I grew up...

Sleepy

Without actually stating that you're Irish how would you tell someone that you were in a single sentence beginning 'I grew up...'?

Don't even ask what part of my brain this came from because I don't know myself but I think the answers could tell us a lot about how we identify ourselves as Irish people these days. I'm expecting a lot of the retrospective, backwards looking posts like 'I grew up in a Catholic country the British opressed for 2 billion years' and the like but are these really indicative of modern Ireland?

To get the ball rolling:

I grew up in a country that went from rags to riches in the space of a decade.

Terry

I grew up in a country that was far more corrupt than it is now (that's not saying it isn't srtill corrupt), that allows me to be pissed of at its politicians and voice my disapproval with them through many means, including speaking to them in person, meaning that I'm lucky to have grown up in this country.

connundrum

I grew up in a coutry where black people were segregated from white people. My citizenship form which was renewed in 1984 declared my age, that I was male, and most importantly that I was white. I'm glad that I was also there when apartheid was abolished in '94.



I know its not referring to Ireland but it does start with 'I grew up..'

xzanti

I grew up in a country divided by religion..

r3nu4l

Never mind a sentance beginning "I grew up...", I can do it in one Word...

Guinness!

Ruu_Old

I grew up in the big snow* and the only channels we had were RTE 1, RTE 2 and VERY poor reception on some of the English ones. (Weather forum people, looking in ye're general direction)


sorry its early and I'm only after waking up an hour ago.

Heisenberg.

This post has been deleted.

User45701

the big snow was that not only 83? i thought u where older than that Ruu.

Anyway id go with

I grew up with a leprechaun in my back garden (is that how you spell leprechaun or is it firefox spelling?)

RobbieTheRobber

User45701 wrote:

the big snow was that not only 83? i thought u where older than that Ruu.

Anyway id go with

I grew up with a leprechaun in my back garden (is that how you spell leprechaun or is it firefox spelling?)

82 was the snow noo?

slipss

I grew up in a country that replaced welcome with immigration laws, character with greed, heroin with cocaine and fists with guns.



Good thread by the way Sleepy, most interesting idea i've seen on after hours since I've been using boards.

Mossy Monk

i grew up in a corrupt **** hole

cornbb

I grew up having my formative years and hence the rest of my life shaped by Bosco and his minions.

UUUUafásach!

Princess Consuela Bananahammock

Sleepy wrote:

Without actually stating that you're Irish how would you tell someone that you were in a single sentence beginning 'I grew up...'?

Don't even ask what part of my brain this came from because I don't know myself but I think the answers could tell us a lot about how we identify ourselves as Irish people these days. I'm expecting a lot of the retrospective, backwards looking posts like 'I grew up in a Catholic country the British opressed for 2 billion years' and the like but are these really indicative of modern Ireland?

To get the ball rolling:

I grew up in a country that went from rags to riches in the space of a decade.

I grew up fighting this ridiculous idea that identifying myself as Irish was in some way important.

Mrs_Doyle

I grew up in the Country that gave spawned Den TV, Zig and Zag, U2, The Corrs, The Cranberries, Roddy Doyle, Colin Farrell, The Quite Man, Darby O Gill and the Little People, ULYSSES, Boyzone, Westlife, Michael Collins, Eamon De Valera, Daniel O' Donnell, Johnny Logan, Oscar Wilde, Enya and Father Ted.

EDIT: And Bosco!

Nevyn

I grew up in a country were condoms were percription only, condom vending machines were illegal and you coudl be procudted for giving someone the name and number of an abortion clinc and all the phone directorys for other countries had that part blacked out and magaines with adds for crisis pregancy agencys were blacked out too, where it was a criminal offense to enguage in homosexual acts.

Ruu_Old

RobbieTheRobber wrote:

82 was the snow noo?

Yep, spot on.

cornbb wrote:

I grew up having my formative years and hence the rest of my life shaped by Bosco and his minions.

UUUUafásach!

Brilliant. the magic door.

crosstownk

I grew up in a country where my bones were rattled by pot holes in the roads.................

muppetkiller

Can't believe you Forgot growing up in a country with Forty Coats

Heyes

I grew up in a country with .....

