Category: Community

Water is one of the main elements that is necessary for life as we know it. However, many of us take water for granted. It is a natural resource similar to any other that we find on our planet and it needs to be treated as such. From what I have observed on this two week course it is fairly obvious that the people of Ireland know how precious water is.  They treat it as if it has a significant value which you don’t see very often back at home in America. Our first three nights in the Eco village were a definitely an eye opener. The showers we used were button operated meaning you had to push a put-on which would give you about 20 seconds of water pressure. Over the course of the three days and nights I found myself taking shorter showers and therefore using less and less water. This could be because I had no desire to take longer showers due to the fact that I had to keep pressing the button. I believe that this practice could be applied to American households in order to help preserve water where it is more necessary. A more recent event that has me carefully checking my own water use is our arrival on the Aran Islands. The aran islands do not have access to massive underground wells or reservoirs. During times of water scarcity they have water shipped here from the mainland twice a day in massive tanks. This may seem impractical, but for these locals it is vital. I have even seen signs up around the island regarding water use. These signs are a constant reminder of the value of water to these people.  Something that caught my attention was the fact that our hostel’s showers needs to be running for five minutes before any hot water is released. This just isn’t what the island of Inis Oirr needs.

Ireland is known for their open and welcoming communities. Throughout my journey here in Ireland, I observed different styles of living. We stayed at Cloughjordan, Achill, Spiddal and other rural areas. Observations I made focused on the people here and their interaction with one another. Similarly, I examined the communities we stayed in and see how the villagers interacted with outsiders, such as us 16 college students.

Irish people smile a lot. That is one of the first Irish customs you will notice when getting off the plane. Their smile is inviting allowing you to feel comfortable starting a conversation with them. The people of Ireland uphold a conversation and are not afraid to ask you questions such as “What do you think of your current president?”. They tend to over apologize especially if they feel like they offended you. We went to the Parsons Mansion in Birr and our tour guide was very apologetic for simply losing her train of thought. The tour guide told our group “Things in Ireland work and then they don’t and then we don’t fix them” she followed her statement with “sorry this is a typically Irish thing” .  Overall, the individuals I have encountered go out of their way to make the visitors feel welcome in their communities and country.

Our first couple nights stay was the Eco-village in Cloughjordan. This is a very small tight-knit community where there are only 90 people in Eco-village and under 200 people in the whole community. This was a village where everyone knew everyone and everything. They all encouraged each other and would lend a hand if anyone needed help. The community prides themselves on both being environmentally conscious and community focused. A survey was conducted and 33% of the people said they chose the Eco-village for their environment choices and everyone else said because of the community. The community itself farms together and all put in hard work to improve their lands. While I stayed in the Eco-village, it seemed to me the community was more a family rather than townspeople. Westport and Achill are focused on their community but are not as closely as Cloughjordan.

The communities and the villagers are some of the most welcoming individuals I ever met. They truly care about who you are and want to know more about you. Not only do they care about the travelers, they care about one another and their village. The people also focus and have pride for their country and the history behind who they are. In the States, as they call it here, people are nowhere near as welcoming. It was a nice change in life.

Ireland is known for many of its small communities, and the CloughJordan eco-village emphasizes this unique aspect of the country. While walking through the eco-village, two words came to mind: simplicity, and sustainability. During our tour guides presentation, Mary discussed the idea of composting. The eco-village takes all of their food waste from each community member and eventually turns it into soil. This process is extremely complex and precise making sure each item of food is accounted for. Another aspect of the community is push-button showers that lasted for around 20 seconds. The idea behind this invention is to conserve the usage of water.
Eco-villagers are brought together by other shared values, such as attending the same church, sharing village responsibilities including education, tour guiding and running the sustainable business center. Additionally, villagers participate in a Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) in which many villagers contribute locally grown produce. On the property, there is a barn that is utilized by many community members to supply and take fresh produce.
Community members are not only brought together by their desire to eat healthy, but to also conserve energy. Spending three nights at the hostel, I was able to notice little to no driving done by members of the village. Walking was much more heavily utilized as well as the usage of bicycles and all for good reason. The shared belief to walk instead of using gas which requires more money to be spent is emphasized by the majority of people making the decision to walk. One final community based program was building each and every house from reusable items. One house in particular, Pa explained had old car interiors that was the material for the roof which was fascinating to me considering you do not see that a lot in America.
All in all, this village was undoubtedly brought together by various ways which helped the community grow and prosper in the healthiest and most efficient ways possible. The members can congregate and relate to each other incredibly easily because of shared values and same ideas.

