yousef eldin

I’d like to thank the (Royal Irish) Academy…

I was flattered to be included in Penguin’s collection of Great Irish Reportage, published last week. Not that you’d guess so from the above picture.

I had been trying to appear casual at the launch. As though my writing gets included in anthologies alongside Flann O’Brien, Fintan O’Toole and Conor Cruise O’Brien all the time, and I wasn’t particularly phased.

So one of my sisters taking flash photographs kinda risked botching that whole operation.

The piece selected, For God & St. Patrick, originally appeared in Mongrel magazine in September 2007. It’s about religious observance in Co. Mayo. If you have a minute, I’d like to relate a little (EDIT: actually a long bit) about how that article came about. Read the rest of this entry »

HAHA… THIS IS WHAT YOU GET FOR BORROWING MY PHONE AND MAKING THREE INTERNATIONAL CALLS

Just got the bill, fuckhead…

GOODBYE, SAYONARA, ARRIVEDERCI

Two very good friends of mine are departing these shores this week. Former Mongrel publisher Yousef Eldin (pictured back row, far left, presumably in the cross-hairs of a powerful nerd-shrinking ray) is taking up a position at Vice magazine in London. He’s a talented photographer and general nefarious schemer, but also a really good guy and one of my best mates. Examples of his work are here and here (but not here). Read the rest of this entry »