Don’t Fleece the Snappers!

To be “fleeced”: to be overcharged or ripped off

Snapper: slang word for baby

Noel and Grainne taught me these Irish terms. I love that babies are called snappers, as if they are giant turtles about to snap your head off if you don’t feed them every two hours.

Excerpts from my journal: Days 5 and 6

I woke up not feeling well at all. Too many cookies, Nutella, and junk mix yesterday, I think.
We hit the street bright and early to make the bus to pick Michael up at the airport. We became turned around looking for the bus stop because the directions we had told us that it was right next to the tourist information center. Well…. The T.I. was not in any normal old building. It was in a CHURCH. And, at 5:30 in the morning when the sky is still BLACK, one does not expect to walk by a church and have it be a tourist information center. DOINK.

But….. we found the bus and made it to the airport and the reunion with Michael was salty (He brought me wheat thins, not cookies…). I was so happy to see him. We boarded the bus and began chatting and before we knew it, we realized we’d never stopped at Suffolk Street and were driving farther and farther away from the city center. The bus driver GRUMPED at us and took us around the whole route again to get us back to where we needed to be, putting us on the bus for almost two hours. Oops.

We snuck Michael into the hostel. He was not checked in yet, and at this particular hostel they had a security measure where each guest showed their key as they walked in. So Lisa and I went up with Michael’s suitcases, and then I went back down, gave Michael Lisa’s key, let him go in, and then followed him about a minute later. We all felt so guilty as if we were committing some big crime. But REALLY, all we wanted was a NAPPPPP. So we took a small one and made it down for breakfast before heading out to adventure Kilmanhem (spelling anyone?) Gaol. The 18th Century prison was eerie, but its history was fascinating. When it reopened as a museum in the 1960s, the last prisoner to be released who was the current (or recent) Irish Prime Minister, was the one to “cut the ribbon” for the opening! Crazy, right?

After that we walked to the Guinness Storehouse which was very state of the art and interesting. We tried Guinness along the way and I thought it was NASTY, Michael didn’t care for it, and Lisa really liked it.

The history of Arthur Guinness was cool. Supposedly they use the same yeast that he made back in the day and have a back-up stock in the brewer’s personal safe in case anything happens to the yeast that they're using.

We came home and rested before heading out to St. Patrick’s Cathedral which was closed sadly, but had beautiful gardens around it that we walked through.

Dinner was at the Brazen Head, which claims to be the oldest pub in Ireland, dating back to the 1100's. It had a cool atmosphere, or maybe I should say a hot atmosphere because I sat with my back to the fire. MMMM, yes. It also had money autographed from customers from all over the world. Most were dollar bills, however…. Those Americans. We found one that was from Elon! CRAZYYYYY.

Next Day…

I was up at 6 this morning because we’d gone to bed so early last night. I just rolled around for awhile until the alarm went off and we started our long, long day. I can’t possibly write all that we did and the stories or details that went with, but thankfully we video blogged a 30 minute clip of a play-by-play of the day. (I think it is too big to upload to this, or I would just put it up instead of my journal!)

Quick summary of the video….
We went to St. Patrick’s Cathedral and toured it, to Trinity College to see the Book of Kells, and we went to the National Museum of History and Archeology where we saw BOG BODIES from HUNDREDS of years ago. Some were nearly perfectly preserved, looking like leather people. It was creepy, but interesting. Since they were found in bogs, most of them had met brutal ends and their captors had wanted to dispose of the evidence, so what better way than throwing the bodies in bogs? I won’t give you the gruesome details, but ALL of the bog bodies had been murdered. They became a bit of a mascot for us for the rest of the trip.

Trinity College was pretty awesome as well. The Book of Kells is an ancient manuscript of the Gospels, and it is elaborately scribed. The LIBRARRRRY there was soooo cool. Lisa and I walked in and BOTH of us immediately felt like Belle in "Beauty and the Beast", wooden walls with books piled to the ceiling. I wish I had a picture of it, but no photography was allowed.

After touring we picked up the rental car... ...and drove to a little village called Glendalough. We got into our Bed and Breakfast around 5, and immediately went out to this ancient monastic city on a hill that had hikes around it and the two lakes it was situated on. We basically had the place to ourselves because it was late and drizzly, so the experience was UNREAL. If I HAD to choose a favorite place in Ireland, it would be Glendalough. We hiked for 2 and a half hours, arriving back at our car in the dark.

We were sooo hungry, and since Glendalough was a small town, we did not have much selection… There was one restaurant and a gas station, so we went to the Wicklow Heather Restaurant and SPLURGED. It wasn’t SUPER expensive, but it was upscale for starving college students. But, the food was DELICIOUS and dinner was literally a two and a half hour food festival.

Ok… back to the written word of the day…

So, a few things not mentioned in the video:
I love how excited Lisa and Michael were about the hostel. Both came in with certain LOW expectations that were not met but well exceeded, and they were both a little bummed in a way to find that we would be in bed and breakfasts from now on.

Driving on the left side today was a bigger deal than I thought it would be. Renting the car, I had to put a gigantic deposit on my credit card for insurance.... which did not give me assurance (AHHHH). And, it was a big deal because it was my first rented car!!! I didn’t realize how much responsibility it was. It makes me appreciate my daddy.

Glendalough is unbelievable, and I’m so grateful to be here in this place that looks and feels like another world with my two good friends. God is so good. I can feel His peace here.”