Stories and storytelling are a important part of Irish culture. As one person told me, “If you have no story to tell, then what good are you here?” After all, stories are a part of our everyday lives and culture. There are many elements to a story: things we use to characterize a story, the places in which it took place, the people one has encountered, and the dialogue that took place. Stories can form new relationships or help make current ones stronger. They bring people together and build a community. Storytelling humanizes, it allows people to find similarities, and differences, and get to know one another in a personal and natural way. Stories are to be found throughout Ireland’s culture through their songs, poetry, dance, and history. An Irish community is based on storytelling and people getting to know one another. I realized just how interconnected Ireland’s culture is with story and song when I walked into Grace’s Pub.

        Cloughjordan is a small and quiet village, where the locals know one another by name and visitors stick out like sore thumbs. One night we went to Grace’s Pub to take in the culture of live Irish music. The community that took place in this pub was beautiful. This live music was nothing like typical live music. These people were locals sitting around in a circle playing their instruments and making music simply because they love doing it. There were no crowds, stage, light, or performance taking place. It was simply people who do something with their community the established through playing music. One man told me, “the beauty of this is that even if there wasn’t one person in this pub to listen to them they would still be here playing. They just love to play.” When he said that I thought of field hockey and what it meant to me. It wasn’t the crowd at the games that made me want to play but the feeling I got when I played. Being a part of a team was a community, the girls I played with I loved because we were doing something we all loved, and doing it together makes the sport.

        The Cloughjordan community was truly amazing. All of the locals respected one another and played to do something that they love; in a community they love. Throughout the night, one by one, someone would sing and have their little solo. Everyone playing would stop talking or playing, to pay attention to the person during their solo. The respect they had for one another built the sense of community. Their songs they shared were poems and stories passed down from Irish culture and literature. They used their community to keep the Cloughjordan community alive through their love for music and respect for one another.

The entire time we have traveled in Ireland I could feel a strong sense of community and involvement within the community. Each village that we stayed in was their own small community and the people were very welcoming to us so that I felt as if we were part of their world. The place that the community was prominent was in the Ecovillage in Cloughjordan. Within the village there were individuals with their own specific purpose and had their own way of contributing to the group of people. For example, Johanna would often cook for others and was a pro at cooking for large groups of people. Then there was a farmer who tended to the community garden and grew vegetables that he would let others have access to. In the village they would often have meeting times in the front building where people would sell their products and food to the other villagers. This creates a strong community because there is a sense of everyone relying on each other and in this way they make a sustainable group of people.

Being here on Inis Oirr, there is the same community aspect and feel just spread out over the whole island. Everyone knows everyone and they can all rely on each other. Our felting teacher was telling us about her family at the workshop and how her son was getting married in a week. When she was telling us about her family I noticed that there was a web of people she was naming that we knew from just being on the island for these 2 days. She explained that almost everyone is going to the wedding which shows how tight knit the community is here in Inis Oirr.

A myth that I had heard about Irish people previous to coming to Ireland was that they are all very friendly. I have learned that this myth is completely accurate. All the people are extremely welcoming and bring you into their community. They also love to teach and inform us visitors about their culture and why they do the things they do. While we ate lunch at the Killary Mussel farm, the people who worked there were telling us about their produce and teaching us how to cook and open mussels, clams and oysters. The community aspect is very strong throughout the places that we have traveled and it mostly is because the people have tight relations with each other, as well as work together to create a sustainable community.