Dublin on St Patrick’s Day? Maybe Not
Editor’s Note: This post is by writer and playwright Anto Howard, a.ka. the Disillusioned Dubliner. He’s writing about his hometown of Dublin — about the good, the bad and the ugly. Last time ’round Anto was saved by a Culchie woman. This time he’s exploring his inner leprechaun.
What’s the best time of year to visit Dublin?
It’s a common but always tricky question put to The Disillusioned Dubliner. The dry, not-too-crowded shoulder months of May and September are one possible answer; the celebratory, slow, two-week build up to Christmas also displays the city at its best; or how about October, when the trees have turned and the theatres are opening a new season. All in all not an easy question to answer. When someone asks what’s the worst time of year to…
I screw up my already wizened face, cut them off mid sentence and answer in a flash — Paddy’s Day.
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| Drunken young men in big, fake hats. Welcome to Paddy’s Day |
St Patrick’s Day in Dublin: Not Impressed
St Patrick’s Day in Dublin is a nightmare if you don’t fall into one of the following four categories.
- Teenage boy before 7pm. (After 7pm your day tends to fall apart when you suddenly feel the urge to leave the pub underage drinking session and vomit on the first pristine cobblestone street you can find.)
- Vendors who speculated early and cornered the market in oversized green hats and blow-up green hammers.
- Children under age 10, before the sweets run out and the boredom sets in.
- No, that’s it, there is no one else.
The 17th of March in Dublin is like August in Paris and like summer weekends in New York. Any city resident with a grain of sense gets the hell out of the place and lets the suburban barbarians and foreign innocents try (and fail once again) to convince themselves — as they shiver in the sleety rain and chow down on a half-cooked, frozen, deep-fried fish fillet that cost 11 euro — that they must be having fun because it’s St. Patrick’s day after all. Myself, of course, seeing it as my duty to report this madness to the greater world, this year bravely chose to stay in Dublin and stand witness to the lunacy.
St Paddy’s Day, Plus ca change
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| Standard St. Patrick’s Day Attire |
So this March 17th I set out from my city centre apartment with very little hope of encountering anything that might change my dark opinion on our national holiday. I made my way up to Dame Street to get a good position to watch the famous Paddy’s Day parade pass by (an hour and a half later than promised).
But I had forgotten — there is no such thing as a good position to watch the Paddy’s Day parade, somehow, in the shifting 10-deep and surly crowd, you are always behind someone (unless you are one of the sick individuals who arrived in the wee hours of the morning, flask of tea in hand, to book your precious place against the ropes). Add to this the aforementioned ubiquitous giant Leprechaun hats, and any chance of a good view was quickly forgotten.
Memories flooded back of freezing childhood St. Patrick’s Days spent on tippy-toes trying desperately to catch a glimpse of some man with a plastic crozier in hand and a large, Papier Mache mitre on his head. Plus ca change…
Dublin City Council may have spent a few shillings in the last few years turning the St. Patrick’s Day Parade into a week long “Festival,” but here I was again with a bad view of men dressed up in costumes that look like they were made by a six year old who had just downed half a cough bottle. Are all parades this boring and uncomfortable? How about Mardi Gras? At least it’s warm I suppose, and the girls are beautiful and half naked.
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| Best place to view the parade, from inside a bookmakers on Dame Street |
But I still think the parade in its essence hints of the Emperor’s New Clothes; everything thinks they are supposed to enjoy them but few really do. I looked around for some kids to make sure my dissatisfaction wasn’t purely an adult rant. Yes, I saw plenty of them smiling, a few laughing, but I quickly noticed it was the crowd, the other children, the sweets stuffed in their mouths that held their interests and delight which quickly wandered from the parade as yet another “creature” made out of paper, spit and watercolour paint wobbled by.
A Few More Kebabs Sold, A Few More Kegs Emptied
After half an hour in the cold I had had enough and was ready to go home. Easier said than done. The crowds had blocked the pavement and even if I managed to squeeze through the police wouldn’t let me cross the road. I felt trapped. I noticed a bookmakers behind me on Dame Street. It was empty but the lights were on. I squeezed in the door and the silence and warmth hit me with the pleasure of simple but forgotten delights. An oasis in the city of the marching mad. I put a few casual, 2 euro bets on some very average racing from Wexford and let the parade pass me by outside.
Two hours later and 14 euro lighter I exited onto some eerily quite streets. On St. Patrick’s Day in Dublin these are the dead late afternoon hours after the parade has ended and before the real business of Paddy’s Day — drinking till you drop — begins. Wrong again!
As I walked past the packed bars of Dame Street and Temple Bar I realized the drinking has already begun in earnest. I walked the streets, desolate as a winter Sunday, the strange silence occasionally interrupted as I passed yet another bar packed to the rafters. Statistically the night of the 17th of March is second only to New Year’s Eve for boozing in Dublin, and I read in the Irish Times the next day that it tops December 31st when it comes to drink-related emergency calls, 400 this year.
As I walked back home though the disintegrating streets of Temple Bar I suddenly realized the real sadness about St. Patrick’s Day in Dublin is not that it’s something strange and terrible, but rather that it is somehow terribly familiar. In fact it is shockingly similar to any Saturday night in a city that has chosen to identify itself with consumption, booze, fast food, overpricing, more booze and more booze.
The problem with Dublin’s Paddy’s Day is that it isn’t special, it’s just a few more kebabs sold, a few more kegs emptied, a few more people ripped off.
No, I’m wrong. Paddy’s Day is not like any other Saturday night, every Saturday night has become another Paddy’s Day! All the Paddy’s Day you can eat, year round. This is the way we choose to sell Dublin to the world every weekend. Giant fake leprechaun hats (that originated in some 19th-century, half-demented, American tattoo parlor idea of what the Little People wore on their heads), heaving pubs where no one can get a seat or hear their own voice over the fake didle-ei music and 24-hour sports news on the five wide screen TVs. This is our Spring Break, except we do it year round. What’s Irish for “show us your tits?”
So don’t worry if you can’t make it to Dublin for Paddy’s Day, we sell “Irishness” year round now. It is no longer our national holiday it is yours, designed for your consumption, any Saturday night you fancy, and we’ll keep selling it to you until you’re sick, literally.
Disillusioned Dubliner’s Alternative St. Patrick’s Day
Least ye all despair the Disillusioned Dubliner is here to tell you that there is a nice way to spend St. Patrick’s Day in his native city, so long as you leap out of the tourist rut the “festival” organizers and sponsors have dug to trap you. Here is one suggested program to get the best out of the next March 17.
Get up early to avoid all the parade bullshit and jump on the DART train out to the beautiful seaside village of Howth. Have a hearty breakfast in a café near the harbour then take a brisk stroll around scenic Howth Head. Back into town on the DART, getting off at Connolly Station to avoid the city centre madness. Head for a really good pint of Guinness at Gaffney’s pub in Fairview (ask anyone to direct you).
Then head to Croke Park stadium, the headquarters of the GAA (Gaelic Athletic Association) and watch the traditional National Club finals in hurling and football, which always take place on Paddy’s Day. It’s a unique Irish experience when amateur teams from every village and town in Ireland are whittled down to these last two. Back on the DART again and a short trip south to the beach at Sandymount for a long stroll as far as the South Wall. Dinner in Cavistons seafood restaurant in Sandycove is the perfect finale.
Planning a trip to Ireland? See all the things to do in Dublin that don’t require being too disillusioned. Then read more of Anto’s “Disillusioned Dubliner” blog posts.
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