Read Online McCarthy's Bar: A Journey of Discovery in Ireland by Pete McCarthy - Free Book Online Page A
Authors: Pete McCarthy
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there was a cattle fair in Dunmanway, on Tuesdays I think, and I’d go along with Uncle Jack. We’d sit on the flat cart-back behind the horse, and sometimes he’d let me hold the reins, a huge thrill for an eight-year-old townie obsessed with the Lone Ranger. But then he sold the horse and got a tractor, and fantasy died. Mechanisation has made small farmers more prosperous, but now children grow up in a world without horses and carts and haystacks. Where’s the romance in silage?
Halfway between the two villages is a small petrol station and shop. As I’m paying for fuel, I notice a cardboard box of still-warm soda bread and fruit scones on the counter. I’m full from breakfast, even though I didn’t finish the dandelion, so I just buy a paper and head on my way.
I’ve gone a way down the road when it strikes me I’m turning up to see Dominic empty-handed. And I’ve heard he’s been ill, a nasty bout of pneumonia caused either by working as a roofer in bad weather, or by passing out and spending the night on the ground in a tepee at a party, he couldn’t be sure which. There was a spell in hospital with the nuns in Bantry, who wake you each day for prayers at first light; but apparently he’s recovered now, and he’s recovered from the pneumonia as well. The least I can do is turn up with something nutritious.
I do a U-turn and go ten minutes back up the road. The same woman is behind the counter. ‘Hello again,’ she says, wondering how I’ve managed to use up so much petrol so quickly.
‘Hello. I just couldn’t resist your bread.’
‘Well, it’s very good all right. There’s a lady out the back there, used to be a confectioner, and she bakes it for us Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays.’
I ask for a loaf and four scones; then, as she wraps them, I’m surprised to find myself revealing intimate details that aren’t strictly necessary for the transaction. Perhaps my Irish genes are coming into the ascendant, and I’m beginning to go native.
‘Yeah, I’m just going to visit a friend of mine who’s been a bit ill recently, and I thought, what could be nicer for him than the smell of fresh warm bread. So I came back.’
She hands me the bread and scones.
‘Well now, you tell your friend the bread’s a present from us, and we hope he gets well very soon. Just give me a pound for the scones. Goodbye now.’
As you enter Dunmanway, you pass a sign saying: ‘Best Kept Village 1982’. There’s no mention of what’s happened since.
The town is essentially a busy little square where three roads meet. The fairs my uncle used to bring me to, when hundreds of farmers packed the streets and pubs, are distant history. These days you’ll see the West Cork company car—a tractor—parked up among the Toyotas and VWs, while its dishevelled bachelor farmer owner buys frozen meat and tinned vegetables in the supermarket, but that’s progress for you.
Like many West Cork towns, Dunmanway was developed in the seventeenth century as a plantation, or settlement, by the English; records show that, by 1700, thirty English families were living there. In recent years the town has once again been settled by the English: not the well-heeled yachties you find in nearby Kinsale, Glandore and Schull, but by alleged Crusties, hippies, druggies, pagans and New-Age travellers. In both cases, you could say an English politician was responsible for the influx: first Oliver Cromwell, and then Margaret Thatcher, whose gimlet-eyed disapproval, and riot police, caused many unconventional young Brits to take their troublesome lifestyles across the Irish Sea. This must have pleased her no end.
On an Irish talk-show recently I watched a millionaire businessman describe how he had once met Mrs T at an official reception in London. ‘And where,’ she’d asked him, ‘are you from?’
‘Cork,’ he replied.
‘Yuk!’ exclaimed the Iron Lady, and turned on her heel.
‘Never mind, old chap,’ volunteered Denis, by
Halfway between the two villages is a small petrol station and shop. As I’m paying for fuel, I notice a cardboard box of still-warm soda bread and fruit scones on the counter. I’m full from breakfast, even though I didn’t finish the dandelion, so I just buy a paper and head on my way.
I’ve gone a way down the road when it strikes me I’m turning up to see Dominic empty-handed. And I’ve heard he’s been ill, a nasty bout of pneumonia caused either by working as a roofer in bad weather, or by passing out and spending the night on the ground in a tepee at a party, he couldn’t be sure which. There was a spell in hospital with the nuns in Bantry, who wake you each day for prayers at first light; but apparently he’s recovered now, and he’s recovered from the pneumonia as well. The least I can do is turn up with something nutritious.
I do a U-turn and go ten minutes back up the road. The same woman is behind the counter. ‘Hello again,’ she says, wondering how I’ve managed to use up so much petrol so quickly.
‘Hello. I just couldn’t resist your bread.’
‘Well, it’s very good all right. There’s a lady out the back there, used to be a confectioner, and she bakes it for us Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays.’
I ask for a loaf and four scones; then, as she wraps them, I’m surprised to find myself revealing intimate details that aren’t strictly necessary for the transaction. Perhaps my Irish genes are coming into the ascendant, and I’m beginning to go native.
‘Yeah, I’m just going to visit a friend of mine who’s been a bit ill recently, and I thought, what could be nicer for him than the smell of fresh warm bread. So I came back.’
She hands me the bread and scones.
‘Well now, you tell your friend the bread’s a present from us, and we hope he gets well very soon. Just give me a pound for the scones. Goodbye now.’
As you enter Dunmanway, you pass a sign saying: ‘Best Kept Village 1982’. There’s no mention of what’s happened since.
The town is essentially a busy little square where three roads meet. The fairs my uncle used to bring me to, when hundreds of farmers packed the streets and pubs, are distant history. These days you’ll see the West Cork company car—a tractor—parked up among the Toyotas and VWs, while its dishevelled bachelor farmer owner buys frozen meat and tinned vegetables in the supermarket, but that’s progress for you.
Like many West Cork towns, Dunmanway was developed in the seventeenth century as a plantation, or settlement, by the English; records show that, by 1700, thirty English families were living there. In recent years the town has once again been settled by the English: not the well-heeled yachties you find in nearby Kinsale, Glandore and Schull, but by alleged Crusties, hippies, druggies, pagans and New-Age travellers. In both cases, you could say an English politician was responsible for the influx: first Oliver Cromwell, and then Margaret Thatcher, whose gimlet-eyed disapproval, and riot police, caused many unconventional young Brits to take their troublesome lifestyles across the Irish Sea. This must have pleased her no end.
On an Irish talk-show recently I watched a millionaire businessman describe how he had once met Mrs T at an official reception in London. ‘And where,’ she’d asked him, ‘are you from?’
‘Cork,’ he replied.
‘Yuk!’ exclaimed the Iron Lady, and turned on her heel.
‘Never mind, old chap,’ volunteered Denis, by
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