Ireland

So time is flying. Literally. I feel like I have spent no time in the city of Prague. The first month took forever but since February I can’t seem to find a down moment. I don’t mind though, every now and again I have taken a “personal day” and done nothing but watched tv shows (ie. the office and weeds, I have finished all of the seasons I can get my hands on) or read a book or taken a nap. School is finally picking up too. It seems like everything at the same time, as always. Funny how that works… But with midterms now taken care of, I just have to worry about a final photo project and paper and a presentation and paper on The Joke by Milan Kundera, which I wanted to read anyway. I still don’t feel as though I am attending school. The situation with classes here is so bizarre and unlike any school setting that it’s hard to actually believe you are in college. Basically I have class on Monday and Thursday, but all day. Having Friday’s off is super nice and allows for some generous time to travel..leading to my next topic, Ireland.

Dublin is awesome. I really liked the city, and I recently learned that Ireland has the most “wealth” among the countries using the Euro (we just had a guest lecturer lecture us about the EU and its economy…it felt like macro economics all over again so naturally I tuned most of it out). Anyway, the trip was good, started off a little rough but overall excellent. Our plane was delayed leaving Prague by 2 hours, so instead of leaving at 8 we left at 10:30 pm. We passed the time in the airport fine, and finally took off. But just as we got to cruising altitude I felt the pangs of vomit rumbling in my stomach. I excused myself to the bathroom and was sick. I thought I felt better, but was sadly mistaken. Three more trips to the bathroom and I decided to sit in the back of the plane near it. Once I had nothing left in my stomach I thought I was good, but I was sadly mistaken. The flight was relatively smooth and I ate the same thing as Charlotte and she didn’t get sick, so it wasn’t something I ate. At this point I wanted to tell them to turn the plane around and take me back to Prague but I had to persevere (there’s my tenacious attitude, dad). I muster my strength and we’re the last people off the plane. Loaded with barf bags, we find a taxi and, after a very expensive taxi ride, we make it to the hostel (Globetrotters/The Townhouse on Lower Gardenier St.). It is now 2 am and the room is freezing (side note* I forgot PJ’s so I slept in my jeans) but I was so tired I just went to sleep.

The next morning I woke up feeling weak but not sick, which was good because we had a lot to do in Dublin. We got breakfast at the hostel and set out to see the sights. Trinity College and the Book of Kells, The National Archive of Photography, The National Photography Gallery and numerous cafe’s and random statues along the way. The weather was quite unpredictable as well. One minute it was pouring, the next it was sunny and hot. Very strange, not something we get in the states. We also did a lot of shopping (it’s cheaper than Prague and I found some great things) and saw a rainbow! Over a bridge! It was the biggest rainbow I have ever seen and also the brightest, each color was easily identifiable. No, we did not find a leprechaun or a pot of gold at the end of it, so please spare the jokes (Dad).

That evening we signed up to do a bus tour of the Wicklow Mountains and Powerscourt Gardens. We decided on the bus tour because the weather was so unpredictable that we didn’t want to get stuck outside in the rain, but wanted to see some more of Ireland besides Dublin. The tour was fabulous… It was nice to see the southern shores (cute little beach towns) and the mountains. Not only was it green, it ended up being sunny some of the time!  The Powerscourt Gardens are an old house and its gardens from the 13th century (http://www.powerscourt.ie/). There we had a great lunch (probably the best chocolate cake I’ve eaten in a while) and walked around the gardens and got to see the pet cemetery before it started down pouring. On the route back we went a different route through the mountains and saw a wedding going on at an old church that has a wait list for weddings that is two years long! Sign up now. As you can image the tour guide made many many many MANY jokes about his mother-in-law and marriage. Naturally this went over very well with the foreigners, I suppose marriage is something to joke about in any culture. The group really enjoyed it. After that we returned to the hostel and relaxed for a little. By this point the weather was nice again so we walked around some more, found somewhere to eat and then went to Porterhouse Pub (very large, touristy and very expensive, 4.5 euro for a small beer) but they brewed 10 of their own beers which is nice.

Sunday our flight out was in the afternoon so we only had a few hours in the morning. We went to the Modern Art Gallery (which was free and had a cool reconstruction of Francis Bacon’s studio) and the Writer’s Museum (including a free audio tour with the price of admission) because we couldn’t find the James Joyce Cultural Center). After that we got some lunch and ran into the stinky boys who were staying in our room at the hostel then left. Goodbye Dublin, I will see you again.

It was weird to be around people who were speaking ENGLISH! It’s funny how much I zone out on the trams here in Prague because I can’t understand anyone, but there it was good to overhear people’s conversations about what they did today, or how the weather was. Also Irish people are just friendly. Everyone was ready to help if we needed it and were polite.

This weekend it’s off to London to visit Katie who was here in Prague a few weeks ago. I leave early Friday morning and return Sunday evening. Next weekend we have a program trip to Budapest, which I’m really excited for, and then my family comes to visit, then Kelly and I satiate our love of traveling together in Bracelona, then my program ends and my friend Elsa comes to visit and then I leave! It’s all happening…