Get back up

Meet Nick Vujicic. he's 25 and he wants you to get back up.



Honestly had a video that made me think like this in quite a while. He's some guy. Inspiring doesn't seem like it's a strong enough word.

I spotted this over on Sean's blog.

Why she does what she does

"I believe I achieve an existential pleasure, a reward and validation if my effort for other people helps further their own happiness, and I feel more realised, if my work results in an improvement, achievement or advance... then I am real."

From a Gmail conversation I'm having at the moment. She continually impresses and surprises me in the best possible ways.

Tim Burton's Vincent, his first stop motion film, made in 1982

I love Vincent Price's voice in this.

Vincent Malloy is seven years old
He’s always polite and he does what he’s told
For a boy his age, he’s considerate and nice
But he wants to be just like Vincent Price.

He doesn’t mind living with his sister, dog and cats
Though he’d rather share a home with spiders and bats.

There he could reflect on the horrors he’s invented
And wander dark hallways, alone and tormented.

Vincent is nice when his aunt comes to see him
But imagines dipping her in wax for his wax museum

He likes to experiment on his dog Abercrombie
In the hopes of creating a horrible zombie,
So he and his horrible zombie dog
Could go searching for victims in the London fog,

His thoughts, though, aren’t only of ghoulish crimes
He likes to paint and read to pass some of the times.
While other kids read books like Go, Jane, Go!
Vincent’s favourite author is Edgar Allen Poe

One night, while reading a gruesome tale
He read a passage that made him turn pale
Such horrible news he could not survive
For his beautiful wife had been buried alive!

He dug out her grave to make sure she was dead
Unaware that her grave was his mother’s flower bed
His mother sent Vincent off to his room
He knew he’d been banished to the tower of doom
Where he was sentenced to spend the rest of his life
Alone with the portrait of his beautiful wife

While alone and insane encased in his tomb
Vincent’s mother burst suddenly into the room
She said: “If you want to, you can go out and play
It’s sunny outside, and a beautiful day”

Vincent tried to talk, but he just couldn’t speak
The years of isolation had made him quite weak
So he took out some paper and scrawled with a pen:
"I am possessed by this house, and can never leave it again"

His mother said: "You’re not possessed, and you’re not almost dead
These games that you play are all in your head
You’re not Vincent Price, you’re Vincent Malloy
You’re not tormented or insane, you’re just a young boy.
You’re seven years old and you are my son
I want you to get outside and have some real fun."

Her anger now spent, she walked out through the hall
And while Vincent backed slowly against the wall
The room started to swell, to shiver and creak
His horrid insanity had reached its peak

He saw Abercrombie, his zombie slave
And heard his wife call from beyond the grave
She spoke from her coffin and made ghoulish demands
While, through cracking walls, reached skeleton hands

Every horror in his life that had crept through his dreams
Swept his mad laughter to terrified screams!
To escape the madness, he reached for the door
But fell limp and lifeless down on the floor

His voice was soft and very slow
As he quoted The Raven from Edgar Allen Poe:

“and my soul from out that shadow
that lies floating on the floor
shall be lifted?
Nevermore…”

Interview with Colin Parry: Foundation for Peace

One of the names synonymous with the Northern Ireland Peace Process for me has been Colin Parry. Colin's twelve year old son Tim was killed following the detonation of two bombs hidden in dustbins in Warrington, Cheshire by the IRA in March 1993. Among the 50 people injured by the bombs which exploded on a busy shopping street the day before Mother's day was three year old Johnathan Ball, who died from the blast.

Tim survived the impact with multiple injuries but died in hospital five days later. In a moving tribute to Tim, Colin tells how he and his wife Wendy were in Manchester for the day but heard of the bombing from a neighbour. They quickly moved to ensure their three children were okay, but with no news of Tim headed to the hospital:

"We were told he had sustained very serious head injuries and that it was unlikely that he would live through the night. Nothing can ever prepare you for losing a child. It is unbearable and is something you can never imagine.

