5 Eileen Finnegan - the first Samaritan of Tralee

 5 Eileen Finnegan - the first Samaritan of Tralee

In house number 17 at Danny Street in Tralee you will see holy pictures, altars and figures yelling to you from literally any wall and corner of that building, but the last thing that you could expect in that place is something good would happen to you. The system which Eileen, the owner of that place, created is really interesting and astonishing. She had 3 “volunteers”, who worked for her in return for accommodation (without heating and with hot water for one and half, maximum two hours daily), and the food from the food bank (grocery items near to expiration date from local supermarkets). One of her “volunteers” is probably on pension, as she is nearly 70 years of age. I don’t know if she is getting any money from the state, as we never actually talked. Another one: Czech man, who is paying her 160 euro weekly for the same condition: small single room with ensuite bathroom, single glazed windows and no heating. The last one is the most difficult and sad example of modern slavery: a Swedish woman in her sixties, who was working there almost all day long. She was not  getting any benefits from the Irish government, living only from that food from the food bank, and got a single room for herself with the same conditions like anyone else in that place. Her example was especially moving for me, as Eileen - the owner - was treating her like personal assistant, secretary, and for all semi-slave giving her constant orders, by yelling her name from every corner of that horrible place and giving new tasks to fulfill: “check the room number …, clean the bathroom in the room…, bring that and that from the storage” and so on. Every morning that poor woman started around 8.30am hovering the floor on the staircase, then she was checking out and cleaning every room - carpet floor, bathrooms, once in the week she changed the beddings on each bed. I never saw her complaining, never saw her angry. Always very kind to everyone, she completed any single task, any activity with dedication. One morning, while I was preparing breakfast, I observed a scene: Eileen had sent her to the local supermarket for two raisin scones. A moment later, she returned with a small bag and received one of the cookies. Then she sat down opposite me, on one of two available places to sit in that kitchen, and ate bite by bite, celebrating every little morsel and constantly repeating: “Thank you very much Eillen, that's very tasty” I thought I would cry as the scene was really touching for me. I figured out that she didn't have many opportunities to enjoy a fresh bakery.

After I had been transferred to another shelter - a "quieter facility" as Jason put it - on Sunday 23rd March I spotted this woman waiting on the pedestrian crossing in front of Tralee train station. She had a small rucksack on, a pillow attached to it and a pair of worn shoes hanging limply. I said “Hello” and asked if she was going on a journey. Her reply literally floored me: "No, I have no place to go. She threw me out (Eileen from the Jesuses’ and Marys’). She doesn't need me anymore. I thought she might have cancer or something, as she acted very strangely. I don't know. I worked so hard. The hoover was so heavy…". "Do you have any money?" I interrupted her, because both: her eyes and mine were starting to sweat; I was getting emotional again and I couldn't afford it; Not in the center of this damned city; Not in the middle of the street. Besides, she was the one who needed support, not me. "No, I have nothing." Without thinking, I pulled a 50 euro note out of my pocket and handed it to her. She opened her arms and hugged me tightly, repeating, "Thank you, thank you very much." I told her that it was nothing, that was all I could do for her at the moment and as she knows, I am homeless myself, so there is not much more I can offer her. I asked her if she ever received money from her for the work she did every day? As I had expected, she said, "No, just a bed and food." My next question: "How long did you work for her?" She replied: “One and a half years”. I was overcome by terrible helplessness, I saw her blue eyes filling with tears and I was unable to do anything, total helplessness. It is such a terribly devastating feeling. I asked her if she had an Irish phone number. She replied in the affirmative, but straight after added that she is trying not to call anybody as she hasn’t any credit, nor money. 

I wrote down her number, told her that I would contact her later, that now I had to go to a meeting - it was Sunday and like every week, I was on the way to my friends in Midleton, just to get away from this nightmare for 3 hours - I asked her to look after herself and not giving up. I felt really bad - completely helpless, seized by fury; overwhelming anger, which I could not give any outlet to. Throwing her out on the street, on Sunday, when all the offices are closed, after one and a half years of toil, without a penny, to nowhere: this is what we could call: meta level Christianity. One question was ringing in my head: did she do it before or after the morning mass, at which she always tries to be visible? 

A phone call to my mother, and after that chat with a friend calmed me down a bit. I told them both about the incident and, as I had heard earlier: "I have to publicize it somehow, as that all is not normal". Interestingly, after returning from my friends' I told the same story in the cell of the shelter which I occupy. Outraged, I ended by saying in very strong emotions that: "If I ever hear from anybody that Eileen is a “good woman” I will personally punch whoever says so". The reaction of the two Irish guys I shared the cage with blew me away: they came very aggressively to her defense, saying that she had helped them (by giving them a bunk for, oh! 160 euros only a week), when the council had barred them from the shelter for a week or two; that the woman had only herself to blame, because as one of them said: "Eileen asked me once to call her from her room as she stayed in bed too long" (the bloody robot, broke down or something), that I am ... (and here a lot of vulgarities not suitable for quoting), that I should be careful because they (especially one of them), can teach me this and that, that I should "excessively hurry up" to my bunk, where my place is, and so on and so forth. I couldn't believe what I was hearing. However, before I heard this stream of vulgarisms, while telling what had happened on the pedestrian crossing in front of the station, I threw out that: "... and I gave her 50 euros, because that's all I had". I heard immediately back: "You shouldn't do that, because you won't see your money again". At that time I didn't fully understand this answer, because I simply operate on a different level of humanity, only after some time did it dawn on me that for them there was no option of sharing in times of need. They probably thought that she was the one who asked me for money. In fact she didn’t even need to do it, as it was me, who gave it to her of my own free will, driven by a normal human reflex. 

