Eoin
(This was originally posted in my blog I started after I moved to Ireland. It was originally written in Hungarian.)
Monday, 13 February, 2012
Of course we find it sexy when a woman, who stayed for a night, not quite planned and prepared, puts on some clothes from the man's wardrobe. A shirt, or a tee, maybe a boxer. In an event like this, the ones who care more about the hygiene feel grateful if they find an unopened set of underclothes. The following little story highlights that this is not the only reason we might want to keep some unopened boxes of boxers at home. Supposedly we care about others...
The situation was so cliche, that I wouldn't believe if it was told by someone else. A comedy in the theaters, a farce would start with a scene like this. But here, in the four hundred-something apartment building's random core's second floor, the man who wreathed his throat behind me, was quite irrational.
This Sunday I made a quick shopping. So it was just a few minutes past nine. When I exited the elevator, I didn't see anybody on the floor. Ten seconds later when I was about to open the front door of my apartment, he was standing right behind me, wearing one, a way too short, and probably woman's coat, and tried to make some human-like sound with his mouth.
For a looooooong moment he was looking for his voice, and I was looking for the language. It happens when my mind grinds on things, it does it in Hungarian, and it makes it really hard to say anything in English. While we were both struggling, I ran my eyes through him. He was Irish. I knew it before he said a word. The curly hair all on his body gave it away. And I was unfortunate enough to see the hair on most of is body: on his crossed feet, on the shins, tights, chest, and head. He was able to pull the tiny white coat as close as possible on his fore-chest, but it wasn't big enough to let him to button it up. I am not lying, he looked very miserable, lost, and confused.
I thought he locked out himself from his flat, but the reality was even more comic. He asked me if I can let him make a call from my phone. While I extended my arm towards to him, offering my mobile, he explained to me that he had no idea why he's almost naked, what's happened on the previous night, and where the heck he was. So he asked me our whereabouts. Now there is a joke, it goes like "A man with a bad hangover asks a random person what year is it? Not the day, the month... the year." My guy was the same. I started with Sandyford. He shook his head. So I quickly added "Dublin South." Another shake. I mentioned the LUAS. No bells rang. I started making a list of all the known schools, parks, pubs, churches I knew around, but I didn't lit any sparks in his red-veined eyes.
During our pleasant but fruitless discussion he called two numbers. No answer. During a whole year spent in Ireland I noticed that the Dublin can't wake up until 10-11 on Sundays. His friends were no excuses. So we ended up in a situation that already started forming in my mind a few minutes ago, but I wasn't sure if I really wanted to go down on that way. Please, dear reader, don't get me wrong. I tend to help people. But a few bad experience, and my studies in sociopsichology made me very skeptical. After 15 minutes of talking to this skinny man, who were standing in the corner of the corridor, barefoot, and bare-almost-everything, I still wasn't sure that he was not playing a game on me. He could be a criminal, wanting to enter my apartment. Or a sociology-student, who's making a research in the helping-willingness of the XXI. people. As a final beg, he told me that he's tried to ask for help at other doors, but they chased him away. He doesn't want any problem. He asked for some clothes and for another phone call.
I don't want to waste my readers (is there any?) time with the details of the next forty minutes. In general: I decided to believe him, and gave him everything from shoes to jacket. (The underwear was original in its box.) And money. Because he kindly tried to make an agreement with the taxi company, first promising the travel free at the destination, then giving them his credit card number - nota bene, he had no idea where he was, but he knew a lot of phone numbers and his card details by heart - they wanted cash only.
I think the most important part of the story happened in the next half an hour. We spent the time we waited for the cab with a jolly conversation. And I have to tell, after a whole year in this country, this was the first real, informal talk with someone. Not at work, not with colleagues, not with a clerk in a bureau, not in a shop... Excellent. Even if the circumstances were comic.
I mentioned farce (my favourite genre of stage plays) in the beginning. A play like that would enlarge and enrich the story. Make it unbelievably bombastic. For example while bringing the clothes for him, I lock myself out from the apartment, and/or enters a very strong and very angry man, asking my "new friend" what he's doing in his wife's white jacket, and other cliches. Or more naked men. The real life conclusion was moderate and solid. The taxi took Eoin away. In the late afternoon he returned with all my clothes in a bag (including the boxer, that I asked him to keep, but he kindly let me to throw it away) and all the world's thanks in his eyes. He gave me a card and tried to give twice amount the money I lent him. I refused it and thankfully he was not too persuasive. 50 bucks is 50 bucks for everyone.
Then he left. All that remained is a name I never heard before - Eoin -, a phone number, a face, and a promise that they'll call me if there's a party around. But I'm going to give it a pass, for sure. I don't want to wake up in an unknown corridor wearing one single white coat.
