Having the Crack

How to survive in the new multicultural Ireland

THE FRENCHIE

Tall. Tanned. Black puffy jacket with furrimmed hood. Works on the French support desk for a major multinational. That’s Andre.

When Eileen became the fourth Irish woman at the office party to say “you can butter my spuds any day, Andre”, he asked, “What is this ‘butter ze spuds’?” She replied, “Mam used to say it to fellas all the time on holidays in France to piss off my dad. I’m not exactly sure where it comes from.”

“OK, Eileen, but what does it mean? Do your spuds need buttering?”

“They sure do, Andre, there has been nothing on that front since Derek went to Australia.” “He used put the butter on your spuds?” “He was very good at it.” “And why don’t you butter your own spuds?”

“Well I do, Andre — but you know yourself, it’s not the same.”

“I don’t really know, Eileen. In France, we do not put butter on our spuds.”

“Go away out of that. I’ve been at French film festivals. Yez are mad for it.”

“Hang on; I don’t know what you are talking about.” “Ah, get up the yard, Andre.” “What yard?” “Ah, Jaysus wept. Andre, all I want is a ride.” “In the Clio?” “I want sex, ya dozy Frog!” She shouted this a bit loud and half the people from the office turned around. Two of them roared, “Ah, would you put a bit of butter on her spuds, Andre!” He decided to move home to Toulouse.

KLAUS THE GERMAN

In his 20 years as a reiki healer in West Cork, not one person mentioned the war to Klaus, the mild-mannered German. Then Angela Merkel took control of the country. This country. In O’sullivan’s pub these days, every night is goose-step night. People now refer to his 1987 Volkswagen Golf as the Panzer. When Klaus popped into the shop the other day, old Mrs O’sullivan said she had been told she couldn’t serve him. “Sorry Klaus, I’m only following orders,” she said and then she started laughing and said she was only messing, and then shouted “Sieg Heil!” and said “I’m still only messing”. When he turned to walk out she roared out, “Where’s your sense of humour, ya dozy Kraut?” Only messing, Klaus, only messing.

When the amateur musical society put on The Sound of Music, Klaus reckoned he would be a shoo-in for Captain Von Trapp, but the casting director Tim Mick JohnJohn Tim O’sullivan had other ideas. “Ah now Klaus, we need you to be the Nazis.”

“All of them?” “Why not, Klaus? Times are tough. You can goose-step away to your heart’s content and no one can say a word.”

“The way the whole town does these days.”

“We’re only messing, Klaus boy, we’re only messing.”

THE EUROPEAN

Don’t ask Deirdre where she comes from. Unless you want to see her take a sip of espresso, adjust her beret, put down her copy of 1,000 Reasons I Wish I was Dutch, look smugly at you from behind her outlandishly expensive designer glasses from Denmark and say, “I would have thought that was pretty obvious — I’m a European.” Why is that, Deirdre? “Because of Voltaire, champagne, the Scandinavian social model, Bauhaus, flamenco dancing, garlic, trams and retiring at the age of 42. Who wouldn’t want to come from a place with all those things?” What have you got against Ireland? “Outside of Dublin, James Joyce, Yeats and the Irish Times, absolutely everything.” Why? “Because I hate culchies. I went to Galway for a poetry slam, and this skinny Monaghan chap with no ass called The Wee Man came up to me in a pub and said, ‘och, it only takes a small hammer to bang in a big nail’ in his funny accent, followed by a fit of winking. After that we all went to a ceili and a chap from Tralee lobbed the gob, as he called it himself. Animals, the lot of them. It wouldn’t happen in a pub in Oslo.”

Ah, it would if you were better-looking, Deirdre. Face it, we’re an ugly race. Lose the beret. Pick up your phone there and get in touch with The Wee Man. He doesn’t need much encouragement.

MARIA THE ITALIAN

She’s not really Italian. Her Sicilian grandfather, Luciano, got on the wrong boat in Liverpool 50 years ago and ended up in Dublin rather than New York. He was dubbed Lucky Luciano by the locals, who thought it was the funniest nickname ever in the capital, except for Bang Bang. Will Dublin ever come up with anything as funny as Bang Bang? Hopefully.

Anyway, Luciano spotted there’s only one thing Irish people prefer to healthy Italian peasant food. Everything. So he opened a chain of chippers across Dublin and married a woman from Cabra who would do anything for a one and one. Anything.

Maria spent her teenage years being chased around discos by Dublin guys who said she reminded them of all the slutty ones in The Sopranos. They meant it as a compliment.

She works now as a solicitor in Dublin. When she asked one of the senior partners for some case notes the other day he replied, “Fuck you, you fucking fuck.” He laughed his head off and said, “It’s funny because you’re Italian.” She smiled. Thinly. He then said, “I’ve got an even funnier one,” and told her the story of Bang Bang. She decided to move to New York. People there don’t mess with Italians. Because of the you-know-what.

THE YANK

JP works for an American software company in Dublin’s Grand Canal Dock. He has never known a day without skinny jeans. He only watches US television shows that he has downloaded illegally from the internet; he knows all about Newt Gingrich but has never heard of Mick Wallace; he wears a New York Yankees cap and makes a face when people mention the Dubs; he says “really” a lot, usually as a question; he prefers Thanksgiving to Christmas; he speaks up-talk. Really? You bet.