On the Sunday, we went to see Tim. What greeted us was terrifying – his head was completely bandaged, his upper body was pock-marked with shrapnel and tubes were coming from his mouth. Also, there was a distinctive smell, probably of Semtex.

The next five days were a roller coaster. We just had to get through five awful days of waiting. And after Tim died, we had to get through the week before the funeral and then the funeral itself."

In the time that followed Colin has become a respected and prominent campaigner for peace. He and his wife campaigned tirelessly for peace in Northern Ireland, the UK and further abroad.

They founded the Tim Parry Johnathan Ball Foundation for Peace (website here) in 1995, which promotes "the understanding, management and non violent resolution of conflict". Since its formation in 1995, it has worked to enhance relationships and promote respect for diversity.

In the year 2000, 7 years after the bombing, the Warrington Peace Centre was opened. This is "a unique centre, providing young children and young adults from Britain, Ireland and beyond with a range of learning programmes on the theme of non violent conflict resolution."

When Parry invited Gerry Adams to a Foundation for Peace event, he said then that yes, the meeting was difficult, but it was

"infinitely easier than holding my son dying. It was infinitely easier than carrying him for the final time in his coffin. It was infinitely easier than saying my final farewell to him with my wife. I can also tell you it is infinitely easier for Gerry and I to talk than to fight."

Tony Blair has said of the Parrys: "In respect of Colin and Wendy Parry, they have shown a quite extraordinary spirit of forgiveness and determination to promote reconciliation. They can be very proud of the work that they have done over the years. It is interesting that the spirit they represent has ultimately triumphed over hatred, discord and conflict. Surely that should give us hope for the future."

Colin was at Chain Reaction to talk about his centre and the ongoing campaigning for peace. I was lucky enough to be invited to interview him, as unprepared as I was. Truth be told, I was nervous meeting this man who has dedicated his life to a cause with such a personal impact on his life. I'm inspired by people like Colin and the amazing actions he and his wife have taken to promote peace.



Thanks to Colin for the interview and his time and to David Wilcox for filming.

The day I knocked Olympic boxer Kenny Egan out

We ducked and weaved, laughing a bit while we faced each other, him a world class boxer and me a guy who'd never been inside a boxing ring before. "Keep your guard up" he says as he jabs at me, "Raise your fists a bit more". I feint to the left, he thrusts with right fist, I come back with a straight right and an uppercut. I connect. He goes down. I lean over.



"Are you okay there, Kenny?"

Barely an hour before I'm sitting in the car park of the National Stadium checking I have my pen and notebook ready, steeling myself for a bout to meet someone I've admired for a while, ever since his triumphant return to Ireland after winning a silver medal - the fourth in Irish boxing history - in the Light-heavyweight final of the 2008 Olympic Games.



Kenny Egan, 26, is from Neilstown in Clodalkin, Dublin, where he still lives and boxes. The man is built like a block. A big block. When we meet I'm surprised that I'm surprised by his physical presence - it shows how little I know about what sort of training and work goes into being an Olympic medal winner.

I'm not what you'd call a boxing fan. I haven't attended the matches, couldn't tell you who any of the world champions are and before the interview had never been to the National Stadium. I did however watch Egan fight in the final against China's Xiaoping Zhang on August 24 and with the rest of the nation wondered what the hell the boxing officials were thinking. I then watched his homecoming, listened to his rousing urges for more young people to get involved in sport and for more resources to be allocated to making this happen. His passion was evident.



Showing me around the High Performance training area in the National Stadium, he impresses on me the difference between where we are now - a world-standard training room, and the school hall in Clondalkin that currently houses the Neilstown boxing club. "We still take the bags down in the evenings and tidy everything away" he says. "But that will change soon."



Looking around this training area, I'm reading names like Michael Carruth, Wayne McCullagh, Andy Lee, Darren Sutherland, Katie Taylor and Kenneth Egan on the walls. Everything is focussed towards motivation and success, training and fighting to do one's best. The walls are covered in motivational quotes from boxers who have trained here: "In boxing, tough is not enough" reads Barry McGuigan's "Combining skill, strength and persistence produces results at the highest level. Boxing is like chess: You don't think, you don't win". Darren O Neill's simply reads "Confront and overcome all your obstacles. Success awaits at the other side."

