Gerry Callaghan

Born a long time ago in a small village in the Northwest of Ireland.

The village had a church and two pubs, one each side of the church gate. Which pub you went into was determined by which side your grandparents had taken in the civil war!

After a childhood on a small farm you learn that compared to it nothing, but nothing, in the whole world can ever be considered work.

The normal 'career path' for a male in my village was that, at the age of 14, you went picking apples for Bulmers in Somerset and at the age of 16 you got a job digging ditches on the motorways of England. A 16-year old school friend died when a trench collapsed on him in Coventry. Fate smiled on me, at 15 I became an apprentice electrician.

I had my first taste of community involvement in the Northern Ireland Civil Rights Association in the late 60's.

I was 18 in Donegal when the troubles started. Like almost everyone else I marched and sang in the demonstrations and got batoned off the streets by the police and B-specials. We used the words and songs of Martin Luther King and Ghandi but, at my level at least, did not really deeply believe in non-violence.

After one march in Derry, when I'd seen a girl's head split open by a baton, I did something I still regret. We threw away the broom handles and stapled the placards to hurleys instead. This made marches considerably safer but started a cycle of escalating violence that is only now coming to an end.

Friends were injured and died, or spent long years in prison. And, it must be said, friends did terrible things too, driven by an ideal that was not achievable. Bloody Friday finally showed me where the republican dream led and I was lucky enough to be able to walk away, many others were not as lucky.

I met the love of my life,married, had two children and spent almost two years building electricity networks in the Yemen Arab Republic. Arrived in Athlone thirty years ago with no intention of staying and I'm still here!

I've been a volunteer with New Horizon, Refugee support for about fifteen years now. The group works to provide information, advice and support to people in the asylum process. New Horizon also helps people whose refugee status has been recognised with housing,employment, health, family reunification and access to education and training opportunities.



"Other men will make history... All I can say is that on this earth there are pestilences and there are victims - and as far as possible one must refuse to be on the side of the pestilence." Albert Camus