Ahmee y Poppy hable ingles despacio. Mas personas en Europe hablen rapidemente. Es moy deficil para mis abuelos comprenden los europeos. Para mi, es facil. Es interesante para mi trater leo y hablo rapidemente. Creo yo leo rapidemente mucho ahora viajo Europe. Me gusto leo mucho ahora.
The next day we woke up, ate a continental breakfast, went on the walking tour, went on a self-guided tour of the castle, went to three cathedrals, went up into a super tall tower, and drove to Dublin. Obviously we spent most of the day in Kilkenny.
When we went on the tour guide we learned a very detailed history about the different sites of Kilkenny and a bit of Irish history as well. Kilkenny was founded on one side of the river; after the Normans invaded the other side of the river had a town. The two towns faced each other, each had their own laws and rules, but each spoke French. They started building their churches and their townhouses with the limestone that was nearby. They also constructed several walls. To get to the black abbey (monks who wore black frequented this church) men would have to pass through a gate. It was ordered that all men had to put up their swords before they entered. Now back in the day this was very insulting to the men, their swords were kind of like the cowboys pistols, and they just couldn't leave them there! Of course fighting often broke out at this gate and it started the Kilkenny Cats limerick. On the outer wall there were a few other gates that people had to pass through to get into the city. The city made a huge profit from these gates because if you wanted to get in you had to pay a fee, that fee would change based on how much cargo you were bringing in (1 pig=2 cents, 2 pigs= cents). After King Henry the 8th started the Protestant faith the Irish didn't change their faith from Catholic (even thought they were a part of Britain). However it wasn't until later that catholics got many of their religious and social rights taken away. When Queen Elizabeth the 1st ruled the Catholics weren't allowed in colleges. In Kilkenny one particularly happy and wellset Catholic family was given a choice. They could either keep their wealth and be protestant, or they could remain Catholic and be sent somewhere else. They responded by packing up and leaving to France where one of the daughters became Queen Marie Antoinette’s lady in waiting (she was beheaded of course). As Britain began gaining more and more land they gained Australia. They needed women to go there because there it was six men to every woman, so the easy fix was to send prisoners over. The prisoners who went into the Kilkenny jail eventually went to Dublin where they waited until enough people were in to send to Australia and then they were shipped away, sometimes for things as “unlawful” as fowl language when drunk.
A few things I must say about the tour. The guide was funny older man who knew tons about Kilkenny and Irish history. After the tour the city of Kilkenny wasn't difficult to navigate around at all. During the tour our tour guide showed us a carving of the first Catholic priest in Kilkenny. I was the first to notice the cat in between the man’s eyebrows, it was so subtle you could barely make it out. Of course the tour guide asked us if we thought the priest looked Irish. All of us said no and a few people ventured guesses as to where he was from, Poppy guessed Africa. I don't even remember where the priest came from, but I do remember that the tour guide started talking about how the Egyptians landed in Ireland. That they had sailed up past Spain and that they landed on the southern part of Ireland. He said that that's where the Irish got many of their instruments (the fiddle, the flute). He also said that the there was a study conducted where they took south Irish genes and compared them to the Egyptian genes, and there are major similarities. Insane isn't it!?!
Ireland has had a great variety of people.
The main thing I learned at the castle was that many British lords left to go back to England and that most of them sold all of the belongings they had at auctions. The lord who inhabited the Kilkenny Castle was one of these lords, and that after his auction he had a good deal of money.
The cathedrals we visited had beautiful stained glass windows. The first one we went to I don't remember much about other than the fact that its main window was knocked out multiple times and that the stone tower they had outside had incredibly steep steps. These steps would've made me nervous even if I hadn't had high heels on! Yes, I walked around Kilkenny, around the Kilkenny castle, and around three churches in heels. I won't be doing it again anytime soon (when I tried them on I had thicker socks on and they provided a lot more comfort which made me think the shoes were wonderfully comfy-nope). I snapped at Ahmee whenever she stopped ahead of me as I was halfway up one staircase. I said, “Ahmee could you please keep moving?!” She asked why and I said, “Because I don't like stopping halfway up a staircase!” I heard Poppy murmur, “You tell her Rachel.” Let's just say that heights make me nervous in many cases and that whenever I'm climbing it isn't too bad.
The other church had a really interesting figurine that they found hidden in the wall. It's a trinity symbol, meaning it had the father the son and the holy spirit included in it. They weren't sure where it came from, but they have conducted a search and so far they haven't found a single thing like it. The preacher who showed us around and gave us a bit of history of the church asked us what we'd already seen in Ireland. We told him the Dingle Peninsula and he cried, “OH! Dingle! It's like you've gone to heaven!” We agreed, it really was that wonderful there.
After all of this walking around we headed back to the car where I read AP US History and ate a leftover brownie that I'd gotten in Waterford. Once we got closer to Dublin I stopped doing homework to help them get to our hotel. This was quite an excursion since most of the roads in Dublin aren't labeled. Another thing that made it interesting was that we were coming in from the south side of the city and the directions our hotel gave us were coming from the airport which was at the north side. Before we got anywhere close to Dublin I suggested we take the bypass that goes up to the north and use the directions the hotel people gave us. As you might've guessed, this is exactly what we didn't do. We went in searching for ages for street signs, finally we pulled over and asked a lovely couple for directions. The man was very nice, but he didn't give very good directions. He went on and on about the things we'd see, not the things we needed to look for and which directions to turn and such. After about an hour of driving around (actually heading in the right direction) we found the right street and our hotel- The Charlymene. We were starving when we first got their so we quickly ran our stuffed bags down to our room and headed out for a good walk that wasn't too long. We ate at a very good restaurant where we were entertained by the pictures on the wall (had a lot of famous people hung up- we enjoyed picking out which ones we knew) and also little clips on the wall. Our favorite to read was: Bushisms. This article showed a ton of stupid things that Bush has said. It was funny and embarrassing. I'll have to see if I can't look it up and post it on this blog, then I could share this document with you all.
Once we got back to the hotel Ahmee and Poppy went downstairs and I went and typed on the internet, talking to Iain mostly on Yahoo and we planned for me to call him the next day (via-email). I've missed being able to talk to him the entire time we've been on this trip. I think it's apparent that I've adored the time we've been spending out here and that I'm doing the best I can to get the most out of it, but I do miss being able to talk to the people I'm able to talk to back home. Funnily enough (Iain lives in Scotland) even though I'm closer to him now I can't talk to him as much. I must say that talking to him for that short period of time helped because that night I had some really good dreams, Ahmee heard me giggle in my sleep more than once.
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