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You are here: Home / Dublin / We went to the parade… and no-one died

We went to the parade… and no-one died

March 19, 2018 by EmmaP Leave a Comment

Last week I needed to figure out what we should do for our first St Patrick’s Day in Ireland (full story in last Friday’s Irish Times). I asked around for tips and a fellow mum told me she was at the Dublin parade last year and it went fine: “it was busy,” she said “but no-one died”. She was the one who told me that our best bet to avoid the crowds (and their stepladders) was to stand at the beginning or end of the parade.

The parade was due to start at 12pm on Saturday. As is normal for us, we left the house about 10 minutes before that. It was really really cold, almost enough to put you off going out and by the end of Saturday night we had snow in Dublin again. But our Norwegian-raised kids decided to buy an ice cream before catching the bus into town. That caught the eye of the bus driver: “Jaysus girls, it’s soup you need on a day like today, not ice cream”.

It turns out we were well in time. Walking around St Stephen’s Green towards the end-section, town seemed to be free of traffic and strangely quiet. We saw the Lord Mayor’s coach had already finished its run, and the horses were being used for a photoshoot.

We asked one of the (many) gardai standing around if we’d be in time to see the parade. “Sure it’s only half past one, they won’t be down here by now. You’ll probably catch the whole thing.”

And sure enough we did.  And it was brilliant. It had started up at the top of O’Connell Street and that was where the serious crowds were. By the time it had snaked around Dame Street and St Patrick’s Cathedral I thought they’d all be dog-tired and freezing by the time it reached us. But every performer put in a great effort right to the end, with lots of cheering from the crowd.

 

Saint Patrick is a bit different from ones I’ve seen before.

We got to wave to Liam Cunnigham, from Game of Thrones. The main guest of honour – Mark Hamill – had already hopped out of the blue car at this stage. Must have had a good reason to do so.

There were all sorts of creative floats, the type that have been a mainstay of the Irish parades for years now though I’ve never seen any of them before – from arts groups like Spraoi, Dowtcha puppets, Bui Bolg and lots of community associations.

But I was almost more interested in watching the watchers.

These army veterans were charming, waving at the families watching from the flats above.

 

Women cyclists marked 100 years of women’s votes in Britain and Ireland.

I’ve never seen a real US college marching band before and there were 13 bands in this parade, including a few from Ireland and Australia. There’s a two-year waiting period for a band to be admitted to the parade and it can cost hundreds of thousands of dollars to get them all here.

https://washyourlanguage.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/03/IMG_0858.m4v

 

Family and friends of the band members seemed to be traipsing along beside their bands, all 3km of it.

Everyone around us – whether locals, people up from the country or tourists – was excited and happy, and dressed up in any bit of green. Plenty of people were going about their business and ignoring the parade. And the streets were quieter for a couple of hours while the pubs were packed with the rest of the population that was watching the Ireland-England rugby match. It all felt very relaxed, normal, festive and fun.

And then it was over.

Temperatures were plummeting further as we spent an hour at Merrion Square at the festival’s fun fair – what we call a “mini Tivoli” in our family. Definitely not on the same scale as the Copenhagen experience but great for kids who don’t often get to these things.

We had no drunken encounters, saw lots of green and many smiling faces (Irish and not Irish), felt no sense of panic or worry, the buses kept running. Yes it was really freezing.

But no-one died.

 

Filed Under: Dublin, Kids, Moving to Ireland, Photography

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I write about language and the quirks of our family life in Dublin and previously in Florence and Oslo. My day job is translating from Italian to English, and proofreading.  Read More…

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Instagram post 2194594614447392381_214605181 Just took a wee trip up to Belfast and now I’m really set to read this wee book
Instagram post 2193062881495298332_214605181 Ah the Christmassy peace and snugness of the Gaiety Bar! You’d never know there was a riot of kids and grannies and shiny wavy wands and noise going on at the panto inside. I wrote a story 2 years ago about my first time with the kids (and husband) at the panto, a very Irish/English tradition. And now they insist on going every year. Link in bio
Instagram post 2190916757279987419_214605181 Took a break at the interval from the panto mayhem at the Gaiety and was drawn to this beautiful portrait outside the bar. It’s Margaret Burke Sheridan (or “Peggy from Mayo” as she always called herself). She was a top soprano in the 1920s, working between Rome and Covent Garden. Puccini apparently swooned at her Madama Butterfly and she made famous recordings of it. She turned down the offer of a Papal Countess (not sure why), and ended up living a quiet life in the Shelbourne Hotel. I’d love to read more about her. Maybe @nuala_oconnor knows a bit.
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Wash Your Language is at The Gaiety Theatre.

6 days ago

Wash Your Language

Took a break at the interval from the panto mayhem at the Gaiety Theatre and I was drawn to this beautiful portrait outside the bar. It’s Margaret Burke Sheridan (or “Peggy from Mayo” as she always called herself). She was a top soprano in the 1920s, working between Rome and Covent Garden. Puccini apparently swooned at her Madama Butterfly and she made famous recordings of it. She turned down the offer of a Papal Countess (I’d love to know why), and ended up living a quiet life in the Shelbourne Hotel. I found a nice story on her at https://irishtimes.com/life-and-style/abroad/… ... See MoreSee Less

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Wash Your Language

2 weeks ago

Wash Your Language

Here's a fun thread on Twitter about weird #Irish expressions of vagueness from the excellent @theirishfor page.
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Not sure if this is something that happens elsewhere but as a child if I asked my Nana “why?” she would reply “that’s the why.” Or if I was asking her where something was it would be “up in Nellie’s room behind the wallpaper.”

What are your favourite Irish vague non answers?

Here are a few of the answers:

Whenever I'd ask where my mam was, my dad would always respond with "she's run off to marry a soldier" lol

What's for dinner? Cats malacky and dogs melodian
What am I getting for Christmas? A bang of a drum, a kick in the bum, and a Chase around the table

Where are you going ?
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Motherfoclóir: Hiberno-English Mark on Twitter

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“Not sure if this is something that happens elsewhere but as a child if I asked my Nana “why?” she would reply “that’s the why.” Or if I was asking her where something was it would be “u...
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Wash Your Language

2 weeks ago

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Rome's Libreria del Viaggiatore, which specialises in travel books and is considered by many as the city's most beautiful bookshop, will close its doors for good on 31 December 2019.
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Wash my language?

Språkvask is the Norwegian word for proofing text. Literally it means “language wash”; a more poetic way of saying it!

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