Ireland, First Impressions 8/30

Topic: Ireland First Impressions

Written:  In Bewley's Hotel Room 9:00 pm

By: Abby Cakebread

After a 16-hour flight to Dublin, my first thought looking outside was, “we haven't moved from Portland.” On first glance Ireland looks much like downtown Portland with more bricks. Upon closer inspection while house-hunting (and looking outside while I wasn't sleeping), the towns are much more... tight knit? Rural? More small-town-y? It's a bit... indescribable, but, if you can picture it, all the stores are connected to each other and all made out of bricks. Each town is almost strip-mall-y without the “mall” part of malls. And everyone has the coolest accent. There is no person with the same accent as the other. One is thicker than the other, one sounds more official/casual, etc, etc. And every town (or so it seems) has a castle or a castle-y building.

It's like saying “hey, look, a tree” in Portland. Dublin, though, is much more city-like, with clothing stores and street players and fear of pickpockets.

In Dublin, after house hunting (shhh! Be vewy vewy quiet. There's mobile-home twaks) for the first two days, we played the part of “American Tourists,” aka nearly killing ourselves every time we go out for a drive, then seeing something important and acting like “yes, Mr. Tour Guide, we know exactly what you're talking about.” We saw the Book of Kells and kept the little audio-tour guide things, so we can listen to the audio-tour whenever we feel like it.

Next, we passed a bit through St. Stephen's Green (similar to Central Park in NY) on the way to Dublin Castle and found an Irish version of the New York Pigeon Man (from the trip Mom and I went on in 2013)! He gave Colleen and I some oats

, and we became Pigeon-Gods for a bit (is that an accomplishment? Just another insightful, inquisitive, college-essay question. Man, I should be a philosopher!). Arriving at Dublin Castle, we paid for the tour of the place. The bottom of it was very medieval, with the stones and the rubble and the creepy thing of water.

Up above, where the rich people spent their days, it was much more modern than you would have expected. Maybe re-furnishing, I don't know, but it looks like something a present-day queen/king would live in.

I would definatly not want to live there because I have the feeling I would trip and somehow break a priceless marble stature or a chandelier or something. Just me.

After the castle, we went to see the Christchurch.

There was a fee to get in. We didn't end up seeing it today. On our way back to the car (because we were all pretty pooped,) we passed (for like the third time) the geek store. Of course I had to go in, if it was the last thing I did. Mom surrendered to Colleen and I's pleading looks, and we got inside. If there is a geek heaven, I found it. Sherlock, Game of Thrones, and Doctor Who posters, all 5 euros. A stuffed T.A.R.D.I.S, Dalek keychains, Adventure Time stuff, a 3-D DOCTOR WHO POSTER, and so much more....stuff! It was awesome! I needed to add to my small collection of Doctor Who posters. So I asked Mom. One. That was all I could have. One. Doesn't Mom understand that the minimum is 12 posters per geek store to fill your antisocial nerdy needs? Jeez. I ended up getting the one with a million Doctor Who quotes. It's pretty cool. But my soul felt the loss of the 11 others I should have gotten (#firstworldproblems#thestruggleisreal). Colleen got a Sherlock poster, which I'm sure she will rave about in her post. We trudged back to the car after walking back (the long way), and attempted to enter the Guinness place. They rejected us, stating that they closed at 4:00. I think they were scared of us 'Muricans…..

We drove back to the hotel, and walked to the Chinese food place across the street. My sweet and sour chicken was honestly better than Oregon's Chinese food. Y'all gotta step up your game, here. We went back to the hotel, and I saved my mother's bacon by heroically pulling her out of the middle of the road before an angry Irishman mowed us down. I feel like that should've earned me the 11 other posters. Then, jaywalking in order to beat Dad and Colleen, ANOTHER angry Irishman came out of the hotel parking lot, and we had to jog the rest of the way before I had to save Mom AGAIN. We are now back in our lovely hotel, me, writing this, Colleen, writing hers, and Mom and Dad, looking at mobile homes.

This is Abby Cakebread, signing off.