belgianwaffle

Ireland

Startling


Posted in: Cork, Ireland

I was at mass with my mother in Cork last week. The local catholic church, in a touching display of ecumenicism which I am sure would be crushed by the catholic hierarchy had they the faintest idea that it was happening, invites a protestant vicar to attend mass every week.

Last Sunday, the vicar read the Gospel and gave the sermon. I had by this point accustomed myself to his presence but since he kicked off with the words “My wife and I..” he succeeded in jolting his catholic congregation wide awake. These are not words you hear from a catholic priest.

It was vocation Sunday (the irony of having a Protestant vicar preach to a catholic congregation on vocation Sunday might not, I suspect appeal to the former head of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, but let us draw a veil over that) so there was a lot of talk of good shepherds.

The vicar told us of his former parish in West Cork and his parishioner, Trevor. Trevor was a good shepherd. He loved his cows. OK, sorry, a good dairy farmer. One day he saw one of the hired hands belting a cow and he fired the hired hand on the spot. Clear analogy, we are with you vicar, your words are only slightly undermined by the visible amusement of your catholic counterpart who had until that story been sitting nodding sagely as you told us of the wisdom of Billy Graham.

At the end of mass, the priest stood up to say a couple of words. Firstly, he thanked the spectacular choir who had come in from the Cork choral festival; secondly he told us that the church was 3 million in the red as the trustees had put all their money in AIB shares and this faith in capitalism turned out to be misplaced hence the need for a collection basked; finally he remarked that we might have seen him laughing during the sermon. He explained that he was a farmer’s son from West Cork. “And,” said he, “Protestant cows and Catholic cows are clearly treated very differently in that part of the world; we’d often give a cow an old belt to move it along.” I don’t know whether this ecumenicism lark will ever really take off.

Yoof


Posted in: Dublin, Ireland

I met some young people the other day. I don’t really meet many teenagers. They were pleasant but slightly alarming. I don’t think I was at all as confident and articulate at 16.

R (16) told me about his motorbike and showed me a picture on his phone. Someone on his estate died in a motorbike accident last week: “he wasn’t wearing a helmet, it happens”.

R is the product of a brief union. He has five step-brothers and sisters from his mother’s second marriage and several more from his father’s first marriage. He also has a baby sister from his father’s third marriage to a woman from Cameroon. Modern Ireland in microcosm. When he leaves school he wants to join the British army. Not the Irish army because they only go on peacekeeping missions.

R’s friend H asked me what I was going to do about teenage pregnancy rates. “Nothing” I said and then ventured “actually, I think that Ireland has a quite a low rate for teenage pregnancy“. “Not in my school” she said whipping out her mobile phone to show me her 15 year old friend’s scan.

I feel very middle aged now, I can tell you.

The English


Posted in: Ireland, Work

The English are class obsessed. I went to hear an “inspirational” Englishman speak about his experiences. He announced to the audience that he was “working class” that his grandfather had been a barman and that it was through the transformational power of education that he was able to enter the venue as a speaker rather than “a servant”.

While Ireland may not be a classless society, it’s a lot closer to that than England is. I think I can confidently say that no Irish person considers that it is embarassing to have relatives engaged in pretty much any job (ok, nobody wants a cat burglar in the family, but you know what I mean). It doesn’t matter what your grandfather did for a living. It doesn’t matter what anyone’s grandfather did for a living.

I thought his use of the word “servant” was interesting too. I wouldn’t consider the waiters or those doing the cloakrooms to be servants. I wouldn’t regard it as their destiny to stay in the same position for ever either. Servants has the whiff of indentured and servility about it. I don’t like it. Maybe it’s just the difference between the colonising and the colonised. All that said, education can be transformative; for everyone.

The Economy


Posted in: Ireland, Middle Child, Princess, Twins

The Princess came down to watch the news last night. “Oh no, not more about the money we all owe, they’ve said it already, we know it.” How true.

Meanwhile, Daniel announced to me that “Parnell Square is where we march”. It is indeed. This will be a useful piece of information for you, should you wish to avoid traffic restrictions when in Dublin.

Dressing up


Posted in: Ireland, Middle Child, Princess, Twins, Youngest Child

Me (to the boys): This is your sister’s school and you two will be starting there in a while.
Daniel: Will we wear a uniform?
Me: Yes, you will.
Daniel: Like our sister’s uniform?
Me: Yes indeed.
Michael: Hurrah, I will wear a skirt!

When we got home, I changed into jeans, runners and a fleece, and trotted out to cut the grass. “You look cool”, said my daughter. I fear that prolonged exposure to Irish fashions has not improved anyone’s dress sense. And we were already coming from a low base. Sigh.

Finally, I have got all my hair cut off. A nice Lithuanian lady gave Daniel and me the same style. It cost us 28 euros in total. Pleasingly economical. I am quite happy but the complete absence of comment other than from my children and that, frankly negative, is a little disturbing. Kissing Michael goodnight he said, “I don’t want you to kiss me, you look like a boy, you’re not like my Mummy”. When I went to collect them from Montessori school, the teacher took one look at me and said, “Ah, that is why the boys came into school and told me that their Mummy is a boy, now.” Sigh.

Things that happen to you when you are over 40


Posted in: Dublin, Ireland, Reading etc.

I have spent the last number of evenings alphabetising our book collection. This is disturbingly entertaining. I may be going insane. In a dull meeting today, I found my mind wandering longingly to the four shelves that then remained to be tackled.

I have a burst blood vessel in my eyeball. It is not an attractive look.

Ireland won the rugby Grand Slam. Alarmingly, I remember when we won the Triple Crown in 1982. Last Sunday afternoon we saw the bus bearing the victorious players and pieces of plate go by while we were stopped at traffic lights. If the children become international rugby stars, we will remind them of this moment – my brother is working hard on their skills, only this evening he had them all practising doing a scrum together.

I am cycling to work and finding that the world of cycling in Dublin is very macho. It’s all men in lycra with high visibility vests and sporting helmets. I miss Brussels where there was a gender mix in the cycling population and all the competitive macho cycling took place deep in Flanders.

I discover that my writing style has started to resemble that of a a TV critic, desperately trying to knit together disparate elements under an unlikely unifying theme.