Pho Viet

We went to California today.  Well not really, but it felt like it.  The sun came out and we had lunch at a Pho restaurant.  My awesomer half took us to lunch at Pho Viet on Parnell Street in Dublin, and it totally reminded me of being back in the San Francisco Bay Area.

She had Pho Ga, chicken noodle soup

and I ordered Pho Tai Chin, rare steak noodle soup

Pho is a Vietnamese noodle soup.  The folks in Dublin do it right.  The noodles were silky smooth, the broth was divine, the meat was succulent.  Everything tasted so clean and fresh.  We will definitely visit again.

Aggressive Panhandling

I am a disgrace.  Well, according to one of Dublin's inner city junkies I am.  Let me explain...

I was waiting here at around 9:00 PM one evening...

in front of Connolly Station

which is by Talbot Street

and Sheriff Street.

Ahhh yes, beautiful Sheriff Street

in the bowels of the city.

So, this junkie comes by, begging.  "Give us 60 cents for a cuppa tae..."  I shake my head no.  "Aw plaze meestur.  Ah nade money far a hostel" says he.  "NO" I say.

Junkie boy walks off.  I notice him picking up cigarette butts near the lamp post.  He talks with a friend for a minute.  Then he walks past me again.  I'm not turning my back on him.  This doesn't feel right.

Junkie McTrackmarks begs some people walking out of Conolly station.  He tries his luck with 5 or 6 people, then he walks past me AGAIN.  This time he meets his friend.  The friend walks past.  They're trying to flank me, one on either side.  I stand like they taught us in Aikido; it's a squared off stance that increases your stability.

So Junkie McTrackmarks passes me a third time.  He makes a point of walking really close to me.  He leans in and says--inches from my head--

"You're a DISGRACE."

I'm like... what?  I stare at him, eyes burning.  He takes a step, turns around and says again, "You're a disgrace."  What?  For not giving you money?  He was really aggressive.  This really pissed me off.

I looked him right in the eye and said quite loudly:  "F*** Y**".

Perhaps it was the threatening way I was holding my umbrella.  I had it by the wrong end, with the hooked handle down.  Seriously, I was ready to clock him with it.  My posture said:  "Come at me bro."  He mumbled something quietly, smiled and backed off...

He and his buddy bade a hasty retreat to Talbot street, jay-walking in front of a speeding taxi.  I guess they were hoping to score.  Or sell their asses in an alley, I don't know?  Losers.

There is a reason why I wear steel-toed Doc Martens.

After living in Ireland for almost 2 years, I have begun to realize that a lot of people have a hand-out mentality.  They think the government will pay for all their needs, and the world owes them a living.  Here is a perfect example:

This made big news recently because the Minister for Social Protection has decided to cut the grant to assist poor families with costs for First Communion.  Yes you read that right.  Ireland--up until now--had been giving out 300 euro grants to families so they could buy First Communion dresses for their kiddies.  According to this article:  "Last year the Government paid out more than €1.5 million in communion and confirmation grants."

In Ireland, being on the dole and getting government handouts has become a lifestyle choice.  There are third and forth generations of people who have not worked a day in their lives.  The government puts them in "Council Housing" and gives them money while they supposedly look for jobs.  In reality, there are 30 year old men sitting on the couch drinking cider and playing video games all day.

Talk about a disgrace.  There are thousands of Irish men who need to grow a pair and support themselves.

Easter in Connemara

It's a rainy Easter Sunday in Connemara.  I walked out in the rain to take some pictures and nearly blew away in the wind.  For the most part we stuck around the house and watched River Cottage, Top Gear and some mystery shows.  We drove into town to do a bit of shopping and had a pretty relaxing day.

Little fishing boat tied up in the bay

The tide is out, rocks & seaweed exposed

This stone fence is likely hundreds of years old

Currach tied up waiting for a better fishing day

Good Friday

Apparently you can't buy beer on Good Friday.  Some kind of law in Ireland bans alcohol sales today.

