Visit to Ireland

 

The Bus

 

Arriving at the bus station heralded the start of a bad day.

'Do you know the way to Leicester ?'

Oh, no, I thought, I’ve heard this before, we are likely to get lost, and we did.

 

The driver asked one of the passengers to help him by reading the map as he went along, and guess what, the passenger was Irish. Well I ask you, that’s asking the blind to lead the blind ! He held the map upside down for a start.

 

The net result of this that we missed the town completely, so when we did arrive, after going round the ring road twice, the passengers who were waiting to be picked up were a bit upset to say the least. S0 we were not a happy bus as we tried to leave the town, the wrong way down a one way street.

 

The next thing we heard was the wailing of a police siren, and flashing blue lights. The driver, expecting the worst, pulled over to the side. A member of the British police, at his phlegmatic best, stepped into the bus and asked,

’ Hello, hello, and where do you think you are going ?’ In one voice the whole bus said, ”T0 Ireland !’ ”Not down this street, your not’ was his reply. “Oh yes we are,”

 

He seemed non—plussed at this chorus, and fearing, I’m sure, that he was already there among idgiots, shrugged his shoulders and said, rather resignedly, ’Follow me.’And with that we had a police escort out of the town, to the chorus of, ’If we ever get across the sea to Ireland, maybe we’ll do it in a day, but not with this bloody driver, we’ll sure get lost along the way !’

 

And so we trundled on, picking up passengers in two other towns, who had some pretty cryptic remarks on where had we been, so When we finally arrived at Holyhead, we had a bus load of rebellious OAP’s. Not a pretty sight. By this time we had been allotted another driver, who only spoke in monosyllables, which I am sure was his way of avoiding trouble.

 

Naturally we arrived in Dublin at the time of the rush hour traffic, and so we were further delayed in getting away from the town; net result arrive at hotel at 9.30 at night! Seventeen an a half hours on the journey — greeted by cold rice pudding at the hotel, and the driver saying, ’Seven thirty breakfast for an early get away for the first days tour !’

 

Well, there was a riot, well as near as you can get to a riot with a bunch of O A P's. Walking sticks were waved in the air, zimmer frames trembled, those with bad hips jockeyed around the room in their exasperation, even cold rice pudding was raised in anger by trembling hands, thankfully not having the strength to throw it !

 

The waitresses, who were all Japanese, headed by a German girl, not unlike someone I knew, stood in amazement at this contumacious assembly The Japanese girls cowed around the edges of the room fearing for their lives, they had been warned of English lager louts, but not rice pudding louts ! The German girl, who's name turned out to be Helena, took command in that typical Germanic way and ordered her girls out with loud cries of, ’ Schnell, schnell, hinausgehen, tous, rous,'

 

This naturally confused the Japanese girls even more, and probably expecting some kind of attack, dived under tables, not a bad move in view of the expected rice pudding projectiles. ‘I WAS ONLY ]OKING,’ cried out the bus driver, in some angujsh ’And so was I, ’ cried out a demented ancient widow, built like a battle ship, who delivered the coup-de-crace, as she scored a direct hit with a rice pudding.

 

Things would have gone from bad to worse if an inscrutable Vietnamese had not arrived upon the scene and called for calm, of which no one understood, but spirit, and the strength to carry on, had failed the O A P’s, and they fell back onto their chairs in exhaustion.

 

The next morning British humour reasserted its self, and great jokes were made of the whole proceedings, the general declaration was that they had not had such a good laugh since granny caught her tits in the mangle - (An old English idiomatic joke !)

 

 

The Trip Out

 

Breakfast was a hurried affair, because we were down late, naturally, so gulping down our last cup of coffee we made it to the bus just in time. It started off well enough, apart from a few grumbles about being kept waiting.

 

We had a guide, who was a typical Irish double tongue. By that I mean everything he said was countered by a qualifier — ’It will be a lovely morning, ifit doesn Train,” — ’Its nice to see you all, that it is, ’ There’s some ancient Celtic crosses in that grave yard, atleast there would be If thy had not been taken away but still it doesn’t matter, you couldn't see them from here !’ But then again we could not understand his accent, so it did not much matter, so we settled down to look at the countryside.

 

Unbeknown to us a passenger in the front seat had a nose bleed. It had started to gush out and there was no stopping it. Paper handkerchiefs Were offered, but of no avail. The bus first aid kit Was opened up, but that had nothing for a nose bleed —- I think personally that he had been picking his nose, and deserved all he got.

 

Anyrate it caused such a kerfuffle that someone from the back shouted out, ’Put a sock in it !' ( a colloquialism for shut up and get on with it !), but in this case the nose bleeder thought it was a good idea, and took his sock off and pushed it up his nose!

