So is Ireland. Last year its economy grew about 10 percent, the Foreign Ministry said — the seventh consecutive year of expansion. And Dublin, which as London’s quaint second cousin had long been more used to bust than boom, is evolving into a fast-paced, multicultural European city, with over half of its 1.1 million residents under 30. Most of them now have jobs and money to burn, too.

”Ten years ago the average young Irish person’s dream was to go to New York and win a green card,” said Ailish Cantwell, marketing director of the Clarence Hotel, a trendy Temple Bar spot founded in 1996 by Bono and U2′s lead guitarist, the Edge.

The party in Dublin seems to have supplanted that dream. The Celtic Tiger, the big boom is called. And the best time to hear it roar is at night, as the newly moneyed hordes converge on clubs, lounges and hotel lobby bars to feed it.