Traveller Funeral

traveller's funeral in Athlone The building I do a bit of work in is adjacent to the new town centre construction site. About 3 months ago in the process of building the new centre they severed the sewage pipes coming from our office.

Since that time we’ve had to visit neighbouring businesses to do ours.

In any case, I stepped across the road this morning to answer nature’s call in the local pub only to find the doors shut tight. Heading up the street I found the other pubs shut as well. It was then I noticed all the gardai about the town - it looked as it extra manpower had been called in. Sticking the head in the local grocer I discovered that a local travelling family had recently suffered a loss and the funeral was taking place in St Mary’s church.

This is something I have seen a few times since moving here - a traveling family’s funeral or wedding causing the pubs in town to lock their doors. Having never so much as shared a conversation with traveling people nor having had any real peripheral experience with them, I don’t can neither confirm or deny the explanation I’ve been given: large traveler gatherings breed violence. Pubs in Ireland shut their doors to avoid being the stage for such a scene.

I must admit the gardai presence today certainly lends credence to such fears, as if the shutting of every pub in town wasn’t evidence enough.

If you can believe it, I was even warned about mentioning this here on the blog, such is the level of concern people seem to have.

Seriously.

You know, I used to live on the border of Oakland in California. Oakland is the home of huge gang activity, rampant poverty and drug abuse and has one the highest murder rates in the USA. Yeah, I’ve been mugged at gunpoint a block from my house. Even so, I still thought that the fear some of my friends and family had about coming into my old neighbourhood was irrational. So it might be a foolish whim, but especially seeing the town-wide reaction to the funerary rites today, I have a real desire to meet some traveling people for myself.