An Irishman's Diary

The summer wind came blowing in from across the sea.

It's time to take the train, was the summer message from Iarnrod Eireann. Travelling by train, as depicted in its television advertisement, is an activity so blissfully relaxing, so gloriously sedate that it's the nearest we can ever hope to get to heaven without actually dying.

It's a world where passengers stroll through spacious carriages with one hand by their side while the other - no, not frantically lunging for the nearest seat for support - casually juggles a newspaper which mysteriously remains neatly folded as it twirls in the air.

It's a place where self-satisfied young men pat themselves on the stomach, lean back and doze off in front of full Irish breakfasts which they've presumably paid for but haven't eaten. What's this guy meant to be saying? I don't want breakfast, but hey, look, I can afford it?

The people who travel by train in Iarnrod Eireann ads look so damned smug and display such self-congratulatory smiles that there is a distinct "the earth just moved" feeling about the whole proceedings. It all conjures up an image of hundreds of passengers lighting up on arrival at Heuston Station, smiling conspiratorially at the person next to them, and asking: "How was it for you?" A sort of mile-high club where you never leave the ground.

Celestial pleasure

Travelling by train is an experience of such celestial pleasure, it seems, that even if you have nowhere to go, you'll go anyway.

On the other hand, in the fantasy world of Iarnrod Eireann advertisements, going anywhere in a motor car is simply hell on wheels. Driving on a motorway involves sitting immobile in miles-long tailbacks. This is so stressful that before you know it you'll be out of your car, perspiring heavily and screaming hysterically at another driver.

So while the National Roads Authority spends millions of pounds upgrading our roads network, another State body spends its advertising budget telling us, in effect, that only those craving a nervous breakdown would drive further than their local shop.

Iarnrod Eireann's Summer Wind ad is, of course, aimed primarily at car owners. "It's time to take the train," implies that the viewer has been making the wrong choice until now. Unfortunately, those of us who don't own cars haven't got a choice.

I have to take the train. And here, in case the people who run Iarnrod Eireann are interested, is what really happens. My most recent journeys - from Dublin to Roscrea and back - were not untypical.

I arrived at Heuston with seven or eight minutes to spare for the Friday evening service; it wasn't a Bank Holiday weekend but it was the tail-end of the holiday season. Already every seat was taken and the space between the carriages were rapidly filling up. I walked the length of the train and back again before claiming a space on the grimy floor between the second and last cars.

Obstacle course

Within two minutes the entire floor space around me was full of fellow passengers, all sitting with bags tightly tucked in under legs to make as much space as possible. People attempting to pass between carriages found themselves confronted with an intimidating obstacle course of legs and bags. Four young women, obviously heading for the dining car, surveyed the scene but found it too daunting and turned back.

The dominant aroma was not that of the summer wind but the rather more stale odour emanating from the toilets whenever anyone triumphed over the obstacle course and made it to the loo.

In the happy, all-summer-long-we-sang-our-song world of Iarnrod Eireann advertisements, not only do all the passengers on the train have a seat of their own, but most have an empty one beside them. Nobody talks; they snooze, they stroll, or they flirtatiously give the eye to other passengers; Sadly, in real-life train journeys people talk. The guy crouched beside me was one of those amiable, friendly, no-strangershere, chatty types. I hate these people.

Train talkers are ruthless in situations like this; the shared circumstances are exploited to the maximum. We're all in the same mess so we don't need to bother with introductions. Nor books either. ("Put that down that book at once!" his eyes shouted at me). I might have managed a short conversation about our shabby treatment at the hands of Iarnrod Eireann, but my fellow traveller didn't seem bothered about this at all. Exercising his mind was the question of where all these people could be going.

"Mad, isn't it?"

"All the country people are working in Dublin and all the Dublin people are working in the country. It's mad, isn't it?", he observed, seeking my agreement. "It's not, but you are," I wanted to reply, but I meekly concurred: "Yeah, it's mad all right."

The return journey was little better. I avoided the talkers but again the connecting train - which picks up passengers from stations on the Limerick line - was full by the time it arrived at Ballybrophy. Passengers of all ages embarking there and at subsequent stops had to make do without a seat.

And another thing: when we arrived at Heuston, there was no beautiful woman in a summer dress waiting for me on the platform. But I suppose I can't blame Iarnrod Eireann for that.