Dan, for example, drinks ONLY Guinness, has lived his entire life in Dublin, and yet has never seen anything on my "list of things to do before going home." Dave, on the other hand, likes to support his hometown's Kilkenny ale, thinks Frenchwomen should NEVER wear berets and takes it as a severe offense against the entire country if you don't think the Irish are a miserable, pessimistic bunch. Elaine has an affinity for baby Guinness shots, prefers "old men" pubs and supported the local radio station last year on it's quest to put Journey's 'Don't Stop Believing' back on the top of the charts in Ireland by ringing every day and requesting it to be played (she succeeded). Needless to say, after hearing their life stories and more, I think I made some friends.
We started off the night at Google's TGIF, which takes place at 5pm or so in every office around the world. Whereas in Mountain View we enjoy some appetizers and listen to the founders speak on upcoming business decisions, Dublin's TGIF consists of quiz games, karaoke and alcohol consumption. Within an hour, all the beer points were empty, with everyone blaming the credit crunch for why there wasn't a back-up supply. So off to the pub down the street we went.
I, being the party pooper that I am, assumed this was an hour excursion before everyone took off for home & their "real" friends, and so left everything in the office upstairs, minus my coat, Google badge and a handful of Euros. I could not have been more mistaken.
Starting off as a party of 6, we shivered outside the pub at picnic tables where they taught me the only way to drink cider was over ice and to order a ha' pint was a waste of time because you'll only have to go back up to the bar later. When the requisite hour was up, I hadn't finished half my drink (whereas my co-workers each had downed about 3) and they didn't understand why I didn't want them to wait for me to finish. Already down a few points in their books, they shoved me into a cab and off we went to O'Donahue's...the former epicenter of Irish traditional music. It was a crazy labyrinth of rooms intersparsed with an outdoor (but somehow also indoor) beer garden. I can't explain it; even after only half my cider, I kept getting lost amongst the rooms. You walk into a traditional long, narrow barroom, filled with beer-bellied, gray-whiskered men drinking Guinness and watching football news on the tvs. Take a right turn at the end of the bar and you're in an overcrowded room the size of a swimming pool with benches and low tables about 2 feet off the ground (please forgive my inability to use the metric system yet!) where no one seems to mind that you keep bumping into them, spilling their beers and generally leaving a trail of dishevelment in your wake. Take another right and you're outside on a cement patio filled with the simultaneous-drinkers-and-smokers crowd...or so you think. You look up, you're not outside, you're in some sort of atrium and there are vines growing along the also-cement ceiling overhead; absolutely no clue how this foliage growth is possible. But, if you manage to not get cigarette ash burning through your coat, you've made it to the pink bar...a smaller room with about 20 high bar tables but only 10 stools total and which all seem to be reserved per the bartender. Only no one is at them. So the entire center of the room is jam packed with those "not in the reservation party" surrounded by an empty perimeter, save for the tables.
Anyhow, despite my confusion, we had a good time, their stories started flowing faster than the pints and we eventually headed off to a birthday party for another Googler...whose name I could not tell you. Only Dave knew him but everyone had seen him before...he is a GIANT. I am serious. I know I am of the shorter persuasion but he really is huge. They told me his height in meters so I went home and used Google to convert that to feet and learned he is over 7 feet tall. That's like Chris-Mihm-sized...who I also think is a giant :) Needless to say, it was pretty easy to spot the birthday boy, so everyone kept buying him drinks and he considered us best friends (along with everyone else) by the end of the night.
Now I usually adhere to the early-to-bed-early-to-rise adage, so I was ready to go home by the time we got to the party. My co-workers were having none of it. They used the excuse that since Howl at the Moon (the venue) had floors for all types of Irish drinking establishments (pub, bar, club and beer garden), I needed to experience them all...probably so I would stop asking them what was the difference :) The most memorable part was dancing in the club and being completely confused as to what kind of music people here like to listen to. I am not kidding, the DJ played Britney's latest release, followed immediately by the cheesy Italian restaurant classic "That's Amore" with absolutely no segue at all. No wonder no one seemed to know how to dance very well! Anyhow, I'm happy I stayed, although the 3:30am visit to the office to get my apartment keys and computer made me a little self-conscious, even though I had purposefully stopped drinking about 3 hours before. Lucky for me, though, this is not a rare occurrence here and I ran into several other Googlers collecting their belongings as well.
