Two years in Ireland

Two years ago on the Thursday (26 Oct 2023) just passed this week I drove my very packed car onto the “final” ferry crossing from Holyhead (Wales) to Dublin – the final stage of my (hopefully) permanent relocation to the Republic of Ireland, so I thought to note this anniversary with some notes of my experiences and observations of the world here.

Distortions

Please note: I am very aware that my perspective of life here is extremely distorted.

All countries have their political and socio-economic issues and Ireland is no exception. Ireland is now listed 3rd in the Global Peace Index’s list for 2023 (PDF) (or here) just below Iceland (#1) and a very close place to Denmark (#2). Apparently up FIVE places from 2023, which is a decent jump as I’m sure it’s quite hard to become a safer place once you’re in the top 10.

Despite this there are seemingly an increase in issues in and around the metropolitan areas regarding far-rightism, division and fearmongering about the volume of refugees the state is taking in. There is a housing crisis, with rent being absolutely shockingly, ridiculously high – unfettered greed at its worst in some cases. Students deciding to live in tents to be able to study their chosen course at the most popular cities (eg Galway, plus Dublin of course). There has been a draft Bill in the Houses of the Oireachtas (parliament for those who don’t know) to ban the practise of sex for rent – it hasn’t been passed yet. There are often reports (search for yourself – don’t take my word for it) of violence against tourists and general street brawls in various cities at night (the usual idiots with their bravado + alcohol).

Things could be better.

They could be a LOT worse.

Bubbles

Meanwhile, me here in my rural bubble well away from idiots. I was extremely surprised when two Jehovah’s witnesses knocked on the front door yesterday as no-one, NO-ONE comes to my house unless they’re delivering a package/letter or have booked to stay in my Airbnb spare room*. I cannot get takeout delivery even if I wanted to (on occasion I miss this option, but it saves me a lot of money).

(*A note for anyone thinking I’m adding to the housing crisis by not renting that room out to longer term renters – I actually tried listing it for rent for a couple of months (as in the attempt took a couple of months). I had about 50 people in a week message me from Dublin, sometimes in desperation who needed to work in offices in Dublin. I had the place linked on a map, I made sure the first line of the description say NOWHERE NEAR DUBLIN and people still enquired from Dublin. I’m 3.5 hrs commute one way and you still need a car as there is no public transport to my village. I believe there is a bus at 10:30 on a Tuesday. It might circle back round weekly, so getting a trip out to the local towns for weekly shopping might mean you have to stay there a week. Lots of people don’t have cars and the ability to drive one legally in the country, such are the rules. The four genuine, “doable” enquiries I had from people decided that commuting 30-40mins to their place of work from my house was “too far”, so I actually never found anyone who wanted to rent it. I know for sure at least 2 of those 4 decided to rent in local towns where they worked and would have been paying double the rent I was asking for to save themselves the commute. Rationality often does not feature in buying decisions. So, as I need some extra income, AirBnB it is. Plus to be frank, I love not having some stranger living in my sanctuary every day.)

I live here (Co Mayo for reference):

This photo was taken by the surveyor just before completing the purchase – a very generous 150 photos of the place with a bunch of drone shots which I didn’t realise he would do. You have to love modern tech to help with this sort of thing! I added the red lines as an indication of the 1.67 acre plot the house is on. You can just about see the nearest neighbour on the left there which is hidden from human level view by trees. There are three houses on a strip of land previously owned by one family who seemed to have built the houses here as investment/holiday homes – all have now now sold in recent times: me in 2021; the middle one a few months later and is still a part-timer’s home away from home (in Co Donegal); the final one took until this year (iirc) to sell to a lovely small family who, like me, love the wildness and wildlife of the place.

Since moving in, I have managed to paint the external walls a muted green and have added a metal shed to the left of the house (as per photo direction), other than that the only “significant” change is that the plants have grown wilder.

Coming from the UK, most people’s gardens (or even their entire plot of land) even for those in the “countryside”, but certainly those in suburbia – semi-detached and fully detached plots… You’ll be lucky if you get more than 0.25 acres for anything like a sensible price. Most are not sensible prices. Most new houses get you a postage stamp back garden… So the idea of being able to live in such a location with 1.67acres of land, however wild it is, is quite mindboggling. That it comes with almost 360 degrees views of the night sky (when not raining) and probably more than 180 degrees view East over a sizable lake which often provides the sorts of sunrises and stormy scenes you might see in a Turner oil painting is often breathtaking. Distorted perspectives of the lands.

