21

Last night was Daniel's 21st. First trip to a bar in America.
Too many hilarious things happened.

We went with his momma and friend Ashley to a bar named Boatsies. Sitting at the bar were older men, glazed eyes, rough faces, baseball caps and beers. Sitting at various tables, playing pool, standing at the juke box were younger people. Men with something dark in their eyes. Women with bleached hair and sunken cheeks. They all stared as we walked in. Newcomers.

The Lonely Planet Guide to the USA offers this introduction to the state of Indiana;
"As Chicago newspaperman Mike Royko once wrote: 'In Indiana, a real good time consists of putting on bib overalls and a cap bearing the name of a farm equipment company and sauntering to a gas station to sit around and gossip about how Elmer couldn't get his pick-up truck started that morning.' Royko was exaggerating but, er, not terribly far off the mark in describing this farm-filled state"

We managed to befriend some of the people. I think Ashley and Daniel may have been at school with a few. My Felon Friend, Keith, came over because his friend had bet him $10 he didn't have the balls to ask the Irish Girl to dance. Daniel screamed Cultural Experience at me. His friend came over and set $5 on our table. Ruby told him off, said her 'daughter' was worth more. He returned with the Car Bombs. His girlfriend works in the local supermarket. She knew Daniel and bought him a shot. There were endless bottles of beer, pitchers of beer, Jaegerbombs....Irish Car Bombs.

Ashley had asked me earlier in the evening if we had Irish Car Bombs in Ireland. I had never even heard of them. I said I could not imagine it as history isn't yet history. I still remember the Omagh Bomb. 29 people were killed. Over 200 were injured. When my mother first moved to Northern Ireland, car bombs were such a constant threat that in city centres, one was not allowed to leave a car unattended. Car Bombs aren't funny. When I think of the history of my country, I almost cry. It has all been so tragic. I told them my uncle had died in a car bomb so the drink tasted like death. It wasn't a very funny thing to say. No one understands my situation. Northern Ireland is a little pocket of uniqueness. And not in a good way.

They asked us back to the After Party. It was at the girl from the supermarket and $5 man's house. It was a nice house. They had a hot tub in the back. They all drove, we walked. I don't remember the walk there but I think it only took like 10 minutes. The walk back home took about an hour. A guy there had a bottle of cherry vodka. There was much shot taking. Daniel stopped being able to stand. He needed to use the bathroom, I took him and held him up in front of the toilet. This took a lot of strength. I held his penis to aim it in the toilet, he was peeing all over these poor people's bathroom. We carried him home but it was snowy and icy and he kept falling over. Hard. He died today. Supreme Death.

I videoed the whole walk home; Daniel is a dick.

Irish Car Bombs

Chatting with a fella named Keith in one of Clinton, Indiana's fine drinking establishments...

"I would love to go to Ireland, I'd love to go anywhere else...but I can't. I can't go anywhere."
"Why not?"
"I'm a felon."
"Oh really, what did you do?"
"Fighting, more fighting, possession.."
"Why'd you do all that? Let me guess...there's fuck all else to do round here?"
"You got it."
"Damn."

These people were nice. These people who could not leave this little toxic bubble for whatever reason, legal restrictions or just a resignation to a life that won't expand much further than a few miles down the highway were thrilled to meet someone from another place. They bought me Irish Car Bombs to make me feel at home, they bought Ruby Irish Car Bombs because they thought she was my mother, they drank them with me so they could share in a new experience. Just like travelling alongside me to a land far beyond the county line, far beyond the state line. A land that might as well be in another galaxy, it lies so unreachable.

I'll Bring You Flowers In The Pouring Rain

I'm lying in bed in Clinton, Indiana. It has just turned midnight here, it's Christmas Day. I think I am on Eastern Time. In my home town, which according to Google is 3750 miles away, on GMT, I can imagine countless families already opening their presents.

I read a quote last night:

"The best of all gifts around any Christmas tree: the presence of a happy family, all wrapped up in each other."

I don't want to think about whether my mother will cry this Christmas, because I am not there, not wrapped up in my family. No one ever asked me to come home.

I read another quote:

"Christmas - that magic blanket that wraps itself about us, that something so intangible that it is like a fragrance. It may weave a spell of nostalgia. Christmas may be a day of feasting, or a day of prayer, but it will always be a day of remembrance - a day in which we think of everything we have ever loved"

I am full of regrets, I have hurt so many people so far on my journey through life. I was cold and I had locked myself up. I like to think I am trying to be a better person all the time. I like to think I am honest, I like to think I keep my word, I like to think I do not let anybody down, I like to think I am more open. But now I am getting hurt like those people I have hurt before. Christmas is about love though. I don't believe in the religious aspect anymore, but I enjoy the love that it symbolises. I enjoy the message, keep on giving, keep the warmth. Any pain I am going through is probably just something a bit like karma. I will keep on trying to better myself. Like Scrooge.

