Ireland Journal: Day Five

February 5, 2009

Day Five

Four Seasons Hotels are always quite nice, but this one was exceptionally so. I found out that a contributing factor was that two former Irish Prime Ministers are in residence here. There is a handful of Bentleys and Rolls Royces neatly arranged around the porte cochere. Security is low visibility but high comfort. The top floor comprises residences, and one of the gentlemen bought his for six million euros. (He had sold his nearby home for 14 million when the Celtic Tiger was still roaring.)

Bless Amex, Aer Lingus, or the fates, but I’m sitting in a bulkhead, first class seat out of Shannon with huge legroom and the only empty seat in the cabin next to me! I figure I have about 25 square feet of “living space,” not bad. I’ve finished reading my second book on the trip (“Scarpetta”) and also finished the next five editions of the Writing on the Wall video series, which we’ll shoot next Tuesday morning.

When I walked on the plane in Dublin, I was seated next to a fight attendant. “My own flight attendant,” I said. “Look around,” she suggested. Still standing in one of the aisles, for the first time I glanced up and saw 16 flight attendants, each in the company’s green uniform, a field of perky shamrocks. They all smiled. “Service will be good!” said one. They were all returning to Shannon after coming home on overnight trips, and every single one fell asleep during the 25-minute hop to Shannon.

The plane was deiced at Dublin, not something they are accustomed to doing very often, then landed in the sun at Shannon. We all had to get off the plane, go through U.S. immigration, then through a security check (“Go ahead,” said the security guy, not opening my bags, “you look like an upright gent to me!”), and then another identity check. We walked in a huge circle beyond the gate, then back on the plane.

“It’s a U.S. requirement, not Irish,” the gate agent informed me when I questioned the stupidity of the process. “I should have guessed,” I told her.

I’m home for about 11 days, then I head for Australia and New Zealand and I’m not scheduling anything like this frequency of travel again. It seemed like a good idea at the time, and I assumed my wife would be with me on at least one of the trips. But winter in Ireland and grandchildren at home trumped those plans.

President of Ireland’s House