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This year’s International Miss Macra Festival will be held from Thursday July 28th to Monday 1st August 2011. The festival is organised annually by Clonoulty Rossmore Macra, and will once again be held in the magnificent surroundings of the Dundrum House Hotel and Golf Resort here in Co. Tipperary.
Irish Beauty Festivals or pageants, as tourist attraction or festival themes, have for the most part died the death throughout this country, but two such events continue to stand the test of time and continue to flourish, namely The Rose of Tralee and the International Miss Macra Festival.
The main reasons for the mammoth and continued success of these festivals, possibly lies in the fact that the emphasis is not just on physical beauty alone, latter which I hasten to add, is very prominent in both, but judging in the afore mentioned festivals places an accent more on internal beauty and true qualification, which always demands a closer examination of those ‘lovelies’ who choose to enter the competition.
For International Miss Macra, this year is a very special one, as the festival make plans to celebrate it’s 40th birthday. It has been 40 years of learning, 40 years of mixed financial fortunes and 40 years of dedicated voluntary hard work, undertaken by an enthusiastic and dedicated Macra membership.
As part of their 40 Years Celebration this year, Clonoulty Rossmore Macra are poised to send invitations to all past winners of the festival. They look forward to welcoming previous contestants and their supporters back to Tipperary, to relive what was surely a memorable weekend in their lives during those past 40 years.
With selection processes underway for this year’s representatives, the club intend to have contestants once again from the four corners of Ireland as well as from overseas.
Promises to be an exciting weekend.
On March 3rd next, Shannon Development, in conjunction with Failte Ireland will, once again, hold their annual Shannon Region tourism briefing. This briefing will take place in the Radisson Blu Hotel, Ennis Rd, Limerick with registration at 10.30am (starting time 11am).
The Shannon Development team will be joined by executives from Failte Ireland as well as Tourism Ireland to present our plans for 2011.
Shannon Development hope that those involved in the tourism industry will be in a position to join them on the day and they look forward to meeting with as many members of the industry as possible, because your input is vital to their work.
This event is also a useful opportunity to network with peers in the tourism sector and to exchange ideas.
RSVP: If you are planning to attend, please rsvp to Bernadette Kelly, Tel: 061 710433. Email: kellyb@shannondevelopment.ie
Shannon Development also launched a new school tours brochure on Wednesday last in an effort to capitalise on the potential of the school tours business for Tipperary.
St.Mary’s Famine Museum, here in Thurles has been attracting school tours for the past 10 years, not only from County Tipperary, but also from surrounding counties, particularly from Limerick, Cork, Offaly and Kilkenny. The Museum offers lecture facilities to all visitors and students and the opportunity to examine at first hand primary sources from the Great Famine period 1845 to 1849 in accordance with the Irish Department of Education history guidelines.
The Museum which is open to the public from May1st to September 31st, each year is also available to tour groups all year round by appointment.
Contact: Telephone: 0504-21133 or Email: george.willo@gmail.com
Amongst its many attractions are the only surviving records of a Famine Food Committee, a detailed record of relief given by local Soup Kitchen’s in 1846/47, plus a model of the town of Thurles 16ft x 8ft, as it was in 1846, recorded by a then civil servant, Thomas Hegarty.
Starting this month, a copy of the “School Tours 2011 in Ireland’s Shannon Region” will be distributed to every secondary school in the country and to all primary schools in the region and surrounding counties.
A major marketing blitz is also planned for the U.K. market.
Councillor John Hogan (Moyne) has stated that the community of Moyne/Templetuohy are very concerned over the future of the Lisheen Mines and of the environment in the locality.
Mr Hogan stated: “I wrote to the C.E.O. of Anglo American, Ms. Cynthia Carroll, expressing the communities concerns over the terrible reputation that Vedanta Resources have in India. Amnesty International has written an in depth report on human rights and serious environment violations carried out by Vedanta Resources. The company also had the Tuticorin Smelter in India closed by the Indian courts. According to the Indian Judges Vedanta Resources violated the company’s operation permissions from the Tamil Nadu Pollution Control Board. In their verdict, Judges said the smelter was emitting noxious air pollution, that the plant’s effluents were hazardous and caused high levels of heavy metals, arsenic and fluorides in the groundwater and that the entire plant site was now “severely polluted”.