I will honour Christmas in my heart and try to keep it all through the year. I will live in the Past, the Present and the Future. The spirits of all three shall strive within me. I will not shut out the lessons that they teach.

Small Town Suffocation

so i'm spending Christmas in a town called Clinton, its in Indiana, population 5000ish.

It certainly seems to have nothing to do in it.

The first night I arrived it was snowing, I went for a walk, it was beautiful. My host took me for a drive around, every building is different, thrown together from planks of wood, american flags flying, porches with little chairs at the fronts, randomly sitting on the grass, no fences or walls to mark the properties boundaries, but I have no doubt that each person knows precisely which blades of grass belong to them and which to their neighbours.

Some of the properties look like junkyards, some are uninhabited, burnt-out or falling down, some just look like they are. The main street is full of recently empty buildings. America is in a recession. There are potholes in the streets, there are potholes in the very few sidewalks. Only one street seems to have streetlights, the rest may have an occasional one on the corner of certain blocks.

The streets are full of SUVs, full of liquor stores, but empty of people.

On the wall in Dairy Queen was a notice. It warned that in the state of Indiana it is illegal to purchase more than 3g of ephedrine or pseudoephedrine within a seven day period. These drugs are found in many common cold remedies and are used to make meth. "Help us make Vermillion County a Meth Free Zone" was the plea from the Sheriff.

Kids in America smoke weed and take pills, they do meth. I have met countless who do this. Some of my friends here do this. If they would just take them all and put them in pubs, give them a few beers, give them somewhere to go, something to do, a place to meet others....well I can't help but think that they'd be a lot better off.

My host is not twenty one for another 5 days. My host does not wish to leave the house. I have never felt so alone and trapped my entire life. I have nowhere to go and I want to escape. It's been two days. And I know I have a way out in a weeks time. I am escaping to Boston, to Virginia, to New York, finally to Evansville.

If I had grown up here, in a run down town, with no job and nothing to do, well who's to blame me if I find my escape in substances....this is the Midwest, with the nations biggest meth problem, this is Wabash Valley, from Terre Haute down to Evansville, where its King. There ain't no other way out.

I am full of sadness.

The General Public is an Idiot

So anyone who has ever had a job where they have had to deal with the general public in any way will know how completely and utterly retarded many people are.

The problems they seem to encounter when ordering a cup of coffee makes one wonder how these people are able to dress themselves in the morning.
The absolute rage these people get themselves into when something goes wrong...makes one wonder how easy these people's lives must be if getting 2 sugars in their coffee instead of 3 is the worst thing going on.

Indiana customers are 10 million times worse than Norn Iron customers. They bother me immensely but at the same time their complete and utter idiocy brings so much joy to my life...

Are a latte and a mocha latte different from each other?
No Ma'am we just give them different names for funsies...

Are a white chocolate mocha and a mocha different from each other?
Again...funsies...

Safety and Security

Apparently campus safety and security are allowed to breathalyze students on campus. I refused of course, I've never heard anything more ridiculous in my life!

This is shocking!

So now I am on social probation for the rest of my time here, I had to take an online module on decision making and write

This is all so ridiculous, I don't know why Americans insist on wrapping their kids up in cotton wool.

And I felt it break for the first time.....

We watch the season pull up its own stakes
And catch the last weekend of the last week
Before the gold and glimmer have been replaced
Another sun soaked season fades away

You have stolen my heart
You have stolen my heart

Invitation only, grand farewells
Crash the best one of the best ones
Clear liquor, cloudy eyes
Too early to say good night

You have stolen my heart
You have stolen my heart

And from the ballroom floor
We are in celebration
One more stretch before our hibernation
Our dreams assured and we all
Will sleep well
Sleep well

You have stolen my heart

I watch you spin around in your highest heels
You are the best one
Of the best ones
We all look like we feel

You have stolen my heart.

People On Dry Campuses Drink From Cups Too

One of the things that is most different from home is the connection between college life and alcohol. In my student union at home, there are three different bars, these are open from 10am until 1am. We have pintage at lunch. The entire university is surrounded by bars and clubs, every day I am handed flyers offering free entry and cheap drinks somewhere that night, I have a collection of them on my wall at home.

