray "the psychological stress of authorship", a well as feeling a certain solidarity through having edited films which were never made. Lodge spoke of the difficulty of trying to get a "novel-like shape" out of a real life, but was praised

by Drabble for extending our perception of James' life into the physical areas which were never touched on in his own work, such as meals and visits to the bathroom.

Lodge himself appeared rather unprepossessing - in fact, as my father pointed out when I described him, he is like a character from one of his novels; a slightly nervous, camerashy, (he almost ran away from mine!) nondescript academic, thrust into the world of media attention through his own success, but not entirely comfortable with it. Being accosted by two Trinity students with a camera at a book fair, as he rushed off to catch a plane, seemed a scene straight out of his fictional world.

Next stop was Simon Sebag Montefiore, historian, broadcaster, and author of the latest biography of Stalin: Stalin: The Court of the Red Tsar. I had been expecting a certain amount of arrogance from Montefiore, for such unfair reasons as his public profile and regular appearances in Hello! magazine.

Instead he came across as mild-mannered and friendly, and immediately claimed my and Simon's sympathy for the rudeness of the Swedish historian interviewing him, who made such disparaging asides as "It's not an academic book, by any means", and “it’s a bit of a daunting read, but it is worth it”, in a somewhat doubtful tone of voice. In fact the biography sounded fascinating, and Montefiore’s account of the process of researching it no less so. Having discovered that most of Stalin’s major decisions were made in his dachas, or palaces, in the south on the Black Sea rather than at the Kremlin, Montefiore visited them, something only possible by UN peacekeeping helicopter. Afraid that his great adventure may have been already undertaken by one of his rivals, he pressed the caretaker as to whether anyone had visited recently. No-one since the 1970s, she responded, “But then there was an Arab gentleman who wanted to see all of them, just like you.”

“What was his name?” “Saddam Hussein.”

Montefiore was also thought-provoking on the difficulties of writing a fair biography of someone viewed as a monster.

The challenge of acknowledging the humanity of someone who committed such vile crimes is clearly complicated, though far from justifying any of his actions, the realisation that he was a loving father who played games with and told stories to his daughter seems to make his brutality all the more chilling than if we were able to categorise him as someone not quite human. Yet to many Russians, according to Montefiore, Stalin remains "the greatest Tsar that never was", and 26% would vote for him this week, while a further 26% would consider it.

Another highlight was the American investigative reporter Eric Schlosser, author of the McDonalds expose Fast Food Nation and the more recent Reefer Madness: Sex, Drugs and Cheap Labor in the American Black Market. Schlosser resists being bracketed with 'Bush-bashing’ writers such as Michael Moore, and does not regard Moore's popularity as necessarily leading to a change in American public opinion, as such partisan work will usually only be read by people who already agree with it. Rather the popularity demonstrates, according to Schlosser, that an emergent strain of liberal opinion already exists in the States.

Schlosser states his own aims as the

stage he positively leapt from the chair and walked very steadily towards the lectern, where he informed us all that he had “hoped to bring my old knee with me to Gothenburg, but I’ve had to get this new one. It’s made entirely out of titanium, steel and concrete. Much like our nation today.”

Thus did the good old Bushbashing begin. Eric Schlosser, who was on stage with Vidal, had in a previous lecture mentioned the possibility that the Republican Party in America would rig the coming elections. I hadn’t believed him. I hadn’t wanted to believe such a thing to be possible in the

world’s most powerful democracy. As Vidal spoke, I started to wonder. In the November elections, there is to be widespread use of automated polling machines which allow the electorate simply to push a button to register their vote. We here in Ireland are familiar with these machines and the debate they cause and at the time we made our uneasiness felt. It seems that in the USA very few people realise the potential dangers for vote rigging this new technology brings with it. Vidal himself (not much of an engineer but certainly always leaning towards sensationalism) told his rapt crowd that to interfere with

According to the fountain of champagne curls which were all I could see of Hite, we need to redefine sex. return to journalistic transparency; to make people think rather than tell them what to think. His political stance is not based solely on the occasionally childish antipathy to Bush demonstrated by some of his colleagues. He regards Clinton as "profoundly flawed and disappointing" for having allowed his own weakness and self-absorption damage the era of hopefulness into which he was elected. Asked whether he had faith he Kerry he responded dryly "I have no choice.", but admitted that he felt Kerry had mounted an ineffectual campaign in what Schlosser regarded as the most important election in a century. Schlosser was extremely impressive as a speaker, his articulacy not unaided by the fact that, as I unprofessionally noted, he has an enormously sexy voice. This fact shielded the absence of any genuinely groundbreaking material, and brought the talk up into the favourites category, even for Simon!

I was dragged to see Shere Hite because, said Simon, it was my duty as a woman. Well, I'd never called myself a militant feminist, but I'd seldom heard feminism presented in such ludicrous terms as to dissuade even the most hardcore. According to the fountain of champagne curls which were all I could see of her, we need to redefine sex because most women can't reach orgasm through penetration alone. But most women in the western world will certainly complain if sex isn't reaching their definition of it- it doesn't seem to me to require that we change the whole concept of the word.

Even more bizarre was Hite's insistence on the necessity for parents and children to be

Laura meets Joanna Trollope, who exclaimed that reporting on the fair sounded “such a nice task!” more openwith each other about sexand the deplorability of the fact that many(?!) teenagers feel more comfortable talking to their friends about masturbation than their parents. How will women know if they are normal to reach orgasm through masturbation but not through sex if they can't talk to their mothers about it? she asks. Hite's solution to this supposed problem, that daughters ask their mothers "Mum, do you ever come through penetration?" or that parents casually introduce the subject by saying over the breakfast table "Gee, I'm tired, we were at it all last night" is not something I can see being enthusiastically adopted in many households, and I can't say I think that's a bad thing.

She also broached the issue of women working together, and the difficulty that two women opening a business together, for instance, will have being taken seriously. This seems to be a more valid point, but she once again stretched it to the extent that it seemed laughable, by complaining that there is no method of celebration for female friendship that is on a par with marriage, despite the important role it plays in many women's lives. Well, no,there isn't, but neither is there for affection between siblings, or male friends, or platonic male/female relationships. Women do not have the monopoly on friendship, and it is not necessary to pollute friendship with a specially designed Hallmark card in order to make people realise its importance.

Still torn between laughing and bitching at Hite, with Simon trying to calm me down with the perfectly legitimate claim that every movement needs someone on the vanguard pushing the boat out in order for people to begin to take on board the less excessive aims (true but there is the counterargument that too many extreme statements and people will write off the whole cause as lunacy), I voluntarily entered "Women and Literature".

However, as I had rightly guessed,there were no demands for mothers to show and explain their vulvas (Hite’s favourite word) to their young daughters here. A discussion between Margaret Drabble, Swedish-born novelist Marika Cobbold, and stand-up comedian turned novelist Jenny Colgan focused on whether "woman writer" was a derogatory term. Cobbold pointed out how frequently it was assumed to be one by citing a review one of her novels had received: "It's so good it's almost not women's writing.", while Colgan described how women's experience is often viewed as trivial by quoting the Canadian novelist Carol Shields: "When men write about people they're seen as subtle and sensitive; when women do it's seen as domestic."

The question of the domestic came up frequently, with the traditional concentration of female writers on it being attributed to its role as the only power base women had.

Colgan, however, felt there was cause for celebration in the fact that women writing now felt they could write whatever they chose, having moved beyond both the restrictions of the domestic and the need in the 1980s to depict ballbusting career women. All three women objected to the term 'chick-lit', particularly Colgan, who felt that the aggressively female marketing of her books has alienated half her potential audience. She claimed that she originally wrote her first novel with no particular readership in mind, but it returned from

the publishers in a bright pink cover with flowers on it! She does, however, receive letters from men claiming to have got so bored on holiday that they resorted to reading their girlfriend's book - and were forced to hide it behind a magazine – usually Playboy, to reassert their masculinity. Margaret Drabble, who as a more "literary" writer (while Colgan objects to "chick-lit", she is happy, in fact proud, to term her writing "commercial fiction") initially distanced herself from the suggestion that her own

shoes of Simon Sebag Montefiore, who had to go home early. I would have thought her ego must have been slightly dented by being such a blatant second choice, but she rose to the occasion in the inimitable way of someone who looks born to be a headmistress, cutting off David Lodge who had begun a list of quotations on the theme of biography which she deemed to be holding up the proceedings. Holroyd, who wrote, if such a thing can ever exist, the 'definitive' biography of G. B. Shaw, and has more recently published two volumes of autobiography, I could have listened to for hours. He has the mellifluous voice and measured delivery of an

other sessions that I don’t have space to bore you with here, provided a fantastic resurgence of enthusiasm before returning for a final year of English Literature, as well as producing the slightly strange result that we kept grinning at famous writers in the corridors because we felt we knew them. I have a worrying feeling that book fairs may prove to be addictive – I think Simon may have already bought a guide-book to Warsaw.

the machines to produce a desired political result would be “as easy as flicking a switch”.

Another much more plausible point which was raised was that had the positions at the last US elections been reversed, the Republican Party would not have conceded defeat anywhere near as quickly and as easily as the Democrats did. It is hard to imagine George W, the ’War Time President’ saying “Hell, Al, I gave it a darn good try and I won most of the votes. But what the hell. Go steady in the saddle!”

It simply wouldn’t happen. It is nice to know that there is still at least one inter-

nationally respected figure who will stand up against the hideous and insidious neo-conservatism of sections of the American Right. Of course, Vidal, like all Left-leaning individuals who speak their minds, is popularly seen as a ’communist’, an ’intellectual’, a ’radical’ and sometimes as just simply crazy.

There are some who would even dismiss his links with the Democrats as plain nepotism (Al Gore is a distant relation). He is, in reality, none of those things. He is an American patriot who believes in the core founding values of his country and detests seeing life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness

destroyed by the bizarrely named Patriot Act. And even though the fact that he’s still alive probably added at least 15 minutes to the Q&A session at the end, I’m glad he is for he provides a voice for those millions of Americans who still believe in the essential humanity of their nation.

"It's so good it's almost not women's writing." writing could be so crudely defined along gender lines, eventually admitted that men will say to her "Oh, I don't read you but my wife does", to which she says she longs to reply "Well at least one of you has some literary taste."

As a result of Simon's rejection of this discussion, there was only one man in the audience, who, rather appropriately, was forced to sit on the stairs owing to the lack of space. The other result was that he made it into the enormously over-subscribed Gore Vidal lecture and I didn't, so you'll have to rely on him to smugly tell you how amazing that one was. ("I don't want to rub it in, but Gore Vidal was far and away my favourite", he smirked over a beer later.) My favourite, I think, was "The Art of Biography", a panel discussion between Michael Holroyd and Anne Thwaite, led by David Lodge.

Thwaite had been dragged over to Sweden at the last minute to fill the

Beryl Bainbridge and Laura

actor, as well as a delicious sense of humour. The discussion revolved around whether biography is merely a higher form of gossip - licensed nosiness and permission to read other people's letters.

Journalist Daniel Johnson terms it "The British vice", and it does seem to be the case that few other countries share the British taste for it. However the enthusiasm of both Thwaite and Holroyd for the thrill of recreating a life was infectious. Thwaite’s focus tends to be on people on whom there has not been much previous public scrutiny, and she described the excitement that this allows in being the first person since the original reader to open a letter, rather than one among hundreds. A pertinent question from the audience raised the issue of how much more difficult will be the task of future biographers, in a world in which people seldom write letters, to which Holroyd responded “One has to look on the bright side – biographies will be a lot shorter.”

Simon seemed slightly disturbed by how much he enjoyed Joanna Trollope, who defended her label as a writer of the middle classes, stating pithily, if provocatively, that they were the only class to write about in terms of relationship anxieties as the aristocracy didn’t care, and the working classes thought “why talk to someone if you can hit them?”! Despite the impression this gives, she came across as a genuinely warm, very likeable person, who obviously cares deeply about her characters and the human types they represent. Rather movingly, she said that the majority of the letters she receives from readers thank her for showing them that it is ok to feel or behave in a particular way, that they are not alone.

All these, and the many

Photo: Simon Thompson

Tuesday October 12, 2004

19

Trinity News FEATURES WHY ARE THE CHRISTIAN CHURCHES OBSESSED WITH SEX? The homophobia unleashed by the consecration of an openly gay bishop in the United States points to a Church which appears to be preoccupied with what goes on in the bedroom, while sadly having little to say about the surely more scandalous affairs in many board rooms. But why is this? Darren McCallig, who is training for ordination in the Church of Ireland, looks at the history of an obsession.

Where did it all go wrong? Why are the churches apparently obsessed with sex?

The recorded words of Jesus show him to be largely uninterested in the subject, so why all this furore?

Part of the answer seems to lie with the cult of Gnosticism. Now, while scholars are divided over exactly what Gnosticism was, we can be pretty certain that it had a rather dim view of the human body. A Gnostic text from the second century describes the body as, “this bondage of corruption, this cloak of darkness, this living death, this sensate corpse, this tomb you carry around with you, this robber who lives in your house who by the things it loves hates you.” Given this hysteria about the flesh, you may not be surprised to learn that Gnostics believed that they could only be saved by self-castration! Ouch!

The recorded words of Jesus show him to be largely uninterested in the subject, so why all this furore?

Precisely how all this influenced Christianity remains uncertain, but what we do know is that the developing Christian Church began to see sex as something inherently sinful. In the fourth century, Saint Augustine went so far as to claim that had Adam and Eve never disobeyed in the Garden of Eden, humanity

would have been able to propagate children without any desire or enjoyment.

Sex had become almost like some kind of disease. Was marriage the cure?

Perhaps, but even here the couple need

Saint Francis de Sales encouraged married couples to imitate the sexual habits of the elephant. to keep their carnal lusts under control.

Writing at the beginning of the seventeenth century, Saint Francis de Sales encouraged married couples to imitate the sexual habits of the elephant: “The elephant, not only the largest but the most intelligent of animals, provides us with an excellent example. It is faithful and tenderly loving to the female of its choice, mating only every third year and then for no more than five days, and so secretly as never to be seen, until, on the sixth day, it appears and goes at once to wash its whole body in the river, unwilling to return to the herd until thus purified. Such good and modest habits are an example to husband and wife.”

But, I’m afraid it gets even worse. At least Saint Francis’ advice can be seen as rather amusing. What’s decidedly unfunny is the way all this craziness contributed towards misogyny.