Monday, 13 February, 2012
Of course we find it sexy when a woman, who stayed for a night, not quite planned and prepared, puts on some clothes from the man's wardrobe. A shirt, or a tee, maybe a boxer. In an event like this, the ones who care more about the hygiene feel grateful if they find an unopened set of underclothes. The following little story highlights that this is not the only reason we might want to keep some unopened boxes of boxers at home. Supposedly we care about others...
The situation was so cliche, that I wouldn't believe if it was told by someone else. A comedy in the theaters, a farce would start with a scene like this. But here, in the four hundred-something apartment building's random core's second floor, the man who wreathed his throat behind me, was quite irrational.
This Sunday I made a quick shopping. So it was just a few minutes past nine. When I exited the elevator, I didn't see anybody on the floor. Ten seconds later when I was about to open the front door of my apartment, he was standing right behind me, wearing one, a way too short, and probably woman's coat, and tried to make some human-like sound with his mouth.
For a looooooong moment he was looking for his voice, and I was looking for the language. It happens when my mind grinds on things, it does it in Hungarian, and it makes it really hard to say anything in English. While we were both struggling, I ran my eyes through him. He was Irish. I knew it before he said a word. The curly hair all on his body gave it away. And I was unfortunate enough to see the hair on most of is body: on his crossed feet, on the shins, tights, chest, and head. He was able to pull the tiny white coat as close as possible on his fore-chest, but it wasn't big enough to let him to button it up. I am not lying, he looked very miserable, lost, and confused.
I thought he locked out himself from his flat, but the reality was even more comic. He asked me if I can let him make a call from my phone. While I extended my arm towards to him, offering my mobile, he explained to me that he had no idea why he's almost naked, what's happened on the previous night, and where the heck he was. So he asked me our whereabouts. Now there is a joke, it goes like "A man with a bad hangover asks a random person what year is it? Not the day, the month... the year." My guy was the same. I started with Sandyford. He shook his head. So I quickly added "Dublin South." Another shake. I mentioned the LUAS. No bells rang. I started making a list of all the known schools, parks, pubs, churches I knew around, but I didn't lit any sparks in his red-veined eyes.
During our pleasant but fruitless discussion he called two numbers. No answer. During a whole year spent in Ireland I noticed that the Dublin can't wake up until 10-11 on Sundays. His friends were no excuses. So we ended up in a situation that already started forming in my mind a few minutes ago, but I wasn't sure if I really wanted to go down on that way. Please, dear reader, don't get me wrong. I tend to help people. But a few bad experience, and my studies in sociopsichology made me very skeptical. After 15 minutes of talking to this skinny man, who were standing in the corner of the corridor, barefoot, and bare-almost-everything, I still wasn't sure that he was not playing a game on me. He could be a criminal, wanting to enter my apartment. Or a sociology-student, who's making a research in the helping-willingness of the XXI. people. As a final beg, he told me that he's tried to ask for help at other doors, but they chased him away. He doesn't want any problem. He asked for some clothes and for another phone call.
I don't want to waste my readers (is there any?) time with the details of the next forty minutes. In general: I decided to believe him, and gave him everything from shoes to jacket. (The underwear was original in its box.) And money. Because he kindly tried to make an agreement with the taxi company, first promising the travel free at the destination, then giving them his credit card number - nota bene, he had no idea where he was, but he knew a lot of phone numbers and his card details by heart - they wanted cash only.
I think the most important part of the story happened in the next half an hour. We spent the time we waited for the cab with a jolly conversation. And I have to tell, after a whole year in this country, this was the first real, informal talk with someone. Not at work, not with colleagues, not with a clerk in a bureau, not in a shop... Excellent. Even if the circumstances were comic.
I mentioned farce (my favourite genre of stage plays) in the beginning. A play like that would enlarge and enrich the story. Make it unbelievably bombastic. For example while bringing the clothes for him, I lock myself out from the apartment, and/or enters a very strong and very angry man, asking my "new friend" what he's doing in his wife's white jacket, and other cliches. Or more naked men. The real life conclusion was moderate and solid. The taxi took Eoin away. In the late afternoon he returned with all my clothes in a bag (including the boxer, that I asked him to keep, but he kindly let me to throw it away) and all the world's thanks in his eyes. He gave me a card and tried to give twice amount the money I lent him. I refused it and thankfully he was not too persuasive. 50 bucks is 50 bucks for everyone.
Then he left. All that remained is a name I never heard before - Eoin -, a phone number, a face, and a promise that they'll call me if there's a party around. But I'm going to give it a pass, for sure. I don't want to wake up in an unknown corridor wearing one single white coat.
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