08/25/08 Dublin, Ireland

Yo estudio para mi clases. Tengo Historica de US (AP) y Espanol 3. Tengo otros clases, pero me gusto historica y espanol. Me gusta historica y espanol porque los clases es deficil aveces. Para mi, escribo espanol es moy deficil. Necesito pratica.
This was an extremely busy day for us. Basically, we went on a tour of Dublin via a double decker bus. This bus system was nice because if we wanted to check out one of the stops then we could get off the bus and explore, another bus came along every ten minutes. We got off the bus 3 times. We got off to see the Book of Kells at Trinity College, to see St. Patrick’s Cathedral, and to check out the Kilmainham Gaol (old jail of Dublin). We were lucky we didn't stop anywhere else because the tours ended sooner than we expected and we ended up having to walk back to the main street to catch a different bus to go up to the hotel. Back to the book of Kells though. This was a religious book, a bible that had been made by monks in Dublin. The extreme detail that went into this book was what was extraordinary. The first couple pages had soooo many different illustrations and it was so colorful! The many different materials they had for this book were amazing. I think it shows how well the trade worked in Dublin because I think that many of the materials had to be imported. After we got done reading the information that came with the book of Kells, how it was made, how long it took, what different styles were used in it, why certain illustrations were shown so often, etc.. Personally I thought it was interesting that the snake shedding its skin was symbolic for the resurrection of Christ. Later on in the day we ran into another symbolic meaning for the snake, this meaning is better known. Many people believe that the snake is a symbol of the devil (watch Passion of the Christ and you'll see what I mean).

After we saw the Book of Kells we went upstairs to the long gallery. This is a famous library at Trinity and it's often photographed. I thought that they rows and rows of books was absolutely wonderful. All of the books were old, so a slightly musty smell hung in the air throughout the library. Something that surprised me while we were in there was that people were not allowed to read the books, they were fenced off. I suppose this shouldn't have surprised me. There are so many people who come to Trinity College to look at the book of Kells, they don't want people waiting too long to see it. If a whole lot of people were stuck in the library for hours at a time looking at some of those magnificent books then that would hold up the line and people would get very testy inside and outside the library. While we were in the library I began to look back on how I'd read every sign in the exhibit (except for the first three). While looking back I realized that I had read those signs faster than I'd ever read anything else (and still understood it and got a good idea of what it was about). It's really exciting! I think there were a couple reasons for why my reading was like that: the first is that here people talk much faster-Ahmee has said that she feels like she has to gear up her brain to understand them (so far I have only had issues understanding one woman), and the second is that I think that with all the reading I've been doing for AP US History and otherwise I've had to learn how to read faster and better- I hope it sticks.

Once we got out of the library and the gift-shop we went around the lawn to another building to look for restrooms. I was in a huge hurry on my way in because I desperately had to go. I didn't pay much attention to the building or the people in it as I scurried towards the toilet sign. Once I came out though I looked around and saw that the building definitely needed some work. There was a lot of garbage on the floor, it was very dark and gray in there, and I believe that the paint had places that were scratched away. In short, it didn't look like Queen Elizabeth the 1st was the founder of the school, it was far too torn up to have been founded by her. Honestly, I'm used to sections of a college looking like that, being somewhat messed up. What's important in college is the quality of the teaching. You go to school to learn right? Granted college is where a lot of people break away from their parents and have a brilliant time doing things they didn't when they were back home with mom and dad, but college was made to help it's students become more educated so that they might do better in a given career. Whenever Ahmee started talking about how terrible that building was I said these things. I think that all colleges have at least one older, less taken care of building, and I think that I'd be more concerned about the education than the beauty of the buildings. However it was somewhat startling to see the college that Queen Elizabeth the 1st founded be like that. She founded the school to give Protestant Dubliners a better education, she said the purpose of the school was to educate and civilize the filth (pretty much that-exactly that harsh). Most Irishmen are Catholic though and the Catholics weren't allowed an education, so for a long time Trinity College wasn't open to educate and civilize most of the filth that resided in Dublin.

