TeenTimes: Cork, the real capital of Ireland, was also the European Capital of Culture for 2005. We are so proud we have been telling everyone about it, including all our European friends. But as the year draws to a close what I want to know is: what has this year really done for us?

I mean, fair enough, Patrick Street does look nice now that it's finished. And I'm sure the new drainage in the city works well even if it hasn't been possible to make it stop raining altogether. But apart from the superficial changes that have taken place, can we really say we are more cultured than we were in 2004?

I'm not happy to say it but I don't think the year has done anything for us in this regard. This year was built up to be something great, something to look forward to. But I think it is nothing more than a missed opportunity to make a real and lasting difference.

Cork 2005 could have been so fantastic. So much could have happened. It started promisingly enough with a fireworks display on January 8th. Since then? Not much really. The year seems to have gone the way of the weather. It was a damp, dull, soggy squib.

I'm sure that if I was bothered to call the organisers of Cork 2005 they'd tell me that there were loads of entertaining items lined up throughout the year. Unfortunately they all seemed to be held at inconvenient times of the day when the normal, hard-working citizens of Cork are busy with their daily lives. As much as I'd love to have seen the Belgian Symphony Orchestra it would have meant me missing a very important physics test. I'm not sure my teacher would have been too impressed had I missed the test with the excuse that I was trying to support our capital of culture.

Another problem was that few seemed to know what was going on in the city. It just wasn't advertised properly. The organisers will tell me that everyone knew about the Peripheral Vision Video Art exhibition which ended a few days ago, but if I were to ask the average Joe Soap on the street they'd look at me as if I had suddenly grown an extra head.

All year long we have been pretending to be the Capital of Culture. How could we do it for real we when we didn't even know what was happening? To the organisers of Cork 2005: I'm sure you did a great job organising everything and I'm sorry to have to complain. But it would have been nice if you'd told us about some of the great and wonderful events you planned.

The truth is I don't feel any more cultured than I did this time last year. As far as I know, neither do any of my friends.

The one thing I am, though, is proud. I'm proud that our little city was the capital of something for once. For this reason I might try to hoover up some last crumbs of culture over the four remaining days of our inauspicious reign.

If I can find out what's going on, that is.

Aisling Bolger (17) is a pupil at Scoil Mhuire College, Wellington Road, Cork city

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