Queensland's Tara Talbot will spend St Patrick's Day at The White House. (File pic)

Rose of Tralee winner Tara Talbot may be a native of Queensland but she certainly has the luck of the Irish.

The 28-year-old schoolteacher has revealed that she will be joining US President Barack Obama for the St Patrick’s Day festivities at the White House in March.

Ms Talbot, who is from the Bribane suburb West End, said she was thrilled at being given the opportunity to meet the Obamas.

“It is very exciting. Myself, the Taoiseach Enda Kenny and a few TDs will be heading over,” she told the Irish Echo.

“Not many people get such a wonderful opportunity to spend St Patrick’s Day at the White House so I am really looking forward to it. I haven’t received a personal invitation from the Obamas yet, but I am hoping I will.

“I don’t know what I will wear but possibly something green. It will have to be very special because I know Michelle Obama has a fantastic wardrobe.”

Ms Talbot, whose father is from Dublin and mother is from the Philippines, is currently in Ireland after spending Christmas with her boyfriend’s family in Dublin.

Although Ms Talbot is more used to enjoying sunshine over the Christmas holidays, she said she was loving her time in Ireland.

“I love Ireland. I spent Christmas with my boyfriend’s family and St Stephen’s Day with my extended family so it was really nice, “ she said.

“Everybody is very welcoming and I am being treated like royalty. The only thing is getting used to navigating the roads – and the cold weather.”

She added that the first half of her reign as the Rose of Tralee has been “absolutely life-changing”, and is looking forward to her plans for 2012.

“I met some great people when I travelled to Kolkata, and recently I met the President Michael D Higgins, who was lovely. I am really looking forward to spending the next few months travelling and doing some charity work.

“ I will be going to Chernobyl in February, America in March and I will be back in Australia in May, which I am really looking forward to.”

Tara Talbot waves after winning the Rose of Tralee. It's the first win since 2006 for an Australian Rose. (Pic: Dominck Walsh/Eye Focus)

Brisbane’s Tara Talbot has been crowned this year’s Rose of Tralee.

The 27-year-old school teacher was born in Dublin and moved to Australia when she was five, returning to live between Dublin and Galway for three years in 2006.

“I’m feeling quite overwhelmed and proud to be honest,” Ms Talbot told the Irish Echo, as celebrations got underway in the Carlton Hotel in Tralee.

She said her win would ‘sink in’ in a little while.

“I’m completely honoured to be chosen as the representative for the festival, for Kerry and for Ireland. I’m looking forward to what the new year brings in terms of travel and opportunities to work for certain charities, to meet the people who are involved in the festival and certainly the Irish diaspora across the world,” she said.

Ms Talbot, who is from the West End suburb of Brisbane, said she expects to take time out from her masters in marketing.

Ms Talbot is a member of the Queensland Irish Association.

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:: Homecoming

She returns to Queensland on September 10, before heading off to Auckland for Ireland Rugby World Cup clash with Australia. When asked who she would be cheering for, Ms Talbot said she was ‘bound to Ireland’ now.

“I’m looking forward to seeing some familiar faces [in Queensland] and it will be very emotional for me because it’s been a really wonderful ride.”

Her mother Carmencita Talbot told the Irish Echo that she was very proud of her daughter. “It’s great to be here and it’s lovely to see the crowds,” she said.

She said that her daughter was doing ‘very well’ but had not expected to win.

The new Rose of Tralee thanked the organisers of the Queensland Rose for all their help.

The Irish community in Queensland has been welcoming the news.

Kathryn Feeney, 28, the 2006 winner from Queensland, said she could not imagine how Ms Talbot is now feeling.

“It’s amazing that there is such hype and a buzz here in Brisbane,” she said.

She said she hoped that Ms Talbot could take the year off to enjoy her time as the Rose of Tralee as much as she had. “I just know that she is so excited right now.”

Rita Stott, of the Irish Australian Support Association of Queensland (IASAQ) was delighted with the news.

“We are so proud, she is a beautiful person inside and out,’ she said.

Caitlin Murphy, who was in Tralee on her honeymoon, said she was delighted for the Brisbane woman after meeting her at the festival.

“I’m just married to a dashing Irish man in Ireland last week and we have spent our honeymoon here. Fortunately for us we managed to attend the first night Rose of Tralee. By chance we met Tara among other Roses but were convinced having met her that she was ‘the one,” said Mrs Murphy.

“We’re delighted that she won and know that she will be a tremendous ambassador for the Rose of Tralee. My mother, Colleen O’ Donnell, who happened to join us in the Dome for the event, was the Melbourne Rose in 1975. It was a special night for us all.”

Mairéad Dundas, now a journalist in France, was Melbourne's Rose of Tralee entrant in 2001.

Rose season is almost upon us.

In the coming weeks, representatives will be chosen from five Australian centres to travel to the International Rose of Tralee Festival in Kerry.

Unlike Sydney, Perth, Queensland, South Australia and Darwin however, Melbourne does not send a Rose to Ireland.

In fact, Victoria has not sent a representative since 2002.

But the organisers in Tralee have told Irish Australia that they would welcome the reinstatement of Melbourne as a centre.