Punching bags hang at regular intervals with apparatus all around. Here a €40,000 machine to measure punching speed, there a truck tyre, frame and sticks. "You beat that into the frame" Kenny tells me "It strengthens up the stomach muscles". The weight room is no less impressive - bedecked in mirrors, motifs and what looks like top quality equipment. "The High performance programme is in place since 2003 only", says Kenny, "But we've gone from the previous four or five to 20 internationals a year."


(Photos from Flickr and my personal collection)

It was his older brother William who got him into boxing at the age of eight. "I remember watching Carruth fight at the Barcelona Olympics and knowing Willie boxed, I wanted to find out more, so Willie brought me down to Neilstown. I gave it a go and stuck with it".

Stick with it he certainly did, with eight Irish champion titles under his belt in the last decade, as well as a European Bronze in 2006. He's ranked fourth in the world and second in Europe. This year, he proudly says has been the best year ever for the club which is over 30 years old. "We have over 60 young people with us now - we can't take any more. This time last year we had 30. We're hoping to have ground broken in January for a new, dedicated building."



He's got great support at home, where he lives with his mother Maura and his father Paul. "To be honest, Darragh, if you told me before the games that I could come home with a silver medal, I'd have taken it with both hands. There was no major media presence in the Olympic Village, so apart from the internet and what the gang over with me were telling me, there was no real way to know. But coming home to the reception I got was mindblowing - I didn't really know how to deal with it.

Everything from the reception in the airport to being recognised in shops to all the things I've been doing and asked to do - from opening shops to signing autographs to posing with local kids and their mobile phones - I'm sure most children in Clondalkin have me on their bebo at this stage. I've been on Podge and Rodge, with Gerry Ryan, on Seoige and of course the nine o' clock news the night I got home".



It's actually his appearance on the news that we talk about most - Kenny standing outside Boomers in Clondalkin, the local kids crowded around to get their faces on camera and him telling the people of Ireland to get young people off couches, away from the TV, the X-box and the playstations and get out into the fresh air, into a local sports club, to get out and get active.

When I ask him, somewhat tongue in cheek what exercise I should be doing, he immediately recommends a good run. "There's no secret, Darragh" he says, "No magic formula. It's about regular exercise, a balanced diet and eating good food at regular times and a big fluid intake. At the height of our training we're drinking 6 litres a day - I lost 3 kilos after one heavy exercise session."



When I ask, quite seriously, if somewhat tentatively, if boxing isn't just one person beating another up, he sighs in recognition of a common misconception, one he feels that keeps people from seeing just how skilful the sport is. "I tell you one thing", he says when I tell him I'm from Kilkenny, "You'd never see me on a pitch with a hurl. It's a weapon. I look at that sport and think it's mental. too fast and potentially violent. Fair play to the lads who do it - I couldn't."

"Amateur boxing (which means, I've found out, more that you don't get paid than it's "lesser" than professional) is four rounds of two minutes, where points are scored for landing and avoiding hits. It's not about knockouts, it's not about damage, it's about a technical approach to using your body to show your skill in movement. In the ring you need to be 100%. If you're not giving it everything, you're only cheating yourself. You can't cut corners. You're going to be found out very quickly if you're not giving what you've trained to give."



In fact, admits Kenny, that's why he didn't qualify for the 2004 Olympics. "I slipped up mentally" he says "Because boxing is about 10% physical and 90% focus and commitment. I didn't have it." In an interview before the Olympic final, Egan's head coach Billy Walsh said "At the highest level of sport you want that extra one or two per cent. All the top sportsmen in the world come under mental strain and the guys who deal with it the best are the guys who come through." Indeed, of the 54 Irish athletes that went to the games this year, the haul of three medals was thanks to three of the five boxers participating.



