Good Feckin' Craic in Ireland

In my defense "feck" is really a kinder version of its swear word cousin, and I'm told Irish people use it liberally throughout the day. Craic is pronounced "crack" and is not a reference to drug use; it means "fun" in...well, it has English/Irish origins. In other words, Ireland was AMAZING.

Where Italy was a bit of a logistical "trial," shall we say, Ireland was the complete opposite. Maybe getting to Bratislava to catch a flight is a bit of a pain, with a god-awful early bus ride at 6:30am. I was so brain-fried when I got to the airport that I briefly thought someone had stolen my bag, when they had in fact moved it from the overhead storage to a seat behind me. This was my first time flying Ryanair, and I didn't think the experience was too traumatizing. Sure, we were herded like cattle onto the airplane, and everyone made quite the ill-mannered and shoving rush to find seats (there is no assigned seating), but if you're traveling alone, it doesn't matter. I didn't care where I sat, so I just took the first empty aisle seat I could find and was happy.

During the flight, the persistent advertisements and parading of products such as perfume up and down the rows got a little tiring. But fortunately I had Shades of Grey to finish and enjoyed some escapism. When I landed in Dublin, the airport bus was right outside the exit and took me just a block and a half away from my hostel, which was also just around the corner from a police station. I got in to Dublin at around 1pm, so I spent the rest of the day wandering the city. I started with a tour of Trinity College, where I learned students engaged in a shoot-out with a professor back in the day after a disagreement about the difficulty of his exams escalated. I saw the Book of Kells and the Long Room, which I am convinced must have been the inspiration for the Beast's library from Beauty and the Beast. It hols 200,000 of the College's oldest books and had a special exhibit on Ernest Walton, which satisfied this nonproliferation nerd.

After that, I wandered around the Temple Bar area, but it was Good Friday, which means that, by law, all pubs must be closed. For real. Even the alcohol sections of grocery stores were cordoned off. Otherwise, all stores were open and ready for business, which was a relief since I had thought there would be a good chance everything would be closed for the holiday. I made my way over to Dublin Castle for a bit, but was already feeling like I might be castled out (oh boy, not a good sign if you're in Ireland). I was taking pictures at one point, and this really weird couple thought I was trying to take a picture of them and actually walked over to stand smack in the middle of my shot and pose.

I walked around Christchurch Cathedral for a bit, then made my way to the north side of Dublin. I walked around Henry's Street, which is just tons of shopping and was completely unappealing to me. As I made my way back to my hostel, I saw a man in a suit skipping down the street while holding a cigarette. Stereotypically happy Irish man? Check. I made friends with a British girl in my room and went to bed early to prepare for my 6:30am tour the next morning.

While in Ireland, I booked two day-long tours - one to the Giant's Causeway and Belfast in Northern Ireland, and one to the Cliffs of Moher in the west of Ireland. The first tour was the one to the north, and boy was it full of fun characters. There were the Italians who were late to every check in, the group of Mexican kids with two chaperones who were also late to every check in, the weird American lady and her coworker, and then the rest of us normal folks. I made friends with a mother and daughter from Ohio and a girl from Berlin. The weird American lady kept making the most inappropriate comments, drumming on the back of the seat in front of her, and clapping horribly out of step along with songs our driver sang. It was bizarre. The mother and daughter and I speculated that she was from New Jersey or had some sort of social disorder, and the bus driver told us later that he was convinced she was stoned.

After stopping in a couple of smaller towns for coffee and bathroom breaks, we came to Carrick a rede rope bridge. This was such a gorgeous sight, but crossing that bridge was terrifying. It swung back and forth and bounced up and down - I was relieved when I'd crossed it but aghast I'd have to do it again to get back to the mainland. It was worth it, though - such beautiful views in that area. We then went on to the Giant's Causeway, which has to be seen to be believed. It's said that Tolkein got his inspiration for Lord of the Rings from this area of Ireland, and I'd certainly believe it. We were also incredibly lucky to have very good weather the entire time we were there. I had Guinness and steak stew for lunch - YUM. Oh, by the way, if you ever go to Northern Ireland, you should probably remember that they use pounds, not euros. Yeah, useful information. Thank god for credit cards.

