The Blind leading the Blind

Visual comment on the current recession,
seen in Wexford Town, 25 February 2012.

BERD Migration

This is the 20th anniversary of the first overseas annual meeting of the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD). The Bank was established at its inaugural meeting in London in early 1991, and true to its commitment to its geographical area of operation, the second meeting was held in Budapest in early 1992.

Hopefully, without revealing any State Secrets, I can reminisce a little on some peripheral aspects of that first overseas meeting.

I should start, however, with a word on the Bank's logo (above). Jacques Attali, then PDG (Chairman of the Board of Directors and Chief Executive of the Bank) decided to hold a competition for a distinctive logo. The Bank's title in French, is Banque Européenne pour la Reconstruction et le Développement, or BERD for short. In English, BERD sounds like a bird and there was a likilehood that the entries would produce flocks of them. So the first rule was that birds were out. Apart from the visual implications of this ban, it would also circumvent the usual quota of smart-alec remarks, like birds not flying on one wing, birds in the hand, in the bush, and so on.

Another aspect of the competition was the adjudication panel, which included Mary Robinson, who had become President of Ireland by the time the Bank was inaugurated, and Václav Havel, who, by that time, had become President of Czechoslovakia. As a result of her participation in the panel which chose the logo, Mary Robinson was invited to the inauguration in London in 1991. That was her first trip outside the country as President and it made the then Taoiseach (Prime Minister) Charlie Haughey very nervous. But that is another story for another day, perhaps.

But back to Budapest in 1992. The first event of the Annual Meeting, from my perspective, was the IRA blowing up the Baltic Exchange in the City of London just as I was leaving Dublin for Budapest. So, what has that got to do with the EBRD? Well, the Baltic Exchange is just across the road from the EBRD's then London HQ in Leadenhall St., and were it not for the AGM and the bulk of the Bank's staff being in Budapest at the time, it is likely that many would have been injured, perhaps fatally. As it turned out, apart from broken glass all over the place, only one member of the Bank's staff was injured.

The attack had one immediate consequence for the Irish delegation to the meeting. Our security status was immediately raised to unprecedented heights and the security man assigned to us turned out to be KGB trained. Why the London explosion should have had any implications at all for the Irish delegation in Budapest was not clear to me. But I suppose the Hungarians would not have been up to speed on the nuances of the Irish situation and, in any event, would not have been inclined to take unnecessary risks.

My own initial reaction was how was I going to face colleagues when my countrymen had just almost blown up the Bank's headquarters in London. As it happened, the AGM was attended by the Irish Ambassador accredited to Hungary, Michael Collins, and when I mentioned my concerns to him he was quite firm in his advice. "Hold your head high. They have not done this in your name, whatever their claims." This was a new line of reasoning for me, but as ambassador he must have had to deal with this sort of situation many times, and it made sense. So I steeled myself and took the recommended line.

Our elevated security status did provide some amusing incidents, however.

At one stage, the head of the Irish delegation, Bertie Ahern, then Minister for Finance, had occasion to visit the loo. Our hyperenthusiastic security man preceded him into the convenience and kicked in the door of the cabin to make sure there was no-one hiding inside and to make equally sure that, if there was, he would be in no fit condition to progress his assassination mission. Imagine ...?

Another incident gave the same security man a real fright. It was during lent, and as is publicly known, Bertie is a daily massgoer during this holy season. Well, on the day we were leaving for home, I had arranged for him to attend mass in one of the big churches. Could have been a cathedral for all I remember. Anyway, the security man accompanied the Minister and his Secretary General into the church and kept them under very strict surveillance during the ceremony. This wasn't all that difficult as they were in the one place all the while. Near the end of the mass, the security man, who was beginning to relax and had joined the rest of us at the back of the church, jerked in shock. The mark was on the move. In fact both marks were on the move. He leaped into action and paralelled the progress of the marks up the aisle to the main altar where they received communion and, much to his relief, returned unharmed to their seats. A close call, and a reminder that you are never off duty until the mark is finally out of your jurisdiction.

A lot of water has passed under the bridge since then, but these vivid memories remain as though they were yesterday.

Some more EBRD reminisences

Trahison

The French always start a job like this by displaying their credentials. So, in deference to them, here we go.

I don't have a general in the family but my cousin is a French Knight. Michael (above) is a Chevalier de l'Ordre des Palmes académiques.

And I have in my possession a letter, from the Chief Conservator in the National Library of France, thanking me for an article I wrote which he says "illuminated in a very useful manner a period in the history of Franco-Irish relations". If you don't believe me you can click on the image below and keep clicking until it gets big enough to read.


And now to the point of this post.

Minister Varadkar has just opened an exhibition, in the French War Museum at Les Invalides in Paris, which deals with Franco-Irish cooperation on the battlefield over a period of three centuries. If you don't believe me, look at the picture below and read the news item.


