We’d moved from Togo, West Africa – first to a direct provision centre in Clonakilty, then Cork City.
Togher Boys’ NS was my fourth school, including in Togo, which I’d left when I was five. It was a lot of moving, not a lot of stability.
I don’t recall the exact day I met John Egan senior. It was soon after we moved to Togher, I was friends with his son. Their home was a couple of doors away.
I’d play with the children outside – they really liked soccer but a lot played hurling and Gaelic football. I felt a bit out of those games. I wasn’t savvy about them, didn’t know the rules.
I guess John Egan saw this, but there was this moment where he actually gave me a hurley.
He taped it up for me, gave me a sliotar and a Kerry football jersey – funny because I was in Cork!
It felt strange someone would give me these for free – even reflecting on it now, these tools of the game are not cheap.
I didn’t know he was a Kerry football legend. I didn’t understand the rivalry, the colours, the depth of what football and hurling meant.
I didn’t understand the pride that comes with the jersey. I just understood it as kindness and someone seeing me.
My parents were struggling too with integrating, stuff going on behind the scenes that as a child I wouldn’t have understood but I felt it.
So John supported me as his son’s friend – and he supported my parents. He was kind, he gave a helping hand.
Whenever I wanted to join a club, or go out and play with my friends, my parents had a lot of anxiety.
They were in a new environment and had a tough time trusting people – they didn’t know the surroundings, the culture. They didn’t want me going off where they couldn’t see me.
And John would come in – other coaches and parents too – and reassure my parents I’d be safe.
There were times they wanted to take me to Funderland, to the park, to join a soccer team, and John would say ‘he’ll be fine – we’ll take care of him’.
With that reassurance, I got lots of opportunities to explore, to make friends.
There were a lot of nationalities in the park: Nigerian, Romanian, Pakistani, Indian.
And in every young person’s porch you saw a hurl, either their parents had bought it for them or John had.
He’d spend an hour or so teaching me how to play the game. I’d have my hurl and we’d pass the sliotar back-and-forth, doing drills.
That was huge – it gave me confidence to really get into the game, to feel ‘I can play this’. It gave me a sense of belonging.
John did it for a lot of young people in the community. He loved the game so much he wanted anybody to be able to pick up a hurl and play.
Reminiscing when he died – just after my Leaving Cert – it was then I heard my mom open up about John and I understood he was there behind the scenes when they were struggling.
When you’re growing up, you look for role models. You naturally tend to look for people who look like you.
Growing up in Ireland, not many people looked like me. John mentored me just by being himself, by being kind, by taking the time.
He took genuine interest in me and my family. These small gestures made a big difference for me, my parents, my four younger siblings.
What he gave our family was acceptance, kindness, the tools to fully integrate, to feel safe within the community we grew up in.
I absolutely love hurling. I’ll still get a hurl and whack a tennis ball off a wall.
I played Gaelic and hurling with my primary school, a little in secondary – mostly I played with my friends in the park. I joined the Barrs on an off for a year or two.
I work in integration. I’m a youth coordinator, working with organisations such as Cork Migrant Centre, the YMCA.
I’m a musician and spoken-word artist and – similarly to John giving me tools from something he was great at – I’m giving young people tools to express themselves through music and poetry.
We’ve a music studio in the city where we record, free of charge, young migrants but also marginalised and vulnerable people in the community, those not able to afford studio time.
Through workshops, we support young people to integrate but also listen to their challenges.
Integration’s a two-way street. The people I work with sometimes feel it’s all on them to integrate. That can be so hard when you don’t have the tools or information.
John Egan took the first step. Now I’m well-integrated and I’m supporting other young people by taking the first step. It’s gone full circle.
- Raphael Olympio is at West Cork Literary Festival on Tuesday July 15; 5pm at Bantry Library.
- One of many free events at the festival, it’s the Irish Writers Centre’s showcase of some of Cork’s finest spoken word artists.
- West Cork Literary Festival, July 11 to 18
