A Lovely Little Country

An Irish comedian, when doing a skit on the weather forecast, remarked that Ireland would be “a lovely little country if you could only roof it.” He wasn’t too far wrong.

I arrived home Wednesday night. This was after not getting any sleep on my last night in Dalian due to the Hairy Wang Band’s final farewell and a night in KTV. So I arrived home in a bleary state and the next day I wasn’t much better since my body woke me up at 7am Irish time!

When I come home, there are stages to my reaction. First of all, on the journey home I am sad to leave China, this time maybe more so since maybe I won’t see a lot of my Dalian friends again (but hopefully I can). So, I get home and am still feeling a bit sad and culture-shocked. Ireland seemed so small. Roads, buildings, towns and on such a tiny scale compared to China. Also, I still haven’t got used to the driving on the left thing. Things seem strage!

The next stage is contentment. Ireland is clean, good fun and beautiful. Yesterday, a friend of mine and I went to Thurles, County Tipperary. The countryside in Ireland is so green! The skies so clear, the air clean! However, it does rain an awful lot, hence the quote at the top. It’s only after spending a lot of time away from your country that you realise how nice it is. Well, that’s my case anyway. Ireland is a beautiful country. Yesterday, I was taken aback by the beautiful cloud formations and contrasting colours during the rain - even got a rainbow!



The final stage usually happens when I am about to go back to China. I don’t want to leave Ireland! Having had a nice time with family and friends and becoming Irish again, it becomes hard to go! I till haven’t been de-Chinesified yet. On a few occasions, I have nearly spoken Chinese to people in shops and restaurants. The pleases and thank-yous. I have been using Chinese to say those little things for the past six months! Hard to switch it off. I also nearly answered the phone to my friend in Chinese! I hope I can find some Chinese people to talk to while I am here, to keep the lingo fresh in my mind.

So, at the moment I have passed stage one and am in the middle of de-Chinesification as I enter stage two!