Shop Queues and Cowards in Uniform

So far my posts on this blog have been celebratory or at least positive. I've written about things that were great and part of the reason I wanted to write about them was to retain the good feeling that came from them.

Tonight I'm writing about two experiences that were far from pleasant. The first occurred this morning just after eleven in the shop across from Trinity. I was in the queue to pay for my sandwich. There were two tills open and the queue was short. Being served was that particular denizen of Dublin that we all know. Barely five feet tall but a full 4 feet wide, dragged back greasy hair, the type of face is swollen rather than jowled, awful dark stained teeth and reeking of the curious mix of stale smoke and alcohol that pervades alleys throughout the city centre. Clad in a baby blue scania jacket with gold necklaces on display and multiple sovereign rings on either hand. She wasn't homeless but she wasn't far off it.

As the man (he was dark-skinned, not african but a dark East Asian I think) serving her was passing her her change he dropped it. This she did not take kindly too. She started a rather bizarre tirade of abuse that was to descend to sickening levels. First of all she took umbridge with the fact that her change had not been placed in her grubby hands. She started shouting "there is no need to fling it at me, trying to avoid the slightest of touches*" then there was a pause. Normally ,I reckon, this could be put down to a bad morning or something equally mundane. What I found odd was how the two suited men in front of me both moved out of the queue and came around to the far side of the incident and started queuing from a different direction. This pause lasted no more than 4 or five seconds as the "woman" scooped up her change she launched into a tirade of abuse based on the fact the server hadn't touched her. She screamed, spittle flying, that she didn't have aids and that "it wasnt the likes of her that brought aid to this country". To my dismay the server just accepted this (obviously he could hardly hit her the wallop that she deserved while wanting to keep his job). She ket shouting at him, telling him that it was people like him, people his colour that brought AIDS in, that were stealing and taking jobs (ironic seeing as despite the obvious working class moniker, i doubt she had worked a day in her life). I was seething and couldn't understand why the 5 people witnessing this said nothing. So me being me I told her to stop. "Ah cop on to yourself and don't speak to people like that" were the first words out of my mouth. I was told swiftly by this specimen of human garbage to mind my own business. Telling her that it was people like her that gave Irish people a bad name didn't sit well with her as she then turned the abuse on me. I was compared to substances unmentionable and asked "did i speak to my wife like that?". Laughing in her face didn't seem to make this decrepit example of society any calmer as she screamed louder and shriller about how I was picking on her because I was big. Reiterating the fact that I didn't care about her or her opinion and how she was a pathetic excuse for a person (exact words) didn't help either. As I paid for my breakfast with abuse still being hurled at me from the far side of the ice cream freezer I apologised for her behaviour to the server. His casual dismissal of the incident saddens me as he seemed to say it was nothing and it wasn't an isolated occasion. Leaving the shop now with taunts and threats being spat at me from the pathway outside it was this that made me saddest. Why should he have to put up with that abuse? Why did three clearly professional people ignore the incident and say nothing? Why did nobody else sand up to her?

*more like - "dere is nmo mneed do flin it a' me,tryin do advoid de slihetest dtouch"

Sadly if people don't stand up to people and actions like this they become commonplace and casual. This is not okay. The people who say nothing are contributing to the problem just as much as the despicable individual responsible for the attack in the first place. I think people need to stand up for themselves and others more often and not let things like this happen. While I think racist jokes are funny, racism isn't. The only way you can joke about things like this is if you find actual racism absurd.



The second thing happened to me was as I was leaving college this evening. Passing out through the gate onto Pearse Street I turned right to cross Westland Row to get a train from the station. As I was crossing I looked down the line of approaching traffic. Three or four cars down was marked Garda patrol car with it's indicator signalling to turn left. With the traffic lights against them they came around the corner and saw me. I was halfway across the road, crossing with a green pedestrian light. They slowed and then stopped. I looked at them and then up at the light which was still red against them. As I got closer to the kerb they inched slowly around the corner against the lights with no siren. I turned back around to see them do this. The driver slowed and then just continued around the corner. All the while I was being stared down by the Garda driving. In his attempt to intimidate me he had missed that on the centre island was a lady with buggy and a toddler who only seconds before had stepped out of the way of his car so that he could get around the corner 20 seconds faster. The situation then took a slight sinister turn as the Garda then slowed to a crawl and leaned over to keep eye contact with me as he attempted to stare me down. He had to lean low and across his partner who was also staring at me. Slowing to a near stop he seemed to signal to me with a flick of his hand and a shrug of his shoulders with an air of menace. Body language screaming out"what are you going to do about it" he smirked and drove off.

His behaviour and the general attitude he was broadcasting smacks of an ignorant, bully boy tactic that I have never experienced in Gardaí before. I really understand now why my friend refers to them as "the cowards in unifrom".


I refuse to let incidents and individuals like this get me down. I am taking the positives from both situations. In an odd way both situations are similar where someone attempts to intimidate someone else and get away with actions that aren't really acceptable. I, for one, didnt want to take it and luckily for me I am difficult to intimidate physically or verbally. It just irks me that these actions are common.