Remember, in the Garden of Eden it was apparently Eve who caused all the trouble? Well, she is certainly not going to be allowed to forget it. The fifteenth

century Malleus Maleficarum or Hammer of the Witches, (a handbook for inquisitors) is a perfect example of how women, sex and sin become almost synonymous: “If the world would be rid of women, to say nothing of witchcraft, it would remain proof against innumerable dangers … I have found a woman more bitter than death … and as the sin of Eve would not have brought death to our soulsand body unless the sin had afterward been passed to Adam, to which he was tempted by Eve, not by the devil, therefore is she more bitter than death ...

All witchcraft comes from carnal lust, which in woman is insatiable.”

That just about sums it up! A movement founded by a man who rarely spoke about sex and who was, for his time, remarkably free in his relationships with women became one where sex

came to be seen by many as intrinsically sinful and women were seen as the dangerous lure to that sin.

So much for the past, how about the present? Well, church leaders

A literal interpretation of the Bible would leave adulterers being stoned to this day and slaves in bondage to their masters. may no longer preach to their congregations on the sexual habits of the elephant or the satanic nature of women, but the obsession with sexual matters shows little

sign of abating.

The current controversy revolves around Bishop Gene Robinson of ECUSA (Episcopal Church, USA).

He is an openly gay man in a long-term relationship with his partner. His election as Bishop of New Hampshire caused a major row in the worldwide Anglican Communion of which ECUSA (along with the Church of Ireland, the Church of England and many others) is a member. Some Anglican Churches declared themselves to be “out of communion” with ECUSA and the Archbishop of Canterbury, who acts as a focus of unity in the Anglican Communion, established a Commission to look into how relationships between the various Anglican Churches should be structured in the future. The Commission is due to report shortly. But, regardless of its findings,

the divisions with the Anglican Church on the issue of homosexuality will no doubt remain.

On one side are those who argue that homosexuality is sinful and is clearly condemned in the Bible. They point to passages in Leviticus and in Saint Paul’s letter to the Romans to back up their views. Moreover, many are concerned that to accept homosexual relationships would be to start on a “slippery slope” to total moral relativism.

On the other side of the debate are those who argue that the biblical writers had no understanding of the kind of committed, affirming and faithful homosexual relationships with which we are all familiar. Besides, a literal interpretation of the Bible would leave adulterers being stoned to this day and slaves in bondage to their masters.

No doubt the debate will continue, but the last word must go to that great moral leader, Dr Desmond Tutu. In the foreword to a recent Amnesty International report entitled, Sex, Love and Homophobia, the retired Archbishop of Cape Town compared the persecution of homosexuals to the treatment of black people under the apartheid regime in South Africa.

Fighting for the rights of homosexuals, he says, “is a matter of ordinary justice.” He goes on, “I could not have fought against the discrimination of apartheid and not also fight against the discrimination which homosexuals endure, even in our churches and faith groups.” Homophobia in the church, he says, “must be nearly the greatest blasphemy. We blame them for what they are.”

FAIR FUN FOR EVERYONE Simon Thompson Discovers the Gothenburg beyond the Book Fair It was immediately clear to us as we disembarked the bus that Sweden is a strange country. It is a SERIOUSLY strange country. All the children are made to take compulsory og-nivus (their equivalent of GCSE) in seventeen modern languages. There is a curfew that exists every night between 10.30pm and 7am which can only be broken by the seriously rich people, and there are no seriously rich people because the Government has all of everyone’s money. Not to pay on the trams that wind their way through Gothenburg is an offence which will get you a few very serious counselling sessions in a large but soulless public building from a man who drives a Volvo and probably always will.

That’s all a lie, of course, but like all good lies there’s a large measure of truth at the heart of it. We all know that Sweden is cold, that it’sunashamedly socialist (in a real way, not like France or Italy were), that it’s expensive and that it… well Volvos come from there. That was certainly the extent of my knowledge about the country and so when I agreed to the estimable Ms. Fergusson’s request that I accompany her to a bookfair in Gothenburg I thought I’d better read up on it. Sadly for my knowledge of Sweden, when I opened the Rough Guide in Stansted Airport, it was at the

section documenting the attractions of Liseberg, a theme-park beside the exhibition centre where the fair was to take place which housed the largest wooden roller-coaster in the world. HA! I thought. Shere Hite in the morning and a Big Dipper in the afternoon. At that point my mind became clouded with symbolism and I had to go sit down.

Thus it was that I arrived in Gothenburg knowing no more than the average man in the street about Sweden other than it had a very big roller coaster. That was ok. I like big roller coasters.

On arrival at 11.30pm we hailed a clean, modern taxi with a clean, modern driver from the deserted streets which whisked us the two miles to our hotel for only £10. Accommodation is very difficult to find in Gothenburg, but I wasn’t worried about that. I had very manfully taken control of finding us rooms and had made a reservation at the rather lovely Spar Hotel Majorna well in advance. Or had ? No. “I have this,” said the beautiful, blonde receptionist. ‘This’ was a bit of paper which I had apparently been sent via e-mail. Not only did it inform me that the hotel was booked out, it also informed me that I was from Thailand.

I knew that one of these things was definitely not true. Sadly for Ms. Fergusson and myself, I’m not from

Central Station - Uncannily like the Haunted House, Liseburg. Photo: Laura Fergusson Thailand. We were thus without a room for a whole two minutes before the receptionist bustled off to the phone and announced - unasked and apropos of nothing more than that she’d turned us away - that she had found us a room for our first two nights, after which we could return to her welcoming bosom for our final two. She summoned a nice shiny taxi with a nice shiny driver which took us to the Hotel Opera which, comically enough, was about two metres from where our airport bus had stopped. On arrival at this hotel we were met by a sour, fat, balding man in hisfifties, but by this stage it was after midnight and all the good-looking people had gone home to bed. The ugly people in Sweden keep the country ticking over from midnight to dawn.

Day 1 (the previous day had been day 0 in my small thriller-reading

mind) was funfair day! Of course there were some lectures too, but good lord I was looking forward to that roller coaster. We encountered a small setback on arrival at the gates to Liseberg where, like an up-to-date National Lampoons film, we discovered that it was closed until 4 pm. We had two hours to kill, so we trudged sadly off to the art museum to suffer rooms upon rooms of stunning works from all corners of Europe housed in the old East-India company building.

This is one of the (many) things I do like about Sweden- their willingness to open state buildings for public use. If Sweden ever invades Britain and makes London the capital of that great new Anglo-Swedish nation, the Palaces of Westminster will become a crèche and the government will operate out of a series of portakabins in Peckham.

Which is exactly how it should be.

The theme park, when we finally broached its outer defence of incredibly complex ticket choices, was nothing short of superb. The roller coaster was all I had imagined and more (thanks mostly to Shere Hite) but my money fo scariest ride goes on a doughnut shaped room around a very large pole. It went up the pole slowly, hovered for a few minutes and came down again slowly. I’m not a great fan of heights, so while Ms. Fergusson put her face against the glass and said all the usual things normal people say when they’re very high up (generally along the lines of “Gosh! We’re very high up!”) I did what I do when I’m very high up and disgraced myself by closing my eyes, holding tightly to the seat and gibbering a little bit..

Over the remaining days and

Trams with a temper! Photo: Simon Thompson nights we attended various lectures, chatted about how we really thought there should be at least one staff member from our School of English at such a large event and got very drunk very expensively while eating very expensive food. Indeed on our penultimate night we so over-imbibed that we got up at a local suburban bar and started to dance in a rather wild fashion which attracted the attention of the natives.

Ms. Fergusson valiantly fended off several young men who looked like posterboys for Hitler Youth, while I was quite eager to accept the seemingly lascivious (they were in Swedish) offers of a 40 year old woman in a mini-skirt. Ms. Fergusson denied me this. “Think of how little honour you have left. You’ll be wanting to keep it”. I’ll not, but for the sake of companionable relations I let my catch go.

And suddenly it was time to leave. Or was it? No. On our last morning we had a lovely and leisurely breakfast, showered and made our way to the airport where we leisurely learned we had missed our flight. Cue scenes of great panic which ended in a cross-city dash in a taxi shared with a young Swede who informed us how “I like to go abroad for the danger”. We made an SAS flight out of Gothenburg’s other airport, sharing our plane with David Lodge, Michael Holroyd, Beryl Bainbridge, Joanna Trollope and Margaret Drabble. Beryl Bainbridge flew first class. That last sentence makes no real sense at all and yet I somehow like it. Just like Sweden.

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Tuesday October 12, 2004

Trinity News FEATURES Getting to Grips with Ghana Laura Fergusson attempts life as a West African journalist.

Beach at Cape Coast Photo: Guy Bloembergen I was reading The Devil Wears Prada, and it had somehow taken over my mind. I was temporarily convinced that I was travelling to work at Conde Nast in a bright yellow cab along 5th Avenue; that I would shortly step out, immaculately dressed, and strut along to the air-conditioned office in my Jimmy Choos, sipping a Starbucks caramel macchiato. It was something of a shock, then, when we stopped with a jolt and I was forced to look up from my book. The tro-tro (an ancient minibus through whose floor we could see the potholed ground and whose already shattered windscreen shuddered perilously as we moved), had arrived at my stop. I staggered out, shoved by various enormous women impatient with my slowness, and stepped cautiously around the open sewers,goats, begging children and rice-sellers to arrive, mud-spattered, eyes streaming with dust, in the room, bare but for four aging computers, that was my place of work. Because fate had delivered me, not to Manhattan, but to Accra.

It had appeared the perfect way to combine all my objectives for my final student summer. I would get writing experience, travel and adventure all in one. I can’t claim that my six weeks in Ghana with Teaching and Projects Abroad, on placement with the Ghanaian Chronicle, failed to provide me with any of these. And no, no-one ever said third world cities were pretty.

However, there were times when, caked in grime and sweat, having narrowly avoided falling in a sewer, running out of polite ways in which to tell people that no, I didn’t think I would be calling them that night because I DIDN’T KNOW THEM, and more ignorant of world events than I’d ever been in my life, despite working for a newspaper, I plaintively berated myself for not having found a placement somewhere, cold, clean, efficient, cultural…where people minded their own business and you could buy a cappuccino…somewhere like Gothenburg.

Accra is a daunting city to get used to. With no real landmarks, and my total lack of a sense of direction, I spent my first week or so in a bemused daze – did I work on the street with three rice stands or two? The omnipresent religious statements and quotations which bedecked every taxi, stall and building provided some assistance – I lived next to the “In God Anything is Possible Hair Salon”, while I worked beside the “God is Great Chop Bar”.

But the absence of street signs, pavements or permanent buildings still got to me. I was given some perspective by a cynical friend whom I emailed just after his return from India after my

first fortnight, saying “Accra is filthy, ugly and disorientating”, to which he responded “Accra is filthy, ugly and disorientating. So is India. So is life.”

Working for a newspaper, even one whose daily appearance seemed a miracle given that whenever I was joined in the office it was by a reporter who would proceedto while away the day playing solitaire, provides fascinating insights into an unknown country. I wrote a feature on an extremely impressive locally run NGO which organised arts workshops for schools in slum areas, attended the launch of a book on correct usage of Ghanaian English, wrote on a Japanese Development organisation, reported on a new women’s manifesto and a forum on the rights of domestic workers. I was asked by a friend when I returned whether being a white woman at these media events had been an issue, but in fact they were almost the only time when it was not. Yes, the TV cameras would pick me out of the audience for novelty value, but I was treated as a fellow reporter.

Elsewhere, however, I was made conscious of my difference to a degree I hadnever anticipated. I had realised that there would be very few white people around, but had somehow thought that in the capital city it would not be so noticeable. Instead it was possibly the most difficult thing to get used to. Worse than the lack of hot water, the absence of milk, sealed roads, hidden sewers, proper shops and familiar newspapers, although I missed all these things, was the lack of anonymity. It was impossible to fade into the background. Every time I walked down a street I would be accosted, never threateningly but always insistently, by everyone who saw me.

“Hey, obruni,white lady, talk to me, I like you, where will I see again, how can I find you,what is your address/number/email, where do you work, I want to take you as a friend, what is your name?” No appeal to logic (“How do you know you like me? You don’t know me.”), or to a Western sense of self-preservation (“I don’t give out my address to people I don’t know”) had any effect whatsoever, people just laughed or looked confused, but would not be put off. I longed to be ignored.

Having said that, if you did want to attract someone’s attention to find out which tro you needed to take, for help with bargaining or to ask for directions, people were overwhelmingly friendly and helpful. Well, as long as you didn’t need the directions to be accurate. And as long as you greeted them first and asked them how they were before launching into “Could you tell me the time/the way to…” The importance of greetings took a little while to sink in – I inadvertently offended my host moth-

NGO Intern Rosanna Thomson discovers a solution to an English student’s unemployability The life of an English student is a hard one. Sure, we may only have eight hours of classes a week. “Studying,” for us, may consist mainly of lying in bed reading a novel or two. We may spend more time in coffee shops than libraries. But we live a life of raw, undiluted terror. What happens next?

In the real world, we are cheerfully told by brusque careers “advisors,” we are unemployable. One such advisor began her inspiring speech to the English department with a smiling “Now, I take it none of you want to make any money, do you?” It is assumed that we will all simply disap-

pear into the morass of the academic world, in which we will continue try-

The programme itself sounded absolutely incredible, and the reports we had from the volunteers were little short of inspirational. ing to persuade people that the world really needs another Shakespeare expert. However, there are some of us,

er several times by failing to find her to say good morning (usually because she was having a bath), before leaving for work, and on arrival in the office I was expected to shake everyone’s hand each day and ask them individually how they were. And if you think that sounds like an inefficient use of time then you really have no idea how Ghana operates – time has no meaning whatsoever.

Several times I arrived at 8.40am for a press conference stated as beginning at 8.30am, and sat by myself for two hours before things finally started to get going.

Although I wasn’t as adventurous as some of my fellow-volunteers, I managed some memorable weekends– from staying overnight in a rainforest and walking a series of bridges strung up under the canopy of the trees, to visiting the castles in Cape Coast and Elmina which were the centre of the British and Dutch slave trades respectively. Standing in the hauntingly unchanged dungeons provided a harrowingly immediate sense of the horrors that were suffered there, and I was glad to have a Dutch friend with me to share the sense of national guilt. More lightly, we spent one weekend having a non-stop beach party of punch, dancing,lazing and moonlit skinny-dipping, which was a fantastic escape from the crowds of the city.

