John Arnold: At the home of the Greek gods, I prayed for my Bride Rovers!
I often let my mind wander to a suddenly remembered yesterday or, on occasions, to futuristic imaginings of what is to come - or might come.
I know, I know, the late great Doris Day used sing that we had no control over what was to come as she sweetly warbled ‘Que sera, sera, whatever will be will be - the future’s not ours to see, que sera, sera’.
Well, anyhow, last weekend was a big sporting one for me personally, and especially for my parish and club. We had two huge fixtures in championship hurling - one on Friday night and the second 24 hours later.
As ye know, my sporting career -including our ancient native game - was short and inglorious. I was enthusiastic, somewhat energetic, vocal and spirited, but completely lacking in the most basic and fundamental skills of hurling. Lack of hand to eye co-ordination and a complete inability to swing the caman as the sliotar was approaching - rather than departing - meant I was deemed ‘awkward, dangerous’ and ‘safer on the side-line’ than actually wearing the jersey.
I loved the game of hurling, but eventually, having inflicted nose, hand and leg injuries in three different games - and all the players I hurt were my own team-mates - I retired quietly.
That was nearly 50 years ago but my love affair with the fastest field game in the world has never diminished and hopefully will continue.
With the GAA ‘split season’ now in vogue, the real busy time for clubs is no longer the lazy, hazy days of summer - as in the past. It’s only after the Inter County season ends in July that the club championships take off in every county.
On a cold and frosty day last February, we got an opportunity to book a week-long holiday in October with our local Social Initiative Group. We had never been as far away from home as Greece so we booked it.
I’ve a curious mind and love history, pre-history and mythology of every kind. Greece truly ‘ticked all the boxes’ so we paid the deposit and didn’t think anymore about it for the next seven months.
As it turned out, ‘all’s changed, utterly changed’ in the meantime. In newspaper advertisements long ago you’d often read the phrase about so and so who is ‘changing his system of farming’ - well, that’s me now after all these years!
So, the Cork club hurling season started in late July/early August and my club Bride Rovers had three adult teams in action. In the 1880s, when we fielded a third adult team (of 21 players) for the first time, the local PP and GAA enthusiast, Fr Edmund Barry, named the team ‘The Holy Terrors’!
Well, our 2025 third XV, the Junior C team, battled all the way to a championship semi-final where they lost out after a great season. So then, after a ‘round robin’ series of matches and quarter-final victories, well, didn’t our Junior and Senior teams qualify for their respective semi-final fixtures. Those two games were down for decision on consecutive nights last weekend.
With mixed emotions, I flew with the group from Dublin to Athens on the first day of October. On the Thursday we had a half-day tour of the Acropolis and the Parthenon.
Look, as Percy French wrote long ago: “I’ve been to a great many places / and wonderful sights I have seen...” but what we saw on Thursday last truly bates Banagher! I’d say if I was there for a month of Sundays, I couldn’t truly comprehend how these ancient monuments were constructed! Round Towers at home, Newgrange and all around Tara evoke the same sense of awe and wonderment.
Yes, our wonderful guide explained how the ancient Athenians of centuries BC were wonderful engineers, architects, sculptors and stone-cutters but still I gazed and still the wonder grew!
We often heard the phrase about hay-making, turf-cutting and harvesting in Ireland long ago. ‘Yerra, they had plenty help’. True, of course, and in Greece and elsewhere much of the ‘help’ was provided by thousands of slaves.
These craftsmen who constructed the huge temples – and the pyramids also - must have been people of vision and intellect too.
Much of what we saw on Thursday was built, demolished by marauding hordes of invaders, rebuilt, flattened by earthquakes and rebuilt again -amazing.
On Friday, as the news from home was all about the impending arrival of Storm Amy, we were on the tour bus once more - bound for Delphi. Much of Greek history and pre-history is a heady mixture of myths, worship of multiple gods and a dollop of war, revolution, betrayal and intrigue - a bit like what was happening at home over the last seven days!
Gods were so important in Greece and about 800 years before the birth of Christ - and Christianity - Delphi was a flourishing and major religious centre. Apollo was supposed to have slain a dragon here, and worship to him began in a huge way. Even today, many centuries later, the remains and ruins are so impressive.
Delphi was famous for nearly 500 years for its Oracle. Here, kings and leaders and powerful chiefs came for advice before making big decisions. In return for this ‘advice’, gold, ivory, marble, spices and other offerings were brought and placed in huge ‘treasuries’, the walls of which are still standing - built from massive marble blocks. The whole ‘business’ of giving advice and telling the future - well, more or less, was organised around the Pythia.
The Pythia was a female priestess -usually a local young girl specially selected for the task.
We saw the Kastalia Spring where the Pythia would bathe and purify herself before donning a simple white dress. Into the massive sacred temple she went on a certain day each month - followed by a retinue of advisors and interpreters. There was a crack or fissure in the temple floor from where came gases and fumes. Herself was placed sitting on a tripod over the fissure. She ate a feed of laurel leaves and inhaled the fumes.
As this was happening, the major questions were put to the Pythia - like will we invade such a country, will we kill such a king, and so on and so forth. She answered in a series of grunts and snarls, but these ‘sacred sounds’ were translated by the experts and the advice was given and they all lived happily ever after.
There was no sign of the Pythia last Friday when we were there. Nevertheless, I stood transfixed on the temple floor as Storm Amy blew at home. I closed my eyes tightly and clasped the stone column near where the tripod seat was long ago. “How will the two matches go?” I asked.
I thought I heard rumbling and grunting - I’d had beans for the breakfast - maybe ’twas internal digestive combustion!
No, the answer swept in my left ear like a mini tornado: ‘Only win one – too much rain, step now’. I was puzzled and shaking as I went down the 314 steps to where our bus was parked.
Later, I got a text to say the Junior game was postponed due to too much rain on the pitch. Next night we won the Senior game by scoring 3-14, the number of marble steps I had descended!
Begor, I was a bit sceptical about all these Greek gods and myths but not anymore. Just be careful what you say and how you say it.
I hope to be back to see the Scottish play in the Opera House this Thursday. In the past, I might have said, ‘Sure it’s all Greek to me’ - not anymore!
App?
