What it means to be Irish

abouttobebanned

Ok...first off, this thread is not what it looks like. Or, I dunno, maybe it is.

Nobody has ever asked what it means to be Irish so I can't really start this thread by saying.."When someone asks you what it means to be Irish..what do you say?"

For me, a freshly appointed 30 year old I think it's cool to have a bunch of people that have so many shared experiences. For the most part, we've all had pretty much the same upbringing.

like...

Going to school with a fcuking 2 ton school bag when you're about 8. We walked to school too...along a road that we probably walked about 100 thousand times in our lifetime. There was a lunch somewhere in that bag too..tinfoiled sandwhiches, a pack of tayto, a club milk for the 11 o clock break... If it was a friday you might have a pound for a lunch special.

During the week we'd watch...well I was gonna add some fancy pictures now but I see I can't do that on After Hours. How odd. Well we'd watch the DJ KAT show...blockbusters, Krypton Factor...at the weekend we'd watch Blind Date and all kinds of crap saturday telly after our bath. Sundays meant where in the world, Glenroe and trying to do the last bit of homework (or lines) before school the next day.

Summer holidays meant watching "why don't you" and going out to play for 12 hours. Our computer games were on the Commodore 64 and then the master system or the nes and then the mega drive (sensible soccer!) or the SNES (F-Zero & Donkey Kong)

In school everyone knows about Busy at Maths 1-5, the spelling books...those pupils who would have a big pencil case full of stuff and their writing was so neat with their red pens for numbers and the blue pen for writing the sentences...

There was school tours...could you ever forget the excitement the night before a school tour. The phrase "packed lunch" has never been so exciting. Turning up at the school at 7:45 for a bus..when usually you didn't arrive in til 9...standing there in the dark thinking about all the other kids who were still in bed but had to get up soon to go in for school... Of course we were only going to Fota Island or Kilkenny castle or some place but it was thrilling.

No uniform days....bring a toy into school for the last day of school before the christmas break...the horror of parent teacher meetings... Topping your pencil at the top of the class...some people don't even know what a topper is...an ex of mine from the north had no idea what i was talking about and then corrected me that it was a sharpener I was talking about...

Buying tapes....tape singles for £2.49 in the little cardboard sleeve. Then came the CD singles for a fiver...you'd get one summer classic dance anthem and get about 7 remixes of the song to impress your mates with...

I could go on but I'm probably getting close to tl;dr territory so I'd better stop. But that's it for me...being Irish to me has fcuk all to do with ole ole ole and Bobby Sands, it's about us all, or at least 90% of us being working class and having, essentially the same childhoods. I know there are people in other countries who will have similar stories to tell...I mean England is close enough to us but they've always been a little different I think...different shops, some different food stuffs (I mean they had walkers for a hell of a long time while we had tayto)...

Feel free to add your own thoughts about what you like about being Irish.

Snakeblood

abouttobebanned wrote: »

Ok...first off, this thread is not what it looks like. Or, I dunno, maybe it is.

Nobody has ever asked what it means to be Irish so I can't really start this thread by saying.."When someone asks you what it means to be Irish..what do you say?"

For me, a freshly appointed 30 year old I think it's cool to have a bunch of people that have so many shared experiences. For the most part, we've all had pretty much the same upbringing.

like...

Going to school with a fcuking 2 ton school bag when you're about 8. We walked to school too...along a road that we probably walked about 100 thousand times in our lifetime. There was a lunch somewhere in that bag too..tinfoiled sandwhiches, a pack of tayto, a club milk for the 11 o clock break... If it was a friday you might have a pound for a lunch special.

During the week we'd watch...well I was gonna add some fancy pictures now but I see I can't do that on After Hours. How odd. Well we'd watch the DJ KAT show...blockbusters, Krypton Factor...at the weekend we'd watch Blind Date and all kinds of crap saturday telly after our bath. Sundays meant where in the world, Glenroe and trying to do the last bit of homework (or lines) before school the next day.

