The English Market in Cork

Mr. O’Connor has invited Mr. Lynch and me to join him and a few others for lunch at the English Market in Cork. Shall we say about one? Fine, fine, says Mr. Lynch. How do we find it? Not a problem, says Mr. O’Connor. It’s not such a big town. Just ask about when you get there.

But setting down our car is a problem. There is no parking in Cork. None that we can see. We cross back and forth over the River Lee, get stuck in god’s own traffic jam along St. Patrick’s Street, Mr. Lynch cursing as motorcyclists zoom dangerously around our blind side and lorries honk their horn at our slow pace. Just look for a goddamn parking sign, Mr. Lynch shouts, or we’re going to end up going in circles all afternoon long.

There’s one! I tell him, pointing at a round blue sign with a P just before another bridge going over the river. Mr. Lynch lurches to the left, illegally, more horns blaring, pedestrians staring at us, and we follow several more signs until we end up in some lot several stories high on the edge of a shopping mall. Thank god, says Mr. Lynch, the engine off, sweating, breathing heavily, hands still on the wheel of the car.

No map. No idea where we are or where the English Market might be. Out on the street Mr. Lynch accosts an old woman pushing a small shopping cart in front of her. I’m sorry to bother you but could you possibly tell us in what direction we should head to find the English Market. She takes his arm in her bony hand. Come with me, she says. Oh, no, says Mr. Lynch. That isn’t necessary. Maybe you could just point us in the proper direction.

Nonsense. You’d get lost in a moment. Better I should take you there. It’s no problem. Down the street, up an alley, down another, and suddenly there we are: Standing in front of the English Market.

Remarkable, says Mr. Lynch as our guide leaves us. Can you imagine anyone in New York doing that? Absolutely not, I say. They’d pretend they’d never even heard of it even if they’d lived next door to the place for twenty years. It’s true, it’s true, says Mr. Lynch.

We’re early. Not yet noon. So we have a bit of a walkabout in the market which is chock-a-block with the most gorgeous colleens I’ve seen anywhere in Ireland. One fair lass with strawberry hair and pale green eyes is grilling up fresh sausages. Reminds me that the only thing we’ve had to eat today are the several glasses of whiskey in Midleton. Can I buy you a sausage, I ask Mr. Lynch. Might ruin lunch, he says, waving me off. Well, I’m getting one, if you don’t mind. Not at all. Go ahead.

The colleen smiles at me as she uses her tongs to flip the roasting grilled meat. What kind would you like? says she. There’s white pudding and black pudding and breakfast sausages and…

Whichever you think is the best, I say.

She grabs a fat beefy boy grilled all brown and delicious and puts it on a stick, wraps it in butcher paper. Mustard with that? Yes, please. Tell me, I say. Do they intentionally hire all the prettiest girls in Ireland to work at the English Market? She laughs lightly without looking at me. One euro, please. I give her a coin. She hands over the hot sausage. I take a small bite of the steaming meat and still it burns my tongue. It’s lovely, isn’t it, she says, daubing at her milky skin with the back of her hand. It is, I tell her. Very lovely indeed.