belgianwaffle

Ireland

Garryvoe Part 2


Posted in: Cork, Dublin, Family, Ireland

For the second week of our holiday in Cork, we booked the children on to a computer course. Herself did it last year and loved it and all three of them were old enough to partake this year. I prayed that the weather would break because I couldn’t stand it if for the finest summer since 1976 I sent them in to look at a screen all day. My prayers were largely answered. The weather was pretty awful:
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This left me free to do a range of things with my free time: spend time with my parents; go shopping; force my sister to look at a large house which was deeply unsuitable for her needs but really lovely aside from the dead pigeon on the drawing room windowsill and the damage to the west wing from the largely collapsed roof and, of course, the derelict listed house next door which was included as part of the sale.

The children meanwhile really, really loved their course. But they were exhausted. We got back early one evening and we ate early and I sent the boys to bed. I was just about to turn my attention to herself when she remarked in tones of outrage, “Do you realise that you sent the boys to bed at 7?” “Yes,” I replied. “You cunning, little vixen,” said she. Really, cunning, little vixen? I have a lot to put up with.

Anyhow, after two weeks we returned to Dublin. The children were delighted to be back pointing out familiar landmarks to each other. “Ah the sights and sounds of Dublin,” said their father. “Tobacco,” shouted the children happily from the back seat. Something needs to be done about the illegal cigarette trade alright.

Holidays – Garryvoe Part 1


Posted in: Cork, Family, Ireland

Did you know we went to East Cork to stay in our friends’ house? We have excellent friends; a lifetime of careful choosing.

So, in a very 1950s way, Mr. Waffle worked in Dublin and came down at the weekends and I stayed in Cork with the children. The weather was quite outstanding. This did not overcome Michael’s permanent objection to going to the beach but we forced him there; an exercise that requires more enthusiasm on the part of a parent than you might imagine.

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The children spread their wings in a mild way. I went for a swim and left them in the house. The three of them went to the nearby playground together, played and came back. They quite enjoyed being out without their loving parents and I am quite pleased with how responsible herself is becoming. Regrettably, she is getting a bit sophisticated for playgrounds.

We made our annual pilgrimage to Leahy’s fun farm which, as usual, delivered the goods. My cousin, who is a farmer’s son and father of three small children, is underwhelmed by Leahy’s but then he has to go and milk cows whenever his brother goes off golfing, so he and his family are more jaded when it comes to farm animals.

There was a climbing thingy:
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There was a snake:
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There were (new this), mice to put in your hair:
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The Princess made friends with a little French girl and the pair of them ran around together. As ever, her parents were utterly unimpressed by an Irish child who spoke good French. There is a reason why sang froid is a French expression. In an effort to keep her French up over the summer, I have offered to pay her €8.25 [a figure subject to intense negotiation] if she reads one of the Harry Potter books in French. She got to page 87 when the e-reader died. What are we to make of this? Insights thus far: “you-know-who” in French is “tu-sais-qui” when speaking to children and “vous-savez-qui” for adults. Watch this space for more exciting updates. We’ve just purchased a new e-reader. Sigh.

My brother and mother came to visit us for the day. My mother has not been well and it was lovely to get her out of the city. The loveliness was somewhat compromised by my father calling to say that my aunt and two of my cousins had come to visit my mother. He had been peacefully reading the Telegraph when they arrived and although he was happy to welcome them, he was even happier when I said that they should come to us. Meanwhile, my brother had taken the children and the house key to the beach and turned off his mobile phone. So my mother and I sat in the rather toasty car contemplating breaking in. I mulled on the state of disorder which would greet my cousins and aunt. Eventually the sandy ones returned with a very melted packet of chocolate fingers. It all passed off peacefully but I retired to bed with a migraine at 9. Visitors are tiring.

We have been to East Cork many times but never to Cloyne so I forced the children to visit. It is full of interesting things. Despite this photo, they did not like it and they did not find it interesting:

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But look, it has a round tower:

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An effigy of Bishop Berkeley who spent nearly 20 years here (though he died elsewhere):
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It also has a rather fancy marble stone memorial to the man who was a leading light in the British and Foreign Bible Society:
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But no, they remained resolutely unimpressed. Can you take more of this tomorrow?

