IT'S MY OPINION by Irene Corbally Kuhn

GALWAY, IRELAND.....Tomorrow, the first month with an "R" in it since April and it's showers surrendered to sunny May, will be a big day here, for it marks the opening of the oyster season. And in two weeks' time, enough to whet an appetite for the luscious Galway Bay oysters, and bring over the bivalve fans from all over Ireland and the continent, the Oyster Festival will get underway.

The Galway Oyster Festival started in 1954, the brainchild of Mr. Paddy Burke of Clarinbridge and Mr. Brian Collins of the Great Southern Hotel in Galway. Paddy Burke's pub is still the center of the Festival, its chief rival, Moran's on the Weir. Here, the 70-year-old Mr. Moran plays host at the height of the festivities, while his beautiful eldest daughter tends bar. Willy Moran is the current world champion, who opened 30 oysters in 91 seconds last September and beat a field of competitors from ten different countries, all with dozens of supporters cheering them on.

When I stopped at Moran's on the Weir to pass the time of day with the Morans, the patriarch greeted me with his usual warm courtesy and sat me down for a small refreshing glass. We talked about the famous Galway oysters, and the Festival, and Mr. Moran's face took on a sad look as he gazed out across his land to his oyster beds.

"Not enough of them this year to take care of the locals," he said. "The big oil spill off the coast of France destroyed the French beds and the French and the Dutch had to import so many from us through the year we'll be running short," he said.

No matter. There'll be more than oysters at the festival which the Mayor of Galway will open by ceremonially tasting one of the luscious big ones. There'll be pagentry, music and color, with throngs of visitors from all over, mulling about the lovely City of Galway and moving along to the City's two favourite oyster pubs, Burke's and Moran's. The highlight of the festival is a banquet at which the guest of honor gives an "oysteration."

"An for those still able to stand," one of the regulars told me, "there'll be a restoring Irish Coffee reception the next day."

What few of the celebrants know is that not far from the festivities, near Clarinbridge, where the sun sets over a big inlet of the bay, there is a reminder of another time, the days of the famine. Hundreds of Irish families, fleeing the famine, came as far as the Bay to try to get aboard ships bound for America. They lived off the oysters until their ranks were thinned by death and a despair that drove the hardiest of them further on. Too weak to move further, and desperate ones had their last look at their lovely island as they watched the sun go down on Galway. Many who perished there are buried in the small cemetery by the water's edge; and, under the high wild grasses waving in the wind, layer upon layer of oyster shells, visible if one kicks lightly at the sandy soil, testify to the bounty of the sea which saved many, and give silent witness today to that desperate time a hundred and thirty years ago. They'd never recognise their proud, free, prospering Republic of Ireland today, especially around the fine city of Galway, where industry has created a special prosperity of its own, in the new Ireland where the old courtesies and traditions still live.

(Release No. 880 Distributed by Columbia Features, Inc.)

Columbia Features Inc., 36 West 44th Street, New York, NYT10036

| Last | | Next | | Reviews |

_________________________________________________________________
|Home| |History| |Menu| |Location| |Awards| |Reviews||Hall of Fame| |About Oysters| |Oyster Festival| |Contact Us|

Copyright 2002 © Moran's Oyster cottage
Site design: Eirdesign