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It's deja vu all over again as Yogi Berra said.

Unemployment, shrines and emigration.

Just like the summer of 1985 when people flocked to Ballinspittle to see the moving statues, Limerick is now drawing thousands of people who want to see the Virgin in a Tree.

I left Ireland the year of the Moving Statues as soon as I had saved the cost of the flight to France.

Why France? I'd been brought up in London and there didn't seem to be any adventure in going back to my childhood home.

So I picked France and au pairing.

1985 was a miserable time to be 19 in Ireland. If you didn't get in to college you were trying to find work in a country with no jobs.

Emigration was really the only way out. Then and now.
 
And now we're back where we started.

An old friend of mine left Ireland today. Herself, her husband and their three school-going children are somewhere over the Atlantic en route to Canada.

Their boxes left two weeks ago. The entire contents of their dream home which they have spent years working for. Packed away and shipped to Toronto, where they are going to try and start all over again.

It's one thing to take a chance on emigration when you're in your 20s and 30s. It's a much braver and more difficult step to take when you're in your 40s and you've got children to think of.

She said she would call me when they get settled. "Up to my eyes with emotion and boxes," was the most recent text as they packed up the house.

In Drogheda, my brother-in-law has abandoned any pretense at a job hunt. There are no jobs to be had in Drogheda. The company that he used to work for has let more people go and those who remain are on a three-day week with a 20 percent pay cut.

In New York, the New York Times is reporting that the Irish are coming back in their droves, back to the same places that they helped revitalize in the 80s and 90s. Woodlawn in the Bronx and Woodside in Queens.

The pity of it all is that unlike my friends on their way to Canada, the Irish coming here are coming here illegally.

April Drew reported yesterday that Senator Charles Schumer wants to get an immigration bill in the Senate for Labor Day. Let's hope for Ireland's sake that he does. Ireland needs a safety valve and quickly.