Burnt to a Cinder


Posted in: Dublin, Ireland

The heat wave seems to be over. It’s probably for the best; we weren’t able for it. I took the children to a beach in North County Dublin a couple of weeks ago. It looked like this.

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We all came back burnt in parts: the Princess’s right shoulder, the back of Michael’s neck, Daniel’s lower back, my ankles. We recovered with lots of shade. I think that this was the longest continuous spell of good weather in Ireland since 1976. We were flabbergasted.

A description of my time in East Cork with the children will follow. Something for you to look forward to.

Cork Views


Posted in: Cork, Ireland

The Crawford has just opened a watercolour room and there are some lovely pictures there which I have never seen before. Not entirely relevant to this post but at the moment there is a great exhibition on cubism as well – Mary Swanzy is a revelation to me; I thought her pictures were really lovely [I’m sure that ‘really lovely’ is the kind of accolade the cubists would have liked].

Anyhow, to the watercolours – look at this lovely view of Cork:

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The picture by John Fitzgerald dates from 1796 and is described as “Old Saint Finbarr’s and Elizabeth Fort”.

And look at this picture of the same view that I snapped on the walk back to my parents’ house:

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Very recognisable, I think, although the old Beamish and Crawford site on the right [now closed down] is obviously not from the 1790s, Elizabeth Fort is still the same and even though the cathedral got rebuilt in the 19th century, it’s still in the same spot.

Now, let us consider one of the great architectural travesties visited on Cork. This is a picture of Cork Opera House before it was burnt down.

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My parents remember the much loved 19th century opera house burning in 1955. I once read somewhere words to the effect that any architects who built a replacement would have had their work cut out to build something that the people of Cork would take to their hearts as much as the old building, but they didn’t even try. This feels entirely true. This is the replacement building on the site of the old opera house:

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It has actually improved since I was a child as then the side facing the river was an uncompromising brutalist plain wall. It has been somewhat relieved by the addition of a glass window over the river and glass cladding at the front but it is still, to my eyes, quite spectacularly ugly. To be fair, I assume that the 1960s architects did not realise that their clean lines would be disfigured by the addition of a large poster for Grease and the Toyota ad on the roof [a permanent, unlovely feature].

Enough Cork architecture for today.

Cultural Activities


Posted in: Dublin, Family, Ireland

Things we have done in the holidays thus far:

St. Michan’s Church on Church Street

I had to practically beat the children to get out of the house to come here. The rain was coming down in sheets and even the short walk from the car to the church had us sodden. But it was so worth it. We have been here before. There are Mummys in the crypt [very dry apparently, unlike outside] and there is a great guide who makes the whole think immensely entertaining for children. They shook hands with the crusader [800 years old still quite a lot of face left – they know he was a crusader because his legs are crossed] and heard the gruesome story of the hanging, drawing and quartering of the Sheares brothers [involved in the 1798 rebellion – ended badly for them]. This was described in loving detail to the intense delight of all the children on the tour. There is also the family crypt of the Earls of Leitrim which has lain unused since the third earl (a bad lot) was buried there. The church boasts the font where Edmund Burke was baptised and the organ on which Handel practised the Messiah before the first performance in Fishamble Street. We ran into the vicar [I think, the titles of Protestant clergymen are always a mystery to me] who asked the children where they went to school and then surprised them by saying he was a neighbour of one of their classmates and horrified them by speaking to them in Irish. After this alarming encounter, they decided that it was best to leave again but not before writing in the visitors’ book. A number of American visitors had described their visits as “awesome” and “amazing”. Michael having laboriously written his name and address went for a more restrained “good”.

Henrietta Street

The Princess and I walked up and down Henrietta Street and admired the buildings. Number 14 was home to C.S Lewis’s great, great grandmother. I thought you would like to know. We went to the Uilleann Pipers house and had a look around. The boys sat in the car and refused to move.

