Lennard Ramone

  The Culchies guide to Dublin Last Sunday, I was walking down the street, on my way to the pub, when a guy in a Kilkenny hurling shirt walked up behind me and shouted “UP THE CATS!!!”  at the top of his lungs at about 4 inches from my ears because he saw someone across the street who was also wearing a Kilkenny shirt. When I told him that he should not shout in a stranger’s ears he looked at me dumbfounded. I told him that he was not in the countryside anymore and that there were other people around. He mumbled an apology and went on his way. It then dawned on me that these out-of-towners that come to Dublin for special occasions aren’t used to city life, and that these country people aren’t always prepared for Dublin, or know how to behave. (For those not entirely familiar with Irish slang- a culchie is someone who lives in Ireland but does not have a Dublin postal code. In general, the further you live from Dublin, the more of a culchie you are.) As an upstanding citizen of Dublin