Amir's Delights was created as an alternative to Dublin's dominant coffee culture - vacillating between badly made instant and a Starbucks on every corner. Occupying a corner shop in Blooms Lane near Ormond Quay in the still new-ish (and definitely not organically grown) "Italian Quarter", it adds some North African lustre to the multicultural area. A Tunisian twist, to be precise, situated between the Italian cafés, the Korean supermarket, a Turkish foodstore and a shop selling beanbags. Yet it is a world of its own ...
... which you notice when you enter and some guys are sharing a hookah pipe. Is this legal? Isn't there a smoking ban? My questions are countered by a smile and the explanation, that in this café Tunisian law applies. Not really though - the hookahs (called chisha شيشة here) don't use tobacco and only tobacco is covered by the smoking ban. So, why not fire a bubbly pipe up yourself, for € 10, in Amir's Delights?