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New Age Hippies in Our Emerald Isle

JupiterKid

It seems to me that Ireland is a bit of a magnet for new age hippie/crustie types who turn on, tune in and drop out in this country, being especially attracted to places like West Cork and Leitrim, where they set up communes and do artistic and crafts-based pursuits.

The locals seem to tolerate them as they largely keep to themselves.

Do you agree with my observation? Do you actually like the fact that we seem to attract English crusties? Or would you prefer if these patchouli oil wearing types just had a bath, cut their dreads off and became members of functioning society?

At least they don't attract widespread ire on here unlike single mothers on welfare or our own well known ethnic minority...

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Muckka

Muckka wrote: »

Is she into Unicorns ?
German ???

I call into some of them for tea sometimes.
They're interesting, and the kids will talk away to you, very articulate I might add.

Love animals and plants etc, there's one guy he loves eating goats, he does amazing things with Curry.

There's a dude up in East Clare called "Road Kill Bob".

He's one of those hippies...

Guess why he's called Roadkillbob

fryup

Muckka wrote: »

East Clare is full of them,

yep, Tuamgraney, Scariff, Mountshannon etc is a hippy mecca....nice people on the whole although their personal hygiene is questionable

[Deleted User]

fryup wrote: »

yep, Tuamgraney, Scariff, Mountshannon etc is a hippy mecca....nice people on the whole although their personal hygiene is questionable

Years ago I know one half of an English new age traveler couple who were very good traditional musicians and made a sort of living busking, but it was hard going, anyway after about 10 years of this the female of the couple got fed up of this returned to the UK became a teacher married and settled down to a middle-class life.

Feisar

topper75 wrote: »

All about the money. Who is funding?

If it is the state - they can **** off.

If they are self-funded (trusties!) then I am obliged to live and let live I suppose.

I sometimes cross over with them on the Venn Diagram of life through musical pursuits. I recall one cafe gig being seated next to a middle-aged couple who paid zero attention to grooming or bathing. They stank like a nasty science experiment. Not nice. They probably thought they were just being 'natural'.

Basically some of them need to become 'mindful' of their scent and think more about their fiscal 'footprint'.

Can you imagine the furry cup? It'd be like battery acid!

sbsquarepants

Muckka wrote: »

Guess why he's called Roadkillbob

Is it to avoid confusion with his father was Roadkillrobert.

Roadkillrobert the second just sounds too upper class?

topper75

Feisar wrote: »

Can you imagine the furry cup? It'd be like battery acid!

Ha ha - I'd like, for many reasons, to think that will NEVER become my problem.

I went away wondering how the other crusties stuck it. Maybe that couple lived way back in the woods and only came out for gigs once a year.

This was in one of the aforementioned East Clare places funnily enough. NE Clare can feel like one big drum circle infestation.

corner of hells

I've a cousin who lives in communes in the west , he moves between Clare , Galway and I think West Cork.

He generally stays in the one area during the school year making sure his kids are in school .

His income is from selling his own prints, paintings and jewelry and he makes sure he's tax compliant.

To be honest it looks line himself and his partner gave a very good existence .
He fairly well educated too and is no fool.

padd b1975

JohnnyFlash wrote: »

Weed smokers, lefties, vegans, questionable hygiene, dreadlocks - plenty to dislike about the average crusty.

Absolutely.

Loads of them around rural Galway back in the early nineties.
I heard of a rather simple local lad (Walter Mitty type) who managed to pop his cherry in the back of a hand-painted Bedford traveling bank.

Poor lad was scratching for months afterwards.

Never rubbered up either.

Church on Tuesday

DaDumTish wrote: »

ah jaysus ,
batin down on the hippies ??

whats next , the disabled ?

Well, it is AH after all and some folk here we're happy to make fun of a woman in a vegetative state who was brutally raped and has since given birth, so I'd reckon give it time and there will be an attack on the disabled any day now.

Poor Uncle Tom

topper75 wrote: »

All about the money. Who is funding?

If it is the state - they can **** off.

If they are self-funded (trusties!) then I am obliged to live and let live I suppose.

I sometimes cross over with them on the Venn Diagram of life through musical pursuits. I recall one cafe gig being seated next to a middle-aged couple who paid zero attention to grooming or bathing. They stank like a nasty science experiment. Not nice. They probably thought they were just being 'natural'.

Basically some of them need to become 'mindful' of their scent and think more about their fiscal 'footprint'.

I think you will find you are obliged to live and let live either way........

bullpost

Muckka wrote: »

Guess why he's called Roadkillbob

To distinguish him from his samurai-wielding brother RoadKillBill?

Emme

I know a West Cork farmer who was regularly asked for a bale of straw when one of what he called the hippies was giving birth. This was in the 1980s.

