Ireland - Part 2
The Ongoing Search for Craic
I thought the Open Championship was a big deal anywhere bordering the Atlantic. Knowing that I was going to be in Ireland come mid-July, I had gotten excited to watch the tournament in an environment with a more genuinely brittle edge. The Open actually means something over here.
My family had been staying in the town of Killarney, located in County Kerry, for the last couple of days and had taken a few walks around the block—plenty of opportunity to scope out which pub looked like it had the best atmosphere to watch five hours of golf in. I wrote down a list with a grin of anticipation.
Sunday came, Rory was in good position to win his second Open since 2014 at Royal Liverpool, and no one in Ireland was fairly excited about that potential outcome. I didn’t necessarily care about who won, all I was looking for was an authentic experience. I wanted some random Irishman in dead last place to drain a long one and watch the pub absolutely erupt. I envisioned beer flying everywhere, food being thrown, anarchy.
Yet, it just so happened that there was another championship that day. The Emerald Isle holds a plethora of world class golf, but it still isn’t its national sport. That title belongs to hurling. “What is hurling?”, one might ask. Good question, I’m not surprised you haven’t heard of it.
Hurling is a sport of ancient Gaelic origin in which the objective of the game is to hit a ball called a “sliotar” with a stick, or “hurley”, between the opponents goalposts. Above the crossbar is one point, below the crossbar is three points due to there being a goalkeeper positioned there. I really don’t have anything against hurling. I bet it’s a fun sport to watch. You can’t walk two steps down the street without someone bringing up hurling or the famine, which although was 175 years ago, still seems to be on everyone’s mind. But County Kerry had gotten into the All-Ireland Senior Hurling Championships, and apparently there was quite a lot of county pride involved in the matter.
People from all over County Kerry had shown up that Open Sunday decked out in their finest green and gold, the colors for County Kerry. Everyone wanted to watch it, including every pub in the entirety of Killarney. Every single TV in those four or five pubs I had written down had the hurling match on. Really? Hurling? It might as well be quidditch to me. So as I grew weary in my search for a TV with the Open on, I decided to pop into the first pub I saw, sit down at the bar, and ask if they could turn on the golf. Fairly reasonable question for a patron.
“Sorry kid, not gonna happen until the match is over” replied the bartender. A stern, elderly gentleman if upon ordering an Irish Car Bomb would probably have some gnarly flashbacks.
“Alright then. That’s not what I expected. That’s not what I expected at all,” I murmured to myself with a head scratch and “Okay. Just a Guinness then.”
Any other day of the week, or the year for that matter, I would’ve been all in on County Kerry’s hurling team, their new number one fan. Give me a jersey, a scarf, and some face paint and I’ll know the Kerry anthem by the end of the day. I almost enjoy the image of congenially wrapping arms with a crowd of Irishmen and raucously imbibing our team, whatever team that may be, to victory.
But the rubber met the road when I leaned over to what I assumed was a seasoned bar fly to ask him how much longer this little charade of a sport would end and getting a genuinely honest yet unequivocally Irish response like “Son, not even God knows when this’ll end.” I looked down at my phone to check my social media feed to make sure that I hadn’t missed the tournament’s entirety, and noticed that Cameron Smith was rocketing up the leaderboard. The tournament was just getting interesting, and I couldn’t conjure up the saint-like patience to wait any longer. I had to think quickly.
I called the bartender over and said “Sir, I have three more people who are on their way to watch the Open. Not hurling, the Open. Now, you know that American tourists in this town don’t have just one Guinness, we have three or four. You’re telling me that you want to waste all that business just because you won’t change one of the four TVs you have?”
“Well alright then. You’re lucky Kerry is beating the life out of Limerick,” the bartender said with a growl. I texted my brother and said that I got a TV and an old Irishman to convert to golf. And as they showed up, something magical happened. Cam Smith was tied with Rory, and some hurley lover behind me found out about it.
“Turn on the Open! Rory’s about to lose!” shouted the man.
“Yeah I’ve already tried tha…’‘ came out of my mouth prematurely as every TV in the pub was then immediately switched to the Open. What followed became Cam Smith’s Irish fan club for about an hour and a half. Cheers and boos were focused around how the two were playing. Cam Smith hitting one of the best putts of the week on 17, the famed Road Hole, conjured a thunderous cheer and sounds of glasses clinking together in celebration. Rory McIlroy hitting any half decent shot or doing anything but vomiting all over himself as he came into the clubhouse brought a collective boo.
Finally, Cam won his first major by carding a staggering final round of 64, and all was right in Killarney. The craic had been restored.
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