This is your time. You've made it. The Leaving Cert is over, school is over. You're free, liberated by the alien notion that life can actually be enjoyable. But there's one stop left on your map before you tear college a new one. It's a right of passage. A booze-filled, very naked assault on a strip somewhere in Mediterranean Europe.
I remember my Leaving Cert holiday like it was just four years ago. It was. But now, as an incredibly wise 23-year old and a veteran of making a dick of myself on the sun holiday stage, it's time to pass down the lessons my friends and I took with us from 2011. I only wish we knew them at the time.
1) Buy the second cheapest vodka
The €4 700ml bottles of the good stuff will haunt your dreams. Literally. If you're skint, prepare yourself for the most vivid nightmares imaginable - all of which end with yourself being stabbed to death. That extra two bob is worth it.
2) Avoid Rushkinoff
At all costs. The Rushkinoff Cough has claimed the voices of thousands of Irish teenagers, and also contains traces of those insanely lucid nightmares.
3) Don't drink bags of wine
The reason it's so cheap is because it's cooking wine. Believe me, enough of it will break your spirit.
4) Don't bring any clothes you don't want to lose
Hit Penneys hard pre-trip. There's a chance you're coming home stark bollocko.
5) If you do a bungee jump, remember to resurface
In other words, do it with at least two or three of your wits left about you. A friend of mine bungeed so inebriated that he stayed under water for two minutes before someone dove to his aid. Why? According to the man himself, he "forgot" he was under water.
6) Mind where you point your cigarette
If you fag-burn the wrong person's eye in hostile territory, you could wind up eating it.
7) Don't get a Mike Tyson henna too near your debs
They can take up to three weeks to fade, so if your debs is upcoming, don't get a henna on your face. Or if you do, at least try to refrain from scratching if off and infecting your own face.
8) Don't get a henna
Just don't get one at all. They do not look good.
9) Don't get your ears pierced
Seriously, your ears will actually turn green from the sheer filth of the swimming pools.
10) Nah, absolutely do get your ears pierced
Then again, it's just so funny.
11) Don't play the natives in 5-a-side football.
Our Irish route one football has no place on the beaches of Santa Ponsa.
12) If you're in a relationship, don't pass out on the booze cruise
Your relationship will meet a swift end when your mouth is assaulted by some gobby pervert. I miss you, Lisa.
13) Keep your hands in your pockets for the first half hour of the booze cruise
The last thing you need is to be handcuffed to some unbearable prick for what should be one of the best evenings of your life. And you better believe they'll have forgotten their wallet.
14) If you don't get on to the booze cruise, definitely don't try to climb aboard like a pirate
The authorities will beat the hell from you using your own flip-flop.
15) Locate your nearest McDonalds almost immediately upon arrival
You actually might not rely on it as heavily as you'd think, but it's comforting to know that it's there.
16) Avoid your ex at all costs
You've made it through 14 years of times tables and the modh coinniollach. You might both have booked Magaluf before you broke up, but you're there to let loose and embrace your freedom. Don't relapse - you'll make shite of your holiday.
17) Do not do naked backflips into the nightclub pool
I was threatened to have my ass, let's say, 'interfered with' by a pair of Cypriot bouncers.
18) Absolutely get yourself checked by a doctor after you do naked backflips into the nightclub pool
There'll be people romping against the water jets, and your orifices will be exposed to various fluids. Do the math. The only thing you should consider scoring in a nightclub pool is a dose of penicillin.
19) Refrain from checking nightclub Facebook pages for photographs
Let's just say if you go back far enough, there are a number of incriminating images of yours truly in the pool at River Reggae, Ayia Napa. Sometimes when I close my eyes at night I still see my own ass.
20) Do not antagonise your accommodation owner
They will literally shit in your bath and try to fine you for it. And all it can take is a throwaway remark such as "fuck the Welsh!"
21) Do everything in your power to obtain security footage of your accommodation
You will never laugh as hard as when you see video footage of your mate stumbling home, bouncing off walls and collapsing in the door balls naked. Another fine. Or reliving the sheer romance of making a potential sex guest climb in the window because someone else has the key to the apartment. Which reminds me:
22) Leave a key out
Key. Just agree on one discreet spot, and leave the key there each night. Nothing ruins the mood like having to climb in a window. And finally:
23) Look out for each other
It might sound a bit cliché and grandad-ish, but whatever.
Such is the nature of the 6th year holiday beast, not everyone will return home every night. But carry out the odd head count, and if someone is missing for three days, make a few calls. They could be locked in a church off their heads on sacramental wine or, worse still, might accidentally have gotten married. Mind yourselves out there.
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