Talking about Christmas, he'll spend it at home with the family. "I'm very close to my mam", he says, "She hasn't watched me fight since I was 16. She didn't come to Beijing because she has a fear of flying, but she's an important part of all this. There'll be the five boys at home, still in the sitting room on Christmas morning, slagging each other and having the craic. The Nationals are on in February so I never go mad. I didn't have a 21st because my birthday is in January. But I don't mind any of that. The proudest moment of my life was qualifying for these games. This has been a goal. I've reached it."



At the moment he's looking at the future carefully. There's a lot of talk of him turning pro - he's just back from watching the Calzhage-Jones fight in Madison Square Gardens and he knows how much prestige, money and work that would bring to his life. "I don't know, I don't really want to, to be honest. It's a cut-throat game, a different kettle of fish altogether." he said in a recent interview. "I can't rule it out. But I have a meeting coming up with the Sports Council and if we can look at the future for me in the amateur game here, I'll do that just as quickly"



His passion and enthusiasm for Ireland and the future of irish boxing is evident though as he names the team behind him for Beijing. Gary Keegan, the High Performance programme director was a big influence. So were coaches Billy Walsh from Wexford and Zauri Antia from Georgia, who, Egan points out, "must make a massive commitment to training camps and fights abroad, meaning they could be away from their family up to six months of the year." Phil Moore and Gerard Hussey were the sports psychologists with John Cleary being the strength and conditioning coach. Jim Moore and Tony Davitt are training the junior team he says.



"Irish boxers have been doing brilliantly this year", he tells me. "Since May we've won four gold and two silver at the EU Championship finals, we won gold in Instanbul and bronzes in Serbia and Austria. Katie Taylor is just off to China to defend her world title, and has already won gold and boxer of the tournament award at the Women's EU Championship. 18 year old Ray Moylett from Mayo is World Youth Champion, that youth team winning one gold, one silver and two bronze medals from the tournament in Mexico. The lads have just won three bronzes at the European senior championships and there's three more Olympic medals in the country."



"I think if people knew how much work, commitment and dedication goes into the sport, we'd have a larger following" says Egan. "We need more encouragement, more support, more dedicated facilities". In a wonderful opinion piece in the Irish Times, Fintan O' Toole writes:

"Boxing does for these young men, in other words, what education and community and society ought to do but don't. It treats them as people who can achieve very tough things, not just in sport but in learning to be a man.

It gives them respect and demands in return that they respect themselves. It defines them as individuals - in few sports is the competitor quite so nakedly alone - but it also creates its own family and its own community. It has no time for self-indulgent victimhood. It both teaches and recognises the dignity that is won in struggling against unfavourable circumstances."

At the moment, Kenny is busy. There's been many award ceremonies, including a People of the Year award and the Dublin Bus Community Support Awards. He's been doing a lot for charities - Our Lady's Hospital for Sick Children, Rebuild for Bosnia ad awareness of suicide in Ireland have all benefited and he's recently finished shooting on his new DVD, which was released yesterday.



Kenny Egan: Back from Beijing is a look at what's been happening in his life since the fight and the return home. "I only watched the fight recently", he says, "I'd been avoiding it, but meself and Billy went upstairs and stuck it on the big screen. It's painful to watch." No surprise there. At the end of the third round, judges failed to score several punches by Egan that would have given him the lead. NBC announcers concurred on this point. (Source: Wikipedia)

"By my count I won the fight by 3 points. I did the best I could do, that's what matters to me. With 14,000 Chinese fans screaming in the stadium, obviously the pressure is on, the atmosphere unbelievable. The scoring was unfair. deep don in my heart of hearts I feel I won the fight, but that's sport. However in the whole tournament I was only hit seven times in 20 rounds, scoring 48 points. I'm happy with that too."

"The DVD is gas - some funny bits, some great craic with the Neilstown boys and a cracking soundtrack from the Coronas. It's been an amazing journey for me, the experience of a lifetime." One can only wonder if he'll be repeating it four years from now in London.



Standing in the training room, holding the Olympic silver medal I can only imagine what Egan, and all the other boxers put themselves through to get to this point. "It's about discipline, self respect and manners" he tells me, "It's so technical and you learn so much, it puts you in great shape physically and mentally". I decline to wear the medal, respecting how much work has gone into getting it.

