Airport Inertia

Airports are not indicative of the nature of a place and it's probably a good thing, given that I usually arrive in them woozy from lack of, or emerging from sleep, sedatives or a couple of glasses of champagne. In fact, the more I land at, the more they seem to blur into one another. This is one part of globalisation I don't like - I understand that logistics may dictate a certain amount in the design of an airport but I really think more flavour can be added to the interior design at least.

Sometimes we're treated to the stunning visual map of a city at night whilst the plane descends into land - I will never forget my arrival into Dubai in 2004 - it felt like landing on the Vegas strip. I had never seen so much neon or so many skyscrapers. Nowadays the plane always seems to come in across the desert so we don't receive the same visual impact. The airport itself is nondescript. White, more white and acres of space. Passport control is generally a nightmare - regardless of the fact that there's about 60 desks in both Terminal's 1 & 3, they are either partly unmanned or just so busy. One of my favourite life-aids comes into use here - E-gate card, which I am lucky enough to own as I have residency in the

U.A.E.

Malaga airport at least tries to brighten the mood amongst arrivals - on the way to passport control you pass a number of photographs displaying the wonders that can be reached from the airport - the Andalucian countryside in all it's glory - Cordoba, Seville, Granada and of course Malaga itself (any photos of the Rock of Gibraltar are conspicuously absent!). It's many treasures both architectural and objets d'art are covered in the exhibition. Everytime I enter I smile, because I know I'm already in Spain.

Cordoba





This year, Dublin airport - or the airport I should say closest to home (but I don't even know what home is anymore) - put on an exhibition of it's own - of Ireland's faces. Some are famous and some aren't. I appreciate what they are trying to do and given that we were an almost completely indigenous island until very recently there are certain celtic traits which are clearly visible and perhaps do suggest to one that you've landed in Ireland - but it doesn't inspire any passion in me for being home. The good thing is that if you land in Dublin on a clear day - you have already been treated to some striking scenery flying in from the Irish sea across Howth head, along Portmarnock and can even spy Croke Park Stadium in the distance.

Artwork trumps ad-work every time and for those stuck in endless terminals something to enlighten oneself on a travellator is a nice distraction - and perhaps for some an education.

I'm sure many of you have visited Heathrow, London and JFK, New York so I don't need to mention how soulless they are. I'm not a Heathrow hater though - I've been through it so many times now that I find it easy to manage and I certainly think it has improved in recent years. Security is a nightmare though, which has become a given in any international city (funnily enough I flew from Sharjah International Airport in U.A.E other day - and I didn't even have to remove my laptop or liquids from my case - perhaps not funny at all? Are Budget airlines not a threat?).

What shocks me is that in the increasingly fashion-obsessed world we're living in is that designers haven't gotten their pricey paws on this huge market? I can certainly see a Dior-Dubai Terminal or Burberry-Beirut. What bigger boost to an ego than a Terminal named after your brand? Even the First class lounges are basic, wouldn't they benefit from a Cavalli-esque makeover? Perhaps the wheels are already in motion, it really wouldn't surprise me.

What is less surprising is that aesthetics are being considered in the new airport designs. Renowned architect, Zaha Hadid is onboard to modernise and visualise a new Heathrow Airport after her deisgns for Zagreb airport in Croatia proved winning.
http://www.wired.com/design/2013/02/airport-architecture/
For me - there's still a lack of substance to these new-gen designs - as they don't reflect the surrounding countryside or culture of each place whatsoever. The design for the new Incheon airport in South Korea looks more like an elaborate flyover rather than saying anything about this wonderfully cultural country.

However I am no architect or engineer and perhaps looking for aesthetics in these functional places is superfluous. All I know is that I ensure my visa is complete before entering any of these airports (this includes filling out those blasted pre-landing cards before arrival), that my passport is handy (not buried in hand luggage), that I have shoes I can slip off, comfortable clothing, a bottle of water and a good book on my Kindle for reading on the queue for passport control. But note to those creatures of vision - we spend more time inside these buildings than outside so some attention to form would be appreciated by those who are terminally in terminals.

Drop into Dublin....