Stay tuned.....

Just say YES

Our philosophy for the trip was.... when someone asks if you want to do something you answer "yes" and do it. We did so many cool things because we said "yes" to things that we wouldn't normally have thought to do.

Excerpts from my journal.... days 3 and 4

This morning Grainne and I drove to the airport to pick up my dearest roomie, Lisa. As the tiny, sleepy-eyed, blond girl walked through the arrival doors, I broke into a huge smile and we ran at each other with squeals of delight. The reunion was sweet (literally.... she brought me homemade chocolate chip cookies!) and we basically haven't stopped talking. Grainne dropped us at our hostel (most graciously... what a lovely woman) and we then walked around the city for awhile. We walked through St. Stephens Green. The sun was shining and warm. We walked down Grafton Street (the main shopping street). We got coffee in a mall food court that overlooked Stephens Green. We walked to Temple Bar which is the touristy Times Squar-ish area. It isn't a literal bar but was originally a sort of port along the river Liffy, making it a central area of Dublin. We walked around inside Christ Church Cathedral (1000 AD) and saw a mummified cat and rat that had trapped themselves in an organ pipe. We walked back to Temple Bar for lunch at a great little pub where LOTS of Scottish men in kilts were drinking in preparation for the match. I tried to take their photo, at which point they invited us to be in the photo with them, commenting on how "tiny" we were. Hmph. We may be small but we can bite!

The pub had DELICIOUS veggie mash soup, and the most wonderful bread on earth.... brown soda bread. It would become a staple for the rest of the trip.

We also got a photo with the most authentic looking Scotsman around. Lisa was scared to ask him for a photo because he was too authentic looking... making him a bit scary. But he was the cheeriest man and we were so glad we talked to him. He is the old man with the beard in the photo below. On our way back we looked in this little designer dress shop that was SO COOL. The woman was a real artist with crazy hair and skinny legs. Cheapest thing in the store? 1000 euros.

Now we're back at the hostel (Lisa brought me WHEAT THINS, CHEEZ ITZ, AND Girl Scout cookies.) and she is snoozin' off some jet lag before we hit a pub to watch the match. I am so happy. Lisa, Ireland, and new experiences add up to a very content Emily.

Next day....

A few things I forgot to write about!

On our drive back from Howth, Noel and Grainne drove me up to a lookout to view the lights of the city. They told me to "look straight ahead because there might be some steamy windows and love's sweet embrace being experienced" on either side of us. Sheesh.. I guess not everyone goes up there to look at the beautiful lights of the city. Oh well. Their loss I guess.

Also on that drive they told me about U2. Noel said Bono was a part of his father's chess club when Bono was young, and that in recent years the club's funding dropped so low that they wrote to Bono and the money that they needed came quietly and swiftly.

Ok, so back to the present. Last night after Lisa woke up, we went out and found O'Connell Street and walked up it exploring. We walked in "The Best Value Rugby Stop" only to find it was a LIEEEEEEEEEE to entice people in and was actually just a junkie tourist shop. We walked over the river on the Ha'penny Bridge (It used to cost 1/2 penny to cross it.) and then wandered back to Temple Bar to search for dinner..... DUDE. Ireland is EXPENSIVE. Every menu we looked at was like 15-20 euros! When we were just about to give up we found a great little pub a little off the beaten path. Lisa got her first fish and chips while we watched rugby (not Ireland sadly because the match was already over... they lost) and then wandered home. We walked by Christ Church, all lit up and peaceful, and Lisa noted that churches were eerie at night because they were so still. So.... we spooked ourselves, turning our little tails around and booking it back in the other direction to Spar (convenience store) and bought some Nutella to eat.

When I think of Dublin on a Sunday morning this is what I'll imagine:

Baby blue skies, church bells chiming from all directions, and the smell of fresh bread. Glorious.

After our meager hostel breakfast of toast and OJ we wandered in the direction of the park but ended up at Trinity College instead. You walk through the entrance and all of the sounds of the city disappear and there is serenity. It was so moving.

We headed back to Christ's Church for a Eucharist service. The girls' choir sang as beams of sunlight streamed in through vaulted windows and tears left streaks of salt along our cheeks. After the service we had tea and biscuits (cookies) in the crypt where we met a sweet old man who told us that the church had 700 members and then introduced us to an American girl named Cathy who was studying in Dublin. We went to lunch with her at the Queen of Tarts afterward. She was a sweet girl from Iowa and had an internship at the Natural History Museum. The Queen of Tarts was YUM YUM and so adorable. OH EUROPE AND YOUR SCONESSSSSSSSS.

We went to the Dublin Castle and got there before it opened so we got trigger happy and took some artsy and not-so-artsy photos in the courtyard...

The castle was really interesting. We learned a lot about Irish history. We also learned that Dublin is the compilation of two Irish words that mean "black pool" for the body of water behind Dublin Castle, and the invaders named the town Dublin because they didn't know better.

We walked around the back of the castle and saw that it was painted like a Dr. Seuss book and took lots of pictures and then laid on a helicopter pad/garden behind it and looked at the sky while some French or Italian or Spanish guys tried to show off for us.
We walked around for awhile before going to Tesco to get some dinner to make at the hostel. We found out that the Irish version of Primark is called Penney's. Lisa loved it.

We played cards for a bit and then went to bed for a FIVE AM WAKE UP. Ew. Michael betta know how much we love him."