If you read my blog on a regular basis, you know that I try to be at least a little more politically active than the average person, though admittedly I am not as committed as I'd like to be. But when time and energy permits, I try to get out there and at least be a supportive body, particularly right now with Ireland's economy in the toilet and "cuts" being promised to services for the poorest people in the country. Well, there's been a timely movement here in Dublin to highlight the inequities that exist in Ireland between the very rich and, actually, everybody else. It's called The 1% Network. The name is derived from the fact that 1% of the country owns approximately 34% of the country's wealth. That's a crazy amount! And the kicker is how many of them are "tax exiles" -- in other words, they manage not to pay any taxes to Ireland, even though they have residences here.

Here's the description of the 1% Network from their facebook page: "We have all heard of the ‘golden circle’. We all know that there is one law for the rich and another law for the rest of us.

The 1% network is a coalition of socialist groups which has come together to oppose the cutback agenda of the government and to promote a socialist alternative to the current socio-economic system. The name of the coalition was chosen to highlight the fact that just 1% of the population control in excess of 34% of the wealth of the nation. Organisations within the coalition include éirígí, Irish Socialist Network, Revolutionary Anarcha-Feminist Group, Seomra Spraoi and the Workers Solidarity Movement.

We are planning a number of events including a walking tour of the houses, secret meeting places and private banks where the 1% are to be found."

So a couple weeks back I went to the first tour. It was mostly depressing, to be honest, but it was also very educational. You can view videos of the tour on the facebook page also. It was kind of like a little bit walking tour, a little bit protest. We walked in the streets and had police along, like a protest, but it was a proper walking tour. Here are some photos I took:
This guy is a great speaker. But something (the old New Englander in me) wishes dammit man, can you not shave your beard and cut your hair so you don't look like some hippie wacko? His message is on point, I just wish he looked a little less wackadoo. But then the hippie wacko in me says, who the frig cares?

View walking down the street.

with the wind in our hair...

At this point in the tour, some yah dude holding a puppy stopped to listen. He stood there for about three to five minutes. When that stop on the tour was finished and we'd all clapped, the guy yelled out, "Why don't you people get a job?" Someone said, "We do have jobs, man." And he just kept saying, "You people need to get a job!" I made me really frustrated and angry because while many of the group were working folks, a number of us, like myself, would LOVE to have a job and can't find one. To be summarily dismissed as some kind of idiot is hard to take. I'm an educated person with work experience and plenty of willingness to work. But there just hasn't been a job that's come my way. So people heckled the guy and he walked away with laughter at his back, but I felt sad over it.

Check out this crazy statue of Queen Maeve:

Like, ok, I get the warrior thing, and the crow and the bull head or whatever, but did she HAVE to be naked with huge fake looking tits? Ugh.


Anyhoo, the Irish Times did a little writeup about the event and who happened to be featured in the photo but yours truly. I'm looking very attentive, aren't I? With the huge sunglasses, I'm all incognito.


I just missed the most recent 1% event, but I look forward to attending more of them, and I think you should too. It helps give a real look at what's going on in the mess of Irish politics and rhetoric. You may be dismayed and depressed afterwards, but at least you'll be informed.

In other news, we gave Galway another shot. See, the first time I went to Galway, I had only been living in Ireland for oh, 24 hours or so. I also got an annoying cold as soon as I got off the train, and it was New Year's Eve. So I didn't get a great impression of Galway because I was jet lagged, sick, cold, and half the town was still shut down for the holidays. We only stayed for the weekend and then hightailed it outta there back to Dublin, and I wondered what all the hype about Galway was over.

So when our friend Eve graciously invited us to stay in her new place in Galway, we couldn't turn it down. And you know what? I thought it was a cute little town this time around! Having all the shops and restaurants open, the sun shining, and being healthy and alert gave me a new perspective on Galway. Plus, it's hard to be unhappy when you are so close to the ocean. We walked around town, perused some stores, walked along the shore, and went to this really funny (and admittedly touristy) pub that reminded me SO MUCH of Maine, I insisted we go there twice.

