Friday, November 25th – A Day of Churches and Castles

Argh.  A slow day.  Pints and pens do not mix well.  I am working more and more from notes and a fading memory than pouring my thoughts down at the end of the day.  And reading the notes I took last night is not pretty.

I finally found the National Leprechaun Museum.  At first I thought it did not exist; that it was just a prank on the tourist.  But here it was.  Right were they said it would be.  It is a complete cheese fest and totally geared towards children.  It was so goofily happy that I felt like Will Ferrell in Elf.  You go through a maze, sit in a big chair, and use crayons to document your experience.

In between all of this, you get a pretty good and basic overview of Irish folklore.  The tour guide was like an Irish Danny Kaye on acid.  We learned that you don’t mess with fairies, you don’t tease the leprechauns, and you don’t leave your kids with the stepmom.  The most important thing I learned is that Lucky Charms are not sold in Ireland.  The Irish are not a big fan of pink hearts, yellow moons, orange stars, and green clovers.  They actually think the whole thing is kind of racist.

So, I crossed the Liffey and went over to the Dublin Castle.  It’s not really much of a castle and is more like a colonial government building with a few rock gates.  Much of Irish history seems to be begrudgingly attached to English history.  The highlights of the Castle tour include pictures on the ceiling of King George III’s coronation, the throne where Queen Victoria sat during her visit, and various bits of English furniture strung about.  At the end of Ireland’s battle for independence in 1921, the keys to the castle were handed over to Michael Collins.  To the irritation of the British viceroy, Collins was late to the ceremony.  He is reported to have replied to the viceroy’s annoyance, “We have waited 700 years.  You can wait seven minutes.”

The Castle sits on top of the ruins of the original Viking fort that stood here when Dublin was established.  It is still an active government building and just nine days ago the new Irish president was sworn in at the Castle.  Around the corner from that hall is the room where James Connelly, one of the leaders of the Easter Uprising, was brought to convalesce so he could ultimately be tied to a chair and shot.  Across the courtyard next to the Bedford Tower is the Figure of Justice.  Her back turned towards the city, this is just one more snub for Dubliners.  The trays in her scale of justice have holes drilled in them.  This is because when it rained the trays used to fill and end up unbalanced.

Behind the Castle is the Chester Beatty Library.  Chester Beatty was a New York mining mogul who collected old books.  He also loved Dublin.  In turn, they gave him their first honorary citizenship in 1957.  Hence, why his library is here.  Ireland has a lot of old books.

Down the road from the Library and next to the Castle is where Jonathan Swift was born.  Dublin knows him as the Dean of St. Patrick’s Church.  We know him as the author of Gulliver’s Travels.  The house and Jonathan are long gone.  The story has been reproduced many times including as a cartoon in part of the Banana Split’s Show and, more recently, in a Jack Black movie.

As I continued through the top of the Grafton Street area and the bottom the Temple Bar area, the next stop was Christ Church.  Christ Church sits inside the old city boundaries (whereas St. Patrick’s is outside the walls) and has been an active church area since 1030.  The area was first cultivated by the Vikings and then managed by Augustine monks.  The walls of the old monk house still stand just outside the church.

When Henry VIII split with Rome, most of Ireland’s churches were thrown into disarray.  Lands were seized by the state and others were shut down.  Christ Church survived but the original Augustine monks were kicked out and replaced with an Anglican clergy.  Most of Ireland’s churches fell in disrepair in the 1700 and 1800s.  With a pinch of irony, it took distiller Henry Roe to rebuild this church and try to restore it to glory.

I really went to this Church to see a dead mouse and a dead cat.  When the organ was being cleaned in the late 1800’s, these mummified remains were discovered and now they are on display for all to enjoy.  Right next to the Foxy Friar’s cafeteria.

The outside of Christ Church is what I expected St. Patrick’s to look like.  Alas, St. Patrick’s is an ordinary looking stone church.  St. Patrick’s in New York City has much more presence.  That said this church does sit on the spot where St. Patrick began conversions in the 5^th century.