• Zig and Zag
• Tip the Can
• Bosco
• Jacks
• Green Milkshakes
• friday night disco's where the cranberries cd seemed to be played on overdrive.
• in a town where your post code instantly gave someone an opinion of who you were without opening your mouth
• culchies
• property hungry nation
• mr freezes
• Father Ted,Ballykissangel, Fair City
• An abundant number of celebrities
• In a country where every american thinks there a native
• Where Road Works never end
• Where girls used to collect fancy paper, and stickers
• Where a cup of tea fix's every problem
• Drinkers nation
• Game of Elastics

There is so many things that remind me of growing up in Ireland and what everyone around me got up to, its intresting reading the above as it brings back a lot of memories, as Julep mentioned freedom of speech, its a quality we all take for granted, but something we should cherrish considering so many countries, even the bigger nations, are unable to speak there mind or see whats going on in the rest of the world, and end up leading a more censored and false life.

cornbb

Thaedydal wrote:

I grew up in a country were condoms were percription only, condom vending machines were illegal and you coudl be procudted for giving someone the name and number of an abortion clinc and all the phone directorys for other countries had that part blacked out and magaines with adds for crisis pregancy agencys were blacked out too, where it was a criminal offense to enguage in homosexual acts.

I didn't have much of a need for condoms in '82.

Edit: hang on, this isn't one of those nostalgia threads. I agree with your point actually. I guess we've come on a long way.

Beruthiel

I grew up in a country where religion dominated my school and home life.
Where every summer turf had to be turned and hay raked.

Sleepy

Ikky Poo2 wrote:

I grew up fighting this ridiculous idea that identifying myself as Irish was in some way important.

That's why this thread is in After Hours instead of Humanities Nationality isn't something I see as particularly important, however much the world community might disagree...

And to stay on topic:

I grew up in a country where Taytos and Club Orange were a staple of my childhood diet.

Beruthiel

Sleepy wrote:

I grew up in a country where Taytos

And they only cost 3p

NextSteps

I grew up thinking that the longest possible train journey was 4 hours.

dlofnep

I grew up and at reaching 5'4", I think it's safe to say - I stopped growing up.

Heyes

Beruthiel wrote:

And they only cost 3p

3p !!!! :eek: , when was that ?!?

humanji

I grew up in a country where nobody cared what they ate as long as it tasted good, and no one batted an eyelid to drinking red lemonade.

Ruu_Old

humanji wrote:

I grew up in a country where nobody cared what they ate as long as it tasted good, and no one batted an eyelid to drinking red lemonade.

TK Lemonade? Don't think its around anymore. I forgot all about Cavan Cola as well in my post...better forgotten tbh.

Flukey

"I grew up in Ireland." - That does not say that I am Irish.

The big snow was in January 1982.

Heyes

Ruu wrote:

TK Lemonade? Don't think its around anymore.

It certainly is, i have a nice cold bottle of it sitting in my fridge.

kaimera

I grew up on an island in Western Europe, just beyond Britain, and was around when Shergar went missing from Kildare and Ireland beat Malta 8-0 at Dalymount.

envelope

i grew up in an country where taytos and bars of chocolate had a set price in every shop.

Red Hand

I should have grown up in a sun-kissed land. Saying that, I have rarely gotten sunburn in the land I grew up in.

Zonko

I grew up a few miles outside of a small village, then moved to a small town a few years later.

biko

I grew up in a place where you could be gone from after breakfast until evening and no-one was worried

chump

I grew up with a small willy that I hoped and prayed would grow with age, but alas ...

DEmeant0r

I grew up in Hong Kong(ok well I spent my first 8 years there).

I grew up in a place full of tall buildings(and the sad thing is, i'm afraid of heights lol)

daiixi

I grew up in a place where the following things (previously mentioned) were also true: availability of red lemonade (commonly known as "creaming soda") and eating paper, tall buildings, people are divided by religion, fists turned to guns and where you could be gone from breakfast until evening and noone batted an eyelid... I'm not Irish though and I didn't grow up in Ireland.

Blush_01

I grew up in a house, mainly.