Another example of our fears in June 2009 a prestigious World Environmental award the “Golden Peacock” was withdrawn at the last minute after
demonstrators protested about the company’s highly polluting alumina refinery on the land of Kondh tribes in Orissa, India. Government pollution inspectors have commented on the ‘alarming’ and ‘continuous’ seepage of toxic waste from the refinery. Kondh people living near the refinery have told Survival International that they have suffered skin problems after bathing in polluted water, that their crops are choked by dust from the refinery and that cattle have died after drinking from polluted streams.”
Councillor Hogan added: “So far I have received a reply from Mr. Hennie Faul, Chief Executive Officer Zinc with Anglo American. Mr. Faul chose not to answer any of the allegations in connection with Verdanta Resources and instead stated that the costs associated with the Mine closure and rehabilitation plan, as well as the perpetual aftercare of Lisheen Mine are fully secured. This reply from Anglo American has added to the community fears, firstly because they sold us out to a company with issues that Anglo American are not willing to comment on. Also Anglo American are disingenuous in claiming that perpetual aftercare costs of Lisheen are secure when as a stake holder our community has not even entered discussions on the perpetual aftercare.”
Moyne/Templetuohy Community Parish Forum are meeting next Monday night to discuss and decide a future plan of action in relation to these issues.
Tipperary Regional Youth Services are proud to announce their first lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) Seminar which will take place this Thursday, the 10th of February at 7:30pm in the Ballykisteen Hotel, Tipperary.
The keynote speaker will be Senator David Norris and the evening will be chaired by Founder and Director of BeLonG To Youth Services, Michael Barron. Members of Loving Our Out Kids (previously Parents’ Support) will also be in attendance.
The seminar will offer information and support on many areas relating to LGBT young people:
1. How can I support my LGBT family member / friends?
2. What services are available locally and nationally?
3. What exactly does it mean to be LGBT?
There is no admission fee for this event. Places, however, must be reserved and unfortunately, the deadline for reserving places was 4th February last.
Contact: Lisa McGrath at telephone 062-52604 with any enquiries.
It was with great regret we learn today of the untimely death of legendary blues rock guitarist and singer Gary Moore. The musician was found dead in his room at the luxury Kempinski Resort Hotel in Estepona in the early hours of this morning. A postmortem is due to be carried out later today in the nearby city of Malaga to investigate the cause of his death. The musician aged 58, from Belfast is understood to have been on holiday at the time.
Electric guitar players everywhere, please stop awhile and listen to true genius share his music.
Moore collaborated with a broad range of artists during his music career including The Right Honourable The Lord Andrew Lloyd Webber. Lord Webber, the most commercially successful composer in history, who now resides at Kiltinan Castle, Fethard, Co Tipperary, colaborated with Garry Moore on the composer’s ‘Variations’ album in 1977.
Lord Webber chose the theme of Paganini’s 24th caprice and added 23 variations for cello and rock band. The work premiered at the 1977 Sydmonton Festival featuring Gary Moore, joined by Barbara Thompson on Sax and Flute, Rod Argent on Piano, Synthesizer and Keyboards and Julian Lloyd Webber on Cello. It was subsequently rearranged and recorded in 1978 reaching number 2 in the album charts.
In a career which dates back to the 1960’s, Robert William Gary Moore, to give him his full title, shared the stage with many blues and rock luminaries including Phil Lynott, Skid Row, Brian Downey, B.B. King, Albert King, Colosseum II, Greg Lake, George Harrison, Jeff Lynne, Roy Orbison, Tom Petty, and Bob Dylan to name but a few.
Moore’s greatest influence in his early days came from his association with guitarist Peter Green, of ‘Fleetwood Mac’ fame, who was a mentor to Moore while performing in Dublin. Green’s continued influence on Moore was later repaid as a tribute to Green on his 1995 album ‘Blues for Greeny,’ an album consisting entirely of Green compositions. On this tribute album Moore played Green’s 1959 Gibson Les Paul Standard guitar, which Green had lent to Moore after leaving Fleetwood Mac. Moore ultimately purchased this guitar, at Green’s request, so that “it would have a good home”.
Moore throughout his career was recognised as an influence by many notable guitarists including Vivian Campbell, Patrick Rondat, Jake E. Lee, John Norum, Joe Bonamassa, Adrian Smith, Randy Rhoads, John Sykes, Kirk Hammett and Gus G.
Ar Dheis Dé go raibh a anam uasal.
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