The Friday View 22/3
A week full of politics, UCC has a plan to dig itself out of a financial hole, Camden Fort is to reopen this summer and Tripe + Drisheen has a trees talk coming to Lifelong Learning Fest!
Good morning and welcome to the Friday View. Let’s get to it!
Well Leo’s out, and the world keeps on turning. We suspect the Taoiseach knew that would happen, but Leo Varadkar, the leader of Fine Gael and the coalition government definitely managed to keep his intentions to quit politics quiet, especially considering a small army of political correspondents were traipsing around after him for a week in the US. Finger on the pulse there!
While in the US, the Taoiseach used the opportunity to repeatedly call for an immediate ceasefire in Gaza. This is the correct and morally right response to the catastrophe grinding on in Palestine. In the international arena, Varadkar has been an able politician, especially in negotiations with UK politicians who were infected with Brexit.
On other matters, he and the coalition government have been a failure: there are more than 13,000 people homeless in Ireland, including nearly 4,000 children; 68% of people aged between 18 and 34 still live at home with their parents, and for those who can afford to rent in modern Ireland, well it’s a financial disaster. Understandably, Leo chose to not focus on any of those headline figures in his short exit speech.
Back in 2017, when he was running for the leadership of Fine Gael, Leo said he wanted to lead the party for “people who get up early in the morning”. We all say stupid things, but in this case it was less a case of misspeaking, to use an Americanism, but signaling to his base, that as leader he’s got their backs, the ones who get up early and presumably accumulate vast amounts of wealth by virtue of this feat.
Might he have said he would lead the party and the country for the people who would like to move out of their parents home some day and live comfortably on their own, then maybe there would have more goodwill shown to him in his exit. Those people also get up early. Thousands of them. Every day, and early.
Elections - local, European and a general election - are on the way. Have your say.
Some news from Tripe + Drisheen. For Lifelong Learning Fest which takes place next month, April 10-17, we’re hosting a conversation all about trees in Callanan’s on April 12. As with everything for LLF, it’s a free event, and you’re all very welcome.
There is, and has been, huge interest in all things trees - from the recent tree giveaway by the City Council at Tramore Valley Park to the new tree strategy which is going through its final revisions at the moment in City Hall.
We’re delighted to announce that on April 12 we’ll be joined by ecologist Eoin O’Callaghan and permaculturalist John Baker who will be in Callanan’s to talk about the arrival of trees in Ireland, how they flourished and declined, native and non-native trees, why so many Irish place names originate with trees as well as practical tips about gathering, storing and processing seeds and planting saplings. After the two lads have talked through their presentations, there’ll be a Q+A so bring your tree-themed questions galore. It runs from 5:15pm to 6:30pm on the Friday evening, after which Callanan’s will open for business. Also, any musicians out there, John is up from West Cork and looking for a session, so bring your instruments along for part two. Big thanks to all those helping us put this together and to our two speakers.
Also, LLF launches later today and you can pick up copies of the programme from City Hall and your local library. As always, it promises to a great week of learning and socialising.
News in brief:
It didn’t take long for Cllr Shane O’Callaghan to back his horse in the Fine Gael horse race which will get underway now that Leo Varadkar has announced he is exiting stage left. With Simon Coveney previously having danced his dance and being voted off, O’Callaghan was out early to announce that he was backing Minister Simon Harris. Just to make sure he was heard loud and clear, Cllr O’Callaghan tagged 97% of Cork’s media in his post on Twitter/X. It turns out that the Cllr has likely backed the winning horse, but then again what do you call a race with only horse?
There’s something in the water: Last Sunday, March 17 on the evening of St Patrick’s Day, just as businesses in the city were about to open up for the night, they found that what the water running through their taps was anything but clear. Several of them, including Miyazaki on Evergreen St as well as Paddy the Farmers and the Southern Star were all forced to close for the evening. One business that T+D spoke to had heard zero from the City Council or Uisce Éireann before, during or after.
Project Alpha and UCC’s financial hole: How do you solve a problem like an €11m debt? Well with a crack team and strong project name like…Alpha. That’s how the heavy weights at UCC are going about it anyway and they have been introducing the new financial controls and controllers to staff in a series of townhalls. Not everyone is loving the new regime, especially as every penny on Western Road has to be double accounted for by the bean counters. This invariably leads to more red tape and more paperwork and more misery. Project Alpha, a path to future growth is sounding more like a path to more pain according to the rumblings of some staff who feel aggrieved that more paperwork and uncertainty has been hoisted on them when they weren’t the ones who put the University in a financial black hole. Watch this space.
More Nominations for Cork Actors: After being nominated for RTS Awards two weeks ago, local actors Máiréad Tyers and Éanna Hardwicke have both been nominated for Bafta TV Awards. Tyers, from Ballinhassig, has been nominated for Best Female Performance in a Comedy in Extraordinary, while Hardwicke, from Glanmire, was nominated for Best Supporting Actor in The Sixth Commandment. Bandon’s Graham Norton was also nominated for the Best Comedy Entertainment category for The Graham Norton Show. We’re taking over biy!
