Today

Proving wrong those who said the Irish boom economy of the late 1990s was a short-lived bubble has been one of Ireland's great pleasures in recent years. The economy was dubbed "The Celtic Tiger" in the international press, and other nations looked on enviously as Ireland decided what to do with its newfound wealth. It verged on silly money, as the E.U. lavished one of its poorest members with subsidies so vast that, at times, the Irish government seemed not to know precisely what to do with it all. Sometimes they made bad decisions -- building bridges, statues, and clocks while traffic in Dublin and Galway City ground to a standstill, brought to inertia by roads too old and narrow to handle the modern traffic. Hospitals crumbled, and parents put their children in private schools, to save them from the inadequacies of the state-funded versions.

In recent years, though, the country seemed to get a handle on its new situation, and poured money into infrastructure -- developing a new tram system in Dublin, and widening roads around the country. Today, the dump truck seems to be the national symbol of Ireland, as the huge vehicles trundle along by the dozen, each carrying tons of gravel and sand to be used for all the building: building new roads, widening old roads, building new houses, expanding old houses, building structures in ugly, boxlike shapes helter-skelter along the edges of old villages, towns, and suburbs that seem to be free of the pesky limitations of zoning ordinances. The chatter of jackhammers forms a constant aural background in virtually every town in the Republic. The sound of hammer hitting nail has replaced the bodhran and tin whistle.

It is, I suppose, the sound of success and progress. But it is changing Ireland rapidly -- has changed Ireland already. Every time I visit a part of the country I haven't seen in a few months, I am astonished by the new apartment complexes and businesses thrown up in the meantime -- so many of them with no character or charm. One worries that architects go begging in Ireland today, as construction companies flourish.

All of this doesn't come cheap, and housing prices in Ireland are shocking. You would pay hundreds of thousands of euro for even the most isolated, unrenovated cottage. To peruse the property pages in the Irish Times is to marvel that anybody can afford to own a home, and many cannot. Property prices have made millions of people millionaires on paper, while making it virtually impossible for young people to buy homes or to live in city centers.

Those who didn't own property before the boom cannot afford to buy now, particularly in Dublin and Galway, where most of the workers come into town every day from small homes in the distant suburbs. This has led to a paradoxical situation familiar to many "wealthy" nations -- wealth has been accompanied by rising crime, drug abuse, and urban homelessness -- but it is new to Ireland, and it has come as a shock.

Added to this is a worrying growth in overall inflation -- in 2006 inflation in Ireland exceeded 4% or double the inflation rate in other European nations such as Germany and Britain. Property prices (combined with soaring fuel costs) were primarily to blame. Is the Irish economic bubble yet to burst? Or has the Celtic Tiger only just hit its stride?

Only time will tell.

Still, it's not all bad news. While the Irish find themselves adjusting to the problems of having, to some extent, too much wealth, they've also relished the biggest side effect of a strong economy -- peace.

In recent years, the violence in the North has calmed, and a recognizable democratic debate grips the land. There is much disagreement still between those who think it should stay as it is -- with the North still under U.K. control, and the Republic fully independent and part of the European Union of nations -- and those who believe it should be united.

There is also still tension between Catholics and Protestants, who are learning not to greet each other's divergent religious views with violence, but who still whisper the words "Catholic" and "Protestant" when talking in a public place. With all of the changes and recent peace, this is still the kind of place where you look over your shoulder when you talk, even in the most inoffensive terms, about religion or Irish politics.

But that is something the Irish themselves seem not even to notice. To them, looking over their shoulders when talking about religion is nothing compared to the past, when they waited for bullets to fly or bombs to explode. For them, this is real democratic peace. There is so much joy in the Republic of Ireland right now about its prosperity -- and a kind of intense pride not seen in this country in some time, about its independence, its strong economy, and its place within the E.U. -- that the North could be forgiven for feeling a bit of jealousy about that. For while the Republic has grown richer, the North has stayed -- at least economically -- the same.

At the moment both the North and the Republic are working through these growing pains, and even when the Irish complain about the changes in their country over the last few years, they do so with a kind of heartwarming pride. Heartwarming because, for so very long, there was little to be proud of in an Ireland torn apart by violence, and perennially threatened by its own intrinsic inability to ever give way, even to itself.

Now the Irish have learned what you will find out for yourself on any visit here, and that is that the new Ireland is not yet incompatible with the old. The country has thus far maintained and preserved its beautiful old buildings and quiet country lanes, while also growing and changing into a place that it can love. It is a difficult -- even tense -- balancing act. Modern new supermarkets stand beside Georgian town houses, and many of the old Irish shops have been replaced by European and British chain stores. But the Irish always find a way to sell their wares in small boutiques and shops around the country, and to make the old new again (one of the most popular Irish chains -- Avoca Weavers -- uses old methods to make intensely modern products from Irish wool and clay).

Yes, the old Irish spirit is still here, beneath its new facade, behind the coffee shops, the juice bars, the pricey restaurants, and expensive cars. You'll find it in the pubs, and when walking in the hills, or sharing a laugh with someone in the post office, or as you stand under an awning in the rain.