PolskaEire Festival falls victim to Covid
A KEY event in the summer calendar for north Wexford, Gorey’s PolskaEire festival, will not be taking place this year due to the Covid-19 restrictions.
Kasia Neumann Kochanska of organisers Gorey.pl said that due to the current restrictions, the group has not been able to source much income to organise events for the coming months or even next year.
‘Unfortunately there will be no PolskaEire this year, and it would have been the sixth edition of the festival. We hope to update everyone with the new dates for the festival as soon as we can. At the moment we do not have any idea what we could do online instead,’ said Kasia.
Although saddened by the latest development, the team at Gorey Polish Cultural Association was happy to mark their fifth birthday earlier this year.
‘Our association, which aims to foster close relations between the native and Polish populations of the town, was established in April 2015.
‘The beginnings were difficult as Gorey.pl was supported only by membership fees and didn’t have any contact with local authorities, the Polish embassy in Dublin or other entities that could support the establishment. However, we had the ambition to make the association recognisable in Ireland by organising great cultural events.
‘Over the years, we tried to maintain a high level and variety of events from culinary evenings to photography and acting workshops, exhibitions, picnics, folk evenings, artistic performances as well as events addressed only to children, adults or to families. We took part in St Patrick’s Parades in Gorey and many events supporting charities in Gorey and in Poland’.
Although planning at Gorey.pl has slowed due to the pandemic, the team is still as thankful as ever.
‘Unfortunately, the festival won’t take place but the most important thing is for everyone to be healthy and get back to normal life quickly. We would like to take this opportunity to thank all the people who contributed to the creation of Gorey. pl, those who were members of the association and who supported Gorey.pl for these five years,’ said Kasia.