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ALL American Ambassadors are gone!

Written by Joerg Steegmueller
ALL American Ambassadors are gone!

ALL American Ambassadors have been removed from their posts and consequently the USA is right now without ANY representatives outside of the USA. In a very strange and definitely unusual move, Donald Trump informed all US Ambassadors around the world tha they will have to have left their post before he became president.

US Ambassadors are usually political appointments and it is not unusual that they change when a new president takes office, but normally there is a grace period to get things organised, to give the existing ambassadors some time to get back home and to appoint the successors. Not this time! And to make things even more harsh, the order was sent to all ambassadors around the world just two days before Christmas on 23 December.

Kevin O’Malley, the most recent US Ambassador to Ireland, who is an Irish American attorney from St. Louis was in a plane on Inauguration Day to get back to the US as ordered. He was nominated by Barack Obama on 05 June 2014.

Ireland being at the lower end of the priority list for Ambassador appointments (The position was left vacant for nearly 2 years from December 2012 until September 2014!) might have to wait a while to get the next ambassador.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=AI0IJplzPqg

Dublin, Elsewhere, Odd, Politics, ,

1916-2016 Easter Rising Commemorations – Was it ok?

Written by Joerg Steegmueller
1916-2016 Easter Rising Commemorations – Was it ok?

In 2016 we commemorated the Easter Rising from 1916. Everybody had huge expectations and I think now that we have left 2016 behind, it is time to look back and to assess if the expectations were met or if the whole thing was a big disappointment.

In 2015 I had expected that the following year will be full of funeral re-enactments and other drama and re-lived pain. Sinn Fein were positioning themselves to be in charge of Dublin City (through the position of “Lord” Major) and it seemed that they wanted to run the whole show.

When 2016 arrived it immediately started with a flurry of events. Talks, discussions, tours, music, poetry, theatre etc and it looked as if this would continue throughout the year. The events were mostly of high quality with very dedicated and passionate people running it and it all culminated in a great (RTE-organised) event on Easter Monday that had whole Dublin buzzing with activity. The streets around Stephen’s Green and Merrion Square were packed with people, O’Connell Street was more than full and Smithfield Plaza was as busy as I had seen it never before. There were concerts, historic car exhibitions, historic trade demonstrations, talks, theatre and everything else you can imagine under the umbrella of “cultural commemoration”. It was an outstanding day.It was very surprising that RTE got overall responsibility as the event had nothing directly to do with TV or Radio, but they did a really great job in keeping all together in that one day.

After Easter Monday, however, it all ended very abruptly. The odd exhibition continued and for the rest of the year only a small number of talks popped up but otherwise it was all done and dusted.

This latter part disappointed me! I didn’t think that all was discussed and sorted by Easter Monday, so the rest of the year could easily have had more activities. Before Easter Monday it was nearly a bit much because all was crammed in the first four months of the year and Easter Monday was – as mentioned – a true highlight and couldn’t have been much better.

Luckily NO political party claimed “ownership” of the commemorations and no one party had bigger influence over it than another party. And luckily also, the commemorations were a celebration and not a sad, drab affair.

So all in all, I would give 2016 a 8 out of 10 as far as 1916 commemorations are concerned. I learned a lot, understood a lot better afterwards and was (for the first time since I live in Ireland) impressed by RTE.

Now we have to ask, what is next. The Irish War of Independence (1919-1921) is next, followed by the Irish Civil War (1922-1923) and history get a lot more controversial at that time. But maybe we can find some positive common denominator there as well?

1916, Dublin, Events, Tourism, ,

Dundrum Town Centre Parking – Daylight Robbery

Written by Joerg Steegmueller
Dundrum Town Centre Parking – Daylight Robbery

There are many out-of-town shopping centres around Dublin. There is Liffey Valley, Blanchardstown, a little further away Kildare Village and there is the Dundrum Town Centre.

Dundrum always wanted to be something different, something better. Posher, more expensive, “better” shops. But in the end it is just a shopping centre … and not a lifestyle choice.

The newest idea to be different seems to be to charge outrageous parking charges. Well, that is one day of being different, but definitely not a way to be better.