Despite having convinced myself before leaving London that I was going to die in Ghana – the guide book’s litany of malaria, typhoid, cholera, AIDS,

hepatitis, yellow fever, rabies and bilharzia, not to mention snakes, crocodiles, stonefish and scorpions, as well as the threat of food poisoning, polluted water, riptides, currents and death-trap roads left me trembling for a week before departure – I didn’t behave like paranoid hypochondriac.

Neither did I die. And in fact, in terms of the usual things travellers to big cities need to fear, Accra is remarkably safe. A few friends had their wallets stolen but there is very little violent crime, and certainly in comparison to other West African cities such as Lagos you need only a normal amount of vigilance.You do need to readjust your sense of modesty though - while it is extremely frowned upon for women to have their lower backs on display, and i frequently had my t-shirt tugged down by a reproving fellow-passenger on tros, urinating in public is such universal behaviour that it is necessary for people who actually mind this, such as the owners of the few smart houses, to paint “Do not uriante here” on their walls .I wouldn’t recommend Accra to everyone- the pool pass to the one 5 star hotel which I initially felt it was cheating to splash out on became increasingly necessary as an escape – but six weeks there were an incredible eye-opener. Living with a Ghanaian family, working for a national newspaper, travelling to work by tro-tro, even if I knew it was all temporary, that I had innumerable safety-nets should I need them, all provided an experience of an alternative existence that, while I wasn’t sorry to leave it behind, was an amazing way to spend a summer.

Elmina Castle

Fishermen on a Pirogue, Cape Coast myself included, who realised a long time ago that we were never going to make it in academia and we need to find some way to con people into employing us. And this is where the joys of the internship come in.

This summer, I went hunting for an internship. No more inter-railing for me, I decided – a distinctly spartan look to my CV and the thought of being forced to live, once again, with my parents, finally forced me to get myself organised (the latter, in particular, inducing wild-eyed, gut-clenching panic.)

I started off feeling optimistic – this was going to be great, I would get experience, I would become a fantastically successful business woman. However, as rejection after rejection came back, I grew steadily less cheerful - you do begin to wonder about your career prospects when you discover how difficult it is to get anyone to allow you to work for them

for free. I mean, I would hardly say I’m arrogant about my abilities as an office assistant (being dyslexic and, well, blonde, put paid to any overconfidence about my practical skills) but the world of work reacted as if I would do more harm than good. I applied for internships in Boston, New York, London and Dublin. I begged, I pleaded, I lied fluently and with increasing magnitude on my CV. I was met with resounding and absolute silence.

In desperation, I turned once again to the Trinity Vacwork section, and spotted an ad placed by Suas, a start-up NGO looking for interns.

They sounded perfect, and didn’t seem to require any actual skills. I sent off my most extravagantly dishonest CV yet, and, thank God, they offered me an internship. At this point, I thought it wise to find out a little bit about them.

So I checked out their website (www.suas.ie, in case you’re interested) and was seriously impressed.

Photo: Guy Bloembergen

Photo: Guy Bloembergen Suas (for those of you who, like me, haven’t come across them in college life) is a charity started two years ago by a group of Trinity students. Among many other things, they fundraise for some of the most inspiring overseas organisations I have ever come across – schools in Nairobi, Calcutta, Delhi and Mombasa which provide basic education to slum children, giving them reading and writing skills, one full meal a day, and most importantly, hope for their future.

I had a fantastic time working for Suas. On my first day, I was so nervous about having my first office job (would I break my computer?

Would they notice my distinct lack of knowledge about anything more sophisticated than email? - the answer to both is of course, yes) that I practically broke into a cold sweat when anyone spoke to me, but, despite my slightly worrying new personality defect, they persevered with me, and I

learned far more than I ever expected.

Each year, Suas sends out volunteers from Irish universities to the schools they help sponsor to work as teaching assistants. I was involved in the running of the volunteer programme – well, when I say involved, I

I sent off my most extravagantly dishonest CV yet, and, thank God, they offered me an internship. mean I was put in charge of sending annoying emails to the volunteers demanding paperwork, but still...The programme itself sounded absolutely incredible, and the reports we had from the volunteers were little short of inspirational. Getting over the

challenges of living in a city as extremely different to Dublin as, say, Calcutta, and working with children who come from such appallingly impoverished homes must be one of the most rewarding ways anybody could spend a summer. As their emails came flooding in, describing teaching classes of over a hundred and organising vast football matches, I was at first awe-struck, and later,without wanting to sound like I’ve been paid (hint, hint) completely jealous.

Even working in the office was a wonderful experience. I got to work with some seriously great people, both the other interns and full-time staff, have a great time doing it, and, believe it or not, bulk up my CV a bit too. So maybe there is hope out there for us English students after all.

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Tuesday October 12, 2004

21

Trinity News COMMENT OPINION SILENT RACE WAR BURNS IN DIVISION Black and white divide in the U.S.A. from an Irish students perspective.

Jim Falvey American cities are funny places.

They are glamorised by spectacular neck- stretching one million storey buildings containing more wealth than could fit in the Grand Canyon. These dominating centres of trade and commerce are by and large filled with rich, snotty-nosed Caucasian males who have a big car, huge house, even bigger garden, a little sexy wife and a handicap of 6. Going down roughly about 144 thousand stories or so and onto the street one will find an entirely different scene. One will find the opposite end of America’s social spectrum- the life of the average African American.

I’ll start with the statistics. 98% of all crazy people roaming the streets in American cities are black and notch that figure up 2% with nightfall, 100% of people requesting a spare quarter are indeed black also and I’m pretty sure a good 95% of all those whose house is the USA Today newspaper are blackand that goes for those missing the odd limb or two. Of course these are massive generalisations contrasting the two extremes of American society and obviously the economic and social divisions between a good majority of whites and blacks is not quite the extreme disparity I have just painted, but a certain amount of resentment between blacks and whites across the classes continues and the misconceptions of equality, goodwill and harmony between different races portrayed

by Hollywood and American television

is total rubbish.

I spent my summer in Chicago. A beautiful clean city which I became very attached to and, like most Irish students who travelled to the states for the summer, I had a terrific time. I acquired a job quite near the city centre selling hot dogs in traditional American style. The job was fine apart from the stingy tips and the devastatingly awful Mexican music which my very illegal moustached work colleague Carlos used to blast out for hours and hours and hours. Anyway, whilst working in this dingy hot dog shop with my newly found Latino friends I began to notice the huge disparities between the various races which arrived into my work-place.

Mixing between the races was almost non-evident. Mexicans stuck with Mexicans, Asians with Asians, whites with whites and blacks with blacks.

The film ‘ Remember the Titans’ was beginning to seem like pile of exaggerated nonsense. It was very rare indeed to see a white and a black man come up to my shop window and order a couple of hot dogs and sodas together (let alone bond during camp in a high school football team). Meanwhile, the chances of them grabbing a few beers together afterwards was simply, null and void. It has been forty one years since Martin Luther Kings famous ‘ I have a dream’ speech and many social injustices then faced by African Americans have been addressed and now thankfully no longer exist, but it certainly doesn’t mean that whites and blacks in American society hold any fondness

for each other.

White people in American cities have, I believe, always regarded blacks as a threat to their safety and indeed their economic and social domination of these cities. Indeed, the majority of white students in Chicago who I spoke to on the matter were, in general, not the most complimentary in their views of African Americans and I most certainly detected an air of superiority in their tone. These students found that those who they condescended against were louder and more abrasive; while their “I don’t give a damn what anyone says” attitude was hard to take. I guess it’s just different from their own more reserved, privileged “I just got three cars from daddy for turning 17 and a half years of age” ways. They see black people as a threat to their perfect little world. On the other hand, many black peoples resent their counterpart due to the fact that they believe these prosperous white people who live in a nice part of town are indeed a stumbling block to becoming successful themselves.

The lack of mixing between blacks and whites though is not just for economic reasons as our customers were well able to fork out for the ridiculously over priced food and drink, it was due to the fact that there are elementary differences in the way American whites and blacks speak, dress and act.

So to follow on from my ridiculous generalisations from earlier- I must add that my coloured customers tended to be louder and possessed a more relaxed attitude towards me while my white all-American customers carried a more uptight disposition. Their dress styles are inherently different also- in accordance with their demeanour my coloured customers were attired in more relaxed baggy flashy clothing (with the odd Mr. T on show), while whites on the other hand, besides the odd Eminem wannabe, leaned as

The boys may have gone away, but with commercial America their desired division remains expected towards conservatism. The practicality of a nice polo neck shirt(often pink!) a nice light pair of beige trousers and a smart pair of black shoes is never lost on the middle class white American male. Don’t even get me started on the differences between white and black women in style and manner. They seemed to bear no relation at all to each other.

It is my belief that people in general are terrified and uncomfortable with differences in others so this instinctively breeds feelings of suspicion. The security of sticking with ones own tends to be the easier safer option for most races in America. Thus, the mannerisms of that self-same race are distinguished as different and individual to accentuate the sense of security in one’s own section. The divisions become embedded to such an extent that the race-line has boundaries which are nigh impossible to cross.

These, and other inherent differences, such as colour itself, music, culture and beliefs cause this natural distrust between whites and blacks in America and the segregation between them caused mainly by the economic gulf which still exists between the two races in the main is also a severe and uncompromising stumbling block preventing harmonious relations between them. As we are all aware American cities are in general segregated between blacks and whites. This was made lucid to me when getting the late train home from the city after work.

Each evening the transport I chose carried a half-full train to the white middle-class stronghold in the northern part of the city. Bordering the other side of the tracks towards the south would be hoards of coloured people heading to a different world. I have to admit, being generally the only white person stupid enough to take the

underground train system in Chicago city at night, made it very intimidating indeed- it was a very uncomfortable experience for me as I was treated to the odd suspicious untrusting eye. Or perhaps, with my pay cheque in my wallet, I had become one of those untrusting, paranoid white men who would probably rather crawl twenty miles through a narrow-rat infested tunnel (Andy Dufresne style) than to catch the underground in their home city at night. The segregation which allows for intimidating groupings of black men to rule the night while the domination of the white man in the city during business hours continues unreservedly is borne out of historical mistrust, resentment and fear of something different.

Resentment and division between the two dominant races in America from what I gathered in my three months in Chicago remains an uneasy factor in

American society and will continue as such for the foreseeable future. This fear between blacks and whites stretches back through the annals American history- from slavery, to the Klu Klux Klan’s heyday and on to the civil rights movement. The mistrust of each other is not an easy thing to erase and has become almost embedded in their psyches. The white Americans who wish to remain at the very top of the American social ladder while coloured people fight for more opportunities.

This elementary, very human struggle between whites and blacks has progressed to a case of recognition and then an underlying dissolvement of social ties and engagement. The mistrust and suspicion created by this silent battle carries on today gives whites and especially blacks further impetus to stick together and continue a dangerous divide which burdens America.

needs as everyone else and that we’re all not really that unalike. The bouncers even force a uniform of sorts on everyone. Dress code essentially boils down to a shirt and pants for guys and not being dressed weird or too like a Leeson-streeter for girls. We herd into the place in queues only to discover it’s not really all that packed inside,

while discussing that it’s a good deal to get a student price of five bucks to be able to attend. Then we dish out another two euro for a nice foreign lady to mind our jackets. The whole scene if one really looks at it is a bit bewildering.

We pride ourselves on being a pub-culture but when is the last time you saw someone come up a random stranger in a pub to chat them up.

Sure, it does happen, but we like to get our kicks in a dark smelly room with lights which sometimes make us blue and go in slow motion. I’ve become a little cynical. I don’t think I was ever that big a fan but now I’m appalled. Of course Fresher’s week has done nothing to help that. Big tip for next year: do not attend Fresher’s nights because they are attended by really, genuinely, very young and clueless people. If you get your kicks on low morals throw your body onto that dance-floor but otherwise abstain. When you’re in that situation dancing like an old man at a confirmation you get a Shreddies-like rumbling of the tummy. The kind of feeling an old man must get dancing with kids at their confirmation. You realise that this is using college for bad means.

However the most troubling thing for me about the nite-club scene in general is the lecherousness. You could see a perfectly nice girl who perhaps is quite lovely in the real world but in the nite-club world the minute you approach her you’re doomed.

Firstly what could you possibly say to a complete stranger that wouldn’t leave them slightly sceptical? The moment you decide to say something, you’re trying to install a pub-scene into an anti-pub scenario and realistically you’re not going to be slightly humourous or interesting. So the only option is to keep screaming random comments you wouldn’t bother even thinking on a normal night and she either tells you she can’t hear you or she laughs. Then you pull off some crap dance move you saw another lad

do nearby, like clapping your hands and stomping one foot at the same time, and you’re off and running. Is this the scene in which you want to meet anyone you could possibly go out with?

Of course we could just say the nite-club scene is merely for the quick-fixers but that isn’t really true. It would be rather degrading to the Irish public between 18 and 24 to say that we’re all looking for the easy option.

So what is it which drives us to attend the cattle-marts. Is it the dream of there always being something better out there for us? Or the hope that this time it will be better, that the drinks will be cheaper, the music more to your personal liking and that the bouncers and staff are not as ignorant?

Is it just the easiest way to have another drink when the pubs close? Probably it’s a mix of all these reasons but at the back of my mind I have long suspected another little possibility.

I think we have to open our eyes to what the scene really gives us and that’s a sense of belonging in a group without the responsibilities. Just for one night each and every adult there has consented to dance along with everyone else, to drink with everyone else and perhaps scream into the ear of everyone else. It’s like a small schoolyard with the familiar uniform and similar consumption habits. There are the slightly cool guys who watch everything from the corner. The pretty girls who stick together and the country boys whose sport is jumping up and down in the middle. There are bouncer teachers who spoil all the fun and games and, of course, the smokers in the toilets. Essentially once you leave school you think you’re all grown up et al. Maybe it’s time to realise that you’re constantly trying to recreate the one time you truly belonged to an institution in your life every night you go out. Or maybe it’s just the vapid dance music which drives us in.

Thursday night the love was starting to die as my wallet became paper thin.

But then, joyfully, another bumper cheque arrived on Friday and a new rush of excitement drew us closer once more. Cocktails and fine whiskeys were splashed across fine marble tables. Little Italy threw open its splendid restaurants and China Town brokered deals. This was New York baby and I was living the dream. I passed movie sets, bumped into celebrities and sang Ol’ Frankie’s tunes long into the night. In a sea of colour and lights I was happy to add my little tint.

