Play your part in the shaping of a new Galway

Thu, Mar 14, 2024

The present and the future have an annoying habit of conspiring to show just how silly we might have been in the past. Armed with foresight and hindsight, something that might have seemed like a good idea at some stage in the past is ridiculed by the present and put right by the future.

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The heads above the parapet

Thu, Feb 29, 2024

In a hundred days from now, most of us will go to the polls to elect new city and county councillors and new MEPs. The race for the European seat used to be a lot more interesting when the constituency was merely the West...now it goes from Rossaveal to somewhere near the Mull of Kintyre. There is never any shortage of candidates for the European gig...as political posts go, they are the most desired. If I ever come back in the next life as a politician, you’ll find me in Brussels or Strasbourg, eating starters instead of main courses to keep the pounds down.

It’s not so easy to find takers for the ticket on the councillor level and this is regrettable, because it is here you find the academy for future TDs and Senators and Ministers. At that level, you learn how to grease the wheels, to press the fatted damp hand, uttering ‘sorry for your troubles,’ with a tear-stained hand and cheese sandwich that the crowd from next door made. It is here, you learn to growl and roar, to fight your corner. To do your bit for the place where you came from, to help those among who you live and work.

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Sleepwalking into the repeat of history

Thu, Feb 22, 2024

I had coffee with some old friends the other day; people who had devoted their lives to doing the right thing; never ones to let a cause go unfought. People who took an interest in the world; people whose emotional ebb and flow was determined by the general state of mankind.

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The reinvigorating power of February

Thu, Feb 01, 2024

My mother used to say that you kept something long enough, it would come back into fashion. But of course, I never heeded her, and so all my trendy Gola sports bags and original three-stripe Adidas tee-shirts were discarded, not knowing they would come back into vogue. So too with flared trousers. It must have been the devil himself who designed those in the 1970s and thought it was a good idea, but back they have come again for certain age-groups.

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Galway facility can sate the palates of the world

Thu, Jan 25, 2024

For anyone who has studied the history of Galway over the past century, you will see therein a repeated window of opportunity which has either been grabbed with both hands (as in the case of our early cultural and artistic endeavours) or frittered away (as was the case with our continuing failure to benefit from the proximity of the waters along which we live).

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Every community needs a Martin Horgan

Thu, Jan 18, 2024

As was the norm, the last time I spoke with Martin Horgan, one of us was either coming or going to a football pitch. Trudging off with a bag of balls, shoving singlets into a box, making some arrangement for the pushing of some project or others, the complexion of sporting satisfaction evident in our visage. Perhaps because it was always in places like that that we encountered each other, my memories are so precious and so sad. Pitches were a playground in our youth, and in our more mature years, they still represent a leap from the reality of life. Perhaps that is why I love them so much. That reality hit home this week when Martin passed away, his death sending shockwaves throughout the sporting community in Galway and his wide circle of family and friends.

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A man who kept the story of Galway alive

Thu, Jan 11, 2024

The great stories have always found their way down to those who appreciate them the most. The cave writings, the hewed and smoothened tablets, the leathery books that fill the most treasured libraries; the tiny lead-made print of the 18th and 19th century newspapers.

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Leave your mark on the city’s built environment

Thu, Jan 04, 2024

Everything happens for a reason. Everything leaves a footprint in its wake.

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Playing it by year — who knows what 2024 holds?

Thu, Dec 28, 2023

They say that an optimist stays up until midnight to see the new year in. A pessimist stays up to make sure the old year leaves. So it will be for many of us this Sunday night when we bid a glad farewell to another year and welcome in the latest instalment — another chapter in the book of life.

We can never trust a new year — every new year is the direct descendant, isn’t it, of a long line of proven criminals? Ones that have let us down, having promised so much.

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Look after the little things this Christmas

Thu, Dec 14, 2023

Look after the little things in life. Because one day the time will come when you realise they are the big things.