Currently NONE of the other out of town shopping centres charge a cent for parking, but Dundrum always did. However the charges were moderate-ish. Now Dundrum is owned by new owners because they went through Nama and were sold in the middle of last year and the new owners seemingly want to get their money back through a huge increase in parking charges. No free parking, no discounts for people that shop for longer, nothing. They want a EUR 3 rate per hour.

But customers are slowly getting together to declare their opposition. There is a new Facebook Group now and you can find the “NO to EUR 3” Facebook Page here: goo.gl/eMP1IK . Support the Page if you think EUR 3 is too much and if you don’t want other shopping centres to get crazy ideas!

Dublin, Economy, , ,

“Dublin One” – INCREASING the North-South Divide

Written by Joerg Steegmueller
“Dublin One” – INCREASING the North-South Divide

The Independent.ie reported on Friday that Dublin has a new “district” and it surprised and puzzled me. I thought one of the fringe areas on the outer commuter belt might have got a new name, but, NO, they were writing about the “new district” called “Dublin One”. What?? A new district? Sounds like a whole pile of bullsh*t….and so it is!

Nearly a year ago, in January 2016, the Dublin Northside Attraction Alliance was founded and it seems that they have done close to nothing for the whole year. They started very confused when they included the Guinness Storehouse in the Northside list of attractions. (You better claim the biggest visitor magnet in Dublin for the Northside even if it is firmly on the Southside!) A website is up but not much else seemed to have happened.

And when you think about it, it does absolutely not make sense to create a deeper divide than there is already. By creating an artificial separation between Northside Attractions and other attractions (there is no “Southside Attractions Alliance”), you don’t market the Northside better, but you fragment our quite small city more and create unnecessary confusion in tourists.

The right thing would be to market DUBLIN (as a whole) and ignore that there is a river separating North and South. So it was an ill-advised initiative to create the Northside Attraction Alliance, but instead of seeing that it failed, now they plan to make it worse:

Last week Dublintown, the trader’s organisation for Dublin, launched “Dublin One”, a new “brand” to promote the area west of O’Connell Street to Capel Street and Parnell Square to the quays. Dublin 1 is already a postal district and doesn’t require any brand. So why a new “brand” was created for a fraction of Dublin 1 is a mystery. Oddly O’Connell Street seems to be EXcluded from the Dublintown district “Dublin One”, it only starts “west of O’Connell Street” according to the website.

Irish Independent journalist Pól Ó Conghaile suggests in his article that it is a great idea. But to subdivide Dublin further instead of pulling together and to promote based on merit and quality rather than on location can’t be a great idea. He mentions some of the highlights on the Northside and while he doesn’t claim it, it could appear that he implies that they are all in “Dublin One”, but they aren’t! Many of the sites he mentions are in Dublin 7 (e.g. K Chido Mexico, Old Jameson Distillery, the old Victorian Fruit & Veg Market).

No, Dublintown, “Dublin One” that only covers part of Dublin 1 and that is intended to discriminate some areas by elevating one small part of Dublin doesn’t make sense! It’s just odd!

Dublin, Society, Tourism, , , ,

Empty Terminal 2 – Where is everybody?

Written by Joerg Steegmueller
Empty Terminal 2 – Where is everybody?

The economy has improved again in the last few years and there are jobs available in Ireland if you are in the right sector. And while we still hear about emigration and many of us know some people that have temporarily or permanently emigrated, the departure from Ireland seems to have slowed down.

But last Wednesday, I was wondering if everybody had left and I arrived to an empty Ireland. I flew from London Gatwick to Dublin with Aer Lingus and we arrived at Dublin airport just before 20:00. We landed at Terminal 1 and – nonsendically – had to treck the loooong walk across to Terminal 2 to get out of the airport. At the passport check there were no queues and only two immigration officers sat there. When we arrived in the baggage claim hall, the place was deserted. There was nobody else around than the people from our half-empty plane. No other planes arriving. Nobody at customs. And after leaving the baggage claims hall there were just about 5 people sitting on the benches where you wait for the arrival of your loved ones. But they were not waiting for anybody, they read books!

What a surreal experience to arrive in a seemingly abandoned airport! Where was everybody on Wednesday evening???

Dublin, Tourism,
 
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