That night, for a moment before I fell asleep after taking two sleeping pills, I sat unnaturally bent in my bunk and wondered: how could one be so drained? How had these people next to me lost themselves? Was it the ubiquitous meanness they experienced every day that had affected them so badly? One of them jumped over me comically, waving his fists and mumbling something to himself. I only replied that he should calm down, because I didn't want any problems. I had an image of millions of Poles opening their homes to Ukrainians fleeing the war, saw Solidarity, thought about ideas of ​​Christianity that are supposedly so close to every Irish person. But it turned out that the most important thing was: to be noticed in church, during mass, in the first row; hanging holy pictures on every wall, preferably 5, putting up altars with figures: in the hallway, lobby, upstairs, in the kitchen, wherever you could. Ireland is separated from Europe, not only by water, but above all by a huge difference in the approach to fundamental, existential, human matters. That night, before going to bed, I took two sleeping pills. I wanted to fall asleep quickly. I was woken up after less than two hours. After I brutally was placed back to reality and managed to register anything, I saw the face of one of them twisted in anger above me, shouting at me: "stop f...ing snoring! Enough of this f...ing sh…t". I fell asleep again in the morning, after taking the next two pills. The other one of them snored loudly and happily all night long, but that wasn’t a problem. So much for: empathy, understanding and compassion.

I met her again after a few days. She was sitting on a bench in the city park. She seemed calmer, and her complexion changed from earthy and grey to more radiant. I asked if she had a place to stay, if she was safe. She replied that she couldn't tell me where she was staying, but someone had helped her. I breathed a sigh of relief - there were good people after all. I asked if she had contacted the homeless unit of the county council. She replied that she had gone to the office on Monday and filled out all the formalities and was now waiting for an answer. Similarly with Social Welfare - the case was ongoing. "At least that much good will come of it" - I thought - "She will finally settle her affairs in this country". I wished her luck and really hoped that finally something positive would happen in this woman's life.

Our paths crossed again on April 1; I met her on my way to church - the one in the center, St. John's. She was walking sadly, absent; with a cat carrier on her back and a small bag held dispassionately in her hand. She almost didn't notice me. I went up to her and asked if everything was OK. She said she had nowhere to go again, nowhere to sleep. I asked "What about the council? Will they allocate you a bed in a shelter?" I heard: "They're still working on it." I was filled with rage: what do you mean "still?" More than 10 people in this useless office can't allocate her a bed in half-full shelters? What's stopping them? What else do these shady crews do, apart from constantly harassing people in need? Haven't they seen this modern slave at Saint Eileen of the Images? After all, they've visited this dump many times over the last one and a half years, nothing ever escapes their attention, and they haven't seen a human robot? She was literally everywhere there! And always! What's the problem with housing someone who has nothing, absolutely nothing? I was filled with rage and regret. I had no money on me, I thought - I was going to church for morning prayer, but didn't help someone in real need. After some time, I found 20 euros in my pockets. I walked through the city park hoping to meet her, but she probably went somewhere to warm up.

I met her in the park that same day, as I walked through it for the third time in the hope of meeting her. I noticed her figure by the bench near the playground, she was walking around aimlessly; the cat was meowing pitifully in its carrier. And again that overwhelming feeling of helplessness. I handed her 20 euros - that was all I could afford. She was moved again. I told her that she should go out for dinner, eat something warm if she could, and that I kindly asked her to do so. From that time until the day I left Tralee to travel to Poznan I saw her almost every day in the city park, sitting on the same bench with a desperately meowing cat in a carrier. Despite the shining sun, it was cold - the temperature at night dropped to 5, 6 degrees. Wrapped up for winter, she shivered and looked frozen. Social welfare and “the office” nearby were working hard on her case - 13th day!

Back to the house of evil and the system of volunteer work there: The Czech guy is more for physical tasks: like moving bunk beds from room to room, putting in new carpet, all of the maintenance and so on. In fact for no extra cost for her Eileen managed to find free labor. Sitting in that cold, small kitchen, which does not fulfill any hygienic and safety standards, she was giving her orders to 3 modern slaves, who didn't have enough assertiveness or other possibilities to say “no” to her. One day she even approached me and said: “You should do something productive, maybe volunteer here for a few hours daily” - “Sure”, I thought “and the next thing you will order me to clean the toilets in return of stale buns and expired food. Never in my life”, but I answered only: “sure, yea… will see”.