The capitalist dream is a scary place to reside. You begin to say things that you would never say back home. You start to resent the needy for not embracing the dream, while not realising that this self same dream can be a nightmare. You see the racial and social divides, order another whiskey and soda and forget all about it. You are just happy in yourself, in your own present position and say “shucks” to the other side. A conceived notion of self actualisation replaces the underlying reality of selfishness. Capitalist

America completely blinds you to anything outside your money-laden dreams. You are willing to spend, but likewise you’re always waiting to have more and more beautiful green notes.

A shade of green which seems so pretty that you’d replace all the fields of Ireland for just another grand.

And then something wakes you up. Looking back I’m not sure if it was realising that the nightclub I was in had a Jacuzzi. Or whether it was the time I bought a hot-dog from a vendor, walked away, then returned to ask for change and his big happy smile turned to a blank stare. Or maybe it was the day I went to the race track and felt scary elation after winning twenty bucks. Of course it could have been when I gave a taxi driver the wrong note and handed him a twenty dollar tip. I should have realised it was a shame and a merely regrettable incident. Instead it half-wrecked my night.

I realised that my love-affair with New York had to come to an end. It was killing me and there was no way I could beat the city.

In my last few days there I

did all the usual crappy tourist stuff which I had to declined to attend to earlier in the Summer. I had believed I was above the regular tourist rigmarole. I had thought that I was New York. But it was all an illusion. I gladly paid to go up with all the rest of the visitors to the top of the Empire State.

I ooohed and aaawed with all the rest of the awe-inspired mid-westerners who had never seen such a triumph of man over nature before. I even took a photo of an old guy with his wife when they asked me. I looked at the view of the city from each of the rooftop’s four sides. I saw Jersey, the Statue of Liberty, Brooklyn, Queens, The Bronx before I gazed on Manhattan once again. Times Square haunted my vision once more. The glow bespoke more about a way of life than a place. It was all too bright for one young man to overcome. I could easily subside once more beneath the glow, but just this time I longed for a bit more shade. At least there you’re not too blind to notice what is good around you.

Disco school days

Freshers enjoy a great night at Histeria last week

Rory Loughnane Sweaty bodies made more vile by the smoking ban. Throbbing music which belies the notion of “music”. Queues to throw more alcohol into yourself so that the next day you won’t remember the

pretty girl’s frown when you looked at her a little too long. Queueing again because you think you’re getting value for money on the drinks promotions and don’t realise you’re drinking watereddown Home Value beer. A girl walks past in what barely passes as a piece of cloth let alone a skirt and because you’re feeling silly you give a sleazy

smile. Then her bad-ass boyfriend wearing a Celtic Jersey freaks you out with a look that would break ice-cubes.

And then you’re wary of the whole scene for about a minute or two so you do a shot of some foul pink stuff to make you forget about his look. And so on and so on and then its two o clock and you stumble out home. The next

day it was “a great night” because you don’t remember a thing.

Ah, the lovely Irish niteclub scene. A place where very few dreams are made, hearts broken or any powerful emotion felt. It is the happy medium-ground where everyone convenes to be basically the same. To betray that they too have the self-same

The Capitalist’s Dream Oh, how I hated the place.

A gentle stroll along a dirty street cost me ten dollars at least. Compulsive spending burned giant holes in my small pockets. A barrage of advice in expenditure accosted my every step.

Each vendor treated me like a new best friend while posters of semi-clad ladies on every billboard wrecked my sensibilities. I was awash in a sea of splendid images and driving forces.

Helpless and alone I couldn’t but involve myself in the appealing falsities and misrepresentations. New York, New York and all the rest of it.

Arriving into Times Square that ridiculously humid June evening I felt sickened by what I had journeyed so far to see. My head spun wildly to catch a million images of products I never wanted to buy and TV stars I never wanted to see. I surveyed the

sheer magnitude, the ugly kitsch grandeur, the thousand races, the surreal shine, and the terrible vision. How could man be so consumed by money that this cruel place became a tourist attraction? Disillusioned I looked for a bar. But everywhere I turned another tourist sporting an ‘I love New York’ tshirt flashed a camera in my face. Will I take a photo of you and your wife?

Big thick middle-America drawl.

Chubby stupid face. No, I say, I’m busy being angry with the lie of progress, the depth of greed and the grossness of this city you’re in love with.

That night I did drink away the blues of capitalism. I lamented the way I could win a smile or a frown from my bartender by how many dollars I left on the table. I tried to forget the way the bartender kept offering me

the bar menu in the hope of more and more tips. I turned away from the real flash American high-roller beside me who was literally tossing money at the bartender, like one would treat a dog, in the hope of impressing some silly blonde who kept telling him she could never drink anything but white wine.

Old Frankie had told that if I could make it here, I’d make it anywhere.

Whiskey-blurred, I was starting to think that maybe I didn’t want to make anything.

So, when did it all change?

When did the love affair with America begin? Truth be told, it’s all a little embarrassing. My affair with the American dream began when my first wage cheque arrived. With money, the city literally opens its arms to you. At this crucial point you can reject the embrace and stay at home every night

lamenting the sad state of things or you can hug it like an old lost friend and forget about what caused the friendship to cease. You just ignore the overwhelming bad stuff, laugh very hard at it when it arrives, and love the good stuff. Like advice at a hair and makeup course, (not that I’ve gone to one) you accentuate the good and paint over the bad. And so, New York, American capitalism’s wet dream, loved me back.

My cash kept flowing and so did the love.

Money translates into a notion of trendiness in the Big Apple.

It’s the collector’s item which you can’t have enough of. Of course you can’t help showing it off to all and sundry also. From Friday to Wednesday New York and I were in raptures with each other as I lavished attention on its costly activities. By

Trinity News &OPINION COMMENT Speaking French does not Trinity News mean you are smart

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Tuesday October 12, 2004

Archive

The case for apartheid Tim McLoughlin November 30th, 1961 Printed in Trinity News Editor’s note: When first published over forty years ago McLoughlin’s article caused quite a stir on campus. Dr. Verwoerd, whom he mentions often in the piece, was the South African Prime Minister from 1958-66. The country became a “Republic” in 1961. Verwoerd had the distinction of presiding over the Sharpville massacre, the banning of the African National Congress, extremely dodgy politics in enacting legislature, and sending Nelson Mandela to life imprisonment. In a twist of sheer irony he was assassinated in 1966 by one of his parliamentary clerks for not being sufficiently racist.

The underlying logic of the article is troublesome to fathom. How can he say that Apartheid is not concerned with white supremacy while supporting a white government that believed that the black majority had no political role to play in the Republic of South Africa, as they were citizens of different countries, or 'homelands'? His final lines are perhaps the most curious though where Mcloughlin dismerits Verwoerd’s critics for focussing on the facts and not the philosophy. Those damn facts getting in the way of a good ‘ol Old Testament-backed theory of development through separation.

In modern politics Paternalism is a cleaner word than Colonialism. Empire Builders made card houses for young Nationalists to knock down with one breath of the word “Freedom,” and where in the past Victorians took liberties, rights are demanded back. The polite, diplomacy-ridden old world – and I include America in this context – accepts the African politician for his colour, not his ideas. The credence given to and the respect demanded by Nkrumah, Tshombe, Mboya, Banda and their colleagues is the result of polite paternalism in the guise of diplomacy. Banda is accepted as a responsible leader “de jure”, not “de facto.” The alleged repression practised by Colonialists is given air and things are found to be no better for it. Men of moral are thrown out of court for suggesting that suppression and repression are not the same thing.

If there is a philosophy of African nationalism it smacks of that of Milton’s Satan; Eve will not be free as long as she is obedient. Those who practice paternalism must carry conviction and command co-operation. The British have relented to their cost; the Afrikaaners refuse to give ground.

In a recent interview Col. Van der Post, remarking on his recent venture into the Kalahari, came out with the comment that when a primitive Bushman meets the European for the first time, both are affected – in different ways, but to no less degree on either side. The inevitable realisation is not what the two have in common, rather at what points they differ. The appreciation of this difference between races is the starting point of “Apartheid.” It is not a policy of segregation for segregations sake or a philosophy of white supremacy. It is a philosophy of the separate development of the European and non-European races in South Africa and is based on the teaching of the Dutch Reformed Church. This link to religion is vital to a proper understanding of the political theories of the Nationalist Party. Theological emphasis is on the Old Testament, not the New; though this does not mean it is non-Christian. If the non-European, who in South Africa is the Bantu, is a “hewer of wood and a drawer of water” there is no reason to deprecate him. He is a creature of God with a soul to be saved; to accomplish this he must be given and has the right to opportunity for self-development.

This, according to “Apatheid” will better be realised in areas separate to European ways of living.

The Government treatment of the Bantu is deplored throughout the world. He suffers the social humiliation of segregation. He is barred from the liberties of European standards of living. In public offices he uses a separate entrance, waiting for his train he sits on a bench marked “Non-Europeans,” going to town he is not admitted to most stores. These effects of Government policy are not seen by the Europeans as stemming from any feeling of racial superiority; they are some of the sacrifices that are inevitable in a period of transition, and the important thing about periods of transition is that they must be accomplished, they must not set into a deep freeze, the transition must go on. At present the Bantu is denied the European way of life, he is denied self-government. This has been decided arbitrarily for him and has been enforced with all the rigour of a Nazi regime. But where the South African Government are taking away with one hand they are offering with the other. The Universities of Capetown and the Witwatersrand – the last two campuses enjoying racial integration- are now for Europeans only. On paper though there are four Universities for the Bantu that will turn out professional men to serve their entirely Bantu society. In the projected racial and even tribal cantons there will be self-government at every level. The initial capital needed for the establishment of social, cultural and sports facilities will be supplied by European financial houses. This idealistic blue-print depends on two things; a sufficient increase in European population to replace African labour- the Verwoerd family is unique in not employing African labour- and the reversal of the flow of Africans from their tribal areas to centres of employment.

Africans are being encouraged to return to their tribal areas, movement of Africans from one province of the Union to another is restricted, passes are essential to keep track of and curtail migrants, and socially to check squatting in already overcrowded locations.

The Afrikaaner behind the wheel of “Apartheid” is physically and mentally a rough diamond. It is part of his nature to be a bad loser not from selfish reasons but from a sense of thwarted ambition. He doesn’t spare himself in his efforts to achieve by obdurate will and conviction what is recognised as worthwhile. Doctors Craven and Verwoerd are industrious, practical idealists.

“Apartheid” considered “in vacuo” may seem utterly impracticable, but in the light of the Afrikaaner mind it will succeed if humanly possible.

“Apartheid” implies two stages for its realisation – separation and development of racial groups. To be blind to the second is to see the cart without the horse. To condemn “Apartheid” as a policy of segregation that gives the lie to human rights, is to show the irresponsibility of ignorant criticism. Dr. Verwoerd is not such a dullard as to be deluded by the derision of critics who look to the present situation as anything other than a transition period. His critics have yet to learn that behind present facts there is a philosophy, and behind that a religion that gives Faith and conviction to the Afrikaaner’s answer to the colour question.

Sourced by Rory Loughnane

Haitian troubles reach fever pitch as proAristide insurgents storm capital.

Rory Loughnane In an article in last year’s Trinity News I discussed how I felt the situation in Haiti would resolve itself considering the impending ousting of Jean Bertrand Aristide. Certainly the situation looked bleak for the President with rebels under the leadership of Guy Phillippe intending an overthrow. This duly happened and the U.S. backed interim leadership of Gérard Latortue has been installed since February. The rebels were appeased and it was hoped that some resemblance of peace could reign on the troubled island. There is however an old Haitian proverb which has bore some truth in the months since and that is: “Sak vid pa kamp” or “An empty sack can’t stand up.”

Of course the interim government has been wracked with misfor-

On an island with a population of 8 million, they have three thousand police officers. tune since its instalment. The worst of these misfortunes have been the horrendous weather conditions in the Caribbean this summer. Presently the situation is firmly about damage control rather than progress. Latest reports suggest that the death toll has risen to as many as 2,700 due to the floods and mudslides unleashed by the storm Jeanne. The official count stands at 1,870 at time of publication. In the midst of this natural devastation, manmade operations are also starting to crumble. The government has been found out to be as unsteady as the shanty houses in Port-Au-Prince’s Bel-Air region. The humanitarian crisis has given ex-President Aristide’s supporters grounds for rebellion and armed with machetes and rocks they have protested in the capital demanding “Aristide or death.”

The world’s first black democracy has once more descended into barely creditable government veering into anarchy. But is this country ultimately ungovernable? The evidence suggests that a second bout of near civil war looms. 14 people have been killed already in clashes between the protesters and the government’s guard at the national palace. UN peacekeepers have

been deployed to quell fighting.

Latortue said the pro-Aristide protesters called “Operation Baghdad” are responsible for the police killings. He noted that Haiti is seeing a “climate of terror” resembling “the four months preceding Aristide’s departure.”

In my last article on this subject I noted why Aristide was being protested against. Now it seems to have come full circle and the past corrupt system is favoured over a system which has nothing in reserve for a tragedy of this magnitude. Of course, countries have come to Haiti’s aid but the distribution of these supplies remains a problem. Aid workers planned to distribute more food yesterday to thousands of hungry survivors in Gonaïves, a city of 250,000 where Jeanne left about 200,000 homeless. Many food distributions have been mobbed by desperate crowds, and young men often loot trucks carrying supplies, while UN peacekeepers fire into the air to keep order. Firing into the air, I might suggest, is probably not enough of a reaction to deter looters.

But I suppose no UN soldier really wants the scandal of actually being effective in some way in Haiti.

In the overall scheme of things Haiti has been fecked over incredibly in its history. Firstly by France and an old saying from that day still exists: Speaking French does not mean you are smart. Basically though, this could be reference to adopting any of the traits of the numerous invading countries, new government fads or ungrounded populist ideas. The problem seems be rooted in the fact that its foundation as a self-governing state was always a myth in the pipe-line created by those countries which wished to exploit its natural resources. The illusion has enabled these countries to retain power over the resources which could essentially enable Haiti to grow as a State in their own right.

