A bit like that line in 'About a Boy' during my weekend, my day is organised in blocks of time. Sunday…wake up…turn on radio…fall back to sleep..wake up again. 1 hour. Head to Hobarts in Ranelagh village, order full breakfast & coffee & juice 30mins. Buy Sunday Papers 5mins. Go to Coffee Society to read papers 1.5hrs…and so on..you get the drift…generally this would then be followed by watch soccer match on Premiership Plus…but last Sunday I completely went over my Coffee Society block of time…not because I was feverishly reading the sports section of the Times..oh no…I was happy out..drinking my coffee reading the paper..when suddenly the café was layed siege to by a bunch of ranelites…picture the scene..about 10-12 kids/teenagers…dressed in the appropriate southside attire…gabbing on and on…the noise only broken by the shrill sound of mobiles…que the phone on loudspeaker and the resumption of the initial conversations…THE NOISE WAS DEAFENING…yet strangely compelling…it wasn’t so much the state of the little umpa lumpa's..but rather the conversation topics…well to be honest..it was a completely different language..one which I am not proficient in. However…this I do know…Ranelites describe fellas in relation to who they are, what their dad's do, what their mom drives, what school they go to oh and do they go to the Wes (niteclub). They louder they spoke the more orange the fake tan/make up seemed to get…anytime any other poor sod went to order..they were glared at…checked out..and then cast off as too poor..too country…or too weird for looking back!!!....and so this continued…….it was like seeing every preconception you have about Southsiders stuffed into one noisy hour on a Sunday afternoon…thankfully…peace resumed…some rugger bugger…announced he was off to Mick Mac (McDonalds) and hence all the umpa lumpa's followed suit. When the din finally subsided…one thought did strike me….while I do consider Dublin a great city to live in when your in your twenties…not on your life would l have fancied growing up there…its all Rosh..this and Rosh that…Mocha's & Latte's…not a football, Choc Ice or bottle of TK Red Lemonade in sight…what kinda childhood is that!
4 comments:
Long live the Choc Ice...staple diet of the country man. Excellent for half time breaks during summer afternoons in Croke Park!
You're becoming one of them.
You should try living in England - not only do they not know what a Choc Ice is (I kid you not), but I cant even have red lemonade with my jameson's because not only do most alcohol establishments not have lovely Irish whisky, they also dont make red lemonade. Could it be time to come home!!
I've got to start paying attention some more - I've never encountered them in Ranelagh except on the Luas.
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