My camera doesn't take good indoor photos, so I had to swipe these off their website.

But here are some photos I took walking along the shore:





Now, the Irish are a hearty people. And swimming in cold water is just one of the common sights all around the country. Maybe it's good for the soul, who knows. But while we walked around in our scarves (ok, I was in a scarf, the others threw caution to the wind), these ladies went for a dip:

This was taken from a diving platform. I'm sure it looks much different in high tide (ie it's covered in water). But this is where people get their swim on:


I decided to take a little ten second video of the view from our little diving platform, for posterity.

So much for posting more regularly. Of course I haven't stopped living, I have just stopped blogging so much about it. But I swear that things have calmed down now so I should be able to keep up! Now, I guess I'm a just gonna have to do a bit of a recap of the month...

Well, first of all, the Rag Issue 5 came back from the printer's! We are all very excited about this year's issue, and I can't wait for our launch party, to which all are invited, on November 20th. Here's the poster for it:

So please come on up to Seomra Spraoi, have a little food, be immensely entertained, dance, and then go home with a copy of The Rag#5 for your very own. It will be a ball!

The first couple of weeks of October were pretty intense, putting together the magazine, dotting our Is and crossing our Ts and making sure everything was more or less kosher. I think we have a great range of articles, two of which were written by yours truly! So look out for it, and if you can't make it to the launch party, never fear, the magazine will be in book shops around Dublin and will be available through Distros around the world. I'll keep you posted on that after the 20th!

I have been a blog neglecter. Well, it's been busy times for me lately! For the past couple of months, I was doing a little mini-internship twice a week for the very talented and very nice Dublin fashion designer, Sinead Doyle. It really got me thinking about fashion and what I'd like to work on next, and she also inspired me to do more hand work like beading and embroidery. So we'll see what I come up with! I still have some nice fabrics from my trip to Florida last year. I have been staring at them longingly for over a year, so I'd like to get through my stash.

It's also RAG season again! So we're making the final push to get the magazine out. Things aren't moving as swiftly as they should be, so I foresee a few sleepless nights ahead.

I think I may have written in February about going to Dublin Community Television to do a show called "Looking Left." We were featured as a comparison to the 1970s Dublin feminist magazine "Banshee." The show has finally been released. Admittedly, I don't say a whole lot. But Clare does an amazing job, and I excel at nodding and smiling.

Looking Left - Banshee Journal of Irish Women United from DCTV on Vimeo.

The other day, I felt like making brunch. So I made a ton of food, and was lucky enough to have a few friends come over and help me eat it. It was one of those days where you feel content and loved and all those nice things. But did I take a photo of us eating the yummy food? No. I took a photo of the plate though! Now, it doesn't look very appetizing, but I assure you, it was. Here is home made corn bread, tofu scramble, corned bean hash, and home made soyrizo. Yum!


A friend of ours was in town between traveling, and he put on a little fundraiser in Seomra Spraoi for a social center in Malaysia. I was supposed to DJ, but there wasn't really enough people. So we just put my ipod playlist on the stereo and had a nice relaxed time. But then, someone asked to turn the music off because some musicians wanted to play. It was magical, and such a pleasant surprise. I took two videos. The second one is haunting and maybe even other worldly. Sometimes I get these reminders at how different Ireland is than America, in a good way. You know those moments where you think, "This would *never* happen back home!" And I feel so lucky to have these moments, particularly when I am missing friends and family back in New England.




September 24th was Culture Night, "a night of entertainment, discovery and adventure in Dublin and across 20 towns, cities and counties in Ireland. Arts and cultural organisations open their doors until late with hundreds of free events, tours, talks and performances." I cycled over to IMMA to meet some friends. I wanted to take photos, but my camera is fairly useless at night. Here's one of Clare and her friend, looking festive!

