Heading to the big shmoke.
The thought of moving to Dublin scared the living bejaysus out of me. At the age of 22, I was leaving the comforts of my lovely Mayo mammy to take on a brand new adventure in the Capital.
Clip via Sinead Fitzpatrick
How hard could it be? I went to college in NUI Galway for four years so it wasn’t exactly my first time living away from home, and how different could Dublin be from the town of the tribe?
The answer? Completely different.
1. Finding a house is a fucking nightmare.
I was lucky to have my sister to move in with for the first week of the big move but there is only so much sleeping on the couch one can take before you start to miss the comfort of a bed.
I’d take any bed, a bed of nails, a bed of roses, a mattress in a tiny box room, just please get me off this poxy couch.
I thought finding accommodation would be a doddle.
Back in Galway, there was a Facebook group called, ‘House Hunting for Sound People’ – you’d type a sob story in that and have a room/house within a couple of hours.
Dublin was different, there were viewings galore and just as many rejections. If I had a fiver for every time I heard ‘we don’t want someone your age’, I could have bought a block of flats in Terenure.
Eventually, thanks to a friend of a friend of a mate of an amigo, I got a room. A tiny room but a room with a bed. I was happy… until I found out how much the rent was going to be.
2. Buses are not your friend.
Clip via GiddyupSkits
I have a car in the west but I thought to myself, with all this public transport, it would be a waste to bring a car up here to have it parked up all day, every day.
I regretted that decision within two days. You may think because the bus says it will be leaving a certain stop at half past eight that it will, but you’d be a silly person to put a bet on it.
Also, if by divine intervention the bus is on time for once, you’d better be standing right beside the stop with your hand outstretched otherwise expect to be left behind. The stuff that Dubs take for granted are a revelation to me.
My advice? Get a Leap Card immediately and, if at all possible, get the earlier bus because if the earlier bus is late, you still have a chance of being on time, d’ya know what I mean?
3. Prepared to get lost, a lot.
Moving to the capital for the first time is like being in your very own Grand Theft Auto: Dublin, you seem to unlock new streets and new parts of the place each and every day.
All the streets morph into one; Stephen’s Green is also kind of part of Grafton Street and I think I could be here for twenty years and that would still confuse me.
Unlike the bus, Google Maps are going to be your best mate for the first couple of weeks, so make sure you get yourself a good data plan from your mobile company and bring your charger to work.
However, don’t stare at your phone for more than five seconds at a time up here because you will either shoulder into a crowd of people, bang into a building or walk into road works.
4. There’s no such thing as a cheap night out.
You’re not in Galway or Westport now, scan. God be with the days where you could leave your college house with €20 and still have four shots, three pints, an admission to the night club and enough left over for some chips in S’macs.
Prepare to blow at least €20 before you even step foot into the nightclub. You will pay a tenner for a taxi into town and another tenner to stand in some place where you will be pushed, shouldered and squashed.
If you’re going to the bar, say goodbye to your friends and your money. Why? Queues are now the bane of your life and you will spend twenty minutes being ignored by the person behind the bar.
Queues wouldn’t be so bad if they sobered you up because at least if you were brought to your senses whilst waiting, you might think twice about paying €7 for a small bit of vodka and a dash.
Disclaimer: aforementioned vodka and dash will end up being spilled all over your clothes on your way back from the bar.
5. You speak completely differently to them.
Okay, first and foremost, you’re a culchie. The sooner you accept that, the easier the transition will be. You may be well spoken and pronounce your words perfectly but you need to slow your accent down.
The first time I got my hair cut in Dublin, I spent a good two minutes just explaining to the barber what I wanted to be done to my hair. He looked at me and said ‘you’re not from around here are you?’
I felt like nobody understood me, a bit like Giovanni Trapattoni when he was managing the Republic of Ireland. I even began to wonder what Manuela was up to these days and if she wanted a new job.
Talking at a million words a second in your native tongue might fly well down home but it will get completely lost in translation up here. If you can, try and learn some of the Dublin slang, bud.
Who better to teach you than Mr King of The Hill, Bernard Brogan…
Clip via King Crisps
6. Friends will inundate you with visits.
Moving away from home for the first time should be extremely hard but when parts of home keep coming into your new life in Dublin, it makes the transition much easier.
All your friends will visit. Not because they actually like you or miss you but because you live in Dublin now and they’re heading to the Coldplay concert on Saturday and f*ck spending a heap of money on a hotel.
They look to you as if you’re the messiah. The first of the friends to move to the big city. You are the chosen one, show us all the good spots in Dublin and if it’s a shite night, the blame lies with you.
No pressure then.
7. You will never get the Northside/Southside divide.
Don’t even try. It has something to do with a bridge or something, I don’t think I’ll ever properly know. I live on the Southside of Dublin and the only reason I know that is because my Snapchat filter tells me so.
Southside people are meant to be posh so technically I’m supposed to be posh now. I’m not. You’ll be forever known as a bogger no matter how long you live in the Southside. It was far from D4 you were raised.
Northside people are known to be not so posh. So, that means that they’re the same as us boggers? Wrong. Even the Northsiders look down on you. The big thicko from the island.
Eventually, you might be able to tell the difference because of the accents but similar to point five, although you speak differently to them, you think they all speak the same which means trying to tell the difference is next to near impossible.
Fast forward to 1:00 and you might be able to get some pointers…
Clip via YourQueenForYears
8. You’ll feel homesick.
Every so often you will come across something that reminds you of home. Immediately, you get the sick feeling in your stomach and a big lump will hit your throat.
You try to hold back the tears but you see someone wearing your county jersey and it all gets a little bit too much and you think to yourself, was the move too big too soon?
It’s normal to feel like this. Moving to Dublin is a daunting task and your new job, your low bank balance, lack of direction can all weigh heavily on your shoulders.
Fear not though, there is only one solution to your problems if you are home sick.
9. Coppers will become your second home.
You’re looking at me now as if I have two heads. What about point number four? The expense, the empty wallet, have you lost your freaking mind man? You want me to call this place my second home?
It’s an expensive second home but it will become your new local nightclub and will dry any homesickness tears that may have flooded your face before this.
The floors, bar and people are all sticky and that is perfectly okay because you know why? They play all your classics. If you want some brand new chart hits, you’re in the wrong place, my friend.
Expect Hit The Diff, Wagon Wheel and the Green and Red of Mayo and don’t ever expect them to play Closing Time by Semisonic because there is no closing time, not until the sun comes back up at least.
Clip via Marty MoneMusic
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