I was driving to work when a piece came on the radio about a place called Tuvalu. It is a Pacific Island with the lowest land mass in the world and is in danger of disappearing from our planet because of global warming and the rising seas.

The following night, when asked to read a bedtime story for my kids, and being sick of the usual bedtime stories, I made one up. I told my kids that I was born in Tuvalu and had come to Ireland in a hot air balloon.

My kids loved the stories and we pulled out the atlas and found the countries and towns that I had visited en route

Over the next few months, the story grew. I took to the internet to find out more about Tuvalu. My hot air balloon had travelled all across the world, touching down in Fiji, New Zealand, Australia, Papua New Guinea, through Asia, then Africa, over Europe and finally landing in Tipperary.

And for the entire journey, I was dressed only in a grass skirt. My kids loved the stories and we pulled out the atlas and found the countries and towns that I had visited en route. Places like Auckland in New Zealand, Timbuktu in Mali and eventually passing over Sliabh na mBan and landing in Fethard.

Then one day my wife, who is from New Zealand, relayed a story my daughter had told her after school. The teacher was doing a geography lesson with my daughter’s class. And as Ireland has become a multi-cultural country, she was naming the various nationalities of the parents of kids in the class.

I’m sure there was an interesting conversation in the staff room that lunchtime

There were Polish, Ukrainian, English, Finnish and New Zealand. “Are there any that I have missed?” asked the teacher. My daughter’s hand went up. “We said New Zealand, Suzy,” said the teacher.

But her little hand remained up. “What is it Suzy?” asked the teacher. “You forgot about my dad,” she told her teacher with her wide innocent blue eyes. “He is from Tuvalu!” I’m sure there was an interesting conversation in the staff room that lunchtime.

So, as he had missed some of the story, I embellished it once again

A while later, I was telling this story to a customer in our bar. A young New Zealand man overheard just part of it. He looked at me and said: “You don’t look like an Islander.” Islander is the New Zealand term for all Pacific islanders.

I had to agree there. I have an Irish head on me. So, as he had missed some of the story, I embellished it once again. I told him that Tuvalu was a former British colony and that I was born there. “Why were your family there?”

By now I knew a lot about the islands, having researched them online to answer my daughters’ frequent questions. I said that my father designed runways for airplanes and was working on the one in the capital, Funafuti, when I was born in Princess Margaret Hospital.

He listened, walked to a corner of the bar, checked with Dr Google and came back. “Wow,” he said. “Everything you said is true.” And he departed Ireland the following day with a tale of a man from Tuvalu living in Tipperary.

Jasper Murphy is a publican and undertaker from Fethard, Co Tipperary.

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