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Stuff other Kids did and had that you did not have or do!

  • 27-07-2009 8:43am
    #1
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 4,612 ✭✭✭


    Weird title I know.

    What did other Kids Have, and other Kids do that you could not have and do?
    and vise versa?

    Growing up, I had little understanding at just how tough my Parents had it,
    paying bills, the Home loan etc. Back in the Day interest rates for some loans I think
    somebody mentioned before were 14%!! :eek:

    My Father Broke his back working night and day to Live in a "good area"
    From what I am told before I came along into the world they had deck chairs in the house
    and not even a sofa for a while!

    Being oblivious to this as a kid I was sometimes frustrated when it came to
    playing with toys and going places etc, I could never understand why the other kids
    always had the best of toys and I got handmedowns from the neigbours next door or
    had to wait till there was a bargain bin sale.

    Burgerland/Mcdonalds:
    The only time I got Mc'Donalds as a Kid was as a treat around my birthday or when
    it was a friends birthday. Other Kids used to go once a week.

    Chinese takeaway: One Chicken Curry was divided into 4 in our house. That was
    normal, and I never questioned it until I stayed over in a friends place one weekend,
    and they got a Curry Each.

    Cinema: I only remember being taken about 3 times to the cinema under the
    age of 13, Other kids used to get taken to the Cinema on Sundays, I was brought out
    to a farm to pick apples in an Orchard full of nettles, wasps and bees. (sniffle)

    Toys: My next door neighbours were fantastic. They had 3 boys who were a few
    years older than me, so I got all their old stuff.

    Star wars:
    I only had star wars toys when Dunnes stores sold them off cheaply a year or two
    after they were popular. Also from neighbours hand me downs.
    The Kid around the corner had ALL the vehicles and nearly all the figures.

    Battlestar Galactica:
    I wanted these figures but only ever had a broken cylon and the imperial leader.
    Other kids had Muffin the dog, cylons, adama and others.

    Masters of the Universe: Nope too expensive for our house, I had to get a
    subsitude which were power lords. (The Cheap mans he-man)
    Lucky for me Dunnes sold these cheaply too.
    http://www.virtualtoychest.com/p/powerlords/powerlords.html
    I never had any vehicles only the figures.

    My friends all had he-mans and of course the kid around the corner (you will be hearing a lot about him) had EVERY THING. Castle grey skull, Battle Cat, Not just one but two different He-mans.

    Transformers: Had Jazz, and Ramjet both presents.
    I had to settle for Go-Bots (the Cheaper version) I got a gobot shuttle for
    my birthday once which I thought was great. Here it is:
    http://www.toyarchive.com/Gobots/Regular/SpayC.html
    Other Kids had Octomus Prime, Megatron, and the kid around the corner,
    had the Omega Supreme which was a space station!!! I had
    some cheap insect like big transformer got in the January sales
    after one christmas in Roches Stores. (A little late for a christmas present)

    Robotech/Macross: The Holy Grail! Only one person ever in school had a Robotech
    Robot....a Rarity. The Toy I wanted most but never had.....until I hit 30 years of
    age and ordered one from Hong Kong. (still looking for a bigger and better one)
    http://animeoltre.altervista.org/pers/robotech.jpg

    Gi-Joe/Action Force.
    Got these as presents on my birthday (I'f I was lucky)
    Had about 3-4 Gi-Joe's most kids had loads of the things.
    Dunnes sold them for 49p years later as action force.
    (There were two Action force sets of )figures.
    I always wanted this:
    http://media.photobucket.com/image/GI%20joes%20sky%20striker/robster001/GI%20JOE/Skystriker.jpg


    Mask: I had NO mask toys ever.
    and interestingly enough neither did the kid round the block! weird.
    only new two people with Mask Toys, My Cousin and one Spoiled Rich Kid
    from school. Who had them all.

