All language subtitles for in.the.name.of.the.son.2023.1080p.web.h264-cbfm

#

I think the loss of a child changes
anybody and everybody irrevocably.

#

You kind of say 'why me?', but then
you say 'well why not me?'

To say it's a life changing
experience is an understatement
really.

You never look at life in the same
way again.

I think one of the biggest things
that mom has achieved,

having lost three children,

is being able to get up in the
morning for us.

Mom headed off with a backpack
on her back,

into the bush to see where Billy
passed away.

That burden of grief that she has
had,

she's just kind of taken it apart
and put it into bricks and mortar
over in Cape Maclear.

#

#

The challenges were enormous in
setting up the clinic originally.

I had to find a piece of land, so,

after many visits to the local
chief, he agreed to give us some
land

to build the clinic.

What you see here is the compound of
the Billy Riordan Memorial Clinic.

This building started in 2004.

Built by volunteers and local staff.

It was originally meant to be a
small out-patient clinic with one
doctor,

one nurse and maybe about ten
ancillary staff.

But we very quickly realised that it
was not going to be enough,

that not having an in-patient
facility is not going to be...it's
not going to work, basically.

The second building was opened in
2008.

Built mainly by volunteer builders
from Ireland.

And the third building which you'll
see behind, was done in 2017.

So this was the original building.

There are consulting rooms, a
pharmacy,

an emergency treatment room.

And there's a close obs ward,

which is down near the end.

This is the second building,

we've another consulting room here.

And then down the corridor here we
have a kitchen.

This is a female and children's
ward.

Sluice rooms.

We have a lot of patients here today
waiting to see our ophthalmic
surgeon.

Okay, this is building number 3.

This was opened in 2017.

Again...

...the clinic was growing so
quickly,

we just realised we had to add
another building.

The first room we see here is the
lab.

Then we have some consulting rooms.

Over the years, we have treated
thousands of patients for HIV, not
hundreds, thousands.

Of all age groups.

Right down to small children.

When I heard that she was looking
for somebody who would work and take
this job up,

I got interested instantly.

And the more I dug in, the more I
kinda fell in love with the place.

We're able to offer chronic disease
management for hypertension,

diabetes, asthma, epilepsy,

and we're able to give the patients
medications which they could not
have even managed

or been able to afford.

But also we have cervical cancer
screening.

Malawi has the highest rates of
cervical cancer in the world.

Gastrointestinal diseases
like diarrhoea,

are very common here.

Respiratory tract infections are
also very, very common.

But top of my list would be malaria,
especially during the malaria
season.

Just after the rainy season, when
you've got a lot of puddles of water
around,

that's when we have the highest
rates.

Mags is someone who is very
interested in output and,

making sure that things happen.

And I'm so glad that I work with
her,

because I know that she, she always
has the best interests of the clinic
at her heart.

#

I grew up in Cork City.

I went to school in Cork.

I went to university in Cork.

And I moved to Kerry in 1972.

I had a really happy childhood,
really happy childhood.

I really enjoyed school.

I loved university.

And em...I suppose when I was thrust
out into the working world,

it was probably a bit of a shock to
the system really.

But I enjoyed it, I was teaching,

I was a secondary school teacher and
I enjoyed that as well.

I suppose my parents did influence
me,

maybe inadvertently.

My dad was a humanitarian. My dad
was a doctor in Cork,

and he was humanitarian.

I was always interested in
protesting things, I mean,

animal rights, human rights,

you name it, I was in there.

I also took part in a lot of
anti-apartheid stuff.

Because that was really, that was
really big when I was in UCC,

so I was very active in that as
well.

In later years then I got into
humanitarian work,

travelling to Bosnia.

I made three trips out there during
and just after the Bosnian War.

She always worked so hard for us
like

just different side-lines she had
going.

Just to make sure we always had
like, I always had the best,

I had my Irish dancing costume for
my competitions,

nothing was ever impossible to mom.