In the years before being in this position I would often sit down whilst resting on an extended walk in the UK to enjoy the vista, or even where no vista was visible, simply to enjoy the place and solitude of the location. Often a thought, a dream would pass through the old brain, “If only I could sit on a piece of my own earth”. Without wanting to get into notes that we all sit on our own earth and that it’s just legally defined boundaries “fencing” plots off from the general population – I appreciate I sound elitist here, but the sense of having your own plot where no other fuckers can bother you or make noise, or leave trash, or play godawful music loudly, where you can just sit and breathe in the fresh air and listen to the birds, and the observe the bees and butterflies go about their daily lives is sublime and divine. I bet even Bezos, Musk et al haven’t got time to do that.

Every day I am nauseatingly grateful for the chance to buy a house outright (thanks to my late parents) and to buy a house in this sort of location is absolutely (in many ways) a dream life for an introverted person.

FAQ

Q: Do I have any connection to the place, like with family?
A: Not at all

Q: So why here?
A: Why not? It was right place, right(ish) price, right time.

Q: Are you mad?
A: Probably.

Rural life in Magical Mayo

Very strange things started happening as soon as I came here.

I would be driving along various tiny road one modern car width wide and through tiny villages and people would wave in a gesture of greeting. (Incidentally, it’s expected you at least make the effort to lift a finger or two in return greeting and you glide by even though you may never cross paths, think of it as a moment of wishes for good luck.)

I come from a land where you’re not entirely sure whether this is satire

I often make comparison to the time I stayed for months at a friend’s house in a similar village in the UK where I would see the locals and acknowledge them with a northerner “morning” (etc) and they would stare back as if I was about to mug them.

What was even more odd was that these strange people in this magical land would often be smiling as well.

SMILING?? That’s not normal, surely?

“Maybe they know something I don’t?” my neurosis would reassuringly comment.

Maybe they do. But the fact is that you can actually drive around villages and the locals walking around will often wave and smile at you as if you have lived there for 200 years, is just one of those little details of life in Ireland which makes their friendliness the legend it is.

The legendary friendliness has extended into “ordinary” life here. Having lived in villages and small towns in semi-rural parts of the UK I am, of course, very aware of how village life works – people like to enquire about every aspect of one’s life as you chat with them so they can weigh you up and make “informed” decisions about “the cut of your jib” as it were, and to then pass that onto their partners and friends who will Chinese whisper it to the rest of the community. I keep myself to myself but am autistically open about my situation with everyone. Luckily, people seem to respect my desire to keep myself to myself and don’t treat me with suspicion. Or if they do, they let me get on with things regardless.

A few weeks after appearing here, I was taken out to a comedy gig by some of the local equally aged men and they refused money for the ticket and for transport to/from the place 40 mins away.

There was a time I was having my car repaired in the local mechanic’s garage and I had 1 offer of a spare car to borrow and 2 other offers of “if you need some shopping” as it’s hard to live without transport here. Luckily Tesco delivers throughout all the rural areas, so although not my preferred supermarket, in a pinch it’s an option.

In all my life (50 years) in the UK never has this sort of thing happened from strangers.

Payment for trades

In a normal world, at least the normal world I have been used to, if you use a trade service, for example a mechanic to fix your car, or a roofer, or an electrician etc, the process is basically like this:

• Have problem
• Get quotes
• Pick best option
• Have work done
• Get invoice with payment terms or pay on the day (or within the terms)
• Get receipt (at least offered)

Here, the locals don’t do that sort of thing.

If you’re new, there aren’t any websites for local tradespeople so the process is more like:

• Have problem
• Ask in the local pub/shop/post office or coffee horse box for recommendations
• Ask 3 times for a rough estimate of cost
• Have work done (including in my case twice so far… pick up car and drive away with it)
• Ask for an invoice (because that has the payment info on)
• 2 weeks later, ask for invoice having not yet paid a thing
• 2 weeks later, gently ask for payment info so you can pay them
• Some time later… On more than one occasion, months later….
• Pay when you want, how you want.
• “We don’t do receipts”

I heard a story from the guy who owned the middle house next to me that he gave a cheque to a local guy for work done, then five years later the guy called him and asked for a new cheque as the first one had expired….

I guess they know where you live so it’s not a problem!

(Edit: I think the thing about no receipts follows that if there’s a problem with the work done, there is a level of accountability and trust that the work will get fixed. That’s the impression I get from talking to a couple of locals since)

Drinking Water

The only real problem I have in the house having risked buying it remotely is that as it’s not connected to main water supplies, there is a private deep bored well* which serves the 3 houses here. I was told by the sellers’ (via solicitors) that the little pump house had filter one it which were maintained once every 3 years at costs shared across the 3 houses. Upon arriving I quickly discovered that to be not at all true. That’s what you get for trusting people you don’t know. In order to get clean, clear and safe to drink water I do have to get filters even 2 years later but that’s still on the savings list. For months after moving I was buying multiple 5 litre bottle of spring water from supermarkets which although not ideal, was sufficient – taking showers is fine, incidentally! This was purely for drinking and cooking.