    Centurions: I nearly had one up on the kid around the block.
    One year my father decided to spoil me. And I got Ace Mc'Cloud
    and EVERY EVERY single add on piece that was out at the time for him.
    http://www.dukenostalgia.com/Centurions/Cent_toys.html
    While I only had one figure but all accessories and the Blue guy was the hardes
    to get, I was very satisfied. The other kids in the neighbour hood had the yellow and green guys and the bad guys.

    Dyno Riders. These were EXPENSIVE toys. Not every kid had them.
    I remember my Grandfather giving me a boring old book voucher,
    much to my delight one Book store started selling toys also, and bought
    my self this beauty:
    http://www.dinoriders.com/Toys/Toys(Dinosaurs-Pteranodon)DR.html

    Marbles: Because of a Handmedown from nextdoor. I was the one kid on the block who
    had the most marbles. I used to keep shopping bags of them in the boiler house beside
    our home, until they were stolen one day.

    Bikes. Everyone wanted a computer bike, there was a cheaper version that looked
    like a computer bike but had a dummy computer that did not work. I got neither.
    3-4 kids in the neighbour hood got them. Raleigh Vektar:
    http://img22.imageshack.us/img22/154/xlraleigh29647660.jpg

    BMX:
    At first I did not have a BMX I had this horrible old deathtrap of a red-bike that
    was about 30 years out of fashion and was the laughing stock of the neighbourhood.
    eventually I had a BMX mustang but the bike to get that I never got
    was the Raleigh Grifter with 3 gears!!! Kid round the corner had a black and gold one.

    Later on when all the kids on the block started to get Raleigh Mountain Bikes
    we had to settle for second best and choose from the Emmelle Brand a really
    cheap poor mans bike.

    ~B


Comments

  • Closed Accounts Posts: 423 ✭✭Pop's Diner


    Good thread. I think I did ok when it came to toys as a kid. But naturally being a kid you were always oblivious to those who had less than you and focused on those who had more. Personally, remember there was two kids in particular who did considerably better than me when it came to toys and I always want the stuff they had. One was an American kid from my school and another was my next door neighbour. In retrospect those two getting all this stuff made sense tho. You see one was the son of a divorcee and the other was adopted. I think the parent/parents were just trying to buy thier respective sons love!?

    TBH in retrospect I'm kinda glad I didn't get EVERYTHInG I wanted as a kid. It kind of kept me focused something and interesting. Without wanting to boast nowadays I pretty much have everything (tangable at least) that I want in life and as a result my life (and myself) are a lot more boring. I'm surrounded by stuff now and I feel like it owns me instead of the other way round.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 35,954 ✭✭✭✭Larianne


    We didn't go on a sun holiday until we were teenagers. I just really wanted to go on an airplane. We camped every summer (twice every year). But looking back we got to see so many places - all round Ireland, England & Wales, France, Holland and Belgium. (All by boat)

    We were never allowed Coke. Only when we went to visit my mothers elderly friend and we'd drink ourselves silly with it! :D

    Our house isn't in an estate and I always felt I was missing out on something. But now I'm glad we don't have any nosey neighbours!

    Not having Sky! Kids in school would talk about certain programmes and I wouldn't have a clue what they were on about.

    I'm sure there's many more but I can't think of any.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 4,612 ✭✭✭bullets


    Yeah I did pretty good thinking back on it, the Spoiled
    Rich Kid that was living round the corner used to drive me mad,
    He had everything, he also used to get "A's" in tests in school so my mother used to constantly be comparing me to him,
    and nagging me to be just like him. :rolleyes:

    I'm in my 30's now, and still fight the urge to buy stuff I never had when growing up!
    I know it will end up being left in a box or thrown in a wardrobe someplace after
    the novelty value wears off! but

    Forgot to mention a few others.

    Holidays: When I was 12-13 went on a plane for the first time
    to the Cannery Islands, where the sand was hot, the water was cold.
    It was the one and only time we went abroad.

    Breakfast cereals, we were only allowed porridge, Cornflakes, or weetabix.
    For a treat were got rice crispies. We were not allowed the others.

    Train sets. Had a Lima train set with green engine.
    Did not have scalextrics racing cars until much later one
    when they brought out clone ones for cheaper.

