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Irish Independent
3 days ago
- Entertainment
- Irish Independent
August bank holiday in Mayo – Top five things to do
With Reek Sunday signalling the end of summer, there are few better places than Mayo to soak up the last of the good (well, at least not cold) weather. Here are five of the best things to do in the land of Michael Davitt and Grainne Uaile this August Bank Holiday weekend: Castlebar Music Festival Don McClean wasn't singing about Castlebar when he referred to 'the day the music died' in 'American Pie'. The town, once renowned for the Castlebar International Song Contest and the Castlebar Blues Festival, will put itself back on the cultural map with its busiest festival in years when the brand-new Castlebar Music Festival rolls into the county town. Headlined by AC/DC and Queen tribute acts, the festival will see more than 20 acts play indoor venues throughout Castlebar all weekend, starting on Friday, August 1. The main event will see six acts play at a day-long hooley at Hoban's car park right in the heart of the county town on Sunday, August 3. If all goes well, this festival will be touching the Richter scale. A full programme of events can be found at Bonniconlon Agricultural Show This is not just any agricultural show, mark our words. From humble beginnings in the early 1950s, the Bonniconlon Agricultural Show has grown to become the biggest of its in Connacht and the second-biggest agricultural show in Ireland. Come hell or high water, the guts of 30,000 people flock to north Mayo village on the first Monday of August each year. With music from country music stars Mike Denver and Michael English, a €60,000 prize fund and dozens upon dozens of stands on 200-acre site showcasing every sort of machine, gadget, goose, hen and heifer one could imagine, the Bonniconlon Show is up there with the best agricultural shows in the world. Further information can be found on ABBA Sensations Oasis are back – as the world and its mother knows. However, with the legendary Bjorn Ulvaeus and Benny Andersson having ruled out an ABBA reunion tour, a tribute act is the best bet for ABBA superfans. ABBA Sensations are no strangers to Mayo or the TF, which they played as recently as April 2024. This weekend, they are back in Connacht's biggest indoor music venue paying homage to Swedish pop royalty who need no introduction. Expect almost-as-good-as the original renditions of 'Dancing Queen', 'Gimme Gimme', 'Voulez Vouz', 'Take A Chance' and so many more on Sunday, August 3. Tickets can be purchased on A Taste of Inishturk Missed the first weekend of 'A Taste of Inishturk? Never fear. The month long-festival on one of Mayo's smallest inhabited islands has plenty in store for those willing to take the ferry out from Roonagh and wave all their cares goodbye this Bank Holiday weekend. As the name implies, 'A Taste of Inishturk' celebrates the cuisine of the Wild Atlantic Way. But there's plenty to do there before you taste the mackerel and chips in Caher View Restaurant. Like marvelling at Mayo's most scenic GAA pitch, the majestic cliffs and sea stacks, or the Napoleonic Signal Tower at the summit of Knoclackan Mountain. On Saturday, August 2, at 9pm, Clew Bay-based vocal group Coda will play the Inishturk Community Club, followed by tunes from Jonny Moran on Sunday at 2pm in the same venue. With its sights, sounds and tastes, there's simply nowhere on earth like Inishturk. More information on 'A Taste of Inishturk' can be found on Newport Grainne Uaile Festival Could you possibly pack any more into a three-day festival? With everything from trad sessions, face painting, balloon modelling, a sheep shearing exhibition, a boxty-making demonstration, a barbeque, a pirate parade, open air concerts, bingo, busking, water sports, novelty races, guided historical tours and a fishing competition, you'd do well to find a more eventful festival than the Newport Grainne Uaile Festival. Named after the famous pirate queen who ruled the waters of Clew Bay, this festival has become near unmissable. The best part? It's totally free. The Newport Grainne Uaile Festival takes place from Friday August 1 to Sunday August 3.
