Shane Hegarty's encyclopaedia of modern Ireland
It was some achievement to turn the Irish language into something sexy, to make it smell of rare and delicate perfume rather than boiled cabbages and chewed tobacco. Irish is not a language that lends itself to sexiness. The Irish nation's sexual maturity must have been stunted by how a "cúpla focail" could bring foreplay (or "imirt ceathair") to a dead stop.
By the way, how many people, when they say that they have "cúpla focail", literally mean that "cúpla" and "focail" are the only "cúpla focail" that they have?
TG4 came along at a critical time. For years before that, most people's daily encounter with spoken Irish was when they skimmed past Raidió Na Gaeltachta on the dial. The Irish language may be a wonderful thing, but when spoken on radio it often sounds like someone's letting a chainsaw run down. To be fair, even Raidió Na Gaeltachta has changed with the times. It still has the usual talk shows and diddly-eye, but there is a magical window at night when you turn it on to find Finnish electronica droning where the Irish language used to.
The TV station brought Irish up to date, especially with its soap opera, even if you get the feeling that the murder rate in Ros na Rún would be even higher if there wasn't a danger that they'd run out of Irish-speaking actors. The channel made a name for itself for the never-ending supply of good-looking weather girls - but most other programmes seem to consist of an old man singing in a pub, surrounded by people staring at their feet, or into their pints? TG4 is always that bit disappointing when it's not living up to the promise of the west of Ireland as being some kind of Amazonian warrior/weather forecaster paradise.
Still, it gives us a sense that Irish is somehow part of our everyday lives. There's a census next year, and you wonder how many of us will exaggerate our level of Irish because it makes us feel good. Because you can understand it pretty well now, thanks to TG4. As long as it's being spoken by Hector. And there are subtitles. So you put yourself down as a speaker. Especially as there may eventually be as much Polish spoken daily in Ireland as there is Irish, and it was difficult enough to the get the kids into a Gaelscoil without having to worry about transferring them to a Polska Szkola.
It's nice to have TG4, down the channels, working away to keep the language alive. And it's great to turn over to it every now again, to give yourself a cultural booster. Yep, it's great to watch Nip/Tuck or the Monday night western, and know you're doing your bit to keep the language alive.