Every morning Eileen receives the food from the food bank or the local supermarkets - all items close to expiration or out of date, unfresh vegetables and stale bread. From those items she is preparing the food for the some homeless people living in the house of evil. But… Yes, there is one big “BUT” in that lovely, touching story - quite disturbing mark: she is asking 35 euro weekly for that service. So in fact she is reselling the food to people who are: extremely poor, reached really the rock bottom of society ladder, to those who don't have anything just to generate a bit of extra profit, because what: “pecunia non olet” - money doesn't smell. As far I know she buys only milk - 2, 3 liters daily and cheap butter with her own money. I don't know, maybe that is the standard way in Ireland: milking as much as you can. Maybe I didn't see that before, as I didn't have any contact to that part of local reality, but in Poland - my homeland was one parliament member - her assistant sold to second hand shops clothing, which he got from Polish Red Cross - the whole case finished in court and it was a big scandal, but that was in Poland: easter country; in wild East, so not really relevant for Irish realities (different standards).

After my stepfather’s funeral I came back straight to Ireland as I was under very high pressure and in very big stress (in my mind I had two main intrusive thoughts: I have to go back because of social welfare investigation, and: they could throw me out to the street, and then I would be in a very big troubles - I know, very irrational, but so am I sometimes, especially when acting under very high pressure and when I am drugged by antidepressants). After the warm greeting, which I got in the office at Denny Street by Rose of Homeless, Maryanne arranged for me a "peaceful room" at Finnegan’s. The first night was relatively ok - the guy who I was sharing a cell with, was smoking, and scrolling loudly on his mobile, but it was better then in the overcrowded room 16. Unfortunately, the next day she moved another guy to the empty bed - he was smoking like crazy (to call him a "chain smoker"?, No!… I am 52 years of age, so let say last 40 years I am fully aware of that what is going around me, and over that four decades I never saw anything like that - he was a male incarnation of doctor Judora Fletcher - a character created by Mia Farrow in Woody Allen’s movie “Zelig” where she was pictured in every scene with cigarette. That guy was really exceptional. One evening I measured: 3 rollies in 15 minutes so each in 5 minutes average. The worst: he almost never left the room and even during the night, in the middle, he was still able to wake up and smoke 2 or 5 right beside my head in his bunk - the room was really small, maximum 12 square meters so our bunks were beside each other and heads maybe 40 cm away. After only a few hours of his presence, because of his addiction I was sick not only to my stomach, I had a very intense headache, and I started to cough very badly. Just one day was enough to make me hoarse. On the top of that in that room was a telly - the broken one without any remote and the only color from the big screen which it emitted was hundreds of shades of blue. In one word: a real nightmare. The smoker - let's call him that way - got obsessed by that old, half-broken device. First night of his company the telly was roaring (really very loudly) until 1.30am. Around 11pm I asked him to turn off that thing and stop smoking. The answer was “NO!”. Second night - more less the same with the tiny difference, that the telly was on until 2.20am. I asked again, but the answer was over and over the same. I took 4 tablets for sleep, one after another, but because of the noise and the incredible stink of cigarettes, they didn’t work at all. Only caused a headache and the impression of a very bad hangover as a side effect for the whole next day.

After second night of that torture I went to Eileen and told her about the issue; I just came back from my stepfather's funeral, it was literally the second night. Her answer just nailed me: “You should be grateful that you have telly in your room, and if you have any issue with that - get yourself earplugs” and saying that, she made a quite characteristic gesture, like she was putting the plugs in her ears. I only thought: “lovely, interesting how you would have reacted after your father’s death, what would you have expected?” travesting her favourite sentence. After I complained I got moved to the legendary room number 16, exactly the same where I started, with small difference - instead of 9 it was only 3 of us in that same place - one guy with heroine issue, who for really unclear reason, decided to be nasty to me, and guy who before told me, that I am making his day very long, and should wake up around noon or 1pm like himself. That was my punishment, as usually in Ireland, if you complain, you’re the one who is getting troubles. 

Last contact with her I had on Ash Wednesday, when surrounded by Jesuses’ and Marys’ from the old armchair in the small lobby, with a cross marked with ash on her forehead she asked: “You moving?”

At Finnegan's you can buy cheap, bad quality drugs: speed, heroin, weed; unfortunately you can't pay by card, but that's probably a less important detail. You can also safely take all of that on the spot - I experienced it myself when at the beginning, completely disoriented, offered to me by my fellow inmates, I snorted speed from the nightstand in the legendary room no. 16, or smoked dubious quality joints in search of sleep when the pills stopped working. Fortunately, I quickly realized that this path would lead me straight to perdition, to a place from which there would be no return. Saint Eileen of the Pictures is also aware of this. None other than her, she called the ambulance when some people overdosed on heroin, and it happens, let's say: not sporadically. The awareness of what is happening under her roof does not prevent her from regularly attending mass in the local church, nor from pretending to be a defender and comforter of the little ones, nor from collecting 160 euros a week from some, heavily dependent, for conditions that are a far cry from any standards out of the 240 that these poor people receive from the state. The most important thing, however, is that the facade shines, not of the house, because it is grey and exceptionally gloomy, but of her personality - a true Catholic.