BreakingNews.ie
11-06-2025
- General
- BreakingNews.ie
Leaving Cert history exam looked 'daunting' and rewarded students 'who avoided rote learning'
A teacher has given his first reaction to this year's Leaving Cert history exams, which students completed on Wednesday afternoon. Jamie Dockery, a history teacher at Tyndall College in Carlow, said the Higher Level paper looked like a "daunting prospect" at first glance. Advertisement "Many will have been surprised not to see questions on Charles Stewart Parnell or the Montgomery Bus Boycott," he said. "Those who placed all their bets on these topics — undoubtedly a sizeable number — will be bitterly disappointed." "However, there was much to be pleased with in this paper. The Documents-Based Question focused on the Jarrow March, a topic most well-prepared students would have covered thoroughly. The sources were engaging, and while the contextualisation question – asking whether the march was a failure – was slightly challenging, it was certainly manageable. "The 'Movements for Reform' section featured an interesting question comparing the successes of Michael Davitt and James Larkin, two reformers with shared ideals but from different eras. "Eamon de Valera was widely expected to appear on the paper, given that this year marks the 50th anniversary of his death—and 'the Long Fellow' didn't disappoint. The question was broad, covering his role in the Treaty negotiations, the Civil War, and World War II. Advertisement "Speaking of WWII, its appearance in an Irish context was welcome, as it hadn't featured since 2021. The topic 'The United States and the Wider World, 1945–1989' proved tricky, with challenging questions on the American Dream and the role of religion in American life. However, the inclusion of LBJ will have come as a relief to many. "As with last year's paper, women featured prominently, with questions on Isabella Tod, Hanna Sheehy-Skeffington, Bernadette Devlin, Mary Robinson, Sylvia Meehan, Simone de Beauvoir, and Nadine Gordimer. Overall, this was an exam that rewarded the candidates who avoided rote learning, who didn't cut corners with their revision, and who were able to think on their feet." Mr Dockery said the Ordinary Level exam will have been generally well received by students and teachers, with the Jarrow March also the focus of the Documents Based Question. "In fact, the Ordinary Level exam had many similar (and in some instances, the same) questions to its Higher Level version across the entire exam – I very much welcome the Higher and Ordinary Level exam having similar questions, particularly considering that the average Senior History groups will have Higher and Ordinary Level students learning together in the one class. Advertisement Lifestyle Leaving Cert: French exam used 'challenging vocabu... Read More "When teaching Ordinary Level students, my advice to them is always to focus mainly on the Case Studies for each topic and the key personalities. Candidates who followed this approached will have been satisfied with this exam. "Many of the main personalities from Irish History found their way into the exam including O'Connell; Yeats; Davitt; Roscommon man Douglas Hyde; Collins, Cosgrave and de Valera. Women will also well represented in the guise of Hanna Sheehy-Skeffington and Countess Markievicz and Maureen O'Hara, among others. Eagle-eyed students will notice that many of these personalities appeared in the 2024 edition. "The 'Europe and the Wider World' topics were also varied and offered the well-prepared candidate the opportunity to do well. Just like in the Higher Level paper, the United States topic was not without its challenges, but the inclusion of the Montgomery Bus Boycott here means that the vast majority of candidates should be fine. It was interesting that the Star Wars question included the parenthesis (the Strategic Defence Initiative) to hopefully discourage answers about Luke Skywalker (as opposed to – correctly – Ronald Reagan!) "As a History teacher, my hope for any exams is that it will give the diligent and hardworking student a chance to show off all they know, and this exam certainly did that."
