New Year's Eve in Ireland is about what you would expect. A big party, small dresses, high shoes, too many drinks, and a cab ride home at 4am.
I, luckily, avoided most of those moments by opting for The King's Head Pub, jeans, sneakers, and being home by 1pm or so. As for the drinking, well . . . it is Ireland after all, and the first one was free to the first 50 ladies through the door. It would've been rude of me to refuse ;)
But I'm getting ahead of myself. Yesterday morning, I was up at 7am to leave Dublin by 8:15am. The parting was bitter sweet because we wanted to stay longer and experience the city more, but were also excited to be heading to our adopted city (in my case, Galway. Others in our group were headed for Cork). But before we began our 3 hour bus ride, we got to learn and participate in the Gaelic Games. What are the Gaelic Games? Crazy good fun and slightly scary.
Gaelic Football is the most popular here in Ireland, like American Football is in the States with the marked difference that Irish players compete for a spot on the national team to play for the joy of playing. That is, they are not paid to play like American athletes are. It's an honor and a personal completion to play for the country as a whole, not a career choice. One of many subtleties to the Irish culture. Gaelic Football is a combination of soccer, American football, basketball, rugby, and a bit of volleyball. I encourage you to check out the game on YouTube somewhere, its quite entertaining to watch http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TEAbWrdB9XU .
After learning some of the basics (poorly) and playing a scrimmage (my team won), we were ushered to the Hurling field. Again, find YouTube and type in "hurling", there is a video that's 5:22 long and gives you an idea of how the game works http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TmzivRetelE . Basically, you have a stick, there's a ball that is about the size of a baseball, and you try to score points in a goal. Here's the thing: the game is a combination (or more like an ancestor of) field hockey, baseball and lacrosse, high speed and a contact sport. If you think Quidditch is the fastest and most intense sport "known" to man, you don't know hurling. Of course we all failed at it since we couldn't pick the darned ball up, so it soon became a game of field hockey with some baseball to score a point. Again, my team won 1-0, which put our entire group to 2-0 Us. And yes, we were very competitive. If there is only one thing we knew how to do, it was the "contact" part of the sport.
We then moved into the mundane indoors to learn Irish hand ball which is racquetball, but instead of having a racket, you have your hand. It's like wall-ball, if you've ever played that. we had a handful of people who were actually good at it, but when it came to the elimination round most of us were out fairly quick. Again, my "team" beat the other guys. At this point I'd like to point out that the win/lose divide was all done in good humor and no one was upset or angry over the game ends because we were all really, really, really, bad at all the games, and knew it.
Last, but not least, was Irish dancing, which felt right to me. At my home school I swing dance and know some contra dancing, so traditional Irish dancing was actually familiar. Those who know me can guess what I'll be dong this semester. Sports? Nope.
Teach me how to dance.
Lunch followed, and the bus ride to Galway was next., along with a quick nap. Once we arrived, rooms were assigned, beds were claimed, showers were had, and American students were lost. Lost how? Trying to find a restaurant in the city center we all had vouchers for . . . the fish and chips shop, who's name I cannot spell, was where the American students trickled in in 2's and 4's. The chips (french fries) were amazing! Cooked in a beer batter, I later that night joked that they were my "pregame". So yummy.
Ireland has a habit of closing up the shops around 7pm or so on week nights, so my group of 4 strolled around a bit until we found The King's Head, as recommended by our Galway contact who said, "When I mention The King's Head, I'm not saying go out and get drunk on your first night here. But it is New Years and if you want to drink, it is a place past students have all highly recommended," by which she meant, "Here's a pub to check out since you're all new. Have fun!"
We did. It took some of the American students a while to warm up, but there were some French students and Irish students there to help. The demographic of the pub was a younger crowd, and the DJ played great music, some familiar and some not. To help welcome in the new year there was a live band (genre rock) and so many people there was little room to move. For my part, I danced with the French guys and a few Irish ones, which surprised some of my fellow Americans, I think. Note that I'm a swing dancer, I love dancing lindy and west/east coast swing, but I also know some Latin dance, bal, and blues -- which are the "closer" dances meant for small and packed spaces. I'm also comfortable dancing with strangers, thanks to my experience through my college Swing Dance Club, so special shout out to them, you all are awesome!
The night ended with a 10 second count down, kisses, Sláinte (cheers), and more music. I would've liked to stay a bit longer, but most of us were exhausted from the day and needed sleep -- including me. We dug our coats, purses and scarves out of the pile and left the pub in groups of 2's through 6's. My group of 6 got lost briefly, but only because we thought we knew of a short-cut that didn't exist. So. We all made it back eventually with good cheer, and rang in the New Year with the luck of the Irish.
Sláinte, and welcome to the year 2013!
♥C
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