We then made our way to Dunlace castle and then Belfast. Throughout this time, our lovely guide, Mike, gave us the occasional history lesson on The Troubles and pointed out how various towns were dealing with the ongoing enmity. Quite a few have made great strides - they no longer fly Union Jack or Irish flags outside their houses and are making an effort to get along, even if the road does divide the town into Protestant and Catholic sides. He mentioned the recent conflicts instigated by the Real IRA, who he says want to take the country back 40 years to the times of The Troubles. Most people want peace and do not want a repeat of that era, but with the upcoming visit from the Queen of England, people are concerned about how violence may escalate. He also had a really great mix of songs on his ipod playing when he wasn't talking - mostly Irish (ok, there was a break for Bon Jovie's "Wanted Dead or Alive" and Bob Marley's "One Love," but I'm not complaining) music that ranged from traditional folk, to instrumental, to modern jams. He was also a gifted singer and sang us a few songs as well. He sang more the next day on my other tour.

When we got to Belfast, he dropped us off for an hour, and that's when the Ohio mother's mothering instincts kicked in and she scooped me and the lone German girl up and suggested we wander together. Thank goodness because I admit to feeling a little overwhelmed at that point - something about the combination of amazing views, slight heat stroke, and a large city sitting suddenly in front of me. We passed some Hare Krishnas (seriously, these guys are everywhere) on our way to some excellent views of the city. After walking around City Hall, we were picked up and dropped off back in Dublin at 7:30pm. I was pretty exhausted, so after walking around a bit, I went back to my hostel, where I met a new roommate who was a Japanese girl studying at Limerick College. OK, guys, I've decided that the single most useful language you can learn if you want to travel Europe by hostel is Japanese: you will always meet someone who speaks it. She said that Irish people studying Japanese at Limerick have thick Irish accents when they speak it, and that just sounds absolutely delightful to me. I am in love with Irish accents, and I love Japanese, so the two combined must be amazing.

The next morning I had yet another day-tour, this one to the Cliffs of Moher (also known as the Cliffs of Insanity from The Princess Bride). I didn't know this would happen ahead of time, but it turns out I had the same tour guide from the day before. In fact, I was the only person to have him for both tours, so he and I became half-friends. This was the third day straight the poor guy was leading day-long tours, so by the end of it, he became hilariously punchy. We also gossiped about the weird American lady from the day before who managed to alienate her coworker/friend and half the bus by the end. She was quite the hoot. He sang quite a few songs the second day, which was awesome - he had quite a beautiful voice, and the bus the second day was much more receptive and into it than the first day. Second day's bus passengers were more normal, which was most a disappointment than a relief to me. Anyway, he sang The Bricklayer's Song, Seven Drunken Nights, Danny Boy, and others. I preferred his performance to the ones I linked to, but what can you do.

On our way out west, we passed the Curragh horse racing track where Ireland's famous thoroughbred horses are raised, and we passed the field where Braveheart's final fight scene was filmed. We stopped briefly at Blarney Castle, but alas I did not have time to kiss the Blarney Stone. We spent a good 2 hours at the Cliffs of Moher, which were stunning. I loved hiking the paths (which were technically restricted due to the hazard of falling, but they were perfectly safe if you were careful), and there was even a street musician playing some quite good Irish fiddle in one area. What I particularly liked about the illegal paths was that only a few tourists walked them, so you could get away from the noise of people talking and walking to be left alone with the sounds of waves crashing against the cliffs.

We headed for Doolin village, which is so adorable, for lunch. On we went to Corcomroe Abbey and The Burren, which reminded me of Pinnacles back in California. Alas, by this point, my camera had run out of battery, so I have no pictures. But I really enjoyed just walking around the rock formations and getting to do a bit of scrambling. It was at this point that, after I told him about an amazing trip to Joshua Tree, our guide told me about his trip to Burning Man where he had the best acid trip of his life.