I remember: Green cream soda. Shannon minerals (see cream soda) including proper red lemonade that left a red ring around the inside of the bottle where the meniscus was. Dempsey's Den. D'Arcy's arse. Podge when he was a postman. Zig getting blamed for breaking Ray's aftershave bottle. Zuppy and Ted. Bosco's "Tidy Up" song. Live at 3 with Thelma Mansfield and Derek Davis, who I always thought were married. Colm Rappel (sp?) and Fergus Gibson freaking me out. Tickling puppies behind the ears with straw. Wine patent t-bar shoes. Being the only child in my school who had the full uniform. Witch in the Well. Murder in the Dark. Bulldog. Rounders, the Irish way. Playing Chocolate Rats when it rained and we weren't allowed outside in school. Spending entire summers outside, unless it was lashing rain. Training calves to drink from buckets. Painting bales with whitewash to scare off crows. Going on holidays for a week with IR£5 in your pocket and coming home with presents for everyone, and change. Hideous clothes passed from brother to sister to cousin. Home-cut fringes that were always a little too short. Getting hairs up your nose when someone cut said fringe. Feeding granny's chickens and collecting the eggs without letting the chickens get out. Being sent up by Granny in groups of two or three to jump on my uncle's bed to get him up for work, so even if he caught one of us, the others could keep jumping. Podger on Scratch Saturday. Pangúr Bán, the cartoon. One pound notes. The first pound coins. Sunburn from the one Sunday a year you'd go to the beach. Getting loads of sweets and still having change out of 20p. Perri Tomato Ketchup flavour crisps. Kylie Minogue jumpers. The flake ad where the woman almost submerged herself in a bath that spilled over the sides, with flakes of chocolate on her lips. My cousin and I trying to imitate the ad (minus the bath) after play school. My dad squashing my trike with the tractor. Crazy Prices, Quinnsworth, the L&N. Monaghan being the other side of the world. Green 99s on Patrick's day. Mork and Mindy. Irish dancing in the Paddy's Day parade. Christmas starting on the 8th of December. Using your imagination to invent games in order to amuse yourself. Staying up late to cover the pit and then going into town for ice-cream. Piling 12 kids into a Micra to go to football/hurling/camogie training, or swimming, or tin whistle lessons... The first garlic mushrooms I ever saw, at the Ploughing Match. Summer camp. A time before mobile phones. A time before the internet being such a big deal, or PCs in most homes. People arranging to meet other people, and being on time because they couldn't contact someone if they were late. Woppas. Tangys. Take That breaking up and a girl committing suicide because of it. Tinkle Tots. Muppet Babies. Enid Blyton. Miffy. Under Giltspur books. The Babysitters Club. Sylvanian Families. The Late Late Toy Show being good, having lots of acrobatic acts, having the flushing Sylvanian Families toilet, Gay Byrne squirting the audience with water guns if they weren't enthusiastic enough. Going for walks at The Cup and Saucer. Finding out about mayflies. Seeing water hens apparently move without moving. Skimming stones at the duckpond. Cycling down "the hill of death". Walking on railway lines. Beethoven, the movie. Buzz Off. Kerplunk. Scrunchies. Scrunchy socks.

I know that's not exactly what was asked for, but it's what sprang to mind.

JC 2K3

I grew up with the internet, which pretty much destroyed any chance of me formulating opinions based on my cultural surroundings.

bug

I grew up in a country where people couldn't get a job and had to emigrate.
When I grew up people could get really good jobs but couldn't afford a house, and now people are emigrating again.

I grew up in a country where every pub had some sort of band on every night of the week and it was free.

crosstownk

Beruthiel wrote:

Where every summer turf had to be turned.

I remember those wasted days on the Dublin mountains cutting and footing turf. But it kept us warm in the winter, which was a small consolation.

The Sweeper

I grew up in a country that used "of the welcomes" in its description of itself, but where all its young people left. Then when it got the young people from the rest of the world, it didn't want them and told them to go back where they came from.

MooseJam

I grew up in a country where pornography was banned, horray for the internet

Healio

I grew up in a country where a pound note was worth a fortune.

embee

I grew up in a country in the depths of economic depression. A lot of people didn't have jobs. Only the "well off" had landlines. Very few people had cars, and practically no-one went away on sun holidays.

Now, our country is drowning in cash, but people seem less happy.

User45701

Ruu wrote:

Yep, spot on.


Brilliant. the magic door.

A Magic door that only ever went to the zoo

thelordofcheese

And Fota island!