This isn’t a problem around Grand Canal Dock, where everyone is more or less American. But it becomes a problem when JP goes home at the weekend. You see, JP is from Dingle.

The first time he heard “Cryst lads, here comes the Yank” he thought it was a term of endearment. The 10th time, he wasn’t so sure. By the time he was on his third whiskey sour in Jim Paddy Andy’s Pub And Insurance Brokers and Undertakers last Saturday, it had started to wear a bit thin. He tried to join in the fun by telling Jim Paddy Andy to “get a life, dude”. Now half of Dingle refers to him as The Dude.

Come Sunday afternoon and JP is dying to get on the freeway back to his buds in the big city. He used to feel guilty about leaving his mother, until she knocked on his window as he pulled out of the drive and said, “Just remember one thing, JP boy — we drive on the left over here.” Jeez, Ma, enough already.

LEE FROM CHINA

You know when an English person asks you what number comes after 32. You say 33, at which point he says “turty tree” and pretty much wets himself. Do you feel angry? No. You feel sorry for the poor eejit, with his wet pants.

It’s the same with “me so solly”. Lee from China hates working in his dad’s northside petrol station on a Saturday night. From midnight on, he gets a steady flow of punters who have clearly told the taxi driver, “Pull in

I hate culchies. I went to a poetry slamand this skinny chap with no as scame up tome and said ‘och, it only takes a small hammer to bang in a big nail’

there to that petrol station. I’ve something hilarious I want to say to the fella at the till.” “Is it ‘me so solly’?” says the taxi man. “How did you know?” “Did you not notice I’m Chinese myself?” “Oh Jaysus, man. Me so solly.” It’s different when Lee works at his uncle’s place on the southside. The yummy mummies are terrified their kids won’t be able to get work in a globalised world controlled by China. So there is always one dragging her toddler into the shop asking Lee to “speak a few words of Chinese there to Jack, while I go look for some bagels”. Lee tells her he’s fourth generation and doesn’t speak a word of Chinese. The yummy mummy looks mortified. She doesn’t say “me so solly”. But the thought does cross her mind.

THE KENYAN

Taxi driver Charles is sick of the Irish. He’s been here for 16 years and we’re killing him. With kindness. For every passenger that used the N-word, there were 100 others who pretty much got into the cab and apologised for being white. One night he had to pull over and console two sociology students from Trinity who burst out crying about slavery after a night of Jaegerbombs in Coppers. At least that was better than the two standard questions: “how do you find Irish people?” and “are you freezing?” He considered telling the truth about Irish people until he said “you are not the worst” to a little old lady going to Fairview and she told him to “fuck off back to Africa”. So now he trots out “you are the nicest people in the world” and keeps his eyes on the road.

His eldest fella plays hurling for the local GAA club and Charles helps out with training on a Thursday night. He stopped there for a while because every second week somebody from the Irish Times wanted him to feature in their latest diversity special titled Ireland — Has Any Country Been This Nice to Black People Except Maybe Holland.

He also had a bit of hassle all right when he was gathering contact details from under 14s so he could email them about training. One of the fathers said: “No way, Charles man, you’ll just sell it on to your mates in Nigeria and we’ll be getting emails from the eldest son of the Nigerian minister for transport who would like to put a million euros in my bank account. I’m not falling for that. Again.”

THE MUSLIM

Hasan reckons there’s only one thing wrong with living as a Muslim in Ireland. Every local he meets has the same question — what’s it like not to drink? He’d like to reply, “I don’t know. What’s it like to drink?” Except he owns three kebab shops in Dublin, so he already knows the answer to that one. And how.

His favourite bit of a Saturday night is when his regulars stagger in around 2am, rub a lamb kebab into their nose for 10

minutes and shout, “You don’t know what you’re missing out on, Hasan!”

His other busy time is Sunday at around 6pm, the Hour of the Munchies as it’s known in drinking circles. Michelle, who had been in the night before belting out “Don’t you wish your girlfriend was hot like me, Hasan, don’t ya?”, enters in a tracksuit and whispers, “Oh Jaysus, Hasan, I can’t remember anything between about 2 and 6am except that his name was Darren and it’s the first time I’ve seen a tattoo in that exact spot. Give me four chicken kebabs, a thing of falafel and a Diet Coke. You must think drinking is the worst thing in the world, Hasan.”

“Not really, Michelle. It has put two of my kids through college and will shortly pay for my house.”

“Ah, nice one, Hasan. Everyone’s a winner.”

THE WEST BRIT

Dermot despairs of this little shithole of a country. Seriously, other than Myles na gcopaleen and Percy French, what have we ever done for the world? Look at the state of the place now — what gave us the idea we could run our own affairs?

As he said in his final letter to the Irish Times: “Sir, You are the editor of the paper of record in a country run into the ground by an army of third-rate gombeen men. I hope you are proud of yourself. From now on, I will be writing to the Daily Telegraph, which is located in London and therefore an organ of some import. Where is Myles na gcopaleen when we need him the most? As the man himself might say, it’s a quare carry on and there’s no denying it. Yours etc. PS I am a great admirer of Percy French.”