    Zoids everyone had, and were cheap to buy and you could use parts from
    one zoid on another. (Never had any of the later bigger super droids)
    I used to chew on the rubber things that held them together.

    Lego I never had, I had Tente?? (Spelling??) from the collecting 8 tokens from
    the Cornflakes box.

    Mechano I had a set and never appreciated it until years later.

    Microscope for my 10th Birthday which was 37 pounds at the time.
    365 in one Electronics Kit when I was about 12-13 (I'd love it it now)now)
    Father gave me his own Camera when I was 15.
    At 16 I had my own darkroom (well bedroom with black bags on the windows)

    ~B


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 4,080 ✭✭✭foxinsox


    My friend had Sindy's yellow bathroom set!!!

    Yellow bath, toilet and sink!!

    I was sooooooo jealous!

    I think I had Sindy and a few clothes for her! :)


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 3,835 ✭✭✭unreggd


    Mr Frosty, and cocaine


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  • Closed Accounts Posts: 423 ✭✭Pop's Diner


    bullets wrote: »
    I'm in my 30's now, and still fight the urge to buy stuff I never had when growing up!
    I know it will end up being left in a box or thrown in a wardrobe someplace after
    the novelty value wears off!
    Pfft. I'd say go for it. Over a year ago I spent over 2 grand on all the original 96 Star Wars figures and big a mirrored glass display case to put them. Then I mounted the thing to my living room wall. Best thing I ever bought. Gives me a big smile everytime I see it and when people come over and happen to see it (esp people who remember them) they just go "wow".


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 155 ✭✭willy wonka


    We didnt have games like Buck-a-roo, Guess Who, Mouse Trap, Operation etc
    We had Monopoly,Connect 4, Downfall though

    We never went abroad as kids but I didn't see this as a big deal. It was only the rich kids in school that went on sun holidays. We had a caravan out at the beach though and this was as good as a sun holiday, I remember the weather was brilliant as a kid and getting up at 6am and going for a swim :D

    My parents didnt have a lot of money but we were never deprived. We always got the toys that we asked for but not the ones that were too expensive. Most kids I knew didnt get the really expensive ones. Like my brothers got loads of Star Wars figures and got some of the ships but an AT-AT or Millenium Falcon was just out of our league! I remember walking by a shop with the AT-AT in the window and coveting it but it was just too expensive (I think it was £20 which was crazy money in the recession 80s)
    foxinsox wrote: »
    My friend had Sindy's yellow bathroom set!!!

    Yellow bath, toilet and sink!!

    I was sooooooo jealous!

    I think I had Sindy and a few clothes for her! :)


    I had Sindys and Barbies but never had any houses for them and when a classmate brought in a box that opened up into Barbie's bedroom, with wardrobe and sink and little clothes hangar i was so jealous!

    Thank God for TV programmes like Blue Peter where you could make houses and rooms out of cardboard!


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 130 ✭✭strangeloop


    Great thread this!
    I'm 34 so I remember being a kid in the bad 80s. :D Mum used to buy my toys in Roches stores. Most of my toys were ex display models. They were either broken or had lots of bits missing. That's right, I was the poor kid in school.

    My friends had everything - I mean everything. I remember one lad showing me return of the jedi on his new video recorder - I was amazed. My parents couldn't afford to let me see it in the cinema, nevermind buying a VCR. Then he started taking out all his star wars toys...Sweet mother of Jesus, I nearly cried with envy. We're talking about top drawer stuff, millenium falcons, x-wing fighters, the lot. The icing on the cake was when he plugged in his zx spectrum.:eek: I had never seen a computer game before...my jaw literally dropped to the floor....this was incredible.

    I went home to enjoy beans on toast and kicking a punctured football against the wall. Being a hand-me-down kid in the 80s recession was a miserable eye opener.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 3,243 ✭✭✭kelle


    I was jealous of other children who had clothes that were bought in Penneys or Dunnes Stores - mine were all handmade from psychadelic print material cut out of paper patterns made in Germany, and machine knitted cardigans and jumpers made with 2 or 3 different colours.

