Got up at three this morning. Taxi arrived at four and we were on the coach by 430am ready to start our Ireland trip. It was a trip organised by the Sree Narayana Guru mission and Murali ended up doing most of the organising. The first leg of the trip was to pick up the rest of the members from Croydon and Southall before we started our long journey across Wales to reach Holyhead to embark on our ferry trip to Dublin where we were going to spend the next few days. The coach was meant to be a 49 seater, but they gave us a 53 seater. As Murali was leading the trip, he sat at the front and I shared my seat with our family and friends at the back of the coach. Baby chechi and I ended up sitting at the very back row with 5 seats just for the two of us, much to the envy of the rest of the team. They were allowed to come and sit for a little while and chat with us, but that was it, then they had to go. We wanted our space.
We watched a Malayalam movie and then listened to some Hindi and Malayalam songs as the coach passed through the picturesque countryside. We arrived at the ferry terminal well in time for the crossing. The ferry crossing lasted over 3 hours and we were wondering how we were going to spend the time. I was quite happy to sit and finish off my iBooks, but Kumar Annan and Prasanna wanted to watch a film. I thought that there were only showing one film ‘Jason Bourne’. The reviews had been pretty bad, but I didn’t want to be the killjoy. Once inside I realised that they were showing ‘Finding Dory’ next door. It was too late to switch and we settled to watch the movie. I lost the plot soon after the film started. How many different styles of car chases can you show? All I can remember is them uploading data and deleting files, chasing cars, shooting, stabbing everyone in sight. People actually pay good money to watch this nonsense??? Only interesting thing I noticed was that there was a character called ‘Aaron Kalloor’ in it. A CEO of a social media enterprise called the ‘Deep Dream’. Surely that’s a malayalee name, although the guy looked distinctly middle eastern.
Three and a half hours later we were in Dublin and on our way to the hotel. The last time I was here was in 1990, when I came here to write my Irish fellowship exam. I spent a week cooped up in a hotel room near St Stephen’s Square between my written and practical exams. I passed, but it was one of the most traumatic weeks of my life. Here I am again about 26 years later and this time I am here to enjoy myself.