In Indiana, I live on a dry campus, and even if I didn't, only about a quarter of the student population could legally drink because the legal age is 21.

I go through mixed feelings about this, on one hand I sometimes feel that this could be a good thing.

I find people that cannot go without alcohol, people that rely on it, people who don't know how to have fun or function without it, people who think it's the only way to be cool, are pathetic. Even though this can apply to me sometimes; I will put up my hands and say there are some situations where I do not feel comfortable without alcohol, I do not know how to react, I want it because it lowers my inhibitions and gives me some kind of confidence. Is this a reflection on the society I grew up in, where the entire youth culture revolves around it? Is it a reflection on my childhood, my difficulty in showing affection, my self-conciousness, the issues I had "fitting in." I acknowledge this, I give it great thought and I work on it. I see people here having fun without alcohol, I respect anyone who chooses not to drink.

So how could this also be a bad thing?

Well I see the kids around me as kids, as babies. I think a lot of kids have been wrapped up way too long and have no idea how to even cope with the small stuff. Their lives have been sheltered and ordered so long, they don't know what to do when something falls even a tiny bit out of control. Alcohol makes you lose control, I lost control. I know how the bottom of the barrell can look, even if I've not been there myself, you can see it more and more the further down you drink. It puts things in perspective.

But why can't we just let kids be kids?

From this post I seem to be leaning more in support of a higher drinking age limit. I don't think this is my real opinion, but it sure seems logical....

A Whole Bunch of Fake

I had a wonderful talk with my friend Daniel. Americans are fucking fake. This is a superficial country of superficial friendships.
OH MY GOD YOU'RE IRISH, I'M 4.908776736% IRISH ON MY MOTHER'S SIDE, I LOVE YOU, I MISS YOU, YOU ARE MY BEEEESSSSTTTT FRIEND!
Best friends. best friends, best friends.
It's very hard to get anything deep, anything real from many people here. I met a girl called Amanda one day, we spoke for about 5 minutes, she took my number because she wanted to call me, the next time we saw each other, she bounced over, hugged me, "I missed you so much" she said. We don't know each other. At all. Then she made me one of her Top Friends on Facebook. I don't understand. Then I decided I would kinda like to hang out with her sometime so's maybe I could try and feel the same way, I invited her over to mine before Passover, she tells me I need more American girlfriends, I should really try and get some, it's not good hanging with either Chloe or the guys all the time.....what the fuck does some 18 year old child know about what I need?!?! More American girlfriends is the last goddamn thing I need!!

Moley Moley Moley

America, or at least Southern Indiana, contains many cross-eyed folks, many folks with a completely vacant expression, the kind you get when breeding occurs within towns too small to be recorded on a map; towns that no-one outside of the town seems to know exists.
Some of these folks have made their way to UE Campus...one of these has a large hairy mole on his face and is known in certain circles (namely my circle) as Moley.
Moley is special. Moley is not skilled in the art of conversation. Moley asks strange questions and tells strange little factoids. Moley said he was messed up because the TV shows were on at different time, Moley did not know how to reply to an email. Moley does not understand that subtle gestures such as grunting, turning one's head away, walking away, not making eye contact means one does not wish to speak with him. Moley thinks that if you smile at him once you must love him in some way and this means he is permitted to stare at you and drool through his bucked teeth and follow you around maintaining a distance of only around a metre away. Moley is special.
One time Moley surprised me, I looked up and shouted "FUCK! MOLEY!" as I was so startled by his cross-eyed, bucked toothed, hairy moled gawking. This may have been responsible for some Moley tears but at least he didn't speak to me again.
Some people may think me mean for such behaviour but I really do not care. I am minus one creepy stalker and that makes every day a more positive experience.
Moley Moley Moley.

How I have managed to waste at least an hour of my life every week....

Well it seems as though UE college life is dominated by a series of completely pointless committees.
Each residence hall has a Hall Council, of a President, Vice, Secretary and Treasurer; they must also have Hall Representatives for RSA(Resident Student Association), SGA(Student Governance Association), FAB(Food Advisory Board), HIP(something about buildings) and probably some more organisations, I lost count and interest somewhere within the first few minutes...Each of those organisations must contain reps from all the other ones and hold weekly meetings and based on experience to date, the meetings are all the damn same.
They also have bizarre regulations, you have to call everything and get it seconded and this makes the meetings last about four times as long as they really need to, even though they are so pointless they don't even need to happen!
I ended up being one of the RSA reps for Moore Hall and I already regret all the drudgery, I'm not sure if anyone understands the rules they have set for themselves and are just getting on like pricks because they are a bit bewildered by all the incomprehensible bureaucracy or if these committees just consist of pricks full stop.
The worst thing was Moley was there.
I will give Moley his own post.
Moley Moley Moley.

