Periodic gas explosions. Flash fires. Frightened shrieks and roars. One small, bespectacled man in a white coat bearing a giant matchstick remains prime suspect after an outbreak of mayhem at a recent gathering in Salthill, Galway, writes Lorna Siggins.
His name is Dr Bunhead, and security sources say he has been engaged in subversive activities for some time. His most frequent activities include blowing up empty Pringle crisp tins with a mixture of hydrogen and air, combusting jelly babies, and destroying hot water bottles and bananas in liquid nitrogen.
The chemistry graduate has also been known to talk liberally to young children about noisy bodily functions. In Galway, he was witnessed forcing adults to assist him in his attempts to break existing air-speed records - by firing raw potatoes through tennis rackets. Bunhead, better known as Tom Pringle, was one of a number of partners engaged in highly questionable activities at Galway's recent seventh annual science and technology festival.
Also under surveillance were two Scottish associates who were reported to have been helping children to create strange objects in a number of public libraries throughout the week. The former art teachers Len McDermid and Dick Warren of Rude Mechanicals set up the project as their response to the fact that people don't get a chance to make things any more. Even "educational" toys come with so many instructions that little is left to the brain, and to plain old ingenuity.
"We can learn to design, research, survey, market, but the actual physical creation of simple things is a skill that we will lose if we are not careful," they say. Their mission in life is to remind us all of the genius within. Thus, with several simple instructions, they set young charges to work making paper dragons and butterflies on wheels, using materials such as wood, cardboard and paper, with paper-clips to drive rotating wings..
Then there were the members of the Scottish MadLabs troupe. Equipped with soldering irons and masks, they invited young visitors to make lie-detectors, decision-making machines, flashing badges, programmable robots and other variations on the electronic circuit board. Lee Gibbs, a science communicator based in Kent, persuaded even the most faint-hearted to cuddle his cockroaches, massage his millipedes and stroke his tarantulas during his "Big Bug Show", while James Soper, also from across the water, discussed the intelligence of his compatriot David Beckham. Soper's computerised presentation included a three-dimensional analysis of the English soccer captain's ball path to show that it incorporated several key scientific principles - including Newton's laws of motions, Galileo's parabola principle, and the Coanda effect, whereby a fluid will follow a curved surface and a ball will spin and turn through air.
It wasn't all adult mischief. A battery-powered lighthouse made by the students of Scoil Chaomhain on the Aran islands, a video analysis of east Galway fox-hunting by students of Kilconnell National School and optical illusion tricks by Killeeneen National School were among the many school exhibits at the event. Competing with them for attention were the Marine Institute, the European Space Agency, Galway's third-level colleges and multinationals. And the Army. . .with not one, but two, stands displaying rather fearsome weaponry.
The festival, run by Richie Byrne along with Simon Lenihan, Tom Hyland, formerly of the IDA, and Bernard Kirk, director of the Galway Education Centre, is now regarded as the largest of its type in Europe. But anyone who knows Richie Byrne well, and there are many, also knows that he has several other strings to his bow - or, rather, his guitar. On Sunday, January 23rd, together with his colleagues Joe Skelton on flute, Maria Fahy on violin and Paddy Cunningham on double bass, he will take to the "stage" in the St Patrick's Band Hall, near Galway's train station. The traditional music performance will mark the third in a series of events organised by the new Adventures in Music (AIM) project.
The name is derived from an initiative spearheaded by the late Mary Kathleen Ó Murchadha. Mrs Ó Murchadha, a music educationist, was so committed to her profession that she also organised classical concerts for young families in Galway.
Smaller kids were also invited into her home for "pre-instrumental rhythm workshops", her daughter-in-law, Anne Weadick, explains.
Ms Weadick is one of the founders of its successor AIM, along with a group of women who met up through a mother and toddler network on Galway's Westside. As the AIM's chair, Tara McDonnell, explains, "When my son started violin lessons two years ago, at the age of three, I could not find a place to take him to hear the instrument being played to a professional standard - a place that was child-friendly." First act booked for the series was the Black Coffee Trio, with jazz singer Ellie Cummins, Jon O'Driscoll on double bass and Jan King on piano. Children learned to click their fingers and "move to the groove", with babies in nappies joining in - if slightly off key. Several weeks later, the hall's resident musicians, the St Patrick's Brass Band, tuned up to play a series of Christmas carols, under the sharp but friendly eye of conductor Michael Dooley. For those adults present, the rich and resonant sound of a brass band indoors was one to remember.
The AIM format encourages children to meet musicians and preview the instruments before the performance begins. Ticket prices have been geared to cover costs only - at €20 for a family pass, or €5 a head. Richie Byrne, Joe Skelton and friends will be followed by classical music with the Elena Gekker Trio on March 13th and an introduction to Thai traditional music by Tumtim Walsh on April 24th.
All of the Sunday afternoon gigs are in the St Patrick's Band Hall, and tickets are available at the door or in advance from Mulligan Records in Middle Street, Galway. Supporting the initiative is the renowned Irish pianist John O'Conor, who has agreed to give an evening concert for older children in the Town Hall Theatre, Galway, on February 11th.