Catch-up (Part II)

Okay, it's Thursday night and I'm going to take a break from 'Ulysses' in order to write some more. We're up to Day Two... oh dear. I'm going to write a much more abbreviated account of the next couple of days.

After getting a much-needed night's sleep, we all woke up feeling refreshed. My cottagemates and I ate a hearty breakfast of porridge, and then Esther, Bonnie and I decided to explore the countryside around our cottages before setting off for an afternoon of museum and graveyard visiting. The sky was blue and the sun was warm (one of the last times this happened!), and we spent a good hour and a half traipsing down narrow roads and up hills to see what we could see. Mostly, we saw cows, including some overtly friendly ones who came right up to us and seemed to be begging for a snack. As we walked, we were charmed by the lovely contrast between the bright blue sky and the bright green grass, and had an altogether pleasant morning constitutional.

That afternoon, we hopped on Jimmy's coach and, led by Jim, set off to visit three places he thought we really ought to see. The first was the Michael Davitt Museum, set in a restored church, behind which Michael Davitt himself is buried. Davitt is somewhat of a national hero to many Irish people; he helped form the Land League, which fought for the ownership of the land by the Irish farmers themselves, and not absentee Englishmen. The museum was full of Davitt's personal effects, Land League propaganda/paraphernalia, and the like. Out back we found the one of the first of many graveyards that we were to see during this first week in Ireland. On a sloping hill were a variety of headstones, from the traditional type you'd see in America to the iconic Celtic cross that is virtually everywhere in Ireland. After taking a multitude of pictures, we headed out again, bound for Meelick.

Jim grew up in Swinford, a tiny "town" right near Meelick. Meelick plays host to one of the five round towers in County Mayo, located in a graveyard that holds personal significance to Jim because it's where his maternal grandfather is buried. En route to Meelick, he shared lots of stories about his childhood, his family, and his childhood experience - he grew up in a tiny house with his mother and siblings; his father went to England to find work, and Jim only saw his father a few times a year. Because of that, his grandfather played a very paternal role in Jim's early life. Jim pointed out the site where his childhood home used to stand, but it'd been cleared away years ago. When we reached Meelick, he immediately led us to his grandfather's grave. A small statue of Mary stood in front of the headstone; the Irish are really fond of decorating graves with flowers and other religious paraphernalia to show that they still remember the dead.

Other than the graves, we enjoyed seeing Meelick's round towers. Round towers are speculated to have been built to watch for Viking invaders, but it's not certain if that's true. Most of them have doors about twelve feet above the ground so that defenders could enter via ladder but could pull it up to prevent the invaders from getting in. The round tower at Meelick is the least famous of all of Mayo's five towers, mostly because its origins are the most murky. Despite that, it was still definitely a sight worth seeing.

Our last stop was at Hennigan’s Heritage Center. This was a really amazing place. Tom Hennigan, the man in charge, has preserved for the public the small, traditional Irish home that he grew up in. Jim knew Tom, who gratefully acknowledged Jim as one of people who first began to help the Center gain popularity among tour groups. The house had one main room, with a little bed for the parents build into a niche in the wall near the fireplace, a small bedroom with two beds for the children to share, and one room on the other side of the main room that his grandmother lived in. Tom explained the way he grew up and the way his family lived, from the implements they used to cook potatoes to how they’d hide goods in little holes in the wall covered by religious paintings to how they’d all bathe together in the middle of the room with one big washtub. It was clear from his presentation that he really wanted to dispel the myth or stereotype that the Irish people, up until a very recent point, lived “primitively.” He argued that their lifestyle, while very simplistic, was also very environmentally friendly and not at all consumerist. Tom also showed us through a series of rooms he’d fitted up in a variety of ways; one was a blacksmith’s shop, one showed traditional knitting and weaving… that sort of thing. Afterwards, we were invited into the small coffee shop-type room for tea, scones, and small sandwiches – a very welcome refreshment after walking around in the cold and being on the go all day long. Once we returned to the cottages, we had made dinner and then got started on our reading, since we had our first class the next morning.

(I've got more typed up, but I'm going to wait to write about a few more days before posting again.)