Over to visit my brother Wim, who used to live there for a couple of years. Reason: In some respects Ireland is one of the most civilized countries in the world: When they consider you to be an artist, you don't pay any income tax. Period. Is why John Huston and Marten Toonder used to live there, as well? Anyway, not so civilized, maybe, with the IRA and all. In 2005 these delivered up their arms - but it had happened before. Let's hope they get lucky (but mark their clover has only three leaves.)
The country was still very poor then, in the mid 1970s. In the Post Office they had ink stands that you could have sold as valuable antiques in Holland, giving the Irish almost wortless ballpoints in return. Which they would have accepted gladly in lieu of mirrors, beads and (to us much more to the point) salt. People warned us that we should count our change when they gave us money back. Just mentioning the mere word revolution when we were talking about Curaçao in a pub, resulted in fingers laid over lips and other hints to hush... hush...
