Brother Patrick Tierney, veteran of La Salle’s Hong Kong Catholic schools, discusses his devotion to education, his fondness for football and Bruce Lee
I WAS BORN IN 1942 on a small farm in the west of Ireland. We were poor; no toilet, no electricity. We did have animals, cows and pigs, turkeys and hens, but it was hand to mouth, because we were a big family. There were 12 children and I was No 12. We sold milk and eggs. It was a village called Snugboro, near Castlebar in County Mayo. Castlebar is the county town and there was a La Salle school there and that’s where I went. In Primary Six, a recruiter (for the Catholic La Salle order) came in and said, “Would you like to join the brothers?” I raised my hand. That was the beginning, 70 years ago. My oldest brother, Thomas, also joined the La Salle brothers.
MY MOTHER HAD to go shopping for pyjamas, shoes and football boots; I really wanted those. We didn’t have a football apart from in Primary Four, when Brother Conleth organised the town into street leagues. That was Gaelic football, of course. I was sent to Mallow, in County Cork, to this place run by the brothers and then on to County Laois to prepare for O-levels. Then we had to do one year of spiritual formation. That was tough. There was a lot of prayer, a lot of chapel and a lot of manual labour as they had big grounds. There was a lot of silence.