“We would be delighted to re-establish the Melbourne Rose,” Valerie Kerins said from Tralee.

“The ethos of the Rose of Tralee International Festival is connecting the global Irish community, and we know that Melbourne could be a big part of this too.”

The Melbourne Rose of Tralee was previously run under the auspices of the Irish Australian Chamber of Commerce (IACC) and before that, the Celtic Club.

In 2003, the IACC board decided against remaining involved in the pageant with convenor Marie Fay telling the Irish Echo at the time that cost was the key factor.

“It was becoming very costly for us to run it, and the board decided it would spend the money better in other ways,” she said.

But no one stepped into the breach and, as a result, Melbourne has been unrepresented in the international pageant, held each August in the Kerry town.

The Queensland Rose of Tralee will be selected at the Irish Club in Brisbane on Saturday, May 21.

The 2011 Sydney Rose of Tralee has attracted nine entrants and the selection ball will be held on Saturday, June 4 at  Cockle Bay Wharf.

The Perth Rose of Tralee will be selected on June 11 at the Novotal Langley Hotel.

The Darwin and South Australian Roses will also be selected in June.

Anyone interested in finding out more about organising a Melbourne Rose event is advised to contact Valerie Kerins at the Rose of Tralee International Festival at info@roseoftralee.ie.

The London Rose, Clare Kambamettu has been crowned the 2010 International Rose of Tralee. This is the second year running that the London Rose has taken the honour.

The 26-year-old psychologist was born in Leeds but moved with her parents back to her mother’s native county of Kildare at the age of eight.

Speaking after her win, a shocked Kambamettu paid tribute to her fellow contestants, describing them as “absolutely amazing women”.

“It’s been an absolutely amazing week,” she said, “and what I’ve learned about the Rose of Tralee is that everything you think is going to happen, you just double it, and triple it, and add a million on to it and you get somewhere near what actually happens.”

Irish Australian Deborah O’Neill, pictured above with daughters Caitlin and Brianna, son Noah and husband Paul, has won the Labor nomination for Robertson.

Irish Australian Deborah O’Neill has won her pre-selection battle with high profile MP Belinda Neal in the New South Wales seat of Robertson on the Central Coast.

The University of Newcastle lecturer and former Sydney Rose of Tralee’s next challenges is to retain the marginal seat at the next federal election, due later in the year.

The Prime Minister, Kevin Rudd, congratulated the mother-of-three saying “Debbie O’Neill is going to be a great candidate for us’’.

Ms O’Neill’s pre-selection battle attracted national attention as her opponent – the sitting member – was Belinda Neal, the controversial MP who was told to get anger management classes by Prime Minister Rudd after an incident at Igaunas nightclub in Gosford in January 2008.

Ms Neal was accused of bullying staff asking them “don’t you know who I am”.

Ms Neal is also the wife of NSW Minister John Della Bosca who had a well-publicised affair last year. The couple have subsequently reconciled.
The pre-selection battle was fiercely contested but Ms O’Neill prevailed by 98 votes to 67.

Ms O’Neill’s parents Mary and the late Jim met in England but were originally from counties Kilkenny and Cork respectively.

“They met at a dancehall called Shorrocks in Manchester. Mum fell in love with Dad’s Irish accent. Mum had moved to England from Kilkenny when she was aged 11 to live with her uncle and aunt,” Ms O’Neill told the Irish Echo recently.

“They got married on June 4 1960 when they were both aged 20 and set sail from England on July 4, heading for the promise of a new life.

“Dad had taken Mum to see a film about migrating to Australia and she was impressed by the pictures of clothes drying in the sun. I was born in Australia on their first wedding anniversary,” she said.

Ms O’Neill remembers her dad, who was just 49 when he died, very fondly.
“My father talked about Ireland a lot. It was heartbreaking for him not to be able to go back for weddings and other family occasions.

“I didn’t get to Ireland until I was 17, after I had finished high school, and I got back again two years later as the Sydney representative in the Rose of Tralee.”

It was former Prime Minister Paul Keating who finally inspired Ms O’Neill to join the Labor Party when she heard his election concession speech in March 1996. “It inspired me to think, if you want things to change, you have to be part of something, you have to act,” she said.

by Billy Cantwell and Pádraig Collins

Tipperary Rose Aoife Kelly has been crowned Rose of Tralee.

The 23-year-old beat off competition from 30 other contestants to become the 49th Rose of Tralee.

She said she was ‘chuffed’ to be taking the crown home. Ms Kelly is an occupational therapist at the National Rehabilitation Hospital in Dún Laoghaire, where she works with patients who have had spinal injuries. She has a passion for travel, spending working summers in the US and has travelled to South Africa doing voluntary work with children suffering from HIV.

Ms Kelly also enjoys making cards, painting and anything creative. She played gaelic football for her university in Aberdeen and also in San Francisco. She hopes to work as a senior occupational therapist and a reflexologist, and return to volunteer in the South African townships.

The Tipp Rose was among the bookies favourites throughout the week but Sydney Rose Hannah Bradley was on the top line of betting just before the decision was made.

Watch RTE coverage here [http://www.rte.ie/arts/2008/0827/roseoftralee.html]