[GCFL-discuss] looking forward to thursday

[gcfl-discuss at gcfl.net]

On Mon, 14 Mar 2005 22:18:49 -0330 gcfl-discuss at gcfl.net writes:

> I'm wondering how St. Patty's Day became an excuse for people to get 
> ridiculously drunk and for banks to take a day off. How does that 
> possible celebrate what Patrick did for the Irish people?
> 
> Now, I live in an area with much Irish influence. St. Patrick's Day 
> is pretty big here, but the only things that happen are the wearing of 
> green, possibly speaking in an Irish accent on occasion throughout the
day, 
> banks being closed on Monday, and copious quantities of alcohol 
> consumption.
> 
> ~Quama

EVERY holiday in Ireland is an excuse to get ridiculously drunk, because
that is part of the national culture. One of the great social conflicts
in American history was between Protestant reformers who wanted to ban
consumption of alcohol, and predominantly Catholic populations (German as
well as Irish) who wanted to drink. In all truth, millions of Protestants
like to drink also. But drinking IS a very Irish thing to do. The word
"whiskey" was originally "uisge beatha" in Gaelic: it means "water of
life." (Uisge actually means "water.")

I had a chemistry teacher in high school who celebrated St. Patrick's day
by telling stories about his grandfather who emigrated from the small
Irish village of Dusseldorf. (In our area, almost everyone was of German
descent. A small town was described as one Catholic church, one Lutheran
church, and six bars.

Siarlys
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