Dermot has high blood pressure and now avoids RTE on the advice of his doctor. Much of his time is spent watching documentaries on BBC Four with names like Great Tram Lines of North Barnsley and The Normans Weren’t As Boring as You Might Think. He also loves

watching Newsnight because don’t rich English people have a lovely accent, all the same?

His first letter to the Daily Telegraph read: “Dear Sir, It is with a grovelling and humble sense of shame that I write to inform you I am that lowest of creatures from the idiot race across the pond. Let me apologise for myself and my fellow countrymen. I would give anything to be a lowly footman in Downton Abbey. Yours etc, Dermot.”

THE AUSTRALIAN

Craig would like to make a few things clear to the people of Ireland. He does not know Alf from Home and Away. He has never met the guy who plays him and therefore doesn’t know if he is like Alf in real life. Like most Australians, he doesn’t even watch the show, and therefore doesn’t get the references to 28-year-old actresses pretending to be schoolgirls, and the fact that whatever else you might say about Alf, he is a great man to organise a search party when some flaming mongrel shoots through.

Virtually every Irish person that walks into Craig’s surf shop in Co Clare has been to Australia. For at least six months. And still he is the first Australian they have met. They all tell the same story. How seven of them moved in with some guy called Stinger from Kildare who had a house down by Bondi Junction. They travelled in tight convoys from Stinger’s gaff to the Irish pub where they would lay siege to their livers. Sometimes, instead of going to the Irish pub, they went to a local place called the Whinging Pom, which was full of Paddies who thought they were being exotic. One time Stinger had planned a trip for all of them to go to the beach where they shoot Home and away, but they went drinking the night before and couldn’t be arsed.

Craig knows what to expect at this point of the story. “Which reminds me, have ya ever met that fella Alf? I’d love to . . .” “Hang on, mate. How old are you?” “I’m 29, Craig.” “Are you not a bit old for Home and Away?”

“Craig. You’re a flamin’ mongrel.”

THE AUSTRIAN

My dearest Mama, Things are still the same here for your son Tobias in Cork. Irish people are as terrified as ever of a prolonged silence, so when they hear I am Austrian they either blurt out Arnold Schwarzenegger or try to remember the name of the man who sang Rock me Amadeus. (It was Falco, you won’t have heard of him.)

If I mention Sigmund Freud, they say “you mean that fella with the dirty dreams”. They infuriate me, Mama. Very much.

‘You must think drinking is the worst thing in the world, Hasan.’ ‘Not really, Michelle. It has put two of my kids through college and will shortly pay for my house’

That is assuming they even bother to turn up. I asked some work colleagues around to my apartment last night for seven o’clock. Sharp. This girl called Deirdre arrived drunk at around 8.30, said something about a problem with her hair straightener, drank two large glasses of schnapps, got sick in my sink and then left to smoke a bong with her sister. My colleague Liam sent a text at nine saying “on the way” but I did not see or hear from him again until we met at work on Monday morning. Apparently this “young one he is banging” gave him a call out of the blue and as he put it “you can’t compete with that, Adolf”. He calls me Adolf, Mama. When I tell him this is offensive he says to me that I am against the crack.

I am not sure about this thing they call the crack. From what I can make out, as long as you drink too much and say “oh lads” and “stop the lights” you can do virtually anything because you are having the crack. This covers a multitude. I will not bother your educated mind with what the Irish call mooning. How is Vienna? Boring as ever, I suppose. I must go and clean out my sink.

Tobias.

THE BRAZILIAN

Hey baby, hey baby, hey baby. Carlos has got a lot of loving to give. Back in Sao Paulo, he was a giddy little fat man with a receding hairline. Over here he’s an extroverted, tanned consultant surgeon who knows how to salsa. He is pretty much beating off the Irish ladies with a dirty stick. Hey baby, you wanna dance with Carlos?

Carlos works the salsa scene across Dublin, where insecure, horny Irish women go to find a man. For some reason they assume that a guy who can dance will make a good life-partner. Hey baby, you’re crazy. Cha cha cha. Carlos is the undisputed king of sexy salsa. His competition is Irish men who are so shy that they are afraid to use the Irish Times dating website. That’s shy, baby. While the ponderous Paddy drowns his nerves with rum shots up at the bar, Carlos is already working the room with the oldest trick in the book: dance with the ugly friend. The other women will think you’re sensitive. Carlos, he knows the ladies.

It’s 9am on a Saturday morning and the latest lucky lady is waking up in Casa Carlos. When he shouts “how do ya like your eggs, baby?” from the kitchen she stops herself from saying “fertilised, Carlos” because she doesn’t want to freak him out. Carlos, he doesn’t like to be tied down.

So she lies back on his yellow satin sheets and thinks: “On the one hand he’s an irritating little gobshite who may or may not be good at salsa — sure, how would I know? On the other hand he’s a consultant surgeon. Oh lads, I think I’m in love.”