This article is part of Letters home for Christmas, an Irish Times series exploring views about Ireland among young emigrants as the year draws to a close
Despite living in east London, home is never entirely out of reach for Tipperary native Emily Bourke. The 26-year-old is speaking a day before she is due to teach a beginners’ Irish class at a London pub, part of her efforts to promote the Irish language and build a sense of community in the city.
For decades, London has attracted Irish nurses, teachers and unskilled labourers. These days, creatives like Bourke are among those making the journey across the Irish Sea. She moved in 2023 after finishing a textile and surface design course in National College of Art and Design (NCAD), Dublin. It was the “natural next step” for a career in her industry, she says, with most of her class making the same journey to the city, “bar one or two”.
These days, she is working as an assistant for a fashion brand and models for life-drawing classes. Her biggest passion, however, is Croí na Gaeilge, a grassroots collective for the Irish language which she founded shortly after arriving in the city.
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She hosts meet-ups, pub quizzes, speed-dating evenings and ‘Pints and Caint’ evenings – casual gatherings where Irish speakers and learners can converse over a pint. Through this, Bourke has built a network that brings a piece of home to a city that can feel isolating for young Irish migrants.
London can “swallow you up”, notes Bourke, with the Christmas season feeling “way busier” than in Ireland. “Never mind the crowds that will be on Grafton Street coming up doing the Christmas shopping, London is so busy. There’s a lot of madness in central London.”
London “wouldn’t have the same familiarity or cosiness that you get at home”, Bourke says. She misses the feeling of going into a pub and seeing someone you know around Christmas time.
She finds herself searching for this sense of connection in small gestures. “I’m trying to say thanks to the bus driver,” she says. “It’s not something I hear [in London], or even saying hello to the bus driver. It’s just so fast-paced, it can become kind of isolating in a big city.”
It was during the initial period of adjustment that she came up with the idea for Croí na Gaeilge. The experience took her back to times when she struggled with mental health as a teenager, when going to the Gaeltacht during the summer would help her feel better.
Feeling she should connect with the Irish language again, Bourke began putting up posters around her area advertising a meet-up for Gaelgeoirs and created an Instagram to further its reach. She held her first Irish language meet-up in March, 2023, and since then, has regularly been hosting events for the Irish community. She emphasises that all levels of Irish are welcome.
The response from Irish emigrants has kept her going through turbulent times, and has allowed her to see the project as “something far beyond myself”.
She keeps a close eye on developments in the Irish language at home, saying she would have liked to attend September’s Agóid Náisiúnta na nGael, which saw thousands protest in Dublin for greater funding and equality for the Irish language and Gaeltacht.
“It made me really proud of being Irish and being really proud that so many people care”, she says.
Bourke feels hopeful about Ireland’s future, but is careful to not look at the country “through rose-tinted glasses” from afar. As a Gaeilgeoir, she says the election of President Catherine Connolly, who focused much of her campaign on the promotion of the Irish language, felt like “a really great step in the right direction” .
But Bourke says Ireland is “a very tough place for young people right now”.
She is particularly concerned about the lack of housing in Gaeltacht areas. “So many houses there now are Airbnbs or holiday homes, it’s kind of pushing people that want to raise families through Irish out of the Gaeltacht.”
She hopes to move home one day and senses “a really amazing energy coming from young people that are in Ireland right now”.
“I’ve seen so many amazing grassroots initiatives and creative projects and new spaces that are being created for young people – things like Dublin Independent Fashion Week, giving platforms to upcoming emerging designers and talent.”
For now, she is enjoying the London life, adding: “It’s a really amazing city that has a lot to offer.”
Bourke will escape the hustle and bustle of city life for her town of Borrisoleigh, Tipperary, this Christmas, where she will spend a week at home with family.
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