The control and power of which I speak is however purely monetary. The U.S. bound interests in Haiti do not extend to actual government beyond their throwing support for the most popular candidate to quell Haitian disillusionment and rebellion. In State control Haiti boasts what must be one of the smallest police forces in the Western Hemisphere. On an island with a population of 8 million, they have three thousand police officers. To this measly effort one can add another three thousand Brazilian-led UN troops. I would suggest for the petty thieves of Dublin, that if they want to go somewhere where they’d probably get away with any crime they desire, Haiti would be the place to go. George Bush has designated $50 million for the relief work in the Caribbean post-Tropical Storm

Jeanne. About half of which will end up in Haiti. How much of this will actually reach the 200,000 homeless in Gonaives or the families of the 2,700 dead is highly questionable.

An interesting point which I touched on earlier is the way the Aristide support-

Tropical Storm Jeanne has made the picture all the more poignant. The scenes emerging are immediately recognisable. A reporter had a gun thrust into his face on Wednesday by a rebel screaming slogans against Bush and the UN troops. He yelled “We are

There is an old Haitian proverb which has bore some truth in the months since and that is: “Sak vid pa kamp” or “An empty sack can’t stand up.” ers are aligning themselves with the Iraqi insurgents. Some of those killed in the fighting have been ritually beheaded mimicking the latest bout of terror to emerge on the Al-Jazeera network.

Such an alignment in ideas belies the truth about these ensuing battles. The outside involvement of the U.S. in the ousting of Aristide has been another blow to the Haitian ideal of self-government. Just as Aristide fixed his last general election, now the decision over leadership has been taken out of the people’s hands in another way.

going to kidnap some Americans and cut off their heads.” Protesters have been demanding an end to “the invasion”- referring to U.S. marines who flew in the day Aristide left in February and the UN who replaced them in June.

This invasion of which they speak may as well refer to a legacy of intrusion for two hundred years. It is easy to recognise how the citizens can be cynical over a new government when they have barely any government forces to speak of and rely on outside protection.

In drawing the Iraqi comparison we see

how the pro-Aristide rebels perceive some chance of success. The media have been firmly focussed on the plights of Ken Bigley, the two Italian girls and the other various hostages.

The spotlight can not leave Iraq between its potent mix of religious insurgence, American involvement, oil interests and tragedy on an individual rather than collective level. In my last article I noted that Haiti longed for its moment to show the world its sad plight. But nothing really happened.

The ousting was quick and wellplanned. Aristide virtually disappeared and another American battle was won on foreign soil. But as with all good American battles they never quite finish the job and now Haiti, ravaged by storm, rattled by misgovernment and raped of its resources is dying a sad death behind its famous storm. No wonder the buzzword on the street is to kidnap Americans. There’s no surer way for anyone to be bothered by what’s outside one’s own little world than seeing someone just like you hanging from a cell-wall. Haiti is a boiling pot of antiinternational aggression and, I fear, it will become prominent sooner rather than later.

Big, bad world looming As final year dawns for some, the prospect of integrating with the rest of the working world becomes a reality and the freedom of first year falls by the wayside.

Matthew Wall I’m back in college again.

Final year. Difficult to believe, but it’s true, the pimply and uncouth young man who walked through the front arch three years ago is now a final year student in Trinity College. My “Trinity experience” is drawing inexorably to a close. I’ll leave the rhetorical questions, poignant reminiscences and observations on the vagaries of time aside for the moment in order to discuss the rather worrying prospect of next year and life outside the hallowed college walls. At the end of this academic year my status as a charitable institution to

Though I am very proud of my mastery of such subjects as the history of medieval Europe, the philosophy of Rousseau etc., I find it difficult to imagine major firms in a bidding war to obtain my services. be supported by family, friends and well-wishers will be revoked and I’ll have to step out into the (gulp!) real world. Yet, even now, on the brink, as it were, of independence, I can only shrug my shoulders mysteriously and mutter pig Latin obscenities whenever I am confronted with some well meaning member of my extended family asking me ‘ So, Matthew, what are you going to do when you leave college?’

For those few (and rather unfortunate

people) on campus who don’t have the pleasure of knowing me personally, I should explain that I am a studying for a BA in European Studies. Even now, I find it difficult to describe what exactly this course entails, and what it qualifies me to do. Though I am very proud of my mastery of such subjects as the history of medieval Europe, the philosophy of Rousseau etc., I find it difficult to imagine major firms in a bidding war to obtain my services. While my degree has proved to be very interesting, I now realize that I chose to study it in order to avoid making any real decisions about my future. And now, three years later, I find myself in the exact same position as when I filled out that fateful CAO form. All of the uncertainty that I thought would disappear during my college years remains. How does one decide?

In many senses, I have myself to blame for this uncertainty. I’ve made no effort to find work placements or summer jobs that might provide insight or useful experience. Instead, I’ve learned how to scrub pots, serve pints, wait tables etc. but I can’t see myself bringing these skills into the office with me. That’s not to knock these jobs, which have, after all, kept me in drinking money throughout my college career. I only wish I’d made more of an effort to try different types of jobs.

This week, therefore, I decided to take my future in hand and headed into the Careers Service Office. While there, I picked up a plethora of multi-coloured leaflets and had a chat with the helpful lady who was working behind the desk.

I was startled by the sheer amount of choices available, not just in terms of job offers, but also year out programs, internships, and volunteering adventure years. My first task, I was told, would be to write up a decent looking CV, send it off to anything I was remotely

interested in and see what came back.

Writing your CV is a weird experience, it’s difficult to know where to draw the

Similarly, in reality I’m lazy, grumpy and disorganized, whereas on my CV I am “A dynamic, well motivated and

And now, three years later, I find myself in the exact same position as when I filled out that fateful CAO form. line between fantasy and reality. In school, for example, I was on the football team squad, on my CV, however, I was the captain of the first team (I only barely resisted the temptation to give myself a player/manager role).

highly organized person”. I also claim to have excellent inter-personal and communication skills. I justified this to myself in terms of my fondness for a chat and a few beers in my local pub, but, to be honest, I may as well written

that I have excellent beer guzzling and kebab munching skills. So, yes, my CV is a big lie, but everyone else is at it too, so what’s a boy to do?

Anyway, I sent this manufactured person bearing my name and studying my degree out into the world to find me a job. So far I’ve received no responses, positive or negative, but the year is young and I’m an optimist. So, I’d like to conclude by wishing good luck to all of you final years who are searching for a job (especially those of you who aren’t looking for the same jobs as me!), may the person with the most successfully fraudulent CV win!

In college, exams seem like the be all and end all but have you considered life after?

Tuesday October 12, 2004

Trinity News

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23

LETTERS

Poor fresher Dear Sir, I am writing in relation to the general offensiveness I endured while strolling around Trinity this past week. I'm a miserably poor Fresher who has been shunned by the money-hungry societies. All had firstly fought for my attention, but when I actually genuinely showed interest in their events, but betrayed barren pockets, they moved on to better dressed and equipped freshmen. Of course, appalled by my treatment, I stormed off in fury. But, no-one seemed to notice.

To add injury to the aforementioned insult I was kicked off my habitual sleeping spot in Front Square by GMB societies anxious for the best vantagepoint for the following morning.

What is a young man, born and bred without substance or merit, to do in this college to fight for one's rights? My qualms are but insignificant ones but I wonder does the social division extend into the class room. For example, is there certain seats for people of my class? I suspect my choice of BESS may prove more troubled than first imagined. So far none of the future class-mates have encountered have deigned to converse with me. But, I'm sure they're all lovely and welcoming once they see I'm in their course.

It's been hard to make friends in my shabby attire and I have been quite bewildered by the high couture of fellow

freshmen. Everyone seems to know everyone else or at least speak in the same lilted way. Maybe if I pronounce my "a's" as "o's" everyone will like me.

Or maybe I should watch some old movies of Shakespearean plays and copy the actor's grandiose verbal stylings. Of course I could extend this to dress too as shawls, neck-scarves and even the occasional crown seem to be all the rage.

I wish I could be as confident as all the rest of my lovely Trinity colleagues. They all seem so loud and vivacious. I have good strong arms from lifting my home around with me so perhaps I could join the rowers. They seem like a great bunch of lads. Always joking around and drinking beer. I think they could grow to like me, but only after I take my Shakespeare movie lessons. I visited Dun Laoghaire last week and really did learn a lot too.

So this letter is really more about hope than protest. I really, really want to hang out with the celebrities of college. The mighty intellectuals of the GMB, the hilarious rowers, the beautifully humble BESS students et al. Just give me a chance. yours faithfully, Bobby Joe Murphy.

Sudden Adult Death Syndrome Dear Sir Over the summer months there have been several reports of deaths of young men as a result of Cardiac Arrest. Sudden Adult Death Syndrome is a constant threat to a small percentage of young athletes today and is being identified more easily with Genetic Testing of those with a family history of heart problems. While at present it is not feasible to carry out mass population screenings as the number of false positives make screening ineffective, there is one why we can save lives.

Introducing Automated External Defibrillators (AED) in areas of high density populations such as shopping centres, airports and universities could save the lives of those unfortunate to suffer a Sudden Cardiac Arrest. The training to operate the AED units is minimal and can also be implemented readily via the Emergency First Responder Programs.

What is the present situation with Trinity College? Do we have any Automated External Defibrillators (AED) on campus? If we do how many are there and our enough people trained to use them?

Will it take the death of a young sporting student after a spot of Cricket for such a sensible and life saving program to be introduced.

Yours

Mike Walton JS TSM

A level criteria restructuring Sir, I have a proposal for you. Here in Northern Ireland, as you can probably imagine, we're a bit short on highly intelligent, motivated, ambitious undergratuates, and at last count you seem to have about five hundred of ours. I hear they've been getting up to all sorts over the last few years - captaining your football team, auditing your societies, editing this very newspaper (on a rather regular basis), and walking off with first class degrees etc.

Well, we would really like them back if at all possible.

In return for this magnificent five hundred, we'll swap you fifty bookworm swots with four 'A' grades at A-Level.

I understand that England, Scotland and Wales are hoping to reach a similar agreement.

Marvellous!

So long, then, and thanks for the memories, Declan Lawn Belfast (Graduated 1999)

If it results in making your campus a more insular, homogenised, and insipid place to be, then I'm sorry - but we really must insist.

What's that?

Your Admissions Office has already done the deal with its new policy on ALevel admissions?

JOURNALISTIC INTEGRITY Dear Editor, No one expects a high standard of journalistic integrity from a mere student newspaper but nonetheless I am appalled by your exploitation of sex and scandal in a weak attempt to drum up interest in your pathetic publication.

I am referring to your announced decision to put a page three girl on page three of your first issue. I have also heard that you intend publishing an interview with Ron Jeremy, the porn star in your next issue. I assign culpability for this farce to both the Hist for inviting these guests and to Trinity News for further publicising their presence.

Despite what a minority of well-paid porn actresses claim, most women appearing in porn films are there under duress or desperation. The women who choose this profession are few – most

feel they have no other way out, either in financial terms or literal ones as their partners, managers or pimps apply coercive pressure. For those on the bottom rungs, the monetary compensation is not substantial. In addition to physical abuse, which admittedly is not standard, the emotional abuse can be far more destructive. Women who engage in the porn trade are systematically broken down leaving their sense of esteem and worth at a crippling low. Once entered into the business, it can become very difficult to leave and piece together a dignified life.

harmless entertainment but pornographic films do not portray a loving relationship and mutual respect. More often than not, the women are belittled and subjugated in the films. Viewing this repeated behaviour cannot help but negatively influence the attitudes of men towards women.

Beyond these individuals, the porn industry is not only exploitative of the women within it, but of image of women throughout the world. To use the frequent yet apt cliché, porn objectifies women. It perpetuates an unhealthy view of women and their place in society. Some may dismiss it as

Yours faithfully, Aoife Downey.

SF BESS

Once again I assert my disgust that a student newspaper run by educated people, are flaunting their disrespect towards women by advertising pornography as mainstream and acceptable amusement.

Scourge of bad grammar Dear Sir,

I have been shocked and appalled over the recent years at the dearth of good grammar within the pages of your otherwise fine newspaper.

Although your writers are predominantly students I would expect to see a better quality of punctuation.

Considering the over-achieving nature of the Trinity student body at large, one would expect to see such staples as the apostrophe and the comma being used effectively.

It seems somewhat unlikely in a university where quite a large portion of the populace achieved over 500 points, or its equivalent, that they would be unable to utilize a grammar they have been learning since they were young. Only five percent of the population achieve such marks and it is not inconceiv-

able that more than five percent could find it within themselves to master the complexities of putting a capital at the start of a sentence which was itself preceded by a full stop: what my old school master called a period. Though the ladies always used to blush.

These rules are not difficult. I think the problem is just plain laziness. We coddle these young people today and look where it gets us: a possessive case without an apostrophe! I remember my old school master standing over me with his large cane in his hand and although it wasn’t pleasant, it filled me with a desire for learning. He would roar and shout and wave his stick at me, but I could conjugate with the best of them and punctuate like a god.

These young people today seem to

believe it is their God-given rightif you will pardon the blasphemyto walk laughing and smiling and all dressed up with ridiculous punctuation. Do you not understand the offence caused by your misunderstanding of the distinction in function between ‘its’ and ‘it’s’? Have you all no conception of common decency?

the Queen’s tongue is conveyed in a manner both aesthetically pleasing and correct.

I remain, as ever, your loyal servant.

Cathal Brady, BA

People are dying in their millions and this is being related to us via a lazy media with an inability to distinguish between accusative and ordinative clauses. It is vile!

Your publication serves as a starting point for the careers of many of these miscreants. Stamp out this unseemly behaviour now.

I shall be organizing, assuming I can get the support of other likeminded individuals, a society dedicated to stamping out such ridiculous punctuation and ensure that

Photograph of the Fortnight

Minister Noel Dempsey notices the door.

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Tuesday October 12, 2004

Trinity News Ar ais ar Scoil le Jarlath Burns

GAEILGE

Tony Quigg Tá Jarlath Burns ina mhúinteoir Gaeilge in Ardscoil Phóil ar an Sruthan i nDeisceart Chontae Ard Mhacha. Fear atá paiseanta faoin Gaeilge, agus faoin pheil ghaelach, bhí sé ina chaptaen ar fhoireann Ard Mhacha nuair a bhain siad trí chraobh Chuige Uladh i gceithre bhliain. O d'éirigh sé as an pheil idirchontae, deanann sé jab maith a shaol teaghlaigh, a phaisean don ghaeilge, agus a chuid dualgaise do Chumann

Luthchleas Gael a mheá. Tá sé ina thrachtaire spoirt ar an BBC, agus reachtálann sé cursaí samhraidh gaeilge i nghaeltacht Thír Chonaill. Tá saol gnoithe ag Jarlath O Broin ach ghlac sé sos beag le ligint domh teacht isteach chuig a seomra ranga le labhairt liom.