Now, this cooperation, often directed against the English, does raise a heap of tricky philosophical questions. I am thinking, for example, of attitudes to Flemings and Bretons who collaborated with the Nazis during WWII in an effort to secure a measure of independence for their own people against an occupying imperial power. However, that is not my purpose here, and it will keep for another day.

My interest is in a French Major La Chaussée who did some magnificent work in Ireland in 1797 (note the date) analysing the strengths and weaknesses of various sections of the Irish coastline and how these weaknesses might be exploited in any French seaborne attack against the British in Ireland.

So far so good, and that is what I thought myself. Until, that is, I found out the Major was not working for the French as an advance party spy. Rather, he was working for the British in order to help them thwart any such invasion.



I doubt if he is included in the current exhibition and I am aware of only one place where his work is on display in this country, and that is in the restored Martello Tower (No.7) in Killiney Bay.

So if, unlike the Minister, you cannot currently afford the trip to Paris, even for the replay, you might like to see the work of a Frenchman who cooperated with the other side on the eve of the glorious Rebellion of 1798.



.

Where is it? No. 8

This is going on for too long. I'll have to give you a clue.

This one is within feet of the first one above.

Solution

Above the amusements building in Talbot Lane, off Talbot St.

To see all the quiz items click on the "Where?" tag below.

To see all the unsolved items click on the "unsolved" tag below

Classics for Kolkata

It all started with Ruth. She's a first cousin twice removed. And she plays the viola.

Her Mammy, who's only once removed, told me Ruth and a friend would be giving a concert at the Froebel College in Blackrock in aid of the Hope/Froebel Kolkata project.

The Hope Foundation works at education and community development in Kolkata (formerly Calcutta) India, and newly qualified teachers from the College go out during the summer to teach and to learn. The concert was to raise funds for the project. Ruth and her friend and colleague, Natalie, were taking time out from a very busy professional schedule across the water to perform both as soloists and as a duet for this good cause.

The performances were virtuoso. And I was stunned to hear just two, so similar, instruments sounding like a full quartet.

A small part of the answer to this aural illusion may lie in the instruments. The girls are part of the Finzi Quartet, who have been taking the music world by storm, and who have been given a loan of a precious set of four matched instruments known as the Evangelists. They were built by Jean-Baptiste Vuillaume in 1863 and have recently been acquired by the Swiss Global Artistic Foundation. They are loaned out to further "the Foundation's ongoing commitment to help young artists attain the highest levels of musical performance and professional advancement". But that was clearly only a small part of the story, the gilding on the lily.

[Update: September 2012 - the quartet has been reformed. Three of the girls have left with only Lydia Shelley continuing. The link above will bring you to the new quartet's site which is under construction.]


These two talented musicians gave us a night to remember.

Natalie played one of her own compositions which I thought outshone that of the established composer that she played before it.

Ruth showed what a beautiful instrument the much neglected viola can be as she became a violin one minute, a cello the next, and something quite unique in between.


There will be another concert next January when Ruth will cajole another friend or friends to join her. Don't miss it.

Unholy Bodysnatchers

This is the altar to St. Brigid in her church in Killester. It was designed to highlight St. Brigid's relic which was donated to the church in 1928 by the Cardinal of Lisbon. "The who?" I hear you ask, "what had it to do with him?".

Well it's a strange story. Brigid is supposed to have died in 525 AD and for security reasons her remains were hidden in various places over the years. Most of the remains have been lost but in 1283 AD some Irish Knights took the head with them on their crusade to the Holy Land. The Knights fell to the Moors in Portugal, and the head eventually ended up in Lumiar, near Lisbon, where it is venerated to this day.

A fragment from the head was given to Killester church when it was built. It was kept in a reliquary on this side altar. The reliquary was modelled on St. Patrick's bell and was attached to the altar table.


The reliquary was stolen recently and this made national newspaper headlines. Fortunately the relic itself had been removed from the reliquary in preparation for a commemoration ceremony for St. Brigid's day which falls on the first of February.

The church has provided CCTV to the Garda in the hope it may help track down the thief. This theft follows that of a portion of the true cross from Holy Cross Abbey in Co. Tipperary. That relic has since been recovered. I wonder, however, at the wisdom of Killester's PP announcing that St. Brigid's reliquary is valued at about €10,000.


Be that as it may, forewarned is forearmed and it looks like lessons have been learned and applied to this other corner of the church, which normally houses a relic of St. Thérèse of Lisieux.


And, as you can see, the glass case is empty for the moment.

Update (Jan 2013): The Killester reliquary has now been recovered and is back in safe hands.

Monto

You can forget about your Monto. This is a Galway Hooker by the neck, seen locally with my own two eyes and captured for posterity by my ever trusty Olympus digital camera.

.