Part 1: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, and now…

6. Weddings and the 6 Nations Rugby Tournament fill Dublin’s weekends with curious images

A stroll down Grafton Street, almost any weekend of the year, will bring you face to face with one of three groups of people:

1. A group of 5+ Irish/Scottish/English women celebrating a Hen party (easily discernible by the rabbit ears/pink tops).
2. A group of 5+ men who are in town to watch a 6 Nations Rugby match (besides having their nation’s colours painted on their faces, the French and Italians are easy to recognize because of their language; now to distinguish the others, watch out for the number of kilts: among the English supporters, there will be none; among the Irish one or two, tops; among the Scottish, loads and among the Welsh loads too, but, additionally… the majority will have reddish curly hair).
3. A group of 5+ Irish/Scottish/English men celebrating a Stag party (easily discernible by… looking exactly like 6 Nations supporters, when no rugby matches are taking place).

7. Spring starts on the 1st of February

Yup. And summer on the 1st of May, autumn on the 1st of August (August!!) and winter on the 1st of November. You can read an explanation of this in the Semantic Bits blog, but I still found it weird. And sometimes a bit uncomfortable… for if it was spring, one could surely turn the heaters off, whatever temperature was outside notwithstanding, could one not? Brrrr…

8. If they ignore the calendar conventions, why not the weather itself?

And there you had them: tons of Irish men walking around in t-shirts and tons of Smurfettes, I mean, Irish women, walking around in barely-longer-than-knickers skirts and no tights… in spite of the 2C temperature. Then again, I do understand that if they had to wait for warm days to wear sleeveless clothes, they would never expose their skins to the sun… I mean clouds…

9. Dublin language translation: Are you ok? = may I help you?

At shops, when browsing around, you will always be addressed with “Are you ok?” by shop attendants. First 100 times you’ll think “wow, I must look horrible if he/she felt compelled to ask me that!”, and then you’ll remember that what they really mean is “may I help you?” and your automatic answer “yes, thank you” could be interpreted as that you do need help, although you didn’t really need any, and then you’ll add “well, not really, I was just browsing” and… your browsing will finish, for you’ll leave the shop red and under the puzzled look of the shop attendant.

10. Irish pride themselves of being laid-back… and they are really laid-back!

I lived like 30 minutes by bus away from the city center (Dublin 18, i.e. south-side). 30 minutes when there was no traffic and no bus delays. I already knew both the Irish were laid-back and that buses sometimes could be 20 minutes late. One morning I was waiting for the 8:10 morning bus to the city center when it started to rain quite heavily. In my bus stop there was no cover so I was just “happy” I was wearing my rain coat (aka my second skin). At half eight I knew I would just have to accept the first bus was not coming and I’d have to hope the 8:40 one did come on time. There were a couple other people waiting with me from the start. At 9 am I wondered if it wouldn’t make more sense to work from home that day, but nobody was leaving the now crowded bus-stop, so maybe they knew something I didn’t. At 9:30 a bus showed up. As everybody got on the bus I noticed that I was the only one with smoke coming out of my nostrils. The locals just got on the bus, smilingly said hello to the driver and went to their seats. No complains, no threats to file a report with the Bus company. Nothing… I wonder if the Irish live happier, longer lives than other Europeans…

The end.

So, what do you think of the 10 weirdest things in Dublin? Have you seen them in other places? Do you know a place where you saw 10 things even weirder than these? We are accepting contributions from anybody who’d like to share their list of weird things they’ve seen anywhere in the world. We can either invite you to olivetalks as a guest blogger (you will retain full credits, of course) or just let us know where have you posted the list and we will comment on it in olivetalks!

So, you’ve been informed. “10 weirdest things I’ve seen in… Tunja/Bogotá (Colombia)” coming soon!

Related post(s)

• 10 weirdest things I’ve seen in… Dublin (Ireland) (part 1) (2)
• 10 weirdest things I’ve seen in… Brussels (Belgium) (part 2) (2)
• 10 weirdest things I’ve seen in… Brussels (Belgium) (part 1) (1)
• 10 weird things about the health system in Jena (4)
• 10 weirdest things I’ve seen in… Jena (Germany) (part 2) (10)

Quick summary: Dublin has a population of around 1 million people and is the capital of the Republic of Ireland. You can learn about the city in http://www.dublin.ie and here are a few of our pictures so you can imagine the place better:

And the 10 weirdest things I saw in Dublin are…

1. Only tourists use umbrellas… for Dubliners know rain falls upwards!

First week in Ireland I lost two umbrellas to the wind. Third one I bought… I decided to leave at home. The rain, contrary to falling from the sky down to my head as I was used to (ok, I have to admit I do not come from a place where it rains much, for it never rains in California… I mean, Alacant…), it came from the side, front, back… even upwards a few times! After the first two weeks, I did not use (=buy) any more umbrellas.

2. To cross the road first look at the floor, THEN see if there are any cars coming

Dublin takes good care of not losing any tourists to car accidents and conveniently informs you of where to look before crossing the road, at each pedestrian crossing.

3. Cold and hot-water taps on sinks are separate

Actually, this only surprised ZoltarStark, for we had the taps separately in Alacant till a few years back when my mother had them replaced. ZoltarStark just couldn’t believe you had to choose between freezing your hands or scalding them when washing them in the bathroom. Then again, in my brother’s bathroom in Edinburgh, he has the cold and the hot taps switched, and that’s even worse! I think the cold water tap should always be on the right and the hot one on the left.

4. “The Irish language must be official in the EU!”they screamed in English…

In 2005 the Irish language became “officially recognised as a working language by the European Union“. I was in Dublin through the petitions and speeches of how important was to have the Irish language granted official and working status in EU. I applauded their ideals and was happy they got the official status. Yes, I was. What just did not make sense to me was, why did they do all the speeches, propaganda, meetings… through English? It felt like a contradiction in terms…

5. Irish gaelic speakers: from 70,000 to 1,860,000 (depending on the source), 3 different ways to say how are you… and million for hello

When I arrived in Ireland, the first thing I did was enrol in an Irish language course. I really enjoyed learning it and even spent a long weekend in the Gaeltacht town of Gleann Cholm Cille doing an intensive course with Oideas Gael and sleeping in a B&B run by an Irish speaking family. A year and a half later, I finally accepted the fact that in spite of the “few” speakers, they have three major dialects which can already be seen in how they say “how are you“:

• Cad é mar a tá tú? (Tír Chonaill – County Donegal)
• Cén chaoi ‘bhfuil tú? (Connacht – western province of Ireland, comprising Counties Galway, Leitrim, Mayo, Roscommon, Sligo)
• Conas atá tú? (Momhan or County Monaghan, one of the three counties of Ulster in the Republic of Ireland)

No biggie… 3 options I can accept. Now, “Dia duit” (hello)… I never heard two Irish speakers pronounce it the same way. Honestly.

and 6, 7, 8, 9, 10…

Tomorrow! Same time, same place

Related post(s)

• 10 weirdest things I’ve seen in… Dublin (Ireland) (part 2) (14)
• 10 weirdest things I’ve seen in… Brussels (Belgium) (part 2) (2)
• 10 weirdest things I’ve seen in… Brussels (Belgium) (part 1) (1)
• 10 weird things about the health system in Jena (4)
• 10 weirdest things I’ve seen in… Jena (Germany) (part 2) (10)