Day 4: Rosslare Harbour

I left Dublin at 10:00am with my rental car and headed south along the east coast. Within 30-minutes the weather went from gorgeous sunshine to heavy drizzle and thick fog with very poor visibility.

Unfortunately, I was unable to see any of the gorgeous scenery or make any of my planned stops on the way to Rosslare Harbour.

The rain stopped just as I was pulling into the Ferryport House B&B but the fog is so thick that the sea is yet to be seen. Rosslare Harbour is just under 63 nautical miles across the St. George's Channel from Fishguard in Great Britain. St. Georges Channel is between the Irish Sea and Celtic Sea.

Visits to the Wicklow Mountains, the Glendalough Monastic Site, the ruins of Selskar Abbey, and several castles, all remain on my to-do list for the future.

The good news is that I quickly became at ease driving "on the wrong side of the road" and have conquered my fear of the dreaded round-abouts!

This miserable day left me B&B bound for the evening and with quiet solitude to ponder something that has been on my mind since crossing “The Pond”. One cannot be in Ireland for more than a few hours without hearing the words Feck and Fuck from just about everyone! Now, being a New Yorker, I am quite accustomed to the later. But, I was really at a loss to understand the difference between Fuck and Feck. Is Feck like Gaelic for Fuck?

My grandfather was as Irish as Irish could be and I spent a lot of time with him as a child. He was more than my grandfather, he was my best friend when I was a kid. I can’t ever recall him saying Feck. I heard him say Fuck many times. Like when we went fishing and a fish got off his or my hook. And, when he was sitting for me and my brothers when our parents were out at night and I’d be allowed to stay up way late with him watching Streets of San Francisco and other TV series. He’d see my parents car head lights pull in and he’d say “Fuck, they’re home, run to bed!”. And, when I beat him at checkers (even when he was teaching me how to beat him). And, especially when I spent a Saturday afternoon at his retirement home playing against other residents while he “coached” me and I would occasionally lose, he’d mumble a “Fuck!”

So, while sitting alone with my bowl of soup in the B&B pub and looking out the big windows at fog soup, I chatted up the barman and asked him what "Feck" is all about?

He explained that Feck is a popular minced oath in Ireland, occupying ground between the ultra-mild expletive “flip”, like “flip the bird”, and the often taboo (but also very popular) fuck.

It’s strongly associated with Irish speech.

The most familiar modern use of feck is as a euphemistic substitute for fuck, as in the phrases: Feck! Feck off! Feck it! Feck-all! Fecker! Feck(ed) up! (I think that means drunk but I still need clarification). Fair Fecks! (kudos). Feck(‘s) sake! Fecked! (exhausted, ruined, in a bad situation. And the intensifier Feckin’ or Fecking, which often collocates with eejit, hell, gobshite or some such insult.

Feck and fuck do not overlap entirely. Feck is “family-friendly”, even according to advertising standards authorities (though not always). As expletives go, it has a playful, unserious feel. People who are genuinely furious – as opposed to merely annoyed – or who want to be properly abusive, tend not to use Feck: it just isn’t forceful enough.
There are significant differences between Feck and Fuck aside from their relative strengths as curses. For one thing, Feck doesn’t have sexual uses or connotations. To Feck something in Hiberno-English generally means to steal it or to throw it, often impatiently or casually.

The word got a boost from its recurrent use in the 1990s TV comedy Father Ted, in which Father Jack shouts “Feck off!” regularly enough to make it a catchphrase. I started watching some of the series recently and Father Jack reminds me in some ways of a priest I lived with, Father…. Never mind, I shouldn’t reveal his name.

Ah, Feck it! He’s dead. He was one of my favorite priests and an adopted grandfather of sorts, Sicilian born Father Viti Turci. We’d have long and deep conversations while I was in formation and when he was tired or just done he’d always say; “Ah, Stevie, Son of bitch! Fuck it!” Followed by pounding his fist in the air.

All I know is that Ireland is a really Feckin special place. Even on days like this when the weather just Feckin sucks! And, I’m super Feckin proud of my grandfather and ancestors for being a big Feckin part of making it Feckin Free!

Hopefully the weather will improve by tomorrow and I’ll have less time to think about this kind of Feckin stuff.

Tomorrow I will drive south-west to the Village of Kinsale and check out Cork City along the way.