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CHAPTER TWELVE

A country for young people

Today, many things are changing in Ireland. It is a country of young people: nearly 50 percent of its people are under twenty-five. Fifty years ago, the Catholic church was full of old men, and they decided what people could do. Life was difficult for women and young people. Today, the church is important, but the ideas of women and young people are important too. Two of Ireland’s presidents were women - Mary Robinson and Mary McAleese. For Ireland’s young people the future is about pop music and computers as well as farming and horses.

Ireland is a part of the European Union, and most Irish people are very happy about this. Ireland is not a poor country anymore; a lot of business people come to Ireland and build factories. Now, perhaps 10 percent of Ireland’s population are people who have come from other countries to find work there. Many come from Poland and other countries in Eastern Europe, and others come from China and countries in Africa. Today, young Irish people do not have to leave their country to find work. they can find work at home. Ireland is an interesting, exciting place for young people.

But of course, there are always problems. There is more crime in Ireland than before. And in Northern Ireland, the problems are not over. Every year the Protestant Unionists march through the streets with their music.

We will always be British,’ they say, and they sing about William of Orange. ‘The British must leave Ireland,’ say the Catholic Nationalists in Sinn Fein. The Unionists and the Nationalists cannot both have what they want. Here, history helps no one.

But most Irish people, in the north and south of Ireland, do not want bombs, guns, and fighting. They want to enjoy life. They want people to visit their island, to walk in their beautiful mountains, fish in their quiet rivers, drink and sing and laugh in their pubs, dance at their ceilis, and most important of all, to talk. Most of the time, the Irish are the friendliest people in Europe.

And the three most important words in the Irish language are:

Cead mile failte

‘A hundred thousand welcomes’