Ireland Impressions

NOTE: If this essay feels disjointed, that’s because it was written over a three-day period and not in one sitting. My apologies.

Hello. Again, it’s been a while. Far longer than it should have been since I wrote one of these up. And there really is no excuse for this - rather, there is a reason.

The way I see it, an “excuse” and a “reason” are two different things. An excuse means you’re trying to dodge responsibility for what happened, whereas a reason means you’re admitting what you did was wrong, you’re just explaining why you did it. But that’s beside the point.

My reason is that I recently traveled to Ireland. This is my second international trip of the year, which also makes it the second international trip since Donald Trump took office. As I wrote this section, I was scheduled to fly home the following day and I’m thankful the airport has U.S. preclearance. If I’m to be rejected at customs, I’ll be denied boarding rather than detained and possibly sent to El Salvador.

In any case, I think I should talk about my trip. 

The purpose of travel, as the immigration agent asked upon our arrival in Dublin, was tourism. It was to celebrate my sister’s graduation from college, so all four of us went. My sister selected the destination based on its literary history, particularly James Joyce (whose most famous work is perhaps Ulysses. More on that later.)

And let me tell you, Ireland is a special place. From the moment the clouds cleared to reveal the northern suburbs of Dublin that lie in the airport’s flight path, I knew I was going to enjoy this vacation. 

Aerial view of some Irish seaside town on the approach to DUB. OC photo taken June 1, 2025.

One of the obvious differences in Ireland is that they drive on the left side of the road. My mother announced she’d take the passenger seat of our rented car, then opened the front right door to reveal the steering wheel. All four of us burst out laughing at that very moment.

As an avid GeoGuessr player, seeing the Irish road signs was quite a treat. The YIELD signs have thicker text than those in America, and the directional signs are bilingual, featuring Irish Gaelic text in italics beside the standard English text. Another way to tell the UK apart from Ireland, of course, is that British signs say “GIVE WAY” rather than “YIELD”. 

Now I’ll talk about some things I noticed in Ireland that, while not exactly culture shock, qualify as notable societal differences with the United States.

I’ll start with the food. For all the talk about how American restaurant food has massive portion sizes, is massively processed, and is therefore massively bad for you, I think I ate less healthily here than I have at home. Of course, part of that is likely because I was on vacation and therefore saw fit to indulge. Additionally, pubs aren’t the only type of restaurant in Dublin, even if they are what the Irish capital is most famous for.

After nearly a week here, what I crave most of all are vegetables. I’m sure there are plenty of veggies if you actually look for them, but I didn’t have too many this week.

And speaking of the portion sizes, it is true that they don’t give you as many fries with your burger as you’d get in the States. However, the burger itself was bigger than most burgers I’ve had on the other side of the pond. The patty was thicker than a hockey puck, and the bun was taller too. It was rather unwieldy to eat, but still delicious.

Again, I’m not naïve to the fact that American food is still worse for you. I’m well aware that the United States is more obese than Ireland on average. But I’ve lived in the USA for my whole life, and your needs as a tourist are generally different from your needs as a resident. 

Of course, like I said above, Dublin has plenty of other restaurants besides pubs. I just didn’t go to many places that would qualify as “other restaurants besides pubs”.

Another cultural difference I noticed was related to renewable energy.

It’s no secret that the United States is not the most environmentally conscious country in the world. Donald Trump is President, and that’s not something that “happened” to us - we, collectively, chose him. At least at that moment in time, there was a preference for a convicted felon and climate denier against a perfectly qualified black woman with more sensible environmental policy, as sad as that is.

The EU is different. As I’m writing this from my hotel lobby in Dublin, it’s very likely that several of the city’s buses have driven by. A massive percentage of these buses, possibly half or more, advertise themselves as producing zero emissions. And I believe it. In addition, when visiting the village of Cong, I was able to spot a gas station. It was priced at about €1.75 per liter, which, if I’m doing my math correctly, equates to over seven dollars a gallon. In the USA, I’ve rarely seen gasoline cost more than $4/gallon. This of course means that gas is taxed more heavily in Europe than it is on my side of the pond.  

Now, I’ll admit that this isn’t really a “culture shock”. After all, in a perfect world, all of us would care about the climate crisis and protecting the environment. But we don’t live in a perfect world. I was pleased to see that the EU is taking significant measures to make things better. And it’s refreshing to visit a place where every politician treats climate change and humanity’s complicity in it as fact.

Another thing I noticed during my time in Dublin was how much it seems to have changed in recent years. While it was my first visit to Ireland, I still found it notable that there were many ethnic restaurants. 

It may not be quite as multicultural as London, but Ireland, once a country that legions of people emigrated from, has become a popular country for people to move to. One day, they should have an immigration museum in addition to their emigration museum. 