It's something Egan wants to help other boxers achieve. "This has been a long time coming", he says. "If I stay on for London 2012 it's a lot of work, but after that I can see myself getting into training or something. Maybe coaching with the High Performance Unit here. Helping out up at Neilstown. I couldn't handle a nine-to-five, sitting around looking at a screen for the rest of my life. This is what I want to do. That's why I do it."

"Ah sure come on, stand over me like you've knocked me out", he says, as Niamh takes the photos. "People love getting that shot". It's one to show me mammy anyways. I look like an eejit but sure I'll never get the chance again.



Of course it's not just the DVD now. Kenny is on the internet, with blog, Flickr, Bebo, Facebook and Twitter account on the go. "I'm learning" he says, "It's a bit of work, but I'll get there". Having met him, I'm sure he will.



"Send that on to me, will you please?" he says as we shake hands, his massive southpaw dwarfing mine. "I'm sure I'll like it." I hope he does. Gentlemen though he is, I certainly don't fancy a real fight with him.

Aravind Adiga wrote the kind of book he'd like to read

Image from here.

He wrote "the kind of book I'd like to read", he told the BBC. "I like books that have ideas in them and that move and entertain."

I'm full of admiration for this year's Man Booker Prize Winner. Aravind Adiga, the 34 year old first time novelist had been given odds of 7/1 to win before the ceremony, but his book, The White Tiger in less than 300 pages delivers a simplicity of narrative complementing a complex storyline. Its strength of delivery is such that Michael Portillo, chairman of the Booker judges said "In many ways it was the perfect novel. This book changed me, it changed my view of certain things, like what is the real India and what is the nature of poverty."



Yesterday Adiga said his debut novel was set in today's India and "revolves around the great divide between those Indians who have made it and those who have not".

"At the heart of the book it is something existential," he added. "It's a quest to break out of the circumstances you find yourself in - it's a quest for freedom."

There are three books featuring aspects of India I return to time and again - Yann Martel's Life of Pi, itself the 2002 Booker Prize Winner, this one and the sprawling epic that is Shantaram by Gregory David Roberts, a book I've read once a year every year since I discovered it. It's the imagery of India I love and indulge in, a country I'm almost afraid to visit, its rampant poverty and crowded population contrasting with the spiritual homes, the scenery, food and welcome of the people. I'm almost saving a visit until I have enough money to enjoy it, enough time to spend and enough gumption to truly value the experience.

Adiga was brave and uncompromising in his writing. Rather than set it in a colourful Bollywood-esque setting or taking the stance of a morally-guiding Hindi movie, without setting it solely in the slums or in some colonial Kipling-esque form, this novel moves through an uncompromising setting of a poor,dark, socially ill India.

In an interview in May Adiga was questioned about the poverty based disparity in his novel, about the premise that one man can break out of the class system to become successful and said

"I believe the extraordinary social structure [in India] is beginning to come apart to some extent. The shameless way wealth is flaunted is extraordinary. Poor people [see] the money the very rich have. Migration of labor is increasing in a big way, especially in north India. Old traditional ties and social structure in the villages and small towns are disappearing, and social unrest and resistance are growing. The Naxalite [Maoist] movement is reviving in many parts of the country and is gaining strength.

My novel attempts to look at what kind of man would be prepared to break the structure. You can in essence say this is a warning story, a fable of things that might lie ahead for India."

I have no aspirations to write a book, simply because I doubt I'd have the commitment. I also prefer the medium of photography and film to communicate complex ideas - I tend to just write and write without reaching a conclusion. My involvement with the 4 day movie project and with Darklight has fed that hunger, but I can't help respecting and praising Adiga for his success. It's inspiring to see anyone who has the dedication to sit and put their creativity into something that will ultimately bring entertainment, or even better, a new perspective to anyone who can pick up their book.