FTA69

I knew a load of them back in Cork and they're a pain in the hole, good for buying grass and acid off sometimes but that was about it. You'd meet the odd one who was sound but even then they'd be a bit floaty; on about psychedelic trance and f*cking fire poi and yoga and the like of it. I've no time for most of them, they'd bore the arse out off you with all manner of mad waffle. I can't trust anyone who was born and raised outside of Clonakilty but still has a posh English accent.

In fairness the ones I knew were the somewhat more well-heeled and normal types, their parents were just a bit 'alternative'. I did go to Coole Mountain once and the f*cking state of them, shower of unwashed glorified junkies living in filth and most of them never worked a day in their lives. I remember asking one fella how he managed trips to Nepal and it was "ha ha what do you think man, save up the dole!". As if none of us have anything better to be doing like.

Hippies give me the proper hump.

topper75

Poor Uncle Tom wrote: »

I think you will find you are obliged to live and let live either way........

Obliged?
Yeah. The same obligation I have to live with scabies, mice, and cockroaches.

corner of hells

FTA69 wrote: »

I knew a load of them back in Cork and they're a pain in the hole, good for buying grass and acid off sometimes but that was about it. You'd meet the odd one who was sound but even then they'd be a bit floaty; on about psychedelic trance and f*cking fire poi and yoga and the like of it. I've no time for most of them, they'd bore the arse out off you with all manner of mad waffle. I can't trust anyone who was born and raised outside of Clonakilty but still has a posh English accent.

In fairness the ones I knew were the somewhat more well-heeled and normal types, their parents were just a bit 'alternative'. I did go to Coole Mountain once and the f*cking state of them, shower of unwashed glorified junkies living in filth and most of them never worked a day in their lives. I remember asking one fella how he managed trips to Nepal and it was "ha ha what do you think man, save up the dole!". As if none of us have anything better to be doing like.

Hippies give me the proper hump.

His trips to Nepal were probably financed by you buying weed and acid off him.

James Brown

LessOutragePlz wrote: »

No suck thing as hippies anymore just crazy left wing liberals now.

Yeah that Trump, what a lefty

Greentopia

I know a good few of them-a few are friends, and I worked with some who have permaculture smallholdings. If you're a permie you get to know a lot of new age/hippie types. Lots of English, Germans and Dutch, some Eastern European now too, and their offspring. Loads of them in Galway, Leitrim, West Cork and East Clare.

We wouldn't have a permaculture movement in this country if it wasn't for them. Many Irish I've met don't even know what permaculture means, including almost EVERYONE I've ever dealt with in social welfare offices and Intreo. "Oh, you mean Horticulture" 'ticks box'...eh no :rolleyes:

Wouldn't have a farmhouse cheese industry either and lots of animal welfare organisations and charities have been started and are run by them, as are various arts and craft industries. Go to any local farmers market (especially in West Cork) and you'll see how many have their own businesses there. Quite an entrepreneurial lot.

Of course you have some who live off the dole, smoke weed all day and live up mountains in hairy houses with no indoor plumbing, but they're a minority. Most earn their own money and contribute to society in my experience anyway.

I always find them well educated and informed (many have university degrees from their home countries) and they bring colour and diversity to this country. We need more unconventional thinkers, not less.

Personally I'd love to swap some of the mouth breathing locals I see around me for more of them. At least you can have an intelligent conversation with the hippies...

fryup

who remembers Swampy

Day Lewin

topper75 wrote: »

Obliged?
Yeah. The same obligation I have to live with scabies, mice, and cockroaches.

If you can invent a way to avoid living with mice, cockroaches and scabies, I'd say you are on to a very good patent and possibly a Nobel Prize.

Them things are endemic and always with us, the obligation comes with membership of the world.

Rows Grower

There's a good few dozen living within a few miles of our village in Kerry, for the most part they are harmless souls that mind their own business and some have very interesting stories. A lot of them are highly educated and from wealthy backgrounds, I admire them for the way they live life and how they raise their children with impeccable manners and open mindness.

Others would bore you to oblivion with conspiracy theories or try and turn every conversation in to a debate whereby they attempt to wow you with their expansive knowledge of totally useless facts, bit like boards really but more in your face and nostrils.

A lot of them are very hard, skillful workers who have over the years began to enjoy the fruits of their labour in a more conventional way like having electricity, hot water, owning cars etc. For some reason they all seem to know an awful lot about computers, but maybe that's just because my knowledge of them is so limited.

They are great people to throw a party and in fairness when they do everyone is invited, they do days and days of preparation for it with different hippies responsible for different aspects. Usually the parties draw hippies from far and wide and they go on for a few days but there has never been one ounce of trouble at any of them.

