week seven: Pubs and Prisons...

1 November 2009
8.30 came pretty quickly… but M, K, C, A and I were determined to see the sights despite the cold (and ignoring all traces of sleep deprivation…) so, we got bagels (ahh… the comforts of home…) and headed out for the day… first stop: Guinness brewery… we’re in Dublin, what did you expect us to do?? Yes, it was barely 10am, but c’mon!
So, we walked through the huuuge complex and learned about the beer process… it was all very interesting, and I managed to pay attention despite the exhaustion… they’re very serious about their beer… I felt bad though, because much of the experience was lost on me… I don’t like beer! No matter how hard I tried (and trust me, I gave a valiant effort… I tried several kinds, and just wasn’t convinced…) I just never enjoyed drinking it… the closest I got was Bulmer’s… a hard cider-like beer that also came in pear-flavor :)
After the tour of the Guinness brewery, we headed over to the old jail… which was possibly the best thing ever… not only was it in this old creepy stone building (with the cold grey of the Irish autumn sky as a backdrop) with heaps of history, buuuut… it was the site where one of my favourite movies of all time was filmed: In the Name of the Father (with Daniel Day Lewis… if you haven’t seen it, I strongly recommend renting it… now!)… I think I turned into a five-year-old for .5sec with my excitement… it was the same feeling I got when I went to the House of Seven Gables for the first time… creepy, historical, excitement… ha…
From there, we headed over to Trinity to check out the Old Library and the Book of Kells… first of all, why didn’t I apply to Trinity??? That campus is absolutely gorgeous!! And I love Ireland, so clearly, bad oversight by me… anyway… walking into the old library was like walking into the set of Harry Potter with all of the dark wood and old books… seriously, if I had been allowed, I would have sat there all day… as that was not the case, I got to wander down and check out the temporary exhibit before entering the vault holding the Book of Kells… The temporary exhibit was on Napoleon, and it had the original Eroica Symphony by Beethoven… you could see the dedication crossed out and everything… again, huuuge music geek/ giddy school girl moment… which resulted in getting the opening movement stuck in my head… yay…
And then on to the Book of Kells… I’ll be honest, I wasn’t entirely sure what it was before going, but remembered (with a little help from my friends :)) just before getting there… wow. Just wow. It was incredible to read (if somewhat badly, through who knows how many layers of thick glass) or, rather, look at awestruck, these ancient pages… I think what got me the most was Christ’s genealogy… you read all of those Dan Brown-like books, and hear about it on the History channel, but actually seeing a written account that old, depicting his blood-line is pretty impressive…
Dinner time… the five of us headed to a pub for dinner before heading back out into the streets… K and I had Irish stew (couldn’t leave without trying it!) and the other girls had some forms of meat and potatoes and the like :) the food was warm, the place was cozy, and we did not want to go back out into the cold! But we were determined to enjoy all of the time we had left in Dublin…
So. We had a list of pubs to visit. Obviously, we had to visit Temple Bar… it’s basically the Mecca of all that is Dublin, and like 5min from our hostel, so we headed there first… next, we headed to the Brazen Head, the oldest pub in Dublin, established in 1198 is at just over 800 years old the second oldest pub in Ireland, and possibly the creepiest. So we were told, or we read somewhere, that if you asked the bar tender, he’d tell you a few good ghost stories… clearly that was the top of our agenda, it just having been Halloween and all… so, we went in, ordered some Bulmer’s, and tried to decide who would be the one to ask… M stepped up, and asked… unfortunately, the bar tender told us he didn’t believe in ghosts, and basically dismissed us… we were annoyed and disappointed, and we sat and moped a bit… finally the bar tender came over, and started telling us a bit about the history of the bar… after several hours of moping, convincing, and probably annoying, we got to go up into the attic… which is one of the scariest things I’ve ever done (not that us telling each other ghost stories before helped any…)
Dublin is amazing. I’m going back as soon as I can.