I flew back from Dublin yesterday.
Given all the storms in recent weeks I was a bit trepidatious when I booked my flights a few weeks ago, but all was well.
Both the outbound and inbound flights were fine, which hasn’t always been the case when flying to Ireland.
I had several meetings arranged, mostly business, but they all involved eating and drinking.
The one non-business meeting was with my old friend Bill who lives near Greystones, which is south of Dublin but the last stop on the Dart railway so it’s very easy to get to, albeit a 50 minute journey from the centre of the city where I was staying.
I first met Bill at Wormit Primary School in Scotland in 1969 and we’ve been friends ever since.
During the summer holidays we camped (and later hiked) in a number of places, most notably Pitlochry and the Lake District.
Our ten-day cycling tour of central Scotland in 1975 didn’t go according to plan because of the ferocious wind and rain, but we stayed in some interesting youth hostels, notably Loch Lomond which was more like a castle and had its own library, and one or two whose facilities were, how shall I say, a tad primitive.
In 1992, after I got married, we spent part of our honeymoon with Bill and his wife Patty (who had married shortly before us) in the Cayman Islands where he was working as a corporate lawyer following spells in Hong Kong and Bermuda (or was it the Bahamas?).
Twenty-five years ago they moved to Ireland, where Patty’s family lives, and since I started travelling regularly to Dublin on business (circa 2003) I have become a frequent visitor to Greystones.
Our normal routine is to meet for a drink in the Hungry Monk, a French wine bar and restaurant opposite the station, then walk to another restaurant just around the corner.
Chakra by Jaipur, founded in 2005, is a wonderful Indian restaurant with fabulous food several levels above your standard Indian menu.
Since we were last there it has been awarded a Michelin star (in 2023), but in recent years it has been joined by a new Indian/Pakistani restaurant called Daata, which is where we went on Monday night.
There are two Daata restaurants, one in Bray, up the road, the other in Greystones. A few weeks ago Gordon Ramsay and his team, who were in Ireland filming, dropped in to the Bray restaurant for dinner and word quickly spread.
Thankfully it was open when we went because many local restaurants are no longer open on Monday or even Tuesday nights. Even the wine bar at the Hungry Monk was shut so we had a drink in The Burnaby, a nearby pub.
Neither The Burnaby nor Daata were busy so it does make you wonder how long they can stay open every night.
It’s a problem that’s not restricted to Greystones or Ireland.
The day before I flew to Dublin I took my wife for Sunday lunch at one of her favourite restaurants outside Cambridge where opening times have been cut to just four days a week (Thursday to Sunday).
Given all the overheads that can’t be substantially reduced (rent, rates etc), is that a sustainable business model? I don’t know, but there’s clearly a post Covid problem in the hospitality sector and how it resolves itself remains to be seen.
Far busier than Daata on Monday night was Balfes, a bistro in the centre of Dublin, where I had a working lunch on Tuesday with three colleagues.
In the evening, though, it was back to another sparsely populated bar, this time in Malahide, north of Dublin, where I met Keith Redmond, a practising dentist and former councillor.
The last time I saw Keith he was compering Forest’s Farewell to Freedom dinner in Dublin in 2018.
Venue was Suesey Street, a ‘contemporary Irish restaurant’ whose major selling point (for us at least) was the magnificent outdoor area where guests could drink, smoke, and eat canapés before dinner in the main restaurant.
It had a real fire at one end and could be almost completely enclosed by awnings if it was raining or bitterly cold.
Sadly, since we were last there, smoking has been prohibited even in the outdoor area so we wouldn’t go back even if we were to revive the Farewell to Freedom dinner.
At the same time the Hibernia Forum, the free market think tank with whom we co-hosted two Farewell to Freedom Dinners and a series of private dinners with various guest speakers from the UK, has also died a death.
Whether the more aggressive ‘right wing’ movement that has popped up in Ireland in recent years will step in and defend smokers’ rights remains to be seen.
At present (and I speak cautiously because I’ve only been following it intermittently and from afar) it seems focussed primarily on Ireland’s culture wars (and immigration).
On Tuesday however the Irish Times published a letter from ASH Ireland urging the government to follow the UK’s example and introduce a generational smoking ban, so the threat is clearly imminent and those who claim to support individual freedom need to speak out, regardless of the issue.
Once the UK has passed legislation, setting a precedent for a generational ban, other governments will undoubtedly consider and then propose a very similar policy.
This isn’t rocket science. Remember the process that led to the ban on smoking in all enclosed public places in the UK?
It wasn’t a British politician or prime minister who came up with the idea. It was a policy first copied by the Scottish Executive, and then adopted by the rest of the UK, from a blueprint created in Dublin.
Thanks, Ireland, and in return here’s a policy copied by the UK from legislation devised (albeit later rejected) in New Zealand.
You’re welcome.
Below: With Keith Redmond at Fowlers in Malahide
