By Micheal Clifford

It is said that a legacy is not about leaving something for people but leaving something in people.

A GAA club far from Ireland’s shores intends to remind the world of the absolute truth in that snippet of wisdom as they seek to produce a documentary on the tragically short, but remarkable life of its founding member.

Derek Brady from Bohermeena in County Meath was just 22 when he was knocked down and fatally injured in an accident while crossing a Taipei street on an October Sunday night in 1996.

In the short time he was in the Taiwan capital, which he moved to after graduating from DCU to take up a two-year contract with ACER Computers, he would leave a legacy that thrives today as the heartbeat of the Irish community in the city by founding Taiwan Celts.

Just a month prior to his death, he had also organised the first ever Asian Games, albeit it was a rudimentary, informal gathering in Manilla when he reached out to Irish friends, both there and in Tokyo to put teams together and play his Taiwan Celts.

In the process it sowed the seed for what has now become one of the biggest international GAA tournaments, drawing up to 1,000 players to converge annually on a host city in the continent.

That is not even the half of it. In leaving this world, his parting gift was to give life to others; his heart-broken parents after travelling to Taiwan directed that their wish was his organs be donated which would have a transformative impact on the lives of six others.

It is a story that demands to be told and for the past few years doing just that has consumed the life of Kildare woman Rebecca Nugent and the club’s former chairperson, Mayo native Chris Walshe, who have compiled the interviews and footage which they hope will see a production company bring Derek Brady’s story to a national audience in Ireland.

"When we started it was just going to be a 10-minute short film about this guy who started a club and 30 years later we are all here, but when we really delved into it and spoke to the family, we found so much more than we just felt compelled to bring his story to an audience because we believe it’s a life that deserves to be celebrated and honoured," Nugent explains.

"It has grown legs now with a proper documentary, so we are definitely a bit out of our depth."

The evidence would suggest that they are anything but. Derek’s passing created a stir in Taiwan in that organ donation, primarily because of the dominant Buddhism and Taoism culture in the region, was a rarity. It is believed that Derek was the first foreigner in the country to donate his organs, and in a journalistic coup, they secured an interview with the surgeon who removed the organs.

Not just any surgeon. Ko Wen-je would go on to become a two-time mayor of Taipei before running for the presidency of Taiwan’s 23 million people last year, in which he was defeated.

Currently, Ko Wen-je, who founded the Taiwan People’s Party, is in detention facing the possibility of a lengthy prison sentence. "At the time, he was running for the presidency, so we actually didn’t think we would get to interview him, we didn’t think he would be bothered, but he jumped on it," Nugent says.

"He took photos with us, and he remembered Derek’s mum and dad. He kept talking about how amazing it was that they flew all the way over here and decided to give Derek’s organs to people who needed them.

"They were not angry at Taiwan at all, and he was blown away by their kindness in that regard. He said most people would be raging at Taiwan, would be resentful, but they were not like that at all.

"Even when they were asked if they wanted to press charges as they had found the person responsible and they were like no, why would we want to do that, there has been enough suffering, why would we want someone else to suffer.”

Instead of taking life, they gave it back in more ways than one, with no fewer than six people having had their lives transformed after receiving Derek’s organs.

"He actually told us that the person who got Derek’s heart changed his name to Ireland," she says. "He is in regular contact with him and he is still living a normal life.

“It was remarkable given that this happened in 1996 that he remembered it so well, but he said what really stood out in his memory was the fact that loads of people had visited the hospital and there were so many people waiting outside.

"It seemed like the whole of the company he worked for and all those he would have met through starting up football in the city turned up to be there."

They had come to honour him. Now almost 30 years later, their hope is that everyone will get that opportunity. The club he founded is now at the heart of the Irish community in Taiwan.

"It is unbelievable having that community here, especially for us because we have no embassy,” explains club chairperson, Limerick native Kevin McCloy.

"If someone is in trouble here, we look out for one another. If someone is moving house, a medical problem, we will all jump into help.”

Nugent shares similar sentiments. "I became more Irish when I came here than when I was in Ireland in that I never played GAA when I was at home," she says.

‘‘We have a lot of international members, and they have all caught onto the lingo too, we have Americans going around saying “sure, that will be grand,” adds the Kildare woman.

And the club founded 30 years ago by Derek Brady found its own novel way of marking that anniversary this year, after Chris Walshe and his half Chilean, half Taiwanese wife, Ling, had their first child.

"They met through the club years ago and now they have got married and had a child named Killian Walshe Fernandez," reveals McCloy.

"He is one of the first Celt babies, so we are having a big party to celebrate it."