There are many strange aspects to today's New Zealand Herald travel feature on the GAA. I'm not talking about the cringey stereotypes about our beery race. Those - like the ones in the intro - are to be expected.
Let's get one thing clear straightaway: the hurling featured in the museum beneath Croke Park has no connection with Dublin's 1000 pubs or the nearby Guinness Storehouse. In Ireland, hurling is a sport, not the result of too many pints of liquid velvet - although the one has doubtless led to the other on the odd occasion during the game's 1500-year history.
What's weird to me is that journalist Pamela Wade, in investigating the rites of the GAA community, spends her time discussing the 2009 Kerry-Cork All-Ireland football final as if it were played just a few weeks ago. In any event, she seems to have been won over by the whole event.
