Frank's post reminded me of a comment made on the flight to the US. Well, it was after we had landed, and everyone was standing, awkwardly, waiting for the doors to open (which took inordinately long). Now, remember that we flew Aer Lingus, direct from Dublin to Boston.
Discussion in the row behind us (and we're all standing up now...)
Woman 1: "I wanted to exercise more, but there was just no time."
Woman 2: "Oh I know what you mean. And the food! Irish women just don't care about how they look, do they? They eat all this fatty food!"
W1: "I can't wait to get back and have some salads, you know?"
W2: "And the drinking! I mean, Irish women just drink like crazy, don't they. They drink so much! They eat tons of food and drink a huge amount."
I was, literally gobsmacked. I wanted to turn to her, put on my thickest (Southside) accent and say something like "You really should watch what you say on an IRISH airline, especially when you're returning to the fattest country in the world."
And the second woman? Who the heck forced the fish and chips down her gob?! If I remember right, every freaking menu has a salad on it! And the salads in Ireland are much better than the ones here, let me tell you...
No, I was a chicken, I didn't want to start anything, but jjjjjjjjjjeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeezzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz.
Monday, July 02, 2007
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thats hilarious..... I would have said nothing either, but would have been seething inside. On another note though.........................It seems to spreading. Childrens clothing age 13-14 is bigger than a mans small in Zara and about the same as a medium. What does this say??
ReplyDeletePolkaDot – I believe there are groups of responsible and the irresponsible humans. You happen to overhear the irresponsible kind that blames everything and everyone for their problems... the victim who is being force fed chips and coke, alcohol, cigarettes, wrong relationships.. familiar?!
ReplyDeleteI find this really funny, because as a vegetarian on my last trip to the states, I found it really hard to eat well - everything was deep fried, all the salads had bacon in htem, despite being ffered as veggy options!
ReplyDeleteI thought the friuit, veg and salad would be fresh, gorgeous and plentiful, but twas not so!
I have to say I don't find it to be the case here so much - it's not like the 80s! Sadly, we are aping American portion sizes and getting well used to them. I did read an article by a doctor about Irish obesity rates and he did say htat at the airport, he never has to search for the Irish check in line, he just looks for the fattest queue.
I suppose the lovely ladies were right and wrong - undoubtedly rude, though!
You do see a lot of obese kids today too, it's inexcusable. My husband used to manage an off licence attached to a pub - all weekend long, the kids of drinking parents would be in and out buying Coke, Pringles and familiy sized bags of sweets, to shut them up while their parents drank. The pub ran a creche for a while (horrible idea anyway!) but had to stop as parents kept drunkenly going home without their kids!
We do need to take a look at ourselves as a nation, i think!
I had a experience not too far off yours over the weekend.
ReplyDeleteGot talking to a lovely Canadian lady at the Timberlake gig in the RDS. One of the comments made was about how hard she found it to get "proper" food in Ireland rather than the fish and chip and kebab shops that are everywhere.
Surely she can't have walked the streets of this fair isle without coming across one of the 4million sandwich bars or coffee shops we have.
Personal choice? eat fat get fat, drink too much get drunk. But why should anyone judge anyone else? I'm fat, but i don't eat loads of crap, I just eat loads of lovely food! I do care how I look, and I think I look just fine. I'm the only person who has to live with myself, no one else, and you know if I'm obese and it affects my health then I'll have to live with that, no one else. People drink, smoke, get stressed, catch sexually transmitted diseases and that's ok? But us fatties? cos our "flaw" is on the outside we are so easily judged! Judge not yet ye be judged! People who point out others faults are usually looking at something that reminds them of themselves. Rant over!
ReplyDeleteThat critical lady should try going to Prague - all there is there if you're vegetarian is deep fried cheese...
ReplyDeleteWaht about all our restaurants and cafes anyway? Ok, so we're a carbo-loading culture- maybe that was her problem, she couldn't escape the potatoes chasing her...
Polka, you have a thickest Southside accent? ;)
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