Irish Coffee+Irish Sweater=Irish Warmth, or 42 hours in Dublin

This past weekend I flew up north to Dublin to visit my friend Kristin from UPS. It was a crazy full apartment for her because her cousin and another one of her friends were also staying with her. I arrived at her apartment mid-afternoon and she greeted me with homemade oatmeal raisin cookies and veggie curry with rice. So delicious. It was then that I made a goal to not consume any Italian products until I flew back to Milano on Sunday. We ate and chitchatted, just catching up, until Kristin's cousin arrived and we went out to meet her at the bus stop. It was a really wonderful group and total crapshoot. Throwing three people who had never met each other before and Kristin into a weekend...how were we to know if we were compatible or not? Luckily we got along great. Kristin's friend had been in Europe for 8 months, first working in Berlin for 3 and then traveling some, and had just finished up WWOOFing in Ireland (where she and Kristin had met). This was definitely the kind of trip that was about the people more than exploring a place. And this was wonderful and probably just what I needed at this point in my study abroad experience. I had purchased tickets to visit Kristin during one of my most homesick weeks and this trip definitely helped me deal with some of it. Granted I have been less homesick recently but I was surrounded by people who loved traveling, loved being abroad, loved the cities/countries they were living in and were all around just really excited to have the opportunity to learn outside the classroom, absorb another culture, and live in Europe. This really helped remind me how limited my time here is and how I must take advantage of it, be really flexible, be brave, explore, and life my time in Europe to the fullest. Friday night we made dinner and discussed all these, compared experiences, stopped at a pub, and avoided as much rain as we could. The conversations from this night reminded me of how much there is in Europe to take advantage of.

Saturday we got up around 10, Kristin made delicious egg scrambles and instant coffee for breakfast and then we left around 11:30 or so and walked around. It wasn't raining yet and we walked to the Temple Bar area and went to a great farmer's market that sold asian food, curries, mexican food, salsas, crepes, meats, fish, beautiful breads, and had a plethora of samples. It was fabulous. Then we walked through this area of Dublin, past some stands of books, and over towards Trinity College campus. I had been to Trinity before when I came to Ireland with my family when I was 13 and I remembered the building the Book of Kells was in. This was super exciting because I don't remember much of Dublin from seven years ago. Here is a picture from the campus:

After this we went to a sweater shop and I fell in love with one and caved...it was on sale!!! Here I am in my new Irish sweater:After this, it started raining so I put on my new sweater under my coat and we walked through the major shopping street to this beautiful park full of golden, brown, red, and a few green leaves. It was so great. It felt like autumn, the air had the familiar Seattle-esque mist (that totally beats Milan's constant downpour) and we wandered around the pond and through the trees.


After this we headed back to that crazy shopping street and went into this massive ritzy department store where they had a gigantic purse, probably around 10 ft tall with matching proportions. The idea was to let people go inside it and sit for a 1 minute video of the world through the eyes of a purse. The gigantic purse even jostled the passenger/viewer around a little bit as if it was going over bumps in the road, on rickety bike, or spinning around on a swing. It was a hilarious and ridiculous marketing technique. Wonderful. We were hungry and ready to get out of the rain after this so we headed back to Kristin's apartment. On our way we stopped at a grocery store to get some food to bring to a Thanksgiving dinner Kristin's friend had been invited to. At Kristin's apartment, she made us a small lunch and we made some Irish coffee as a wonderful pick-me-up and prepared vegetable to take to this Thanksgiving dinner. I forget how Kristin's friend had met these people but an American who had fallen in love with an Irish man and now lived here was hosting it on the outskirts of Dublin near the ebay headquarters of Dublin (since they worked for ebay). The dinner was a wonderfully crazy medley of Irish, Scottish, British, Canadian, German, French, and American. I love the mishmosh of culture that can come together, differing accents and lifestyles, in any small country in this small continent of Europe. The had turkey, cranberry sauce, stuffing, mashed potatoes, sweet potatoes, corn, and much much more. Also pumpkin pie and apple pie!!!!! I nearly burst open...and managed to not eat or drink any Italian products!!! I met some really great people from all over, had some hilarious conversation, a round of story telling, and just a really random fabulous time. We left around 11 to go back towards Kristin's apartment. We got back a little after midnight and met up with one Kristin's friends from her program, went to a pub for a very short while, and ended up back at her apartment around 1:30. We all hung out for a bit longer until everyone passed out except me. I needed to leave her apartment at 4 am to get on a shuttle to the airport to catch a 6:30 am flight so I just stayed up all night, made some non-Irish coffee, and left at 4 am. Kristin lives on a canal (I have missed living near water SO MUCH) and I walked along it, next to the million swans gliding along, to the shuttle and sadly (very, very sadly) so goodbye to nourishing weekend and the land of the leprechauns.