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On the last day As a Rock and I were talking, and he asked me if I believed in God. I laughed and didn't answer and asked if he believed in God himself. He raised one eyebrow slightly and said "I'm not allowed to believe in God, you know, I'm a member of the Communist Party."
I laughed and said, "Since when?"
As a Rock said, "I joined last year - Marx is my God," and twisted his mouth at me.
I looked at him and said, "I saw how your face moved just there. You're utterly sarcastic, aren't you - I never noticed before."
He said, "You've been missing a lot."
We had a good laugh about that.
The photo above is Dalian, taken just at cloud level during take-off. About twenty hours later I finally landed at Dublin, having chased the sun west for the best part of a stretched day. You know yourselves how it is.
I told As a Rock about the term "card-carrying communist" and asked to see his card but he didn't have it with him. He saw me to my bus and shook my hand and, deadpan as ever, said "Goodbye, Comrade."
So now I'm in Ireland - small, rich and harmless. It's a beautiful country and really feels like an island. Nothing is very big or deep or tall and weather rushes past quickly - you can see rain coming, take cover, and after twenty minutes step out again. And it's terminally, preposterously friendly. A day here and I remember why I'm such a sap myself: it's because I grew up in this carefree, inefficient, rainy, anarchic island country full of Marys.
I've been here a week and have almost finished staring like one hypnotised. I tried very hard not to stare on the train from Dublin. People near me were all of types I haven't seen all year: a tall pretty Trinity boy with curly hair, an issue of Computer Arts magazine and a look of creative resolve; a young African woman with a gorgeous toddler on her lap; and three women from Enniscorthy who talked about property, cosmetics and Rod Stewart the whole way down.
"Would you exfoliate your face, now, Mary?"
"Ah I wouldn't, no, it'd be too stringent."
此致 etc.