After a few months being here, the guy who eventually bought the 3rd house on the strip of land knocked on my door to say hello (checking out potential new neighbours) and we had a chat. I explained about the water and he told me about a natural spring which turned out to be just up the mountain road behind my place.

My childhood was spent being brought up to hike the hills of the The Lake District national park in England (which has very similar landscape and weather, only a LOT more tourists and the property is a LOT more expensive). Part of that upbringing was that it was ok to drink water from streams in certain parts of the landscape (higher up than where the sheep would graze, for example), but as time went by this seemed to become considered unsafe.

I am well aware of the safety difference between drinking clear water from a stream vs from a mountain spring – water off a mountain is not the same as from within a mountain.

So when I was told of this magical, mystical spring from which people would come from miles around to collect natural spring water, my urban conditioned fear based mind was both suspicious and also curious.

Sure enough, just up the winding tiny single track tarmac road behind me – the road with no barriers to protect cars from driving into ditches and the occasional small cliff which provides stunning views of the wild wild landscapes on both sides of the ridge – there is a well-worn few steps down to what looks like a naturally formed stone bowl, into which crystal clear water pour freely from a hole in the mountain. People have places a “dam” of stones around the front of it, with just enough gaps to allow free flow to a trickle of a brook down the side of the road. When I first went there, there was a local Mayo County Water Services van with a driver filling his own containers with water from the spring. I think that says enough about the quality.

Ever since that day, on an almost weekly basis I have been driving up to refill bottles . It does go down easily (as they say). Probably the best tasting, most refreshing water I have ever tasted. Far better than the majority of bottle “spring” water bought anywhere, even the “posh” bottles you get at nice hotels and conferences around the world. And it has travelled much less “carbon” miles too.

Dark Skies

One of many advantages to living in a country of a similar size to England with a tenth of its population is that outside of urban areas, there are a lot less signs of civilisation – a lot of space between buildings, and therefore a lot of areas without so much light pollution.

An hour up the road from is the Mayo Dark Skies Park – there’s a handy map of light pollution in Ireland here which shows the Park’s “boundaries as well.

Where “me” is located is on a border between ultra dark and very dark. You can see the 3 brighter urban dots of life which are the 3 nearest towns to me.

Of course we all see the moon and acknowledge its existence.

Until you live or stay in a place that has such little light pollution can you understand how much sunlight our nearest celestial object can reflect in the dead of night.

Imagine a sharp, well-defined shadow on a bright summer’s day, but it’s at night and the light is silvery. It’s that bright. Sometimes I have found myself wishing the clear night wasn’t full of moonlight as it blocks the view of the stars…..

This below is not mine but is an accurate indication of the level of stars I can see on a clear night (which is rare)

(Photo by Min An from Pexels)

My own images:

Irishisms (The good, the bad and the curious)

Notes on an aspects of Irish culture which isn’t particularly obvious or visible until you start talking to people from the country (or live here). These are entirely my own understanding and perspective on the things folk will say and what is inferred by the utterances. I may have misunderstood.

Please, if any actual Irish people who have lived in the country come across this and want to tell me I’m wrong, please do.

Sunny on the outside

To be fair I have only heard this a couple of times, but when greeting an acquaintance, one might enquire in small talk fashion about how that person is. A normal thing to do.

The reply is a chirpy “Ah sure look, you know yourself, sunny on the outside”, which is nice, but begs the unspoken question, “How dark is it on the inside?? Are you ok??”

You know yourself

An expression to show solidarity of life being is what it is – the state of the economy, the weather, one’s general health, the cost of living. Better to know yourself than have notions of affording anxiety-free heating. (Please note the sarcasm-laced sentence there).

Notions

You might hear (or say) something like, “He has notions.” which is a heavily “loaded” point to note that person has ideas of being in some way “better” than the general populace around him.

Notions of getting a better job, more money, more status, better life, nicer house etc.

Around these here parts most people (forgive the materialistic example here) drive cars which are anything between say 5 years old and 10-20 years old – drive until it drops kind of mentality. Why buy new when you can look after it and fix it? So when you do see someone driving round in a new plate car (or usually a huge SUV these days) of a well-shined marque which oozes “status”, especially if the driver’s history is known locally and that history isn’t exactly one born of status, ie they stand out, you you might note he has notions. A sharp, expensive and bespoke tailored suit? Notions. A house with bespoke designed kitchen? Notions. A PhD? Notions. Bought a new car as soon as you get a better job? Notions.

