A Quare Day For It ☘️🏐

So, What’s the Craic?

The Craic is back to deliver news and views on all things Ireland on a fine Friday evening. The Craic is the weekly newsletter from Shift, our platform to connect the Irish and people interested in Ireland around the world. You can get Shift here if you haven’t already. And if you would like someone else to get this email every week, ask them to enter their particulars here, please.

News from Home

All-Ireland Finals. Limerick are All-Ireland Hurling champions after a fairly routine win over rivals Galway. It is their 5th title in 7 years, and a reminder that Limerick, not Kilkenny, Cork or Tipperary, are the dominant force in hurling today. It’s over to the football, then, at Croker on Sunday for Mayo vs. Kerry. We’d say 99% of the news coverage is centered on people saying that Mayo should not focus on past failures, which, of course, only serves to remind everyone of Mayo’s past failures… This year though, right? 🙏 

Building Ireland. You know we proudly bang the bodhrán for every aspect of Ireland, but, well, even we must admit that some of our infrastructure, particularly public transport, is crap, at least on some parts of the island. The government seems to know it, too, as it has just announced emergency laws to fast-track major infrastructure projects. The rail network should be one of the biggest beneficiaries 🚝. Could be a big win this, especially if we want to attract more tourists…

Concerning. Where are you all? Annual international tourist arrivals to Ireland have been steady-ish at about 6-point-something million per annum since 2023, but it’s still way down from the pre-pandemic numbers – about 30% down on 2019. It might be the cost of accommodation (we’re not pointing fingers, Airbnb) or something else, but it feels like something the government needs to get a handle on.

Shortages. You probably picture Ireland as a fair green land, but it’s kind of got a brownish hue at the moment because it hasn’t rained in a few weeks, leading to that quintessential nightmare of middle-class existence – the dreaded hose-pipe ban. A wee bitta drizzle is due tomorrow, so we hear.

The Craic Recommends….Romance, Love, Shifting, Dalliances, Marriage. We are happy to report that Shift’s Blind Date Night on Saturday was a huge success, with well over a hundred people attending the Auld Shebeen for the show. This is the first live event Shift has organized, and for those who attended, thank you! Sure, it was a blast, and your feedback has been incredible. So yes, we’ll be back! Our next live event will be at Mór Fest in NYC next month, where we’ll be joining the incredible line-up organized by the team at Tara Mór. Stay tuned for more details and the official announcement!

The Irish Influence

Irish politics has changed a lot over the years, but there was always some familiarity in the delivery of political news and analysis – RTÉ’s Áine Lawlor. The broadcaster is stepping away from RTÉ after over 40 years, hosting her final Week in Politics show last Sunday. Lawlor was basically the face of political journalism in Ireland in the 21st century, and she wound up her career with that rarest of accolades – respect from all sides of the political spectrum. In her own words, she was “tough but fair” on Ireland’s politicians, and that’s basically what we all want from our journalists, right?

Cúpla Focal

Quare – {Kwair) – Queer, Strange, Very, Impressive. In light of our Blast from the Past (below), we wanted to take a look at one of those multifunctional Irish slang words – Quare. It is a play on the word queer (in a non-sexual sense; strange), but it has come to have a variety of uses (like craic, grand) depending on context. For example, if you remarked that a singer has “a quare set of lungs on him”, quare would mean impressive. It can also mean very – “that’s quare soft” – or unique/interesting – “he's a quare boyo”. 

Blast from the Past

On July 24th, 1956, Brendan Behan’s The Quare Fellow made its debut in London. The play had an earlier, low-key run in Dublin, but it was the London shows that catapulted Behan into literary stardom, perhaps acting as a catalyst, too, for his eventual demise as the great man found fame difficult to take and found (even more) solace in the drink. The Quare Fellow is a brilliant starting point to explore Behan’s genius, and even if you haven’t seen the play, you may be familiar with its signature song, The Auld Triangle, which is a staple of Irish folk rock and just about every pub lock-in on the island. It has been covered by the Dubliners and Pogues, among others. The song’s composition is often wrongly attributed to Behan, but it was actually written by Dick Shannon. 

And One Last Thing….

The (relatively) successful Northern Ireland Peace Process came about in no small part thanks to the effort and money put in by other countries, not least the US. It’s the view of many (including us) that the best way to repay that debt is by teaching other troubled nations and regions that peaceful coexistence is possible. There was a small example of that at the Interface Games in Belfast this week. The games, which bring children from different political backgrounds together to promote reconciliation and understanding, have been a huge success. This year, we even had unified teams made up of Palestinian and Israeli children taking part. This is the way. But as if to punctuate how fragile peace can be, a viable New IRA bomb was discovered and intercepted on the Northern Irish border this afternoon, destination unknown. This is very much not the way.