I can't express to you how wonderful it is to just go out each day and meet the people of Ballyvaughan. In the past week I have been given more cups of tea than in my entire life combined. Today I went over to the Costello's Home and farm where Finola and her husband Martin live with their three children. As is the custom here I was welcomed with a hot cup of tea and a plate of warm scones baked that morning. Finola and Martin have been farmers their entire lives, first as children helping their fathers, then as professionals. Today we sat and told stories, I of my childhood growing up and them of theirs. Something amazing I learned, figured out rather, today was that they really have a "barter" society. It was small things I noticed at first but then I began to look for it. Not many of the locals exchange money but rather lettuce, paint, a helping hand, and of course, spuds. Every week now I spend the day at the Farmers Market of Ballyvaughan meeting the growers and sellers, both learning the history of the town and about them themselves. Finola was telling me over tea about how last week Martin was finishing the paint on the house but ran out of paint. So naturally they called a friend who had paint and traded him one gallon of paint for 20 pounds of "padaduz" (potatoes).
I've really been enjoying my time meeting the locals and photographing them for my portraiture project. It's becoming more about networking than about the photography lately. I find myself having the best conversations and most enjoyable moments when my cameras, and I have 5 at this point, are all put away. All I can say is that I'm accomplishing things now that I feared in Greece. I was always far too timid to approach a stranger and ask them for a photograph. It's not a big deal when you say it like that but what I really want, what I really am asking is for them to let me observe them in their everyday life as they get recorded, photographed and interrogated. It's asking a lot of people that you don't know, so I'm very good at making good first impressions. I really feel that this project is what I came to Ireland to do and that I'm doing what study abroad students should all be doing,...and what all students around the world should give a chance.
My advice to all the J.Y.A. members, keep it up. Joel, great footage with the drummers...Chris, very interesting choice of "interview of a local"...You are all doing amazing things.

My final note. I want to thank the J.Y.A. Producer for coming up with this idea for the show, without it I don't think that any of us 10 would push ourselves so hard to be immersed culturally as we are now. Thank you.

Rog

Posted by Roger at 09:18 PM | Permalink | Comments (4) | TrackBacks (0)

So I'm in week two of my portraiture project at this point. It has been an absolutely amazing time getting to meet everyone from the area and really getting to know them. I have done more of a social thing than a photography thing at this point but that's how it starts I think. I went over to a B&B not to far from my house that is owned by the son of a woman that is at the farmers market that I frequent every Saturday. Her name is Teresa Fahy. She invited me in to see her son’s place, where she works to help him out. There I met Donica, one of her other sons, (there are 7 by the way, and 2 daughters)...Donica made us breakfast before bringing me a couple towns over to his farm where he has been growing lettuce for about 10 years. He then brought me through the "Rine", a strip of land that extends out into the water in a town called Newquay, it's here that most of his family all have their homes. The first stop however was not to a family member of his but rather a friend and local farming family, the Nolan's.
The Nolan's are always at the farmers market on Saturday, that's how we met. There on their farm they raise pigs, chickens and all sorts of fowl, they grow a huge stock of potatoes along with a large greenhouse for smaller veg. I just happened to show up on a harvest day for the potatoes and so naturally I asked to if I could join in. Try to imaging a small yellow house being pulled by a huge tractor. Inside this house is this giant machine that tearing up the ground beneath it and hurling potatoes and rocks up into this series of conveyer belts...you stand there and separate the rocks and rotten spuds from the good spuds...easy right. But THERE WERE SO MANY POTATOES! By the end of the day we had filled about half of a warehouse full of potatoes, thousands and thousands of potatoes piled about ten feet high and about 30 feet back.
After harvesting Donica cam back and picked me up. He brought me over to meet his brother Carl that runs a Manhattan Bagel shop...then to see his brother Roger who runs a dairy farm and ice cream business, as well as their father Tom. Tom and I spent the better part of 3 hours talking in his living room while taking breaks to sip Irish whiskey, make sandwiches, drink some tea and eat orange chocolate cookies. We sat in the dim light of his home and I just let him talk...about his life growing up, his parents, his sisters, the famine, his kids and their businesses, his wife....everything. One of my episodes was going to be an interview of a local person here. I came to me that this family of the Fahy's is such a close unit that they should be the interview collectively. I have been working on meeting some of the other family and will continue to over the next week or so. It's truly been an amazing thing to really get to know the people around here.

One thing that I worried about before leaving for study abroad is that I would be trapped with just the American students, something they told us to be careful of doing. They encourage everyone to try and get out on their own and meet people but I've never really gone out on my own so much as I have been here....it's great.

Wish me luck with the rest of my project and make sure to catch the Fahy Episode!

Rog

Posted by Roger at 02:41 PM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)