Memories of Ireland on St Patrick' Day

Another backblip - sorry. Photo, and most of the text, done for my grumpytyke blog post, for St Patrick's Day. Ireland and it's people share the top spot in my favourites with Romania, though it's a few years now since I visited. Must remedy that.

The little Belleek vase was bought on one of the most memorable of many memorable Press visits when I was working full time as a journalist. It was bought as a memento for my mother and came to me when she passed on at 91 years five years ago.

A guest of the Irish Export Board with two other journalists, we were ferried around for three days in a Mercedes limousine, a wonderful - quite crazy - trip around many bars with several factories between. I returned to England I swear with a tan, Guinness tan, a preference for Irish whisky which has never left me, and a lasting wonder of Irish food. Despite the ride in an alcoholic haze (in those days all true journalists worked better well over the limit - alcoholism and divorce were the main enemies), the export board got their money's worth with a published feature on the working places with export potential which we visited. It must have been 1970 or thereabouts.

The itinerary certainly included Dublin, Limerick and Cork (near which the obligatory kissing of the Blarney Stone took place). We never went anywhere near the village of Belleek, which is just over the border in Northern Ireland, but I acquired the small piece somewhere. I've always considered Ireland to be one country anyway.

So on this day particularly, I turn green -
with envy, for all those lucky enough to be there over the Irish sea.