Things you notice about Ireland when you return from abroad?

Irish Guitarist

I love the shape of Ireland. It reminds me of a teddy bear reaching out his arms to give someone a hug.

reeb

Cookie_Monster wrote: »

I'm leaving New Plymouth in 3 hours to fly home. I can already heard the "howaya bud" being screamed by some knacker at the airport
/shudders

Make sure you spend the whole time telling everyone how amazing New Plymouth and how **** Ireland is like you do on here. People love that.

maninasia

Fuinseog wrote: »

why is that?
I notice its usual to go up to complete stranger and 'slag' them to the point of looking for a fight.

Two words - alcohol abuse

Cookie_Monster

reeb wrote: »

Make sure you spend the whole time telling everyone how amazing New Plymouth and how **** Ireland is like you do on here. People love that.

:rolleyes: will do buddy
We should meet up, i'll do you a full presentation and eveything and you can be ****ty and dismissive and begrudging about it internally while remaining friendly outside and pretending to listen

uberalles

One thing everyone seems to be agreed on is quality irish tasty rashers. If everyone irish abroad bought just one pack of rashers a month via the www we could pay off all our bank debts in a year

pickarooney

uberalles wrote: »

One thing everyone seems to be agreed on is quality irish tasty rashers. If everyone irish abroad bought just one pack of rashers a month via the www we could pay off all our bank debts in a year

Send me a link* and I'll start ordering and saving your arses right away.







*Please do not post sausages.

Laneyh

Jellicoe wrote: »

Dublin airport is probably one of the most badly organised and laid out airports in the world. I avoid it if at all possible. It spoils most holidays.

I'm going to have to assume you've never been through Stansted then
The passport control queues need to be reorganised but otherwise I don't find it particularly bad

gurramok

Deleted User wrote: »

I hate adding a negative point to this thread but....the length of time it takes to get your luggage back in Dublin Airport. 45 mins I waited last night :mad:

Must be the luck of which baggage handler you got. Mine was back within 20minutes after a long haul flight(including a transfer) a couple weeks ago.

Jellicoe wrote:

Dublin airport is probably one of the most badly organised and laid out airports in the world.

You sure? I was recently in Gatwick and Heathrow. In both places myself and other passengers were directed to the airport exit on a connecting flight(:eek:!) plus the wrong terminal on second asking(Gatwick) and the wrong departure gate(Heathrow) by staff. All airports have their problems, not just Dublin.

Nodin

Fuinseog wrote: »

the security staff are a joke. heaviest Dublin accents ever ,........../QUOTE]

...from a man who gives out about foriegners.

Overflow

Its quite normal to be randomly, verbally abused by some scumbag while walking down the street.

IsaacNewton

I've been living abroad for quite a while now but two observations that stand out for me when I make a journey back home to Ireland:

How simple and unsophisticated the Irish are. Their idea of a good "feed" is to pig out on fatty rashers, sausages, bacon and rancid kebabs. The type of people who order chips and chicken nuggets when they go out to a restaurant. It's embarrassing to dine with these oafs.

How unambitious and narrow minded the people are. I know people who have never been outside their bog village in their whole life, and have zero interest in leaving. They are adamant that Ireland is the best country in the world without ever having been abroad to make a comparison. They are content with their simple life of GAA, crap unhealthy chipper food, the dole, and getting drunk every weekend in the local dive bar.

Sad, really.

gobnaitolunacy

The general stifling negativity pervading everything.

horsemaster

How early the shops close....

LordSutch

People wear an awful lot of black clothes

pickarooney

LordSutch wrote: »

People wear an awful lot of black clothes

Strange, I notice the complete opposite. Compared to France, the Irish wear all kinds of colourful clothes. Hoodies, mostly.

Emeraldy Pebbles

IsaacNewton wrote: »

I've been living abroad for quite a while now but two observations that stand out for me when I make a journey back home to Ireland:

How simple and unsophisticated the Irish are. Their idea of a good "feed" is to pig out on fatty rashers, sausages, bacon and rancid kebabs. The type of people who order chips and chicken nuggets when they go out to a restaurant. It's embarrassing to dine with these oafs.

How unambitious and narrow minded the people are. I know people who have never been outside their bog village in their whole life, and have zero interest in leaving. They are adamant that Ireland is the best country in the world without ever having been abroad to make a comparison. They are content with their simple life of GAA, crap unhealthy chipper food, the dole, and getting drunk every weekend in the local dive bar.

Sad, really.