 

The driver, who had left his seat to look for the first aid kit, sat back on it, and as it went down it caught the toe of the man with the nose bleed, who’s foot was sticking through the space underneath the barrier between him and the driver. He leapt into the air with a great cry of pain, shouting out ’MY FOOT,’ followed by a string of profanities that even the bus driver had not heard of, and stunned the guide, sensitive catholic lad that he was.

 

Naturally the passengers at the back of the bus had not known what was going on, and were surprised, to say the least, to see a man leaping up into the air with a sock stuck up his nose; they must have thought there was a loony on the bus!.

 

’Are you alright ?’ The driver asked, and with the stoicism of the English, the man answered yes whilst still writhing in pain.

’We’ll go then !’ said the driver, and off we went.

 

The first stop was the cliffs of Moher where everybody dutifully got off and climbed the path up to O'Brien’s tower and looked at the cliffs. Well cliffs are cliffs, so that did not impress me very much, they looked as if they could do with a good srub ! So I filled in some time buying and writing some postcards. Suitable photographs were taken, and all passed peacefully enough, and then we were on our way again, until there was a cry from the back of the bus, ’Where is my mother ?’

 

Whoops, the bus is brought to a halt, those without their seat belts on bang their heads on the seat in front.

‘We can’t have left her behind,’ says the driver, ‘I counted everybody on.’

”But she’s ninety,’ came the response, as if that explained everything!

’I’m here,’ says a little voice, we look round and there was a little grey head arising from the toilet, ’What's the problem?’

We heard a faint gasp as her daughter fell back into her seat with some relief, and a despairing, ”Oh! mother !’

 

The bus, I really should call it a coach, drivers get really upset if you call their Executive Coach a bus, continued on its way, with totally un—cypherable comments by the guide, other that what was there is no longer there. I began to think that the whole of Ireland had been shipped away!

 

And then we reached Innes, a large town not far from Shannon airport, I make this remark because it is a big factor in the changing face of Innis, if not the hole of Ireland. Illegal immigrants arrive at Shannon, and Innis is the nearest town, and so it is now populated by a cross breed of foreigners, from Latvians to Cubans, plus la change.

 

Entertainment

 

And so ended the first day - but the night was still young - we had to sample the entertainment. Well it was an old silver haired guy who advertised himself as Mr. Music. That was a bit of a laugh. He certainly knew lots of songs but his keyboard playing was a bit haphazard to say the least.

 

His highlight of the evening was to take out his false teeth and mime to an operatic aria. A sight to be seen, well not really, and certainly not to hear. And, it would seem, he had a mate!

 

I have not mentioned this before but the town of Lisdoonvarna, where we were located, is famous for its matchmaking, no not making matches but matching couples together with a view to getting married. This is an ancient custom where farmers come down from the hills to meet with potential wives.

 

Well on this night he had come with Mr. Music to try his luck with some of the English ladies staying at the hotel. He was what is known as a rough diamond, and the ladies loved him. He had on Wellington boots, overall trousers that had not seen a tub for many a day, old ribbed jumper, a cap he never took off and three days growth of beard.

 

He didn’t need to be invited to perform, he left his winkles on the bar - you know those smelly fishy things in shells - and got up and sung a song in Irish which no one understood a word of.

 

Well it didn’t matter, he leered at the ladies and a strange thing happened, he seemed to project a strange fascination and several of the attractive ladies jumped and swayed along with him, to embarrassment of their husbands. Some were hustled off to bed shortly afterwards!

 

He then told the joke about the three Nuns.

 

Three Nuns die and go to heaven. They think they will go straight in, but no. St. Peter stops them and says, ‘I’m sorry but you will have to answer three questions correctly or you will be going to Old Nick.’

 

To the first Nun he asks, ‘ Who was the first person on earth?’ ‘That’s easy,’ she replied,’ Adam.’ ’Go straight in,’ says St. Peter.

 

To the second Nun he asks, ‘Who was the second person on earth?’ ‘That’s easy,’ she replied, it was Eve.’ ’ Very good,’ says Peter,’ Go in.’

 

To the third Nun he asks, ‘What was the first thing Eve said to Adam?’ She looked at St. Pete in anguish and with some despair and said, ‘That’s a hard one!’ Good answer’ says St Peter, ‘Go straight in.’

 

I’m not sure the OAPs understood this, some laughed, and some looked distinctly puzzled - perhaps it had been a long time since they has seen a ‘Hard one! ‘ With that the party ended, and ended the visit and we went to bed happy to prepare for the long journey home.