And I not knowing no focal at all...

Cavanman's Diary

I was standing in the middle of Páirc Naomh Fionnán, Cornafean, ag snaigaireacht agus ag cur allais go fras – stammering and sweating heavily.

What’s the Irish for an existential crisis? I wish I knew – but I was enduring one.

In front of me was a cameraman, flanking Gráinne McElwain, television presenter. To the side, a lad held a bright lamp and a woman was holding on to a large, grey, shiny short of a thing, reflecting the light. Underfoot was muddy. Undershirt, my heart was going 90.

I was there to drone on about John Joe O’Reilly for a TG4 series called Scéalta na gCorn. Normally, that wouldn’t be an issue but, somehow, I had talked my way into doing it in Irish.

Yes, you’ve read that correctly and, I know, you’re probably shaking your head already. And tá an ceart ar fad agat – you’re dead right.

I had been driving when Hannah, the researcher, called me and asked would I be available.

“Absolutely,” I said.

“Great!” said Hannah, “you’d hardly be able to do it in Irish?”

“Of course,” I told her. I may even have added a little “gan dabht” (without doubt) for effect.

“That’s music to my ears,” Hannah said.

“Fadhb ar bith,” I gushed. No problemo, mo chara.

I came off the phone delighted with myself. At long last, my TV break had arrived. Here was a production company ringing me up, looking for me to say clever-sounding things on their programme. Who knew where it would lead. More appearances on TG4 seemed certain. The Sunday Game? Highly likely. Hollywood? Unwise to rule it out.

It was about 10 seconds later, just as I was starting to consider what sort of cut I’d give my agent, that reality hit me like a sledge. I haven’t spoken Irish properly since school – it was preposterous to think I would be able to speak it well enough for the telly. Had I lost my mind?

In hindsight, the phone call feels like a sort of out-of-body experience. It was as if, when the question about doing it as Gaeilge was posed, the brain, always keen to delegate, turned round to the ego and said, ‘I’m going on my break, you take this one’. And the ego knew immediately this was his time to shine.

Now, like most people, I have a cúpla focail somewhere in the memory bank. In school, I always leaned heavily on set phrases, ar ndóigh (“of course” – and that is one of them).

Mar shampla: “Inis dom faoi an cluiche peil…” (Tell me about the football match…)

“Bhuel, tá rud amháin cinnte,” I would answer, “mar a fheictear domsa é, ar ndóigh, gan amhras ar chor ar bith, go raibh a lán daoine ag an gcluiche seo, is dócha.”

(“Well, one thing is for sure, it seems to me, of course, without any doubt at all, there were a lot of people at the match, I suppose.”)

My vocabulary isn’t terrible but actually constructing proper sentences, aside from the stabiliser wheels employed above, is well beyond my pay grade.

Anyway, this was Friday. The show was to be recorded the following Thursday. Experience has taught me that the best way to deal with any impending crisis in life is to ignore it so that was what I did and for a few days, ní raibh aon ghéarphráinn liom – I wasn’t panicking.

I could talk about John Joe all day as bearla - how hard could it be to prepare a few lines and just translate them? So, I penned about a dozen paragraphs and tried to translate them myself with the help of Google.

By Wednesday, lá uafásach if you recall, I was beginning to worry. As the wind and rain battered the windows, I was stressed.

Eventually, I swallowed mo bród and contacted a múinteoir friend in the west. When he answered, he was at the Giant’s Causeway of all places, away for a few days with the family. My heart sank. Would he have time to help me out? No bother, he said.

That night, Pat sent me an email with the script and followed up with a series of voice notes reading it out.

“An dtuigeann tú?” he asked me.

Yes, I thought, I dig it, man. I sent back a thumbs up.

By now, it was nine o’clock or so as I got stuck into it.

“Rugadh John Joe sna Derries, Cill na Sean Rátha, sa bhliain 1918,” my piece began.