As we were not so excited by the happenings there, a group of us continued on to some other galleries on Franklin Street. And I had a celebrity sighting! Tommy O'Neill, aka Detective John Deegan from Fair City! I was pretty pleased, but I didn't go up to him or anything.

It's hard to convey just how many times you see horses in Dublin. I don't mean the kind of horses like you see in downtown Boston that have fancy carriages that will take you around the Common. I mean just kids on horses, guys in little mini-carriages going down the road by horse. It's no strange sight to see horses used as regular transportation, and they usually go down the roads like cars. But the other morning, I caught a horsedrawn hearse in traffic, and I just had to take a photo. The horses in front of the bus really creates a contrast!


Well hopefully it won't be so long before my next update!

Yesterday we biked along to quays, then through Irishtown and Ringsend to the water. We walked through these trails, eating blackberries and dandelion leaves along the way, until we hit a beach and a long jetty that led to a light house. We walked all the way out to the lighthouse and back, and then sat on some rocks on the beach and ate peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. Then we biked home. The weather is just too good to stay inside!
The little beach:

Mark taking photos that will kick my photos' butts

The water in the wind:

Some kind of industrial building

Light house:

View from the Light house:

As I was on my futile quest to find a free writing course/workshop/group, I came upon an event that interested me, a reading put on by Some Blind Alleys, "a literary entity that supports new Irish writing through publication, readings, and events, as well as creative writing courses for aspiring and established writers." Unfortunately, their courses are profoundly out of my price range (they are reasonably priced; I am unreasonably poor), but the event was only 5 bucks in, so I figured I should check it out. Of course, I literally only had that much in my pocket, so buying a drink once I got inside was out of the question.

Earlier in the day, I received an unexpected request to DJ at that night's Seomra Spraoi gig, since the scheduled DJ backed out. I said, sure, what the hell, and then realized that it would take a certain amount of prep since my itunes files were all a mess, and not only that all my music is now on an external hard drive, so I'd have to decide on the playlist in advance and burn the songs onto a CD-R in order to bring them with me. And I'd started a sewing project as well that I wanted to finish. AND I wanted to go running. So I sewed for a bit, went for my 5k, came back, showered, then started in on my playlist. But of course that took much, much longer than I wanted it to. So I reached a point where I thought gee, maybe I shouldn't go to this reading after all. But I'd planned it in my mind for weeks, and so at the last second, I ran out the door, not bothering to change out of my scuzzy jeans and t-shirt or put any makeup on. "It's a reading, not a fashion show," I thought. So I hopped on my bike and walked in the door of the Cobalt Cafe only a few minutes late. But when I walked in, I was sort of surprised at how posh everyone looked! I mean, in my mind, I guess I just expected to find grubby people like myself, but I walked into this strange scene of women tottering around on high heeled shoes holding full glasses of red wine, dressed to the nines. My only hope is that they had after-reading plans, to be dressed like that. The men were more mixed, but also looked intimidatingly well dressed. I stood there, reminding myself, "You *do* own nice clothing at home, Angela. It's not as if you put any effort in." But as I stood there, being all grubbed out, and too broke to at least wallow my wardrobe sorrows in a glass of wine, my initial feelings of awkwardness and inadequacy turned to a strange sort of anger. I started to wonder about the gritty process of creating a piece of writing, and how opposite it was of this (apparently) glitzy world of presenting it. The only thing to do, since the event was late in starting, was to inspect everyone else in the room with slight scorn, wondering if I'd want to be the sort of person who got dressed up for a literary event. I think I am, actually. But maybe only if I were the one reading.

So there I was, standing behind the doorway, leaning against the wall like a true wall flower, looking on, wondering if I should leave and finish picking out my DJ set. But then I thought, well, that would be 5 euro wasted, so I'd better stay and at least see something. My obvious bad vibes must have been picked up by the organizer of the event, Greg, who very graciously introduced himself to me. He wanted to know how I'd found out about the event, saying, "We don't get a lot of stragglers to these events." I definitely qualified as a straggler, and I laughed at being outed for my lack of fitting in. My pride prevented me from accepting a drink (or rather the fact that I knew I couldn't buy one back), but it was nice to be reminded that I was actually out amongst fellow human beings.

