大连的爱尔兰团体 - Dalian's Irish Community

Over the last week I have been reading what I consider an excellent book "The World is Flat" by Thomas Friedman. Amongst things it has totally challenged my concepts of whether I am skilled enough to handle the next 10-15 years of my career, what i can do to make use of the latest information technology that has come along in streams, changed my views on sustainable development and challenged me as to how I will educate any future children. Not bad for one book! READ IT!

Another aspect of this book that I found of interest was that it mentioned Dalian and Ireland amongst other places as shining examples of cities / countries that have embraced the latest technological revolutions and globalisation forces to surge ahead as competitive economies. In fact it helped clarify something that I noticed pretty early on in my stint in Dalian ie that of all the "western" foreigners that are in Dalian, I would say that it would be fair to say that the Irish make up one of the biggest subgroups. What was also surprising for me was that whilst the name "Dalian" rarely registers any form of recognition from Australian friends, it is a well known Chinese city for Irishmen and there seems to have historically been some sort of city to city relationships that has developed this.

My run in with the Irish community here was purely accidental, an Irish classmate did the meet a friend of a friend thing and I ended up meeting a great Irish guy who had lived in Dalian for a number of years, married a local and amongst other things was the captain of the Dalian Wolfhounds Gaelic Football team! Finding out that I had 2 hands 2 feet and could run I was duly invited to a training session to test the water. Although I must admit it wasnt my first preference to play an Irish sport in a Chinese city, the guys were great and allowed me to make up for my two left feet by allowing me to prop up the goals =) My first game out with them saw us play a Shanghai team and we even ended up on TV for a short stint haha. There is apparently an Asian Championship in May next year (yes there are Irish everywhere!!) so that might be something worth getting stuck into for a bit of a laugh.

When I first arrived in China I made a mental note not to make too many English speaking friends as I felt that this might affect how quickly I was able develop my Chinese. However the warmth of this group which has led to other than football, poker nights, Irish bar parties, numerous dinners and the start of a friendship group in Dalian was been an absolute godsend. The latest benefit has been a contact that has enabled us to start looking for a new house. New cities, in new countries with new languages are blardy hard work and yours truly has been truly grateful for what can only be described as a totally random introduction to this great group of people.

上个星期我看完了一本叫《世界是平的》的书。作者是美国人，内容是关于信息技术发展的结果的。随着信息技术的广泛利用，我们的地球越来越‘平’的。发达的信息技术让更多人更容易联系。这本书里面讨论了很重要的话题但是我觉得最有意思的部分是关于大连和爱尔兰的。这本是美国去年的最畅销的书所以当我看到大连的话题我吃了一惊。

因为大连和爱尔兰很重视他们的信息技术，并且这方面也得到了快速的发展，结果这本书关于这个方面写了很多。到大连的时候我也发现大连和爱尔兰的城市有关系。

我偶然间发现了大连的爱尔兰团体。我在大外学习的时候我的爱尔兰同学介绍我和他住在大连的爱尔兰朋友。这个朋友已经住在大连很久了，而且跟本地女孩结婚了。他曾邀请我跟他的爱尔兰足球队一起踢球。那时，我看到了大连的爱尔兰团体。

其实我不太喜欢踢足， 但是因为我原来没有很多朋友，所以当他们邀请我的时候我就接受了。并且，同意跟他们来一场爱尔兰足球比赛。因为我踢球不太好，所以他们让我当守门员。我玩儿得不错，所以比赛以后他们邀请我一起去大连唯一爱尔兰酒吧。

到现在我跟我的爱尔兰的朋友做了很多事情，所以我跟他们越来越熟。他们经常邀请我参加很多活动，比如去踢足球，打牌，聚会，吃饭什么的。而且他们介绍中国朋友帮助我找新的房子。

虽然我没打算找到那么多的外国朋友，但是这个又友好又热情的爱热兰团体让我很感谢。