Except for two guys that I know, the rest of them are totally against hunting in any way shape or form. I don't mind that but I never shy away from a conversation about it or think twice about mentioning how it is my hobby and how much I enjoy it and in fairness they are broadminded enough to accept it's just what I like to do. I once had a problem with a locator box that was just out of warranty so I asked one of them would he have a look at it and try and fix it for me. It was very funny the way he reacted all serious, "Jesus Christ mannn, you know that is like the equivalent of asking Ghandi to make a nuclear bomb yeah?" He fixed it anyway fair play to him.

The worse ones I ever came across were over in Schull in a pub one night, they were playing various instruments and were for the most part absolutely brutal at both music and singing. No one was really bothered as most people were engaged in private conversations anyway and it was really only background noise. Near the end of the night one of them asked for silence and made a speech about how they all love Ireland so much and wanted everyone to listen to the next piece they were about to play/sing as a group. She then handed out sheets to the rest of the group and before starting informed us all how much this meant to all of them and how proud they were to be able to play it in public.

Then they started playing and singing "Molly Malone". In Irish. It took about 30 seconds of sheer disbelief for it to actually sink in what was happening. I started laughing and tried to remain inconspicuous but the more the wife elbowed me into the side to stop the more uncontrollable it became and to my eternal shame it spread around the bar. Every where I looked people were trying their best not to show they were laughing. No one could talk. At the end my wife was actually crying with silent laughter an she wasn't the only one either. They got a massive round of applause, cheering and whistling when it was finished but then your one who was kind of the spokesperson for the group made another speech and she was very angry with the audience who once again broke into fits of laughing, she stormed out the door in a huff and two minutes later came back for her coat and stormed out again.

We saw her in a cafe the next day, she bought a takeaway coffee paid with ten euro and said keep the change as she swanned off out the door. It was like being on an acid trip.

topper75

Greentopia wrote: »

... almost EVERYONE I've ever dealt with in social welfare offices and Intreo. "Oh, you mean Horticulture" 'ticks box'...eh no :rolleyes:...

Nasty shower them. They always try to roll you into actually having to do work in offices and factories like mere normal people.

AllForIt

Unfortunately the ones that moved to the country close to my parents home are also religious and during the marriage ref dropped some Christian literature through the folks letterbox at that time. They weren't too happy about it and either was I. I for a second though to fill it with cow manure and put it back through their letterbox but thought better off it. They probably would have appreciated the gesture and used it a fertilizer.

fryup

great anecdote Rows Grower, enjoyed that :pac:

super_furry

One word - Galway.

gozunda

Rows Grower wrote: »

....

Then they started playing and singing "Molly Malone". In Irish. It took about 30 seconds of sheer disbelief for it to actually sink in what was happening. I started laughing and tried to remain inconspicuous but the more the wife elbowed me into the side to stop the more uncontrollable it became and to my eternal shame it spread around the bar. Every where I looked people were trying their best not to show they were laughing. No one could talk. At the end my wife was actually crying with silent laughter an she wasn't the only one either. They got a massive round of applause, cheering and whistling when it was finished but then your one who was kind of the spokesperson for the group made another speech and she was very angry with the audience who once again broke into fits of laughing, she stormed out the door in a huff and two minutes later came back for her coat and stormed out again.

We saw her in a cafe the next day, she bought a takeaway coffee paid with ten euro and said keep the change as she swanned off out the door. It was like being on an acid trip.

Sounds hillarious - I presume they murdered the tune but why was yer one so angry?
Did they ever go back to playing music in the pub after that?

Rows Grower

gozunda wrote: »

Sounds hillarious - I presume they murdered the tune but why was yer one so angry?
Did they ever go back to playing music in the pub after that?

They were brutal as a group, plus the english accents trying to sing in Irish being read a sheet didn't help, as didn't the choice of song. She copped the laughing during the performance and was non too pleased.

We haven't been back to Schull since but I wouldn't be one bit surprised if they are still playing that very tune in the same pub to this day, it seems we were just lucky enough to be there for it's public debut. That was the summer of 2017, not 100% sure but I think it might have been O' Regans pub.

gozunda

Rows Grower wrote: »

They were brutal as a group, plus the english accents trying to sing in Irish being read a sheet didn't help, as didn't the choice of song. She copped the laughing during the performance and was non too pleased.

We haven't been back to Schull since but I wouldn't be one bit surprised if they are still playing that very tune in the same pub to this day, it seems we were just lucky enough to be there for it's public debut. That was the summer of 2017, not 100% sure but I think it might have been O' Regans pub.

Thanks. Might have to check the venue out

Hector Savage

Can't stand those terror supporting squatting scum..

fryup

^^^^^^^^^^^^^

ah come on, they're not all like that....a certain percentage are yellow vest but not all

lcwill

FTA69 wrote: »

I can't trust anyone who was born and raised outside of Clonakilty but still has a posh English accent.

I suppose to be really Irish you need the right religion, right politics and right skin colour, as well as the right accent?