dublin

I have always had mixed feelings about Dublin. Lots of people I know adore the city, but it has never really captured my attraction in that way. It has its moments: I enjoy strolling along the river or the canals, or walking on the cobblestone streets….but it has always struck me as too small, provincial and certainly too expensive for my tastes. Architecturally, it is too close to a small English city, with lots of brick buildings and a dark gloomy feel. The now-over boom of the pervious decade led to some nice blocks of flats being built, but in general, there are still a lot of British-style terraced houses. On top of that, the prices are high even compared to London. A pint cost me between 5 and 6 Euros in the various pubs I went to in the centre, which is rather steep, and the restaurants were similarly over priced, and generally offered far less choice than in London. Some people rave about the “new Irish cuisine,” but I confess it leaves me cold. Of course it is unfair to compare a city of 1.5 million to one of 10 million, but even compared to cities of its own size, I think Dublin stands out for its high prices versus level of quality. You can certainly eat better for less in Barcelona, Lisbon or Rome than in Dublin. Furthermore, while I like intrinsically the pubs in the renowned Temple bar area, they tend to be filled with the Worst of Britain: English people over for stag parties or Hen nights, apparently under the impression that because they are technically abroad, they have a special license to behave like savages. As I was showing foreign friends around the city, I felt like I had to at least take them by Temple bar, but instead of using the medieval street patterns and low ceiling buildings to conjure up images of Irelands famous writers scribbling away in dark corners over a pint of Guinness, I found myself attempting to explain why there were large groups of very drunk English girls with angel wings strapped to their backs, running around semi-naked and screaming in the streets. We eventually went elsewhere to sit down, enjoy a pint, and catch up. There have been efforts to ban stag and hen parties from the Temple bar area, but they have clearly been unsuccessful. If I were Irish, these parties would be just another reason for disliking the English, not that the Irish need to search too hard for such reasons.
But we were extremely lucky with the weather. Although my friends had flown over armed with jumpers and rain gear, it was sunny and close to 30 degrees every day. We spent several hours lying on the grass in St Stephen’s green chatting away. We wandered around the streets until 10 pm, and the sun showed no sign of disappearing. Even amongst the drunken English revellers and the overpriced offerings, it was hard not to enjoy ourselves.

strategy safaris

i am quite certain i was not made for a corporate career.
the only targets and goals i am truely motivated to achieve are those i set for myself. spread sheets do not motivate me. neither really does financial incentive, even though i thought it would.
i am writing this while sitting in something called a "strategy safari." this is a webcast that everyone in the company around the world is meant to log into at the same time so that top managers show us the future. such things bore me. after 15 minutes, my eyelids start getting heavy, and after 30 minutes i have to pinch my legs to keep from falling asleep. yet virtual attendance is required, and we are not meant to be doing anything else at this time. i am pretending to be ending questions to the moderators via the web. i dont know how much more of this i can take. not much, i feel sure. i hate wasted time, i hate empty bullshit. my boss walks around the floor telling us again and again to : "make some money." but i dont care, money motivates me as a means of survival, not as a way of existing. there has to be more to life than this, surely?

london- Strike!

I am back in Britain in time to watch it….behave like France! The Metro workers have declared a 48 hour strike, which began Tuesday afternoon and will apparently continue for the next 2 days unless a deal is reached between the unions and the TFL. I seriously thought this was a Franco-German problem, but I guess not. Our HR department sent us an email yesterday afternoon telling us to make sure to go home before the 7pm deadline. I walked past several tube stations around 6:30 and it looked liked a war was about to break out. The entire entrance was jammed by people trying to get in the station before it closed, people were pushing, shoving and shouting at each other in frustration. This morning was more surreal. The streets seemed to be filled with businessmen walking briskly to work, looking frequently at their watches to see how late their pedestrian route would make them. The queues at bus stops were epic, as people desperately looked down the road to see if a red vehicle was moving their direction. Yet despite the feeling that the streets were crowded with people, the office was dead when I walked in. at least half the staff were missing. Some later made it in, late, with tales of hour long waits for the bus and other horrors. The head of marketing for one bank told me she thought she would escape the mess by taking one of the overland national rail services....only to arrive at the station to find it closed due to a suicide!
Even in the rain, I was grateful for my bike!

zagreb

it is strange how many good croatian friends i have, given how much i dislike Croatia.
as a result, i do from time to time end up in this country. yet, everytime i am here i am aware that clearly my friends are not representative of the country. over a lengthy dinner Saturday night, the guy next to me estimated that in his entire life as a Croat, he had managed only to be in contact with two percent of the population, something he seemed quite grateful for. for it is a country with some scary elements, as i got to see close up this weekend. One of my good friends got married in Zagreb and of course i came over for the occassion. He had a very civilised ceremony, and had planned an after party in an elegant restaurant on the Central square, Trg jelacica. but soon after he made the reservation, he realsied that they very same night there was going to be a Thompson concert on the very same square. for those of you lucky enough not to have been exposed at length to the kitchy horror of Balkan Turbo folk, Thompson is a singer from a town called Cavoglave. he joined the army and fought in what the Croats are now calling the "Homeland war" and made lots of videos of his music, featuring him in his uniform and lots of guys waving guns over their heads, as they pledged to defend their village from the cetniks.
by the time we got to the square around 7:30, the square was already filling with Thompson fans. they were the kind of Croats i dont know: loud screaming people with ustasa tatoos and flags wrapped around their bodies. a couple of guys from the wedding party insisted on escorting me into the building where the after party was to be held, lest my accent exposed me to the mob as the evil person they would think i am, and lead to me being lynched. "you dont mess with these guys, they are crazy and violent," one of my escorts whispered in my ear as we walked pass a guy in a Thompson shirt brandishing a fake looking sword.
By 9pm, the square had tens of thousands of people. we went on the balcony overlooking the show to watch as a priest came on stage to describe what a hero Thompson was, and to detail for us all his great struggles on behalf of the homeland in the war. By the time Thompson came on stage, the crowd was a screaming mob of hysteria. the stage had been constructed as a fake castle, and periodically flames lept out of certain parts of it, as the now middle aged ex-war hero ran around in incredibly tight jeans. it was slightly absurd and I giggled. "yeah, it is funny for you, you dont have to live here," groaned the guy on the balcony next to me. The croat of his screaming countrymen was clearly as foreign to him as to me. yet what was most curious was the age of the audience: they were not old war vets. Many looked to young to have fought in the war. this was not an event appealing to nostalgia, it was something that was still drawing and attracting new blood.
what planet do i live on that allows me to frequently travel to a country, speak its language, make friends, and yet still be so astonished by a clearly sizable chunk of its population that is exotic enough to me that it resembles a freak show?