Irish emigrants in New York tell of missing home at Christmas

New wave of emigrants prepare for first Christmas away from home

BERNIE MALONE,

IrishCentral.com Staff Writer

Published Saturday, December 24, 2011, 7:07 AM

Updated Saturday, December 24, 2011, 8:09 AM

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Irish emigrants in New York prepare for their first Christmas away from home.

“The whole business of being illegal seemed crazy to me at the time. I said I’d go over for three months. But then when I got here, I began to notice how many Irish were here.

“I’m planning to go home next September. If I overstay by more than a year, that means a 10-year ban. But if it’s less than a year, it will just mean a three-year ban. When my friend moved here, I thought she was mad,” she told the Examiner.

“It’s like home, it’s not like Dublin, it’s kind of like a country town. It’s closeknit, it’s really nice. So then when I got work, I decided to stay because it’s not nearly as bad as you think it might be once you come over. It was all very unexpected but it’s definitely worked out.”

Sean Kennedy (25) from Mallow in Cork, is also here on the new one-year visa offered to graduates. Living in Queens he decided that going home for Christmas was too costly.

“It’s too expensive to go home for Christmas and I feel like I would break my momentum if I did that. I’m still adapting to life here, I’m making friends and I’m doing interviews for jobs. It’s been hectic to say the least. Getting set up doesn’t happen over night in this city. It can be tough at times, but surviving is the key.”

On Christmas day he intends to enjoy dinner and drinks with friends before heading to heading to Madison Square Garden for the opening day of the NBA basketball season.

“But I’m looking forward to it too. Christmas in New York... it should be fun when ‘Fairytale of New York’ comes on in a pub on Christmas Eve. We haven’t had snow yet so it remains to be seen whether it will be a white one or not.”

Click here to read the full Irish Examiner story: ‘It will feel strange not being with family’

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Joancuddihy | Dec 25, 2011, 01:15 AM EST

As an immigrant from the 80's who never returned to Ireland, I'd like to point out that the Internet wasn't an option back then, so emigration today, doesn't exactly 'mirror' what was happening back then. I was in Australia in those pre internet days when Skyping didn't exist and transcontinental phone calls were both expensive and unreliable in quality. Most of our 'news' was a week or two old by the time we heard it, now it's instantaneous. Don't get me wrong, I love this new era and have totally embraced the internet/facebook/Skype/instant messaging, etc etc but emigration in the 80s was Not the same experience as it is now. Nor was emigrating in the 1980s the same as emigrating in the 60s, 50s, 40s, or indeed 1847...just sayin'..

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joan1954 | Dec 24, 2011, 05:13 PM EST

I guess the difference is that the holiday here in the US is very secular and materialistic while in Ireland tends to be more family orientated. They should have realized that when they came over, our job situation here is that we don't have the standing week off like Ireland does or is it did.

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carrickcourt | Dec 24, 2011, 09:20 AM EST

Just watched touching videos on RTE online of people returning to Ireland for the holidays. I know my Irish third cousins, five sisters, will be enjoying their traditional family gathering for Christmas dinner on Sunday. We miss the phone call we would get from my cousin's late Dad Tom at the end of their Christmas dinner. What a kind and giving person was the late Cousin Tom.

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