This morning we had only one engagement, but it was the biggest one of our Irish visit! The international team was attending a special welcoming ceremony held for the runners in Irishtown Stadium. The ceremony was attended by distinguished guests as well as children from two nearby Dublin schools. From the crack of dawn, the setup crew were hard at work constructing the stage for the event.

The ceremony began with Ambarish Keenan, Irish coordinator for the World Harmony Run, introducing the Run to our distinguished guests, before welcoming the runners on stage.

The torch was then handed to Ondrej, our European team captain who introduced the rest of the team, and gave an extremely entertaining presentation of the Run and its message.

Some of the schools had prepared performances for us. First the young ones from Star of the Sea National School came up and gave us an extremely cute rendition of the World Harmony Run Song on the tin whistle.

This was followed by a choral performance from Naomh Padraig Girl's School.

Then we invited the Minister up to say a few words - as the leader of the Green Party in Ireland, Minister Gormley obviously cares a lot about global warming, and he talked about the great need for the whole world to come together in harmony to overcome the challenges of climate change together.

Then we invited the Minister to pace a few steps with us and the Torch...

Then we invited the Lord Mayor of Dublin, Paddy Bourke up to say a few words. The Mayor had met the Run in the Mansion House when it last visited Dublin, and had some very warm words to say about the Run.

Afterwards the performances continued; another choral performance by girls from Naomh Padraig Girl's School, followed by an extremely entertaining rap performance by the sixth class boys from Star of the Sea National School.

And of course the children had a chance to run with the torch.

Then came the climax of the event - the children had written little messages expressing their hopes and dreams for a better world. We had attached these messages to floating balloons, all waiting to be released to the air, symbolically spreading harmony far and wide. At a count of three - two - one, the balloons were let go, sending our wishes for world harmony soaring into the heavens.

A crew from the Den TV News2day programme came and filmed the entire event; later that evening, we watched a truly inspiring news report produced by them that for us truly captured the spirit of the Run.

Then it was time to for the runners to leave the stadium - a Garda police escort was waiting at the entrance, to escort the running team all the way to the city centre.

Lunch was very kindly provided by the crew at Blazing Salads, which also took time to hold the Torch with the team.

After the hectic morning, the international team had a relatively free afternoon to catch up on the little-mentioned aspects of life on the Run (like laundry), before the next leg of their 49-country odyssey through Europe. As with lunch, our dinner was also provided by a kind-hearted restauraunt, this time Cornucopia, the oldest vegetarian restaurant in Dublin. Here Colm and Jarek are holding the torch with Dierdre from Cornucopia.

So that concludes our wonderful journey through Ireland - we move on tomorrow morning to the mountainous wonders of Wales. Who knows what the next day will bring...

Team Members:
Ondrej Vesely (Czech Republic), Stefan Ehrenfellner (Austria), Jerek Werner (Poland), Evelyn Schmedemann (Germany), Colm Magee (Ireland), Kamilla Hozlarova (Czech Republic), Matthias Eckerle (Germany), Rosta Vagner (Czech Republic)

Harmonemail:
You can send a message to the runners or read the messages.

Gallery: See more images!