    One girl in our entire school would go on a foreign holiday every June (she was the only one who had both parents working). The teacher would go on about the place she was going to and it's culture. And she went on a plane too. How jealous we all were. Nowadays, her parents would be told off for taking her out of school!

    I was envious of my friend who was an only child, had everything she wanted and lived in a quiet, tidy house - complete opposite to me. I longed to be an only child, but I'm glad now I'm not.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 36,634 ✭✭✭✭Ruu_Old


    I never went to the cinema as a child (not once), we were too far away from a theater and it was too expensive anyway (the cinema thread is breaking my heart) ;_; We always got electronic items either second hand or years after the release date when "everyone else" had long played them. :)


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  • Closed Accounts Posts: 1,126 ✭✭✭xanthor


    .....but an AT-AT or Millenium Falcon was just out of our league! I remember walking by a shop with the AT-AT in the window and coveting it but it was just too expensive (I think it was £20 which was crazy money in the recession 80s)

    I remember the Millenium Falcon being more like 50??? I may be wrong, but whatever the cost was, it seemed like more money than i could ever possibly obtain as a child. Had a few Transformers, some Star Wars etc. Anything past around 15.00 quid just wasn't going to happen, but i did okay, and soon learned to play on my grandparents affections. Trips to McDonalds and the like were uncommon. The cinema was a rarity.

    In later years, things were a little more slack and the toy count multiplied quickly. For several years i had pretty much every G.I.Joe/Action Force toy released, and most of the M.A.S.K. line too.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 364 ✭✭BillyGoatGruff


    I remember all the kids with their Nike runners slagging my Dunnes 5th gear runners. I was like " It means I can run faster than ye cause i've got FIVE gears".:P


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 9,273 ✭✭✭Morlar


    Never had the holidays in the sun as a kid, wexford, cork and kilkenny etc were as far as we went. The first plane I was on was to london at 18 next one was the states. I had a neighbouring kid who had lots of cool toys and we used to gamble soldiers & jeeps and tanks on marble games so I made up for it! Did anyone else have a black maria and RUC van dinky toys ? I had an aunt who took me to the cinema the odd time - I think I went with my parents maybe twice throughout my entire childhood, but used to make up for that by going to the green with some mates of mine or sneaking into harolds cross through the fire exit. I think toys were mostly for rainy days the rest of the time was spent running around playing soldiers and throwing muckballs at each other to simulate grenades or climbng trees or playing in the forest, horses etc.

    I think parents today go way the hell overboard trying to compensate for their own un-privileged childhoods by buying their kids a ridiculous amount of expensive toys. They get opened and put aside on the same day which is a total waste imo.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 1,193 ✭✭✭shqipshume


    Hahahahahahhaha oh my god funny thread :D

    I remember my moms best friend and her kids growing up.We would literally beg to go stay at her house,they had everything Atari first one out on shelves all the computer games,my sister and i wanted one between us but weren't allowed.
    I only went to cinema on my birthday,went on holiday three time down the country one time butlins( i was in heaven) lol ,
    First time out was when i was fourteen my sis paid for that second time was when eighteen i paid for all the family.
    But i havent been on holiday in sixteen years barr two weekends away down the country.
    I never got barbie or cindy's or anything like that growing up.I played with busy bodies and i mean i had two.
    They always had better Clothes then me and god i got some grief for that.
    Going to funderland i had a tenner and would get to go once,and they all had fifty to hundred pounds and got to go all time.
    Funny now with this freakin recession i can afford anything anymore either.
    Although in saying all that i think made me better person and more kind because i didn't have anything growing up.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 9,273 ✭✭✭Morlar


    bullets wrote: »
    Bikes. Everyone wanted a computer bike, there was a cheaper version that looked
    like a computer bike but had a dummy computer that did not work. I got neither.
    3-4 kids in the neighbour hood got them. Raleigh Vektar:
    http://img22.imageshack.us/img22/154/xlraleigh29647660.jpg

    BMX:
    At first I did not have a BMX I had this horrible old deathtrap of a red-bike that
    was about 30 years out of fashion and was the laughing stock of the neighbourhood.
    eventually I had a BMX mustang but the bike to get that I never got
    was the Raleigh Grifter with 3 gears!!! Kid round the corner had a black and gold one.