“Ba chúl báire clúiteach é a athair le foireann an Chabáin sna fichidí. D'imir a bheirt deartháireacha le foireann an Chabháin freisin, an t-Athair Brian ar feadh tamaill bhig agus a dheathair ba shine, Big Tom O'Reilly, an peileadóir clúiteach a bhuaigh trí chinn de bhonn Uile Éireann.”

(“John Joe was born in the Derries, Killeshandra, in 1918. His father was a famous goalkeeper with the Cavan team in the 1920s. His two brothers played with the Cavan team too, Fr Brian for a short time and his older brother, Big Tom, a famous footballer who won three All-Ireland medals.”)

Tar éis cúpla noiméad, I had calmed down again and figured I could handle this; it wasn’t actually too bad. As I began to recite it, I even threw in a few little flourishes, adding emphasis on various words, waving my hand in a statesmanlike way.

But that was just the start. There was a lot to get through. Around 1am, I called it a night. The next morning, I had to go to Dublin and I played the recording on repeat, all the way up the M3 and back.

Coming through the second toll, I finally nailed it. The note that Taoíseach Jack Lynch passed to John Joe’s teammate, John Wilson in 1973 came to mind: “Bí ullamh” (Be prepared).

Like Wilson, I was ready to rock! I went through it again and again, each time perfectly.

“Tháinig scileanna peile John Joe chun suntas,” went the second line, “agus é ag imirt dá chumann peile áitiúil Cornafean agus ar ndóigh le Coláiste Phádraig an Chabháin.”

(“John Joe’s skills came to prominence when he was playing with the famous Cornafean club and of course with St Patrick’s College, Cavan.”)

I recorded myself saying it all and sent it to my new-found mentor. “Tá sé nádurtha agat,” he sent back in a voice note. “You’re a natural, I thought it was Paul Mescal there at the Academy Awards. Ha ha ha.”

Was this good or bad? I began to over-think his reply. Was he being serious? The Mescal reference suggested otherwise. Maybe I was making a complete amadán of myself.

I abruptly decided to stop. I pulled in at the Shantully Inn and paced around the car park, looking at the sky, reciting my lines like a monk. Everything I knew off by heart minutes earlier was now eluding me. I mangled sentence after sentence. Bhí mé ag cailleadh misnigh – go tapaí. I was losing hope, fast.

There was no turning back now. Soon, I was at the Cornafean grounds and the first person I met in the car park was Gráinne, who welcomed me warmly and said something indecipherable, to which I replied “Aw, tá, Gráinne!”, hoping my enthusiasm would paper over some canyon-sized cracks.

“Rugadh John Joe sna Derries sa…” I murmured to myself like a madman. “Rugadh John Joe…”

I was ushered to the middle of the pitch. Watching on was George Cartwright, fear uasal agus Gaeilgeoir den scoth. I wished we could we have swapped places but George had already done a slot about the Anglo-Celt Cup.

There was an interminable delay. First, it was too cloudy. Then, some fella in a neighbouring field started a chainsaw, an implement I was beginning to wish I also had to hand. Eventually, I began to blurt out my lines ach, go tobann, there was movement to my right and a buzz overhead. We stopped again.

“Eitleáin,” somebody announced.

“Thanks very much,” I purred.

“No, there’s a plane flying over.”

“Oh… Tá,” I said, sheepishly, and grammatically incorrectly.

Eventually, we got down to it. The first two lines or so rolled off the tongue beautifully but then, I got flustered. I knew I was struggling when Gráinne switched to English. “We’ll use a bit of both,” it was suggested gently.

Job done, I trudged off the pitch like a disgruntled player and in for tea and biscuits. “Bhí tú go hiontach,” George assured me.

“Maybe you will give the show a mention in the paper?” Hannah asked me, wisely opting for the foreign tongue this time.

“Ar ndóigh!” I said. And here we are. The show goes out in September. And as I’m sure you’ll agree having read this, nár cheart a chailleadh – it’s not be missed…