I think that's part of the trait
that got her so far with the
clinic as well.

But having lost three children, how
can she ever achieve such happiness
again?

Is it even possible?

So I just think that side of
achievement is...

...it just shows so much
strength, it's just phenomenal.

Unbelievable.

Well we had a very old car,

and just basically, I was turning
the car to come off the pier and the
brakes failed...

...and we just went over the edge.

Just me and my daughter.

I was actually thrown out of the
car, I was actually thrown clear
through the windscreen.

And my ex-husband was on the pier
and he went down,

but...you know, it was early in the
year, the water was very cold.

And I knew that there wasn't much
hope for the baby.

I don't remember them bringing up
the car,

I don't remember anything,

I kind of have no memory of that.

Everybody rushed to help, of course
they did.

I would never, ever, ever drive down
a pier anywhere,

I couldn't...even to this day I
would never drive anywhere near
water,

it's just left me with that fear.

#

How are you?

Yeah I'm good, how are you?

I'm good.

Thank you very much

This is our volunteer centre.

This is where all of our volunteers
stay when they come to work at the
clinic.

They get their board, their food,

and they have a nice social life,
when they're not at work.

When we came here first,

there was and old house here where
the solar panels are,

it was kind of a ruin really with
just,

broken tin roofs.

So we raised the walls and put on
the thatched roofs,

and I lived in the first room there
for eight years.

And we were running out of space so,

instead of going any further down,
we had to start going up so,

we built that building,

and I moved in upstairs.

So this is the dining area,

where volunteers can, as I said,
dine...have their meals.

There's a kitchen in there so
they're free to cook,

and use all the kitchen facilities.

There are fridges and freezers, etc.

All thanks to...our solar panels.

We're very grateful that we got
those when we did.

We have very, very few volunteers,

who given a chance, wouldn't come
back.

They're fairly tiring days working
in the heat,

even though we get a long break, it
kind of...

...your mind does fully go.

It's great because it benefits your
career,

but also you're helping people as
well so,

it works in two ways.

Yeah and you lean so much about
yourself and also about,

diseases and culture that...yeah
definitely recommend it.

(Children playing)

So we're all in Fourth Year of
Medicine UCC.

So we've just finished, so we're
going into final year now.

I think em...here like you can
really see exactly how resourceful
everyone is with everything.

Like you know when I get home, if
you open a packet of something
that's sterile,

and doesn't end up being used, it
goes in the bin, or like,

you know like sutures, they're not
reused or anything like that,

whereas here, where there's no
option to kind of just supplying
things,

like, they have to reuse things and
they have to re-sterilise things.

We're quite naive still, we haven't
had that much practical experience
in hospitals,

anything that we've seen, we've
kind of been a bit sheltered I
suppose from the,

the harder sides of medicine.

Like at home there'd be no malaria,

or things like that which is huge
here and,

HIV of course, we learned a lot
about those kinds of diseases.

I think this is definitely a
once-in-a-lifetime opportunity for a
medical student,

to come over and...just see how
different everything is here,

and how much we have at home.

(Child crying)

#

My son Luke was a cot death.

Sudden Infant Death Syndrome, which
at that stage was only beginning to
be acknowledged.

He was asleep in a carry cot in the
back of the car,

and I was sitting in the car reading
the paper.

I heard nothing.

I noticed nothing.

To say it's a life changing
experience is, I think is an
understatement really,

I mean...you never look at life in
the same way again.

Em...

...I had a suspicion,

I had a suspicion that...

...that...the world mightn't be
finished with me yet.

I voiced that to people, to friends,
to family.

Em...

...and of course people said 'oh no
don't, don't be crazy, that's a
crazy thing to think'.

And, part of me thought, 'that is a
crazy thing to think',

and then another part of me thought,
'well...maybe you have reason for
thinking it.'

And...that thought lived with me
until Billy died.

That thought lived with me until
Billy died and,

it was almost like I knew it.

I didn't know how, I didn't know
where, I didn't know when,

I didn't know who.

