Megan O’Brien

Welcome to my blog, I am a student journalist in TU Dublin and this blog is where I'll be posting photographs of people, places and things that I have taken for varioius photojourrnalism projects over the course of 2020.

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Dyslexia, Helping your child cope

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The Student Cookbook

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Fast Fashion

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Study Guide For Students

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The Gardening Year

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The Mindfulness Handbook

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Finally, after a long day keeping himself busy in isolation, John sits down and relaxes on the couch, finishing off a book he’s had on the go for almost a year! “I’ve been trying to finish this one for so long, I’m sure by the end of this isolation I’ll have read twenty books but for now I’m delighted to have a just a minute with this one”.

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Although all of his staff have been laid off and his business is temporarily closed, John still has to keep up with his paperwork. He still does everything by hand, “I don’t bother with much technology I wouldn’t have an interest in laptop or anything like that. I’ve been running a successful business for 30 years, a pen and paper has gotten me this far, I think I’ll stick with it”. 

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COVID-19 is a global pandemic and is causing sadness and fear all over the world. Spring and some warm weather have been a welcome arrival and remind people that there is light at the end of this scary tunnel. For John, there’s no better thing to do in weather like this than clean off the barbecue, get some burgers on and enjoy them with his family. 

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John is using some of his time in isolation to get going on something he’s always wanted but never had the time to make: a vegetable patch.

“There’s a lot more to it than you’d think, you have take off all the sod, dig the soil, lay shallow trenches, sew the seed and then you have to fill all the soil back in.”  It’s lot of work to be doing in the sun but with 100 days until you see the signs of the first potato, there’s no time to waste. “Potatoes, onions and carrots galore” John says he will have by the time we’re out of isolation. 

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Spring has sprung and although we can’t enjoy it like we usually would, John O’Brien from Leixlip, Co. Kildare is making sure he gets outside. He knows he has to keep himself busy while his business is closed temporarily, “I’d go crazy if I was to just sit around and watch the tv all day, I’ll probably have to resort to that when I run out of jobs around the place”. 

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Positivity in a pandemic

John O’Brien from Leilxip, Co. Kildare has been self-employed for 35 years. His contractor company celebrated its 30th anniversary las August and he is proud of what he has to show for his hard work. “I never liked school, I wasn’t good at it and if you weren’t good at it back then the teachers weren’t exactly nice about it”

Realising school wasn’t for him, John left at sixteen and became an apprentice carpenter. But when he lost his job at that and got sick of being on welfare, he decided to try going out on his own. “It worked out, for no other reason than hard work and not crying over the little things”

John’s business grew into a successful one and all was going well for him until the outbreak of COVID-19 reached Ireland and launched everyone into unknown and worrying territory. As the crisis got exponentially worse throughout March, less and less work came in for John’s business as his clients all began to air on the side of caution. “I was doing little bits here and there for the first few weeks but then we all realised how serious this was getting and I had to call it all off”. 

On the 24th of March 2020, John laid off all his employees and has been self-isolating at home with his wife Maire and his three children ever since. For many this is a boring time but for John, who always has a long list of DIY jobs, its a busy one. He’s using this time to dig up and make himself a vegetable patch where he plans to plant “lots of spuds.”

Keeping up with paperwork is important too and afterwards he can relax with a good book on the couch, “something I never had time for before, I was always so busy running around 24/7″.

Despite all the pain and suffering going on all over the world, the arrival of Spring has managed to bring a smile to many peoples faces including Johns. He’s excited to be getting the barbecue out and getting it cleaned so he can use it soon.

These are uncertain and tense times for everyone but in John’s words: “we have to keep positive, everyone needs to make themselves stay positive”.

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The Model Airplane

Ireland is a small island but we are more connected than ever. As the 15th most globalised economy in the world, we are home to the headquarters of many major multi-national corporations including Google, Facebook, Apple and IBM.

We are becoming more and more connected every day on an economical level but also on a personal level as air travel becomes increasingly accessible to everyone thanks to the emergence of budget airlines such as Ryanair.

This model airplane is representative of globalisation and increased connectivity in contemporary Ireland.

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The Ripped Plaster

As of January 2020, there are 12,000 people on trolleys in hospitals around Ireland, a very topical issue in the run up to the Irish general election in February. Various parties were promising to provide beds to alleviate this problem, however, when you crunch the numbers, the number of beds each party claimed they would make available would only provide for roughly a third of the people waiting.

A ripped plaster is a simple metaphor for a healthcare system in crisis. Just like this plaster, our system is no longer able to serve its purpose. 

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The Climate Change Placard

It’s hard to believe there are still those who deny climate change and the influence the human race has on it, but the deniers are most certainly still out there. Kerry TD Danny Healy Rae became known as one of these last year when he publicly stated that he does not “subscribe to the idea that man can influence climate”.

This ‘School Strike for Climate Change’ placard is representative of the ongoing, worldwide battle to educate people on the climate crisis, prevent further global warming and banish these deniers. 

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The Football

In January 2020, it emerged that one in four children in Ireland cannot run properly, two in four cannot kick a ball and only 17% of primary school children engage in the recommended one hour of exercise a day.

This football is a metaphor for the hours of exercise that children are missing out on as they favour spending time on iPads, video games and television screens over physical activity that is key to the development of motor and fundamental movement skills. 

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The Empty Wallet

The Growing up in Ireland survey has reported that more than two thirds of 20-year-olds in Ireland still live at home and are still financially dependent on their parents.

These figures can be traced back to the rising cost of housing in Ireland; young people are being priced out of the market but also cannot afford to rent or save for a mortgage.

The picture of the empty wallet represents this difficulty and the little prospect that the situation will improve any time soon.