Weekly Blog - 21 -27th January. Snow in the Mountains and Snowdrops in the Lowlands

“ If I keep a green bough in my heart, the singing bird will come”. (Chinese Proverb)

 
Rumours of a heavy fall of snow and sub zero temperatures rumbled away this week  and thankfully up here in the north west resulted only in  a soft pattering . This snow quickly dissipated in the lowlands and lingered in the mountains  providing  a scenic backdrop. We all remember like world weary   survivors of some awful disaster  those two successive  terrible  winters a few years back when Ireland became   one vast skating rink for weeks at a time . Even now I  still speak in hushed tones when reflecting back on that time and my heart   sinks every time I hear a mention of snow and plummeting temperatures on the way. One of the few perks of that harsh weather a few years back   was the appearance in our gardens of birds that we would not normally see. As well as the usual robins, chaffinch, blackbirds, gold finches, great tits and blue tits  my heart would  skip a beat on  sometimes spotting  red poll,  linnet, a jay  and once a brambling amongst a flock of chaffinches.One dull,bleak day   even a  snipe  appeared , ponderously probing it’s beak deep into the ground for  worms etc and suchlike. Even bullfinch and long tailed tits that I usually spot tantalisingly in the distance flitting from bush to bush appeared at my bird feed  hangers during those terribly  cold winters.

This week I went for a walk with the Manorhamilton based informal walking group The  Holey Soles to Killery Mountain  just outside Dromahair.  It was a brisk , cold day and we were  blessed with no rain. High up on the mountain there was several inches of snow that crunched pleasantly underfoot and provided a grip as we shimmied down the sides of ridges and drumlins.

At the top of Killery Mountain

 

Knocknarea Mountain in the distance

It had been my first really hefty hill walk for a long while. I enjoyed that breathless but satisfying feeling of striding and clambering and putting one foot in front of the other, dogged with concentration. Then the awe of being on top of  Killery Mountain and taking in the vista of surrounding mountain ranges  and lakes – Lough Gill, a tempting peek of the Atlantic  in the distance, Knocknarea Mountain and to the  south, the Bricklieves or Curlew Mountains.

I have been listening with interest to the  unfolding of the  hostage situation in Algeria that started in mid January.  A massive natural gas complex situated in a town called  In Amenas which lies near the Libyan border and partly operated by British Petroleum was raided by an armed band of jihadist fighters. They took dozens of workers hostage (some Irish amongst them) .A rescue attempt of the captives by Algerian ground troops was attempted  which released some hostages and allowed others to escape including  one of the Irish workers. But many workers also died. I  noted that these jihadists may be part of the Sahel region’s militant/bandit groups  loosely linked under the umbrella of  an Al Qaeda group that have been operating in that whole remote desert  area of Mali/Niger/Libya/Mauritania for many years now.

 In 2005 I worked for a couple of months with the international non governmental organisation ,Concern, providing technical support to  their emergency nutrition response in Niger. This was a response to a deterioration in nutritional status of children leading to alarming levels of malnutrition. Concern worked in a place called Tahoua in northeast Niger. At the  time some of the international personnel used to go for the occasional weekend to a  place called Agadez , a town that sits at the edge of the seemingly limitless   Sahara desert  which the  spans several countries that I have already mentioned above. 

In Amenas in Algeria  and also where I have been in relation to it (Tahoua and Agadez, Niger)

The town of Agadez

At that time  there were  no problems with security and we could travel at will. But over the years that remote area has become more and more insecure. 

Escort waiting for me to finish work at health centre outside Agadez in 2011

 Then  fast forward to 2011 and I was once again in Niger this time  heading past Tahoua  out to Agadez to work. This time I had to visit the health centres with a small armed escort – a far cry from the days in 2005 when Agadez was a weekend retreat for exhausted international aid workers.By 2011 that  whole area northeast of Tahoua and out past Agadez had become very insecure with frequent kidnappings of people by these jihadist  turned bandit groups that now roamed these desert areas . And now Algeria which is also part of or at least borders  that whole Sahel region  has been pulled into that whole unfolding insecure scenario. 

 

Myself and work  colleagues outside health centre

Snowdrops in Drumcliffe

As I drive around north Leitrim and Sligo during mid January I  glimpse flocks of sheep – ewes waiting calmly  -  barrel shaped with  their  snug lamb packages within .They have that air of almost gleeful expectancy that late pregnancy brings.  In fact that stir of anticipation can be found in many places  at present if you know where to look. I go to a favourite stomping ground  of mine  – Drumcliffe ,to the church and grave yard where the Sligo poet  Yeats is buried . I see what I expect to see at this time of year – clumps of snow drops . I love  the peculiar resilience  of snow drops that their appearance belies.  They present an almost tuburculous  aspect with their slender bending  stems and drooping  wan, white, bell shaped flowers. Yet unlike their seemingly  more robust, colourful  counterparts such as the  daffodil, crocus and hyacinth they are the first flowers that push their way up through frozen ground, sometimes through snow- against all odds and  despite their apparent fragility.

 However , although snowdrops give you the hope of spring, they  arrive so early that  even when you see them on a bleak, iron grey, bitter January day, it still seems that Spring is far, far away . But  for me,  seeing them  once again this year  in Drumcliffe ,their delicate hanging flowers and tiny stems  bending,stoic and valiant to a bitter wind strewn with searingly icy hailstones ,reminded me of a   recent post  someone had put on Facebook   -  “Might not be tonight or tomorrow  or the next day .... but everything is gonna be OK”

Camels in the Sahara desert  are like rain in Ireland - everywhere!

“Life is too short to wake up with regrets.

So love the people who treat you right,forget about the ones who don’t.

Believe everything happens for a reason.

If you get a second chance, grab it with both hands.

If it changes your life, let it.

Nobody said life would be easy, they just said it would be worth it”.