Summer holidays meant watching "why don't you" and going out to play for 12 hours. Our computer games were on the Commodore 64 and then the master system or the nes and then the mega drive (sensible soccer!) or the SNES (F-Zero & Donkey Kong)

In school everyone knows about Busy at Maths 1-5, the spelling books...those pupils who would have a big pencil case full of stuff and their writing was so neat with their red pens for numbers and the blue pen for writing the sentences...

There was school tours...could you ever forget the excitement the night before a school tour. The phrase "packed lunch" has never been so exciting. Turning up at the school at 7:45 for a bus..when usually you didn't arrive in til 9...standing there in the dark thinking about all the other kids who were still in bed but had to get up soon to go in for school... Of course we were only going to Fota Island or Kilkenny castle or some place but it was thrilling.

No uniform days....bring a toy into school for the last day of school before the christmas break...the horror of parent teacher meetings... Topping your pencil at the top of the class...some people don't even know what a topper is...an ex of mine from the north had no idea what i was talking about and then corrected me that it was a sharpener I was talking about...

Buying tapes....tape singles for £2.49 in the little cardboard sleeve. Then came the CD singles for a fiver...you'd get one summer classic dance anthem and get about 7 remixes of the song to impress your mates with...

I could go on but I'm probably getting close to tl;dr territory so I'd better stop. But that's it for me...being Irish to me has fcuk all to do with ole ole ole and Bobby Sands, it's about us all, or at least 90% of us being working class and having, essentially the same childhoods. I know there are people in other countries who will have similar stories to tell...I mean England is close enough to us but they've always been a little different I think...different shops, some different food stuffs (I mean they had walkers for a hell of a long time while we had tayto)...

Feel free to add your own thoughts about what you like about being Irish.

Jumpers for goalposts, hardboiled eggs, and Dublin Zoo for 3 school tours in a row. Chester one year. HURRAH.

Sykk

abouttobebanned wrote: »

I could go on but I'm probably getting close to tl;dr territory so I'd better stop. .

You crossed the line. Though I did keep reading, I don't understand how any of that has anything to do with being Irish. More a short story of your life... Dribble if you ask me!

thebigbiffo

gettin pissed on guinness and eatin half cooked chips from a van out the front of a small village pub. now THATS irish

abouttobebanned

Sykk wrote: »

You crossed the line. Though I did keep reading, I don't understand how any of that has anything to do with being Irish. More a short story of your life... Dribble if you ask me!

What's dribble?

The point is that Irish people will understand a lot of what I wrote up there but there's a good chance that someone from another country won't (even when translated )

ucd.1985

It means we are not English,

Thats what it means.

Catari Jaguar

That's more of an account of a 1980s childhood than what it means to be Irish.

scientific1982

Childhood wise id say most of us in and around your age have a ****load in common. Id say thats why we tend to be so cliquish when abroad. The younger folks wouldnt know as much about walking to school, playing outside for hours and being covered in cuts and scrapes continuously. My nephew hasnt a clue what a tape is.

Jesus Wept

It means absolutely nothing beyond the fact that you hold citizenship through whichever method you acquired it.

abouttobebanned

People spend too much time trying to ridicule threads these days instead of taking part in an interesting conversation. If you think this is just a recap of an 80s childhood, it's because I said I was 30 and that's what I know. If you want to recap a 70s or 90s childhood, go right ahead, it would be a nice addition to the thread. I don't think you'd be like this with people in real life, trying to belittle what they say in as funny a way as possible in the hope of getting a thanks from a passer-by...so why do it online?

bonerm

For me personally it means practically nothing beyond that I have a more comfortable life than had I grown up in a less socialist, less economically developed country.

As to your memories OP I'd imagine it'd have been exactly the same had you been born in the UK (note how your post makes absolutely no mention to the use or learning of the Irish language for example).

Sykk

abouttobebanned wrote: »

What's dribble?

