Ainle Ó Cairealláin: Language as Infrastructure

92.911 - 115.611 Harrison Gardner

He also hosts the Rebel Matters podcast and casually cycles around Ireland raising funds for Gaza when he feels like it. Welcome to the show, Anla. Thanks very much for the invitation. It's great to be here. Yeah, it's great to have you here and fresh off the plane from Cuba as well. I'm still a little bit jet lagged, but I'm good to go.

115.591 - 132.722 Harrison Gardner

Well, why don't we start with a little bit of context and maybe we can talk about the gym. We can talk about Akhla Palestine and maybe you can give a little context of when you started that project and what you were feeling at the time that made you want to start that project.

133.225 - 154.153 Ainle Ó Cairealláin

Yeah, well, the first time I went to Palestine was in 2018 and it was on the back of just a longstanding curiosity to go to Palestine and find out more about what was happening on the ground there. And really that stems from growing up in West Belfast and having this sort of awareness that there was a connection between Palestine

154.133 - 174.524 Ainle Ó Cairealláin

ourselves as Irish people going through like an anti-colonial struggle and other countries who are going through something similar. And I say, I use the term similar kind of cautiously because while there are always parallels between communities that are in struggle, there's always differences between them as well. Like no two circumstances are exactly the same.

174.984 - 195.042 Ainle Ó Cairealláin

And that really was what kind of encouraged me to go to Palestine in the first place. to learn more about what was happening. And with regard to the gym and how that came about, really actually some of the stuff that you mentioned there in the wee introduction about growing up with our parents and being really fully involved in...

542.159 - 559.002 Ainle Ó Cairealláin

So they took the initiative and they set it up for themselves. Like, they set it up themselves for the community that they were a part of. And in terms of, like, the podcast and the other stuff that I'm involved in, that's the essence of it, really. When I think about...

558.982 - 584.635 Ainle Ó Cairealláin

the podcast I mean I started the podcast primarily because I was just so curious to sit down with people and talk to them people who are doing interesting things yeah and a lot of the initial episodes are just my mates that I invited that I wanted to sit down with and like do this basically because exactly you know like it's not very often you get as we know not very often you get to sit down with someone for an hour and just talk to them about things that they're doing it's true we've been friends for years and when was the last time we talked for a whole hour

584.615 - 600.548 Ainle Ó Cairealláin

That was the initial thing. Now, when I look back over the last few years, especially considering what has been happening in Palestine and the impact that the global media has had on people's perception about what's happening in Palestine.

600.528 - 622.114 Ainle Ó Cairealláin

the sort of manufactured consent that's been just ongoing in terms of the West allowing the occupation of Palestine to continue and to keep on kind of like progressing and escalating without any kind of serious intervention over the years and then from the beginning of the genocide how that was portrayed in the media that we're mostly exposed to

622.094 - 644.625 Ainle Ó Cairealláin

is the big motivating factor now for um for rebel matters because a lot of the time we're talking to people who are presenting really valuable perspective but it's a perspective that isn't always heard in the kind of traditional media because a lot of the time doesn't suit the western narrative about what's happening in palestine if we're talking about that issue just specifically but um yeah so down to the question i suppose they are kind of connected

1401.584 - 1423.727 Harrison Gardner

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1423.707 - 1453.005 Harrison Gardner

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1453.025 - 1478.584 Harrison Gardner

And the whole reason I want you here is that I've always seen the work that you do as a response to a problem that you see in the world. And rather than sitting there and waiting for someone else to come and solve that problem or to create the solution, you just go and do it. You go and build whatever it is. You go and start it. And it's pretty scrappy to start with.

1478.644 - 1503.645 Harrison Gardner

And then it grows and then it grows. And until you have a very loud voice in this area, which you have now. And I guess I'd love if you could talk a little bit more about the gym itself and the heart of behind like, Why a gym? Why this community center? Why those very practical things as your response to the injustice and the problems that you saw?

1504.286 - 1522.108 Ainle Ó Cairealláin

So the gym is based in the IDA refugee camp, as you mentioned, which is in Bethlehem. There are around 5,000 Palestinian refugees living in the camp. It's hemmed in by the apartheid wall and seven or eight military watchtowers, massive military base. There's about 20 security cameras there.