One of the signs along Oliver Plunkett Streets has taunted me during our many, many walks down the boutique and café-lined street. About one block away from the ever-popular An Brog, An Droghan is marked just by a tan hanging sign advertising traditional music. Though on Tuesday night much of the group calls it quits after the depressing “FML” show, Kelly, Tom, Luke and I decide that we’ll look for a pub off the beaten path, just for one drink. Tonight’s the night to check out An Droghan, I decide, and we make our way across the city center.
The floor space is not much bigger than Harrisonburg’s Jack Brown’s with a couple extra feet at the end where the guitarist has set up for the night. Locals of all ages flock here throughout the week, and the four of us Americans immediately stand out. With pints in hands, we press against the wall to blend in. But that’s the perfect place for people watching, and specimens fill the pub.
Sitting at the end of the bar (right in front of us) is an older man with disheveled white hair. It sticks up in poofs in the front and his wide white eyebrows stand straight above his eyes. I can feel him keep looking at us, moving his eyes up and down our group. I stare back. He continues to talk to the man beside him, who has donned a bright green shirt with silver stripes that looks like a construction worker’s vest (Are those really the colors or is it just because of the lights? Tom says it’s not our imagination.). The men look at us, look at each other, and shake hands. We’ve become the subject of a bet, it seems, and I’m dying to know the details. The bartender points to their almost empty cups and quickly brings them refills: Guinness for man number one, and Carslberg for man number two. When number one looks at me, looks back at a group of younger guys that has walked in, and then winks at me, it’s too much. I have to know their story.
He comes here every night of the week, he tells me. Monday to Friday, the bar features live music, while on the weekends it is disco. “Why do you come here?” I ask. He comes here to sit at this corner of the bar because of the music. A mix of all ages fills the room, and he says that’s typical. I picture him sitting in the same seat night after night, greeting the other regulars that walk in. Even when he leaves, no one dares take his stool in the packed bar. His friend in the green has enjoyed a few too many drinks this evening and draws out his words slowly. But because of his thick accent, low voice and the speakers for the lone guitarist hanging above our heads, I only catch pieces of what he’s trying to say. He doesn’t come here everyday like his friend does because he works. “I love Ireland,” he says. “I do too now!” I exclaim to both, but I don’t think they can here. The language and noise barrier frustrates me, though I’m yearning to hear more of their lives. As I say goodbye, I ask number one what his name is. “You’ll never forget my name because it’s the same as a famous rock and roll artist,” he says. But even after he says it four or five times I can’t understand.
The man just around the corner, in the “man cave” area of the bar where four or five middle-aged men each sit by themselves, struggles with his Guinness. He’s got a glass of what may be Red Bull alongside his pint, and for awhile he slowly alternates sips. But after the second refill of the Guinness that I saw (though he probably had had several prior), it just looked like he was forcing it down his throat. I laugh at his constant stout foam mustache that forms on his upper lip every time he takes a sip. He doesn’t notice though, so it stays. A white rosary hangs from his neck, tucked into the top of his button down striped shirt. We wonder if he’s an immigrant or what his life story is? We’ll never know though, because after Tom finishes his Murphy’s, we leave for the night to walk back down Washington Street.
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