These past weeks have been maybe
the most hectic, but also best, weeks of my life. My roommates, Sophie, Marina,
Julie, and I have been country hopping on the weekends between our classes. I’ve
already wrote about our time in beautiful Madeira, so on to St. Paddy’s day in
Dublin, Ireland.
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| The Americans take on Guinness |
Our
plan ride from Edinburgh to Dublin was a quick hop, 45 minutes. The plane was
understandably packed with kids trekking from all over the world to celebrate
Ol’ St. Paddy in the most appropriate place. We checked in and had an early
night in preparation for the festivities that would start early the next
morning. We arose Saturday morning and walked from our hotel, which was located
right next to the Dublin Spire, to the Jameson Whiskey distillery. A big group
of us American exchange students toured one of the original Jameson buildings
and sampled a few whiskeys. Jameson was by far the best closely followed by our
own Jack Daniel’s. Immediately after we not-so-gracefully made our way to the
Guinness factory for another tour, because when in Ireland. Here we learned how
to pour the perfect pint and that it takes 119 seconds to pour the perfect
Guinness. A much needed breather was in order now, as we’d knocked all this out
before 1.
That
night we wandered through the incredibly crowed streets of the Temple Bar area
to settle in at an Irish pub with live music. While there I conversed with
people from Belgium, France, Germany and more from all over the world. I have
never been in an area more diverse than the Temple Bar area St. Paddy’s day
weekend. I suppose the love of throwin’ down for St. Patrick is universal.
The
next morning we took a short bus ride to the fishing village of Howth to see
the Cliffs of Moher, but we’re unfortunately deterred by the blistering cold.
On our
final day woke early to have breakfast at an Irish
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| This was the best hot chocolate I have experienced in all 21 years of my life |
burger joint named BoBo’s. After
this we wandered the halls of Trinity College, and from there we made it to
Butler’s Chocolate for a cup of hot chocolate ranked #25 best cup hot chocolate
in the world. I would say I have to agree. I had an amazing cup of white hot
chocolate and my roomies ordered cookies hot chocolate, which is just as
amazing as you would think. It had chunks of Oreos in it. Enough said. Whilst sipping
our hot chocolate we settled down in a nearby park where we made one of our
first Irish friends. Kyle taught us some Irish, not Gaelic, sayings such as “Aon
Scéal?” meaning “What’s the craic?” and also “Póg mo thoin” meaning “Kiss my
ass.” This is when we realized the temporary tattoo Marina had been happily
wearing on her cheek all day indeed said “kiss my ass” rather than “kiss me I’m
Irish.”
There
is an incredible amount of other information I could include for this weekend,
but I think that gist comes down to St. Paddy’s day in Dublin was an amazing experience.
It was incredibly crowded and rowdy, but I highly recommend it.