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DoChara's Ireland Blog
Random Writings about Ireland and the Irish
Tuesday
April 3 2007
No Smoking - Three Years Later
Time was when an evening in an Irish pub meant a dense smoky atmosphere and smelly clothes the following morning. When the smoking ban was introduced just over 3 years ago it seemed incomprehensible that it would actually work, that pubs would have clean air and you would actually be able to see from one side of them to the other. Then we just got used to it.
Some publicans will say it has had a detrimental effect on business, though few of their now much healthier staff are complaining. It has changed some things though. Beer gardens, albeit often no more than fairly miserable yards with a lone patio heater, have become a commonplace, with hard core smokers determinedly sitting outdoors even in sub-zero temperatures. Restaurant tables on pavements have ceased to be a purely Summer phenomenon and are now available, and occupied, all year round.
Image by GrahamElle
Pass though any town or city, especially in the evening, and most pubs will have small groups standing outside their doors having a quick puff. Romances have begun when smokers met in this way.
But the most remarkable thing is how unremarkable it now seems. I remember being in the US in the late nineties and thinking it bizarre that people uncomplainingly went outside to smoke. Recently in the UK I was in a pub and found it equally weird that people didn't. But that's changing too. Scotland banned smoking indoors a year ago, the Welsh are about to do so this week and England will follow in September.
Maybe one day they will all follow the example of Bhutan, the only country in the world so far to have banned smoking and the sale of cigarettes completely.
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