Ah, the sixth year holiday.
The ritual that every Irish secondary school girl must adhere to and enjoy while simultaneously secretly dreading.
Such fun.
Chances are if you went on a sixth year holiday, you went to somewhere like Magaluf or Santa Ponsa or, if you were really posh, Kos.
It’s even more likely that if you went on a sixth year holiday, most of the following things occurred.
It wouldn’t be a sixth year holiday if they didn’t.
1. Everyone’s wearing the same cheap holiday clothes
Penneys, hun.
Penneys.
2. Someone shifts an awful looking lad and has to spend the remainder of the holiday dealing with her actions
We’ve all got that one friend who gets a little too drunk, gets with some lad(s), and immediately regrets it afterwards.
The only difference is, when you’re on a sixth year holiday, you’ve got to deal with that shit until you’re on the plane home.
Trying to relax by the pool? ‘Remember you shifted that lad?’
Hanging out on the beach? ‘Remember you shifted that lad?’
Struggling to eat your eighth bowl of pasta of the holiday because Italian is the only food Irish people eat when they’re away? ‘Remember you shifted that lad?’
People don’t forget.
3. Fishbowl every night
Every. Night.
4. Club promoters ruining your entire life
We may be on a sixth year holiday Jonathan from Basildon, but believe it or not, we don’t actually want to do shots of sambuca at 2pm on a Tuesday afternoon.
Except we do.
We definitely do.
5. Everyone shifts everyone
On every sixth year holiday it is absolutely customary for a group of Irish girls and a group of Irish lads to get together.
It doesn’t matter where the respective groups are from.
It doesn’t matter if some people aren’t attracted to each other.
It doesn’t even matter if there’s one lad and about seven girls.
These groups will come together and they will remain intertwined until the very end of the holiday thanks to the intimidated power of the shift.
6. All pics taken feature tiled floors and dodgy curtains
Look, it’s not the sixth year holiday if there aren’t a few hundred rustic orange tiles present in every single photograph.
And dodgy curtains.
Always dodgy curtains.
