Well folks, we arrived safely in Dublin, Ireland on Saturday,and we have already had an eventful few days!
Before I go into too much detail about life in the city, I wanted to tell you a little bit about our trip from Stratford to Dublin. Before we ventured over to Dublin, we stopped at Conwy Castle in Conwy, Wales. (Yes,the a is intentionally absent.) The Welsh language struggles a little bit with vowels, as you can tell. King Edward I of England built the castle in the later part of the 13th century as he sought to subdue the Welsh. The Castle was fairly interesting, and there is a whole string of them along the border. The castle ruins were SO much fun to explore! For you Anderson folks, imagine the Kidventure Playground at the Civic Center, in the form of an 800-year-old castle where real English monarchs once lived! The castle extended in a mile-long wall enclosing the town of Conwy, so we walked around the wall and admired the wonderful view from the top of the stone spires…despite the cold, rainy weather, it was a wonderful experience that felt like a step back in time! From Conwy, we went to Holyhead, Wales and boarded a ferry bound for Ireland. Although it was initially fairly overcast, the sun began to shine brightly as we got closer and closer to Ireland! It seemed like a good omen for our next few weeks ahead. Stratford to Wales to Ireland- all in one day!! Whew, we were exhausted to say the least!
On Saturday night, we got settled in Trinity College (our home for the next little while) and went out to grab some dinner and explore a little bit of Dublin. Dublin is a lively city that seems to blend the past and the modern well. As many of you doubtlessly know, the Irish economy experienced a remarkable amount of growth in recent years (Celtic Tiger), and its prosperity is on display. However, signs of its recent economic downturn are also apparent. Our first night in Dublin went well, and it was actually one of my favorite parts of the trip so far. However, I will let Julie have the pleasure of sharing that portion of the evening with y’all. Why thank you Thomas! Saturday night… Wow. Such a great memory. It was around 10 pm, we were all pretty tired and all VERY hungry from a long day of travelling, so we headed out of the college and down the street, where we were immediately surrounded by the bright lights and noises of a Saturday night in Dublin. We had no idea where we were going, but Brian heard some interesting music coming from one street so naturally we followed the sounds down that street and came upon a group of interesting young Dubliners. They were probably around high school age, and they were all dancing and singing in the street while a small band of young people were playing guitars and singing on the other side of the street. They were playing some familiar songs and they looked like they were having so much fun, so naturally we wanted to join in their excitement. SO, being Furman students from South Carolina, our first reaction was to go join in the dancing by breaking out some swing dance moves. And so we did. Is swing dancing acceptable in Ireland? I don't know, but we did it anyway, and we had SO much fun! We were literally swing dancing in the streets of Dublin at 10:00 at night, singing along to songs like "Don't Stop Believing" and "Wonderwall" with a group of young Irish people (who probably thought we were CRAZY, but then they started trying to copy our swing dance moves with each other, so we think we might have started a new craze), and it was just truly a magical moment...one of those times when you stop and ask yourself, "Is this real life?" I am sure that the memory of that night will be one of my favorite memories of this whole trip! J
The next morning we woke up early to go to a service at St. Patrick’s Cathedral. Although our St. Patrick’s in New York is Catholic, Dublin’s St. Patrick’s is Protestant. The service was beautiful and a Bishop delivered an excellent sermon rebutting some of the claims from the World Atheist Convention, which was just held in Dublin. Traditionally, Ireland has been a devoutly religious country, but in recent years, religious identification has declined.
Today (Monday), we explored some museums around the city. We went to Trinity’s library, and we saw the Book of Kells. The Book of Kells is the first four Gospels of The New Testament written by Celtic Monks in 800 A.D. It was remarkable to see it, and it revealed a lot about early Irish history. We also went into the Long Room of Trinity’s library, and it was absolutely phenomenal. Photography wasn’t allowed inside, but it was perhaps the most beautiful library I have ever seen. We also went to an exhibit on William Butler Yeats, and it proved to be interesting. I saw a hand written draft of “The Second Coming”, which I actually recited for our class this morning. This afternoon, we made the obligatory pilgrimage to the Guinness Storehouse (Factory). Although I will let Julie describe the trip more fully, I will share a few thoughts. First of all, I am astonished that they have a multi-story museum dedicated to one type of beer. It’s mildly absurd. I can also say that a Brewery is not the most exciting outing for someone who abstains from alcohol. Anyway, if any of you are diehard Guinness fans, I apologize for my offense. Well, I will start by saying that the Guinness Storehouse is a classic Dublin attraction, one of those you “you have to do it to say you’ve done it” kind of things. So I’m glad to be able to say that I’ve been there and done that! It was crazy to see how they could make such an elaborate and extensive museum just about beer, in fact it was a full SEVEN floors of Guinness history, but I must admit that learning about some of the family history and learning about the beer-making process was interesting...for the first floor. The six floors above that quickly lost my interest so I just strolled around finding random weird facts, such as my (embarrassing) first-time realization that the Guinness Book of World Records is indeed the same Guinness that makes beer. Oops, never put that one together! Anyways, the top of the factory is a circular dome-shaped room surrounded by glass windows that allow you to see the entire span of Dublin so that was pretty cool, and there's also a bar where you can redeem your ticket stub for one free pint of Guinness. Thomas and I both chose not to indulge in our free pints (I was so grossed out by the smell that I knew I would have been grossed out by the taste too), but we enjoyed hanging out with the rest of our group, people-watching, and experiencing some of the classic Irish cultural heritage. :) Here’s a picture illustrating just how Thomas and I felt after FINALLY reaching the top floor of the Guinness factory:
We're off to more adventures in Dublin this week, so we'll be sure to keep you posted!!
Yours Truly,
Thomas and Julie
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