The point is that Irish people will understand a lot of what I wrote up there but there's a good chance that someone from another country won't (even when translated )

Sure they will! We're of a different culture than most, I'm sure the British would!

That_Guy

Coddle and Tayto.

Maybe not mixed together but it might be interesting.

helimachoptor

@ abouttobebanned - > awesome post

mikemac

You forgot to mention Ann and Barry, márla, Patch and Wanderly Wagon, the safe cross code, school tours to the Aquadome in Tralee and those marshmellows we got for Polio
Taytos cost 12p, the blue Mr Freeze was the nicest, Snickers was marathon, we still have Opal Fruits, only rich families had two cars and you'd be killed if you played soccer on the parish GAA pitch.
Nobody bought bottled water and bring back Supercans!

You walked or cycled to school or possibly got some battered Bus Eireann bus in rural areas that would send Health and Saftety experts screaming in horror nowadays. :eek:

If you asked your parents to drive you to school you'd be laughed at and kicked out and told to hurry up.
Ah kids nowadays, going to school gates in an SUV

-Leelo-

Ah love this thread, I was a 90s kid so for me it was Zig & Zag, Saved By The Bell, School trips to Clara Lara and Butlins, those horrible tracksuit bottoms with the poppy button things up the side, and even worse those trouser things with skirts over them (anyone remember them, they were woeful) Gameboys, Apple Jacks & Postman Pats, JR icepops, TAMAGOTCHIS!!!

Ruu_Old

Schoolbooks covered in wallpaper, renting videos (and the video recorder, until we got a top loading one that our richer cousins were throwing it out ), going home in the old yellow CIE school buses. Visit from the parish priest (one who wasn't a dirty, auld ****!) every once in a while, the Micro-T test. School uniforms were navy jumper, slacks with a light blue shirt and red clip on tie. Weetabix for breakfast.

I had a pair of white slip on shoes that I used for Communion that had to do me for school as well for a good part of the year, thought everyone would take the piss out of me but they thought they looked cool! I hated them! ;_;
Being in the country meant that the summer job was picking stones or working on the farm.

Football until dark, holidays to England via the ferry to Hollyhead.

kfallon

abouttobebanned wrote: »

If it was a friday you might have a pound for a lunch special.

Ah God Bless the Beefy King, £1 burger special, chips, burger (somehow I always ended up with the one with no 'red sauce' despite ordering it with) and a little bottle of pop (otherwise known as pisswater) Getting left out for lunch 5 mins early so you could leg it down before the queue!

moonage

Being Irish (or any nationality) is an accident of birth and is nothing to be proud of.

-Leelo-

abouttobebanned wrote: »

People spend too much time trying to ridicule threads these days instead of taking part in an interesting conversation. If you think this is just a recap of an 80s childhood, it's because I said I was 30 and that's what I know. If you want to recap a 70s or 90s childhood, go right ahead, it would be a nice addition to the thread. I don't think you'd be like this with people in real life, trying to belittle what they say in as funny a way as possible in the hope of getting a thanks from a passer-by...so why do it online?

After Hours is where smart asses who wouldn't say boo to a goose come to vent their frustration on others, pay no heed. Its an absolute clique-fest here too!

-Leelo-

Ruu wrote: »

Schoolbooks covered in wallpaper

Brilliant, forgot that one!!

ch750536

Sorry OP but thats the same as my life. I'm from Stoke so thats not what it is to be Irish.

scientific1982

abouttobebanned wrote: »

People spend too much time trying to ridicule threads these days instead of taking part in an interesting conversation. If you think this is just a recap of an 80s childhood, it's because I said I was 30 and that's what I know. If you want to recap a 70s or 90s childhood, go right ahead, it would be a nice addition to the thread. I don't think you'd be like this with people in real life, trying to belittle what they say in as funny a way as possible in the hope of getting a thanks from a passer-by...so why do it online?

