Irish Tribes of London

silvervixen84

I just read this story on the Irish Post about the "New Irish" and the three tribes we apparently fall into.

http://www.irishpost.co.uk/life-style/three-irish-tribes-london-one-part

Now, before anyone gets all heated, this thread is meant to be light-hearted and stir up a bit of fun debate. :pac:

I live in North West London (Category 1), work in media (Category 2) and socialise in bars with mismatched furniture (Category 3).

What are your thoughts about the "New Irish"?

Fysh

Due to the absence of "None of the above" in the quiz, I'm apparently an East London hipster according to the IP's test. Not sure what to make of that, really

Edited to add: Thinking about this further...I live in NW (category 1), work in IT (category 2) and frequent bars with, if not deliberately mismatched furniture, then at least a good selection of weird beers (and where possible a pinball table). Which I'm almost certain will count as category 3. Thus my failure to either be a big D4-head or know anything about GAA means that the test is on the money and I just don't live in the right place. I suppose East London would put me closer to Bar Kick and Bukowski's Burgers, but on the other hand that much further away from Heart Of Gaming....

Playboy

A solid category 2 for me although I don't really follow the GAA much these days

Scarinae

I live in east London (category 3), work in the media (category 2) and keep hanging out with potato heads in the NW [the article's words, not mine!] (category 1)

BrokenArrows

You are: A member of the SW tribe

However all the questions were answered with "this one is the least wrong" sort of attitude. haha.

83ste

Scarinae wrote: »

I live in east London (category 3), work in the media (category 2) and keep hanging out with potato heads in the NW [the article's words, not mine!] (category 1)

POTATO HEAD!?! I resent that.

silvervixen84

83ste wrote: »

POTATO HEAD!?! I resent that.

Well some of us did grow up watching this on Bosco:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O2St2rpxzbA

Looking back, it's a bit creepy now :eek:

ballsymchugh

ye poxy londoners up there with your walking and your hands doing that breathing thing.

LadyMayBelle

You are: All about hip and happening East London

Guilty as charged.

rainbow kirby

Work in IT (category 2), live north (not north west really, so not fitting any category, but closest to 1), have a slight preference for rugby over GAA but enjoy both (category 2), work 5 minutes from Shoreditch and enjoy Brewdog a little too much(category 3)...

Jack B. Badd

ballsymchugh wrote: »

ye poxy londoners up there with your walking and your hands doing that breathing thing.

It's summer - you can't walk for all the bloody tourists & (if Embankment yesterday was anything to go by) breathing runs you the risk of being overpowered by exhaust fumes, the smell of sewerage & miscellaneous dead thing in the park. Not sure about hands though...

FTA69

Live in traditional Irish area in North London.
Background in construction for an Irish company.
Now work for a trade union (detested by Irish construction companies).
Follow the local GAA.
Predominantly Irish friend circle.
Love things that aren't Irish.
Love Irish pubs.
Don't like Guinness and only drink ale.
Work in East London.
Love going out in hipster-dominated Shoreditch and Brick Lane.
Hate f*cking hipsters.
Miss home.
Never going home.

I'm a walking mass of contradictions really.

enda1

FTA69 wrote: »

Live in traditional Irish area in North London.
Background in construction for an Irish company.
Now work for a trade union (detested by Irish construction companies).
Follow the local GAA.
Predominantly Irish friend circle.
Love things that aren't Irish.
Love Irish pubs.
Don't like Guinness and only drink ale.
Work in East London.
Love going out in hipster-dominated Shoreditch and Brick Lane.
Hate f*cking hipsters.
Miss home.
Never going home.

I'm a walking mass of contradictions really.

You should give fucking hipters a go in fairness!

FTA69

enda1 wrote: »

You should give fucking hipters a go in fairness!

I got up on one once when I moved back over here at 23; some mad looking one at a house party in Angel. She said I had a beautiful Irish accent and I should write poetry.

In actuality I have a gruff working-class Cork accent with a slightly nasal pitch. Definitely not the Joycean type.

The Brits are hilarious sometimes.

enda1

FTA69 wrote: »

I got up on one once when I moved back over here at 23; some mad looking one at a house party in Angel. She said I had a beautiful Irish accent and I should write poetry.

In actuality I have a gruff working-class Cork accent with a slightly nasal pitch. Definitely not the Joycean type.

The Brits are hilarious sometimes.

See that's the poetry she was talking about. Almost... visual!

*Shudders*

FTA69

enda1 wrote: »

See that's the poetry she was talking about. Almost... visual!

*Shudders*

I wrote a haiku to celebrate the event.

"Met a dacent beor. Bate the hoop off her. Not calling her again. Yurt."

