French connection still strong between Offaly villages and Jaux

BALLINAGAR Ballycommon Geashill Twinning Town committee members are busy at present getting their Legacy Tree project off the ground.

This idea came from one of the committee members to involve all of the three schools in Ireland and Jaux national school and to deepen the connection around the town twinning.

The idea is that five children from each of the four schools will be trained and shown how to create their own legacy tree from different components like wire and other materials.

Each individual tree will represents a metaphor for the child’s own deep roots in their family, school and community. Each child will then be involved in making a larger tree which they will keep and display within each school namely St. Coleman’s NS Cappagh, Scoil Seosaimh Naofa, Ballinagar, Geashill NS and Jaux National School.

The children will attend a series of workshops in Ballycommon Telework and Training Centre while simultaneously online the children in Jaux will be receiving instruction with artist Glenn Gibson on zoom.

Glenn Gibson, artist and sculptor who is based in Galway specialises in Legacy Trees projects will be the main facilitator of this project along with members of the Town Twinning committee and other invited guests.

This is planned over the coming weeks and we look forward to showcasing the Trees at a later date. This project was part funded by the Offaly County Council Arts Office.

The committee would like to thank the children, parents, teachers and principals of the three schools for their continued support of this Town Twinning Project and we look forward to many similar projects in the coming years.

Meanwhile in Jaux, there has been a lot of activity around the Town Twinning project with ‘Le Jaux Olympiques’ which formed part of the Jaux village festival.

This unique event saw families getting involved in sporting activities which featured the hurleys and sliotars which were presented to the committee by the BBG TTC in 2019 while on a group visit there pre COVID.

The committee in Jaux have also opened a multi-media library with books and materials for the community to borrow which showcase Ireland, Offaly and our BBG areas, its rich heritage and culture. This has proven to be a great success and so much so that a group intend to visit Dublin in the very near future to explore our capital city and to hopefully meet up with some of their friends in Offaly.

Future plans planned from Jaux are Halloween pumpkin colouring and decorating workshop, and a workshop on how the Irish celebrate Christmas in terms of traditions and rituals.