Comedian Des Bishop will be in New York this weekend for a one night only show in support of the Irish Lobby for Immigration Reform at Rory Dolan's in Yonkers. An immigrant from the U.S. to Ireland himself, Bishop has some pointed things to say about the hot topic subject to CAHIR O'DOHERTY.

BACK in the day, as they say in Queens, Irish American comedian Des Bishop was getting into quite a lot of trouble. By the age of 14 he'd already been kicked out of New York's famous St. Francis Prep School, becoming another teenage tearaway - into hip-hop and rap and giving attitude to his elders - and he was getting into worse scrapes by the day. Things were looking a bit grim by the time his cousin weighed in with a life changing suggestion - why not send the boy to boarding school in Ireland? In the grand Irish tradition the decision was made before it was even considered, and Bishop suddenly found himself cooling his heels in the land of lukewarm showers, damp bedrooms, weird plumbing and 40 shades of rain.

And to his great surprise he loved it. Not immediately, though. It was, Bishop admits, a rocky enough love affair for the first few years, but the strange magic of the people and the place worked their charm on him.

As luck would have it Bishop had arrived in Ireland years before the Celtic Tiger had even been heard of, and so he saw the place the way that most Irish people of his generation remember it - as a charming ruin, delightful and maddening in about equal measure. It was that Ireland he fell for, although he admits that the boom era has had it upside too.

"Look, I got kicked out of school in Queens early and it wasn't anything that was thought about before it happened," Bishop tells the Irish Voice. "The suggestion was made and a month later I was living in Ireland, and I have never returned to America long term again."

School was now the stately St. Peter's College in Wexford, and it was a massive culture shock. Bishop had a typical urban upbringing in Flushing, Queens and so early 1990s Ireland was like a different universe to him.

"Even basic things like heating - the houses were so much warmer in America - and to me everything felt damp in Ireland then," says Bishop. "It was good at the beginning but it became harder when I'd go home for Christmas, at least for the first few years. Long term I settled into it."

But from the beginning Bishop's experiences as a new American immigrant were complicated by some very unexpected surprises. First, as far as he was concerned, he was already Irish, since both of his parents were born there and he'd grown up in an Irish neighborhood where many his neighbors were first generation. Add that he went to Gaelic Park in the Bronx at the weekends, and he knew more rebel songs than the Irish kids he was suddenly going to school with.

But he was amazed to discover the locals didn't agree. No matter how he'd grown up or what he knew, everyone he met in Ireland still considered him an American. It wasn't for up for debate, either.

Since Bishop has seen both sides of the immigration experience - both the coming and going parts - it has given him a unique perspective on the issue that has become a huge part of his stand up routine these days.

"I became an immigrant at a time when there were none in Ireland. So that by itself was unique," he says.

"I had a New Yorker's point of view on immigration, and so when the other immigrants started coming to Ireland I thought it was good and interesting. Raised by immigrants, I became an immigrant, and I watched other immigrants arrive to a country that never had immigrants - all that kind of stuff."

In publicity photo after photo Bishop presents a rugged or streetwise tough kid persona, but his secret is that beneath that wise guy exterior lies a bracingly observant, not to say intellectual man. But just don't let on that you know, ok?

These days, as he says himself, the only type of Bishop he will listen to talk about moral issues are the members of his own family. He's also very protective of his personal life - Bishop admits he recently got engaged to his long-term girlfriend, however he's keeping quiet about the details.

"Yeah, we are engaged but I don't really like to talk about it because you have to keep some thing private you know," he says.

Asked why he has decided to come to New York for another one night fundraiser for the Irish Lobby for Immigration Reform (ILIR), he replies that there are two good reasons.

"We were coming to New York to work on my current TV program where I'm learning Irish and I wanted to do a gig to raise money for ILIR. It was handy for the television program and for the benefit," he offers.

The new TV show emerged after four years of planning, and it's obviously a project that's very close to Bishop's heart. Called In the Name of the Fada, it will air on Irish broadcast network RTE One starting in March.

"I just really wanted to learn Irish because I thought it was interesting. Growing up here most people have at least some experience of trying to learn it, and I personally felt a bit left out," he says.

"Then I decided it might be a good idea to learn Irish as a TV series, with the hope of doing a gig at the end. We decided I'd just move to the Gaeltacht and I've been living there since February 2007. I'm in Connemara right now."

Call it total immersion learning. For Bishop it's the only way to learn a language. Just throw yourself into it and you don't have time to worry. "Because I'm right in the middle of the Gaeltacht I'm not as hung up on the grammar which wrecks people's heads," he says. "You can experience a very deep cultural atmosphere in Connemara because there is something powerful about people speaking the language here on a daily basis."

The locals have kept Bishop pretty busy. They've fielded him on the local GAA team, they've invited him out to do some day laboring, they've asked him to help pull their lobster pots, and in the process they've introduced him to the authentic life of the Gael.

But Bishop is a little different in that he's accompanied everywhere by a camera crew. As he says himself, TG4, the Irish language television station, has its headquarters just down the road and they're a common sight on the streets, so local people have become comfortable with the cameras.

For Bishop the experience of learning the language has been like another homecoming.

"I never considered myself American, I considered myself Irish," he says. "The American part was just a given, but the Irish thing made you different from everything else. My blood is the same as Johnny O'Garrif from Co. Cork, even though your upbringing was different."

With the American political landscape consumed by another anti-immigrant nativist moment, Bishop laments what he sees.

"I'm raising money for ILIR because America was born on immigration and it's pretty regulated anyway, and I just don't understand why it has to be decreased. America's evolution as a country will starve if it cuts off that support. Obviously there's a lot of fear in society and that leads to narrow minded decisions."

Bishop remembers and values the experience of growing up with plenty of first generation Irish people in his New York neighborhood to ground him in his own culture.

"We weren't like the Irish Americans that the Irish make fun of - you know, my great grandfather came from there sort of thing. We played football at Gaelic Park, we marched in the St. Patrick's Day Parade, we lived among first generation people, and we were properly connected," he says.

"The immigrant community brought all that about. But now the community is in steep decline because things have gotten so tough. If I moved back to the States now and I had children I would hate the fact that they didn't have a genuine Irish experience to tap into."

The ILIR benefit performance begins at 9 p.m. at Rory Dolan's, 890 McLean Avenue in Yonkers. Tickets are $20 at the door.