Right next to Trinity College was the bus stop, instead of getting on this immediately we went looking for an atm and a nice bar to have lunch in. We found both. The bar we ate at was very large, it had a sandwich section, a section reserved for warm meals, and the bar. The mushroom soup that I got was killer and Ahmee and Poppy's meals were pretty much the same. Something that really stuck out at this bar was the fact that there were a whole lot of Americans there. After checking out someone's nametag I realized that they were all together at a resort. Ahmee, Poppy, and I have had conversations before with the heads of the b&b's here about how many Americans nowadays went on buses or spent their entire time in Europe in a five star hotel or resort. Both of these things are not good to do! You don't get to really experience a place by looking at it for half an hour, buying a few trinkets, and then moving on! You most definitely don't get any idea what a country is like (and the people and customs involved as well) by staying cooped up in a hotel-no matter how sweet the hotel is. I think that the way we're going about it, while conservative, is much better than those two. I honestly think that the more time you spend in an area the more you get to really know it. I think that backpacking is a great way to go about traveling.

Anyway! Back to St. Patrick’s Cathedral! After we got done eating we headed back to the bus and got off at St. Patrick’s. At first the three of us slowly made our way around, checking out the tombstones, statues, and plaques that were in along the walls. After about fifteen minutes a man's voice came booming, "If anyone would like a guided tour of St. Patrick’s Cathedral we're about to start!" The man who showed us around St. Patrick’s cathedral gave us quite a lot of history of the place. For instance, St. Patrick’s Cathedral was built by the Normans near the site of the wooden church St. Patrick used. St. Patrick used a well that was close by to baptize the people and convert them to Christianity (Catholic). Mr. Guinness spent large amounts of his own fortune fixing St. Patrick’s Cathedral and that Mr. Guinness's daughter was a huge humanitarian who helped the poor the best she could. She had a stained glass window dedicated to her in St. Patrick’s cathedral; funnily enough one of the pictures has her helping a child drink from a very large chalice (Guinness providing the drink-har har). For a long time St. Patrick’s Cathedral was a part of the church of England. That was a time of grandeur for St. Patrick’s, which had several knights dedicated to it. Now it is not a part of the church of Ireland and that church is right up the road from St. Patrick’s. St. Patrick’s cathedral when it was Catholic had many different statues in it, more tombstones, and it had the ceiling painted blue with yellow stars. The church was built in a cross form and often different sections f the church were cut off. Behind the altar there's another church entirely that's called The Lady's Church (this along with the stained-glass window was dedicated to the younger Mrs. Guinness). The two "arms" of the church were cut off at one point in time as well by a wall. The left hand wing was a separate church, and the right hand wing was a church, a school, and a meeting place for politicians (these were different stages of course).

After the cathedral we got on to the bus and were delighted to discover that the bus driver had a fun sense of humor. For instance, as we pulled away from St. Patrick’s he said over the intercom, "And to your left is the cemetery. Everyone loves cemeteries! I know ya do! I'll bet that you all didn't know that the inventor of the crossword puzzle comes from Ireland and that he's buried over there! Yeah! He's buried over 5 and up 3." This man had a good time telling us about the Guinnesses and their personal life. He told us that Mr. Guinness married a very rich young woman, that that woman’s money was what built the factories, and that they had over 20 children together, and that together they started the phrase that every bottle of Guinness has a baby.

Not soon after we passed the Guinness factory we came to the Dublin Prison. This prison is not in use today but its got wonderful tours that tell a lot about Irish history. I think many jails probably do end up telling the history of the nation. In the tour we found out that Ireland did not get their independence from England until 1921-1922, but that there had been several attempts at it over the years. Only two stick in my brain though. The first was led by a silly fellow who was 25. The general idea was that his was poorly planned and I think he was silly because after he got away he came back to Dublin a month later and got captured. The second was a much more well known try. People got together and protested the English, stated they should be a country unto themselves, and they started pro-revolutionary propaganda. Fighting ensued between them and British troups. After two days though they surrendered, simply because so many civilians had died. The people who had volunteered for this were rounded up and sent to the jail. Most of the Irish people didn't like this. They spat on the people as they walked into the jail. Later, their view changed. It changed whenever all of the volunteers were executed. Mostly it was the heartbreaking stories that made the Irish people want to take action against the British and work to develop their own country. One story told of how the jailors allowed a prisoner to get married to his fiancé, a couple hours later he was taken out with the rest of the political prisoners, lined up, and shot. The man had just gotten married!