Couldnt agree with you more.

minotour

Ruu wrote: »

Schoolbooks covered in wallpaper

When my italian wife heard that we did this she couldnt stop laughing, t'was at that point decided not to tell her about banana sandwiches:D

gurramok

abouttobebanned wrote: »

Going to school with a fcuking 2 ton school bag when you're about 8. We walked to school too...along a road that we probably walked about 100 thousand times in our lifetime. There was a lunch somewhere in that bag too..tinfoiled sandwhiches, a pack of tayto, a club milk for the 11 o clock break... If it was a friday you might have a pound for a lunch special.

That first part just shows how mollycollied todays kids are.

When we grew up, we were not sitting on our arses playing computer games. We were kicking a ball on the street and roaming around causing mischief!

Computer gaming along with Mcburger bingeing has made todays kids FAT.

bonerm

Ruu wrote: »

Schoolbooks covered in wallpaper,

There's a flashback. We had that too in our house. I remember the better off kids in school would have a kind of clear-plastic material stuck on their books that both protected AND displayed their schoolbooks.

Oooh how I envied those damn richers! :mad:

mikemac

Ruu wrote: »

renting videos (and the video recorder, until we got a top loading one that our richer cousins were throwing it out )

In the 1980's a VCR could cost over 400 punts, crazy amount of money at the time! Sure a DVD player nowadays costs €60, nothing in comparison.

If you rented videos from the local shop there would have just a few so you put down your name a few days in advance.

And Xtravision threatened to fine you if you didn't rewind the tapes before returning them :eek:

Ruu wrote: »

going home in the old yellow CIE school buses.

They truely were pieces of junk, often leaking on wet days, falling apart and unsafe.
It was either that or cycle, lol only few got driven to school.

Ruu wrote: »

holidays to England via the ferry to Hollyhead

Foreign holidays? Spot the rich family
We went to Leisureland in Salthill once a year for one day out. Can Galway folk tell me if Leisureland is still around?

minotour

feelingstressed wrote: »

Foreign holidays? Spot the rich family
We went to Leisureland in Salthill once a year for one day out. Can Galway folk tell me if Leisureland is still around?

Check out all the richers, we went to Ballybunion once , was the best holiday we ever had...........and the only holiday we ever had.

-Leelo-

feelingstressed wrote: »

Foreign holidays? Spot the rich family
We went to Leisureland in Salthill once a year for one day out. Can Galway folk tell me if Leisureland is still around?

My dad lived in Germany while I was a kid so when I was 8 I went over to visit him for the summer, I was the envy of all the kids on my street, and I had the best material for the "My Summer" essay they made you write when you returned to school in September My one and only holiday till I was 15

Scuid Mhór

moonage wrote: »

Being Irish (or any nationality) is an accident of birth and is nothing to be proud of.

you're so hardcore - i wish i was as uncaring and as cynical as you.

Sir Gallagher

Cola, Desperate Dan, Wham and Roy of the Rovers Bars even the thought of them now has my mouth watering in that sickly way. Those bars we're like Ecstacy for kids.

The buzz of the school play, remember being in the school at night time was so strange and thrilling.

Irish Guitarist

Ireland is the only country where "go home with yer big head on ya" is considered a witty remark. Or maybe that's just in Carlow. I must have been on the receiving end of that a hundred times.

Bosco and Wanderly Wagon were the height of entertainment when I was a kid. My sister brought me to see Wanderly Wagon performed live back in the late seventies or very early eighties. There's still a picture somewhere of my sister standing next to Eugene Lambert.

Ireland is probably the only country where a (alleged) former Nazi could make a fortune from producing school text books. Not that I knew who was making my school books at the time. That bee symbol brings back memories though.

Haircuts with a 'tail' at the back. Anyone remember them? They were what all the 'hard' kids used to wear back in the late eighties. Again, that may have just been a Carlow phenomena though. Either way, they were crap. About a quarter of my class looked like tadpoles.

I loved no uniform days. It was easier to mitch when not wearing a uniform.

I once wore my tracksuit to school as it was sports day. On that day someone punched me in the nose and I thought it was broken. I went to the principal with my nose spouting blood to ask if I could go home. His reply was "why aren't you wearing your uniform?".

