Hector meets Mullingar family in new show

A family from Latvia who have made Mullingar their home feature on the first episode of Hector’s new three-part TV series, which starts this Thursday night, September 30 on TG4 at 9.30pm.

‘Hector - Éire Nua’ sees Hector take us on a whirlwind tour of Ireland meeting all the great people from overseas who now call Ireland home.

From Brazil to the Congo, Canada to Ghana, Russia to Syria, he’s in search of answers of who they are, why they came, how they settled in and how Ireland is treating them. These people are the changing face of Ireland – This is Hector’s ‘Éire Nua’.

In the first episode Hector begins his travels on the banks of the Blackwater River in his hometown of Navan where he meets Nigerian radio star Yemi Adenuga and her husband Dsji. Yemi tells of her life before moving to Ireland. She says, “I’ve been in this town since 2004…… Home. That’s the one word that describes what we feel about this country, about this county, about this town.”

In Mullingar he meets the Kislinas from Latvia who came here for work and Iveta says that “Home is here now, life is here. I never imagined us staying so long.”

And New Yorker Jeaic who came for the language and now lives in Lucan training in the local GAA club. Hector’s journey continues with a fishing excursion alongside a French fisherman that has made county Clare his home. He then encounters Victor, a Russian man that learnt his impeccable Irish in Moscow. He discusses the daily struggles that radio presenter Ola Majekodunmi experiences when trying to work with the Irish language and hears a heart-warming tale of nurse Patricia’s first time arriving in Ireland.

In second episode, Hector returns to Westmeath to meet Liberian born GAA star, Boidu Sayeh; he hears how GAA-mad Jeannine O'Brien from the Congo was swept off her feet by an Irish man in Limerick.

He hears stories about families seeking asylum from activist Fadl Mustapha in Letterkenny and Syrian soap maker Reham Ghafarji in Clonakilty before heading to meet Kerry’s Una-Minh Caomhánach.

Hector explores the pull and effect that Irish culture has on people from around the world and discusses the musical connection with Argentinian born Fernanda and Irish speaking, Uilleann Piper, Megan from Canada.