Where once only the rich and Aer Lingus air hostesses shopped in New York at Christmas, now the rest of us are off to spend our cash. Orna Mulcahy joins the rush
'It's a bit like the bus to Newry in the old days," says one woman, and those who remember the old days laugh and agree, though it isn't really like the bus to Newry when all you were expecting to buy across the Border were children's clothes, cheap butter and maybe an Eccles cake or two. Flight EI105 to New York is similar only in that it is all women, a henhouse in the air.
Almost. There are about 10 men cowering in their seats but the other 300 are women of all ages, whose sensible shoes and warm jackets suggest they are going to hit the ground running.
"We'll do Ground Zero and Century 21 first," says another lady to her two pals, as they fasten their seatbelts for the five-hour flight to shopping paradise. Handbags bulge with addresses of shops that have to be visited, everyone's dress and shoe sizes, the timetable of the bus from Port Authority to Woodbury Common in New Jersey with its 220 designer discount stores and dog-eared copies of Angela Phelan's candy pink guide to discount shopping, So New York .
Wallets strain with dollars. The massive suitcases stacked in the hold are empty, or packed - Russian-doll style - with more cases inside, and a couple of spare sets of underwear. Sure if we need more clothes we can buy them.
Ireland may have more shopping centres than ever before, but the annual pilgrimage to 5th Avenue just keeps growing. Where once only the rich and Aer Lingus air hostesses shopped in New York, now the rest of us are off to spend our cash, having been told we're being ripped off at home.
The girl across the aisle has never been to New York, doesn't need to buy anything in particular, but, it's like this, if she sees something she likes she isn't going to deny herself.
The feel-good factor is high and conversation centres on the best places for shoes, furs and homeware, and any advice you want about electronic goods. A veteran New York shopper, on her second trip since November, gives precise directions to Canal Street for the knock-off handbags and sunglasses while next to her, a group are wondering if they really will have time for a Broadway show if there's late-night shopping.
The 10.30am flight from Dublin is ideal. With a quick cab into Manhattan for $45 (€38), you can be checked in, showered and back on the street by 2.30pm local time.
Girls, it's all about the right footwear from here on in. The wrong shoes and your hooves will be in agony. And don't bring a heavy coat. The shops are like ovens, the streets like ice. New Yorkers wear down-filled coats or jackets from North Face and cute hats, though any hat will do as the temperature plunges. Those who don't mind looking like a housewife from the Midwest trail a wheelie suitcase behind them to carry the bags, getting stuck occasionally in the revolving doors.
THE BAGS THEMSELVES are an issue. "You can't be seen with those!" says Esther, the elderly sales lady at a make-up counter in Barneys department store on Madison Avenue where this year the windows are filled with puppets of the British royal family. Tsk tsking at my red complexion - "You like wine?" - she clearly feels my cargo from Old Navy and Bed Bath & Beyond is lowering the tone.
"Here, let's get you a proper bag," and she decants all my purchases into a smart navy-blue Barneys' carrier bag covered in coronets. "Thaaat's better . . . " It does feel better walking into Fred's on the top floor, the ultimate cafe for ladies who lunch where you can have eggs benny and coffee for, oh, about 60 bucks a head.
And rubber neck all you like for free. Last time my friends were here they had Mayor Giuliani on one side and Yoko Ono on the other. As Sarah Jessica Parker once told Vanity Fair, "if you work hard and you're a nice person you get to go shopping at Barneys. It's the decadent reward." Indeed.
Next stop Abercrombie & Fitch, where over the deafening din of the music, the sales guy tells me that the weekend after Thanksgiving they took over $1 million at the till. Not surprising since the basic hoodie is $139 (€117). Kids love the washed-out tees and jeans that look as though they have been savaged by a dog.
The queue here is worse than immigration but it beats being out on 5th Avenue where the afternoon crowd is one solid stream of humanity heading for Saks with its glorious white and silver windows, and lights that chime with bells.
On a side street it's: "You want Louis Vuitton, Prada, Fendi?" from the guy with the handcart filled with black plastic sacks as he dodges the police. Can't resist the little-girl imitation Vuitton bags at $20 17) apiece. A few more names off the list.