Sir Gallagher

-Leelo- wrote: »

My dad lived in Germany while I was a kid so when I was 8 I went over to visit him for the summer, I was the envy of all the kids on my street, and I had the best material for the "My Summer" essay they made you write when you returned to school in September My one and only holiday till I was 15

The big budget epic version of "Our News"

billymitchell

Getting pissed on alcopops at 14, then cider at 15, then sh*te lager at 16(harp, carling), budweiser at 18. Cheap sh*te during college, then everything and anything ever since!!

Getting pissed alot is kind of what I am getting at here

Terry

feelingstressed wrote: »

In the 1980's a VCR could cost over 400 punts, crazy amount of money at the time! Sure a DVD player nowadays costs €60, nothing in comparison.

If you rented videos from the local shop there would have just a few so you put down your name a few days in advance.

And Xtravision threatened to fine you if you didn't rewind the tapes before returning them :eek:



They truely were pieces of junk, often leaking on wet days, falling apart and unsafe.
It was either that or cycle, lol only few got driven to school.



Foreign holidays? Spot the rich family
We went to Leisureland in Salthill once a year for one day out. Can Galway folk tell me if Leisureland is still around?

****ing Leisureland.
My cousin talked me into going down the waterslide despite my protestations that I could not swim.
Got to the bottom and I went under the water straight away. He pick me up, let me go and I went under again. I told you that I couldn't swim, mother****er.

These days leisureland and the like are sued for undue stress upon the child.

who the fug

Ruu wrote: »

Being in the country meant that the summer job was picking stones or working on the farm.

Picking stones, :mad::mad::mad::mad::mad::mad::mad::mad:that and stooping turf.

Both were justification for killing my parents when I was 12

thebigbiffo

SODASTREAM!!!

well, it's not what it means to be irish but its a definite feature of my childhood.

up for anything

bonerm wrote: »

As to your memories OP I'd imagine it'd have been exactly the same had you been born in the UK (note how your post makes absolutely no mention to the use or learning of the Irish language for example).

He was writing about pleasant things. :P

mikemac

Ah picking stones,

Or better still, stacking square bales.
And then they all are stacked on trailers the kids sit on top for some extra weight as you bounce around everywhere and dodge tree branches,

The gardai would probably stop the tractor is they saw that these days for being unsafe

But we loved it

Terry

Irish Guitarist wrote: »

Ireland is the only country where "go home with yer big head on ya" is considered a witty remark. Or maybe that's just in Carlow. I must have been on the receiving end of that a hundred times.

Yeah. Probably Carlow.
Although, calling your friend "A big bollix" or something similar as a term of edearment seems to be lost on foreigners.

Bosco and Wanderly Wagon were the height of entertainment when I was a kid. My sister brought me to see Wanderly Wagon performed live back in the late seventies or very early eighties. There's still a picture somewhere of my sister standing next to Eugene Lambert.

Yeah. School trips to the Lambert Puppet Theatre were a staple of our school trips around that time.

Haircuts with a 'tail' at the back. Anyone remember them? They were what all the 'hard' kids used to wear back in the late eighties. Again, that may have just been a Carlow phenomena though. Either way, they were crap. About a quarter of my class looked like tadpoles.

Had me one of them. It then grew into a mullet. Thankfully that was only for about a year and no pictures exist.

billymitchell wrote: »

Getting pissed on alcopops at 14, then cider at 15, then sh*te lager at 16(harp, carling), budweiser at 18. Cheap sh*te during college, then everything and anything ever since!!

Getting pissed alot is kind of what I am getting at here

Alcopops? There was none of that crap in my day.

abouttobebanned

Oh...the Christmas presents....

Mr. Frosty...the game of life....battleship...go for broke...annuals! Buster...Look In...shoot!

up for anything

gurramok wrote: »

That first part just shows how mollycollied todays kids are.

