The Luck of the Irish

« Return to Ireland

Next day, new missions, new bumps in the social cosmic tumble-dryer. I bus up the coast to an 800 year old castle with bolwling lawn greens as far as the eye can see. It rains twice a year in Dublin, once for 6 months and once for the rest of the year. Back in Dublin, I get lost looking for the monstrous 15 block monolith that is Guinness. A totaly commercialised little venture, the Guiness factory was a little cheesy, even if the pint at the end was the best tasting stout I’ve ever had. Some lady gets violent with a guide about the fact that Guinness do scant recycling, producing 5 tons of Guinness each day on the Dublin site alone. That’s more than Brad Resnik can drink. I think.

Saw some quality gonzo-action in the famous literary pubs of Dublin (where the drinkers had writing problems), which involved 3 South African sisters, 3 Dutch engineers, 2 Australians, a pub crawl, a big bottle of Smirnoff, and a trashed 4 day old hotel room. It turned ugly when I demonstrated why rock stars trash hotel rooms (the room belonged to an English TV geezer, who didn’t see to perturbed) - just a thumb in the direction of the people who kiss their asses now, but wouldn’t hire them as bus boys before they were famous. So we basically behaved like wild vodka soaked animals, and came close to throwing the TV out the window, to see how long it stayed on before it crashed. But I’ll wait for the first million before I do that one. It was about at this time I decided to bring peace to Northern Ireland.

“Fears of more violence - BELFAST: After yesterday’s shooting in a nightclub, incidents of rioting and violence have been reported around Ulster.” - Irish Times 30/12/97 It wasn’t planned (nothing was) but when I first saw the signs pointing to Belfast I knew I had to go strap on a red, head band, grow long black hair quick and buy a survival knife. I bought my bus ticket, and then read the above headline. I fear less. I gonzo.

Three and a hours later, I’m in one of the hottest cities on the planet, and that’s not referring to the rain or the freezing temperature. Eyes are shifty. If neck hairs could dance, they would skip town for Vegas. Tension bubbles. I check into a hostel, stroll around town. Immediately I’m aware that this isn’t Ireland anymore. BT phoneboxes sprout like colonial pimples, the streets are cleaner, the traffic lights wider, the streets narrower. It is England in Ireland. Irish money (punts) is not accepted, Northern Ireland has it’s own currency, it’s own accent, it’s own twang on the green harp. The wildly euphemistic “Crime Busters” are the only give away. Heavily fortified patrol vans, menacing as Caspers, speeding around everywhere. Somehow, they don’t give the impression that crime is what is being busted. REM says “Welcome to the Occupation.”

I stroll through a devastated Gap store (no bomb could have caused the damage that Christmas Sales inflict on any Ladies department) and emerge with a new state of mind. Thing’s aren’t tense at all. People are smiling. The city is bright and prosperous. Where’s the war zone?

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