I leg it across town in my Merrells fur-lined clogs - a tip from a friend in Boston, so cosy, so comfortable - then back to Broadway, to Restoration Hardware, an upscale Crate & Barrell where you can buy home essentials such as cashmere-covered, hot-water bottles, bath pillows, and big gilded initials for $12 (€10) each.
On to Anthropologie, where well-heeled bohos flick through rails of itsy bitsy, lacy garments and stock up on swirly picture frames and arty notepaper.
The next morning I'm at the Empire State Building by 8am when there's no queue and the view from the 86th-floor terrace almost makes up for the biting wind coming in from the sea. "Look, Macy's," says a south county Dubliner to my left. I follow them to queue for the 9am opening.
FIRST STOP IS Macy's visitors' centre, where your passport entitles you to a 11 per cent discount card. Then the MOMA shop. Like the Dublin couple in front of me, I'm too busy this trip to actually visit the famous Museum of Modern Art but not too busy to buy the trinkets. Here are the smartest Christmas cards and calendars, art sets for children and reasonably priced jewellery copied from 18th- and 19th-century masterpieces.
The Irish are everywhere in Macy's. In Polo Ralph Lauren, a Corkman is leaning by the elevators, waiting for his wife and sister to finally decide on sweaters or shirts. In the fur vault, a lady with a broad Kerry accent is falling victim to an ankle-length sheared beaver that would certainly cut a dash in The Park in Kenmare.
Later, in the hell that is Filene's Basement, some sisters from Flight EI105 are rooting through the size-52 men's suits, the Chinese cashmere jumpers and the Calvin Klein underwear, wondering where the hell are the bargains. Like Century 21, they say you can be lucky here but I never have been.
There are no Irish shoppers at the Hell's Kitchen market early the next morning where I hunt for bric-a-brac. Oh to have a container because the art deco cabinets are plentiful and cheap, but surely there's room for some vintage tree decorations at $1 or $2 each, for Irish embroidered linen towels, $24 (€20) for six, and some great 1950s rhinestone jewellery. I leave behind the 100-year-old Pennsylvanian blanket at $75 (€63), the $200 169) fur opera cape and the heavy American flag at $65 (€54).
There's a glorious amount of tat here, but with the temperature near zero the biggest queue is for the chicken soup stall. No Irish either in the thrift shops, but then there are no obvious bargains there, even at the top-rated Sloane Kettering Memorial shop on 2nd Avenue where they keep the fur coats in a cage, and broken down Chanel pumps are on sale at a ludicrous $90 (€76). Good comfy sofas at $150 (€127), if you have that container standing by.
The rush! With only a few hours to go how can you not do Greenwich Village and Bleeker Street where at Marc Jacobs they have a real live Santa in the window, inviting you to call in and sit in his grotto.
Ralph Lauren's tiny boutique here is staffed by three languid girls in pencil slacks and pashminas, none of them quite able to use the till when it comes to my modest purchase.
That's it. The bags are full to bursting. The stash in the wallet is down to single dollar bills, so it's early to JFK for the flighthome. But more temptation to spend, spend spend. The Xpres Spa in the departures hall is fabulous, a walk-in salon with rows of vibrating leather armchairs where you can lie down and have a $25 (€21) foot massage. We do.
The flight home is subdued. There are some anxious faces. Women who perhaps have bought too many pairs of Nine West shoes, or blown everything on an Oscar de La Renta coat with fur collar that is just a bit tight under the arms, or yet again stocked up on things that go straight to the back of the cupboard: cookie cutters, Williams-Sonoma mulling spices, beaded coasters, tree skirts.
I loved it, but, shopping wise, it is a long way to go for a hoodie, a fur handbag, the bric-a-brac and a box of fudge-covered Oreos. Add on the flight, hotel, cab fares, meals, drink and tipping like a maniac, and it's a very expensive weekend, but what the hell. "You Irish are rich right now, aren't you?" as the girl in the Gap said. "Go spend it!"