Today there is a big celebration of St. Patrick's Day going on in Trafalgar Square. We got a brief glimpse of it as we exitted the National Gallery, which overlooks the square. Green and orange, hats, clothes and flags, Celtic music, Celtic dancing, beer, beer, beer, and trash, trash, trash are my overwhelming first impressions. The English have a weird relationship with this holiday. In truth, we haven't quite worked it out. On the one hand, any excuse for a party is welcomed, and there were plenty of people celebrating downtown. But there is, nonetheless, a hesitancy when you ask people about St. Patrick's Day. At best, they are apt to vaguely reply, "Well, it's important to the Irish." Inherent in that statement is a suggestion that the holiday is not only important to the English, they're about half convinced that something about it is downright offensive. Thus, you have the headline of today's Sunday Express Newspaper focusing not on the historical linkages between these these two island nations seperated by a sea but rather on the fact that security is being increased around the Princes William and Harry out of fear that they may be targets for IRA extremists. Given that neither Laura's nor Scott's heritage is Irish, we're really not sure how to celebrate on Tuesday. We'll probably have to settle for (Danish) beer in a green bottle and (American) Pringles in a green can and call it good.
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