    I remember the vektars and bmx's with the yellow or blue wheels ? Man - I had a big heavy grifter I could barely lift off the ground. Painted matt black head to toe with back brakes that didnt work and front brakes that had either 'off' or 'full brakes now/ stop the earths rotation' setting. Came off that bastard thing so many times it's unreal.

    I think this recession is bringing out the nostalgia in us all !!


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 1,193 ✭✭✭shqipshume


    Morlar wrote: »
    I remember the vektars and bmx's with the yellow or blue wheels ? Man - I had a big heavy grifter I could barely lift off the ground. Painted matt black head to toe with back brakes that didnt work and front brakes that had either 'off' or 'full brakes now/ stop the earths rotation' setting. Came off that bastard thing so many times it's unreal.

    I think this recession is bringing out the nostalgia in us all !!

    One of my friends when i was about 10 had a fold up bike and we were on it flying down a steep path and the thing folded lol :(:D It was a mess.
    I remember the grifter bikes,i didnt have a bike till i was about 11 and it was a bike made from three different ones:o


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 130 ✭✭strangeloop


    shqipshume wrote: »
    One of my friends when i was about 10 had a fold up bike and we were on it flying down a steep path and the thing folded lol :(:D It was a mess.

    ROFL! my brother after watching bmx beat(anyone remember this?) decided to try a few tricks on his raleigh ultra burner. He was doing all the usual stuff, wheelies, bunny hops etc.. I couldn't tell if he was laughing or crying when he landed on his nuts. With hindsight he was definetly not laughing.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 226 ✭✭Holopimp


    I always wanted a spacehopper when I was a kid. My friends had them. Finally my mother bought me one when I was...... 25 years old. It was the guilt. By then I was much too big for it to hop.:p

    I wanted a SNES, I got a second hand ZX Spectrum.

    I wanted a real puppy, I got a soft toy puppy.

    I wanted to go on the school trips away to France and stuff. But I didn't even bother to bring the permission slips home because I already knew what the answer would be.

    I also lived in a paper bag in the middle of the road....oh, hang on, that was Monty Python. :D


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 4,612 ✭✭✭bullets


    Holopimp wrote: »
    I always wanted a spacehopper when I was a kid. My friends had them. Finally my mother bought me one when I was...... 25 years old. It was the guilt. By then I was much too big for it to hop.:p

    I wanted a SNES, I got a second hand ZX Spectrum.

    I wanted a real puppy, I got a soft toy puppy.

    I wanted to go on the school trips away to France and stuff. But I didn't even bother to bring the permission slips home because I already knew what the answer would be.

    Never had a space hopper but wanted one.

    Never had a SNES but had an Atari, and a 2nd Hand ZX 48K spectrum.

    Thought I was Royalty getting an Amstrad CPC464 Green Screen with Tape Deck
    until I realised other people had colour screens. :eek:

    I wanted a puppy but had to wait until I was 16 before I finally got one, it followed the
    postman and got de-capitated by the Local bus on my birthday poor fella, was walking
    home from school and saw teeth all over the road and an some hair, he got an awful death. Never got a dog ever again.

    Never went on any of the school trips abroad, at the time there was only ever a handful of the Snobby Jock rich kid variety that went on them and it was a mixture of different years in schooll.

    I'm not bitter honest :D

    ~B


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 1,193 ✭✭✭shqipshume


    ROFL! my brother after watching bmx beat(anyone remember this?) decided to try a few tricks on his raleigh ultra burner. He was doing all the usual stuff, wheelies, bunny hops etc.. I couldn't tell if he was laughing or crying when he landed on his nuts. With hindsight he was definetly not laughing.

