![Hans-Peter and Arlette Riedo, parents of murdered Swiss Student Manuela Riedo, were taken by Gardai to the scene where their daughter's body was discovered in October, 2008. Arlette Riedo placed a single white rose at the scene. [Picture: Philip Cloherty]](http://www.advertiser.ie/images/2024/10/143385.jpg "Hans-Peter and Arlette Riedo, parents of murdered Swiss Student Manuela Riedo, were taken by Gardai to the scene where their daughter's body was discovered in October, 2008. Arlette Riedo placed a single white rose at the scene. [Picture: Philip Cloherty]")
She'd still be the apple of their eyes. The steely determination she showed as a teenager evident in whatever career she chose to place herself in.
She'd have travelled more; the excitement at her first trip an indication of her desire to see the wider world, to learn and to live.
She'd probably be still using her old room when she'd come home. Pushing aside the things of her childhood and fitting in before telling her proud and amused parents of the realities of her new life. In hearing of her adventures and her mistakes, her learnings and her experiences, they'd join the legion of parents guiding their babies through adolescence and over the cusp into adulthood.
But that's not how it has worked out.
I write about it this morning because weatherwise, this week resembles that week in October, 2007. A bright blue-skied few days where the dying summer meets the handshake of autumn. The crunch of leaves underfoot, the golden sunsets adding a lustre to everything. It is a wonderful time of the year, and especially in Galway, and even more especially, if this was your first time to see this all.
The events of that week in 2007 created a shock that has never left this city and county. The name Manuela resonating ever since.
Her old room still has not changed. Passing it, sitting in it, a painful reminder for her parents of that dreadful day 17 years ago this week, when they received the most terrible news any parent could receive. Their hearts shattered that day and have never repaired, the dreadful details of her death adding to the trauma in the years after.
I have met them several times, their memory and connection kept alive by the wonderful Shane Lennon who did so much to turn this unspeakable tragedy into an opportunity for learning and awareness of the cruelty we inflict on each other. Shane's work ensured Manuela lives on in the name of highlighting just how unacceptable such behaviour is.
The amount of violence visited by men upon women in this country is shocking. In the last few weeks, four women have died violent deaths in the north of this country alone. Since the mid 1990s, almost 350 women have lost their lives to violence in Ireland.
When I think of Manuela, I think also of all those who have been impacted by violence in this city and county over the past few decades; their empty room, their empty chairs a constant reminder too for their families who might never have been in the public eye, but yet whose loss is just as great.
My heart breaks for them. There were other heartless and senseless crimes that left young people dead or grievously injured around that time, and I think of them all today.
There has been a lot of death in our lives this past few week. The horrors of the Middle East and Ukraine beamed into our lives.
Life and death, meeting in a fleeting moment and wiping out years of memories and years of possibilities.
