Had some very Irish experiences in my last 24 hours in Ireland. Attended a traditional music concert in an old church, had a tender Irish lamb dinner in a pub, watched some Gaelic football, and enjoyed a traditional Irish music jam session in a traditional Irish pub. I’d had a coffee at the pub earlier and was chatting to the nice bartender who told me there’d be a traditional music sesh on so to come back. That was very nice as he knew he wasn’t exactly going to make money out of me as it had come out that I couldn’t drink alcohol. When I came back for the music a few hours later he remembered me and asked if I wanted another coffee. People are very friendly here. He’s from Dublin and he was talking about how he’s from a ‘rough’ part of Dublin where he feels like the police have just given up and there’s a lot of crime and trouble so he was keen to get out. He’d worked in Australia too as many of the young Irish I spoke to had. Met some interesting people at the pub – a really lovely young girl living in Ireland with her Irish dad but from the Sunshine Coast, her friend – an Aussie guy on leave from the army who had done tours in Afghanistan at the same time as the American ex-army guy I also met who is now running a business leasing land to people to grow legal marijuana!! Funniest of all though was realising that one of the band jamming was the young fella I’d been chatting to at the gym – he recognised me at the same time I recognised him and we had a good chat. He seems like a nice young fella and he said if I ever came back ‘with yer man’ he’d show us around and help us out. I also offered for him to come visit the farm. I was talking to the lads about my awful bus tour only for them to realise that was the one they were booked on for the next day – hopefully their experience is much better! Well I’ve had a ‘grand’ time in ole Ireland but can’t wait to get back to see my ‘darlin’ man’ ( as they’d say here).
