If Galway has a heartbreak hotel, it has to be the Eglinton on the seafront in Salthill. There may not be too many of big Elvis's broken-hearted lovers, weeping bell hops or desk clerks dressed in black, but the few occupied rooms are nearly always crowded. . . with families separated from their homeland, friends and relatives, writes Lorna Siggins.
While movers and shakers pound the "Prom" across the street, lonely, dejected faces of various nationalities gaze vacantly from the hotel's front window to the Burren beyond. Young children gravitate to the steps outside, but the busy traffic makes it far too risky to linger. Their parents have come seeking a better life, but the Department of Justice's "direct provision" accommodation isn't the most inspiring place to start.
Or is it? Walk down a long corridor, through the rather bleak and empty bar, and a door with no name opens into a haven of happy activity. Here in the small computer room, two Iraqi dentists are talking to their relatives in Baghdad, an 11-year- old "blogmaster" from Israel is mounting more images on his on-line photo gallery, a Siberian economist is tracking local radio stations in his native Omsk.
Several children anxiously wait their turn at the computer terminals, which have been provided through the hotel and the generosity of local businesses.
The virtual village is the first of its type in an asylum seekers' centre, according to its architect, Brendan Smith, community and education officer with NUI Galway's Digital Enterprise Research Institute (DERI).
DERI is one of these flagship university projects, funded by Science Foundation Ireland, which is currently researching the next stage of internet technology known as the "semantic" web. As part of its mission statement, it has a strong "outreach" remit. Since it began engaging with the Eglinton several years ago, a large number of its multinational residents have been tutored in computer skills, enabling them to use email, download vital information, set up their own websites, create their own links - and chat to each other as they work.
Young Iraqi dentists Adil and Huda Jafer have both established their own "blogs" (internet diaries) since they came to Galway nine months ago with their two children. Adil clicks the mouse to show photographs of Sunni and Shia marching together back home. "These are more positive images than you see in the press", he says, explaining that their own mixed marriage was one of the reasons for leaving everything they had behind.
They were both refused their initial asylum application here, and have lodged an appeal. There is no trace of anger or bitterness as they talk.
"We are just happy every day to be alive," Huda says cheerfully. They may be checking Google Earth daily to see if their house is still standing, but this State of a thousand welcomes obviously doesn't believe they have left a war.
Vladislave Korenblat (11), the Russian/Israeli "blogmaster", is currently at St Nicholas's Parochial National School in Galway city. Maxim Glaida (15) is studying at Monageeisha Community College across the city since he came to Galway six months ago. Originally from Sakhalin island, his family settled in Israel and he has his own interpretation of the current conflict on three websites he has built.
Under a community computer recycling initiative established by DERI, the computer room was equipped with monitors, keyboards and other used technology donated by Udarás na Gaeltachta, the Galway Technical Institute, the Galway Public Library and individuals. Keyboards were adapted by Smith to allow for Cyrillic and Arabic alphabets.
The six-month training programmes which he runs form part of a series of DERI initiatives which are supported by Galway City Council, Galway County Council, the HSE West, Galway Centre for Independent Living and other NUIG departments. Gort's thriving Brazilian population, active retirement and parents' groups and other organisations across the city and county have benefited from the courses.
Smith has appointed team leaders, and the Eglinton residents have created a community website, www.galwayasylumseekers.blogspot.com, which carries news on upcoming events in the city and county and reports of various community activities which the asylum-seekers have been involved in - such as planting trees for a city-sponsored maze on the banks of the Corrib.
It also has vital information on legal issues for all first-time arrivals in Ireland. "Our aim is to set up more of these initiatives in other hostels in the city and county," Smith says.
For him, one of the most rewarding aspects has been witnessing the impact on people like Shpresa Gjeca, from Albania, and her husband, vet Osman.
The couple have three children, aged 16, 14 and 10, but they haven't seen them for almost a year.
With her best English, Shpresa tries to explain how mafia-type criminality has made it almost impossible to remain, how the couple want to find a home for all the family elsewhere - and how they had to leave the three children with relatives for now.
Thanks to webcams fitted to the Eglinton computers, Shpresa and Osman can chat at a reasonable phone rate to the trio, and can also see them on screen almost every day. As she speaks, the youngest is laughing and reaches out his arms on the computer monitor thousands of miles away. Fortunately, he can't see his mother's tears.