Sunday 7 June 2008

We have been so very busy, not too many posts so far.

Some highlights of the past few days:

After two full days in Dublin, we traveled south by our coach on Saturday from Dublin to Cork on an exceptionally lovely, sunny and warm day, with stops in Waterford to have a tour of the crystal factory and another stop in the little town of Dungarvan for lunch. Dungarvan is pictured here. Luvley (lovely) small town. On the drive we passed through several counties and learned about their history and geography from our superb tour guide, Barbara Hunter. We arrived at a FOUR STAR hotel, the Imperial, in Cork in the afternoon. After settling in and rambling a bit, we had a great dinner as a group in the hotel.

Cork is the Repulbic of Ireland's second largest city and has a lot to explore. On Sunday choir members were on their own to do so. Some went to the Women's Gaol -- quite interesting. Some to St. Fin Barr's Cathedral for a service that included their own choir -- quite good. Some went to the hotel spa. Some saw a cricket game. Many of us watched the hurling match between Cork and Tipperary. A huge event in this town.

We walked together to the Augustinian Cathedral of Cork to participate in the Polish Mass. The Polish community in Cork is over 20,000 (of 123,000) so this Catholic church has two Masses each Sunday. They have a choir which performs during the mass and we too sang three of our American pieces as part of the service (see video of 3 here]. Looking out at what was probably 1,000 faces was surprising, as was their applause. It's not clear what parishioners knew about us ahead of time -- the priest explained in Polish who we were at the outset of the service -- or even if they understood the words of the songs, but the tears we witnessed and kisses some received spoke volumes. It was exhilarating and moving and we can't wait to sing more. The Masses are recorded and we are trying to sort out the Polish language on the website to see where ours might be [any Polish speakers reading this? Link here].

p.s. Tipperary won, sad for Cork. Germany won over Poland in football (read: soccer), sad for our Polish friends.