Lulz.

/unsophisticated oafette response

RainMaker

The absence of Gardai in the city centre during the day

Laois_Man

What jumped out at me driving around America was petrol prices. Even in last night's prez debate, we hear the American whining over petrol prices up to $4 per gallon now.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but the US Gallon, converted to our gallon, then converted to litre and then the currency conversion results in Americans paying €0.81 per litre where we're paying €1.70. Yeah, me heart feckin bleeds!

gurramok

LordSutch wrote: »

People wear an awful lot of black clothes :

Get on a plane to Paris now, they must be the most dullest fashion wearers on the planet. Both men and women only wear dark coloured clothing, its as if a certain Mr Ford was watching them from above "you can wear any colour as long as its black"

LordSutch

Hmm, I didn't know that, but I just seem to meet up with friends who are invaribly wearing black shirts, sometimes with black ties, accompanied by black rain coats, far too much black around I say . . . .

gurramok

LordSutch wrote: »

Hmm, I didn't know that, but I just seem to meet up with friends who are invaribly wearing black shirts, sometimes with black ties, accompanied by black rain coats, far too much black around I say . . . .

Stop going to funerals :P (or hanging around with Goths)

BraziliaNZ

IsaacNewton wrote: »

I've been living abroad for quite a while now but two observations that stand out for me when I make a journey back home to Ireland:

How simple and unsophisticated the Irish are. Their idea of a good "feed" is to pig out on fatty rashers, sausages, bacon and rancid kebabs. The type of people who order chips and chicken nuggets when they go out to a restaurant. It's embarrassing to dine with these oafs.

How unambitious and narrow minded the people are. I know people who have never been outside their bog village in their whole life, and have zero interest in leaving. They are adamant that Ireland is the best country in the world without ever having been abroad to make a comparison. They are content with their simple life of GAA, crap unhealthy chipper food, the dole, and getting drunk every weekend in the local dive bar.

Sad, really.

I'm afraid you'll find people like that in every country, boyo.

Pal

As soon as I get to the baggage hall in Dublin Airport, I notice that I'm depressed to be back here.

BraziliaNZ

Pal wrote: »

As soon as I get to the baggage hall in Dublin Airport, I notice that I'm depressed to be back here.

Why do you go home then? Surely if it's to visit family etc that's a nice thing, no?

ViveLaVie

fasttalkerchat wrote: »

In Czech rep. Slovakia and Poland its a cultural thing. Its rude to talk to someone you don't know.

How do you get to know new people so?

Mr. Manager

Having left Ireland for Malta almost a year ago now I miss nothing other than fast food! The junk food after a night out is crucial and Dublin did it so right. Other than that, the place is a pile of ****.

Andrewf20

1) Its rudy freezing & usually raining.
2) People driving around at 3mph.
3) Proper fry ups and legend tea.

Richard Hillman

I adore arriving into Dublin after being away, it's a thing of beauty.

I love our city

derekcarroll

What a load of negative downbeats you all are. I was born Irish, lived here for almost 70 years and still love the place. Sure, there's plenty of bad aspects but also plenty of good. And if you morons ever travelled anywhere with open eyes you'ld see that every other country also has it's good points and it's bad. Cop on.

Faith+1

derekcarroll wrote: »

What a load of negative downbeats you all are. I was born Irish, lived here for almost 70 years and still love the place. Sure, there's plenty of bad aspects but also plenty of good. And if you morons ever travelled anywhere with open eyes you'ld see that every other country also has it's good points and it's bad. Cop on.

How old are you??:eek:

Tchaikovsky

No public toilets at all.

Albedo0.39

Fresh crisp air

somefeen

Our villages and towns are a lot more colourful then anywhere else. Scottish, French, English towns are basically the same colour as whatever they're built from. Its boring and depressing to look at.
Ireland is great, we have better pubs than any country I've been to.
And Irish people are lovely, people complain that we moan too much, but thats true of every single nationality.

Ireland is amazing, if you haven't emigrated consider yourself very lucky.
If not, **** off and free up some space for the rest of us!

ArnoldJRimmer

I've lived abroad for over three years and would agree with a lot here, I'm absolutely fooking dying for an Irish chinese though. Up there with the Irish breakfast when I go home for christmas

maninasia

Faith+1 wrote: »

How old are you??:eek:

Fifteen.

