REMARKS BY PRESIDENT McALEESE AT AN IRISH COMMUNITY RECEPTION, MUNICH TUESDAY, 26 FEBRUARY 2008
REMARKS BY PRESIDENT McALEESE AT AN IRISH COMMUNITY RECEPTION, MUNICH TUESDAY, 26 FEBRUARY 2008
Dia dhíbh go léir. Tá an-áthas orainn bheith anseo libh tráthnona.
Thank you Ambassador and also, now that we’re in Munich, a big thanks to our hard-working Honorary Consul, Herr Erich Lejeune.
Martin and I are delighted to attend this evening’s reception and to meet members of the Irish community in Bavaria, your German friends and members of Irish-German Associations from across Germany.
Munich can lay claim to be Germany’s Irish capital city for, not alone has it a large Irish population, but there are formidably strong, cultural and business ties between Bavaria and Ireland. Those ties did not happen by accident but by dint of the hard work of Bavaria’s Irish community and in particular the German-Irish Friendship Association in Bavaria. I know that you invest in that friendship because of the great love you have for both countries, both peoples and that none of this work is done for thanks or recognition. But it is only right on this visit that I say a huge thank you to you and to all members of other Irish clubs and societies represented here this evening, from Bonn, Düsseldorf, Friedberg, Frankfurt and Stuttgart. What you do is greatly valued in Ireland for you spread and strengthen the net of friendship, you open us up to one another, explain our cultures and characters in such effective and immediate ways - you make us friends, keep us friends and as partners together in the European Union now more than ever it is crucial that our shared citizenship is expressed in such intimate and real ways.
Word of Munich’s fantastic St Patrick’s Day parade, one of the largest in Europe, has spread far and wide! I know that organising such a parade is a massive undertaking and calls for an army of volunteers. It is a unique showcase of Irish culture and a showcase too of Irish-German camaraderie so to the members of the organising committee and all the volunteers and sponsors a warm thank you.
Of course we know that the Irish reserve their greatest passion for sport and Munich’s renown in Irish sports circles for its GAA and soccer clubs is helped by names like Colmcilles GAA Club and the Irish Rovers Football Club! And just as Ireland itself is today home to many nationalities so your clubs are “international” but with “a strong Irish heart”. Through you Ireland, her sports and her culture are offered as a gift and a welcome to a much wider public and to new generations. You bring enjoyment, fun, skill and I hope lots of successes.
I have also been hearing about the extent to which Munich’s thriving Irish traditional music and dance scene includes so many talented Bavarian performers, including Nike Dünnwald who played so beautifully earlier. Music and dance are the most shareable of things and it is really heartening to see that Bavaria is writing its own chapter in the history of Irish music and dance. And a few other things Irish besides, for I hear Munich will also host a special Bloomsday celebration later this year with the addition of Weisswurst, to the traditional Bloomsday breakfast, hopefully as a much more appetising substitute for the less appealing, grilled mutton kidney to which Leopold Bloom was so addicted and which was said “gave to his palate a fine tang of faintly scented urine”.
We can see all around us the evidence of so many contemporary German-Irish interactions but we are in fact simply another generation adding its layer of history to a story that goes back centuries. In the city of Würzburg tomorrow I will walk in the steps of the Irish saints and scholars Killian, Totnan and Kolonat who, though martyred there more than 1,300 years, left a legacy that profoundly shaped the region and lives on even today.
What is fascinating is the extent to which the relationship between Ireland and Bavaria has been driven in every century by personalities, by individuals rather than events. You are part of a long tradition of hand-to-hand, heart-to-heart friendships that have made of us, Irish and Bavarian friends, neighbours, colleagues, partners. Our Bavarian/Irish children are fortunate to draw from two deep wells of heritage. They are doubly blessed and they are uniquely privileged to be growing up as citizens of a shared European Union which is a bulwark of peace, prosperity and partnership in an otherwise troubled world.
Martin and I have been so overwhelmed by the welcome we have been given here. I thank you for being such great ambassadors for Ireland here in Bavaria and for Bavaria in Ireland and I thank our own Irish Ambassador, his wife and staff for making all of us feel so at home in each others’ company on this lovely and special evening. Thank you all for coming.
Go n-éirí go geal libh ‘s go raibh míle, míle maith agaibh.