Don't despair, Mom, I spent the rest of the weekend enriching my mind rather than ruining my liver :)
I woke up Saturday morning...rolled back over...and then met Dave at noon. Dan was supposed to join us, but he found another party during his cab ride home that kept him out until 7am. Elaine had the foresight to know she wasn't going to make it, so we never expected her. So the 2 of us, extra strong lattes in hand, set off for Trinity College for an older type of story-telling.
This trip is my 4th time in Dublin just over the past year, and everytime my grandmother tells me I have to see the Book of Kells. For those of you who haven't heard of it, the Book of Kells is a lavishly decorated Latin translation of the 4 gospels, written by Irish monks over 1000 years ago, sometime around 800 A.D. The Book is in 2 volumes made entirely of calfskin and using dyes from such interesting sources as impregnated Mediteranean insects and they turn the page once a day (or so I've been told...disclaimer: this fact was neither confirmed nor denied by anything I read in Trinity's exhibition). It was bequeathed to Trinity in the 1600's for safekeeping, which was pretty ironic seeing as the Catholic Church considered it a mortal sin to attend Trinity until about the 1960's.
Anyhoooooooooow, enough of my excited history sharing that none of you are probably interested in :) We had to queue for almost an hour to get into the bookshop alone and then forked over 8 Euro to see the 2 pages. It was the best-spent money of my whole trip. I was completely and utterly fascinated by not only the Book (where I made hung-over Dave read every single wall description, watch 2 silent videos on 12x12-inch screens showing how the book was created and the decorations done, and basically listen to me go "wow...read this!" for about an hour), but the Long Room upstairs as well. Trinity has the right to the very first edition of every British and Irish publication (for free!) and houses all 3 million of them in about 8 buildings. It's most rare and precious collection is stored in the Long Room, which also contains the oldest surviving Irish harp that appears on the back of Irish euros and an original 1916 Proclamation of the Irish Republic. They had to expand the building upward in 1860 to add more bookcases, this place is so huge and full. The room just smells old and being a reading/writing dork, I seriously could have sat there all day.
Fortunately (or unfortunately for him), Dave was along and wouldn't let me waste my Saturday indoors. We watched 2 football teams (one from Northern Ireland we assume according to their accents and one from Dublin) play for awhile on the field inside Trinity until one player's nose sounded like it got broken and a fight seemed to be on the edge of breaking out. As the only spectators, we chose that moment to leave and avoid any fault by association (we were cheering for the team who seemed most likely to start the fight). We ate a very late lunch and then I went home to nap and try to figure out why my Chase United Visa won't allow me to take money out of the ATMs and all customer service numbers on the website are "no longer in service" (turns out I have to enter a + sign when dialing from my blackberry....). I wandered out a bit later to buy some birthday cards, look for a gift, and get some groceries (where I again had trouble "fitting in" when I asked if the store sold egg whites...I could have been speaking another language for all it mattered...they asked if I meant cheese!).
Today I went again to ChristChurch Cathedral where the Deacon almost didn't let me in b/c I referred to the service as a Mass. It's an Anglican-Episcopal church and the seat of the Church of Ireland. I know it's not a Catholic church, but the service is almost identical (and the wine tastes better! haha). But what really made me come back after visiting last week was the choir; it will absolutely take your breath away. I read today that this was the first choir to sing Handel's Messiah in Dublin in 1742 (not the same choir members, obviously) and I only wish I could have listened to that performance. Anyhow, I acted as pious as I could and didn't make any more faux pas and they didn't kick me out :)
Spent the rest of the day just walking all over Dublin and had my first wanderings north of the Liffey. If you stick to the main street and 2 of its off-shoots you will be bombarded by every department store known to man...on this side of the Atlantic anyways, sadly no Nordy's over here :( I hear if you decide to get adventurous, the northern half of town can get a bit rough and was warned by co-workers to mind my bag should I go off the beaten path. Well...I didn't mean to be such a daredevil, but I took a wrong turn and got myself lost. Fortunately, I ran into Heuston Station, which I've been meaning to find for the out-of-Dublin day trips I want to take, and didn't run into any shady characters. Thankfully, no real story here :)
By this time, it was 4pm and I was starving, so I headed back south, grabbed a coffee, and went home to make dinner. Full and exhausted, I will go to bed early tonight and promise to dream a little dream of you all. Hope this finds you happy, healthy, and enjoying the onset of fall as much as I am. My 4 sisters spent the weekend together in Chicago carving pumpkins and my kickball team is now league Champions :) Glad to hear that life continues on just fine without me....
Sending a hug to you all!
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