How Rich became an Irish Traveller

It has to be said, i’m really not clued up enough on Irish Travellers, especially considering I now am one.

So, like many of you have I imagine, I was filling out the University registration forms when it asked me to update my personal details. These details included current address, contact information and, most importantly, ethnicity. Does the University expect us to change our ethnicity on a yearly basis? Could I suddenly goes from White – British to Black Bangladeshi?

Out of a healthy curiousity, I decided to see what options were available, most of them were fairly standard. “White – British”, “White – Scottish”, “White – Irish” (gotta seperate these people out you see), then I came across one which seemed far more interesting, “Irish Traveller”. What is an Irish Traveller? Does anyone know? Are these Snatch style gypsies living in Caravans around the campus somewhere? I certainly haven’t seen many. Are these a lot of gypsies does anyone know? Or did the University simply add that ethnicity in on the off-chance that an “Irish Traveller” would be registering for a course one day and sue the uni for discriminating against his Irish Traveller heritage?

It soon occured to me, this might be my only opportunity to ever become an Irish Traveller. So I selected Irish Traveller as my ethnicity.

Do ya like dags ?

Here are some facts about my new heritage from Wikipedia:

“Irish Travellers are a nomadic or itinerant people of Irish origin living in Ireland, Great Britain and the United States. They refer to themselves as The Pavee. An estimated 23,000 Travellers live in Ireland, 15,000 in Great Britain and 7,000 in the United States.”

“Some of the marriage customs, at least in the Southern Travellers (Memphis and “Georgies”), allow for 11 year old girls to be engaged to be married to 20+ year old men. Weddings occur as young as 16, often to a first or second cousin. Because in Traveller culture men are the ones who provide for the wife and family, a girl’s main goal is to marry. The bride’s parents pay the groom’s parents a dowry, which in some cases can be quite substantial”

“The Traveller lifestyle often produces friction in the community, especially in urban areas. Labels such as gypsy and pikey are common in Great Britain. Gypsy is more properly applied to the Roma people but is offensive to both groups. The derogatory terms gyppo and gypolata, derived from gypsy, are also heard in Great Britain.”

If i’m honest, I only selected Irish Traveller so I could get a screenshot of proof, then change it back. However, there isn’t actually any option to change it back. So until I find out otherwise, I am officially the only Irish Traveller university student in the UK.