Camden Fort Meagher to reopen soon: The Echo reported Wednesday that Crosshaven’s Camden Fort Meagher is due to reopen next month, and that negotiations with a firm to take over the café on the site are at an advanced stage. While some areas will remain fenced off due to safety hazards, a series of interviews will take place for the appointment of a manager next week, while up to eight tour guides are in the process of being recruited for the Fort. There’s no fixed opened date yet. Meanwhile, Carrigaline Municipal District is also applying for a €250,000 town and village renewal grant.
Out + About
Dr Michael Waldron will be making the short trip from his usual haunt in the Crawford to Cork Public Museum to present a talk on Cork’s ‘Periclean moment’ in the 1810s and 20s. In those decades there was a flourishing literature and visual arts scene, during which the ‘Canova Casts,’ arrived in the city. It was also a time when certain ‘merchant prince’ families temporarily aligned to the mutual benefit of artists, writers, and the public. Join Dr Waldron for this fully-illustrated lecture featuring the art, literature, and prominent people of early nineteenth-century Cork. Contact museum@corkcity.ie or 021-427 0679 to reserve your place.
Time, date, place: 1pm, March 23, Cork Public Museum, Fitzgerald’s Park
Movie of the week: Perfect Days in the Triskel. Wim Wenders returns to Japan, a country he has long been fascinated, for Perfect Days and with it a protagonist who could be plucked from a Haruki Murakami novel. Koji Yakusho stars as Hirayama, a contemplative middle-aged man who lives a life of modesty and serenity, spending his days balancing his job as a dutiful caretaker of Tokyo’s numerous public toilets with his passion for music, literature and photography. It’s worth it alone just to see the best public toilets in the world. Times and tickets here.
Time, date, place: Various times, Sunday March 24 - 27, Triskel, Tobin Street
Anois.Agora.Now is an exhibition by dereliction campaigners Frank O’Connor and Jude Sherry, as part of a residency at Crane Visual organised by Dermot Browne who has been making great use of the space and hosting a range of artists. Focused on how cities should and could be, the exhibition runs through to May. More info here.
Time, date, place: March 21-through to May, Musgrave Theatre, Firkin Crane, Shandon
Cyprus Avenue will be taken over by a host of artists and musicians plying their trade in Cork all playing to raise funds for Gaza. Included in the lineup for Gigs for Gaza are as My Goodness’ ‘Goods For Gaza’, the fundraiser will feature sets by I Dreamed A Dream, Pretty Happy, Elaine Malone, Caoilian Sherlock, The Altered Hours and Fixity. Tickets, which are 20 are available here with the proceeds going to Human Appeal to support the humanitarian disaster unfolding in Gaza.
Time, date, place: 7pm, Sunday March 24, Cyprus Avenue, Caroline Street. Cork.
A stacked triple lineup of folk takes place in Coughlan’s on Sunday, with Galway’s Pádraig Jack headlining. From the Aran Islands, he was nominated for the RTE Folk Awards and writes and sings songs on guitar and piano in Irish and English. He is joined by SAL, a Cork City based singer-songwriter who’s music explores the spectrum of pop music, and Clare singer-songwriter, and David Hope, who has' previously worked with Irish folk legends, Terry Woods and Declan Sinnott, and most recently, Christian Best. More information here.
Time, date, place: 7:30pm, Sunday March 24, Coughlan’s, Douglas Street, Cork.
Light and Shade is an exhibition currently ongoing at the Crawford Art Gallery, featuring 26 works from the gallery’s extensive collection that are evocative of Spring. The goal of the exhibition is to shed a light on some lesser-known works and artists in the gallery’s collection. Amongst the artists are John Arnesby Brown, Soirle MacCana, Anne Yeats, and others. More information here.
Time, date, place: Saturday March 9-Sunday April 14, Crawford Art Gallery, Emmett Place, Cork.
Karen Power is a Cork–based composer, performer, and educator, with an approach that engages with the natural world through sound, challenging the distinction between what we consider ‘music’ and all other sonic existence. She is currently exhibiting wondrous worlds within/without: interspecies gossip at the Sirius Arts Centre in Cobh. The exhibition explores the architectural and social characteristics the Sirius building, and the soundscape dialogues with that of Cork Harbour, which includes water, animals, and church bells, among other sounds. More information here.
Time, date, place: Saturday March 2-Saturday April 27, Sirius Arts Centre, Westbourne Place, Cobh.
This week on T+D: On Tuesday, we wrote about groundwater contamination at Cork Airport first detected in 2021 but not widely reported. Read that story here.
And on Thursday, we wrote about the group of protestors highlighting the plight of Palestinians with their footbridge protest each Friday in Ballincollig. You can read that here.
That’s it for this week’s Friday View.
Any tips, news or events you’d like to share with Tripe+Drisheen, you can contact us via at tripeanddrisheen@substack.com. We are always happy to speak to people off the record in the first instance, and we will treat your information with confidence and sensitivity. Get in touch. Have a lovely weekend.