On the way back to Dublin, our guide stopped the bus next to a field of cows at one point and starting lowing at them. They all looked up at him as one, stood up from where they were standing, and looked terribly confused. He is truly the cow whisperer. On this trip, he went into the history of the Potato Famine, Famine Follies, Tinkers and Knackers, and again into the Troubles a bit. We also learned that some assert that a real Irish breakfast is Guinness and oysters (who can argue with that?). Can I just say that the Irish accent is so pretty? I think it's funny and endearing that the 'th' sound becomes 't' for soft 'th' and 'd' for hard 'th.'

That evening, I was exhausted again, so after walking around Dublin a bit more, I went back to my hostel. As I was giving a key back to the front desk, I high-fived a drunk guy, who turned out to be a Californian who'd been in Ireland for 5 months. He claimed to have just seen a dead body on the train, and wanted me to go have a whiskey with him to take his mind off of it. Well, since no great trip is complete without a bad decision, I decided to go. My bad decision's name was Shawn.

As Shawn weaved drunkenly through the street and occasionally collided with me, I learned that he was returning to California to "atone for things he'd done wrong." Oh dear. I definitely did not want to know what those were, so I steered the conversation back to CA. Before I knew it, he was suddenly peeling off his shirt in the middle of the street, and I was protesting, backing away, and raising my hands in horror. Turns out he wanted to show me his tattoo on the back of his shoulder blade. It was a pretty Celtic design. "My dad has the same one, on his chest." Ohh, that's neat. "But he got his in prison." Oh dear! "I didn't get mine in prison." Well, that's a step in the right direction for your family. "But I've been in prison, so I don't judge."

So I asked him why he'd been in prison, and he paused before saying, "Violence." Oh shit. At this point I seriously considered just sprinting back to the hostel, which was only a block and a half away. I mean, he was so drunk that he'd either run into a pole on the way back, or he'd run into a parked car. But I decided I just wanted to see him safely to a bar, and then I'd split. So here's what happened, apparently. Shawn was living the perfect life - he'd had a great day, he was in a great band, and he was back to his band's practice space. When he got there, he found the bassist sleeping with the drummer's girlfriend. It was at this moment that Shawn realized the band was toast - there was no way the drummer would get over this. Naturally, this was the bassist's fault. So Shawn "beat the shit out of the bassist." I find this story quite ridiculous on its face and in retrospect, but at the time, as he was telling the story, Shawn got quite worked up and angry about the whole thing again, as if he were reliving it. Not very pleasant.

I paused and said, "Maybe that wasn't the best way to handle the situation," hoping I wasn't inviting violence on my own person. "Oh, I know it's not, but sometimes people just think a way that's wrong and I don't know how to deal with it." Anyway, after that we talked about mothers because Shawn's mother is the best woman on the planet who loves him unconditionally and he just loves her so much. Oh drunks, gotta love them. We got to the bar, and I begged off, saying I had to get up at 3:45am for my flight (totally true) and should leave. In truth, I'd been hoping the bar we went to would have lots of people and I could just ditch my Bad Decision for more entertaining and gentler Irish people. Alas, this bar was fairly deserted, save for two patrons smoking outside. They stared at us intently as I tried to extricate myself from Shawn, which was reassuring as I hoped they'd help me if "violence" happened again. Shawn was so woeful at my departure: "You're just going to leave me here?" he cried out despondently. I said, "No, see, you have those nice two men to talk with!" He just looked at me silently, so I wished him a safe journey and walked off.

The return to Vienna was fairly uneventful, save for my seatmate crossing herself before takeoff and prior to landing (does she know something I don't?!), and the entire plane applauding the landing (seriously?). Ryanair plays that song they play at the start of races when they land, which is really weird.

I loved Ireland even more than I thought I would and can't wait to return. Hopefully that day will be sooner rather than later.