When we grew up, we were not sitting on our arses playing computer games. We were kicking a ball on the street and roaming around causing mischief!

Computer gaming along with Mcburger bingeing has made todays kids FAT.

There is always someone cribbing about the youth of today. When my dad read this thread and came to your post he was disgusted at your ball playing and the fact that you had time on your hands to cause mischief! He asked how come you weren't doon tha pit like he had to be when he was a kid.

Ms. Captain M

Fortycoats. And spokey dokeys!

AskMyChocolate

Sugradh Sonas and Spraoi (Irish comics)

Chris P. Bacon

I'm going to be 30 in a few weeks and everything you said just bring back memories

Also remember i lived about 1 minute from the primary school,and always had to walk past the house on the way home,and we could smell the dinner up the road and we would run even quicker to get home

Remember too when my father worked in MB and we used to go to the xmas party and actually meet santa,it was the highlight of the year.One of the most vivid memories i have when i was about 10 is of sitting on the couch on Christmas eve with all the family around and the beautiful smell of turkey n ham and Guinness and farts all over the room and nobody having a care in the world.

I have a lot of memories of standing outside off-licences asking people to get us champagne cider which was £1:50 a bottle,and then heading into one of the lads's shed in there back garden to smoke a 10 spot,which we were able to afford from all the windows washed and gardens we cut that day.

Simpler times and us Irish can only appreciated times like that,with so much sht going on around us now people should think back to the days when they were truly happy,and maybe bring some of that happiness back into their lives,and make this great country happy again

livinsane

Everybody is talking about childhood but if you're still living in this country, what makes you feel Irish these days?

For me its coming across a road bowling match and having to stop and wait for yer man/wan to throw the bowl.

Or else going to a local festival/road racing and getting a carton of chips from the chip van.

Passing a church and feel a bit guilty for not blessing myself.

Mint Sauce

OP that describtion sounds more like any typical childhood influenced by UK culture. I grew up in england done all my schooling there, and sounds preaty similar bar the outing destinations, bobby sands, and glenroe. as for the TV shows mentioned, most of them were made by the BBC or ITV.

fontanalis

AskMyChocolate wrote: »

Sugradh Sonas and Spraoi (Irish comics)

jebus

Aprilmay

AskMyChocolate wrote: »

Sugradh Sonas and Spraoi (Irish comics)

They still produce these my son got one in school last christmas:)

Irish Guitarist

I just remembered another few things.

The Angelus. When I heard it on RTE I knew my dinner was ready (my mother always had the dinner at six).

The crap programmes on a Sunday evening when there was only RTE, BBC and HTV. One was Bullseye. Another was Glenroe. Hearing the Glenroe theme tune was like a death knell telling me the weekend was over and I had another week of school in the morning.

We used to have an old television with only five channel buttons. One day my sister discovered that if you pressed numbers one and five together you could get S4C. I thought it was great having a new channel at first. Then I realised most of it was in Welsh.

Bleached schoolbags. Everyone I knew used to bleach their bags for a kind of tie dye effect. I thought it looked good so I tried boiling my bag in water and bleach. It turned out alright until my bag fell apart one day and all my books fell all over the road.

Also writing band names on your bag. The 'hard' kids would write Metallica or Iron Maiden on their bags. The 'cool' kids would write Happy Mondays or The Stone Roses. Me, I used to write Erasure and Jesus Jones on my bag.

Irish Guitarist

bonerm wrote: »

There's a flashback. We had that too in our house. I remember the better off kids in school would have a kind of clear-plastic material stuck on their books that both protected AND displayed their schoolbooks.

Oooh how I envied those damn richers! :mad:

That clear plastic was (and is) called contact. I wasn't rich but I had it on my books. At the start of every school year my mother would buy loads of rolls of it and spend hours sticking it to all my books. I was jealous of the kids with no covering on their books. I thought they were more carefree and rebellious. In hindsight their parents probably couldn't afford contact. I thought the wallpapered books were just disturbing.