But...it was like I had this feeling
at the back of my mind that,

something might happen again.

And it did.

#

There was 4.5 years between Billy
and I and the same between Jennifer
and I.

I was the middle child.

We would have been very close. After
Mum and Dad split up, you stick
together as kids.

He loved life.

He was very charismatic, very
popular.

Had loads of good close friends.

Just had a huge appetite for life.

Back in those days, when I was a
teenager, if I had a worry about
anything to do with school,

he'd always throw his arm around
and say, Jennifer, come on, it will
be fine.

Any memory you have with him was
always fun.

Even when he went to
university, he went to Galway, to
UCG,

and he used to write me letters
which I still have in a box over
there.

Just finding out how I was getting
on at school and telling me his
exams were coming up.

He just always kept in touch.

For some reason when he was gone
that time I just had this feeling,
it was so weird,

and I still have a letter from a
friend of mine.

I just had this feeling that
something was going to happen to him
on that trip

and I don't know why or something
just told me something was going to
happen.

It was a really special sort of
friendship,

I'd say a really unusual male
friendship.

There was a real love and bond
between us and a closeness.

I was in the Rainbow Hostel, I
was working there.

I was in bed and the phone rang,
sort of late at night,

I think it
was around 5 in the morning.

It was Roy Friis. Billy had met Roy
in Africa on his previous trip and
Roy had come to Dingle to visit.

They had decided to go out to
Africa again.

He said that Billy had gone for a
swim and hadn't come back.

I remember shouting to Ellen because
she was going back up to bed.

Richie was there as well, Billy's
father, so he heard the shout too.

Yeah, I had to go up and...

....yeah.

I had to go and tell Richie.

I remember Richie saying to me he's
gone, isn't he? And me saying yes to
him,

because I suppose I knew he was,
that the other stuff wasn't really
plausible.

And then I had to go, Mags lived
about a mile away where she still
lives now.

I had to walk over to her.

Yeah.

I remember her coming to the door
and kind of happy to see me

but she must have been wondering
what I was doing there at that time
of the morning.

That was one of the hardest things.

This is Cuan Cill Fearnog.

It's back west of Ventry.

It's just a little harbour here.

It's a place we would have come in
the summer

when the weather was good and we
could get together for an hour or
two and just get away.

He was almost like a force of nature
really as a person.

It was Billy really who started me
off writing poetry.

I don't know if it would ever have
come out

or would have become a need for me
to write if it hadn't been for that

whole mourning process after Billy
died so in a way that's something he
left me with.

(IN IRISH)

He went for a swim and one of his
friends went in a boat, in a dugout
canoe.

The friend that went in the dugout
canoe couldn't swim and so he got
nervous

because Billy was messing around
in the water with him

and he got nervous
that he was going to upend the
canoe.

So he came in and something happened
after that but we don't know.

But he was actually very close to
the shore. He was maybe 25 metres
off the shore.

Nobody witnessed what actually
happened.

No matter what you heard or what you
discovered, it was never going to
bring him back.

We were very close and he was very
close to his sisters.

It was huge. Words can't describe
the devastation that it led to

and the far-reaching implications
his loss had.

It still is a huge loss.

It's not something you ever get
over.

You learn to live with it but you
never get over it.

When I was coming out for the
occasion of the first anniversary of

Billy's death, I just thought I'd
like to bring out something as a
memorial

because we wanted to put a stone
here in memory of what happened

and just so as people would
remember.

It didn't frustrate me that I never
got a hundred percent accurate
account of what happened

because I've said it before and I'm
sure I'll continue to say it,

it changes nothing.

Had it all not happened, the clinic
wouldn't be there

a lot of lives would never have been
saved, a lot of lives would probably

have never happened because the
other people's lives wouldn't have
been saved.

When I do get a bit down about the
whole thing,

I say to myself that something very
positive came out of it.

That's the best you can expect or
the best you can hope for.