But to write it in an individual style - without compromising your style because anyone thinks it's wrong, stupid or flawed because it doesn't match their literary aspirations, well, that's just that extra bit special. Such was the joy of his editor, Ravi Mirchandani, interviewed by Time Magazine, who said of Adiga's narrative "The voice is fantastic and it never falters".

The White Tiger is the most recent novel to reignite a thirst to travel, to see India, to see for myself a culture and a people that seems to be quickly changing but is still a world away from our own. It's almost time. I have Aravind Ariga to thank for that.

Naomi's Atomic Angels

I read this poem yesterday on a break from reading these three books.



I think it's clever, poignant and strangely appropriate to my current reading. It's by Naomi, whose MySpace is here.

Atomic Angels

When I was four

I asked my mother

"Where's God?"

"He's under the chair,"

she said, 
"everywhere."


So I lifted the cushion

and in the darkness

I saw.


Years later

I'm full
not empty.

If you ask me 
where to find God

I tell you

"under the chair"

I believe in no God

but feel that if there is one,

It must be everywhere.


I see oaks, 
churches of canopied ceilings,

green fresco
es to make Old Masters weep.

Altars of basalt
, cemented with clay,

Bricks, mortar...

all quiver with the song 
of atomic angels.


Daily bread
 is coloured tartrazine,

divine blood makes
 plastic bottles

labelled River Rock.

Relics like rosaries,

fashionable reverbations
of moonstone 
or common nickel

real holy artefacts

hewn from spirituality itself:
Awareness.


Read a Bible in the cerulean sky
or pensive clouds
of precognitive meteorological forecasts.
Tears litter the inky sky,
blinking eyes of satellites.

Blessed crosses 
map paths and junctions

life trails of humans
offer salvation
the whole world wide is your Friends List.


As for Darkness,

don't worry.

If there was God
It would live in
 black holes,

Under The Chair.

You bring the light

lifting the cushions

looking for answers.


Discussing it with me, Naomi wrote "... everything we touch, see and do is miraculous, even the clear plastic of a bottle that was refined from crude oil which was once carbon and biodegraded matter... if we are our own gods by creating miracles through science, those atoms are the spinning angels."

In many ways she's right. We have come so far, especially in Irish society, having been ruled by literal interpretation of the written word of those who used the figure of Jesus for their own power and dominance. We have far more power than ever before.

Yet, with all the scientific breakthroughs, the experiments, the advances and the progress, we still are reliant on things like love, a hug, a friend's company, a smile. The poem echoes my belief - God is where you look for God. Seek and you shall find.

Meet Adam Bender

I'd like to meet this kid and say well done. His story has inspired me.


Image by M. Spencer Green/AP, from here.

Adam Bender, 8, plays catcher, one of the toughest positions on the field with only one leg. Because of cancer, he had his left leg amputated when he was one. Adam doesn’t use a prosthesis, and only uses crutches when he reaches base for the Astros.

Michelle Bender, Adam's mom, told the Lexington Herald-Leader she appreciated the effect her son has on people young and old.

“Adam has helped other kids see that a person with a disability can be fun to hang out with, and play with, and they can still be a part of a community or part of a team. It's developed the kids' compassion.

“And if he can inspire even one family to allow their kid to try something they normally might not try, that's great.”

• Hi quality video here.
• News story from Kentucky.com here.

Having worked in Barretstown, I know the courage of children who have suffered from cancer and other blood related illnesses is exhilirating, inspiring and amazing. You can help just by clicking here.

Thanks Niamh for the nod :)

Two reflections from the wedding ceremony

Take time to think, it is the source of power.

Take time to read, it is the foundation of wisdom.

Take time to play, it is the secret to staying young.

Take time to be quiet, it is the opportunity to seek God.

Take time to be aware, it is the opportunity so help others.

Take time to love and be loved. This is God's greatest gift.

Take time to laugh, it is the music of the soul.

Take time to be friendly, it is the road to happiness.

Take time to dream, it is what the future is made of.

Take time to pray, it is the greatest power on earth.

-- and --

You don't marry someone you can live with

You marry the person who you cannot live without.