Category Archives: Misc

berlin

Berlin D2 independent coffee shop, café and club on Clarendon Street, Dublin 2  is to close

Via Dublin Inquirer:

“We’re quite devastated really,” says staff member Poppy Copeland. “We spent a whole year trying to develop a nice community coffee shop where a lot of people have met and developed relationships,” she says. “It’s a real nice hub for everyone to meet and just to feel like that space is going to close soon is just sad for everyone involved.”

Café manager Stephen McCusker says he agrees. It’s been a year or so since he and Copeland started to work together, and, it looks to them as if they’ve created something in that time.

As a space, Berlin D2 evolves throughout the day: mornings and afternoons, those who work in the area nip in for coffee and lunch. As evening approaches, one or more DJs occupy the decks for an ambient, boozier, feel.

Berlin D2 rents its space from the Powerscourt Centre, and after some disagreements with the landlord, McCusker and his team decided to call it a day.

“We could get into, for want of a better term, a shit-fight over the place,” he says. “But I think it’s better to come out with your head held high and you go, ‘We did a great thing but due to unforeseen circumstances it has to finish.’”

It’s unclear what might take their place. Copeland and McCusker reckon it’ll be one of the big chains. They note the empty retail spaces on Coppinger Row which adjoin the café.

A spokesperson for the Powerscourt Centre did not respond to phone calls asking to talk to somebody about the space, and what might replace Berlin D2.

Copeland notes the recently opened Starbucks on Drury Street and feels the area is no longer the stronghold of the smaller, independent coffee shop.

On Clarendon Street, Berlin D2 Says It’s Calling It a Day (Conal Thomas, Dublin Inquirer)

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From top: Wales Green Party assembley election literature; Dan Boyle

Wales goes to the polls today and a ‘richly rewarding’ position as Wales Green Party campaign manager comes to an end for the author.

Dan Boyle writes:

This is what it all come down to. After eight months a project is coming to an end; a phase of life has been lived through.

Today is polling day for elections to the National Assembly for Wales. The whim I followed then now makes sense to me. I needed to get away so I better understood what home was to me.
While the experience has not been been without frustration, there are many warm and happy memories I can take from having been here.

Not least of those will be of people who choose to promote their values, knowing of the difficulty of being able to persuade others – the apathetic, the cynical and the unthinking.

For such people to have one person who shares their values, elected, would be a victory. Those of us who have been through that so many times realise what often follows that becomes the start of a whole new set of problems.

Progress is being made though. I hope that a breakthrough can be achieved. Not to recognise any contribution I have made, because that really isn’t important. It should happen because The Greens in Wales deserve it to happen.

I would argue the political culture of Wales would be better should Greens be elected to the National Assembly.

Welsh politics, like Irish politics, has too many elected representatives who are politically bland, politically blind, politically mute.

The people I’ve been working with; people of passion, ability and commitment, are immeasurably better than many of the time servers the voters of Wales have been led to believe represent what is supposed to be their best option.

There are differences, some nuances; interpretations where communications were sometimes less than clear. My hands off managerial style has as often frustrated as it has amused.

Despite these it has been a positive experience. For me a richly rewarding one.

An ideal world for me would be one where when I write a sentence, like this last sentence, it would be understood in the context in which it was meant. When I write ‘richly rewarding’ it rarely has anything to do with money. This has been a position, a job, for which I’ve received payment.

It hasn’t been a position in which I’ve made money. I took up the position not intending to make money. I continued to rent in Cork, always having intended to come back.

The reward has been doing something interesting, getting to know people I otherwise wouldn’t have known; enjoying the scenery and the history of a beautiful country. That is reward.

The past is another country, one I’m greatly looking forward to be returning to. Like it has before it will frustrate me and it will make me angry, but more often than not that frustration and anger will be about myself.

I’m coming home Cork.

Díolch Cymru.

Dan Boyle is campaign manager for the Wales Green Party and a former Green Party TD and Senator. Follow Dan on Twitter: @sendboyle

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‘sup?

This afternoon.

Siptu members (including Maltese Terrie ‘Lemmy’, above) and Luas drivers picket the Red Cow Luas depot in their ongoing dispute with Transdev.

Meanwhile

The National Transport Authority has fined Transdev €1m for failing to deliver the service. The net cost to the company is €400,000.

RTÉ has asked the NTA at what point Transdev’s failure to deliver the service would lead to it losing the contract, rather than just being fined. A response is awaited.

A spokesperson for Minister for Transport Paschal Donohoe this afternoon said: “It is up to both sides to work together to narrow their differences and find a resolution to this dispute, which continues to negatively impact commuters.”

Eight strike days expected at Luas next month (RTÉ)

Earlier: The Tracks Of Our Tears