# #

When we opened in 2004 we had no
idea of how much in demand we would
be.

The immediate community here was
about 14,000 people

but there are two other villages
in the hinterland with another

20,000 people again with no access
to healthcare

and very quickly it became obvious
that we were actually catering to
that size of community,

which we weren't in any way prepared
for.

That was one of the challenges,
getting people to think in terms of

my child is ill or I'm ill, I should
go to the Billy's which is what the
clinic was known as.

That was a big challenge at the
beginning.

We now have young mums bringing
children to the clinic

and they were brought to the clinic
as babies.

I think very few of them would even
consider going anywhere else for
medical treatment.

We have a women's health programme
which we look after specifically
women's issues.

We also have non-communicable
diseases clinics

which are specifically for epilepsy,
asthma, high blood pressure.

We hold those once a month. In
addition to people coming to the

outpatients department with a
bronchitis or a broken toe,

we also have these clinics which are
run regularly every month.

The child is in distress. It's
coming out and can be pushed back
in.

The mum was taught how to put it
back in.

For an average Malawian child, this
child is quite chubby.

The growth plotting is way above.
The normal is in between these two
lines.

So sense would say this is a happy
child. (laughs)

This is a lady I've seen about two
months back.

She had come with a specific
abdominal pains.

She was very sad and very anxious.

She came today. We were able to
determine that it's now certainly a
female baby.

Is Zoe around?

Outside. Out here?

You need to go on holidays. Yes. To
England.

Initially because HIV was raging in
the village at the time,

with 6,7, 8, 9 funerals every day,

it was just devastating.

If somebody needed to be treated for
HIV, they would have to go a minimum
100 kilometres.

They didn't have the vehicles, the
money for transport and so people
were just dying of HIV.

So we thought we would start our own
HIV treatment programme.

When I look back at 2004 and then I
look at where we've come,

from one doctor, one nurse and 10
staff to four doctors, four nurses
and 35 staff

and a whole range of extra
programmes,

it's quite amazing.

I definitely think there's something
or someone pulling the strings.

Definitely. I don't question it too
closely cos I don't want it to go
away

but there is no doubt about it that
people do get sent to me, to the
clinic, to the Trust. Definitely.

You have to connect it not
necessarily directly to Billy

but you have to connect it to karma,
the universe, we're doing the right
things for the right reason.

It has to be connected to something
because there's no such thing as
coincidence to my way of thinking.

I can't really define my faith as
attached to a particular church

but I definitely would ascribe
myself to the Christian values.

But that's not to say that I don't
think other broadly speaking

religions don't have equally good
values, I do.

But I was born and raised in a
Christian country

and so I tend to have Christian
values.

Driving here in Malawi is always a
bit of a challenge.

But the challenge changes depending
on the time of year.

The rain season makes things very
difficult and it's not unusual to be

completely cut of from the rest of
the country, unable to get out
except by boat for days or weeks.

In terms of supplies for the clinic,

we do virtually all the collection
from the pharmaceutical companies in
the two main cities.

One is Blantyre and the other is
Lilongwe.

We try to do a trip every six weeks
to two months

because it's a round trip of about
10 hours.

When we do go, we try and do
medications, other supplies, food
supplies,

any kind of general hardware,
whatever we need,

we would try and
do the run and incorporate
everything together.

We are supposed to be getting a
tarred road this year but maybe not,
who knows.

This is the room that Dr Meyer works
from.

You've seen a lot of the patients
lined up outside.

There are quite a number there
today.

This happens every 3-4 months.

It really is amazing to see this
opthalmic service being offered

in the middle of nowhere basically.

Can you manage?
Thank you.
You're welcome.

(whispers)
That poor woman, you couldn't
have her sitting on the floor.

I met Mags about 10 years back at
Cape Maclear.

I looked at the situation because I
love to come here 3 or 4 times a
year,

and I've been coming to Malawi for
26-27 years,

I decided to try and
help the locals here at the lake
where we have the holiday.