The end of the Irish revolutionary war was a treaty that Britain signed and several Irish representatives agreed on. In this treaty all of the counties of Ireland were free except for 6 and those 6 would remain with Britain. Ireland would have their own separate country. The treaty was accepted and this caused a civil war. Immediately following the revolutionary war, the Irish had a civil war were it was literally "brother against brother" in many cases. On one side people believed that the treaty was a generous offer and that they'd be better off taking it, on the other side people felt that they hadn't accomplished what the people in prison had died to achieve: a free Ireland - there were still 6 counties to the north that were under British rule. Obviously the first was the one that won, because to this day we have an Ireland and a Northern Ireland.

The jail was often very crowded. Dublin was the main center where all of the prisoners who were to be transported to Australia were kept till they had enough for the boats. Later whenever the great famine occurred many people were in the jail because they felt it was better to be in jail and get a little food than be out and have none at all. The jail also took it's crimes very seriously. People could be sent to jail for: stealing (shoes, coats, apples, etc.), for using fowl language while drunk, and for being homeless. There's a lot more. It did not take much to get you thrown in jail. There were a lot of kids in jail too. The youngest for a girl was 7, she stole a lady's cloak and got sentenced to five months. The youngest for a boy was 5, for stealing apples. Something else I should mention is that there was a parliament member in the jail at one time who conducted government business from his jail cell. There was also a Duchess who later became the first woman to be in the Parliament of Ireland.

After the jail, we rode around on the bus a bit longer. Unfortunately we didn't have the live commentary on this last stretch and we also had the unfortunate luck to have to sit behind "UGLY AMERICANS". Obviously this is not a term used for all Americans. These are the Americans who expect to be pampered, who expect all places to offer the best for them, who expect for everything to entertain them, who are loud and rude about a different culture, and who don't care how turned up their noses are (also are known for eating McDonalds while on vacation in a different country). I was very relieved when they left, because not only did I not have to listen to their complaining, but I also got to take their seat and get out of the rain (we were on the top of a double decker and we were caught in an area where there wasn't a roof).

We discovered shortly after those people left that the tour was over and that we were going to need to go find a different bus to take us back up to the hotel. This took us about 15 minutes.

Once we got back we grabbed some money and we were on our way. I wanted to get wireless internet and grab a phone card while we were out, but I decided I should wait until after we ate since we were all very hungry. After we ate I went into an internet cafe and asked the cashier if they had wireless internet. He told me no but that McDonalds had some. At first I thought he was pulling my leg, but it turned out he was telling the truth. I was able to hook up at McDonalds for the price of one coffee. After I got stuff done on the computer I went back to the cashier in the internet cafe and asked where I could find a phone card (so I could call Iain). He told me that there was a place just around the corner that should have it, again, he was right. I bought a card for 7 euros.

Of course, I naturally called Iain once we got back to the hotel. It was a little late for Iain because he had been busy working, but I don't think he cared too much. We both had a wonderful time talking that night, even if it was for only 30 minutes. We both had missed being able to talk to each other. During this conversation I had a thought denied, I had thought that after we started waiting to talk until after he was done working that I was no longer the main person he talked to. He told me I still was the person he talked to most. It made me very happy to talk to him; I've missed our crazy conversations. He asked if I'd had to fight off the Irishmen, how things were getting along between Ahmee, Poppy, and me, he asked how schoolwork was going, he and I talked about "THE UGLY AMERICAN", he told me about things there-how Scot was moving out to live with his girlfriend and that Iain was thinking of going back to school or get a second job so he wouldn't have to depend on Scot getting stuff done, and we were just goofy. I can't wait to see him in Scotland.