accents, beer and tim hortons

with the incredibly low price of flights in europe, i had no problem paying 30 euro to join to of my finish friends, laura and katri, on a four day jaunt to dublin.

after nearly four months in holland, i understood rain. but i had kind of expected a break...not to be had!! of the four days we were in dublin, we did not see a single break in the sky. sure, the rain would pitter down to a small sprinkle, but soon enough it would grow into yet another rainfall. but it's all about the experience, right??

on our first full day, we took a tour of the kilmainham goal. this now retired jail felt cramped and muggy. once we arrived at the main part of the jail which is called the 'victorian wing,' i felt like i recognized the place. our guide explained that the design for this particular area of the jail had been used to guide the building of numerous other prisons. it was also used as a setting for a number of films including the original "italian job." there were a number of famous irishman who were held there and/or died there. it is famous for holding many members from the "easter rising" which had hoped to gain irish independance from britian. many of these were put to death in the courtyard outside the jail. it was incredibly interesting history lesson.

urr next stop was the guiness brewery. here we were able to find out exactly how they make the infamous dark beer. on the floor as you enter is the 9000 year lease which arthur guiness signed for the building in 1759...i think they have some time left. one of the most interesting parts for me was to see the advertisements (tv, poster and magazine) over the years as guiness developed. beer commercials always are the best ;). at the end of the tour, you end with a large pint of guiness as you look over the city (which, of course, was covered with rain clouds).

on the same day we went to st. patrick's cathedral where i can say hosted one of my most embarassing moments. at the guiness factory, i decided to buy a small present for martijn: a beer bottle with a sappy nickname on the label. a note about europe: they are VERY against plastic bags. (as a frequenter of superstore, even the 4 cent deterence doesn't faze me anymore, yet there, i was never given anything other than a paper bag, except maybe at a clothing store or something). thus, i was given a paper bag. as i have mentioned, it was raining every day and it was no different on our walk to the cathedral. as we walked amazed through the cathedral, i didn't notice that the rain had made my bag quite soggy and soft. that is until...i heard something crash on the floor of the cathedral. at first i didn't know what it was, that is until a very unmistakable beer smell started lofting to my nose from beside me. i looked down and there was martijn's gift, shattered on the floor of the cathedral. i had desecrated a church. or at least that's what i thought. a guy working there came over with a mop and said something like, "it smells like heaven" and that it's only right that it should shatter there. *sigh* well, cheers to you God!!

that night we signed up for a pub crawl. we had heard from other travellers that they were huge groups of tourists who would party together by stopping in at numerous pubs and clubs in the city. well, the huge group of tourists ended up being the three of us and the guide. she was nice enough to offer to take us to a couple bars anyway and in the end she stayed with us all night. we stopped by pub after pub getting free drinks and chatting about the differences between our cultures, travelling, music, which nationality had the cutest boys, basically anything that popped into our heads. my favourite stop was the porterhouse. it's a brewing company that serves only their own brewed beers. you can get anything there: a typical lager to strawberry beer, or chocolate beer. it was very interesting to taste them.

one of our last tourist attractions was dublin castle. i usually picture a castle standing on a hill in the countryside, but this one is right in the city.

one of my destinations in dublin was a tim horton's which was rumoured to be in the city. a very typical canadian coffee company which i had the pleasure of working at for three years. how could i miss it?? i was not disappointed (and yet i should have been). while i had expected the actual coffee shop, it was actually nestled within a small convenience store. it was "serve yourself" coffee and they had only a small selection of donuts, but nonetheless, it was a taste of canada in europe. what made it an even bigger thrill was the sign which stated "a taste so big could only come from canada." perfect.

as for observations about ireland:

1) the people are the most canadian-like i have ever met!! they are so friendly, so willing to help you. even go out of their way to help you. very easy to strike up a conversation. while i found other europeans very pleasant to talk to, irishmen were not afraid to be the first to strike up a conversation, or make a small comment while waiting in line. it felt a bit like home in that way.

2) before this trip i had thought my favourite accent was british...i don't know if that's true anymore. hearing the irish accent makes me smile almost instantaneously!! on young kids it sounds so cute, and on some of the young men, well...more than cute ;).