As mentioned earlier, this is where Jonathan Swift was dean.  He and his wife are also buried here.  While Christ Church was the spot where senior representatives of the Crown were sworn in until 1869, St. Patrick’s was treated a little rougher when Henry VIII took over.  At one point, Cromwell used the nave as a stable for his horses.  Like Christ Church, it took alcohol to help save St. Patrick’s in the 1800s – the Guinness family bellied up.

I was planning to check out the Marsh Library, which is next door, but I ran out of steam (and maybe I saw enough old books for the day).  I headed back to the Temple Bar area and grabbed a very late lunch at the Queen of Tarts.  I went here off of a recommendation.  It was more like a tea room/pastry shop for mom and the bridge club but the food was good and the waitress had a funny little Irish laugh.

On the way back to the hotel, I cut through the shopping area on Henry Street.  This is basically a huge outdoor mall.  Between yesterday and today, the Christmas lights are up!  I know people in the States are complaining that it is early but I kind of liked it.

Alas, the day closed early for me as my Irish friends kept me out late the night before.  On a side note, it seems that whenever you book the “internet special” for a hotel it means that they put you in the handicapped/old people’s room.  The furniture is lower, the bathroom has a million hand rails, and the shower has a folding seat.  It is really kind of annoying as you are constantly banging your shins and ducking your head.  However, as tired as I was today, it seemed to be easier to slip into the shower and climb into the bed.

I am thinking that this will become even more “handi” with the Guinness and Jameson tours still on the agenda…

Thursday, November 24th – No Turkey for You!

A couple of things I will miss while I am Dublin – Thanksgiving and bar soap.  I knew I was going to miss Thanksgiving so I had no expectations for turkey.  However, I had forgotten about Europe’s fascination with “body wash”.  Essentially, squirt soap.  I guess this is ok when you are washing your hands in the public restroom but when I am taking a shower I want a bar of soap.  Maybe it’s just me…

After hitting the ATM to refresh my stack of Euros, I headed south to cross the Liffey.  Wow, what a different vibe on the other side in the Trinity College and Merrion Square area.  The streets are tighter; the people are bouncing around a little faster; it generally looks like business is happening.  Which it probably is.  Since it is a Thursday.

I passed by the Bank of Ireland which did not look so much like a bank but rather a temple with the money changers set up out front.  There were all sorts of weird stands propped up hawking indulgences and treats.  The Bank used to house Ireland’s Parliament but in an act of self-immolation (more specifically, the 1801 Act of Union) they voted themselves out of existence.  The building was sold and was to never be used again to house an Irish government.  I did not actually go inside, but supposedly the smaller House of Lords chamber survived renovations.

From browsing the Bank and peeking into Trinity College campus, I went down to the National Museum of Ireland – Archeology.  The National Museum of Ireland – Archeology traces Irish history from the dawn of man up through medieval times.  Apparently, all Irish history stops here as I cannot find any museum devoted to anything between medieval times and the age of Irish writing.  Also, apparently, I picked the day to hit the museum when every primary and middle school was here.  Ah the days of screaming school trips…

Leinster House IS where the Irish parliament meets.  Like visiting the US Congress, you can get a free, advanced ticket to sit in one of the galleries and watch one of the houses while they are in session.  Instead, I choose to watch the stream of protest processions gather outside the gates.  Much like the Occupy movements in the states, I couldn’t quite figure out what they were for or against.  But, to their credit, no hacky sack was happening.

I wanted to do the walking tour of Trinity College.  The Lonely Planet guide recommended it as good way to see the place.  However, as we are in winter season, walking tours are only available on weekends.  But I was here now.

Trinity College in Dublin was established in 1592 by Elizabeth I to stem “popery”.  I could not understand what she had against those floral-smelling wood chips but Trinity went on to produce Jonathan Swift, Oscar Wilde, and Samuel Beckett, among others.  Besides a fine education, the big attraction there is the Book of Kells.