Feckin Whiskey!

I just found Feckin Whiskey in the Liquor Store round the corner from UE.

Made in Portaferry.





Could not stop smiling.

You never truly know someone until you've walked a mile in their shoes..

Well I say, you can never really know America until you've travelled a mile in a Greyhound Bus.....or 1153 miles to be exact.

There was an alcoholic father and son who liked to walk up and down the bus even though they were so drunk they couldn't stand and couldn't remember which seat they were in even though there were no other free seats on the bus apart from the ones they had just got up from.

Mullets.

People that take up more than their fair half of a double seat.

About one good tooth between the whole bus.

People that smell like piss; or more accurately, people who smell like piss died on them and it's now rotting on them.

There was a man who had all his belongings wrapped in a little bundle clutched to his chest who also had an open pussing wound the size of his whole cheek on his face that he tried to keep covered with a dirty rag.

Then there was an old black lady, she must have been about 60 odd, she managed to sneak her way onto the bus. I think she was a tramp and had just wanted somewhere warm to sleep. Someone told the bus driver at the next stop and he literally dragged her off and just left her at this garage we had stopped at. She could barely walk and said she hadn't slept for two days.

All you hear about America when you're abroad is about the American Dream, the American Way of Life, the prosperity, but it didn't happen for these people.

They asked me if I was a movie star, they said I looked like I was a movie star travelling incognito. They said I didn't belong on their bus.

In this giant expanse of land they call the United States of America it is very easy to be forgotten. No one wants to know about these people. No one wants to ride their bus.

Chicago

So I had a most awesome weekend in Chicago.

It all started with essentially getting stood up/majorly fucked around/ whatever by a stupid American "bad-ass" so I was left with two days to go til Fall Break and no plans....

Ok so I booked a bus to Chicago...then discovered there was no accomodation to be found in Chicago apart from some hostel with comments such as...

bed bugs, mice, crack dealers..."should be quarantined and condemned" etc

so I'm like fuck this, lets try and find a couch on couchsurfing, which also didn't work, so my good friend Daniel suggested a site called Craig's List which is like our gumtree and I found a random person renting out his room short term...PICK ME PICK ME I CRIED! so we spoke and he had had a few drinks and was feeling adventurous and I got myself a cool place to stay, yeeeeha!

and the weekend was great, I got to hang out at the beach at Lake Michigan and look at the water which calmed me down no end, I didn't even realise how much I was missing the sea until I was there just looking out at this great expanse of water, the water is free, it's nature, it cannot be controlled by humans, it has its own spirit. I am so lucky to have grown up by the sea. It was also just great to be in a city, where I could be by myself and be independant, not like in Evansville where I have to depend on people for lifts if I want to do anything.

Damn it was depressing when the man next to me on the bus on the way home told me I was back in Evansville and I had no idea. It is indistinguishable from any other place we'd driven through in the Midwest, just an expanse of highways with fast-food joints and motels and screw all else. Living the American Dream!

And my experience staying with my new friend Matthis was interesting too, Chicago's very own Phil Lynott, looking forward to my next couch-surfing experience, it's how I plan to roll for the whole of Christmas Break and I hope I have a friend in Chicago that I can always call on for Tamale (though I'm still not 100% clear what that is!) and dive bars!

5 Hour Energy

I have been awake for about two days now, thanks to an amazing little magic bottle of wonder known as 5 hour energy. I love it, it is the answer for people like myself who leave everything to the last minute and who are in America so they can't miss class EVER, waaaaahhh.

I miss term time holidays.

Fressen

I eat too much, they have also just made the trays and plates in the canteen way bigger, not good times, and I've just been fricking eating "candy" all day, boooooo!
I discovered chocolate pretzels in Walmart, woop de woop, and have also discovered that that South Park episode about Walmart is goddamn true, you just go there and then like 3 hours later you come out with a trolley full of tat and you're like 'where the fuck did that even come from?! I don't remember doing that!'

Lesbisch

Chloe told me an awesome story the other day about the girl that was here before her. She used to hang round with this random girl all the time and then all the religious ones started leaving notes on her door saying she was going to burn in hell etc.

Genius.