I’m not going to say Ireland is perfect in terms of welcoming foreigners. No country is. But when I visited the Guinness factory in Dublin, the exhibit mentioned how progressive the company has historically been. (Admittedly, since it’s the company museum, one shouldn’t take that uncritically). A contemporary employee was quoted as saying that, while a Korean BBQ joint next to a 200-year-old Irish pub might seem disjointed, it works. 

I think that’s an exhibit in how the components of a national identity can change. For much of the last 200 years Ireland was an unattractive immigration destination, to say the least. But that isn’t really the case anymore. Irish national identity now includes people who are Irish by choice rather than by chance. 

Again, I’m one to talk - I live in the USA. But most Irish people (and Brits) probably do not agree with British Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s controversial “island of strangers” speech. Indeed, the people of Ireland were among the friendliest of any place I’ve visited - more on that later.

Now, in case you didn’t know, there’s quite a lot of interesting places to visit in and around Dublin. One such area is pictured just above - the James Joyce Tower in Sandycove. Admission to the tower is free, though you can purchase souvenirs from the gift shop. The tower is known for being where James Joyce lived for six days, and is the setting for the opening pages of Ulysses. My sister, a major fan of Joyce’s, seemed to be in heaven.

Sandycove, which is not to be confused with one of the most horrific days in American history, reminded me of a combination between Cape Cod and San Francisco based on its geography and architecture. There’s a well-known swimming hole in Sandycove known as Forty Foot, which was featured on The Amazing Race 35. 

While walking around Sandycove and the neighboring town of Dun Laoghaire, I was struck by the realization that if I were ever to move to Ireland, this is the sort of place I’d want to live in. It’s a suburb of Dublin with numerous parks and amenities thanks to its mixed-use zoning. I’m sure it’s among the most expensive places to live in an already high-cost-of-living country, but if you can afford it (a big if), it’s probably amazing. Especially because it’s so close to the city!

Speaking of James Joyce, it was during my visit in Ireland that I learned about Bloomsday. No, that isn’t a typo. Instead, it’s a national (or at least local) holiday held every year on June 16, which is the date on which Ulysses takes place. On that day, particularly devoted Joyce fans partake in celebrations at the novel’s portrayed locations throughout Dublin. Some of the most fanatic Joyce readers even walk the whole way as a form of “pilgrimage”, for lack of a better word.

My main anxiety concerning this trip, other than possibly being detained at customs on the way back into the United States, was the way I would be perceived abroad once people learned what country I lived in. It’s no secret that America’s international reputation is in the shitter, and it’s sadly well-deserved. Domestic issues like expensive health care and gun violence are one thing, but when it comes to threatening Canadian sovereignty and doing nothing about climate change, we had no right to elect Donald Trump. Especially when our economic recovery was pretty good under Joe Biden!

So yeah…considering all that, the Irish people had every right to curse us out at any opportunity. It does not matter that I did not personally vote for Trump - the fact that I still need to pay taxes to his administration is bad enough. 

Fortunately, the anti-American sentiment I anticipated largely did not materialize. As stated above, Ireland’s people are some of the kindest out of the 16 countries I’ve visited. In fact, most of them didn’t even bring up Donald Trump unless I mentioned him first. 

Of course, it needs to be said that I took every measure to preempt any animosity centered around my nationality. For instance, I always said “Boston” before I said “USA” when asked where I was from. It’s my general sense (and a group of Canadian tourists I met in a small yet famous village confirmed) that Boston has a better reputation than most American cities. 

Seriously, even other tourists were quite upbeat. My memory is that I met a group of travelers and asked them where they were from (answer: Ottawa, Canada). I then said I was from Boston and was like, “I don’t know what to say right now…but I hate Trump” or something to  that effect. As I figured, however, they get that a lot whenever encountering American tourists, and one remarked that Boston isn’t a MAGA place. After that, I asked one of them to take my photo in front of the statue of an actor from The Quiet Man.

On the whole, the Golden Rule still applies whenever you’re a tourist, even if you’re an American tourist. You treat locals the way you would like to be treated if the shoe was on the other foot - it’s as simple as that. Don’t tell locals you’re Irish just because your great-great-great-grandfather escaped the country during the potato famine of the late 1840s. In general, Europeans care a lot less about which country’s blood you have, and why shouldn’t they - the last time they got obsessed over that, it didn’t exactly end well.

Oh, and whatever you do, don’t wear a MAGA hat. Truth be told, most Americans who visit Europe probably lean left of center (as the right-wingers tend to think the USA is the best country in the world and why would you visit anywhere else), but if you do support that asshole, you’d be wise to keep it to yourself when you’re in a country that’s far less sympathetic toward Donald Trump. 

If I ever go back to Ireland (and I’m likely to one day), I would want to spend more time on the country’s west coast. I might not visit the Cliffs of Moher, since they’re incredibly touristy (even if it’s for a good reason), but I would always relish the opportunity to drive around those impossibly verdant hills and mountains. Seriously, there’s a reason they call it the Emerald Isle.

If you wish to see photos from this trip, follow me on BlueSky at @snowlabrador.