Despite having been born and brought up in Dublin I've never really worked a 'real' job in Ireland. I left in 1993 to go to university in the UK and never moved backed. My job took me all over the world for the best part of ten years, But now I find myself back in Dublin doing the one thing I have never really done, commuting with my fellow Dubliners across rain soaked broken paving stones on a cold November day that can't decide between drizzle or downpour.
While the Celtic tiger was roaring I held fast to an image of Dublin developing into a modern capital in the European model. A city of cosmopolitan cafe culture, with streetcars transporting it's inhabitants across this thousand year old city, students from all corners of the world attending it's educational institutions and attracting businesses with it's English speaking population perched on the western edge of Europe. I never had a working view of Dublin, for me it was a city of relaxation and long lunches, of family and good times.
As I reached the end of my second week of working week in Dublin I fear my view of that idealised Dublin has been changed for ever. This is not the city I had imagined. Years of working in other cities has had a profound effect on the tint of the rose coloured glasses I viewed my city through. It was never fair to place it up on the same pedestal as Copenhagen or Munich or London. Dublin is a city of poor roads, debilitating congestion and disjointed public transport. Ten years of economic growth seems to have concentrated on tinsel and decoration, numerous modern apartment and office blocks to let, with no pleasant or reliable way to get to them. While there have been efforts to improve the actual infrastructure of the city I sat in Dublin airport having endured a half hour delay to Dublin's rapid rail transit because it couldn't cope with the seemingly surprise onset of winter in Ireland, a 60 minute taxi ride through the heart of the city because it was quicker and cheaper than the roulette of battling through yet more road works to get to the fast port tunnel that goes under the city ( can I be the only person who sees the irony of raising the toll on a relief road during the rush hour that has the effect of forcing traffic back onto the congested streets), only to reach an airport whose security seems to operate a different set of rules to every other airport, and whose flights never seem to leave on time. I left the office on Dublin's South side at 3pm and got home to South West London 7 hours later.
I can't let one bad week or journey effect my view of this city too much, but I left that Friday night with an suspicion that the city I thought had become truly European, is still far from that destination. Thomas Wolfe famously wrote "You cant go home again", and for the time, I think I understand what he meant.