The Book of Kells is one of the oldest books in the world.  Produced around 800 AD by monks on the remote island of Iona, it survived looting Vikings and the ravages of history.  The Book consists of the four main gospels of the New Testament (Matthew, Mark, Luke, and Gabe).  However, you only see two pages.  Bummer.  The viewing set up is like the crown jewels in London but without the people mover.  Since I did not have a wait to see it, I was not disappointed.

The Book of Kells “tour” dumps you upstairs into the Long Room.  This is what a Library should look like – two floors of books shelved to the ceiling.  You should recognize the Long Room from Star Wars Episode II:  Attack of the Clones.  Yeah, I don’t remember it either.  I think it’s the one with Jar Jar Binks.  Anyway, the Long Room is the background for the Jedi Archive.  Alas, there are no Jedis here.  Just a copy of the Proclamation of the Irish Republic, which was read out loud by Padraig Pearse to kick off the 1916 Easter Rising, along with two hundred thousand books all probably older than the United States.

Since I did not do the walking tour, I missed a lot of the items inside the campus buildings.  However, I could not miss the Campanile – the campus bell tower.  Unlike Texas, no one has scaled this tower to pick off fellow students.   But, superstition holds that if you walk under the tower while the bell tolls you will fail your exams.  Who needs a bell tower for that?

After reaching a higher education, I swung back to the National Gallery.  The building itself is supposed to be a work of art.  Except that it is missing its roof.  That was the bad news.  The good news is that they crammed three floors and multiple rooms of art onto one floor and a few rooms cutting out all that filler art.  The gallery has a whole boat load of W.B. Yeats and other Irish artists.  It also has Caravaggio’s The Taking of Christ.  While it is an interesting piece using various shadings of light, the only thing I noticed is that the Roman centurions were wearing medieval armor.  I guess this is called artistic license.

In my continuing effort to knock off every museum in one day, I walked around the corner to the National Museum of Ireland – Natural History.  But first, I ducked into Merrion Square.  It’s a nice little park.  Dublin has a number of green spaces including this, St. Stephen’s Green, and Phoenix Park.  I plan to visit Phoenix Park another day.

The National Museum of Ireland – Natural History smells like my grandmother’s attic did.  Everything that can be killed, stuffed, and mounted has been killed, stuffed, and mounted in here.  The only thing scarier than the rotting Basking Shark hanging from the ceiling is the excited German tourists bouncing enthusiastically from one display to the next saying, “Ya! Ya!”  Paging Dr. Mengele, anyone?

So, before anyone gets their undies in a bundle over this lovely hall of death, it really is interesting to have so many animals side-by-side.  despite the whole dead thing.  Birds, fish, lizards, lions, elephants, oh my.  The building includes two floors of taxidermy and bones including a human skeleton or two.  On my way coming back downstairs I passed an old codger going upstairs who could have easily been part of the exhibit.

I had forgotten about the travel drag you can get when you spend an entire day traveling.  I hit so many museums and sites in the first thirty six hours that my head hurt and my eyes were crossed.  The only cure for that would be a pint of Guinness.

I wanted to go to one of the traditional Irish pubs and I found O’Donoghue’s.  This pub is known for its traditional live Irish music.  The Dubliners started here.  Thin Lizzy played here.  Alas, there was not live music tonight.  Instead, we got Rihanna and her road crew.

On a rookie mistake note, I followed tradition and bought the guy next to me a pint.  He returned the favor.  His name was Ken.  We met Shelia who was with the Irish Times (this is how we found out Rihanna was there).  A few more friends showed up.  The rounds increased.  The stories got louder.  The rounds got faster.  The hours started to slip away like minutes.  We bounced out into the street and three pubs later we all collapsed into the Ha’Penny just before closing time.  Somehow, it only cost me 50 euro.  And rather than creating the international incident that I threatened to, all I appear to have done is spread more American good will.  The State Department should hire me.

