Of Galway and Guinness – Connacht and Craic

By Charlotte Coldrey
April 29 2004

The day that I had been waiting for had come at last. It was my birthday and we were off to Ireland to see the game. Rather than open my presents early in the morning (we had to leave at 5:30am), I decided to celebrate on Sunday – the day of the game.

We got to our hotel, which was where the players were staying and found out we couldn’t get our rooms because other people were still in them (which I was quite angry about seeing as I had hardly any sleep because that morning I had to get up early). Then we found out that the player’s flight was delayed and we thought we weren’t so unlucky!  Anyway we walked up through the main streets and there were a lot of street entertainers. There was one excellent one with some puppets. One of the puppets was playing the piano and was really funny!

We went back to the hotel and Ashley and I were really desperate for the players to arrive. Dad said that they wouldn’t be there until another couple of hours so we decided to keep busy and checked into our rooms and went up to watch some telly. Dad wanted to go out again so Ash and I decided to buy some souvenirs for our friends, and Dad went for a wet towel shave, which he said was fantastic. We walked back to the hotel and waited and waited in the hotel bar for the players. Finally we saw a coach pull up outside and we rushed out there to see them all. Ash got his camera out and they all looked very, very annoyed after their long trip.

We decided to go back up to the rooms. It wasn’t because the players were going to go up in the same lift as us… really! We got in to the same lift as George Harder and Simon Miall. George tapped Ashley on the back and pretended it wasn’t him, which was really funny (as I had also been doing that to him all day)! Then we decided to go down in the lift again because we wanted to go and tell our parents and you never know there may be another player would be in the lift with us!

We all had a bit of a sleep and went off in the evening up Quay street to look for some food but we were all a bit tired and couldn’t really fancy anything but managed to find a McDonalds for us kids. BAD NEWS….. no kids allowed in the bars after 9:00pm which was really upsetting because every bar had live music which ash and I were desperate to see and also we knew the players would be celebrating (if we won) in one of them the next day.

We woke up at 8:30 and this day was supposed to be my official birthday day (so I was pretty excited). We got dressed and went down stairs to get a big breakfast. We all ate and it was prezzie time! I got some really great stuff (which made the weekend even better).

Then off for a walk on the beach which was beautiful. We saw some crazy people swimming in the sea which made me feel cold just watching. Are they mad or what? No, just Irish!!! Don’t we love them!

Finally the time had come for the game, and for some reason my crazy dad bought me some face paints. I don’t know why I didn’t ask him!!!

The match was a night-mare-all mum’s finger nails have gone! Dad was so involved he didn’t even drink his beer (and believe me that is EXTREMLY rare)! At one point I just gave up cheering because I thought we had lost it. But then along came Will Greenwood with his superb Try! We were all shouting and screaming (I’m very surprised that I didn’t lose my voice)! Ash played the Mighty Quins on his penny whistle, or at least he tried to, but he did a very good job-didn’t he everybody?

After the game there was a very long walk to Galwegian’s Rugby Club which was only supposed to be a 10 minute walk but took us half an hour, and we met up with the rest of the Quins fans. They were very sweet there, a bar man heard everybody sing happy birthday to me and gave me a very rugby ball shaped hat with Guinness written on the side!

We got back to the hotel and saw all the players with a pint of Guinness in their hands! So there was only one place for us to go! We sat down and guess who walked into the bar -  yup Pat!!! So mum said hi and said that it was my birthday and he bent down and gave me a kiss (and that was without her asking him to!) but then thank goodness for my Auntie Zoe she said “WAIT! We have to get it on camera” so I got another kiss from him while Ashley was filming but he didn’t get it L (oh well just another excuse to get another kiss off him!

My auntie Zoe said that earlier on that day Ugo came over and gave her a massive hug and kiss! So she decided to give him her last Rolo (get it? - the advert, do you love someone enough to give them your last Rolo?) . But the funny bit is, is that he didn’t accept it at first!!!

The time had come for us to eat and Dad forced me to leave PatL. We went up to have a Chinese and I couldn’t wait for the meal to be over (literally, I couldn’t wait, me and Ash left early to see the players)! We walked down the street and I saw a bunch of muscled men wearing familiar tops! It was the players! -  So we walked down past them all, and turned around straight after and followed them all! We were walking up the street and a man came up to me wearing the same Quins top and said “Is it your birthday? Wait a minute, stay here”. Me and Ashley looked at each other and heard all the players start to sing “Happy Birthday!” This other guy came up to me and asked me what my name was, so I told him, and he told the other man that my name was Shannon, so they all sang Happy Birthday to Shannon! But it was still amazing; just imagine a bunch of your idols singing Happy Birthday to you! We met up with Auntie Zoe, Dad and Mum, but Dad said we couldn’t even try to get into the bar with them (so I was very disappointed). We went to the hotel, ash and I played cards but then Auntie Zoe, Dad and Mum wanted to go to a bar so we went to our rooms and watched some telly then went to bed, whilst the grown ups had a bit of a laugh.

The next morning we got up and had some breakfast and the players were all really sweet to us - talking to us and stuff ( I think it was different to the morning before because the match was over and they were all chilled and ready to go home). We hung around for a bit at the hotel and then saw all the players leaving and I rushed up stairs to get the camera but then guess what? When I went outside the coach was just pulling away and I was so upset I wished and wished it was another coach but Ash said he saw Mel Deane in it.

We got in the car shortly after that and went for a drive and then to the airport and I was so upset because the weekend was over.

I just want to say thank you to everybody that made it so special to me and without some of those people that weekend would be a blur to me now. I want to say a special thank you to Barbara for trying to arrange the announcement. Thank you.