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Our train station is getting a facelift — now the trains must follow suit

Thu, Dec 07, 2023

They say you never get a second chance to make a first impression. For the vast majority of visitors to Galway those who come to shop to visit, to study, or to stay, the first impression for many years has been the dour greasy uninviting Ceannt Station. Ostensibly an impressive building in its day, for decades now, it has been outdated and unable to cater for the tens of thousands of people who use it weekly.

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The need to keep our spaces safe

Thu, Nov 30, 2023

It must be the goal of every city or town that it makes its spaces safe. As each place developed over the centuries, it aimed to leave behind the areas within each which were determined to be wild or unsafe; places where you would be discouraged to be by nature of their design or wildness.

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What might have been...

Thu, Nov 23, 2023

It is not often that the one story dominates all the world’s headlines. We got a sense of it a few years back when we were all under the curse of Covid. For the first time, perhaps ever, the entire globe was at the mercy of the one ailment; the entire global news cycle carrying the same, but localised versions of the same story. We all had variations of the one restrictions; we lived our lives in the manner that the regulators dicated.

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When the calm waters turned against us

Thu, Nov 16, 2023

Communities are made up of many factors. The teams that represent us. The societies we form for the betterment of us all. The hostelries where we gather in sorrow and joy...and the businesses that light up our streets; that sponsor our football teams, that give employment to our teenagers, that provide us with the goods and services we need.

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Putting the brave face on the darkness of November

Thu, Nov 09, 2023

There’s a welcome inherent in us for the bright lights of winter. A place in our souls for the gaily coloured lamination that heralds the impending season. It is just a few weeks since that the dark curtain of winter darkness has fallen upon us.

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Why are we so helpless in the face of evil?

Thu, Oct 19, 2023

There is a pain deep in the pits of our stomachs this week. With the winter rains and dark clouds marking the time of year when nature resets itself for the renewal of the growing cycle, the light that gives us hope and energy is in scarce supply. It is a time when sadness is accentuated, when you grapple to find the good in things.

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...and the killing still goes on

Thu, Oct 12, 2023

If one was asked to construct an essay on the reasons behind the rising murder rate in this country, you would probably feel like laying the blame at the feet of the gangland criminals who facilitate the peddling of death through the toxic poisoning of our communities. The high profile nature of their internecine battles is what fuels the coverage of crime.

But such an approach would be wrong. The main reason for the burgeoning rate of violent death in this country is the continued killing of women by men...and it is growing. The shocking numbers are camouflaged by the reason that there are thousands of serious assaults each year in which the victim almost dies.

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The need for our worthy organisations

Thu, Oct 05, 2023

Back in the days when I used to buy albums, there was always that first-play thrill of finding out just how many single-quality tracks were lying there between the grooves on the vinyl. I might have been aware of a headline track, but hidden beneath would be tracks that were wonderful, but which might never see the commercial light of day, and would go on to become life-long personal favourites.

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Drawing cities and conclusions

Thu, Sep 28, 2023

At different times of the year in this city, we have a juxtaposition of people whose objectives and daily pursuits may not seem the same. There is the rollover from the Galway International Arts Festival into the Galway Races where the punters/performers in both are quite keen on dressing up and pretending they are something they are not. There is the crossover of the Solemn Novena and the fringes of Rag Week where sometimes the pursuits of one are not entirely compatible with the other.

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Our on-field successes can boost sporting tourism in Galway

Thu, Sep 21, 2023

Tomorrow night, on a field in Kerry, there exists the potential that Galway United will capture the First Division title and with it, seize the sole guaranteed promotion ticket back to the Premier Division. If it happens, and if not, there is another chance at home to Finn Harps next Monday, it will represent a return to the top tier for the first time since the club has dined at the main table under the new ownership.

What it means is that next season, United will be playing among the top teams in the country. The creme de la creme of Irish football will be coming west every two weeks to play our side that has powered its way through the First Division this season. I must admit, after leaving the Markets Field in Limerick last winter after United had unfairly lost heavily to Waterford United, that it was hard to be optimistic, but with shrewd signings and management, the club has now almost certainly regained its place among the best.

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E-paper

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