I closed the night out at Subway.

Wednesday, November 23rd - North Of The Liffey

I checked into my hotel room at 8:30AM or so. I was waiting for a hearty Irish brogue but was greeted by a weak English accent at the desk. Never the less, I was in my room, showered, and out by 10AM.

I spent most of my first day North of the Liffey, since that is where my hotel is located. The River Liffey cuts the city in half. North of the Liffey covers the northside of the city and is considered more gritty compared to things south of the Liffey which are considered more posh. I guess I’m just slumming it with the working class heroes.

The City consist of nine general neighborhoods – North of the Liffey, Grafton Street, Merrion Square, Temple Bar, Kilmainham and the Liberties, the Docklands, Phoenix Park, beyond the Grand Canal, and Beyond the Royal Canal. My first day I stuck close to my new ‘hood.

My first stop was the Hugh Lane which is the Dublin City Gallery. Hugh Lane was a rich Irish man who spent many years trying to convince his nation to fund his art gallery. Annoyed, he re-wrote his will to donate his art to the National Gallery of London. He then proceeded to go down on the Lusitania. Although he had submitted an amended will to return his art to Ireland, that will was never witnessed. After a long, drawn out debate, the two galleries agreed to share his bequest.

Ultimately, this is a small collection in an old house. The big draw is the Francis Bacon Studio which was torn apart in London and rebuilt exactly as the dump it was in the gallery (Bacon was a bit of a slob). Why was Irishman Francis Bacon working in London?  It seems that Ireland has a bit of a history of chasing its tortured artist overseas. Anyway, the two galleries are still haggling over who should have what when. Currently, in addition to all the Francis Bacon stuff, the Hugh Lane has a nice Manet and a nice Pissarro.

As the weather was mercurial, I took a chance between the clouds to walk across the street to the Garden of Remembrance which was empty (maybe people forgot). There is a large bronze statue by Olsin Kelly entitled Children of Lir. It depicts an old Irish legend where the wicked stepmother turned her step-children into swans. They were cursed to travel to three islands for three hundred years each. Upon their return home, nine hundred years later, they returned to human form and immediate to dust (since they were nine hundred years old). Much of Irish folklore and legends are peppered with unhappy endings. Hence, probably, the association of this story to the Easter uprising of 1916 (which is what the garden is trying to remember).

I bounced right back across the street to the Dublin Writer’s Museum. This museum attempted to cover every Irish writer of note. The most interesting thing to me was a first edition of Bram Stoker’s Dracula. It appears that Mr. Stoker worked in the tax office.  Many people believe that he drew the spirit of his story from that job function. Other famous Irish writers include W.B. Yeats, Oscar Wilde, James Joyce, Samuel Becket, and George Bernard Shaw.

Staying in North of Liffey, I moved over to the James Joyce Cultural Museum. The museum, while nice, was every bit as obscure as Ulysses.  James Joyce's lasting legacy is that he is the greatest writer never read, according to most of the scholars quoted there.

After clearing my head, I ventured over to O’Connell Street, which is the city’s main drag. It is a wide boulevard with a generous median strip used to house taxi stands and various statues and monuments including the Spire which is also affectionately known as the stiletto in the ghetto or the erection at the intersection. Apparently, the city has mixed feelings about this relative recent addition. The London artist who inflicted the highest sculpture in the world upon this city is Ian Ritchie and, I hope, no relation.

Right by the Spire is the General Post Office (GPO). This would be an ordinary government building if not for the fact that the leaders of the 1916 Easter uprising made this their headquarters on those days in April. You can still see the bullet holes in the large columns out front. The uprising lasted about six days in which the English shelled much of the area. The Irish lost, the rebels were executed, and another chance for independence slipped away.

