Not like James Joyce Characters, but...

The Dubliners

Doing things that Dubliners probably don't do.

Bri, Elizabeth, and I went up to Dublin last Friday after class. We made it to the Big D late in the afternoon, after a very relaxing, albeit delayed, train ride. It was a mild evening; we took the bus from Heuston train station, and then caught a taxi to our hostel. Dublin is much larger than Cork and equally confusing the first time (at least without a map).

We checked into our hostel and then went out for food. We went with the cheap and reliable Quiznos, followed up by an amazing crepe dessert at Half Moon Crepe Company in the Temple Bar neighborhood. We retired early to our 6-bed dorm and woke up to hearing Sam Jones was indeed on his way into the city!

He arrived early Saturday morning, and despite being jet lagged, came out with us to hit up the town for two straight days. It was raining the entire time!

On Saturday, we made it to the National Museum of Archeology. A special display is running about bogs, a major feature of the Irish countryside. Druids, back in the day, used to sacrifice people and animals, or just execute them, by throwing them into bogs. The thing about the moist, marshy area is that it preserves bodies really well, even after hundreds of years. So, we looked at creepy and mostly preserved "bog people" for about an hour.

Then we got food a cute cafe with horrible service, and then went to the National Art Gallery. We went our separate ways to look at what was of interest to us; I spent a half-hour in a portrait gallery filled with pictures of historical figures in Ireland: politicians, writers, musicians, athletes. It was rather enlightening.

We then left and had a wonderful dinner at Hard Rock Dublin. It wasn't very busy, and much more the Hard Rock experience than London. We enjoyed some cocktails and delicious foods that reminded us of home.

Only then were we ready for the next exciting an adventure, a Ghost Tour. It was on the world's only ghost bus, where we sat onboard surrounded by covered windows and red light while traveling the streets of Dublin. Our tour guide, Hannibal Lectur AKA Gary, offered some excellent, theatrical narration, telling us some amazing stories about one of the most haunted cities in Ireland. We made two stops, one to a park that used to be a graveyard, and to a part of the old city wall that rests next to a church. We stopped at the wall near the "forty steps" known to be the most haunted spot in all of Dublin. We did find it rather eerie, but didn't have any exceptional experiences.

It was a great activity and absolutely exhausted us. We were planning to hang out in the hostel, but we got a new roommate that day and he was....well, he was. Needless to say, we crashed around 12:30 and woke up to check out the next morning at 10.

We stored our luggage and did some more exploring. We started at Dublin Castle; a lack of a crowd made it really cool and perfect for self-timing pictures. The Castle used to be the seat of British government in Ireland, and loads of famous protests, executions, and speeches happened in the plaza there. It was kind of cool!

We then traveled to the Dublin Writer's Museum, which showcased one of Ireland's hidden assets: amazing authors. In a refurbished Georgian-style house, we learned about Irish literary history, which really complimented my early start class. We also learned really new details we never thought about before, like: did you know Oscar Wilde was gay? He was married and had two sons, but was prosecuted for "homosexual activities," which he didn't deny. One of his last works, "Des Profundis" was written to his male lover.

Wilde also had an interesting connection to our next stop: the Bram Stoker Dracula Experience. Abram Stoker was born and raised in Dublin, and moved to London to be the business manager of the Lyceum theatre. Although a writer, "Dracula" was his only literary success, and that success came long after he died. The Dracula Experience was a haunted house/museum set up in a family fun center on the outskirts of the city. It was meant to dramatize the characters of the famous novel while giving the Irish author proper recognition in history. We learned lots about Stoker, Dracula, and the characters in that novel. He was good friends with the Wilde family; Stoker's wife was first Oscar Wilde's girlfriend, but she left him for Stoker. Wilde hated Bram after that.

It was a pretty standard haunted house, but included a documentary about Stoker's life and his writing of Dracula, as well as a corridor dedicated to Stoker's life. It was cool!

This brought us to the end of our trip to Dublin; we got a 7 pm train back to Cork and were home before 10.

It was a good trip, and now: SAM JONES IS HERE! We have a day trip planned, but mostly, Sam and I will be enjoying all that Cork itself has to offer. He's in Cork until Friday, and I'm so excited to have a familiar face around.

Oh, and I go back home in just over a month...

~MJ






Pictures on Picasa!
The one at the top is in front of the bog people museum; the one with Elizabeth, Bri, and Sam standing is at Dublin Castle; the red/orange one is on the Ghost Tour Bus; the one at the bottom is at Dublin Castle.




PS Everyone and their brother was in Ireland this weekend. And I missed them! Ok, by everyone, I mean:

Bill Clinton was in Dublin to fundraise for Hillary (what I need to look up: McCain/Feingold on Foreign Donations)
Bono was on my campus for a photo op and to talk about one of his charity projects. My friend Dan got a chance to be a part of the press pool, and the pics are on his blog.

I no clue two of my favorite people in the whole world were so close to me and where I'm living! Well, shoot!
But hey, Sam Jones came to town too...and I got to see him!