    Hahaha yeah i remember everyone going around doing their bunny hops etc... after that :D Ouch not good i dont think it was laughing either :eek:


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  • Closed Accounts Posts: 484 ✭✭Shan75


    bullets wrote: »
    Burgerland/Mcdonalds:
    The only time I got Mc'Donalds as a Kid was as a treat around my birthday or when
    it was a friends birthday. Other Kids used to go once a week.

    Ah yes indeed.I remember when being brought to Burgerland was the most exciting thing ever.I'd say if I was there 10 times ever that is it.Everytime you'd walk up William St you'd want to go in there but you just knew it wasn't going to happen.Of course there was always some little b0llocks who always seemed to go there every week.
    bullets wrote: »
    Cinema: I only remember being taken about 3 times to the cinema under the
    age of 13, Other kids used to get taken to the Cinema on Sundays

    Another rare treat for me.Going to the Carlton Cinema was something to appreciate and if you could manage to go into the balcony seats you thought you were in heaven.I'd say I was there about 6 times with two of those being in the balcony.A couple of times in The Central as well with it's big and comfortable seats.
    bullets wrote: »
    Toys: My next door neighbours were fantastic. They had 3 boys who were a few
    years older than me, so I got all their old stuff.

    I never had any of the latest or branded toys but I must say it never really bothered me.I remember getting one of those hand held Pac Man games once and my goodness it was simply the best thing ever.I think the mother got it in King Kanutes which is the only reason I managed to get it.
    bullets wrote: »
    Bikes.
    Later on when all the kids on the block started to get Raleigh Mountain Bikes
    we had to settle for second best and choose from the Emmelle Brand a really
    cheap poor mans bike.

    We always had crappy bikes which my dad got off his friends because they were throwing them out.

    To be honest though when I was a child all we wanted to do was run around the place playing games or exploring the local fields, riverbanks etc.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 46 Tif


    I never had a Barbie doll until I was in 6th class and it was considered a silly toy when I was this age. We also never got to go on any holiday. First time I flew on a plane was when I was 19 years old. I was always jealous of other children and said I would be so much different when I was older!


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 2,506 ✭✭✭lil'bug


    i never really had a lot of stuff as a kid.mostly hand me downs i lived in home made jumpers til i was 8 i think, my ma even made my communion dress.funnily enough my older sister always got every thing she demanded :(


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 2,261 ✭✭✭kenon


    When I was a kid I "watched" a football match on a scrambled channel. Continuously convincing myself that I could make out some of the players when in reality all I could see was...

    VIDEOC2.JPG

    I really appreciate my Sky Digital now!

    5/6 a side football

    Coolmine Sports Centre - Wednesdays - 8pm

    PM me for a game

    Thread



  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 8,004 ✭✭✭Ann22


    We weren't well off when I was a child. My dad drank so even before he lost his job by late '70s money was tight. My mother however was a great money manager. My friend's dad worked in a bookies and was loaded. They got armloads of toys and stuff every weekend. We only got toys on birthdays and at Christmas....In saying that, Christmas for me was a million times better than it was for her. I wrote my list, never asked for too much in case Santa thought I was too greedy. This was an example of what I got one Christmas...

    A Sindy Doll with an extra outfit
    A Sindy wardrobe and bed
    A pair of slippers
    A colouring book and crayons
    Two annuals like Mandy and Bunty.
    A selection box.
    (the wardrobe and bed was a surprise)

    Once I had a doll with long hair to brush I'd be happy. I don't remember envying anyone else, anything I really wanted I got and that was due to my mother scrimping and saving for months.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 14,516 ✭✭✭✭briany


    Well, when I was in primary school alot of the kids had pogs and I never got into that scene at all. The trouble is, if you didn't play pogs then you were one lonely kid at playtime because EVERYBODY played pogs on the playground at that time. They got so big that at one time, they practically equated to hard currency, lol. Then came Gogos and I never got into that either, just the same old rubbish again *shrug*. Never did understand why little cardboard or plastic discs or plastic figurines where so popular amongst the kids at that time.:confused:


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 12,060 ✭✭✭✭anewme


    This is a funny thread. We were very poor and my dad gambled so we were pretty poor.