I wandered down along the Liffey to the Four Courts. This is Dublin’s massive legal building. Everyone was running around looking very officious. You would think those powdered wigs and robes would like archaically silly (I always envision John Cleese) but they had a few rather attractive women running around in them.

As the day started to escape, I visited St. Michan’s Church. Supposedly, the organ in the church was the first place Handel played the Messiah.  Hallelujah. The real draw is the mummified remains in the vaults below. Apparently, the combination of limestone, which draws away moisture, and methane, which comes from cows, makes a perfect preserver. Open caskets included remains of a nun and a knight. Before anyone gets all horrified, the church did not open the caskets. In the vaults, families stacked caskets up like books on shelves.  Over time, the weight of the caskets above crushed open the caskets below and the bodies fell out. This is how they discovered their preservative situation.

On my way back to the hotel, I tried to find the National Leprechaun Museum but I think, like the elusive pot of gold, it does not exists. I will try and find that tomorrow.

I am holding off on the Old Jamison Distillery, which is at the west end of the neighborhood. I intend to lump that together with the Guinness Storehouse tour for a lovely but blurry day.

I heard the Whispering Stairs was one of the places to eat so I ducked into there for dinner. My only meal of the day had been some sort of savory treat at the Hugh Lane served by some guy who was like Serge from 48 Hours. The fish I had was excellent. The beans and sausage was very European.

My lack of sleep caught up with me and I crashed around 7PM. Even though I flew under the United banner, I was on a Continental plane. Now I remember why I never flew Continental; they must have the smallest seats in the air. It is hard to catch some sleep while sitting on a postage stamp. So, all this waking and traveling made for an interesting night’s sleep - up at midnight; up at 3AM, when I received a page from someone in San Francisco asking if I was “here”; woke up at 8:30 to the knock of the maid because I forgot to put my door hanger up.

I covered a lot of ground today. We’ll see what tomorrow brings.

Prequel

Dublin? Why Dublin? I needed the miles.  Miles traveled, not that "awards" stuff. Last year I was able to reach Premier status on United Airlines. Some may not think that means a lot but free Economy Plus upgrades plus two bags free every trip means a lot. The extra leg room comes in handy and the extra cash saved from bag fees certainly comes to good use (like buying last second tickets to a place almost six thousand miles away).

Ok, I didn’t need all those miles to maintain those benefits.  I didn’t even need half of that.  I actually only needed about seven hundred miles which could be achieve just by going to San Diego and back.  I'd seen the Midway and the Gaslight District. And the snow report on the horizon was just not that good (so ski destinations were out).

So a conversation over beers turned to polo and alpacas and the Argentine spring. The weather would be good, the miles would be more than enough, and the polo lessons, well, those were just a bonus. However, Buenos Aires was a thirteen hour trip and I was having a hard time thinking of when those polo lessons would come in handy.  That is when I fell into pints and leprechauns and the Dublin fall. I could use some luck and drinking skills can always come in handy.

I have never been to Dublin. Heck, I've never been to Ireland. But 2011 had become something of a rut. Stops, starts, pull ups, and kick downs, I needed to do something to shake the taste of the year out of my mouth. To paraphrase Otter and Bluto, this situation absolutely required a really futile and stupid gesture be done on somebody's part and I was just the guy to do it.

So last Saturday, after watching USC put the hate onto Oregon, I stumbled home from the Brixton and locked into a ticket to Ireland. I had renewed my passport in October and I felt like stretching it. Unfortunately, the Euro was not cooperating but, torpedoes be damned, I was locked into a flight.

At 2AM.

After discussing my options with David the bartender at The Lounge.

While David may be a good mixologist, he is probably not the best person to discuss life decisions with.

Anyway, woke up to a godless Sunday and a plane ticket half a world away. My alarm went off Tuesday morning at 3AM and I was on a plane bound to Newark at 7AM. I left the Newark rain at 7:30PM and arrived in the Dublin dark at 7AM. A quick trip through customs and I was on a city bus and in early morning rush hour under the Irish sunrise.