Planet Utah

Ireland: the lost diaries

I was doing some clean-up around the house this weekend, when I found a few more jottings from my Ireland trip. These are all from Dublin...almost all of them quotes from a tour guide who showed us the sites of the 1916 Easter Rising.

• "How do you know when a girl north of the Liffey has an orgasm? She drops her french fries." (The Liffey is a river that divides Dublin in half; the north part of Dublin is rougher than the south.)
• "Whenever I tell that joke, the American women always say, 'What's an orgasm?' The American men tell them, 'Don't worry; it's something that only men have.'"
• "Within the first hour of the Easter Rising, one of the rebel women walked right up to a cop, pulled out a pistol, and plugged him in the head, point blank, killing him where he stood. That's a helluva thing, here in Ireland. In America, I realize, that's just a normal Friday night."
• "One of the bullets hit right here (points to a divot in a marble wall), about 2" from where Mick Collins was standing. Two inches doesn't seem like much to you and me, but trust me on this, if you're a Cork man, two inches is quite a lot."

The guide also noted that when George W. Bush was governor of Texas, the Irish were taken aback by the number of executions over which he presided. He added this: "You might not think we pay attention to that sort of thing, but we do."

And now, what will REALLY be my final observation from this particular trip, recorded while I was in Dublin: "As much as I love this country, Irish history is to English history as William Howard Taft is to George Washington."

Farewell to Ireland, for now

This will be my last Ireland post (for a year or so; I plan to take another trip there next fall).

So, I wrapped up the trip in Dublin. What a great city. It's like Manhattan--one of those places that makes you feel alive just being there. So many people, so much music, so much history, so much going on...people living, people working, people playing. It has big city problems, too, of course: beggars, crime, traffic, immigrant vs. native tensions, crazy prices, etc. But it's one of those cities where you feel as if you can see anything, be anything, do anything. 

One of my more memorable outings in Dublin was to the Brazen Head pub, which is 800 years old. I was tempted to say, "Excuse me, I put in an order for some pub fries about 240 years ago, and they're still not up. Can you check on that?", but I figured they'd heard it before. So, I just ordered a black and tan.

The bartender looked at me funny and said, "We don't make those here."  At first, I thought I had committed a faux pas. (Black and tan were the colors worn by the paid thugs who tried to put down Irish rebels in the first part of the 20th century.) I was thinking to myself, "Wow, hold a grudge much?", when I noticed an Irish couple looking on sympathetically. I asked them, "Did I just cross a political line of some sort?" The couple, whose names turned out to be John and Trish, shook their heads. Trish said, "No, the bartender's Polish. Most of the serving staff in Dublin are from Poland or elsewhere in Eastern Europe. They don't know what a black and tan is."

So, I felt better, and I had a nice, long talk with John and Trish. Like almost all of the Irish I met, they were unfailingly kind and polite. We talked a lot about Ireland and America, and somehow we got on the subject of accents. They asked me if I could tell the difference between a Cork accent, a Dublin accent, etc., and I said, "No, it all sounds Irish to me." Then, to my amazement, they claimed not to be able to distinguish an American southern accent from every other American accent (or non-accent). I asked them if Bill Clinton and Barack Obama sounded the same to them. They said, "There's no difference to our ears."

I still can't believe that's true, but why would they lie about such a thing? And to be fair, they were just as perplexed over my inability to recognize the unique qualities of the Cork accent.

And now, my final Ireland trip observation: The euro just don't seem Irish.

Penultimate Ireland post

Looking at my trip notes, I have very little jotted down for the final four or five days of the trip. That's strange because: (1) I met some people during this part of the trip with whom I'm still in touch, whom I've visited back in the states a couple of times, and whom I now consider friends; and (2) this part of the trip included Dublin. You'd think that stuff would be fodder for a few more pages' worth of notes. Anyway...

