Obama Arrives for Ireland 'Homecoming' in a Four-Nation European Tour
U.S. President Barack Obama arrived in windswept Dublin on Monday for a highly personal stop in Ireland at the start of a four-nation European tour.
Obama's visit will also take him on a state visit to Britain, the G8 summit in France and Poland.
In Ireland he will address crowds in Dublin and then travel to the tiny village of Moneygall in rural County Offaly, from where his great-great-great grandfather Falmouth Kearney on his mother's side emigrated more than 160 years ago.
Kearney was the 19-year-old son of a shoemaker who arrived in New York in 1850 in search of a better life.
Obama and his wife Michelle arrived on a blustery morning, with the wind whipping across rain soaked Dublin Airport as he was greeted by officials on the apron.
The president was to start his visit by meeting Irish President Mary McAleese at her official residence, followed by talks with Prime Minister Enda Kenny in nearby Farmleigh, also in Dublin's Phoenix Park.
Afterwards he will make his way to Moneygall, little more than a one-strip village in the midlands, by helicopter or by road depending on the usually fickle Irish weather.
Parts of the Kearney house are still standing, while an upper floor has been added on the pebble-dashed, two-bed roomed home.
U.S. security men have been staking out the village for nearly a week and only the 350-odd residents of Moneygall and the surrounding farms will be allowed in for the trip, expected to last little more than an hour.
Obama's eighth cousin, 26-year-old accountant Henry Healy, was buzzing with excitement.
"This is going to be one of the most historic days we have ever seen," he told Agence France Presse.
A song celebrating Obama's distant Irish heritage is doing the rounds.
"O Leary, O'Reilly, O'Hare and O'Hara, There's no-one as Irish as Barack O'Bama," goes the ditty by the Corrigan Brothers.
"He's as Irish as bacon and cabbage and stew. He's Hawaiian, he's Kenyan, American too," it goes on.
Obama is to round off the day with a speech in Dublin's College Green road, where one of his Democratic predecessors Bill Clinton gave an address in 1995.
A crowd expected to exceed 20,000 is due to gather to hear him speak from the steps of the Bank of Ireland, with Dublin's famous Trinity College on his left.
Ben Rhodes, U.S. deputy national security advisor for strategic communications, told reporters that Obama's speech would discuss the affinity between Ireland and the United States.
"It's a chance for the president to really celebrate the ties between our countries and the kind of unique feelings that the American people have for Ireland," he said.
Obama's address is set to be the culmination of a party, with Westlife, the Sawdoctors, Irish Eurovision stars Jedward, the National Chamber Choir and Imelda May among the performers.
Actor Daniel Day-Lewis, Ireland rugby star Brian O'Driscoll and football hero Robbie Keane were also to appear.
The Irish Examiner said the visit was part homecoming, part political mission and part election photo opportunity.
"The ebb and flow of political and social power in America reflects the changing demographics of the world's greatest melting pot," the newspaper said.
"President Obama may be the epitome of that energizing diversity but we should all celebrate the fact that he chooses to celebrate his links with Ireland, however distant."
Source: Agence France Presse
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