Now, here's where I am going to be brutally honest, because it's my blog and I see no reason to blow smoke up anyone's ass. Carlo Gébler is a highly accomplished author, obviously, and I'm a nobody. But if he himself asked me what I thought about the piece he read last night, I would have told him that it was a very good first draft. Usually when you see writers read their own work, it goes one of two ways. Either their reading makes you fall in love with the writing, and see something in it you'd never have seen, or it makes you feel uncomfortable and put off. I actually felt that the way he read the piece did the work a disservice, and I had to look down at the floor while he read, because his mannerisms and gesticulations distracted me from listening to the words. It felt a little like when you go to a small hole in the wall comedy club, and well known comedian comes in to test out new jokes. But I'm glad I went. Sometimes it helps to realize that we're all in the same boat, and that just because I haven't been published doesn't mean I'm not talented. I have faith that I have something to say, and I can say it compellingly.

I didn't get to stay to see the other readers, since I had to rush back home and finish preparing my DJ set, then jet over to Seomra Spraoi. The rest of the night was spent playing music, dancing, being plied with wine, and chatting until the wee hours. These days, it's been very difficult navigating the ups and downs of grieving for the loss of my father, so these full days remind me that there are lovely things in life to celebrate.

This week has been Heritage Week here in Ireland. Basically, all week long there are events all over the country in Tourist Offices, Libraries, Office of Public Works Sites, Heritage Centres & Historical Societies, Museums, Bus Eireann Stations, and Various Hotels, plus a bunch of other places. These events celebrate Ireland's history and educate people about the country. Actually, it's pretty awesome. So far, we've gone to three events. The first was at the Cabra Library, and a woman from the Dublin City Library and Archive on Pearse St to talk about genealogical research. Boy do they have a lot of resources I never even thought of! So it was definitely an hour well spent, particularly for Mark, whose family is from Dublin.

Yesterday we biked over to the National Museum on Kildare Street for a lecture on the Sheela Na Gigs of Ireland: "Mr Eamonn P. Kelly, Keeper of Irish Antiquities, NMI, will discuss the origins and functions of the mysterious sheela-na-gigs." The lecturer relied maybe a bit too heavily on his powerpoint presentation, so it was a bit more dry than I was expecting, but then when the audience started asking questions, his answers were a bit more off the cuff and more interesting.

Then we hopped on our bikes, and stopped for a quick bite to eat. I now have a dilemma! Remember my post a few months ago about Pablo Picante and their fantastic burritos? Well, I have to admit that Boojum gives it a run for its money. Now, the bean burrito at Boojum is like 2 euro more than the one at Pablo Picante, but it's a hair bigger. It was a really satisfying burrito though, and I am overjoyed that there are now THREE good burrito options (the third is Cafe Azteca, on Lord Edward St. which also have nice burritos) in Dublin. Hooray!

Due to a small wardrobe malfunction (note to self: don't bike around on a men's style bike with a pencil skirt), we stopped home for five minutes, then scooted back to the Cabra Library for Joe Lee's documentary film, "Bananas on the Breadboard," about the women traders of Dublin. It was a great movie! If you're into local Dublin history, I highly recommend this film, which is available from all the city Libraries. He covers a lot of ground in a short amount of time, but the women traders that are interviewed really steal the show. Tough broads with great senses of humor, for sure.

Anyhoo - I'm really looking forward to having a bit of a "me" day today -- I'm going to do some creative work, clean up my work space, go for a run, and then tonight I'm going to a literary event, followed by a gig at Seomra Spraoi, which I've just been asked to DJ (after the bands). So it'll be a late night for me, but a fun one I'm sure.