With O'Leary in Bogotá

It’s pretty much well known that the Irish are migrants. Coming from a small island, yet at the same time close to a host of the world’s old superpowers, it was pretty much inevitable that we’d wander outside our shores to see ‘what’s out there’.

The Irish-Colombians: O'Leary still stands the tallest though.

Indeed, in the early days of Ireland’s human history, its inhabitants took on the role of travellers with gusto, regularly raiding the neighbouring island of Britain. 

Subsequent generations would pay a hefty price for such daring. But before total British interference, in our early Christian days, our brightest and best traversed the European continent in what you might call an Irish-Christian educational enlightenment.

Subjugation to our English neighbours didn’t change that; the only difference was that emigration wasn’t seen as a choice for many, but more of a necessity. 

It meant the masses went on the move, rather than just the privileged few. And for most of those early movers to the 'New World', leaving the homeland didn't guarantee any great improvement in conditions. It would be a few generations down the line before those of Irish descent started being treated as equals with their superiors.

However, some of those who left did find instant success, or at least had a big influence in their new abodes.

In South America, that tended to manifest itself in the military sphere. For one, you had Admiral William Brown, the County Mayo man regarded as the father of the Argentinian navy. 

On the other side of the Andes there was Bernardo O'Higgins, Chile's founding father and the bastard child of a County Sligo man. The signs of that Irish interaction, and others, can be seen today in street names and the like across Argentina and Chile.

Yet, one place where the Gaels didn't seem, at least I had thought, to leave a mark was in the north of South America. OK, a few Irish lads had a recent, less than positive run in with Colombian officialdom in the early part of this century, but that was about the height of links between Ireland and the land that is now called the Republic of Colombia I'd known about.

Irish charm: A dapper, young O'Leary. (Image from wikimedia.)

'There's always one', though, and that more positive association comes in the face of a Mr Daniel Florence O'Leary. The County Cork-born general was an aide-de-camp under the great liberator (that's a loaded title) from Spanish rule of these parts, Simón Bolívar.

In his later years, as a historian and diplomat, he wrote important memoirs documenting what was a landmark period in South American history. He also played a part in securing Venezuelan independence from what had been Gran Colombia.

In between all that, he found the time to father nine children; that might help to explain the odd few ginger-haired Colombians knocking about.* (Now, while this writer hopes to leave a positive mark on Colombia, replicating the reproductive exploits of O'Leary isn't part of that; not right now anyway.)

It's fair to say that he doesn't get the same recognition in Colombia as his aforementioned contemporaries in Argentina and Chile — perhaps for valid reasons — but there is, at least, a bust honouring him in a Bogotá city park. He did, after all, breathe his last breaths here, as well as leaving a decent gene legacy. (For the record, his remains lie in Venezuela’s National Pantheon.)

That’s something the rest of us Irish in Colombia, 127 at the last official count, will do well to emulate. Perhaps in time, though, a bust of ‘Wrong Way’ will be erected in La Perseverancia?
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*If anyone knows of living descendants of Daniel O’Leary, it would be much appreciated if you could let us know here.

A special thanks to the staff at Bogotá's Instituto Distrital de Patrimonio Cultural for providing me with valuable information.

The 'bastard' child

For those of you familiar with Chile's geography, it won't surprise you to be told that this elongated stretch of land is a country of extremes. From the driest desert in the world in the north to the bitter coldness of the Antarctic south, boxing Chile's terrain into one category is impossible. So maybe we shouldn't be overly surprised that efforts to neatly sum up the culture and people of the country prove equally challenging. 

Chile's barren yet spellbinding north.

In our efforts to simplify the world we live in, one-word summations of countries have become the norm. Argentina-tango, Brazil-samba, Colombia-coc ... ... ahem, coffee, Ireland-drink (apologies to all us Irish — sure let's have a drink and forget about it), New Zealand-rugby. You get the drift. 

But Chile-what? It's difficult, eh? Thanks to the extraordinary survival story of the trapped miners in 2010, maybe we could throw in mining there, but that's just seasonal in a sense. Yes, they’ve got some excellent wines of course, but there is much competition in that regard. 

For visitors — and indeed many locals — to this weird and wonderful land, getting Chile has and still proves to be a difficult task. It's in Latin America, but it's not quite 'Latino'. The pre-Spanish indigenous influence exists, but it's no Inca bastion à la its neighbours to the north, Peru and Bolivia. Can it match the style and swagger – or is that arrogance - of its counterpart over the Andes, Argentina? Well, we won't go there, just to say that bumbags were big in the 80s if indeed they were at all. 

When it comes to native cuisine, it seems that Chile was missing the day they were ‘serving up’ the national dishes in these parts. At best it’s a mix and match of the least attractive offerings from a host of countries, deep-fried. Although at this point we must mention the delightfully addictive street snack, sopaipilla. Cheap and cheerful, this pumpkin-based wonder is the perfect hunger-buster on a ‘chilly’ Chile evening. Heck, it’s that good it makes up for the general lack of culinary quality on offer.

Sopaipillas - yummy!

Physically, Chile is a very isolated country. Alongside its aforementioned harsh northern and southern borders, it has the world’s largest ocean submerging its western frontiers while the biggest peaks of the imposing Andes Mountains saddle its eastern extremes. Such isolation alone ensured, over the country's fledgling years, that it was pretty immune to the influences of its more — dare we say — illustrious neighbours. Furthermore, for visitors from Europe and North America, Chile was — and still very much is — the last stop on any voyage to South America, considering one even made it that far. 

What's more, while the majority of Latin America venerates Simón Bolívar as its saviour from Spanish rule, the Chileans have a different, more controversial liberator to honour – Bernardo O’Higgins. It’s surely more than just a coincidence that this unacknowledged, ‘illegitimate’ son of an Irishman emerged to become the founding father of modern-day Chile. The correlations between the man and the country — comparing both to their apparent peers — could hardly be more salient. The atheist, ‘bastard’ child in a place — and a time — where religion mattered.

'The Bastard Child' - Bernardo O'Higgins.

On top of all this, the nation is still 'finding its feet' after General Pinochet's dictatorship — a past that is proving unsurprisingly difficult to move on from. Indeed when you put all these factors together, it is quite remarkable that the country is as stable and relatively successful — in a South American context — as it is at the moment. 

Part of the reason for this may be down to the fact that Chileans are possibly the least 'emotional' of the Spanish-speaking nations in Latin America. This may be explained by the strong German influence that exists there. Herr Steffan is more noted for his business acumen than his sensitive side. This is a characteristic that has helped Chile, arguably, make much more out of the natural resources at its disposal compared to some of its, let's say, more laid-back neighbours.
 

So putting all this together, what exactly ‘is’ Chile? A ‘western’ nation trapped in the craziness of South America? Well, outwardly speaking, perhaps. But scrape away at the surface and you’ll notice a much different beat than what you get in much of Europe or North America — thankfully so you might say. So maybe it’s an example of how the rest of the Latino world would operate if it acquired a bit more order? 

Whatever it is, this baffling land has plenty to offer, from the truly amazing to the utterly annoying and everything else in between.