By Paddy McCarthy
Just back from being Out&About in sunny Ireland with weather that was better than if you were in Spain. I had a whirlwind six days in my native Cork and as I said the weather was just fabulous and beautiful. It all started with me flying from JFK to Shannon Airport aboard an Aer Lingus flight that was very smooth with no turbulence. My brother Joe picked me up at the airport to drive me back to The Metropole Hotel in Cork City and that was very smooth drive as well.
I got an early check in at the hotel and again what a great welcome it is that I always get there and who came to meet and greet me as well, only the one and only Aaron Mansworth, Managing Director of Trigon Hotel Group, responsible for the Metropole Hotel, Cork International Hotel and the Cork Airport Hotel. Now he is well-known and well-liked in the Cork Business Association including serving as their Vice President over the past year. Aaron is also on the board of Visit Cork and is on the national management council of the Irish Hotels Federation, now where would yea get it that he came to greet me, ahh well I must be nobody, just kidding.
It was great to be home in Cork for a few days and to meet up with some friends since we were babies for a pint. That I did in the afternoon on my first day. We got to meet in a nice pub called Fordes in Barrack Street that I was so thrilled to meet up again with Tony Creed, Tommy O’Shea, Steve Dennehy, Michael Hehir and Tom Holland. What we always talk about is the old days and I love all that and you would think that I never left and that is the beauty of it, now how is that for a bit of gossip.
The next day I went to visit my sister Mary who was convalescing at home after her operation, she was a little bit uncomfortable. I have since spoken to her and she is back on her feet T.G. It was like a very fast couple of days as I also got to meet all the family and friends like my brothers Joe, Bernard, Kieran and John, along with Barry Twomey, Gerry Walsh and a trip down to Youghal to visit the Coyne family, Sean, Rita and Pat, as well as visiting my brother John who resides the at Saint Raphael’s Community Living. I went down by bus and again it was very pleasant drive down with my brother Kieran.
When I was back in Cork City, I had a tear in my pants and Kieran’s wife Geraldine repaired it for me, just a bit of gossip to tell yea. That was my out and about in Cork Ireland, the bottom line is I had a very nice time and I got a “Céad míle fáilte” from everybody, ahh I love it so much.
This newsletter came from a great friend of The Irish Examiner USA, Susan McKeown: “Hi from the Lower East Side folks, we hope this finds you really well. Following the landmark vote last month by Jacob Riis residents to reject the PACT privatization process we’re excited to invite you to a book talk and discussion at our Lower East Side office this Friday May 16 at 7 pm with Irish author and activist John Bissett about his book ‘It’s Not Where You Live, It’s How You Live: Class and Gender Struggles in a Dublin Estate’. Since last year John has collaborated with us at Cuala for ‘Shared Struggles,’ an online series exploring the challenges faced by public housing residents in Dublin and here on Manhattan’s Lower East Side amid escalating levels of privatization, displacement and dispossession of public housing. We hope you can join us for what promises to be an engaging event. Further details can be found on our website at cualafoundation.org/cuala-new-york.”
Hope to see you all again when I’m Out&About again…