Celtic Tiger Mauls Through My Pocket Book, Liver.

When humans shifted from Palaeolithic societies to Neolithic, the nomad traded and atalatl for an ard. The change to a sedentary, agrarian lifestyle meant that these people found themselves at the whims of weather and harvest for their survival. Thus, food preservation became a necessary task. One of the first things that effectively preserved grain was beer. Indeed, some scholars postulate that the creation of beer predates even bread. In many civilizations, beer was drunk every day at every meal, and indeed without it, people would not have the requisite calories for survival. Further, poor water sanitation also promoted beer as the preferred liquid consumed. However, this function of beer has really ceased in the industrialized world.
But now, I actually depend on beer for sheer calories, or else I would waste away to nothing. I have quickly discovered that everything is expensive in Ireland. Food, travel, alcohol, and sort of good or service. For a base of comparison, the McDonald’s €uro saver menu advertises sandwiches for the low, low price of 2€. The exchange rate is currently 1.55 American Dollars to one Euro. That means, something, back home, that would normally be on the dollar menu cost three dollars here. During the 90’s Ireland’s economy underwent a massive boom, due to all sorts of economic policies and entry into the EU. They refer to it as the “Celtic Tiger.” Wages rose steeply. So did prices. Minimum wage here is around 7-8 euro. The job I had this summer would have paid me 15-20 euro an hour, rather than the 7.50 U.S. I received for sheetrocky red neck goodness. No, I’m not bitter, really.
Still, the learning curve is steep. There are ways to live somewhat on the cheap:

Do: Eat good bread, eggs, and other cheap produce from the English Market. Pregame at a good pace with a decent meal and only buy one or two pints at the pub.

Don’t: Attempt to make any sort of Japanese food. Get blackout drunk, speak with some Italians in Spanish, and then proceed to buy a round for a bunch of strangers.

Here are a few of my other initial observations about Ireland:
1. These people can’t fooking drive. The roads are fooking horrible, and basic automotive conventions, such as turn signals, are optional. There have been instances when, even though I have a fooking green walk signal, three fooking cars wiz fooking past me. There was one time where a car actually ramped up on to the fooking sidewalk to hang a Uie (is that how you would write the slang for U-turn?) right in front of my fooking pedestrian self.
2. The Irish have a reputation for fighting. I have seen more black eyes in my tenure here, than the proceeding five years in the states. I've seen kids fighting in an alley way by my apartament.You be the judge. Having said that, no guns, so, fair enough.
3. The stereotypical Irish accent Americans imagine the Irish use, is really only representative of crotchety old men. I have not heard anyone say “oh Jaysus.” They do say “fook” a great deal. For example, where we might say, “oh, for goodness sake” they say, “oh, for fooks sake.”
4. Their usage of the filler word “like” is quite interesting. Where we might say something to the effect of “it was, like, awesome,” they would say “oh, it’s grand, like.” In their usage, it’s is almost as though they combine the hyphen and comma before the word “like.” Like this: -,like.
5. All this reputation about terrible food is absolutely false. The English Market (more on that later), rocks my world. I would give some sort of bone marrow transplant or something to get the olive stand magically transported to Collegeville, MN.
6. They mos def drink as much as everyone says. And not just young people. There are particular pubs where 40+ is not the exception, but the rule. They're parting like the young folks are. On the most weekends, depending on the street, it will be filled with stumbly characters from all walks of life.
7. It does rain all the fooking time here. Seriously.


More to come soon, including a glossary of people, places, and things. And the next two intended entries:
Anthony finds random shit-tanked Irish man asleep on his couch. Hilarity does not ensue.
Anthony makes first pass at Irish girls, crashes, burns.