Lots of people think it's a needless ban.  I mean, come on... you can still buy a pack of smokes at the corner shop, but you can't buy a beer?  I see.  So the Irish lawmakers think it's fine to destroy your lungs, but not your liver on certain days of the year. I'm just bummed because I had a crappy day and I wanted to get a beer after work.  Then I come to the shop and find this; the beer aisle has curtains over it.

Lá Fhéile Pádraig Shona Dhaoibh

Festive fish from the Galway farmers' market

Happy St. Patrick's Day!  We are in Connemara this weekend.  My awesomer half and I have a book called Sacred Ireland that is full of megalithic sites, stone circles, and old friaries.  We visited the Moyne graveyard and in County Mayo and Annaghkeen Castle in County Galway today.

An early Christian graveyard in Co. Mayo (approx. 8th century)

Annaghkeen Castle in Co. Galway (14th century)

Swedish Meatballs

Cue "Also Sprach Zarathustra" by Richard Strauss.  Picture an African savannah.  A group of primates (homo habilis) wakes up to the sunrise.  Suddenly, they notice before them, standing tall and silent... the monolith.  They are fascinated by the monolith.  Around this time Homo habilis began to use the first stone tools.  They were our ancestors.

Step forward 2 million years to a grassy plain on a windswept Atlantic Archipelago, (ok, it's just Finglas, stick with me.)  Tool-using man has evolved from whapping each other with bones to constructing flat-pack furniture with a hex key.  Today my other half and I visited the giant blue monolith that is Ikea.

Touch the monolith

oh look, they have a Rocky Horror department!

we love these color-changing night lights.  Spooka!

OMG we shouldn't have ordered the large.  There were a lot of Swedish Meatballs.

Dragon.  It's what's for dinner.

This was pretty trippy...

This was too.  Whoa... far out man!

Behold, aisle five in all its glory

Some Boat Thing (part 2)

My other half and I went to a confusing event yesterday.  It was packed full of people and not much was going on.  The official title of the event was:  The Dublin Tall Ships Races Festival presented by Szczecin, Sail Training International.

Let's try to make sense of this:

• The Tall Ships -- ok, I'm with you so far...
• Races Festival -- wait, the boats are just parked there, not... racing.
• presented by Szcsecin -- Szzwhutthefuk?  Who?  Huh??
• Sail Training International -- excuse me, this is some kind of training exercise?  I thought it was a race.  What's going on here?

Surely this can't be some sort of sailboat training class.  I mean, the Italian Navy showed up.  In this:

Something tells me these guys have advanced past Dinghy Sailing 101.  I mean, they don't let the noobs pilot something that looks like it came out of the Museo Nazionale Romano, do they?

Lo and behold, if you Google Amerigo Vespucci (the name of the ship) you find it IS a training vessel.  What is going ON here? 

I wish somebody would have explained the event better to the crowd.  I doubt anybody attending the "Tall Ships Festival" knew what it was all about.  I mean, me and like 999,999 other people simply took pictures of stuff:  Like this twat parked illegally:

"Will the owner of the Alexander von Humboldt please move your vehicle?  You are in a 24 hour Clamping Zone."  Haha, we really didn't know what we were looking at most of the time.  Case in point:

The Mexicans have a nekkid Aztec dude on the front of their boat?  Really?  I was kind of expecting a Chola with a switchblade or something.  The Hispanic member of the Village People doesn't exactly strike fear into the hearts of pirates.  Even this is better:

Behold, the BAE Guayas proudly displaying the Ecuadorian Battle Turkey, in all its glory!  Pitty the poor pirate who underestimates these sailors.

We saw this guy getting off the boat from Ecuador.  He better watch out, the sailboat from Sweden was right behind!

This was the HMS Ikea, flagship of the Swedish Merchant Marines, delivering its shipment of flat pack furniture to the Dublin Port.