Electric Picnic 09 Glimpse

Oh it was GRRRREAT! & sorry I was having too much fun, and was way to chilled to even think about getting my camera out to take photographs of the wonderful Body & Soul magic mystery tour vibe, Tiny Tea Tent, Dutch outdoor Hot Tubs (! yes hot tubs in the middle of the night!), Fleet Foxes.... and so on... Even the mud was delightful. & what a glorious sunny Monday morning, to wrap it all up in a warm fuzzy EP haze til next year. Our lush tipi was being packed up and sent to Bestival at Isle of Wight for its next stop in the festival roundabout. But the guy dismantling it (see below), assured us that EP is the best festival he knows. Notice how everybody EP's eyes glaze over and a beatific grin creeps over their face when they mention "Body & Soul" - try it and see what I mean...

Some Art and a Sudden Storm, Delhi 2009

Let's dump parochialism and just go global... 1.26 BILLION people in India. How many in Ireland? 4 million? 5 million? Now that's what I call PERSPECTIVE.

Edith Wilkins Streetchildren Centre, Darjeeling, India

During the "Monsoon Wedding" trip to Darjeeling earlier this month, we were lucky enough to get to visit Edith Wilkins uplifting Streetchildren Centre - of which my cousin, Emma O'Brien (the Bride), is Assistant Director. After reading Slumdog Millionaire, and seeing the movie, I was expecting something grim - but Edith's happy centre is far from grim - as you can see from these pictures, it's full of light and joy (thanks to cousin eile, Niamh ni Aodha for the pix). But I guess these are far from the conditions these kids have been rescued from.

Edith Wilkins is an incredible Cork woman, who trained as a nurse in Cork with Emma's mother, Eileen, after which she headed off to India "for a few years". Famous last words - that was 26 years ago! She initally worked for Goal in Calcutta. In the meantime she set up The Hope Foundation for Streetchildren in Calcutta, worked with Goal in Sudan (among other places), where she bumped into her old friend Mother Theresa (they both looked at each other and exclaimed "What are you doing here?"). Edith most recently moved to Darjeeling where she set up the wonderful new centre which we (about 30 of us, from Ireland), visited, as part of the Emma O'Brien/Roshan Rai wedding party. Oh, and Edith has also fostered 20 children (she has grandchildren now), and adopted two - the lovely Omar and Krishma. Krishma was one of Emma's beautiful flowergirls. In Edith's lively centre on the day we vistied, leading up to Emma and Roshan's "Dhog Bet", and wedding, the kids were singing, playing the guitar, playing games, and chatting to us about their schooldays and their lives. They are a super, happy, well cared-for bunch, thanks to Edith's initiatives, and of course the support of Irish Aid, fundraising, and private Irish donations. For example, while I was there - one well-known Irish businessman sent over a considerable sum of money with some of the wedding guests to pay for a heart operation needed by a child in Calcutta. Edith's foundation was keen not to waste even one penny in bank charges, so the donation was delivered by hand. That's pretty typical of how this inspiring NGO works. Check it out: www.edithwilkins.org.

Darjeeling - en route to Rishikesh...

Had an amazing time here in the foothills of the Himalayas at Emma & Roshan's Dog Bhet and wedding (Aug 6 - 8) - loads of images and stories to post up of all the fascinating people I've met here so far, but it's probably going to have to wait until I get home in a couple of weeks... So watch this space for the latest on an Indian adventure...

U2's Contraption and Croke Park Gig, July 24th, Croke Park

I woz there! With my iphone - but without zoom. Magnificent show - Catherine Owens, Willie Williams (show director); Mark Fisher; Bruce Ramus (lighting designer). How did they dream up that intergalactic spaceship
contraption?!! I would love to know. 

The Touring Experiment: Dance Case Study

Check out the interesting Dance Case Study I conducted with Dance Theatre of Ireland on the 2007 national tour of their show "Slow Down" - you can download it from the Arts Council website here:

http://www.artscouncil.ie/en/areas-of-work/touringpolicy.aspx

It's one of the reports (including theatre, music, dance, and visual art), that helped to formulate the new Arts Council Policy: "A future for arts touring in Ireland 2010-2015".

Skellig Michael "Jaunt"

We were looking forward to a quaint Sunday jaunt out to Skellig Michael, County Kerry (after the opening of ART 250 Kerry the night before), to explore the 6th century monastic UNESCO world heritage site. Well, we were in for a bit of a surprise!

Sean Feehan’s boat pulled out from Ballinskelligs, and soon enough it felt like we were being thrown around in a washing machine while having buckets of sea water flung at us - AND being simultaneously disembowelled of anything we ever ate. That lasted for about an hour, before we finally pulled up to the mighty rock. We looked like we had been thrown overboard. But luckily, the sun came out, warmed us up (we were shaking), and dried us off. Oh yeah, this is a traditional pilgrimage site, and this experience is all part of it (we were told). THEN there were the 580 vertiginous steps to climb, up to the monastic site itself. We practically crawled up the incline, but it was all worth it once we got there. The gorgeous puffins on the way cheered us up too. The only other thing it reminded me of are the spectacular rockhewn churches in Lalibela, Ethiopia – also a UNESCO World Heritage site.

Up there, we sat and chatted with Eamonn, the guide at the top who explained the amazing sculptural beehive structures to us; the fact that they were built without mortar; the diet of the 12 hungry monks who spent their lives praying for people on the mainland; the monk-beds; their lavatory system, and how eventually, in the 12th century they moved back onto the mainland and set up the Augustinian Monastery in Ballinskelligs. Then there were the pilgrimages and the lighthouse families. A spectacular, spiritual place. We got comfortable and could have chilled out there a lot longer (or perhaps avoided the boat-trip back forever) but – Sean Feehan the boatman was waiting for us down below, and we had to hurry. Wisely, we didn’t eat the sandwiches we had brought with us. There was only one way home... I won’t go into the details. On a positive note, it was amazing to pass Little Skellig with its bird colonies before hitting the open sea again.

As we pulled back in the harbour at Ballinskelligs, Sean Feehan informed us that the boat-journey was considered to be part of the pilgrimage, and no wonder the monks only came off the island once a year when they lived there. Now he tells us! We were pale, our hair was covered in vomit (the glamour!), we nodded in agreement. A fantastic, if somewhat visceral experience... & we get a plenary indulgence for that - which could come in handy to cash in against future misdemeanours. Good to have up your sleeve - just in case!

PS that's the amazing artist Hughie O'Donoghue ducking into a beehive hut in the last photograph, bottom right. Now how did he sneak into my photo-frame?!!!

......"But for the magic that takes you out, far out of this time and this world, there is Skellig Michael, ten miles off the Kerry Coast, shooting straight up 700 feet out of the Atlantic. Whoever has not stood in the graveyards at the summit of that cliff, among the beehive dwellings and their beehive oratory, does not know Ireland through and through, It is the beauty of Ireland that has made us what we are." From the "Beauty of Ireland" by George Bernard Shaw