I dtús báire, cad é an sort oibre atá a dhéanamh agat ó bhí tú ar Choiste na nImreoirí?

Ceapadh me mar ard-oifigeach de choiste náisiúnta scóir agus ta neart dushlain romhainn: ar an chead dul síos

tá cuid mhór aiteanna in Eirinn nach bhfuil ag déanamh a choda ó thaobh dul chun cinn scóir de agus tá sé sin ag cur buairimh orm agus ag cur isteach orainn. Mar sin an chéad sprioc atá againn ná pairtíocht a iomlannú thart faoin tír agus caighdeáin na gcúigí a ardú i scór mar is é sin ceann de na spriocanna is mó atá ag CLG dul chun cinn scóir mar is ea ceann de na aidhmeanna is mó atá againn na an cultúr a chur chun cinn, agus muna bhfuil daoine ag comhlionnadh a ndualgaise air sin tá siad ag déanamh beag den chultúr atá ina gné iontach tabhactach ag CLG.

Chomh maith leis sin, táimid ag iarraidh daoiní a spreagadh i dtreo Gaeilge a labhairt níos mó thart faoin eagraíocht agus a gné sin den eagraíocht a chur chun cinn. Caithfidh mé a rá go bhfuil mé ag baint an-sult as an obair sin mar bhí mé pairteach i gcúrsaí scoír nuair a bhi mé óg, agus anois tá sé ina onóir mhór domh a bheith mar chathaoirleach ar an choiste náisiúnta.

Abhar conspóideach faoi lathair ná an osclófar Pairc an Chrocaigh do spoirt eile. Cad iad do thuairimí féin ar an abhar sin?

Bhuel, tá an-bhród agamsa féin as Pairc an Chrocaigh - bhí mé ann aréir caithim cuid mhór dem am ann, chan amhain ag na cluichí ach ag cruinniuithe agus ag lainseáil leabhar, agus gach rud mar sin, agus is áit den scoith é a léiríonn cé chomh hiontach is atá eagraíocht Chumann Luthchleas Gael.

Na heagraíochtaí spoirt eile atá in Eirinn, ar an drochuair ní raibh an leargas nó an fhís acu agus a bhí ag Cumann Luthchleas Gael ag an am nuair a togadh Pairc an Chrocaigh.

Agus b'fheidir go dtiocfadh leat a rá gur

chuir siad amú an chuid is fearr den airgead a bhí acu, mar shampla ag am Chorn an Domhain, nuair a bhi an tairgead ag teacht isteach go flúirseach ag Cumann Sacar na hEireann. Agus nuia a bhíonn tú ag plé le heaagraíocht amaitéireach cosúil le Cumann Luthchleas Gael, síleann tú i gcónaí gurb é airgead a théann le himreoirí a íoc airgead atá curtha amú. Ach i gcead dóibh, sin dualgas atá ag na heagraíochtaí eile sin nach bhfuil ag CLG. Ach ar an abhar sin an ceart Pairc an Chrocaigh a ocailt do spoirt eile, caithfidh mé a rá nach bhfuil mé go huile is

DU PUBLICATIONS Contributors Reception COME AND MEET THE EDITORS AND CONTRIBUTORS OF YOUR MOST TREASURED INDEPENDENT STUDENT PUBLICATIONS. WHY NOT JOIN US FOR OUR ANNUAL NIGHT OF MEDIA MUPPETRY MADNESS!!

Date: Time: Place:

Tuesday, 19th October 7pm till late Hist Conversational Room (Upstairs in the GMB)

TRINITY NEWS PIRANAHA MISCELLANY DIVERSITY ICARUS

WE WANT YOU!

EVOKE

IF YOU’RE INTERESTED IN ANY OF THE FOLLOWING: WRITERS: WRITING ARTICLES ON ANY SUBJECT MATTER UNDER THE SUN. PHOTOGRAPHERS: TAKING PHOTOGRAPHS OF GORGEOUS MODELS, POLITICIANS AND FELLOW STUDENTS IN COMPROMISING SITUATIONS. EDITING: COPY EDITING, PICTURE EDITING OR LAYOUT AND DESIGN. ARTISTS: POETRY, PROSE AND GRAPHIC ARTISTRY.

DO YOU HAVE WHAT IT TAKES. 19TH OF OCTOBER IN THE HIST CONVERSATION ROOM, THE GMB. !! REFRESHMENTS WILL PROVIDED !!

DU Publications is a capitaed body that is responsible for all the independent publications in Trinity. The Publications have different themes, from journalism and poetry and prose, to current events and socio-political meanderings, Writers and idea most welcome!

Dublin University Publications Committee, Floor 2, House 6, Trinity College, Dublin 2 dupubs@tcd.ie

go hiomlann ar a shon nó nach bhfuil mé go huile is go hiomlann ina éadan.

Nuair a bhí mé ag comhdháil cúpla bliain ó shin, vótáil mé ar son í a oscailt os rud é go sílimse gur drochriaill é riaill 42 mar is drochriaill é aon cheann a chuireann cosc ar duine ar bith rud a dhéanamh. Níl riaill cheanna ag Cumann Rugbaí na hEireann nó ag Cumann Sacar na hEireann, ach thig leat a bheith cinnte nach bhfeicfidh tú peil ghaelach nó iománaíocht a imirt ar Lansdowne Road, agus fiú má dhéanfaimid ar shúil le Riaill 42 ní ionann sin is a rá go mbeidh péil nó rugbaí a imirt i bPairc an Chrocaigh. Go fírinneach ba mhaith liomsa seans a thabhairt daofa tairiscint an CLG a dhiúiltiú, mar sílimse féin gur sin a rud a tharlódh.

Mar shampla, cúpla bliain ó shin, nuair a bhí an cuma ar an scéal go raibh CLG chun Pairc an Chrocaigh a oscailt do spoirt eile, d'éisigh Cumann Rugbaí na hEireann ráiteas ar an lá sin ag rá ba chuma cad é a dhéanfadh CLG go raibh siadsan ag dul fanacht i mBothar Lansdún. Chomh maith leis sin thig le Cumann Sacar na hEireann bheith biogóideach nuair is mian leosan; cúpla bliain ó shin nuair a bhí iomrá ann go raibh pairc ag dul a bheith tógtha i ndeisceart Bhaile Atha Cliath, pairc a bhí le hoscailt do pheil ghaelach agus do sacar, agus duirt siad ag an am sin nach raibh siad ag iarraidh staid a roinnt le Cumann Luthchleas Gael. Tá sé ró-fhurasta gan ach do mhéar a shíneadh ag CLG agus a rá gur millteanach an rud é nach bhfuil siad ag tabhairt cead do spoirt eile imirt i bPairc an Chrocaigh. Tá fathanna maithe ann mar nar cheart do na cluichí sin a bheith imeartha i bPairc an Chrocaigh; téann cuid acu b'fhéidir in éadan na fealsúnachta atá ag Cumann Luthchleas Gael.

Ach an mhéid sin ráite agam áfach, níl a dhath ar bith agam in éadan daoine eile a bheith ag imirt i bPairc an Chrocaigh mar sílimse féin go dtiocfadh linn Pairc an Chrocaigh agus cluichí s'againne a dhíol ar fud na hEoraipe agus ar fud an domhain. Is

dóigh gurb é an rún is fearr coinnealta atá ag CLG agus ag Eirinn ná go bhfuil an staid iontach seo againn, nuair a ba cheart dúinn a bheith ag fógairt an ruda seo thart faoin domhain agus a rá, amharc, seo amaitéireachas ar a scoith!

Ta daoiní ag imirt anseo go hamaitéireach gan aon íocaíocht agus mar gheall air seo amharc ar cad is féidir linn a dhéanamh i dtír iontach bheag: an staid is fearr san Eoraip a thógáil dúinn féin os rud é go n-imríonn ar gcuid imreoirí peil agus iomaint ar mhaithe le grá don chluiche, grá don pharóiste, grá don chontae, in áit grá don airgead!

Agus tú ag labhairt ansin faoin amaitéireachas, an dtchíonn tú am eigin sa toghchai gairmiúlacht ag teacht isteach sa CLG? Ní aontaím le gairmiúlacht ar chor ar bith. Mar a duirt mé cheanna, is é an fath a bhfuil an staid is fearr san Eoraip againn ná go bhfuil an t-amaitéireachas againn. Bhí mé ag eisteacht le Miceál O Muircheartaigh nuair a bhí sé ag scaoileadh a dhírbheathaisnéise aréir, agus le linn a oráide an rud a duirt sé ná ach ab ea an t-amaitéireachas, ní bheadh Pairc an Chrocaigh ann mar atá sé anois, agus fagann sé go bhfuil freabhacha na heagraíochta iontach laidir ar fad mar tá gach duine sasta oibriú agus feidhmniú le chéile gan tuarastal os rud é go ndéanann gach duine eile é, agus má bhriseann tú aon cheangail den slabhra sin brisfidh an slabhra ar fad.

Mar sin ní aontaím leis, agus ní dóigh liom go bhfuil chan amhain an t-airgead sa tir ach fiú níl an toil i measc na nimreoirí - guí go ndearfadh daoine a mhalairt - fa choinne 'íocaíocht le haghaidh imeartha'. Anois ní hionann sin is a rá nach bhfuil mé ar son íocaíochta má dhéanann imreoirí rudaí ar leith a bhaineann leis an chlú atá faighte acu mar gheall ar go bhfuil sé ina iomanaí nó ina pheileadóir den scoth. Mar shampla, sílimse gur cheart dúinn i bhfad níos mó de na himreoirí a fheiceáil ar an teilifis ag fógairt rudaí, agus ag an am cheanna ag díol a gclú agus a n-ainmneacha. Buiochas le Dia tá peileadóirí le feiceáil ar an teilifis le déanaí ach caithfimid i bhfad níos mó na sin a fhéiceáil. Ach bheadh an-athrú fealsúnachta agus athrú meoin de dhith ag an CLG le ligint don ghairmiúlacht teacht isteach, mar is rud í a rachadh in éadan achan rud a sheasann Cumann Luthchleas Gael dó: bród sa gheansaí, bród sa pharóiste, bród sa chontae, agus bród go ginearalta!

Tuesday October 12, 2004

Trinity News

25

FRESHERS PICS Want to feel a little Fresher?

TN sent out a hoard of photographers to capture the fun and frolics of fresher’s week and this is what they came back with.

Dubes Bears: Dubes Dudes put on quite a good show this year with their cute and furry costumes.

The effort seems to have paid off here as they’ve attracted the attention of what appear to be keen freshers.

History Society: Despite garnering fairly little attention, the History Society’s War on Wednesday in Physics Square was a spectacle to behold. I’m sure the Society would insist this should have been taken more seriously and with grown up men in tights fighting like it was going out of fashion, why shouldn’t they?

Paintball Society: With a final push, Freshers week ends for the Paintballing Society, all their hard work seems to have paid off though as they scooped the coveted prize of Best Freshers Stand.

26

Tuesday October 12, 2004

SPORT

Trinity News

FEATURES

Football: A history lesson?

Patrick Nulty Football, politics and religion: three topics sure to provoke heated debate in any setting whether that's the local pub, restaurant or around the family dinner table. When these topics intertwine it is often possible to learn more about people's social and cultural attachments than any sociology textbook could ever reveal. Football is a huge aspect of Global popular culture and despite the commercialisation and greed that has infested the sport, genuine football supporters are still as passionate and dedicated to their team as ever. Football clubs are not just sources of entertainment and recreation, they are often grounded in the social, political and economic context in which they were established. Thus, to their supporters they are a representation of their community, culture or value system. This exemplified by the origins of many of Europe's leading clubs and while many of these clubs have changed considerably over the years it is still worth examining their historical origins.

Many clubs were founded or associated with sectarian or partisan political causes and if one is to eliminate these biases one must understand their origin. The classic example of an unpalatable concoction of football and religion is found in Glasgow where the two great giants of Scottish football lock horns four times a season in a game that still has deep rooted sectarian undertones. While both clubs have made efforts to eliminate this from the

game and both clubs allow players of all faiths to play for them the essence of the rivalry is still based on political and religious conflict. Celtic was founded by Irish migrants who upon arriving in Glasgow's east end faced dire poverty and discrimination.

Therefore community leaders sought to create an outlet for their community through sport. While Celtic always adopted a pragmatic approach to signing players from all communities it was not until 1989 that Glasgow Rangers signed their first Catholic player Maurice 'Mo' Johnstone amid huge controversy at the time. However this sectarian division did not confine itself to Glasgow. Indeed the rivalry between Hearts and Hibernian in Edinburgh pre-dates the 'Old Firm' rivalries. Also in Dundee religious division lead to the establishment of the pre-dominantly catholic Dundee United to rival the dark blue of Dundee. Thus, immigration of Irish Catholics to Scotland and the need for them to forge avenues for the expression of their cultural identity deeply influenced the evolution of the Scottish league.

This linkage of particular Football clubs with certain social or ethnic groups is not confined to Scotland. In England Manchester United or Newton Heath as it was previously called was founded by Irish emigrant rail workers and has always maintained strong ties with Ireland ever since. Equally Everton on Merseyside has always been deemed to be closer to the Irish catholic commu-

nity than city rivals Liverpool within the popular mindset. In London, Tottenham Hotspur has always been said to have a strong affinity with the Jewish community. On the continent the same cultural nuisances exist in the great rivalries of European Football. In Spain, Real Madrid are despised by other clubs supporters as the chosen team of General Franco's Fascist dictatorship and are still regarded as the aristocrats of Spanish football. By contrast, Atletico Madrid's Vicente Calderon stadium is located in a working class area of Madrid and is viewed by many as the team that represents Madrid's vast working class communities. Another European club with a rich history is FC Barcelona who include Pope John-Paul II among their shareholders. Barcelona along with teams like Celta Vigo, Bilbao and others are associated with Spain's Republican and egalitarian legacy. The link between political affiliations and Football clubs is always apparent in Italy. In Milan the Rossinairi or AC Milan have always been associated with Milan's industrial working class as opposed to their somewhat more affluent neighbours Inter. This makes it all the more ironic that Milan is owned by Italian Prime Minister and media mogul Silvio Berlusconi whose political philosophy amounts to an attack on ordinary Italians, is riddled with corruption and through his domination of the media poses a threat to the democratic process in Italy. Only a couple of years ago Lazio's ultras displayed banners paying homage to Serbian warlord

General Arkan who was accountable for mass murder during the conflict in the Balkans. Regional division also exists between poorer southern clubs like Cagliari and Napoli who loathe rich northern rivals like Juventus.

