I watched Troy Parrott’s heroics against Hungary in an Irish pub in Malaga. But only just.
Bitter experience suggested there was no way Ireland could back up the Portugal miracle with another win three days later, away from home. That and the company of a football-sceptic companion persuaded me to swerve the game and concentrate instead on the delights of a Sunday afternoon in Andalucía.
Still, I entered a caveat: “If it’s 0-0 or 1-1 with 15 minutes left, we might have to find a television somewhere.” In the event it was 1-1 after 15 minutes and 1-2 at half time. So much for that, I thought, nearly forgetting all about it.
But the beating of a Parrott’s wings in Budapest must have affected air pressure in southern Spain, because something made me glance at my phone again around 4.30pm. “Jesus! – 2-2 with 10 minutes left.” At that, we fled for the nearest Irish drinking emporium, Morrissey’s, and installed ourselves just as the kitchen sink was warming up on the sideline for Ireland.
A stranger in a pub in Spain hugged me like we were old friends after Parrott’s heroics
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It was as if I’d suffered through the previous 95 minutes when Parrott escaped his cage yet again for the now famous goal. In the ensuing mayhem, a man I’d never met before hugged me like we were old friends. He turned out to be Jimmy from Mitchelstown. We’re friends now.
***
I felt a bit like Sir John Falstaff in Henry IV part 1, where he feigns death to avoid fighting in the Battle of Shrewsbury but revives just in time to share the spoils of victory. This may seem a fanciful comparison, but Falstaff was on my mind anyway, because one of the joys of Andalucía is the thing he called “sack”, a sweet wine especially synonymous with Malaga.
Fresh from his pretend heroics in battle, he delivers a soliloquy on the heart-warming, courage-giving properties of the drink, which (probably echoing Shakespeare’s own enthusiasm for it) he pronounces superior to all others.
“If I had a thousand sons,” he concludes in dubious parenting advice, “the first human principle I would teach them should be to forswear thin potations and to addict themselves to sack.”
The best place to experience Malaga’s wines is the Antigua Casa de Guardia, an old bar where you stand at the counter – there are no seats – while staff pour your orders from the big wooden barrels behind them.
This being Spain, the wine is accompanied by shellfish and Manchego cheese. If you look like you’re staying a while, they write your tab in chalk on the wooden counter in front of you. When it gets busy, that sometimes means you have to stand your ground or get pushed aside and end up in front of someone else’s account.
***
I was supposed to fly home on Tuesday, before leaving Dublin again early Wednesday for a press trip to the battlefields of Flanders. But after securing a cheap one-way flight to Malaga, I had been reduced to booking a flight home from Madrid to Shannon. That was even cheaper, and seemed like a good idea for a time. Then I realised it was like one of those bargains you find in the middle aisle at Aldi and never use.
So I let it go and instead flew direct from Malaga to Brussels, where I could spend a relaxed night and avoid the Wednesday red-eye before joining the Dublin group at a civilised hour. The downside of this convenience was going straight from a balmy 20 degrees and sunsets at 6pm to just above freezing and darkness at 4pm, which can damage your brain. Also, I was still packed for Andalucía, not Anderlecht.
***
Then I discovered that all the hotels in central Brussels were full, except a few for €500 a night. So, resorting to the suburbs, I found one for €130, ignoring Tripadvisor reviews that declared it only “passable”. The meaning of this became clearer when, after an epic bus journey into the outer darkness, I arrived at a reception lobby that looked more like the security hut of a factory.
In general, the hotel was short on frills. It also had signs, in multiple languages, cautioning parents not to let their children play in the lift. From this and other clues, it gradually dawned on me that most of my fellow guests were asylum seekers.
Not that this was a problem. The few I met were polite. And my room, which included a sad-looking kitchenette redolent of 1980s bedsit-land, was clean(ish) at least. Still, I was not tempted by the next morning’s buffet breakfast (€7), which seemed to comprise self-serve filter coffee and two slices of white bread.
On the way back into town, I read that the Belgian government recently announced it was phasing out the use of hotels for asylum seekers. The implication was they were too luxurious for the “humane yet modest” accommodation to which the government remained committed. But in this case at least, I can confirm, reports of luxury were overstated.