Subsequently I went on my own to no.14 to see the Dublin Tenement Experience. This is a performance set in the 1913 Dublin lockout and using no.14 Henrietta Street which is largely unchanged since it was used as a tenement. The performance is done by the same people who did “The Boys of Foley Street” so I was prepared to be alarmed and to have plenty of audience participation. Maybe my previous knowledge of the company ruined it for me but it’s just not so real when you are accompanied by a bus load of elderly tourists from Northern Ireland. I thought it was mildly interesting and reasonably well done but I certainly wouldn’t have been gushing that it was the best thing I had ever seen as I heard one of my fellow participants say in awed tones to the woman on reception. Still and all, well worth a look.

Unrelated but as I was there they were filming an ad for C&A. The security man told me that they had been filming for 5 days for a 30 second slot. 5 days! So, if you see a nice old Georgian street in a C&A ad, you’ll know where it was shot.

No. 29 Fitzwilliam Street

The Princess and I had previously tried to visit this restored Georgian house but it was closed for renovations. This time we got in and I think she found it mildly entertaining but really more fun for me than for her. Sometimes she is a saintly child. Ironically, the ESB which funded the restoration of this house, knocked down all the rest of the terrace. There is some bitterness about this. It’s interesting though that Irish attitudes at the time were very ambivalent towards Georgian architecture and what it represented. I think now there has been a complete turn around and no one would argue for the wanton destruction of Georgian houses but certainly there’s still plenty of neglect in the centre of Dublin.

Glendalough

I forced the children to go to this world famous monastic site. They haven’t been for a couple of years. The traffic was dreadful. It took us an hour and a half to get there. The information that the American first children had recently been forced to go there left them unmoved other than leading to a slight fellow feeling. When we arrived I made them go on a mild walk.

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It went pretty well for the first half but by the second part of the circuit they were getting tired, hungry and fractious. Michael fell down a hill and was picked up by a kindly German tourist. Daniel got stung by nettles. We saw deer but even that was insufficient to rouse them to any great enthusiasm. The Phoenix Park has made them all a bit blasé about deer.

I got to use my picnic basket again. As I was unpacking it, two very small girls stood and watched me enviously. See below, Michael enjoying the picnic which, in his case, consisted of 5 cream crackers.

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After the picnic, I played hurling with Dan. Very poorly. A number of Americans stopped and took pictures of this native sport; unfortunately the quality of the play gave very little idea of what hurling is actually like.

After this I tried and utterly failed to get them to the monastic site. This is as close as we got to Glendalough this year.

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St. Audeon’s Church

For the best part of a year, I have been threatening to take my family to this city centre church. Mr. Waffle kindly minded the children one morning and I set off on my own. It is a lovely, lovely church managed by the Office of Public Works in co-operation with the local parish. It’s less showy than St. Patrick’s or Christ Church both of which are nearby but really peaceful and very appealing.

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The OPW has done a great job with the exhibition in the oldest part of the original church. There is still an unroofed part – the Portlester chapel – which is somehow particularly attractive in the centre of the city surrounded by very busy roads. It feels like it belongs somewhere else altogether. Petrie has a drawing of it from the 1800s and it is still very recognisable; although no one was hanging out washing while I was there.

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I will now force the children to come with me and see it because they have not suffered enough.

It’s All Weekends


Posted in: Dublin, Ireland, Middle Child, Twins

And finally, for my last trick, I have to describe the weekend of the street party. As Mr. Waffle said, for this to be a success there would have to be four fine Sundays in a row. We did not have four fine Sundays in a row. This mattered surprisingly little. And you know, the sense of obligation to get out and do something in the [limited supply of] sunshine is very tiring.

The children played soccer in the street for hours [Daniel, who had played a GAA match that morning and got a medal for his participation in the mini-league along with a bag and a wristband and cap, spent, by my calculation, seven hours that Sunday running after a ball]. The grown-ups resigned themselves to the weather and ate from the really excellent selection of food on offer. There was bunting. It was good. It would be great all the same if, just one year, it didn’t rain on the street party.