Sunday, March 21, 2010

Freud and the Irish and some other modern Myths and stories

When U2 were playing a gig Bono got the crowd to slowly clap after a moment he said "everytime I clap my hands a child in Africa dies from hunger", in the silence one guy shouts back "Stop f#cking clapping your hands then", this funny as it may seem is an urban legend. What is true and ironic is that Bono is a tax exile from Ireland, with all his work on global responsibility to poorer countries, he pays very little tax at home!
There is a belief that Irish people cannot be cured using analytic methods of psychiatry, "This is one race of people for whom psychoanalysis is of no use whatsoever"  is what Sigmund Freud actually said about the Irish. Freud claimed that the Irish had no rational thought processes that could be analytically studied, I do not know what size of a group he studied to come to this conclusion or if it was from observing people in an Irish Bar but luckily there is nothing in the water or the Guinness that makes us any different to all other races genetically. But we love the quote and what other way can we explain the madness of being Irish :-).
Last one is a Titanic myth, the Titanic was built in Belfast where there has always been tensions between the Prodestants and the Catholics. The story goes that the hull welded onto the Titanic by a Prodestant was 3909 04 or when viewed in a mirror is 'NO POPE' , for this reason the ship was sunk. This of course is false the actual  number was 401.
BTW we may be a bit mad as a race, but we do put the fun in dysfunctional!

Wednesday, March 3, 2010

Nemedians the next wave of Mythological people to Ireland

The Nemedians were the next people to arrive in Ireland, they arrived a few years after the sad demise of the Partholanians. They were descended from Nemed a Greek King and landed in the north east after getting lost wandering the seas for a year and a half. The fleet sailed with fortyfour ships and a thousand people, but only one of the ships survived to make the journey landing with only about thirty people. 
They started to repopulate the countryside until they ran into the Fomorians, in the beginning the Nemedians won the major battles and kept their freedom. But they too were struck down with disease like the Partholians, with their numbers ravaged, the Fomorians easily seized control and were a cruel master. The Fomorians exacted huge taxes on their subjects, they required two thirds of their wheat, milk and children! This was to be paid each Samhain, this went on until the Nemedians population grew and they led a revolt on the Fomorian stronghold of Tory. 
They were victorious for a time, especially after an intense battle off the coast of Ireland, in what is known today as Bloody Foreland (Not because of the battle as some would have us believe, but because of the landscape at dawn and sunset. The Nemedians had even captured parts of the castle on the Island of Tory the Fomorian stronghold. This was until the Fomorians received reinforcements and the Nemedians were all but wiped out in a massacre. 
There were only a small number  that survived, less than one hundred these fled landing in Scotland, England and Europe, one group went as far as Greece where they were enslaved, these would later grow in number and return to Ireland as the Firbolg nearly 300 years later
Bloody Foreland daybreak

Piseogs the madness of being Irish, contd, babys fingernail superstition.


It is considered bad luck to cut the fingernails of a baby until the child is at least one year old. If you do the child will turn out to be a thief!