There was one entire day during, which--thanks to Adderall--all I ate was two chocolate bars and a cookie. If I were still dating Joanne from Dallas, there's no way I could have pulled that off. She would insist on three square meals a day--the kind where you sit down and eat--and snacks in between.

Thinking about Joanne and her food quirks, I wonder: Is every relationship an agreement to tolerate someone else's idiosyncrasies in exchange for their companionship? 

I heard David Denby on Irish radio say this: "During the presidential campaign, there were veiled references to Obama as an uppity black man with no business seeking the presidency. Now they're not even veiled any more." I was tempted to call in and say, "Hi, question for Mr. Denby: What the hell are you talking about, you pandering son of a bitch?"

Check out this picture of Skellig Michael. A billion years ago, Irish monks retreated to this lonely hunk of rock so they could worship God with no distractions. Unfortunately, the Vikings who passed Skellig Michael convinced themselves that the monks were trying to get away with something, so they (the Vikings) would stop and pillage every now and again. I can just hear one of the monks saying, "So, let's see here, I have a bird egg and a shiny rock I found down at the water line. That's it. Those are all of my worldly possessions. Before you showed up, I was getting ready to eat the egg, so then all I'd have is the rock. And, what, you can't stand the fact that I have the rock and you don't? Really? Seriously?" 

The highway markers indicating distance are ALL screwed up. It's actually kind of funny. You'll see a sign that says "Kenmare: 45 km," and then you'll drive for 10 or 15 minutes and see the next sign, which says, "Kenmare: 48 km." What? Was someone just guessing? Did the first guy bother talking to the second guy? Did I drive through a black hole? A wrinkle in time? 

I have not seen a single beggar in Ireland...but I'm not in Dublin yet. 

Ireland: home stretch

I'll link you to a picture of where I am at this point in my trip:

Click on me.

Pretty spectacular, huh? But that's just the way Ireland is...beautiful on the coasts, beautiful inland, beautiful in the city, beautiful in the country.

So, there's one thing I've noticed a few places in Ireland that I've never seen in America. If you go to a pub to hear traditional Irish music, it's not uncommon for people in the pub to sit in for a number or two. And I'm not talking about an open mic night thing. I'm saying there's a band that's been hired to play at the pub, but they invite people from the audience to come sing a song, play an instrument, whatever. Kinda cool.

Here's another cool thing about Ireland: The prime minister of the Republic of Ireland is referred to as the "taoiseach," which is pronounced "TEA-shook," which means "chieftain." And when you are speaking to the prime minister, you refer to him as "taoiseach." So, you might say, "Taoiseach, tell us how you think your party will fare in the regional elections this fall."

How cool is it to come from a country whose political history, past and present, is dominated by clans and chieftains? (Maybe that's part of the answer to my earlier question about why everyone thinks it's so cool to be Irish.)

"Ginger," which is a word used to describe redheads (e.g., "That ginger lad over there is my youngest"), can be heard all the time in Ireland (and Scotland, and England). You never hear it in America, though, nor do people make nearly as big a deal here out of someone being a redhead.

Good travel tip: It's much better to wake up NOT hung over and NOT feeling rushed than it is to wake up with a pounding headache and with the B&B owners telling you that you were supposed to have been out of your room an hour ago.

One thing you'll never hear anywhere in Ireland: "Who do I have to screw to get a pint of Guinness around here?"

Another gorgeous spot I pass as I make my way northeast.

In America--at least in places where I have lived--a disproportionate number of service workers are Hispanic. In Ireland, they're Eastern European, and Polish in particular.

On a tour of a place called Muckross House, the guide says that it was sold for 60,000 pounds in the 1800s. Someone asks, "How much is that today?" The guide says, "I have no idea." Give her credit for her honesty, but don't you think she gets that question every time she does the tour?

Drove past this, on my way to this. Or maybe it was the other way around. Either way, both were beautiful.

Crap! I forgot to mention O'Carroll's Cove, which I hit a few days back, and which claims to be the only beach bar in Ireland. Naturally, I had to stop and have a black and tan on the sand (though the bartender didn't know what the hell a black and tan was; they don't really drink those in Ireland). It was a rare beautiful, sunny day on my trip...one of those days on which I couldn't believe how blessed I was to be where I was, doing what I was doing.

There's doesn't seem to be a Highway Patrol in Ireland. As if you needed more reasons to love the place.

Somewhere in a public toilet (as they call them), I got to try the awesome new Dyson hand dryer. It dries your hands in about 10 seconds. It's kind of like sticking your hands into the slots of a toaster and then having the skin blown off, but whatever, it works.

 

 

Ireland: getting ready to turn left

So, at this point in my trip, I'm about as far south as I want to be--another 50 miles or so, and I'll plow into the ocean. Accordingly, I'm going to change directions at Killarney and start working my way back toward Dublin.

Before I get there, though, I can't help but laugh at the signs for the "Strands of Dingle." They remind me of the Robert Klein riff about the town name of "Oxnard": "That sounds like something you'd hear in medical school: 'Notice the clumps of Oxnard around the patient's liver...'"

I began the trip thinking that I should have gotten a bigger car. After a lot of road time, though, I've decided that smaller is better--for parking, for navigating the tiny country roads, for dodging sheep, etc. The flip side of that nimbleness is that a head-on collision with anything--car, truck, cow, biker, WWI vet, clump of ferns--would turn the car into pixie dust.

On the road, I realize that I have a new guy-dream. (The universal guy-dream is to buy a bar with your college buddies, never get married, never get a real job, and never really grow up. The universal girl-dream is to own an adorable little boutique. The girl-dream, though, includes a husband and children.) Here's the new dream: to own a B&B in Ireland with a classic Irish pub attached. (Ironically, all the girls say: "You should totally do it!", while all the guys say, "Dude, get frickin' serious.")

Met an Irish kid out at a pub, and he wants to go here, and there, and then to this other place. (I have a car; he does not, so he's proposing a deal: He'll take me to some cool Irish places if I will be his chauffeur.) I hesitate because I'm on a schedule...just passing through town and all that. So he says to me, "Stop thinking like an Englishman, and start thinking like an Irishman." 

I agree, we hit the first place, and wouldn't you know it, he disappears after we get rebuffed by some Irish wedding-party girls. But come on! The only guy in Ireland who NEVER gets blown out is Colin Farrell. 

Later that evening, having consumed my body weight in Harp, and surrounded by some middle-aged Irish folks, I break out a little meme that I often use with foreigners. "The cool thing about America," I say, "is that you can become an American. Any one of you could come back to America with me, and, once you went through all the citizenship stuff, you'd be just as American as I am. But I could never move here and become an Irishman." 

They all agree. And one of the women even tells me that I have a "lovely" American accent! Doesn't do me much good, though...with her or any of the other Irish lasses. (I'm not saying I didn't sleep with her. I'm just saying I failed to establish a deeper connection. And if you don't know that I'm kidding about that, you're probably one of the Irish girls who wouldn't sleep with me.) 

Footnote: Ack--I'm coming up on the anniversary of this trip, and I'm still blogging about it. Need to wrap this up soon.

Somewhere in Ireland...

Reviewing the notes I kept during my trip, I realize that I did a lousy job of keeping track of where I was, exactly, when I made this observation or that one. But the route I followed was around the country, counter-clockwise, starting in Dublin and ending up in Dublin again about a week and a half later. 

So at this point in the adventure, I've crossed the entire country from east to west--Dublin to Galway--and then headed south. Within a day or so I'll get about as far south as you can go, and then I'll start heading northeast, back toward Dublin...

As I mentioned in an earlier post, the sport of hurling is as big in Ireland as football is in the U.S. I had the good fortune to be in Ireland for the all-Ireland hurling championship, which I definitely wanted to see. I didn't, and don't, give a flip about hurling, of course, but I thought it would be a unique cultural experience.

There are no big sports bars in Ireland, so if you want to watch sports on TV, you just try to find a pub with a decent set and a place to sit. Turns out this wasn't nearly as difficult as I thought it would be. I was able to find a good, non-touristy place to watch the game...lots of room to stretch out, but also an abundant supply of Irish who were happy to answer my hurling questions. ("Wait...why did that guy just give the thing to the other guy? I thought he was trying to keep it away from him..." "How many points do you get for that?" "Why is the crowd booing?" "Have you ever seen American football? Oh my God it's so much better than this.")

The game didn't do much for me, to be honest, but I still have a few memories from that day. First, there was a kid playing pool in the pub, with no apparent supervision, who kept looking up at the TV screen and saying, "Oh, for fuck's sake." (His team was losing.) This is a common expression in Ireland, but to hear it coming from the mouth of an 8-year-old pool player was enough to make half the room laugh.

Second, I took a bathroom break during the match, and I met a guy whose Irish brogue was so thick, I simply couldn't understand him. That happened twice on this trip. (It happened a couple of times on my trip to Scotland, too.) There we were, both speaking English, but I could not make out what he said. And this "conversation" took place in the bathroom, which made it all the more awkward.

Third, I took off my money belt in the bathroom so I could pee. When I got back to my table, I realized that I no longer had it. So, I went back into the bathroom, but it wasn't there. I asked the bartender if anyone had turned it in, and he said no. 

So there I was, having lost my passport and several hundred dollars in cash. Except that I hadn't, because I had stuffed the money belt in my back pocket! I didn't figure that out, though, until I had gone through the whole panicky thing of thinking I'd lost it, trying to find it, and then finally accepting that I'd stupidly left it in the bathroom and it had been stolen. 

Even though it wasn't actually stolen, I have to say that when I thought it was, I handled the situation pretty calmly. What bothered me most was the idea of having to spend time getting a new passport, when I'd rather have been in a pub drinking so much that I couldn't keep track of the old one. 

Anyway, once I realized that I still had my money belt, I was too embarrassed to say, "I found it!" So, I just skulked out of the place.

During the course of my trip, I found myself getting self-conscious over the phrase, "you guys." It just sounds so middle-American and unsophisticated. But what's the alternative? I can't pull off "y'all," and "you all" is barely any better than "you guys." 

"You guys"--and the word "guys" in general--is something that you'll hear the English and Irish say when they imitate Americans. (And when I would reciprocate by imitating the Irish, I'd say, "Oh, for fuck's sake." Or I'd say, "Brushing my teeth with porridge and whiskey--it's lovely, it is. It's just grand.")

Here's a mystery I wasn't able to solve during my trip: Why does everyone think it's cool to be Irish? There's a lot of pride among the Irish in being Irish; there's a lot of pride among people of Irish descent, wherever they may be in the world, in being of Irish descent; and finally, there's a lot of pride among the Irish with respect to the foothold they've established in other parts of the world (in Boston, for example). 

Why is that, do you think? Where does that come from? You don't see it among Scotsmen or the English, or among Italians or Germans or the Spanish. For whatever reason, though, the Irish are pretty much the Texans of Europe.

More Ireland!

Everyone's been clamoring for a resumption of my Ireland travelogue--and by everyone I mean no one--so let's get back to it.

At a pub somewhere, an Irish kid tells me: "The whole world hates the English because they try to take over everything." I wonder how much that describes people's feelings about America, too. 

This kid and I get to talking a bit about Irish history, and it occurs to me that people really need/want something to live for, fight for, even die for. The modern Irish have had that. They're lucky that way. (If you want to see what's supposed to be the best movie about the Irish revolution, see "The Wind That Shakes the Barley." When you see it, ask yourself if you'd make the same choice at the end of the film that Cillian Murphy makes.)

A few random aspects of Irish culture: For one thing, everyone seems to drive a BMW. For another thing, they have weird food/flavor options here. If you go to a Subway, for example, you can get peas on your sandwich. Peas? If I'm going to have peas in Ireland, I want them mixed in with mashed potatoes and drowned in gravy. Beyond the peas, if you want a combo meal, you can get these chip flavors: "Buffalo," "cheese 'n onion," and "prawn cocktail." A third thing: Irish interstates are set up like casinos or grocery stores, designed to expose you to the maximum number of opportunities to spend your money. Seriously, on Irish highways, you don't take an exit ramp to get to a gas station or restaurant. The entire highway system IS an exit ramp, taking you past every rinky-dink business in the country at a top speed of about 25 miles per hour. A fourth thing: In America, we refer to "Northern Ireland." In Ireland, they just say, "the north"--or, more accurately, "da nort." A fifth thing: There are signs everywhere for pony trekking. Pony trekking! Irish kids love their pony trekking outlings. Doesn't that just make you happy? A sixth thing: The Irish use the phrase "Chinese whisper" to refer to a story that gets exaggerated over time as it is told and retold. A seventh thing: In Ireland, you don't buy rounds of drinks, you buy "calls." You say, for example, "This is my call," and you buy everyone's drink. Skipping out on your call(s) is considered VERY bad form. I never miss my calls, in Ireland or America. 

I stop at the Cliffs of Moher, and they are as spectacular as advertised. Really. Google up some pictures for yourself. You'll see. (There's a pretty good pic here.)

There are signs and leaflets at the cliffs that have the number for a suicide hotline. Apparently, people come up here to kill themselves. 

That is NOT the way I'd do it. I'm too much of a coward to plunge hundreds of feet to my death in the icy cold Atlantic. I think I'd rather drink myself to the other side, "Leaving Las Vegas"-style. (I may even be doing that already. It's just going to take me another 40 years to finish the job.) 

Lots and lots of people seem to be staring at me as I walk around the cliffs. I wonder if it's because I'm the only person who's here by himself, and if that has people worried that I'm going to jump.

Having been here a week, I've definitely had my fill of the whole rural, barren, rocky, desolate, windswept, gray, rainy part of Ireland. I'd like some sunshine, blue skies, and warmth, please. 

Geographically, I'm getting closer to Kilkenny, whose local team will win the Irish hurling championship in a few days. (This is like winning the Super Bowl in the U.S.) The Kilkenny team is called "The Cats"--which I assume refers to some kind of predatory big cat that once (and still?) stalked the unpopulated areas around the city. 

So, anyway, I'm in a pub and I can't help but notice all of the pro-Kilkenny banners. And they all say this: "Come on, the Cats!" This makes me laugh. It would be like us saying, "Let's go, the Suns!" But that's the way they exhort their teams in Ireland, apparently. 

Back to Ireland

Getting back to this oft-interrupted travelogue, you may remember that I was on the western shore of Ireland, hanging around Galway and the Aran Islands. Got in my car after that and headed south, just hugging the coastline, soaking up the scenery, stopping here and there to see this and that. A few random thoughts:

• If I don't exercise on this trip, the Krav Maga workouts back home are going to be extremely painful. But who wants to exercise on vacation? Plus, the weather has been absolute shit--rain, wind, cold temperatures. That's lie-in-bed-and-read weather, not interval training weather.
• Despite the lousy weather, there are parts of this country that are as beautiful as anything I've ever seen. And when the sun peeks through, oh my...
• Man, am I hungry on this trip! On my last trip abroad, I had just started taking Adderall, and for a few weeks I operated like some sort of super-human: extremely focused, with little need for sleep or food. Now that Adderall is part of my routine, though, all of those awesome side effects have faded. Having to build meals and rack time into my schedule is really complicating things. 
• Maybe you're not supposed to say this sort of thing, but I think there may only be two or three black people in all of Ireland. 
• Cold beverages are NOT a priority here. Everything is served cool, and if you ask for ice, they just laugh and say, "Next you'll be demanding indoor plumbling!"
• When am I most content on this trip? When I'm sitting inside, listening to traditional Irish music, drinking a Harp. I wonder if that's a job you can get over here...
• A lot of the routine sights here are probably what you imagine when you imagine Ireland: gray skies, hilly terrain divided up by stone walls, a billion sheep (spray-painted with different colors to keep track of the flocks), and ruddy old guys in wool sweaters leaning into a stiff wind. 
  

What? You want to hear more about Ireland?

Well, I'm flattered. In looking at my notes, I find that I have more random jottings than I do a coherent, chronologically continuous narrative structure. So, let me clear out some jottings.

• If you ask an Irish person where they're from, they will tell you where they were born. If you ask an American where they're from, they will tell you either: (a) where they currently live; or (b) where they consider home. I think the Americans get this one right.
• Americans say "um." The Scottish say "aim." The Irish say "em."
• America is BIG. Ireland would fit inside a lot of our states. But if you say that to an Irishman, he will knock you unconscious with a shillelagh.
• Here's a challenge for you: Try not to tap your toes when listening to traditional Irish music. This is like trying not to cry blood after reading a Frank Rich column.
• I'm ashamed to say that I, as a single person traveling alone, am creeped out when I encounter other single people traveling alone. I think to myself, "Does that guy have leprosy? Is he radioactive? Is he carrying partially digested chicken livers in his backpack?"
• What kind of a weird country considers "Finbar" a normal name for a guy?
• Ireland makes a much greater impression on me in terms of its scenery than its history.
• No tipping! Really, you're not supposed to tip. That's a relief when you're paying $47 for a pint of beer. 
• In general, the Irish are incredibly polite and friendly. If you open a map anywhere in public, you'll have 10 Irish trying to give you directions, all 10 of whom will insist on accompanying you for the remainder of your stay in their country.
• The ugly American stereotype has some validity, but only among older American tourists (like 60+ years, I'd say).

So, where were we? Galway...

All right, so now I'm on the west coast of Ireland...Galway, to be precise. It's not a great town in and of itself--it's mostly famous for a dolphin that makes its home in the harbor--but it's a good jumping off point for some other places.

One of those other places is the Aran Islands, an isolated farming/fishing outpost that's about an hour's ferry ride from Galway. 

There are three reasons to go to the Aran Islands. One is to see some Iron Age ruins--stone forts, stone huts, etc. Another is to see a small, traditional community that's not particularly interested in modernity. (If you're a single guy on Aran, your version of eharmony is a village elder who gives you the names of the three single milkmaids on the islands who are your age, +/- five years. If you don't have any luck with those three, you better swim to the mainland or start thinking about sheep.) The third reason is to lie on your belly at the very top of a 300-foot cliff and look straight down at the ocean. This will make you woozy. It will make you even MORE woozy when you read, after the fact, that people are often killed doing this; strong winds simply lift them off the cliff and toss them into the sea. Seagulls gotta eat, I guess...

Some random thoughts before we move on to the next location:

• My hat blew away, but I'm not sure it was working for me anyway. I was trying to pull off the Michael Nesmith look, but with questionable success.
• At times, it feels ridiculous to be doing a trip like this by myself. I mean, I'm sitting at a bar, drinking a pint, listening to Irish anti-war songs...alone. It just feels weird. But it's also completely liberating not to have to worry about anyone else's needs or wants. 
• Irish speed limits are insane. My comfortable driving speed is WAY below the posted limit. Also, the Irish treat stop signs as a suggestion, not a requirement. Then, this: A guy just tried to get by me on a very crowded street, and his driver-side mirror smacked into my driver-side mirror as he passed. In America, both parties would get out of the car, assess the damage, etc. In Ireland, the guy just gave me a polite wave as he drove away.