My Blog (Eugene Ward)

This weekend the Munster and Connaght Football Championships are down for decision but that's not the only Gaelic Football silverware up for grabs this weekend. Many miles South of Salthill and Killarney, between the Andes Mountains and the Pacific Ocean, a Gaelic Football tournament, a kind of Copa America of GAA, will take place.  Lima Gaels have made the camino de Santiago and will take part. The driving force behind the new GAA club in Lima is Declan Tighe and I take pride in seeing the crest, in which I had a hand in designing, displayed with the other GAA clubs of South America taking part. Lima Garls Abú

Why El Peru? One question I always ask is why it is the Repubica del Peru and not Republica de Peru.  The name Peru  Garcilaso de la Vega (1539-1616) was one of the first historians to tackle the etymology of “Peru”. Garcilaso, commonly known as “El Inca,” was the son of a Spanish conquistador and an Inca noblewoman. His  Comentarios Reales de los Incas , published in 1609, remains one of the most important contemporary accounts of the Incas and the Spanish Conquest. In the first volume of his Comentarios, Garcilaso offers one of the first answers as to why Peru is calledt “Peru”. According to “El Inca,” a group of Spanish explorers landed on the Pacific coast somewhere south of the equator, where they encountered a native fisherman at the mouth of a river. With no interpreter at hand, the Spaniards tried to ask the fisherman his name and the name of the land on which they now stood. The native replied that his name was Berú and that the place where he stood was Pelú...

Another day of shame for the police here in Peru as students are attacked in their university campus  Students attacked at San Marcos University There has been protests against the president Dina Boularte who came to power last month after former president Pedro Castillo was impeeched. Protests across Peru which have been going on since early December have claimed close to 50 lives. Protests in Peru The presidential election of 2021 saw Castillo, who is popular in much of Peru but not in Lima finish ahead of right-wing candidate Keiko Fujimori. Her supporters, similar to Donald Trump and Brazils's Jair Bolsonaro, have always contested the outcome of the election despite international observers agreeing that it was free and fair. Peru Elections 2021 Castillo's time in office was turbulant. He had his enemies in parliament who have tried to oust him several times, finally succeeding on 7th December 2022 after he tried to close the parliament in a failed self-coup.  F...