A night out

The last drinking night before Ramadan, and the bar was heaving. Wherever you go in the world, will you always find an Irish bar?

I went with a few of my colleagues to the Irish Bar. There was much talk beforehand about how women here never need to pay for a drink here because men are so desperate for female company. Personally, I find the idea of never standing my round rather unsettling. I certainly can't manage the sang-froid required to accept a drink and then turn my back on the donor - apparently a perfectly normal sequence of events. I don't really think that any of us are quite at that stage. However, there is a bit of fair play maybe in the fact that men often can't get into a bar without a woman, so a drink seems to them small price to pay for entry.

Well, I can only say that there is something in the desperate men theory - even I managed to get chatted up. Yes, by a straight man who did actually realise that I'm a woman. I've a feeling we even danced. What is the world coming to?