End of Europe and New Beginning

Once in Dublin we stayed at the same hostel Brendan had stayed at while he was there earlier on his trip, which meant he played tour guide for me. The first evening we wandered around a bit and just enjoyed a nice meal at a Irish pub nearby.

The next morning we toured Trinity College. It ended up being a very interesting tour and allowed us to see Book of Kells, which is a famous 9th century gospel manuscript.

Of course the first thing I needed to do was to get a scone and have some coffee:

We ate our scones here, I wondered whether Kristin used to go running here :)

After that we had lunch at the Ginger Man, a pub that Kristin went to quite often while living in Dublin.

Later on we wandered over to Temple Bar and perused that part of town. The rest of the day was spent relaxing as it was our last night.

Do you know how many countries I tried to see this movie in??


Goodbye Europe!

Once we made it back into the United States I had a great weekend with the girls before heading to North Carolina to visit the parentals for a week or so. It was great to have the time to relax and catch up on some much-needed sleep after the travels. My mom and I also did some test driving of cars as LC was not the most practical car for the city. We decided on the Subaru Forester and now CC (citycruiser) has joined our family.

My mom, dad and I flew back to Chicago last Thursday afternoon and headed up to Oshkosh, WI to see the EAA Airshow both Thursday evening and Friday. One of the highlights was seeing the 787 Dreamliner land and see it up and personal Friday morning. Saturday mom and I went out and bought CC and the rest of the day got pretty busy, but we met up with the rest of the family for dinner in the South Loop. Sunday we went sailing with Jack, Jules, Dixie and Troy and had dinner on the boat. All in all a very relaxing weekend!

I was told I would be given my start date some time soon for Accenture so I'm looking forward to hearing more details!

4th of July in Belfast

Well the European adventures have ended and I have arrived safely back in the United States. Our plan for the remainder of our trip was to spend two days in Valencia and possible an additional two days in Barcelona before heading back after Malaga, but unfortunately it became very expensive. Due to that we made the spontaneous decision to head to Ireland! With some fast thinking we were also able to change our flight reservation home to out of Dublin in order to save the price of flying back to Spain.

We spent two days in Belfast in time to see their version of an Independence Day, which was quite interesting. The first day we were there we went on the famous "Black Cab Tours" to see many of the sites involved in the Troubles, toured Queen's University and hung out with new friends from Australia. The next day we watched the parades, wandered the town to see the main sites and then took a later bus into Dublin.

Where our hostel was:

We wandered nearby at the University of Belfast:

They had a rose garden that was absolutely stunning!

An advertisement for the Black Cab tour we took:

Protestant neighborhood:

Wall murals within the neighborhoods is very common. They are icons for martyrs, memorials for victims and propaganda for the cause. The one below is very famous because no matter where you stand looking at the mural it appears the sniper has the gun pointed at you.

During the tour we had the opportunity to write on the Peace wall:

This shows you just how large the wall really is and some perspective as to just how tall (!) it is:

The sad thing about the Peace Wall is that it was meant to be temporary. And it was meant to have been taken down almost a decade ago...but the fact of the matter is that both sides of the conflict want it. When violence breaks out, the wall still protects homes and neighborhoods on both sides despite the fact that things are thrown over it.

During the Black Cab tour (at a Catholic side memorial), our guide showed us the rubber bullets shot directly at individuals who were killed, some as recently as earlier that year.

Looking into the memorial, it is on a location of arson and murder:

Here is a view of part of the walls that divide the neighborhoods. Notice the back of the houses are covered in metal screens to protect homes when conflict arises and debris is launched onto either side. There has been a history of fireworks, huge stones and bricks and even explosives thrown over the wall onto the other side.

We were also shown an area near the Catholic neighborhood that is a memorial to other causes around the world for "the underdogs" in a sense.

Preparation for the bonfires that night:

After the Black Cab tour we were a little emotionally exhausted and ended up simply hanging out at the hostel with our new Australian friends for a while. Once food finally roused us we decided to go for something traditional:

At the hostel there was a wall where you could paint something to show you had been there. Now there is a record of the first Domers to have visited that hostel in Belfast! Of course I'm not sure how that will go over when some day someone figures out that Notre Dame is a Catholic school...whoops!

After some dinner (and drinking of course-we were in Ireland after all) we headed to go see the bonfires that are traditionally set at night. As these can be catalysts for conflict we made sure to go to ones nearby the hostel:

I don't know if you can quite see it, but there were actually Irish tricolor flag's placed on the top of the bonfires before they were lit. It was interesting to see as Brendan and I were discussing what the public reaction would be were a yank burn a Confederate flag or how people are in an uproar if the US flag is burned anywhere.

The heat of the bonfires was unbelievable, it was difficult to get pictures that show the scale. A home sporting flag showing their pride.

Showing a fraction of the number of the people who were at just this one (relatively "small") bonfire:

The next morning we woke up in time to see the parades before heading to Dublin:

While the parade was interesting to see, it also somewhat made me sick to my stomach. Perhaps I am only sympathetic to the Catholic side due to where I went to school and how I was raised; but seeing parades of people where it is guaranteed many have participated in the violence and will continue to do so was slightly eery. I saw more than a few younger men with black tear tattoos.

A fun fact-this is the most bombed hotel in Europe:

(They were quite proud of this fact)

After the parades we had a little time to kill before heading out so we just explored the city a little bit.

I found a new boyfriend...

City Hall: