Bit o' Blarney

Stanstead Airport, London: Nov. 10, 9:45am
Angus Deaton has gum on his bag! I was waiting in line behind him at a coffee shop in Stanstead Airport and there it was. I saw it with my own eyes -- GUM! I feel a warm Londoner bond with him. I too have gum on my bag! I picked it up on a Connex train from Waterloo to Kingswood Warren. I'd been feeling a bit foolish about it since. You think I'd know enough not to let any part of my possessions or person touch a Connex train by now. I feel much better now that I know Angus has obviously had a similar lapse. He may be the witty urbane host of "Have I Got News for You" but he still has his frailties

Yes, take away the fame and wealth and we are much the same Angus and I. Two suave dudes with gum on our bags.

This email is an account of my trip to Ireland. I'm off to meet my friend Dr. Derrick for six days in Dublin. I've known Derrick since we were both 13. Last time we met up Prince Waleed of Saudi Arabia bought us a drink. PW, as we like to call him, is the second richest businessman outside of the United States and for a while the three of us were buddies. He may not have been exactly aware of it at the time. We were in the bar at Momo's off Regent Street listening to some Morroccan drummers. The prince and his entourage of sycophants and strumpets were sitting nearby and their drinks order arrived just as they were informed their table was ready upstairs. With a shocking and fortuitous display of profligacy, they abandoned the newly arrived tray of drinks and exited the bar. Being the jackals that we are, we lunged for the scraps. Ah, it was a night to be proud of. I'm looking forward to more such glamour and good fortune on this trip.

Marless House, Galway - Nov 12, 12:45 am
Two days in, the trip is looking good. I arrived in Dublin yesterday afternoon and met up with Derrick and Roberto, a Dutch friend of Derrick's he met in an Irish pub in Peru. We saw the new Harry Potter film in the afternoon, then watched a World Cup qualifying match between Ireland and Iran in a pub which had a disturbing lack of Iranian supporters. You'd think the Irish would be more even-handed about such things, but everyone seemed to be cheering for the home team. No originality. Although I admit it might have been a bit much to accuse anyone of unoriginality when at that point my holiday had consisted of going to a film and watching television.

Later that evening we went to the Gaiety Theatre which is a grand old theatre now used as a night-club. There are five bars distributed over three floors along with the auditorium itself. Movies are shown in the luxurious auditorium which has plush comfortable seats populated by lascivious drunks. They yell at the screen, grope each other, smash glasses and smoke up a storm. I couldn't help think about Vincent Vega’s comments in Pulp Fiction about being able to take a beer into a movie theatre in Europe. I’m sure this was exactly the North American nightmare of what would happen if you allowed the patrons to take alcoholic beverages into a movie theatre.

Distributed amongst the five bars were 2 djs, a blues band, and an eclectic string quartet (four fiddlers and a double bass). It was perhaps the best night-club experience I've ever had. The Irish are an amazingly friendly race and it was an epiphany to just talk to people and have them talk to me without any hidden agendas or expectations. Also, the music was at a reasonable level. You could actually hold a conversation in any of the rooms. What a concept! We were kicked out around 4am and my ears weren't ringing and my throat wasn't sore from shouting. All in all, a fantastic night.

Marless House, Galway - Nov 12, 11:30 pm
Derrick and I have challenged each other to read Ulysses. Derrick saw an article about how Ulysses had been voted the greatest English Language Novel ever written. The article was presented along with a sidebar of quotes from famous authors who had meant to read the book but had never quite managed it. A typical quote from a Booker Prize winning author might go "Oh yeah, Ulysses! Brilliant book! No, I haven't actually read it. I read the first couple of chapters but found it a bit heavy going at the time. Always meant to take another stab at it, though."

Both of us have had similar experiences with Joyce's great work. This got us thinking that no one may have actually read the book and maybe it was actually a pile of crap, "The Emperor’s New Robes of literature" so to speak. Before we leave Ireland we are going to buy matching copies and embark on a mad race to actually read and understand the damn thing. It is unclear whether this will be primarily a co-operative or competitive effort.

Rohan's B & B, Castlegregory, Dingle Peninsula - Nov 13, 11:15 pm
I feel l should correct a few myths about Ireland:

1. Guinness Tastes Better in Ireland. RUBBISH! It tastes exactly the same to me as when I have it in London. This is a myth. That said, I did have one or two other stouts that were much tastier than Guinness. Guinness still make the best ads, though
2. The Weather. The Irish make out that the weather is terrible here and that it rains all the time. "My two favourite days of the year are Christmas and summer," one Irishman told us. This seems, based on our experience to date, to be a BIG BOLD LIE. It has been sunny almost every day that we've been here.
3. Ireland is Green Like Nowhere Else.I've had many people try to tell me that the green fields of Ireland are a richer green than anywhere else. Not true. Dublin isn't green at all. It is kind of generically city-coloured. The Burren just southwest of Galway is almost solid grey due to the limestone and shale in the area. Connemara, directly West of Galway, is predominantly orange due to the heather at this time of year. It is so orange that when we finally hit some green fields, Roberto remarked, "This must be why there is green & orange in the flag."

Roberto is Dutch. He has some wonderful sayings. My favourite so far is "You can't pull feathers from a frog." This is the Dutch equivalent of the saying "You can't get blood from a stone."

One stunning difference between the Dutch and Canadians is that Roberto is genuinely pleased when people mistake his accent for American. This happened in a bar in Dublin and he was so chuffed we gave him an American name for the duration of the trip. Whenever there were young ladies in earshot, we called him "Chad".

We encountered a number of genuine Americans on the trip. Roberto/Chad became unduly enamoured of a couple of American woman in the Quays pub in Galway (great pub by the way) and tried to charm the socks off of one of them by asking if she was 40 years old. This was partially my fault. The three of us were sitting in the pub eyeing up the chicks as young lads on a stag holiday are wont to do and Roberto announced his admiration of a woman sitting near us. Derrick and I were somewhat surprised as he had told us that his prospective partner age range was a firm 22 – 32 years old. Roberto, himself, is 28. We both argued that while she was undeniably an attractive woman, the woman he indicated was outside of his stated demographic.

"You are crazy!" said Roberto. "Look at her friend. They are both in their twenties."

"I think that’s her daughter," said Derrick.

"You Canadians know nothing about woman. How old do you think she is, then?" he asked.

"39 to 41," I said.

So Roberto leapt up and went over to the woman in question and said. "Pardon me. My friend says you are forty years old. I say he is crazy. Who is right?"

It turned out that she was 41 and her daughter was 21. They both declined to join us at our table. Upon reflection, I doubt the mother would have been that offended by Roberto's query. I wonder how the daughter felt about it. Roberto learned that she was attendng College in Galway and her mother was visiting from New York. So there she is, possibly away from home for the first time, showing her Mom the sights of Galway, feeling independent and powerful, and this cute guy walks up to her... And hits on her mother.

We seemed to get on better with most of the other American tourists we met on the trip. There are a lot of them in Ireland. One guy in particular engaged us in an enthusiastic discussion about the toll bridge to Rhode Island which apparently has replaced the ferry that used to be the main access to the island.

"It costs me 4 bucks just to get across the bridge to go bowling!" he complained.

His friend tried to point out that the ferry cost exactly the same amount before it was replaced and took half an hour each way.

"Exactly! Nobody is going to spend an hour on a boat just to go bowling! Don’t be so damn stupid! But with the bridge, it’s like a 4 dollar tax on bowling."

Despite this encounter Roberto/Chad remains proud of his pseudo-American accent.

Speeding Car near Dingle - Nov 14, 3:55 pm
Just bought the World's Ugliest Sweater. What the fuck was I thinking? It's the colour of nuclear waste fertilised raspberries. It just goes to show, as every woman knows, you should never go clothes shopping with men.

Speeding Car near Cork – Nov. 15, 11:45 am
After a spirited discussion, we have decided not to kiss the Blarney Stone. In case you were unaware of the legend, it is said that whomever kisses the Blarney Stone will have the gift of the gab. If this is the case, then all the Irish must have kissed it at some point in their lives. Derrick felt that we were loquacious enough already. In fact he was worried that it might suck our conversational power from us.

"If the stone works, it has to get its power from somewhere. Maybe it takes from people who already have the Blarney and gives to those who do not," he argued. "The Blarney Stone is like the Robin Hood of gab!"

Another Irish oddity – all the local radio stations read out the death notices just before the news. If one can ignore the implication of loss, they are wonderful to listen to: a name followed by a last itinerary followed by another name and so on. You’ll be sitting there, listening to Brittney Spears reassuring us all that she is "not such an innocent girl" and then there’ll be this respectful Irish voice telling us that so and so is residing at this funeral home, moving to this church at this time, finally moving to such and such a cemetery. When it comes near to my time, I may have to return to Ireland just for this last fleeting bit of fame and reassurance of my existence.

Dublin Airport – Nov. 15, 6:25 pm
The departure lounge is curiously of devoid of witty topical quiz show presenters. The woman sitting beside me has no gum on her bag. She must not be from London. Sure enough, she speaks with a Irish accent. I can hear her talking on her mobile phone. "I left my car keys in your house. I threw them in through the letterbox but I think they may have landed in a plant. What are you doing with a plant in front of your letterbox? You put it there to catch my keys I suppose."

I am reading Ulysses. Derrick and I bought each other matching copies in Cork. So that is one goal well on its way to attainment. The woman finishes her phone call and says to me with no preamble. "You’ll not have a plant in front of your letterbox, I suppose?"

On page 19 of Ulysses, it reads "The sacred pint alone can undo the tongue of Dedalus." That may be true for Dedalus, but for the rest of the Irish no such lubrication seems necessary.