Irish Times
03-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Irish Times
Academic questions: Frank McNally on Titanic terriers, epic expense accounts and the rise of the ‘full professor'
At the prestigious annual Theatrical Cavaliers table quiz in Dublin last weekend, held this year in aid of the My Lovely Horse animal rescue charity, they had a round on the theme of dogs. A typical question asked us to identify the Pekinese terrier, named after a famous revolutionary, which was one of only three canine passengers to escape the sinking of the Titanic. This is the sort of utterly useless information that we veteran quizzers pride ourselves on knowing. And I'm half-embarrassed to admit that I did indeed have the answer on the tip of my tongue. Or nearly. I knew the name had three words, all monosyllables. I knew it was Chinese. And I could have written a short (if vague) essay about the revolutionary in question, including the fact that he admired and wrote letters to Michael Davitt – a detail retained from a visit to the Davitt museum in Mayo a few years ago. READ MORE But after rifling through various dusty files in a back office of my brain, I came out with the wrong one. Chiang Kai-shek, I pronounced with confidence, wrongly. Doh! It was of course Sun Yat-sen. Oh well. We won the quiz anyway, the generous prizes for which, as usual, included a potted plant. I have one from last year too, now overgrown. If this run continues, I'll end up with a garden. The journalist Emile Joseph Dillon (1854 – 1933) would have known the right answer that question. He probably knew Sun Yat-sen personally. As the foremost foreign correspondent of his day, the Dubliner befriended many famous statesmen, and as well as writing about them for the Daily Telegraph, became in some cases their confidante and adviser. He was, as we would say today, a player, helping to end the Russo-Japanese war (1905) and the Balkan wars of 1912-13. In recognition of his influence, three of the resulting peace treaties – Portsmouth (1905), London (1913), and Bucharest (also 1913) were signed with his own gold-cased fountain pen. Forgotten for decades after his death, Dillon is now the subject a first-ever biography, the launch of which I attended on Thursday night The book is by Kevin Rafter , professor of political communication at DCU, who drew envy from some of those assembled in Hodges Figgis by describing the glory that was journalism in the early years of last century. Much as some of us today might envy EJ Dillon's influence, more would prefer his expense account. Not only did it allow him to stay in the best of hotels and dine in the finest restaurants, it also covered such essential purchases as silk top hats and Cuban cigars. Even after a 60 per cent cut as part of a Daily Telegraph austerity drive in 1917, which caused him much indignation, he was still allowed expenses of £1,000 a year, the equivalent of £110,000 today. He also at times had the services of two secretaries, one of whom he liked to have play piano for him while he wrote dispatches. Sigh. Try claiming for a piano-playing secretary today and see what happens. To quote Mark Antony: 'O, what a fall was there ...' Rafter was introduced at the launch (by DCU President Daire Keogh) as a 'full professor', a description also used on the book. You hear this curious phrase more and more these days. And for me, at least, it always evokes the image of an academic who has eaten too much. [ The spirit of 1965 – Kevin Rafter on Ireland's first television election Opens in new window ] I suppose the point is to distinguish from the mere assistant and associate professors that proliferate these days, and whose titles can be rounded up in casual usage, to the detriment of their seniors. Even so, there must be versions of that problem in many careers. And yet I can't think of another that uses this construction. You never hear of full doctors, for example, or full plumbers, or full chefs (full-Irish chefs, maybe). Come to think of it, you also don't hear of full columnists, which could be useful to distinguish those of us who write daily from the part-timers and dilettantes who do it once a week and think they're great. In support of my impending expense claim for a piano-playing secretary, I may have to start using the term myself. Somehow it seems to go against native Irish genius to describe people as a full or complete anything. Our preference is drawing attention to inadequacy. Hence the countless diminutives in Hiberno-English, describing people who fall short of something: girleen, maneen, squireen, priesteen, etc, etc. Strange to say, you never hear the junior grades of professor described as professoreens. Maybe that's the problem. Speaking of Irish-English, or vice versa, my thanks to several readers who sent me the picture of a sign over a door in Beaumont Hospital, on which 'Please Knock Before Entry' is translated as 'Le Do Thoil Cnoc Mhuire Roimh Iontrail'. The translator appears to have mistaken the verb 'Knock' ( cnag in Irish) for the Mayo village of the same name. Unless the intended suggestion was that those seeking hospital treatment should first consider a visit to the Marian shrine. That would be a reversal of the usual order of things, certainly, but also one way to cut waiting lists.