She agreed to that and then we
decided to change one of the wards

into a theatre and also use it as a
consulting room.

I schedule this more as a holiday,

then I work for three days.

The rest of the time I go sailing
and have a nice holiday at Cape
Maclear.

He is probably blind for five years
now.

He's got dense, dense cataracts.

It's like taking photographs with a
camera with the lens cap on for the
last five years.

These are the ones we are yet to
treat.

Most of the stuff we do is basically
cataract surgery and glaucoma
surgery, pterygium surgery.

That's about the big bulk of the
stuff.

But there are smaller eyelid tumours
and things that we have to remove.

She's got a dense cataract that
side.

See what this eye does.

(WOMAN SPEAKS IN CHICEWA LANGUAGE)

Two.

Are you happy? (WOMAN TRANSLATES)

It's an absolute reward.

I mean this is fantastic.

All the people in the team loves it.

The left eye we did yesterday, it
was totally blind.

Can you see? Yes. I see.

Can you count my fingers? Yes.

Two.

Five.

Two.

Are you happy? Yes, I'm happy.

It's a modern day miracle.

You change people's lives with not
really doing much.

because if you don't do that, it's
just a diaster.

She's been having much pain in the
eyes.

When she got treatment yesterday,
she even had a nice sleep last
night.

She didn't have any pain anywhere
else.

I'm very happy!

Happy now.

Happy family as well.

Mags is very dedicated to do this.

I can take off my hat to her
dedication and to the energy she
puts in to make this thing work.

It's a 4-seater aeroplane that we
only put in four seats.

We've got a lot of space for all
this stuff.

Also the lasers.

It's quite expensive, so we just
bring them in the aeroplane.

My hobby is also flying.

I'm a commercial pilot with 5,500
flying hours.

I would just say I like to enjoy
life!

There was a lot of work and a lot of
fun.

I really enjoyed it.

All the best. Thank you so much for
everything.

Travel safely.

To see people coming in being seen
by Dr Meyer on a Thursday,
operated on a Friday

and to be there
on Saturday morning when the bandage
is taken off.

To witness somebody seeing for the
first time in years - for me it's
one of the best parts of the clinic.

#

#

(Children chatter)

We looked at the possibility of
having a partnership, going into
partnership with somebody,

a bigger NGO.

Or a big organisation that would be
able to fund a lot of the
development that

we'd like to see down the line for
the clinic.

So we allied ourselves with
Catholics in Mangochi,

and as a result of that we were able
to join CHAM,

which is the Christian Health
Association of Malawi.

We're now looking at being able to
develop the clinic,

with the help of CHAM and the
Catholic church.

That in turn gives us the chance to
look at further enhancing the
services

and further enhancing the equipment
and the buildings.

We have been able to step back from
funding the day-to-day running
expenses of the clinic,

and the monthly salaries,

we have 35 people working full time
at the clinic.

To have that pressure taken off,

has been wonderful.

The pricing structure was explained,
that it hadn't got more expensive,

it had just levelled out, and in
some places had actually got a
little bit cheaper.

It's like anything really,

when change comes, there is going to
be resistance.

I think that's just something that
we expected,

and it came in spadefuls when it did
come.

It took us some time but we did
eventually, em,

manage to get the chiefs on board,

and have a couple of big meetings in
the village.

The clinic is very well understood
now by the community,

far more than it had been, for the
first few months after the
changeover.

We were fundraising in Boston.

We met some people from the Irish
community there,

and they were quite taken with the
whole idea of the clinic and what I
was doing,

and they offered to form a charity
in the United States.

So the board of Billy's Malawi
Project USA are very active,

and they do a lot of fundraising for
us.

I met Mags on a corner after she got
off the bus carrying her little
model of her clinic and

she came, and she stayed here.

I think it was back in 2003,

the Dingle traders were coming to
the Big E,

and one of the Dingle people
suggested that I might like to come
and

try and raise some money,

for the clinic.

