Dingle night life

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When I woke up I took my time and then went out to explore Dingle some more. By the time I found a bakery I was famished, yet again, so I got a scone and it was one of the best food decisions I made: buttery and flakey with plenty of raisins, and filling enough to raise my energy level--and blood sugar level.

While munching my scone I wandered into a little pottery shop to look around. The shopkeeper and I ended up having a long talk--or rather he talked and I listened--about politics, Noam Chomsky, Mitt Romney, and how he studied political science in Dublin. He managed to express all of his opinions of these things without coming across as pompous or manipulative, which was really quite a feat. He was probably about 75, very sharp, with white hair and wise blue eyes. He said to know what's really going on you must seek the truth for yourself, because skewed messages are being perpetuated all the time in American media. He likes NPR though, he says that's okay. He really was fascinating to listen to.

I left and stumbled upon The Garden Cafe (on Green Street, I believe), and had a proper meal of quiche and salad. It was an afternoon of music shops, art galleries, and the library, all in the shining Irish sun. But the real fun started that night. Talk about intensified living! Sometimes you have to get out of the library and DO stuff; or maybe that's just me.

I went back to the Hideout Hostel to see what I could find out about what to get myself into that night. I spoke to Chuck, who works there. He's from Iowa, has curly gray hair, wears glasses, and has a little silver hoop earring through his left ear. He suggested a walk along the coastline beyond the Dingle harbor as a nice evening stroll. I decided on this after he had suggested that another option would be to rent a bike and ride 30 miles. On a practical note, I told him my little room towel had been taken from my bathroom and hadn't been replaced, so I asked if I could have another. He walked up the stairs with me and opened a closet. Pulling out a gigantic, orange towel he said, "Tell anyone who asks that you found this on your bed." I loved that it was orange--the color of life and vitality, and the theme color of this trip, it seems. I'm taking countless pictures of orange flowers and sunsets.

I then went out to take my coastline stroll. On my way I passed within inches of some cows and had to dodge a van which had driven up on the sidewalk where I was walking. A boy happened to be on a trailer behind a passing car as I was goggling at the cows (all these points converged), and he saw the van and said, "Mind yourself, there." Another guardian angel moment. The van wasn't going quickly but still--better to be safe than sorry. This is all to say that it wasn't the easiest footpath to reach or find, but once I did, it was absolutely magical. I walked from the beach patrol building back in toward the heart of Dingle along the coast. With the peachy orange sunset hanging like a postcard before me, I walked along a 6-inch-wide footpath, which completely disappeared at times into green grass. It also involved a bit of climbing and a few old picturesque stone stairs up and down the little hills in the landscape. The air smelled much like the salty sea air of the Atlantic back home in Maryland. My view from the foreground up was seaweed, water, green fields and boats in the distance, and the expansive sky with the sun hanging low overhead. What could be better?!

I danced/floated back to my room with a grin on my face to get a shower and get ready to go out to dinner. I met my new roommate, Brittney, from Georgia. We got to talking; she is an artist/art teacher living in Ireland for a few months teaching art to kids--how cool is that? (Or as they'd say here, "How grand!") Brittney is tall with long, long hair which she had tied back in a handkerchief headband. We ended up planning to go to some of the pubs in search of music together. Before we left, I thanked Chuck profusely for his suggested walk, and we told him we were headed to the Courthouse pub, of which he fully approved as the place to go for music.

Once there, it was very crowded--so crowded we couldn't really see or hear the music very well. Apparently there were some stag and hen parties that had come in at the same time. It wasn't a loss though, because we met Mary, an organic farmer from Illinois living in Ireland for four months, and Carla and Sandy (an aunt and niece in Ireland together). They were celebrating Sandy's birthday with a nice long trip; both had lived in Maryland for a while so we got to talking quickly. They asked me how long I was staying in Dingle and told me that they were planning to go up to the Cliffs of Moher on Monday (the day I was leaving Dingle) with their private driver. They invited me to see the Cliffs with them and drop me off closer to Galway since that was where I was heading. I wasn't sure if they were totally serious. Since they didn't offer their details at that point, I took it as more of a polite offer, not a real one. Who knows, though. I just said that would be great, and the conversation moved on. They said they were planning to do a pub crawl as well, so we said we'd probably see them later.

Brittney and I headed off to find some food and found a place with a live musician from Dublin playing, called The Blue Zone. We ordered appetizers and a drink each. I tried Heineken for the first time and liked it. I also got crab and seaweed dip with bread. It had sort of a French hipster atmosphere, and the musician had an Elvis Presley vibe so it was a bit confusing, really. We left to find more traditional Irish music when we'd finished. Luckily we ran into Molly and her friend, both from Dingle, who were walking along the sidewalk in full clubbing attire. Molly was teasing her friend about her broken shoe when Brittney struck up conversation with her to ask where to go to see some music. Molly started talking a mile a minute about where to go, what order to go to them in, how long to stay in each place, etc. She said someplace, maybe the club, stayed open until "half two." I liked that terminology. Everyone here uses it but I'd noticed it when she said it. We followed Molly into the packed place she suggested to go first called The Dingle Pub. It was a packed pub, but in contrast to the Courthouse, we could see and hear everything; two guys were playing up on a little stage, one on banjo. We saw one of the same hen parties there that we saw in the Courthouse; they were making the rounds as well. They turned out to be a serious dancing group and the atmosphere escalated quickly, with stomping feet, clapping hands, and lots of twirling and singing. Most people in the room knew the words to the Irish songs and it made me really want to to know them too. Many songs have shout outs for cities, naming specific places like Limerick or Dublin. The musicians sang "Galway Girl," which I took as another good sign about going to Galway.

We stayed at The Dingle Pub until the musicians stopped playing at around 22:30. We saw Carla and Sandy there before the night ended, come to enjoy the music and spectacle of dancers. I spoke to Carla again briefly. She said they'd be walking around Dingle the next day, so maybe we'd run into each other.

When Brittney and I left, we talked about the behavior of the women and the treatment of women in Ireland. The genders seem quite equal here. Women are respected and at least in Dingle are given liberty to act crazy and go wild in the pubs. The women were the ones we saw dancing the most, being the most demonstrative, dancing with and showing affection to each other. They ruled the scene.

We also walked into a dance club, where we spent about 30-40 minutes. They played songs they play in the US, had mist machines going, but here there was no grinding. Guys danced with us, but weren't nearly as aggressive as American guys can be in clubs. It just seemed a lot more respectful of personal space. We acted silly dancing, passing an imaginary ball between the two of us and trading places as we cast imaginary fishing lines out for each other. We were getting tired by then and instead of trying to find more music so late, we went back and went to sleep. Before shutting my eyes I felt like that one day (9/9) had to have been at least three days. You really don't have to plan each moment for amazing things to happen. In fact, I'm starting to think that the less you plan on vacation, the more fun you have.

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