Throughout Europe the origins and locations of different clubs often represent an interesting insight into how political, religious or other divisions can manifest themselves in popular culture. In the Netherlands the rivalry between Ajax and Feyenoord can be seen as a metaphor for the conflict between the cultured artisans in Amsterdam against the industrial core of Rotterdam.

While it is interesting to examine the origins of Europe's clubs it is important to note that the game has moved on and most clubs are making concerted attempts to eliminate prejudice and any form of racism or discrimination from the game. While plenty of progress has been made these old hatreds still surface on occasion and if one is to tackle them it is important to understand their origins. In reality, the contemporary game has seen clubs become more like businesses than cultural institutions and the game has become driven by money, often exploiting the ordinary fans. The challenge for modern football is to remain at the heart of their communities, to actively encourage the creation of a family friendly atmosphere around clubs and to continue to work towards eliminating old prejudices while always remaining conscious of their historical roots.

More than a matter of life and death

Glasgow Rangers fans wave Union Jacks. Photo: Rangers Loyal

The girls’ guide to football: everything you never wanted to know about the beautiful game Christine Bohan The Essential Guide to Football This week, the Offside Rule In a sport not usually associated with any high-falutin "concepts", the offside rule has grown to be the closest thing there is to one in football (at least in the minds of those unable -or perhaps just unwilling- to tackle its intricacies). At its most simple, it is brought into play when a player is running towards the goal and, more often than not, looks like he is about to score. But there's more to it than that. I asked the TN Sports Features Editor Andrew Payne to explain the rule in a simple, girl-friendly way and this is what he came up with: TOP 5 THINGS TO SAY TO IMPRESS YOUR BOYFRIEND AND THE LADS DOWN THE PUB #5: "Rooney going to United was the greatest move Ferguson's made all season. Not only has it revived what was going to be another lacklustre season for United but itís a great foundation for future seasons. Of course getting Gabriel Heinze in comes a close second..." #4: "Beckham is totally overrated as a player - United did well to offload

"Right. Now you'll have to pay attention to this. It's not difficult, just a bit technical. If the ball is played further back in the pitch than when you're standing, then at the time the ball is passed, blah blah, opposition players, something something, goalkeeper between you and the goal... are you still listening to me? Your eyes have glazed over and you're drooling on the computer keyboard".

Accompanying this was an obtuse diagram, drawn with the intensity of a Joycean stream of consciousness - evident from the arrows pointing manically all over the as he got more and more into what he was saying. It was several hours later that I finally emerged from the TN office, more confused than I'd entered

it but more understanding of the complex intricacies of the mind of an average sports editor.

Now listen carefully. I will share what I learnt but will say this only once.

When the guy receiving the ball is running towards the goal, unless there is at least one defender from the other team between him and the goalkeeper, then it's offside. Again, for those at the back, that means if there's no-one between the attacking player and the goal when the ball is played then it's offside. And that my friends, is offside.

Not as difficult as it's made out to be, and surprisingly, not as pointless - the aim of it is to stop too many goals being scored in a match. Go and impress your man ladies and thank me later.

him to Madrid when they did. He's famous for his looks and his wife, but when it comes to football, the only thing he's good for is free kicks and the odd cross - it's style over substance."

like a bad move now, where did a continuous squad rotation system get Claudio Ranieri?"

#3: "Sven Goran-Eriksson should step down now before he embarrasses England and the FA anymore he's consistently overrated but despite the hype, has never produced the goods"

#1: "It's time for Ireland to stop settling for moral victories. Passion should be an accompaniment for technical excellence, not a substitute for it" Disclaimer: TN accepts no responsibility for arguments that may ensue as a result of these possibly objectionable statements.

#2: "Although Mourinho's not playing some of his big names may seem

The Crisis of Italian Football Patrick Nulty

The Iraq soccer team line up for a soccer international during the reign of Uday Hussein Andrew Payne When thinking of Saddam Hussein's Iraq and the aftermath of the United States' invasion of the country most people don't think of sport, yet sport is perhaps one of the few parts of Iraqi life to see a positive improvement in the last year. In an Olympics largely devoid of stars, Iraq's progress to the semi-finals in the soccer tournament was one of the most impressive achievements. To start with only a year ago the Iraqi football federation had been disbanded and its Olympic committee was suspended by the International Olympic Committee. The reasons for this lie in the preceding twenty years and make for harrowing reading.

In the 1970s Iraq was one of Asia's stronger sporting powers and in 1980 the country sent 46 athletes to the Moscow games. In 1984 Saddam Hussein decided to hand control of the Iraqi Olympic committee and football federation over to his then 20 year old son Uday, best known today for the images of his dead body shown on newspaper front pages all over the world. Uday had at this point already developed a violent reputation, bragging at 16 of murdering a teacher who had embarrassed him in front of a girlfriend. Saddam felt that success in the field of sport would help restore national pride following the Iran-Iraq War. Uday, having no history in sport himself, set about running Iraqi sports as a reign of terror. Underperforming athletes were brutalised and tortured in ways unimaginable to most athletes.

Speaking to Sports Illustrated magazine in March 2003 Sharar Haydar, a former star of the Iraqi soccer team who escaped from Iraq in 1998, recalled the punishment doled out to players after losing a friendly match to Jordan 2-0: "Uday

had me and three teammates taken to the prison. When we arrived, they took off our shirts, tied our feet together and pulled our knees over a bar as we lay on our backs. Then they dragged us over pavement and concrete, pulling the skin off our backs. Then they pulled us through a sandpit to get sand in our backs. Finally, they made us climb a ladder and jump into a vat of raw sewage. They wanted to get our wounds infected. The next day, and for every day we were there, they beat our feet. My punishment, because I was a star player, was 20 [lashings] per day".

Incidents like this led to many Iraqi athletes faking injuries ahead of international competitions as they knew the fate awaiting them if they failed fully fit.

Another example of a punishment reportedly doled out was to the volleyball team. After losing a match, Uday forced the team into a room with a five foot high ceiling designed so small that not all of the players could sit at the same time. The only way to fit in was for half the team to stand bending over while the other half sat with their knees tucked into their chests. One former volleyball player, Issam Thamer al-Diwan, now living in the United States, has a list of 52 athletes he claims to have been murdered by the Hussein family. Other punishments included chaining athletes' bodies in contoured positions for days at a time and beatings with iron bars.

Not surprisingly these techniques failed to bring an improvement in Iraqi sport, instead performances collapsed. In the 1996 Atlanta games only three athletes competed and in the Sydney games of 2000 only four. The fear of the consequences of failure was enough to dissuade Iraqiís from entering into sports. For those who were successful punishment was also a near certainty as popular figures were seen as a threat by the government. Of the three athletes present in Atlanta the

Iraqi flag was carried by weightlifter Raed Ahmed. Despite orders not to look at President Bill Clinton during the opening ceremony Ahmed did so and was amazed to see the US President smiling and applauding his athletes, Clinton did not seem to him the monster he'd been led to believe.

The moment had a profound impact on the athlete and he defected to the United States during the games.

Despite this widespread abuse athletes were unable to speak out for fear of the consequences to them and their family. A FIFA delegation investigating claims of abuse of players in 1997 failed to find any evidence despite widespread knowledge of the incidents. It was not until May 2003 that the Iraqi Olympic Committee was suspended by the International Olympic Committee.

With the fall of the Iraqi government and murder of Uday Hussein the Iraqi Olympic Committee finally re-organised in January of this year and in February was re-instated by the IOC. As the summer approached journalists were shown torture equipment used on Iraqi athletes over the previous 20 years in a Baghdad sports stadium, these included iron-maiden style caskets with spikes insides reminiscent of Medieval times. In August Iraq sent 39 athletes to the games. Of these the most successful were the soccer players who qualified for the Olympic soccer tournament for the first time since 1988. In their opening game they pulled off a shock victory defeating Portugal 4-2 and went on to beat Costa Rica and Australia before losing to Paraguay 3-1 in the semi-final then narrowly missed out on a bronze medal as Italy beat them 1-0 in the third place play-off.

Fourth position was however a magnificent achievement.

The story doesn't quite end there however, US President George Bush used the story of the Iraqi soccer players in a campaign ad on US televi-

sion as well as making reference to it in a speech where he said "The image of the Iraqi soccer team playing in this Olympics, it's fantastic, isn't it? It wouldn't have been free if the United States had not acted". These comments were met with anger by the Iraqi athletes. Although every member of the Iraqi delegation said they were obviously glad Uday Hussein was no longer in charge, they were clear that they found being part of George Bush's election campaign offensive.

Midfielder Ahmed Manajid was quoted in Sports Illustrated as saying of Bush after the ad was played in the United States, "How will he meet his god having slaughtered so many men and women?". He added that if he were not at the games he would be fighting as part of the resistance, "I want to defend my home. If a stranger invades America and the people resist, does that mean they are terrorists? Everyone [in Fallujah] has been labeled a terrorist. These are lies. Fallujah people are some of the best people in Iraq". Iraqi coach Adnan Hamad summed up the feelings of the athletes when he said "My problems are not with the American people. They are with what America has done in Iraq: destroy everything. The American army has killed so many people in Iraq. What is freedom when I go to the stadium and there are shootings on the road?".

Impressive as the athletes achievements were then the players are under no illusions as to what's most important for the people back home.

Although sport for them is not more important than a matter of life and death, as Shankley would have it, at least for them it is no longer one.

Italy is a country riddled with division whether that is regional, political or economic. Italians are passionate emotive people who often express their differences explicitly and in a spirit of confrontation not conciliation.

However nothing stirs the passions of the Italian populace more than the "beautiful game" and throughout Italian society from Prime Minister to pauper, football is an integral part of Italian culture. However Italian football is in crisis. Both on and off the field of play Italian football has been usurped by the flair of the Spanish La Liga and the drama of the English Premiership. The abandonment of a Champions League match between Roma and Dynamo Kiev on September 15 following a missile striking the referee exemplified the rotten core at the heart of the modern game in Italy. The problems of the Italian game do not simply manifest themselves through crowd disturbances; allegations of match fixing, drug taking and dire financial mismanagement have threatened the existence of many leading Italian clubs like Lazio, Parma and others over recent years.

This is in stark contrast to the glorious era of the late eighties and mid nineties when Italian teams dominated European competitions and star players flocked from across the globe to experience the millionaire lifestyle and hero worship afforded to star players in Italy. As with everything in life this success and the subsequent decline of the Italian game must be understood in context. The tragic events of the Heysel Stadium disaster denied English clubs entry to European competitions which they had previously dominated. Thus, Italian clubs seized their opportunity and exerted a dominant influence over European competition with a strong emphasis on defence and counter attacking football. The resurgence of English football that followed their re-entry to European competition fuelled by Rupert Murdoch and his TV millions gradually eroded Italian dominance and left leading Italian clubs struggling to compete in an inflated transfer market. However keen observers of football know that

finance is only one aspect of a successful club.

Football at the highest level is often decided by the tightest of margins and determination to win is as important as technique or skill. The influx of overseas players into the Italian league has had mixed results.

While leading players from Brazil, France and elsewhere have enhanced the standard of competition a disproportionate amount of relatively mediocre players has stifled the development of young Italian players with a genuine love for their club. This problem is not confined to Italy and is a factor in many leading European leagues where the demand for instantaneous success takes precedence over long term progress. This is due to the inflated expectations of supporters, sponsors and directors often fuelled by media hype and speculation. Equally instability within the management structure of clubs parallels the instability of their political system which inevitably results in a high turnover of players and a lack of foresight and strategic planning among Italy’s leading clubs. While Italian football is not facing a doomsday scenario and clubs like Milan, Juventus and Inter can still claim to be among Europe's elite the

problems of the Italian game are deep rooted within the Italian psyche and culture. One had to look on with sadness as the once mighty "Azzuri" crashed out of Euro 2004 while struggling to beat a poor Bulgarian team.

If the Italian game is to return to former glorious the emphasis must shift to developing young talent and long term investment rather than frivolous spending and poor financial planning. Equally the Italian mentality which focuses on defence must change. Football is an art not a science and great artist must be brave, bold and courageous. Italian teams should aspire not only to win but to win with style, to attack and most importantly to entertain the Italian public who adore football and who sustain the game’s very existence. Sometimes it is only when a situation reaches crisis point that necessary reforms are made and only time will tell if the Italian game can adapt to contemporary circumstances and reassume its dominant position within European Football.

Milan’s Fillipo Inzaghi misses the target. Photo: BBC

Tuesday October 12, 2004

Trinity News

27

SPORT

DULBC and the Forthcoming season Rachel Liu The rowing season is well underway after a very successful Freshers week.

Lured by the great success and camaraderie offered by the ladies boat club, our new rowers join a uniquely exuberant international community.

Following the success of last year, DULBC looks to build an even stronger squad. At the National Championships in July, our senior pair of Kate McCullough and Luise Ronayne won their race for the third consecutive year. Along with postgraduate Nicola Fitz-Simon, they continued on to represent Ireland at the Home International Regatta, joining other DULBC alumna. These three rowers received college Pinks last year, the highest honour awarded to college athletes.

This year, we hope to develop strong intermediate and senior crews, as well as novice crews. The aim is to dominate domestic races including the Colours race and the University championships. The focus will very much be on retaining the intervarsity Bank of Ireland Cup and build on our results from the National Championships. Triumph in home waters will lead to success overseas, as we aspire to offer strong competition in prominent international regattas including success at Henley Women's Regatta which will be held in June.

This seems entirely possible due to the vast experience of current members and recruits, and very enthusiastic

This summer at Henley Royal Regatta were Anna Walsh (Captain), Rachel Liu (Secretary), Dorothy White (ex-Captain) and Charlotte Ashe. Photo: Katherine Miller newcomers.