So I thought....I'll buy stuff from
the local artisans in Cape Maclear,

and I thought I'd bring those and
try and sell them.

It was the beginning of a very good
and strong relationship.

We got a website designed,

and it just kind of snowballed.

I think that she took this tragedy
and turned it around for something
positive.

I spent time with Jefferson,

who is the Paper For People man.

I thought that he must have a little
warehouse where he did all his,

creating his papers.

It was very primitive, how he mixed
the paper,

how he collected the paper from the
paper that was left over from the
clinic

and the boxes of medication.

We would buy items from him so that
we could help him make more money.

And I think it's been very helpful
for me to go to the village and see
the people because,

I have individuals that I can
visualise,

that I know what we're doing is
helping them.

Mags is a real friend of our family,
Flannery family,

and we've links with the Billy
Riordan Memorial Trust in Malawi,

so it's fantastic to link up with
such an important foundation,

like the Billy Riordan Memorial
Foundation in Malawi,

and to work in partnership to
promote it,

over here at the Big E.

(Piano plays)

(Applause)

Welcome...

...to this year's Academic
Convocation.

And this evening, we have a real
life story,

of what can become possible,

through solidarity,

in our guest speaker, Mags Riordan.

Her son Billy loved to travel, and
visited Southern Africa frequently.

He was particularly fond of Malawi,

which in his last letter to Mags,

he called 'paradise',

because of beauty of the landscape,

and the kindness of the people.

Within 48 hours of writing that
letter,

Billy went out with friends,

and drowned in Lake Malawi.

He was only 25 years old.

Thank you very much for inviting me
here today.

And good afternoon to the President.

My name is Mags Riordan.

I'm an Irish woman.

I've been living and working in
Malawi,

in Central Africa for almost 20
years

Currently Malawi is the 10th poorest
country in the world.

When I first arrived in the area in
the year 2000,

to my horror I discovered there was
no healthcare available to the
people.

Malaria kills 750 children every day
in Africa.

Many of our young patients presented
at our clinic with malaria.

Thanks to the presence of the
clinic,

most recover,

and that stark statistic no longer
applies to our small patients.

I first visited the area one year
after Billy's death.

My wishes and my intentions were to
contribute to the community in some
way,

in memory of my late son.

As adults, solidarity should
eventually become,

a realisation that the planet
depends on us all working together,

to improve and enrich, both our own
lives

and the lives of our fellow human
beings.

Finally, I would like to wish you
all a very happy and fulfilling,

academic new year.

Thank you very much for allowing me
the opportunity to address you
today. Thank you.

(Applause)

In the business I used to have,

Mags Riordan came to stay one night,
just by chance.

And I was chatting to her and she
said 'I know just the place for
you.'

I'm an engineer by background,

and I used to house maintenance and
buildings and things like that.

And I was doing plumbing and
electrical work and things like
that.

So I came out here, doing the same
sort of thing for six months.

I love the work.

I went back to Sheffield, sorted the
business out,

and then came back here.

And then...six years ago, I actually
married the boss!

So...(He laughs)

...it's gone full circle for me now.

It's altruistic for myself.

I get so much out of what I've been
doing here.

You can't help but like living here,

particularly the work I do.

And the buildings obviously take a
lot of upkeep.

Say like something's broken, we
can't get the spare parts.

So instead of going to the local
hardware shop and getting it off the
shelf,

we have to make things, we have to
reinvent.

Every so often we do a fire drill,

we keep the fire pump here where the
volunteers live

and we've got the vehicle here, the
ambulance.

So if there's a fire in the village,

they can get the message out to us,

we can put the pump in the back of
the ambulance,

and take it to where it's needed.

We've used it several times to put
actual fires out.

This is literally the only fire
service.

Mags is a very strong person, she's
had to be, and she still is now.

But I think once you chip away,
there's more of a soft centre there.

And I suppose that's why I like her,
is she is so determined, so strong.

It's many, many people within the
village,

and I see them day-by-day so
thankful for the clinic,

opened 17, 18 years ago.