Irish Independent
01-05-2025
- Business
- Irish Independent
Letters: New office aimed at boosting house-building needs additional primary legislation to achieve its aims
'This office will help secure the enabling infrastructure needed for public and private housing development and unblock infrastructure delays on the ground, maximising the number of homes delivered from the supply pipeline already in place,' he said in response to Dáil questions. The house construction target is 300,000 units from now to 2030. In 1975, just under 27,000 new homes were built; in that year we had a population of 3.19 million. The estimated 2024 population, based on the Census 2022 figure of 5.149 million, is 5.394 million. There were 30,330 new dwelling completions in the whole of 2024. Acknowledging the large number of completions in the 'housing boom' era, the historical fact remains that last year just over 6,000 more homes were completed than 1975, despite a population increase of over 2,200,000 (59pc) in that period. The SHAO faces enormous challenges: unblocking infrastructural delays; facilitating a climate whereby builders can access finance to engage in major developments; increasing the number of houses built directly by housing authorities; minimising the effects of the Nimby culture and judicial reviews; and somehow providing a proper supply of affordable homes for purchase, rather than renting. We are facing a tenure crisis that would have Michael Davitt spinning in his grave, with hundreds of thousands of citizens living in accommodation in which they have not a bathroom tile of equity. Unfortunately, as I cannot see how the provisions of the Planning and Development Act 2024 address any of these issues, or the crippling complexity of our planning process, without empowering additional primary legislation I fear the SHAO mission is doomed. Larry Dunne, Rosslare Harbour, Co Wexford Why appoint a housing tsar when we already have somebody to do the job? It is the job of the Housing Minister to be the 'housing tsar'. Bill O'Rourke, Crumlin, Dublin 12 Hefty salary of €430,000 would be better spent on providing family homes The €430,000 salary flagged for the next housing tsar would be better spent on renting homes for up to 20 families currently living in emergency accommodation. ADVERTISEMENT Of course, it would also mean not introducing just another bureaucratic layer in attempts to actually solve the housing crisis. Peter Declan O'Halloran, Belturbet, Co Cavan Minister could easily field a couple of football teams with all those assistants Jim O'Sullivan ('Government should stop building empires and start building homes instead' Irish Independent, Letters, April 30) points out that the Housing Minister is supported by three junior ministers, a general secretary and nine assistant secretaries (I would assume several 'advisers' also). Does the appointment of a so-called housing tsar mean the Government does not have confidence in the minister to carry out his duties? Michael Moriarty, Rochestown, Cork Chasm growing between Roman Catholicism and Christianity this century Following the death of Pope Francis, public deliberation on the tenets and beliefs of his successor is widespread. Currently, a group from the US is lobbying cardinals in Rome to appoint a man they wish will undo the great Christian work of Francis. The chasm between Roman Catholicism and actual Christianity is sadly becoming larger in the 21st century. In Robert Harris's excellent fictional novel Conclave, the Dean of the College of Cardinals, disturbed after a dialogue with Cardinal Benitez, thought to himself (page 279): 'Was it really possible that he had spent the last 30 years worshipping the church rather than God?' This sentence, and ignorance of the tradition that cardinals appeal to the Holy Spirit for guidance in electing a pope, illustrates a clear refusal by some to trust God, while ignoring the importance of the Trinity, both as individuals and one God. That they opt to put labels on any who are not of their ilk is totally unchristian. Declan Foley, Melbourne, Australia Trump got dressing-down for dressing up – in a blue suit – at Francis's funeral Some sections of the media will stoop to any low to have a go at Donald Trump, probably resulting from a fit of childish pique, having got the US election result so disastrously wrong. The latest, almost farcical weapon of choice, is what one might call 'Blue Suit-Gate'. Apparently, some of these hard-bitten hacks have gone all sensitive over Mr Trump wearing a blue suit at Pope Francis's funeral. The facts undermine this bout of pseudo-fashion sensitivity. First, funeral etiquette dictates that it is perfectly acceptable to wear a blue suit at a funeral, particularly if one is not a chief mourner. I have to confess to the media fashion police that I have comm- itted this 'crime' myself. Guilty as charged. Second, and more importantly, if one looks at the rows of dignitaries seated behind Mr Trump, a substantial number were also wearing, you've guessed it, blue suits. One suspects that had Mr Trump worn a dark suit, it would have been judged as the wrong shade of dark. Eric Conway, Navan, Co Meath Policies have ruffled a few feathers, but president's pace of change impressive Much of what has been written about Donald Trump's first 100 days has been negative – and perhaps justifiably so ('In a mere 100 days, Trump has created a more volatile world', Editorial, April 30). His policies have strained international alliances, unsettled economies and divided public opinion at home and abroad. Yet one cannot ignore the sheer pace at which his administration has moved. In an era when political processes often crawl forward, his ability to implement change – for better or worse – is remarkable. There is an uncomfortable lesson here: energy and initiative, even when misguided, can leave more deliberate democracies wrong-footed. Those who value steadiness and principle must now match that urgency not with haste, but with conviction and a clarity of purpose that resonates across borders.
