Category: Gaeilge
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Aye, sure, for a bit a craic
What’s the craic? – How are you doing? Ach the craic was ninety! – The fun and laughter amongst the people was at very high levels indeed! Aye, sure, for a bit of craic… – Let’s try that idea as we are curious beings in need of entertainment… When I look up a word I…
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You’ve made Duo sad…
My first attempt at learning Irish with the Duolingo app doesn’t go well. I fall foul of it’s attempts to cajole me with stars and gems and special points. Duo’s next tactic is to send me emails deploying the weapon of shame. This is surprisingly effective – given that my greatest fear is the fear…
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It’s all Japanese to me
Two years of Latin. Five years of French. One year of German. One year of Spanish. And a brief dalliance with Japanese. But not one word of Gaeilge. Not one. The grammar school that I attended was mixed. It had both girls and boys. It had both protestants and catholics. When I was at school…
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Ach away…
I’ve seen my dad mow the lawn a thousand times. Usually my brothers and I were waiting in the wings to play football on the freshly-cut theatre of dreams it created. My dad was usually a bit grumpy about this. Apparently our excessive footballing had created patches where grass was now impossible to cultivate. There…
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Bag head
In my early years, it wasn’t too long before I became aware of a polarisation of the people who lived where I lived. Firstly, there was us. Good living country folk. Then there were townies. They seemed to play differently. They were the Tom Sawyer to our Huckleberry Finn. We spent summers picking potatoes and…