    Remember no toys one Christmas.

    Then mam got a part time job and things improved (slightly)

    We only had one holiday ever when I was a child (once to Mosney) and our Money ran out on a Tuesday.


    When we went to St. Patricks parade in Dublin city, we were never allowed to go to mcdonalds or Burger King, we were brought to Wimpey. I wanted a burger in a box, but was only allowed a burger in a paper.

    We did eventually get a bike, I wanted a Raleigh Cowboy Chopper and what appeared instead was an Eska(folding bike out of Quinnsworth)

    We always envied people who went on holidays, and next door who had a car and a Spacehopper!!!

    Also often had no food (bread with hot milk and sugar poured over) on Tuesday and Wednesday every week until pay day on Thursday. Food over Christmas, but no money for new year, because pay day was not until the dole went back to work.

    Never allowed buy clothes in proper shops - always had to wait for the Frawleys Clubs. Sickner was for me almost 30 years later when I discover that my Communion dress was bought in a second hand shop.

    So signs on it now, that I buy myself everything and anything I want. Always wanted to be able to buy what I want and not have to look at the price tag.

    Did me no harm and made me never want to feel poor.

    One of those childhoods, we were poor but we were happy, how true.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 5,288 ✭✭✭pow wow


    Commodore 64, Hungry Hippos, Guess Who.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 1,657 ✭✭✭komodosp


    Jaysis anewme, you make me feel lucky!

    We had only RTE1 & 2 so I never got into the cartoons and so never wanted the toys that were based on the cartoons, constantly wished we had "all the channels" (i.e. UTV, C4, BBC1 & 2) I had Monopoly and lego and that sort of stuff... Got a Lolo ball when they came out too... But never even wanted the other stuff. I remember a friend of mine practically all the He-Man figures...

    But most of those things were a load of shaight any way. I remember one day one kid brought in a cool looking Star Wars lunch box and thinking what manner of cool wonderous toys lay inside! He opened it up and what was did he reveal?
    His Lunch.

    Major disappointment. He also had star wars copies and pencil case, also giving the impression that there might be a comic inside the copy or something but no, just white lined paper for doing school work and pencils and rubbers and stuff in the pencil case. Made me wonder what the point is...

    Also went to the cinema rarely enough... Bambi and then Batman... and then didn't really go again until I moved to a place with the cinema down the road, and nice and cheap...

    Also never went to McDonalds. The one time I did go, I had a burger with one of those horrible gerkins in them. Thinking all burgers were like that I was convinced I didn't like burgers until I was about 17!

    Also remember coming into school one day and everyone was mad about wrestling... they even took on the gimmicks of the wrestlers of the time - the whole class, even some of the girls! and had mock fights and talked about it and Wrestlemania and Royal Rumbles and Hulk Hogan and Macho Man all the time. Hadn't a clue what they were on about.

    Was also extremely jealous of kids who went to the local English-speaking school a stone's throw from my house, when I had to go (walk if it wasn't lashing!) to the gaelscoil on the other side of Leixlip... "You're allowed speak English in school? Wow you're fluke!"


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  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 8,800 ✭✭✭Senna


    I remember being the last of my friends to get a BMX, but when i did, i got one with the number plate on the front, it was 88 and i though i was the coolest kid on earth. Of course a few months later my mates started to get mountain bikes and suddenly mine wasn't so good:(

    Also remember being obsessed with The Simpsons, and i knew everything about them. Of course we didn't have sky and i never even seen an episode, but all my mates had:(

    We weren't very poor and the toys we got were great, but everyone else had toys, game, video game for years before we would get it. While i had a C64 my best friend had a Atari and i wanted one, then he got a Megadrive and i wanted one, then finally my dad bough me a Megadrive but by which time my mate had moved onto a PC:(


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