Thespoofer

Sally O Brien and the way she might look at you...

juan.kerr

The Romanians and the junkie scum.

gozunda

The main thing that I have observed about this remote unimportant little island is the rampant cronyism and corruption that is accepted as normal practice by the powers that be. Swindlers and bullies are maintained in jobs and responsible positions in both private and public organisations. There appears to be no recourse or willingness to deal with such behaviour and a tacit acceptance that 'sure its grand'. This has resulted into a continued descent into a mire of corruption, created by the general indifference to morality or conscience. But sure It's a great country lads....

cheepnis

Two extremes really. I think when Irish people are friendly, as a good many are, they're among some of the most pleasent, witty and generous people in the world. I notice that when I come home. It's a general feeling about the place. For the most part, people are approachable and would go out of their way for you. It's nice.

The other extreme is that Irish people can be extremely self-deprecating, and particularly since the recession hit, the sheer amount of moaning about the place is tiresome. The other thing I notice is that, despite there being exceptions for sure, the lack of customer service here generally is dire. I'm not saying I want staff to approach me incessantly and ask if I need anything, but being served at a till in a manner that makes me feel like im an inconvenience is not my cup of tea. You get this the World over of course, but I've experienced it much more at home.

Solair

I can't say that I notice that many negatives except when you come onto a thread like this or talk to a taxi driver who just won't stop moaning.

I've lived in a few continental countries and there are many, many positives to Ireland.
It's cleaner (very little graffiti etc) , the public services are much easier to deal with. Try ringing Revenue for some help vs trying to ring their French or Spanish counterparts (in fluent local language).

The weather in Ireland is extremely wet.

The food these days is a lot better and more varied than than most of the continental countries I've been to. It's certainly as good as you'll get in London or parts of the US.

The tv and radio are good.

There are long, smooth, quiet, relaxing motorways without idiots in Renault Twingos trying to overtake at 180km/h


Train stations etc in Ireland are clean, tidy, and not depressing kips like most in France or Belgium. They seem to spend money on a few key stations while leaving the rest looking like shacks.

I also like how it's not a police state. You get a bit sick of places like Belgium where the police even call to your home to verify that your name is printed correctly on your door bell!

Just an endless barrage of pointless bureaucracy in many other EU countries.

Or try Spain where most of the public service and police seem to have trained under Franco.

Or the US where the police seem to operate by threat of violence at all times.

There are negatives too like Irish banks are by and large a pain in the hole. They're hardly ever open and usually totally unhelpful if you want to do anything. Same in Britain too. French, Belgian and Spanish banks are far nicer to deal with.

Customer service in Ireland is worse than much of the US at times but light years ahead of Belgium, France and Spain.

It's not unusual in Belgium for shop assistants (more so in chain stores etc) to answer the phone mid conversation or to look like you've just interrupted them if you ask for something.

They do the scripted greetings but that's as far as friendliness goes in a lot of places.

Eh the other thing that hits me in England and Ireland is carpets in houses. Loads more houses here have wall to wall carpets. On the continent that's quite unusual as they've usually got tiles or wooden floors.

Sockets! They never seem to have enough of them on the continent. Even in modern houses its not unusual to have one single socket in a bedroom! Often in some ridiculous location like beside the light switch.

Modern buildings in Ireland tend to have plenty of them and they're not the 'easy shock' variety from 1925 that a lot of older houses in some continental countries have!

However, it's the endless moaning from some people that gets me. It's similar in Britain too. Two islands full of whining types. In Ireland its done on Joe Duffy radio shows in England its largely done in the tabloids and depressing comedy . Same thing though. Lack of positivity and a glee taken in being depressing.

I find I have to actively avoid depressing, misery fetishists in both countries to remain happy and positive! They drag you down to talk to unnecessarily. Best to stick to people who are practical and positive about life!

Eve_Dublin

Solair wrote: »

The food these days is a lot better and more varied than than most of the continental countries I've been to. It's certainly as good as you'll get in London or parts of the US.

This is something people won't agree with but I agree with you totally. People have this mad belief that Spanish food is fantastic when it's really not (except in San Sebastian). They don't experiment here at all and your options in the supermarket are very limited. The fruit and veg here are of a very high quality but the range generally is for the very conservative taste bud. Spanish food is mainly fried and as basic as basic can be. I love simple food but I also love experimentation. You don't get that here. I find the Irish much more open to experimentation with food and don't get irked by something just because it's unrecognisable. Probably because we don't really have our own cuisine and have had to branch out.

