*Peadar Derrane from Ennis and Micheál Faherty from Inis Meáin with an Irish speaking group called Caint agus Comhra who meet up regularly at glór. Photograph: Natasha Barton.
Caint agus Comhrá are celebrating a decade of their Irish language meet ups this year.
The group which gets together at 11am on Saturdays and Mondays at the glór Café, as well as 8pm on Thursdays from September 8th, have casual conversations, over coffee, through Irish.
Reg O’Rourke, one of the group’s founders, explained its development to The Clare Echo, “This is our 10th year, we began in 2012. We started above in town in the evening and then we moved to coffee time in the morning. Eventually the thing expanded. We used to go to Suas and there would be 20 or 30 people, it would be overcrowded, it would fill the whole shop. So, we spread out and there would be an Irish coffee morning, every morning, in one coffee shop or another somewhere in Ennis. People come, people go. There might be 10 people here this morning and 20 next week, you don’t know who’s coming, it’s all very casual and all very enjoyable”.
While the group has reduced the number of gatherings since COVID-19, for those who attend Caint agus Comhrá the coffee mornings, and the Irish language as a whole, are still a great source of joy in their lives, “I love it, I love the whole idea of tradition. It’s part of who we are” said Sean McDermott, one of the ‘cainteorí’ there on Saturday.
Sean spent much of his life in England. Though he returned to Ireland and became a primary school teacher, he felt he’d lost much of Irish during his time abroad. Caint agus Comhrá has helped him get more confident with the language, “if you don’t use it, you lose it. It’s a wonderful opportunity to come and sit here and speak, whether you have a lot of Irish or a little you can still feel part of it and you’re not made feel different. If people can’t find the Irish word, they can use the English word. So, it’s a lovely gathering and while I don’t always know everybody’s name, little by little you’ll meet them on the street and they’ll have the cupla focal with you. It’s great to keep it alive within you and within the group”.
Everybody in Caint agus Comhrá is hopeful about the future of Irish in Clare, “I’d say there is a slow but strong revival. Maybe through so many children going to the Gaelscoil and the Gaelcholáiste. It’s amazing too the number of people that have come to Ireland from another country and are very anxious to learn it. I have a grandson and his wife to be is from Poland and she never learnt Irish but during COVID she said she’d love to learn Irish and she did the Leaving Cert last June having done a year and a half of Irish. I don’t know how she got on, we might find out this Friday, but she has love of Irish and embraces everything Irish including the language,” said Sean.
This a significant phenomenon the members of Caint agus Comhrá have noticed in recent years, many non-Irish nationals have developed a great enthusiasm to learn the language. The group has been visited by people from all over the world including Canada, The United States, Poland, England and Jamacia.
James Meade, who was at the meet up on Saturday, is a retired Irish teacher originally from Spanish Point though he moved to Ennis 53 years ago. He came to Irish out of the necessity to make a living but now he has a real love of the language, and he too has noticed a small revival, “I’ve been teaching Irish most of my life. I’d gone a bit rusty to be honest but for the last five years I’ve been asked to teach Irish in the men’s shed in Clarecastle so I’ve been doing that and there are about 8 and 10 fellas that are doing it with us, including Bishop Willie Walsh. So, I’ve refreshed the Irish that I had forgotten because there would have been 25 years where I wasn’t much connected to it but now I’m back at it and enjoying it”.
James has also seen the rise of foreign Irish learners first hand, “Every Friday morning I have a Mexican girl coming to my house to learn Irish. She only started it for the first time in January and she’s coming along and making progress but, she has about three or four languages already, and she says it’s the hardest language she has ever tried to learn. Yet she’s doing it and I asked her why and she said she’s married here now, she’s expecting a baby, and she wants the baby to be brought up in three languages, English, Spanish and Irish. It’s interesting, I might be doing some good you never know,” he said.