Internally, DULBC continues the dedication and organisation which earned us the first annual "most successful women's DUCAC sports club" award. This title was particularly apt since it coincided with the College's celebration of the women's centenary. Among plans for the year are the ever-continuous search for sponsorship, the establishment of a database and means of contact for our past rowers, the detailing of the history of the club, in addition to the logistics of organizing training and competition.

GAISCE - The President’s Award The President's Award is the National Challenge Award from the President of Ireland to the young people of Ireland aged between 15 and 25 years of age.

The purpose of the award is to encourage a young person to set a demanding challenge of himself/herself and then to persevere with achieving this challenge. The award challenges young people to examine what they are capable of achieving during a given time period. There are four different areas of activity as follows: community involvement e.g. helping the elderly, personal skill e.g. learning to play a musical instrument, physical recreation e.g. swimming, venture activity e.g. a four day cycle.

Once the challenge under the guidance of a leader known as the President's Award Leader (PAL) is successfully achieved, the participant earns an award i.e. there is no competition with other participants. Each participant is striving to achieve his/her personal best. In each case the challenge agreed between the participant and the leader is unique to that participant.

No one individual has an advantage over another in earning the award - the basic requirements for each participant is measured by hours of endeavor and effort to earn an award.

For this reason, the award has appeal to a wide range of young people coming from different backgrounds.

There are three awards: bronze, silver and gold, reflecting different levels of time commitment. A bronze award takes 6 to 9 months to complete.

A silver award takes 12 to 15 months to complete. The gold award is a more demanding challenge over approximately two years. It is not necessary to undertake the bronze award before attempting silver and similarly it is not necessary to do the silver award before attempting the gold award.

Participation in the award commences once the participant has agreed the challenge in writing with an award leader. The PAL monitors the participant and verifies that all the activities are completed and then signs the participant's record book. When all the goals that were set at the start are matched, the participant will be entitled to receive their award. The president presents gold awards.

The personal qualities that each participant must call upon and develop in order to earn an award are perseverance and dedication. The award is a motivational tool that encourages a participant to make a quantum leap in his/her development for the betterment of themselves and others. If any Trinity students are interested in taking up this challenge or looking for more information contact Matt who is a Gold Award Holder at pawardtrinity@eircom.net.

Sumbit your sports articles, match reports, sports photographs and/or general sporting related gossip to sport@trinity-news.com

Schumacher’s unexpected defeat at Shanghai. Photo: Motorsport.com

We also rely on our strong relationship with DUBC, made possible by the excellent communication between the Committees and Members of both. In order to launch successful fundraising campaigns and organise large scale, high profile events such as Trinity Regatta, both clubs must pool minds and resources effectively. The tasks taken on by the clubs can be overwhelming, and the support offered to each other by both clubs resulted in the wonderful success of last year's Regatta. It was the first time that both clubs were heavily involved in the

Regatta committee and is a positive step in preparations for this year's competition.

With many social events planned and the inevitable bonds that come with training and competition, we're looking forward to a fantastic year. We always welcome those who want to give rowing or coxing a go, and will respond to all queries; please visit http://www.tcd.ie/Clubs/LadiesBoat for more information and contact details.

Fun and Frolics on New Square

Is it a bird? Is it a plane? No it’s the DU Canoe Club fooling about by jumping off O’Connell Street Bridge in the lashing rain last Wednesday... Photo: Matt Pitt

DUFC New York 2004 To conclude the 150th celebrations of the DU Football Club, an overseas campaign left for Penn State University during September for a five day training camp followed by a challenge match. Training was intense with all players (30 in all) doing three sessions a day including intensive body

conditioning (weights).

Later in the week, DUFC players travelled to New York for the Remembrance tournament on Travers Island, NY. After two days of sightseeing, the players arrived back in Dublin.

As well as bringing much positive publicity to DU sport and Trinity

College itself, the trip served as a basis for the forthcoming season. Division One will be tough but if the squad can stand together, train effectively and perform then 2004-2005 will be extremely rewarding.

Henry Pilkington having a knockabout. Photo Matt Pitt

Roger Hamilton The DU Croquet Club has seen its popularity increase dramatically this year with many new members attracted to the ambient surroundings, welcoming social scene as well as some stiff competition.

With Winter looming, now is the time to get out of the library and wander over to New Square for a leisurly afternoon skill and tact. During the summer, DU Croquet players attended the Irish Croquet Championships at Carrickmines Croquet and Lawn Tennis Club. Dr. Robert Barklie

(Physics Dept. and current DU Croquet President) excelled himself in the handicapped doubles but unfortunately he was knocked out in the latter stages of the tournament, being overcome in the final.

This summer saw DU Croquet players compete in a south of England tour. The series began in Bath with competitions in Exeter, Sidmouth and Budleagh Sallterton. Captain Conor Broderick is looking forward to yet another successful year in the hot seat - “Thank goodness there will be no Trinity Ball this year as the lawn really does get destroyed”.

Fresh from the big apple, DUFC expect a challenging year ahead in division 1. Photo: Matt Pitt

Formula One Insight Tom Murphy We are fast approaching the penultimate race of the season in Suzuka, Japan and unfortunately we have witnessed another Schumacher whitewash. Michael Schumacher is with little argument one of the finest racing drivers the world has ever seen and he has had the championship tied up since Spa in Belgium. His only regular competition has been from his Ferrari team-mate Rubens Barrichello and Jensen Button who continues to go from strength to strength but lacks consistency at the moment.

This year, Schumi has well and truly eclipsed everyone else off the circuit.

With only one race not completed and one not in the points it has been a pretty good year for him and Ferrari. He is signed up and tied into Ferrari for another 2 years at least and there is not much sign of his dominance stopping short of the FIA banning him wheels.

The luck that I so hoped Jordan would get unfortunately has not materialised and it is unconfirmed that Eddie is looking to sell the team to a consortium of overseas bidders. He has been in talks with the Royal Family of Qatar who are looking to purchase a motor sport team but it seems these meeting have failed to yield suitable middle ground.

There has been much talk of the rule changes in F1 to prevent the kind of domination that has been seen this year by Ferrari. In truth any rule change is going to widen the divide between small teams with a low budget and the corporate machines that are

Ferrari and BMW. It is much easier for a team with a large budget to design new engines and new shells for their cars with all the design cost and wind tunnel testing than say Minardi that are doing all but borrowing wheel nuts to keep them on the grid. Max Mosley seems to think that reducing the engine capacity from 2.8L V10 to 2.4L V8 is going to benefit the smaller teams but in fact it will only slow them down and Formula 1 with it.

Suzuka looks to be a big washout this weekend with Saturday qualifying being postponed to Sunday morning and typhoon 22 set to hit Japan Saturday midnight. Testing has also been cancelled for safety reasons as Friday’s practice sessions were both run in torrential rain. Most drivers put in little more than installation laps, and several spun off into the gravel traps.

The Suzuka circuit is located in Ise Bay on the island of Honshu and will be a technically challenging circuit with its unique figure of eight layout.

It is its distinctive blend of high speed corners and tight low speed hairpins that makes it such a favorite for the drivers and spectators.

If Schumi does not produce a win in Suzuka it will mean no win for 8 weeks. Is this the way he wants to bring this season to a close after such a blistering start?

Sailing Aspirations Ronan Dillon-Murphy DU Sailing Club are looking forward to yet another successful season and are currently planning several campaigns to foreign destinations.

In the first event of the season, TCD saw some serious competition in the George Plate at the Royal St. George Yacht Club Invitational which was held in Dun Laoghaire last Sunday week. There they finished an impressive 5th behind IRL1 and 3 UK teams. This gives TCD the second

qualifying position for the ISAF Worlds for Ireland. This would be an unprecedented achievement as no Trinity varsity team has ever qualified for the worlds in team racing.

DU Sailing Club hope to fair well in the IUSA team racing circuit which this year will be held in Schull. The hope is to be in a strong position to take top honours in all the events and secure the varsity title once more.

Within the club there are proposals to take part in an Elan 31 event which is held in Italy each year.

Last year the invitation to compete was turned down but hopefully this year, DUSC can get together a crew to compete in this world class yachting event. Other plans are to take part in some of the UK team racing circuits which would offer more serious competition and much more challenging racing.

Further information can be found at www.trinitysailing.com

Qualifying starts Sunday 1am (GMT) Race Starts Sunday 6.30am (GMT)

DU Sailing Club anticipating further improvement on last year’s success.

Photo: Matt Pitt

28

Tuesday October 12, 2004

Trinity News

SPORT 57 Years of History to be Replaced by an Office

Windsurfing the Best Locations with Trinity ment.

Matt Pitt Ireland has one of the best windsurfing locations in the world, the west coast.

With constant battering of large powerful waves and strong forceful winds, Ireland is an ideal spot for the adrenaline junky looking for that extra rush.

The only thing missing is the lack of sunshine. But who needs warm weather when you have a good 5mm wetsuit.

Windsurfing is constantly growing in Ireland due to its ideal weather conditions and its increasing competitiveness on the international windsurfing scene. Windsurfers such as Ireland's top home competitor Oisin VanGelgeren has dominated the competitive circuit around Ireland in both racing and waves. The next main event in Ireland will be from 23rd to 25th October at Belmullet, Co. Mayo. The event however sadly clashes with the DU Windsurfing Club’s annual weekend at Achill Island which will consist of three days of windsurfing instruction. This year the club plans to compete at major Irish Windsurfing Events to improve our racing tactics and hopefully bring home some silverware.

Brandon Bay is another amazing windsurfing location. Situated on the Dingle Peninsula in Co. Kerry it has everything from mast high waves for the pros and surfers amongst us, and calm flat bays for the beginners, freestylers, speed demons and slalom sailing enthusiasts. We plan to travel down at the beginning of December on a safari with Surfdock who are our main suppliers of windsurfing equip-

DUCAC AGM The DUCAC AGM takes place on Thursday October 28th at 7:30pm in the Edmund Burke theatre. Thorny issues to expect this year include continued delays in the construction of the biggest

If you didn't get the chance to sign up with the Windsurfing Club during Freshers Week, it’s never too

late and beginners shouldn’t be afraid to come out and give it a go. We have boards and sails of all standards and willing experienced windsurfers to

give you advice. We cannot promise you a miracle but we will do our best to get you up and windsurfing and show you a good time.

Matt Pitt windsurfing in Malahide. Photo: Chris Darling white elephant in College that is the ‘Sports Center’ and continued budget cuts with no hope of reversal. Prof. T.T. West, an avid supporter of Sport in Trinity and who has just recently retired from the Maths Department is expected to retain the Chair. Not much change is

expected when it comes to the election of Officers although a New Treasurer will be required after Ms. Emma Stokes unexpectedly resigned earlier in the year.

Some reshuffle is expected when it comes to the nomination of the

new Club Representatives. The Pavillion Member’s Committee is expected to remain unchanged.

Experience something new in the Old Library

Oarsmen outside their beloved 23.0.1 removing the last few things. Photo: Matt Pitt

Roger Hamilton Dublin University Boat Club received a major setback to their rowing program when Brendan Tangney, the Junior Dean and Registrar of Chambers refused to allocate rooms to the club.

The Boat Club have been the proud occupiers of the infamous 23.0.1 since 1947 with Boat Club rooms becoming an integral part of the club’s workings for members, Old Boys and the Trinity Regatta.

The 2003/2004 season was a hugely successful year for the club. At this year’s Henley Royal Regatta (the most prestigous regatta in the world), the club’s Senior coxed four made it through to the semi-finals only to be beaten by Imperial College, London. In addition to success at Henley, DUBC beat UCD convincingly in the annual colours race from O’Connell bridge to the Guinness factory. The only other time that Trinity won by such a margin was in 1981 when the infamous Nick Dunlop (former Captain) was coach.

Other wins included beating Queen’s University on the river Lagan for the ‘University Boat Race’ and winning the University Grand Challenge Cup at this year’s Trinity Regatta.

Despite DUCAC nominating the Boat Club for rooms this year, Brendan Tangney went against their recommendation claiming the general culture of behaviour within the club "off the water" was unacceptable.

This summer, the Captain Richard Northridge, had received several letters and emails of outrage, disgust, support and concern from the 700 Old Boys in 28 countries worldwide, who, amongst themselves raise €10,000s annually for new boats and travelling expenses. From 23.0.1, The Boat Club ran Ireland's major rowing event 'Trinity Regatta', held annually since 1898 and commemorated in Jack B. Yates' painting. Recent guests at the regatta have included the Provost, British Ambassador and University Senators with the event having generated huge amounts of high profile publicity for Trinity College.

23.0.1 is to be stripped out and replaced by yet another generic administrative cog similar to the office

next door. Last week, club members got together to pack up everything for the last time and have one last get together before closing this chapter of Boat Club history. Boat Club rooms has housed various pieces of memoirbilia including a Trinity oar from 1977 that won the Ladies’ Challenge Plate at Henley, historical photographs, documents, paintings and numerous trophies – All are now filed away in the manuscripts library, stored in vault in the Dining Hall or placed in the Boat Club’s club room at Islandbridge.

One Old Boy remembered his days in Trinity and how times had changed – “Back in the day the Junior Dean called over to 23.0.1 to ask for their help during the Porters' Strike.

Every night a group of Club 'vigilantes' (his expression) would accompany the JD around campus (as his guard) to secure the gates of the ‘Holy and Undivided’.” These days however the only result of this campaign against the Boat Club has been to strengthen the resolve of DUBC as a club, and for that, at least, the Boat Club must be thankful to their 'masters' in College.

DU Ladies Rugby affiliate themselves alongside DUFC

10% Student discount available

The Trinity Library Shop

Roger Hamilton Dublin University Ladies Football Club was established in 1996 so as to cater for the growing interest in women’s rugby at Trinity. This year saw the affiliation of DULFC alongside their male counterparts, the proud founders of the ‘Oldest rugby club in the world’. Much recent debate has taken place on the appropriateness of separate men’s and ladies clubs within Dublin University.

Presently, the Boat Club, Cricket, Golf, Ladies AFC (Soccer), Hereans and Gaelic Clubs all have a brother club which are affiliated separately to DUCAC. In UCD last year, the ladies boat club and ladies hockey club teamed up with their other halves. Of course most clubs coexist quite happily together and often members on both sides prefer it that way.

The debate continues.

The Library Shop opening hours are: 9.30 - 5.00 Monday to Saturday 12.00 - 4.30 Sundays Email: library.shop@tcd.ie Photo: Matt Pitt

http://www.tcd.ie/Library/Shop/