17 syllables on the nose. I'm bringing out a book soon.

silvervixen84

Set up a twitter account called Irish Haiku, and by the end of the year you'll have enough content for a stocking-filler book

Drank way too much beer.
Weak for garlic and cheese chips.
Hillbilly's was shut.

/demands 10% of all takings

FTA69

Another one, I call it "A Norrie Haiku"

Down the Shakey Bridge
Throwing cans of Dutch at swans
When will the pain end?

FTA69

silvervixen84 wrote: »

Set up a twitter account called Irish Haiku, and by the end of the year you'll have enough content for a stocking-filler book

Drank way too much beer.
Weak for garlic and cheese chips.
Hillbilly's was shut.

/demands 10% of all takings

Good show. Are you also a frustrated working class Irish poet??? Fair play kid. We should meet up and smoke rollies and discuss existentialism.

Harps

I live in the NW, work in engineering and have a majority Irish friends base so category 1 fits me quite well, only problem is I haven't got the slightest interest in GAA which seems to be the main point cat 1 is built on

Playboy

Harps wrote: »

I live in the NW, work in engineering and have a majority Irish friends base so category 1 fits me quite well, only problem is I haven't got the slightest interest in GAA which seems to be the main point cat 1 is built on

I think the article over estimates the interest in GAA to be honest. As it isnt on the telly and the majority of people you bump into dont follow it then it soon fades from the mind. Think I have watched the All-Ireland a handful of times and I have had to sign up to a channel to do it

Scarinae

83ste wrote: »

POTATO HEAD!?! I resent that.

It was not you that
I called a potato head -
That's not where you live

:pac:

seachto7

What about late 30s Irish male, with a few kids trying to pay his bills and rent?

silvervixen84

FTA69 wrote: »

Good show. Are you also a frustrated working class Irish poet??? Fair play kid. We should meet up and smoke rollies and discuss existentialism.

Indeed, I'm an award-winning poet* from the wrong side of the tracks**, trying to make my way in this smoggy metropolis***.

*A trophy from my local library for a poem I wrote about a snowman, aged 6

**the green fields of East Cork

***usually found slurping Gin & Tonic in Kilburn

Reekwind

Alas, poor Elephant & Castle continues to go ignored. It may be a tribe of one but there is a SE Tribe.

Dead (shopping) centre;
Empty can
sits in the sun.

(Admittedly this new SE tribe doesn't contain any poets)

Zippy1991

They've nailed me in the SW Tribe.

I was negotiating with an illegal taxi outside the swan re a trip to Balham not 2 weeks ago :-)

frag420

I am such a contradiction that every time I try to do test it freezes on me!!

So what is an Irish guy who lives in North London, goes out anywhere north of the river but mainly around fins park, horsey, shoreditch, hoxton etc, about two rise friends, used to work in media but just quit to try something different and only watches GAA when my country are doing good?

I am royalty in excile!!

ClashCityRocker

frag420 wrote: »

I am such a contradiction that every time I try to do test it freezes on me!!

So what is an Irish guy who lives in North London, goes out anywhere north of the river but mainly around fins park, horsey, shoreditch, hoxton etc, about two rise friends, used to work in media but just quit to try something different and only watches GAA when my country are doing good?

I am royalty in excile!!

It's fairly downbeat around there, the locals always have long faces :pac:

danotroy

frag420 wrote: »

I am such a contradiction that every time I try to do test it freezes on me!!

So what is an Irish guy who lives in North London, goes out anywhere north of the river but mainly around fins park, horsey, shoreditch, hoxton etc, about two rise friends, used to work in media but just quit to try something different and only watches GAA when my country are doing good?

I am royalty in excile!!

Nice try Frag.

silvervixen84

Now we're being referred to as 'Semigrants':

http://www.independent.ie/life/the-semigrants-the-young-mobile-london-irish-30334357.html

Jack B. Badd

silvervixen84 wrote: »

Now we're being referred to as 'Semigrants':

http://www.independent.ie/life/the-semigrants-the-young-mobile-london-irish-30334357.html

"After all, the British ruled half the world for 300 years and they have lots of souvenirs."

S.M.B.

Now that's a decent article. The one in the OP irked me even though it was supposed to be taken tongue firmly in cheek.

'Semigrants' may be a silly name but I do agree with the sentiment of the piece and I would happily lump myself into the semigrant 'tribe'

Santa Cruz

silvervixen84 wrote: »

Now we're being referred to as 'Semigrants':

http://www.independent.ie/life/the-semigrants-the-young-mobile-london-irish-30334357.html

Probably the same fellow that coined the word "staycation"

Reekwind

I don't like the term 'semigrants'. Admittedly I've never heard of it until now - would anyone actually say that word out loud?

