I O EU

Post over there on MeFi about how The Yoof of Europe like Europe. Inevitably, the thread went on a US-centric de-rail which I attempted to re-focus on the idea(l) that the European Dream is rather wonderful.

When I came studenting to Ireland as a just-barely-adult in 1973, Ireland was a poor, backward, peripheral theocracy. I got me a partner, a son and an education and, along with Ruth and thousands of others, we spent the recession of the 80s in foreign [NL, US, UK]. When we came back in 1990, Ireland was in the process of _transfiguration_ lubricated by buckets of cash from Europe. From 1994-2000, I was the Irish node of a European quango [science, training, infrastructure] and collaborated with people from all over the continent. In that tiny corner, I was, and am, proud that Ireland was giving back as a nett contributor to the enterprise. My 30-something daughters and their friends are just fakkin' bri'nt: hard working, colour-blind, pluralist, adventurous, righteous, generous, kind. They were able to become their best selves because Europe gave us a leg up and showed us other ways of being human and alive. 
Knowing that defending Europe may require more than a lapel-pin and some rhetoric . . . the pike is in the thatch.

The next comment came from a Minnesotan explaining the pike is in the thatch for their EirIgnorant compatriots. I'll add that hereabouts a pike is used to pitch hay. The croppies [woot woot Heaney alert] of 1798 went rambling that Summer with pitchforks (or scythes) if they had them; otherwise long ash saplings with pointy ends.

Mais revenons nous à nos euro-moutons: being Director and Sole-Employee of INCBI allowed me to commission the creation of a manual for Bioinformatics 101 which I hawked round the island, the continent, and further. A significant part of 'My' EU quango's brief was to equilibrate upwards: bringing training and resources from the well-funded / capable to the under-privileged / need-to-know-some. I had short-term regular gigs spreading the word in Oslo and Helsinki in the final years of the 20thC. But I was also able to bring the late, great Jack Leunissen from Nijmegen to Dublin a tuthree times.

For three years, I was on the quango's Exec Committee, two years as Secretary and one year as Chair. I was better as Secretary [obsessive attn to infra-structural detail] than Chair. Indeed, the year I Chaired was also the year the money ran out and we/I massive failed to write a convincing argument for re-funding. Big red face, me. Ireland was out in the cold w.r.t. Binfo infra-structural support for 25 years until Aedín Culhane and others threw in our lot with Elixir.