Solair

Eve_Dublin wrote: »

This is something people won't agree with but I agree with you totally. People have this mad belief that Spanish food is fantastic when it's really not (except in San Sebastian). They don't experiment here at all and your options in the supermarket are very limited. The fruit and veg here are of a very high quality but the range generally is for the very conservative taste bud. Spanish food is mainly fried and as basic as basic can be. I love simple food but I also love experimentation. You don't get that here. I find the Irish much more open to experimentation with food and don't get irked by something just because it's unrecognisable. Probably because we don't really have our own cuisine and have had to branch out.

It's partly due to lack of an established cuisine but, I think it's also down to being plugged into the bigger English-speaking world too. There was also an explosion of Irish foodieness during the 00s which isn't likely to reverse. We're generally pretty good at fusion food and borrowing tasty food ideas from everywhere. Same goes for the UK too.

That coupled with a vast array of really nice local artisan foods that emerged over the last couple of decades.

A lot of European regions (not only countries) are fixated on THEIR regional dish. It becomes part of identity and they're often really conservative about trying anything different nearly to the point of xenophobia. Places like San Sebastian, Barcelona, etc are exceptions to the norm where as on Ireland you'll find some small café serving amazing stuff in the middle of nowhere totally unpretentious approach to it too doing totally mad stuff.

I've had great meals in places like that in Ireland and you usually get talking to some cafe owner who loves what they're doing too and can tell you about every aspect of what you're eating.

France in particular can be exceptionally disappointing when it comes to food. It has great stuff in great restaurants , but it also has a lot of really awful cafés and smaller places. You get pretty horrified when someone charges you a fiver for a soggy, microwaved croque monsieur!

Eve_Dublin

The Spanish make me laugh when they go on about the diversity of their food. I've been given it as a reason why they'd never emigrate (they'd miss Spanish omlette too much....ehhh...we sell potatoes and eggs as well ye know!). That's fine but they have this wrongly-held belief that we eat **** in Britain and Ireland and they really look down their noses at us on that front. I have to do some serious tongue biting. They'd drive you nutty.

syklops

Solair wrote: »

A lot of European regions (not only countries) are fixated on THEIR regional dish. It becomes part of identity and they're often really conservative about trying anything different nearly to the point of xenophobia. Places like San Sebastian, Barcelona, etc are exceptions to the norm where as on Ireland you'll find some small café serving amazing stuff in the middle of nowhere totally unpretentious approach to it too doing totally mad stuff.

I miss this too. Every feckin restaurant here sells gulas, pork ribs, some form of soup and thats it. Some have an international option of a burger or a steak. I know a British promoter who is trying to improve the menu in the local Irish pub. His wants to add his recipe for barbecue ribs to the menu. I nearly strangled him. Everywhere in the city from the greasy spoon to the top notch restaurant have ribs on their menu why would you try to compete with them? Its like trying to improve the variety in a Dublin pub by adding Guinness.

I pointed out to my mother last Christmas, we were in the small local Dunnes stocking up, and I said, you wouldn't believe it, but there is more variety in this small Dunnes Stores in this small town in the west of Ireland than in the 3 biggest shopping centres, including Tesco in Brno. I gave up on Jamie Olivers 15 minute meals because I could only ever be guaranteed to be able to buy 3 of the ingredients.

Rented Mule

No Mexicans.

somefeen

Scotland is fairly backward compared to Ireland actually.
The sectarianism is fairly rife all over the west coast. They've actually had to ban songs. Imagine that, you can be arrested for singing a certain song.

Their silly single track roads annoy me aswell, they have wee laybys called passing places for you to pull in if there is a car coming towards you and if you don't use it your a dickhead, even if there is clearly enough space for two cars. The Irish method of simply hypothesising thats there's space for two cars and continuing until that hypothesis is rejected is far more efficient.

homerjay2005

davet82 wrote: »

I notice its still a kip

Ireland isnt a kip, its one of the most beautiful places in the world. what makes it a bad place at times, is the greedy, selfish and ignorent people that live here.

other than that, i notice the food and drink here is unbeatable anywhere in the world.

and oh ya, the weather is s*it...very few countries have no seasons like we do, yet have 4 seasons in the one day.

Ziegfeldgirl27

Dairy Milk and Tayto crisps

Wibbs

Eve_Dublin wrote: »

Spanish food is mainly fried and as basic as basic can be.

I also noticed loads of pressure cookers. They were only a fad her, but seemed to have caught on in certain parts of Spain.

Wacker The Attacker

I notice that its great to be back.

For all its faults, you could do a hell of a lot worse than to be living in ireland