#

Obviously it goes without saying,

Billy was the reason I came here.

I would never have come, if
everything hadn't happened here.

What have I got from the last 20
years in living here?

A lot, is the short answer.

It has, it has shown me the
unfairness of the world.

You're a victim of your birth, and
if you happen to be born,

in a wealthy country, you have a
much better chance than

if you happen to be born in an
impoverished country,

it has also show me that, there are
challenges,

and if you really want to, you can
rise above those challenges.

I would never have thought that I
would have been able to do what I
have done.

So it has taught me that.

Am I happy that Billy brought me
here?

I suppose, a piece of me is, a piece
me is happy that,

I was able to do what I have done.

But...it was a very high price to
pay, to come here.

And it was a price, if I was given a
choice,

I have to be honest and say I
wouldn't have paid it.

(Children playing)

(Children respond)

(All cheering)

This morning we're here in Cape
Maclear government primary school.

And we are doing part of what we
call our Bilharzia Treatment
Programme.

We do this programme twice a year in
the village,

to help protect the children from
Schistosomiasis, which is the
disease they pick up from swimming

and being in the lake.

Bilharzia is a disease.

It's caused by a parasite.

It's called Schistosomiasis.

So this parasite basically, the
heads of the parasites,

can go through the skin,

and it can affect the urinary tract
organs, the bladder.

They can also affect your guts or
intestines.

The treatment for bilharzia is
called praziquantel.

However, it can't be taken on an
empty stomach.

So we guarantee that the children
will have something to eat,

when they're taking the tablets.

We give them biscuits and a drink of
orange,

to help them to digest the tablets.

It's really essential that it's
done, because we see the results of
bilharzia in the clinic every day,

and because of that, we just decided
that we would start treating it,

before the children got ill enough
to be taken to the clinic.

#

#

Kind of got to know her story and it
just kind of,

by osmosis got to know her and,

she's just...one of these people.
Very rare I'd say.

But I think em...

...she doesn't shout things from the
rooftops.

She...she just is.

She's just that burden of grief that
she's had,

she's just kind of taken it apart
and put it into bricks and mortar
over in Cape Maclear.

It's just...it's crazy. I don't know
how anybody would do that,

how they could get out of their
head, long enough to even think of
something like that.

I love her like. She's great!

She's transformed so many peoples'
lives.

Like not in a million years would
somebody think that a lady could
leave Dingle,

in memory of her son,

and battle her way through all the
obstacles there are,

to achieve building a clinic in her
son's name, in the bush in Africa,
in Malawi.

The nasty, horrible, unfortunate
things

and the loss of people that you
love,

you still have it, it's still there,
but it's like a wound that's kind of
covered over.

The scar is there.

The scar is there.

I think as long as Billy's name is
over that clinic,

and as long as there's...

...blood in mum's veins,

she'll be...over and back the whole
time and,

I don't think mom is the retiring
type.

As one human being to another,

it's your duty to give people a
helping hand,

and if it means saving a life,

it means saving a life.

And I mean I have seen mums, whose
children have died,

in the clinic, because they've been
brought too late and there's nothing
we can do.

And the devastation is the same for
her in sub Saharan Africa,

as it is for someone in Dublin.

And so when you're faced with that,
you realise,

that what you're doing in the right
thing.

It's the hallmark of any good
development,

that eventually it goes back to the
people of the country,

the project that you have done.

You get it into such a condition,
and then you can hand it back.

I'm not packing up!

If I packed up, what would I do?

You know...I couldn't, I couldn't
see myself packing up, I just...

...yeah.

If you pack up...

...you know...

...I don't know, I would never see
myself packing up.

# And yet a star shines constant
still.

# On yonder cloudy sky.

# And hope is bright, my bosom
fills,

# From faith that cannot die.

# Row on, row on.

# Another day

# May shine with brighter light,

# Ply, ply the oars

# On pull away

# There are storms beyond the night.
#

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2023