Mum had expressly warned me not to get back to the house in Dublin before them; she is committed to having a spic and span house when anyone comes to visit and Gareth was no exception! So, as we drove into Dublin we decided to see if we could fit in a showing of "Ted" to our packed schedule. It was on our list as films shown in the U.A.E get shredded by the censors so we really wanted to catch it on our "tour". We weren't disappointed! I'm sure I don't have to tell many people that it was the film of the summer. Back to the McBride Madhouse of Merriment and Gareth met my lovely little sister Nickki and her boyfriend, Dave. We all sat down to dinner (Gareth couldn't get over the fact that we serve more than one sort of potato - well it is Ireland!) and a few vinos. Both my parents are pretty good in the kitchen; something I have yet to inherit but am hopeful comes with age. So the food was great, the conversation lively but around eleven I started to flag - maybe it was the 5 hour drive, the constant drinking, the over-exertion in general but everything shut down for me at midnight and I had to go to bed, leaving Gareth in the capable hands of my parents to feed him Spanish liquors and whatever else was going in our little kitchen of wonders. On Tuesday I wanted to show Gareth our Dirty Ol' town of Dublin but he was loathe to get out of bed; he had indulged til the early hours with Mum and Dad and I was pleased he had made such an effort with them so I let him sleep a little longer. We headed into "town" as we call Dublin City in the late afternoon and decided to take in a little culture by way of St. Patrick's Cathedral. It is 800 years old, a stunning example of a period architecture and also houses burial chambers for many marked figures of our history. It was home to Jonathan Swift, author of "Gulliver's Travels" as he was Dean of the Cathedral in the 1700's and it also held the first ever performance of Handel's "Messiah" in 1742. I'm not sure how interesting Gareth found it, although he seemed engrossed at the time, but I really enjoyed it - I love a bit of history now and again. At this point I was getting hungry - and I can be quite a nightmare when I'm not fed. We stumbled across "Corfu" on Parliament Street and definitely thought some tzatiki would go down well. Thankfully restaurants in Dublin seem to have adopted recession-buster menu's so we ordered a 2 course earlybird with a glass of wine for 10euro each - not bad! Corfu was a real find, the feta cheese parcels melted in our mouth, the meatballs were really tasty - all in all just a really lovely meal at a great price. We then moved down to O'Donoghue's on Suffolk Street for a catch up with some of my friends. Cilla, a friend from college, arrived in first, as usual regaling us with tales from school and home. Shortly afterwards Kerry arrived in with a little shriek of delight when she saw me. We ended up with my cousin Al, my sister Nickki, Dougie, Cathal (Kerry's husband) and a few pints whilst the Olympic boxing took place on the tv. After a few hours we decided to find somewhere with music and show Gareth some other great bars in Dublin. On this we failed...miserably. We took him upto the Dakota on South William Street, which used to be one of the hippest places in Dublin but was like walking into an empty cavern that night! By this point I was hungry again so Gareth tried to bribe the barmen by any means possible to rustle up some food (the bar food had finished about 2 hours previous). The best they could come up with was a pear. Gareth proffered said pear to me, I took a bite out of it and threw it back (playfully!) - the bar staff were not amused! Apparently it could have been used for cocktails; I'm pretty sure they weren't going to get asked for any more cocktails that night - we were the only table occupied in the bar. My wonderful boyfriend was fretting about me wanting "chips" so he took to the unknown streets of Dublin to find some for me. Unfortunately he returned empty-handed so at that point we headed to Bob's diner for some garlic cheese fries - lucky him getting to sleep with me that night! It was lovely to see everyone but disappointing we didn't get to see a quality band, usually found all over Dublin on any night of the week. That was the end of our Irish trip - it had been alcohol-fuelled and full of new experiences; I was so glad to have shown Gareth a few new things for his list, and how well he'd been received. I think the general consensus was that Irish women quite like a man with a beard and Gareth's great around parents!

Mums Day Out

Back in April my mum celebrated her 60th birthday, whilst I managed to get home for the party; there wasn't enough time to do what my sister, Nickki and I had planned for her present.

So, Thursday 26th July was the arranged date for a day out together to spend some quality time - isn't that what most people need more of? We had a leisurely start time of 1130 and we headed to The Lovely Food Company in Terenure for brunch. It really didn't disappoint. The staff were absolutely lovely, my poached eggs and bacon on artisan bread with a tomato relish were a delight and the conversation flowed, we were all in a great mood. That continued as we made our way to Aspen where we had booked in for facials and a massage for Mum. It's a quirky little salon but they succeeded in relaxing all three of us and we had lovely shiny faces after 90 minutes. I made a slight error in judgement in asking them to do my spray tan though. The machine didn't seem to work very well - there was more tan on the floor than on me; I had to assist the girl in doing my own tan and she really didnt have a clue how deep the colour should be! Unfortunately I did end up a bit stripy! Anyhow, we moved on for a spot of afternoon tea in the Cake Place off Pleasant st. What a find! The lemon polenta cake was so light and tasty - I'm still salivating 5 days later! The chocolate brownie was also delectable, so rich. More girly chat and feeling refreshed we even managed to fit in donating 3 full black bags of mum's barely worn clothes to Enable Ireland. Trust mum to fit in something off her to-do list on a girls day out. It made her happy though so that's what counts.

Onto Bluebell, an unlikely location for the "Flavours of Italy" Italian cookery school, where Giuseppe awaited to impart his wisdom on preparing a 3 course Italian dinner. He explained the idea of bruschetta (which really should be pronounced "bruscetta") and offered some ideas for accompaniments - gorgonzola, fresh olive pasta, olive oil with lemon and chilli - our palettes were tantalised but we had some hard work to do first. Downstairs to the kitchen, we had to form teams of five. Unfortunately we were short some people so Mum, Nickki and I formed a team. I thought this was a great idea as other people wouldn't get a look in with us in the kitchen but it put us under pressure later on. First up was the starter - pizza or latticed bread. We loaded up on fresh mozzarella, pancetta and mushrooms and tossed our dough to our hearts content,  Giuseppe's tips as he moved around the kitchen were sometimes welcomed but at other times we wanted to dump some flour over his head. 3 women in the kitchen - possibly a recipe for disaster? We moved on to prepare the dessert - a very typical Italian tiramisiu, here we also had challenges, mum tired of beating the egg whites, Nickki of the yolks and mascarpone, I prepared the biscuits, dipping in orange juice and limoncello and cutting fresh strawberries for a summery interpretation of the sweet. The heat was on at this stage and tempers were fraying at the table, mum tried to escape for a cigarette and all sharp objects had to be removed from my sisters reach. For the main course we tried making our own tagliatelle from dough and preparing a pesto sauce. This was great and team harmony reigned once more. We were ready for the starters when they arrived out of the oven, with a lovely Pinot grigio to wash it down. The latticed bread was a success, the other team complimented us on it too. Overall a great evening out, even with our less than aesthetically pleasing tiramisiu cups. 

Sated from a successful day I fell into bed after the few vinos dreaming of the weekend to come in Cork.....