But, aside from being just silly, I think the term downplays both the degree of estrangement from Ireland and the realities of emigration. So I (generally) don't face open discrimination in London? Nice. I'm still working in a foreign country because there's a lack of opportunities at home. I still moved here because I needed a job, not because of an abundance of quirky burrito joints. I still get to see my family 3-4 times a year.

Which is fine. I've a decent life here (much better than previous generations would have) and was never under any illusions as to what emigration meant. But sentiments like "people seemed really excited and motivated by the chance to use the education and the drive they have to build careers and lives for themselves [after the economic collapse]" and "young people coming here say, 'Thank God, finally I'm in a place where my skills and drive can be rewarded'" are entirely alien to me.

I think such thoughts are just a new take on the same old Irish inferiority complex. The not-so-hidden subtext is that Ireland's a dump and thank God I'm out of there and in a proper country. Again, not something I'd agree with.

Plenty of people will of course have moved to London as a career choice, rather than out of necessity, and fair play to them. But it seems strange to characterise an entire generation of emigrants in such terms, particularly when, as the statistics suggest, most of us recent arrivals were pushed to leave Ireland by the crash.

enda1

Reekwind wrote: »

I don't like the term 'semigrants'. Admittedly I've never heard of it until now - would anyone actually say that word out loud?

But, aside from being just silly, I think the term downplays both the degree of estrangement from Ireland and the realities of emigration. So I (generally) don't face open discrimination in London? Nice. I'm still working in a foreign country because there's a lack of opportunities at home. I still moved here because I needed a job, not because of an abundance of quirky burrito joints. I still get to see my family 3-4 times a year.

Which is fine. I've a decent life here (much better than previous generations would have) and was never under any illusions as to what emigration meant. But sentiments like "people seemed really excited and motivated by the chance to use the education and the drive they have to build careers and lives for themselves [after the economic collapse]" and "young people coming here say, 'Thank God, finally I'm in a place where my skills and drive can be rewarded'" are entirely alien to me.

I think such thoughts are just a new take on the same old Irish inferiority complex. The not-so-hidden subtext is that Ireland's a dump and thank God I'm out of there and in a proper country. Again, not something I'd agree with.

Plenty of people will of course have moved to London as a career choice, rather than out of necessity, and fair play to them. But it seems strange to characterise an entire generation of emigrants in such terms, particularly when, as the statistics suggest, most of us recent arrivals were pushed to leave Ireland by the crash.

Then the term simply doesn't apply to you

I take it as more a mental decision taken that you're not some famine boat estranged immigrant. For what's it's worth of the Irish in my core group of friends, none came here out of necessity nor out of desperation. All chose to come to London for positive reasons, be they creative, financial or ambition. I think the perceived extent of the financial exile is somewhat of a myth perpetrated by certain political parties.

Reekwind

enda1 wrote: »

Then the term simply doesn't apply to you

The problem is that it feeds into attitudes like "I think the perceived extent of the financial exile is somewhat of a myth perpetrated by certain political parties."

If people moved to London out of choice then fine. Happy for them. Let them call themselves whatever they want. But emigration did not jump post-2008 because hundreds of thousands of people suddenly woke up to the attraction of countries in which it doesn't rain 360 days a year. That is not a myth. Nor is it particularly honest to talk (as the article does) of this wave of emigrants as uniformly positive go-getters, happy to have left Ireland behind. As if a university degree automatically comes with a plane ticket.

I'm aware that that's how some people think of themselves but, as I said, I see that as a new form of old complexes.

enda1

Reekwind wrote: »

The problem is that it feeds into attitudes like "I think the perceived extent of the financial exile is somewhat of a myth perpetrated by certain political parties."

If people moved to London out of choice then fine. Happy for them. Let them call themselves whatever they want. But emigration did not jump post-2008 because hundreds of thousands of people suddenly woke up to the attraction of countries in which it doesn't rain 360 days a year. That is not a myth. Nor is it particularly honest to talk (as the article does) of this wave of emigrants as uniformly positive go-getters, happy to have left Ireland behind. As if a university degree automatically comes with a plane ticket.

I'm aware that that's how some people think of themselves but, as I said, I see that as a new form of old complexes.

Emigration begets emigration. I do think a large number moved (and more than is pretended by Irish media) for positive reasons. They saw friends in London for example earn lot's of money, discover new things etc. and saw their life mapped out for themselves in a suburban semi-d and decided "feck this" and moved. I'm fully aware of how that sounds - that it feeds the stereotype but stereotypes come from somewhere.

The article is a bit happy go lucky/arrogant yes, but that's journalism, they try to emote a response.

Lastly in my opinion there is nothing more draining than those who come to England and just complain that they were pushed out: use it as a chance to (even if you are conning yourself) chose that you choose to emigrate and thrive in London. A bit like the pioneers travelling across the great plains of the US (though in a massively downsized, watered down less Steinbeckian manner).