Emma Hickey reports from Screggan

THE NATIONAL PLOUGHING Championships has something for everyone, and for men this year, there are free haircuts doled out at the Movember shed.

It’s the charity’s second year offering free haircuts from its impressive barber shed, supported by longstanding Dublin barbershop chain Sam’s Barbers. 

Music played as boys and men waited inside the shed for their turn to sit in the two plush barber chairs, where barbers were wielding shears and clippers and chatting to their clients.

Ambassadors out the front offered passers-by information on the initiative and the charity’s goals.

Inside, Movember’s director of policy and advocacy Walter Jayawardene explained that the set-up can create informal opportunities to talk to people about men’s health.

The Ploughing can oftentimes attract men that are less likely than their peers to engage with authorities regarding their health, either physical or mental – indeed, back in the hub of the site the Irish Farmers’ Association was offering free health checks to attendees for that reason.

Jayawardene told The Journal the “cuts and conversations” aims to “encourage people to come in, have a chat, and think about their health, their physical health, their mental health”.

“It’s part of Movember’s work across Ireland in promoting the advancement and the improvement of men and boys health.”

At the Ploughing, it’s a chance for the well-established charity to meet “practically every community in the country”, he added, and to share the message of attending to one’s health.

It’s also an opportunity to get its message out before its big fundraising campaign in November, where men will grow moustaches, do push-ups, and anything else to raise money for men’s health.

Movember does a lot of work in promoting men’s health through investment in research and raising awareness around mental health, suicide prevention, prostate and testicular cancer – and more broadly men’s health in general, Jayawardene said.

“If men have good health and if men seek to get better and seek to improve their health, it is good for society, it’s good for families, and it’s good for communities,” he said.

The Movember barbershop at this year's National Ploughing Championships in Screggan, Co Offaly. Cliodhna Travers / The Journal Cliodhna Travers / The Journal / The Journal

Sam Donnelly of Sam’s Barbers was in agreement. The now-head of the barbershop chain, which was established in 1901, told The Journal he has been involved with Movember for almost 15 years.

Donnelly’s son was also present to help his father with the big event. 

“As a fourth generation barber, I had learned over the years that, you know, the barber chair is a place where guys open up and talk,” the barber – sporting his own impressive ‘tache – said.

“We’re getting so many TY students coming down, and it’s getting us an opportunity to get the kids sitting the chair, sitting waiting for the haircut, talk to the kids about who we are, what we are and why we’re here.”

He has seen real differences and lives saved as part of his work with Movember, he said. Donnelly mentioned one event he was involved with which included a health check.

One of the men who had a health check was advised to urgently attend his GP as a result and was then diagnosed with testicular cancer, but it was at an early enough stage where it was treatable.

That man would never have gone for such tests if not for Movember’s work, Donnelly said.

“What they do and what they do in Ireland is very important to me.”

Video by Cliodhna Travers