I often refer to it in jest with people I know, but in reality I feel it is a term which can make one feel bad for trying to better oneself in any way at all – as some Irish writers I have seen in recent times note, there is a inherent sense of downtrodden, hard working life and sadness in the people of the land. Should you wish to escape this underlying sense of darkness, of “this is how it is”, the idea of “notions” is often used as an insult and thereby can exert a level of pressure from peers to remain the same as everyone else in that social circle. If you resist that pressure and seek a different path, then there is, I think, a sense of a risk of being exiled.

Returning calls (especially sales enquiries)

I can’t always have the excuse on this one that maybe it’s just my voice, that I’m British and there’s a “history” (ie not a great one) of British imperialism and colonialism along with the usual awful abuses therein between the British and Irish…

The ONE thing that I have found to be a oft frustrating experience in living here is that people often do not call you back, or follow up on contact – usually when I have expressed an interest in buying things or services from a variety of individuals. I already have neuroses about being not listened to and being somewhat invisible (not helped when a car stopped at a zebra crossing for someone else and then drove into me as I tried to cross the other day. I mean I’m 6’2” / 188 cm, FFS.)

A short list of things I have been ready to buy at the time and made unsuccessful enquiries about to multiple people:

• Electrical work (domestic) – actually managed to get a quote once but opted to only go for half the work to start with (a difference between €600 and €300), only to never hear from the quoter again
• Wood burning stove – I have emailed 3 different shops around the country – no reply
• Bulk buy compost – spoke to a guy I believe sells good quality material – a trailer load, about 9 tons for a paltry €150. I asked him to confirm prices and he chirpily said he’d let me know (based on distance to my place from his). 3 days later I messaged to remind him. No reply since (at least 2 months later).
• Water filters – one company never called me back, another said they couldn’t advise me what to buy as they were too busy and didn’t like giving advice out for free and no, didn’t want my business anyway as they were too busy (repeated)
• Bathroom supplier – although some of the order I made did arrive quickly, one part didn’t, and was told multiple times over a span of about 3 months that the next delivery “should” have the part. I eventually said that surely they “would” know exactly what is coming and what is not on each delivery, that there wouldn’t be any guesswork of “should” and maybe they could call their supplier to ask, who then apparently also said it “should” be on their next delivery too. I guess Just In Time manufacturing isn’t a methodology that works here. Me here, the annoying Brit, with my notions. When they eventually found out for the 5th time the part wasn’t in fact on the next delivery, I gave up and made the part myself.
• Smart Electricity Meter – I had notions of wanting to be able to analyse my electricity usage. I’m one of those people who have smart mains sockets which allows me to monitor on a daily and monthly basis how much my fridge, kettle and PC is using and therefore costing me – more so since electricity prices went to the moon. Despite the local conspiracy theory roadside boards saying “NO TO SMART METERS” believing it means higher bill costs, and despite a national rollout of the things, it took me 18 months of nagging the national supplier to actually get one installed.
• Solar panel provider x2 – asked for quote, got told “too busy”, never followed up
• Buying second hand cars (or anything really) – BUYING not selling. I am used to people not arriving on time or messaging silly offers when trying to sell a car, but never in my life have I had such a challenge in trying to buy a car. Not just private individuals either – a couple of local dealers didn’t bother calling me back after speaking to assistant sales guys about buying one from them. But private individuals – I contacted a good handful of people for a variety of options I liked the look of, only to be completely ignored by all of them until I finally got a reply from a someone. Me with my notions again expecting folk actually want to sell their “for sale” items….

I feel like there’s more but that will do… You get the idea. I find it consistently bizarre and no-one seems to be able to tell me why this happens. For me with my neurodivergent and neurosis/anxiety filled brain, it’s confusing and frustrating as hell. It’s also not just local to me, or a Co Mayo thing – I’m talking about suppliers nationwide and even into Northern Ireland.

If you are Irish and can explain this behaviour, or give advice on how to successfully buy things in this country, please do let me know.

Summary

As an introverted chap who loves nature, I love it here. Make me move out over my cold, lifeless form.

I am always torn between encouraging people to visit and not wanting any more people in the area than necessary lest it spoil the ambience and become overrun like the Lake District.

But it would be nice if people would call you back when they said they would….

Notions.

The place certainly isn’t for everyone, but if you can and you like the introverted hermit life yourself, do it. Oh and make sure you’re ok with the weather (ie wind, rain, lukewarm temperatures at best). It’s great weather for art. And ducks. At least it is climate change-proof…

Thank you for reading my rambles if you got this far 🙂