A chara, - I enjoyed Deaglan De Breadun's article (The Irish Times, December 21st) about his train journey from Dublin to Belfast, the highlight of which were the crooners from West Belfast on their way home from a day's shopping. I hope they had some breakfast before they left home.
On December 20th I had some business to do in the National Library and, together with a friend, caught the 8 a.m. Enterprise to Dublin. We hadn't eaten before leaving and decided to have breakfast in the dining car. When we tried to enter it we were told, very courteously, that it was for first-class passengers only. We decided instead to eat in the other half of the carriage, the bar. But when we ordered breakfast we were told that we had to wait until the people in first class had eaten. I began to feel like we were in steerage on the Titanic. After about 15 minutes we again approached the caterers and were told that we wouldn't be fed until the train picked up passengers at Portadown, some of whom would be travelling with first-class tickets and might require breakfast. We could eat after them.
Finally, the fry we ordered came ingeniously packed between a split soda farl, so that there was no need for a knife and fork, a plate, salt and pepper, or a dining car.
Happy New Year, Translink and Irish Rail. - Is mise,
Danny Morrison, Belfast 11.