Going beyond the cúpla focail: What it's like to learn Irish as an adult

Aisling O'Donovan with dog Zena.  Pic: Larry Cummins

Very seldom could I say that the lyrics of Richie Kavanagh truly speak to me.

However, in the little ditty “Aon Focal Eile”, Richie sings: “aon focal, dhá focal, tú, focal eile, and I not knowing no focal at all” and unfortunately that’s where I am, or so I thought.

I have a classic tale. I kind-of half-grasped the aul' Gaeilge in Primary school, a bit of “cófra” here, bit of “an bhfuil cead agam dul do dtí amach” there and you know yourself - before you know it you’re in 6th class and you kind of learned a tonne and absolutely nothing at the same time, but you don’t really care because Primary School's beneath you now.

You’re off to the big-time Secondary and all that matters now is your haircut, and convincing your mother to not buy you a uniform three sizes too big so you “get the time out of it”.

This for me was the turning point. I had a woeful teacher in First Year and well, frankly and unfairly, I’ve been blaming her ever since. Because everybody knows the chances of success/lack thereof, of doing anything worthwhile rests not with yourself, but with a single other person whom you half-knew almost three decades ago in my case.

I scraped through the Junior Cert in the Honours Class which speaks more to my skills of camouflage than linguistics. I gave the Honours a go in 5th year, but after a few months of looking down at my totally bewildered face, the teacher had to call it.

We had “the pass chat” to which I, unpatriotically, felt immense relief.

I fully accepted my relegation, secure in the knowledge that I wouldn’t be using this potential C or D in pass to count towards my final tally anyway, so off I went on my merry way memorising in the language of the oppressor how ox-bow lakes are formed, and the difference between stalagmites and stalactites and other such information which I have found invaluable as an adult.

And from that point on this beautiful native tongue of ours has become more and more of a mystery to me. Agus ní maith liom é!

I’m not sure if other people do this but I certainly do, I am occasionally guilty of admitting to myself and to others that I’d like something to change, but its like the vulnerability it took to admit it is enough work so I leave it there.

Like the couch to 5k people who are still focusing solely on the couch part.

I then place said item on the long-term to-do list, where it remains, its existence only to be acknowledged at the next night out where I will again say to my friend or my sister who has beautiful Irish that “I hate that I can’t speak Irish” and so on and so forth…

There’s not a whole pile on this list, I guess that’s how I justify its existence… in fact, I’m not guilty of procrastinating generally, in the usual run of things I am much more guilty of diving in the deep-end minus the goggles.

Now that I mention it, swimming properly with the breathing out to the side is actually also on the perpetual to-do list.

But the Irish stands out among the others, because it's the only one that hurts.

I hate that I don’t fully understand our anthem. I hate that I am a proud, patriotic, Irish red-headed women and though my mother tongue is English I don’t even have Irish as a distant cousin.

I love our language, I love the sound of it, I love the rhythm of it, I love that it's ours and ours only.

There are more than 7 billion people on this planet and yet only 5 million born to this beautiful rugged Atlantic land and it is in you- this language is in you.

It is in us all if we just look for it, so many of the words are tucked away in the shadows of your mind.

Do this with me now for the craic…..Cad é an focal do-

Dog? Tree? Whiskey? Snow?

See! It’s in you.

Aisling O'Donovan: "Bí ag caint a little bit everyday." Pic: Larry Cummins

And if it's not in your mind then it’s in your soul;

Too many of our own people went before us speaking Gaeilge for us not to carry its essence somewhere deep.

So if you are like me and your Irish has faded like an old photograph know it doesn’t have to be this way if you don’t want it to be.

It’s not an exclusive club, it’s yours, it’s mine, it’s for us…..na daoine as Éirinn.

Try it.

Bí ag caint a little bit every day, get on the Duolingo or any other app, speak it to your kids, your mother, your brother, your friend, even a little bit gach lá and you’ll see how much you remember and how enjoyable it is.

And I implore you, for those of you like me who struggled with our language in school, mentally rid yourself of that baggage.

There is no exam on the way. There is no beep from an aural test tape coming down the track with the sole purpose of ageing you about 10 years with its stressful squeak. You need not worry about poor old Peig perished out on the Blaskets any longer, or if you conjugated a verb correctly.

I think the Irish education system has so much merit, and the teachers of this island deserve nothing but appreciation. If we consider minding two children hard work, well, now make that number 30, and now, also teach them something. 

I mean it's an incredible feat really to get through every day and for all those kids to come home with a richer understanding of so much more than they went in with, and that doesn’t even begin to speak to their ability to decode the absolute mystery that is long division.

That being said, there is something amiss with an education system that makes a language compulsory for 14 consecutive years, and yet the majority of us can’t speak it.

I am not a teacher, so this is only my advice through my experience, and if you follow it the year you’re doing your Leaving Cert you’ll almost certainly do worse than you hoped, but here it is…

Let all the perfection go.

Say it wrong, chance your arm and learn as you’re going, let go of any expectations…

My only aspiration is when my baby becomes a bigger boy, that we can chat together in Irish if he wants or that I can at the very least help him if he’s stuck on a focal or on a few ceisteanna.

Bet you knew that one too!?!

I’m only at the very start of my Irish journey, and it all feels quite new and yet like I’m travelling somewhere welcoming and familiar.

It’s easy to feel a little lost these days, to feel disconnected, So all the more important to come home to what we already know... We are a really special nation, blessed with a unique language and culture.

There is a magic to us, and that will never change.